Cameron for PM

Tories not in disarray over Grammars

2007-05-31T13:05:00.000-07:00

More in the press today about the grammar school split in the Tory party. This has erupted again with an article published by Dominic Grieve, the Shadow Attorney General, in his local paper saying that more grammars should built if in his constituency if they are needed.

The media has jumped on this and its timing shortly after the departure of the Europe Minister Graham Brady earlier in the week to paint a picture of the Tories falling apart over the issue of grammar schools.

This is not really the case. Grieve's comments on the issue which will have been made in response to the concerns of some of his constituents who would have asked for clarity on the issue over the past fortnight is to reiterate the Tory support of existing grammar schools but with no grand plans to vastly expand the number of those schools across the country.

Grieve is a thoughtful and supremely intelligent politician. I think he was right as a local MP not to rule out the building of some new grammars in the future when addressing his constituents should demographic change precipitate a school shortage. But he also underlined that this was not an immediate priority and not the party's aspiration.

In fact he welcomed the party's focus on the school system nationally and attempts to improve it which is the direction that both DC and David Willetts have tried to pull the party in the last fortnight as part of projecting a modern message.

I hope that that important message, focusing on the opportunities of the many and not just the few, continues to get through and doesn't get lost in the media's need for political factionalism and spin.

Talking about improving our failing school system is vital to improving our social fabric and quality of life and DC has begun to make an important contribution to that debate. I for one hope it continues.

Johnson still Favourite in Underwhelming Field

2007-05-30T13:13:00.000-07:00

I watched Labour's deputy leadership hustings on NewsNight and was rather underwhelmed by all six candidates.

Peter Hain was trying to be too cool for school, John Cruddas wants to return Labour to the 1980's, Harriet Harman couldn't answer a simple yes or no question with a yes or a no.

Of all the candidates I though Hilary Benn probably performed best on the night. Alan Johnson doesn't usually fair to well in such competitive situations with people vying for attention but did enough to suggest that he would be the best choice. He is a measured performer and gives an impression of honesty and openness in his thinking which is refreshing after the spin of the Blair years.

Whilst Harman was her usual dour and dreary self, it was left to the barely visible Hazel Blears to make possible the lamest argument of the night. When asked how she would tackle inequality the 4ft 9 chairwoman of the party said 'I and the majority of people just want to get on'.

Well said Hazel with that sort of reason and thought its a wonder you didn't run for the leadership.

Hopeless Hewitt should be kicked out

2007-05-24T13:22:00.000-07:00

So Patricia Hewitt survived her 'no confidence' vote in the House of Commons, yesterday, it was no surprise given Labour's majority in the Commons.

But I am still confused as to what frankly she is still doing in her job?

Hewitt's inept handling of the junior doctors application process, which triggered the no confidence vote, is just the latest in a long line of hopeless mishaps on her watch as health secretary.

These include the overrun of cost and time on the NHS's 'choose and book' computer, huge budget deficits across the country, massive job cuts of front line staff and the closure of local A&E and maternity ward.

Hewitt also had the nerve to tell a forum of health professions last year that the NHS had had its best year ever! (She was rightly ridiculed for the remarks)

The fact remains that if anyone else had presided over so many disasters in the private sector they would have been booted out long ago.

Brown would be well advised to dispense of this Blairite as soon as he enters no 10, the NHS staff and the hard-up British taxpayer deserve much better.

Is DC right to pick a fight on grammars?

2007-05-22T05:11:00.000-07:00

For Tony Blair his priority of education, education and yes you remembered it correctly education was one of his core appeals to the British electorate in 1997. The appeal to better education and greater opportunity was one of the main reasons for Labour’s landslide and the public was expecting major advances and impressive results.

This play has been adopted by the Cameron camp, who many believe are copying their moves from the Blair play book. Hence it is no surprise that at a time of attempted renewal within the Labour party Cameron chose education as his policy of choice to try to grab back the attention. Whether it is a smart move or not only time will tell.

With all the attention focusing on a smiling Gordon Brown crawling across the country kissing babies, smiling inanely DC knows that for the press to come calling at his door he has to come forward with something controversial or ‘beefy’.

This he did last week with the announcement by shadow education secretary David Willetts that the Conservatives will not build any more grammar schools, and more controversially that they will entrench advantage rather than widening it. It was the second part of this announcement which caught the right wingers of the party on the hop, leaving many fuming. Ex grammar school boy and Tory leader Michael Howard was said to be deeply unhappy at the announcement and others were baying for a showdown with Cameron at the weekly 1922 committee meeting of backbench MP’s.

DC is playing a bold hand here. He is right to say that education should focus on the opportunity of the many and not the few and that by having a debate on increasing grammar schools which account for such a small percentage of children in secondary education (there are only 164 in the country) that a great many children are excluded.

Cameron instead wants to use the academy framework (independently run schools in the state system) to move forward the Tory ideas of aspiration to a broader base (The Tories would push for greater streaming and selection in City academies). He has learnt that just by appealing to the core Tory vote he is not going to get elected to Westminster and that being attacked by the right on a policy initiative of this kind may well play straight into his hands as a modernising centrist.

The blowback could be deep fissures within the party and greater distrust of his leadership. As with Blair and the Labour party accusations that DC is not a real Tory but an impostor taking the party in a dangerous direction away from core beliefs could well increase and could lead to uncomfortable moments when he needs to rally his party to support legislation in the House in the coming weeks.

DC will also have to deal with a difficult position, namely that grammar schools are good schools which are massively oversubscribed, so why not support them? (this was something John Humphreys failed to ask him on the Today programme earlier today) And also what is to become of the one’s in existence. If you support academies so much why not abolish grammars altogether and turn them into model academies? In short DC may be accused of trying to have his cake and eat it all at the same time.

DC also has problems given his own privileged background in abolishing new grammars (Humphreys made a great deal of this earlier). With so many Old Etonians around him in the Shadow Cabinet the idea of restricting grammar schools which are very popular with aspirational middle class voters could turn them off and leave them at home in key marginals.

As for the academies themselves they have had encouraging results, in that the numbers getting better GCSE’s have improved and that the facilities are new and impressive. Although there are concerns that given the amount of money pumped in the benefits have so far not been fully maximised (particularly when the past results were so abysmal with many new academies replacing failing inner city schools with GCSE pass rates under 20%). They have also been controversial given their role in the cash for honours investigation.

In picking this fight DC is treading dangerous ground but he knows that buy positioning himself as the champion of the great and not the few he steadily changing the traditional Tory party image.

Surveillance Britain coming to a village near you

2007-05-21T13:46:00.001-07:00

If you thought that only city dwellers were those most likely to be caught on CCTV as they go about their daily lives then think again.

The sleepy village of Stockbridge in Hampshire has spent £10,000 on installing CCTV cameras throughout the village. The council argues that these are vital in protecting he public, but protecting the public from what. Crime in the village is virtually zero and when asked what sort of crime there was the local council chief couldn't recall any in particular apart from some vague incident of a smashed window.

This is a massive waste of local people's council tax and defies all logic. The local Hampshire police chief has rightly raised concerns about the UK sleepwalking into an Orwellian state (we have the most cameras in the world), with Stockbridge symbolising a worrying trend of surveillance branching out from built up areas into the countryside. The release today of a mobile CCTV police drone to much fanfare from police is further evidence of this state becomign a relaity as our liberties are eroded in the name of fighting crime and terrorism.

Further afield in higher crime areas, the idea that a few cameras will bring crime rates down is simply not true. Criminals quickly learn where the cameras do not operate either avoiding them by popping round the corner or quickly working out where they are not monitored and maintained properly (remember the 7/7 bombers in London and the lack of CCTV footage at the time because cameras did not have films in!) and proceed to carry on thieving and robbing regardless.

When my father's car was broken into in Nottingham, the landlady of the pub where it happened said that they had a camera watching the car park but that it had no film in it, in short it was just a deterrent...... how pathetic.

Britain currently has a sprawling mass of 4.2 million cameras, about 1 per 14 of the population, this is too many. I am not arguing that we should remove all cameras, but I do believe that there number should be limited to certain public spaces and that these ones should be properly maintained and monitored so that when needed (as in hunting the 21/7 bombers) they can be used as evidence in court and in manhunt investigations for awol suspects.

Cameras are only one solution to fighting crime and they are in themselves a very limited weapon, which is being abused doing little in the battle with gangs on the street whilst simultaneously eroding our hard won liberties.

With plans for microphones in cameras and talking cameras coming in the next few months, a stand must be taken against the rise of the omnipotent state.

People in Stockbridge can now testify how it feels to have Big Brother watching them over...... I wonder if they feel any safer?

Freedom of Information farce shows just how transparent Gordon really is

2007-05-20T11:23:00.000-07:00

Well so much for Gordon Brown pushing a new kind of politics. I think in total it lasted under a week.

This week MP's in the House of Commons decided that they should be exempt from freedom of information legislation and as a result be allowed to keep details of their expenses a secret.

Now whilst this measure was brought in by a former Conservative whip, David Maclean, it only passed in the Commons with Labour votes. What was more interesting was that that many Brown allies voted in favour of the restrictions. They included the current chief whip Jacqui Smith and most surprisingly Brown's right hand man Ed Balls. There is no way that Balls goes into the Commons and votes on any measure without consulting Gord, so we must assume that Gord supports this. And as one columnist rightly said this weekend, if Brown had wanted to defeat this bill he could have easily done so, so his inaction speaks volume.

Ultimately this is a travesty for hard working tax payers who will now not be able to find out how their elected officials will be spending their money.

So much for more transparent politics Gordon.

Can Labour really elect Blears?

2007-05-18T08:54:00.001-07:00

The Deputy Leadership Contest for the Labour party is certainly hotting up. Earlier this week all 6 candidates attended a hustings event in London hosted by the Fabian society.

By most accounts the hustings were pretty tame fare.

Surely to take over from a man of Prescott's stature, class, political poise and rhetoric the process for selection should be more exciting and run as follows:

Round 1 - A Royal Rumble (first two candidates over the top rope, eliminated, odds are on Peter 'perma tanned' Hain and Harriet 'im all woman' Harman falling by the wayside here.)

Round 2 - Rhyme the following words twenty times in under a minute without swearing: 'fuzzy duck' (2 more candidates eliminated, most likely Hilary Benn and Alan Johnson (both too slow)

Final Round - Being given a Government Department to run for a year. The objective is to waste money indefinitely on gimmicks and naff schemes and then blame it all on the Tory 'bastards' opposite (John Cruddas would be eliminated here. With no experience of running a government department incompetently under Blair it would not be a fair fight with Blears.)

That leaves the current Labour Party chairwoman Hazel Blears as the surviving candidate.

Could Blears win the real thing? Well amazingly yes, despite the fact that she is incredibly annoying, with one journalist this week describing her as the sort of woman who enters the office every morning with an innate smile and who spends the whole day constantly telling everyone to cheer up asserting that things aren't really as bad as they seem.

Blears won the hustings earlier in the week with 26% of the vote, could she win the whole thing? Now that would be funny!

Shock Horror: No challenge to Brown

2007-05-17T03:16:00.000-07:00

So Gordon Brown will not have a challenger for the leadership after all.

In my view it just reveals how cowardly and pathetic the current crop of Labour MP's are that none of them has the balls to stand up to the plate and take on the Chancellor, do none of them want to be PM? Do they really think Brown can beat Cameron?

So they might lose, big deal, if that had been Cameron's attitude when running against David Davis or George Bush when running against Al Gore they would never have even got out of bed.

John McDonnell was frankly a loose cannon of a candidate from the left of the party.
But despite the fact I hugely disagree with his platform, his candidacy did represent a growing number of disaffected Labour voters.

These voters want to address issues implemented by this Government which they thoroughly disagree with: top-up fees, the level of private involvement in public services, climate change, Iraq and Trident. All these issues have divided the Labour Party in recent times and we have witnessed huge rebellions from the backbenches on the Government side.

Blair standing aside provided Labour with an ideal opportunity to re-engage with this disaffected element of the party and it is good that Jon Cruddas is trying to do is in the deputy leadership contest.

However a Brown coronation which will merely bulldozer over such concerns may well lead to increasing levels of disaffection and ever dwindling participation in the party from Labour activists on the ground.

One of the results of Labour's trouncing in the local elections will be fewer people of influence on the ground in key marginals campaigning for a Brown victory at the next election.

Whilst McDonnell's entry would have led to a feeling of democratic engagement, Brown's coronation gives the feeling of dictatorship and could well damage the party and party unity in the long run.

The biggest failure really is for a Blairite to run. All have ruled themselves out in recent weeks paving the way for a serene transfer to Brown. Why?

Perhaps it is cowardly, maybe they couldn't get the 45 votes, but maybe it is also shrewd.

The two top contenders Miliband and Reid (soon to return to the backbenches) may well feel that a 3 term labour Government is on its way out anyway and that by staying quiet now they can pounce after a Brown defeat in the near future and return Labour to power after a brief Tory interregnum...

This is certainly a gamble. But what is certain is that the sight of Gordon Brown running for office with no-one to oppose him is going to make ludicrous and ridiculous viewing.

Blair draws the curtain on 10 years of New Labour

2007-05-10T13:11:00.000-07:00

So he finally did it. Today TB made his announcement and named the date when he will stand down as leader of the Labour party and as Prime Minister of this country. He will fulfil his promise of not serving a full third term (yes he kept one promise!) and leave Downing Street on the 27th of June.

Blair has most definitely achieved a mixed record at the top, for every peace settlement in Northern Ireland there is the disastrous occupation of Iraq, for every year of economic growth there have been year on year of increases in violent crimes, for every extra pound invested in the health service there are pensioners struggling to make ends meat after the Government's pensions raid in 1997, for every freedom accorded to the gay community, one has been taken away from another, such as the hunting community.

I am not going to use this post to lambast Blair's record in Government (My series Blair's failures covers areas where I think he has underachieved/failed and suggests how his successor could do better the next post is coming soon).

Blair's legacy has been written, it will despite his best wishes be about Iraq and the war on terror, his alliance with George W Bush and his pre-emptive foreign policy doctrine.

It is Iraq which people will talk about in twenty, thirty or even forty years when they discuss the reign of Anthony Blair at number 10, not foundation hospitals, trust schools or Asbos. No issue has so divided the public and none will have such far reaching consequences across time. Ultimately it will be through the success or failure of Iraqi democracy that history will pass judgement on Blair's reign at the top.

Iraq aside we will miss Blair. Love him, hate him or despair of him, he has dominated British politics for a decade and the Tories have never beaten him or even come close in all that time. It is they who will be happiest to see him go.

Blair came into politics in the era of celebrity and 24 hour news and television and no-one has come close to matching his brilliant ability to encapture the mood of a nation in its time of need, whether it be after Princess Diana's death, the July 7th attacks in London or in the Parliamentary debate before the Iraq war.

It is this Blair that the nation will miss , sure of himself and resolute when reacting to a crisis and addressing the nation: Blair the showman, the performer, the actor. He was at his best on such occasions a tower of a man, a man to be respected and listened to, a man of wisdom, an ambassador for our island. The next man in the chair, whether it be Brown or Cameron has a huge void to fill. They are all to aware of this.

However as with every performer sooner or later the curtain had to come down.

The tragedy for Blair has been that he stayed on stage too long, leaving his audience impatient for the next act, his fans disillusioned at his conduct and his fellow actors impatient to move on.

That process can now begin... and that can wait for now...

BNP loosing ground to the Tories

2007-05-08T11:40:00.000-07:00

Whilst last week was a great week to be a Tory, life was not so good for the other main political parties. Labour recorded a miserly 27% of the national vote whilst the Lib Dems did even worse with just 26% losing over 200 councils on the process.

The picture of failure was repeated elsewhere by the minority parties in England (Plaid Cymru and the SNP did exceptionally well in Wales and Scotland respectively). The Greens failed to make a significant impression despite wooing the like of activist Peter Thatchell to help front their campaign whilst Respect, remember them led by milk guzzling Galloway, likewise performed poorly.

However the biggest losers of the night were the BNP. The racist party talked up their chances before the election of preying on people's fears and prejudices to claim 100 council seats. They never even got close despite fielding a record 750 candidates across the country. Even in hotspots of campaign activity such as Shadwell in the West Midlands, where they ploughed money and campaigners in by the truckload the BNP failed to get ahead of one of the most unpopular Government's since the war.

What was even more enlightening was the fact that in areas where the BNP has had councillors, some were voted out of office. In Burnley the party now has just four councillors whereas before Thursday it had 7. The party also lost its council member in Broxbourne.

This I believe is down to two things.

Firstly these losses were victories for the Conservatives who are now resurgent under Cameron's leadership and are beginning to reclaim disaffected Labour voters. The Tories still have work to do in Northern cities, but these have never been easy places to be Conservative and even under Thatcher the party had only about 50 northern MP's. What is encouraging is that progress is being made.

Secondly the BNP has shot itself in the foot. It has no real interest in local politics and this can be seen by the woeful attendance level of BNP councillors at council meetings and their abject performance when being given power on local council boards. They are only interested in preaching hate and not tackling the full range of issues which make a council tick. Further they struggle to work with the other parties as a result of their extreme views.

Whilst the BNP's failings are most pleasing, the fact that the BNP even has 1 councillor in the UK is in my opinion to many. I would thus urge all those reading this to sign up to the anti-BNP group at the following link:

http://www.uaf.org.uk/

It is time to unite against fascists and prevent them from gaining any more seats in the future.

Reid snubs Brown

2007-05-07T12:01:00.000-07:00

Gordon Brown's premiership may well be unravelling before it has even begun.

Whilst Labour party loyalists are playing down John Reid's move to the backbenches and spinning its as an opportunity to inject the cabinet with younger fresher faces, his move represents a serious blow to the Brown camp.

Whether you like Reid or not (personally I have little time for the macho-Scotsman) he was appealing to those voters who are sick of crime and disorder on their streets. His tough talk, preaching a tougher line on terrorists, yobs and other criminals had certainly endeared him to the right wing press and he had won favour with the all important Sun newspaper.

Reid's departure will also give Brown the headache of who should take over at the Home Office. I have lost count of the number of Home Secretaries under this Government, but another change will allow Shadow Home Sec David Davis to crow loudly about another scalp that he can add to his resume.

Whoever takes over, my money is on Jack Straw or Alistair Darling will have an uphill task with the department soon to be divided and morale at a very low ebb.

Finally, I'm sure Brown would have wanted Reid in the cabinet as it would have at least allowed the Chancellor to control a potential rival. From the back of the house Reid will have a free reign with other anti-Brownites to stir up trouble for the next PM.

Before he has even got the top job Gordon Brown is finding it just how hard it is to be Prime Minister.

Cam flying high after local elections

2007-05-05T09:25:00.000-07:00

So after a bit of a lull Cameron for PM is back with avengance and in buoyant mood after Thursday's local elections.

'The Cameron effect' was in full evidence as the Tories romped to a stunning victory with 40% of the vote, well on course to form a Tory Government at the next General election.

DC was understandably delighted with the results which show that the party is making real progress in persuading wavering centrist voters to come back into the fold and vote Conservative once more.

The results were not as disastrous for Labour as some analysts had predicted. Some pollsters had tipped the party to come in a lousy third with just 24% of the vote, but there finally showing of 27% was whilst bad, explainable for an unpopular third-term administration.

The big question for Labour is now whether they can generate the necessary renewal under a new leader to lead them to victory at the next election.

With Brown now a certainty to take over I feel this is most unlikely. How a man who has played one of the most active roles of any Chancellor in history can lead a renewal of Government baffles me. Further his coronation without a contest from a genuine challenger (Left wing loons McDonnell and Meacher don't count) is unlikely to change his image as a power hungry, arrogant control-freak.

Whilst the results were bad for Labour, they were expected. The night was worse for the Lib Dems. The country's third party made minor inroads in Labour areas (Hull) and Tory strongholds (Eastbourne) but these were overshadowed by a series of crushing losses, including in the ward of Loose in Maidstone where my friend Ben Sherreard ousted a Liberal councillor.

Quite what the Liberals offer these days nobody knows. Ming Campbell's leadership is as uninspiring as a dinner date with Jacques Chirac, whilst their front bench politicians are obsessed with sex either shagging rent boys or pulling ugly celebrities and then bragging about it to other MP's in the House (enter asteriod watcher Lembit Opik).

On policy they have not moved their support base on from the gains they accrued at the 2005 election gained from their opposition to Iraq. Old policies, such as upping the higher rate of income tax from 40-50% for earners of over 100,000 have been shelved and in its place nothing new has been offered.

If the Liberals want to hold the balance of power in a possible hung Parliament and not be barged aside by a resurgent Tory party under DC's leadership they should dispense with Campbell asap. The doddering fool should be replaced with someone who is a credible alternative. Chris Huhne did well in the leadership contest last year and is one to watch but I think the Liberals should look to Nick Clegg, their Home Affairs spokesman. He is a man of reason and sense which is more than can be said for the rest of them!

Finally a big Congrats to all those Tory Councillors elected on Thursday, lets hope these results are built upon at the next General Election.

Current lull on blog activity

2007-05-03T12:45:00.000-07:00

Dear all,

Apologies for the lack of activity on the blog over the past week and a half, this has been the result of my going on holiday and on my return being snowed under with work!

I am hoping to get back in the swing of blogging soon, so watch this space for more PMQ reaction, Blair failures and other topical posts.

Thanks

Slig

Blair Failures No 2 : Inept Ministers Part I

2007-04-22T09:42:00.000-07:00

After 10 years of Government it is no surprise that we have had some useless ministers. But what is amazing is just quite how many their have been and how useless and sleaze ridden many of them have been. This after we were told New Labour was to be ‘whiter-than-white’.

Inept and sleaze-ridden ministers form Blair’s second major failing in my study ‘Blair’s Failures’.

I have constructed a top 10 of the most inept/scandal ridden New Labour ministers under TB’s premiership and will present these in two separate articles due to the lengths of each piece.

The following represent the 6th, 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th most inept ministers under Blair with the top 5 to follow shortly:

10: Stephen Byers – Byers a Blairite finds himself in the top 10 thanks to his infamous handling of the Railtrack affair. Transport is never an easy brief but when it was handed to Byers in 2001 he made more of a pigs ear of it than could have been expected.

His decision over one weekend to put Railtrack into administration leading to the effective re-nationalisation of the rail network put many private investors out of pocket. The Government eventually had to offer compensation to investors in a bid to placate the wrath of the city

At the same time it was revealed his diary secretary Jo Moore had suggested that the 9/11 attacks were a good day to ‘bury bad news’.

Byers stumbled on, but eventually resigned in 2002 after fresh controversy erupted over his decision when Trade Secretary to allow pornographic publisher Richard Desmond to buy the Daily express newspaper. A tawdry end to an inept spell in Government.

His reputation was hit further years later when on leaving Government MG Rover collapsed. It was revealed that when he was Trade Secretary Byers advocated MG Rover be taken over by a group known as the Phoenix Consortium. This kept the company going for five years but ultimately the company folded with huge profits to the executives of the consortium.

9. Ruth Kelly – Kelly’s career as a minister began as Economic Secretary to the Treasury. Here she refused to compensate or provide any form of assistance to those who lost thousands of pounds through the collapse of Equitable Life, many of whom still seek financial redress today.

As Education Secretary in 2006 Kelly was found wanting when it was exposed that her department had let a known sex offender to work in a school in Norwich. Kelly trundled on but her time at the DFES was up when it was confirmed that another teacher who had indecently assaulted a 15 year old in the 1950’s was working at a school in Portsmouth.

Kelly was moved after the 2006 elections to the Department of Local Communities and Government. Here part of her role was as minister for equality, which was quickly exposed as a sham. It was revealed that since 1997 Kelly had never voted for any of the measures designed to increase gay rights and she was roundly criticised for not doing so.

Kelly, a strict Catholic from the Opus Dei school of Catholicism has never come out and explicitly rejected homosexuality as a sin. Kelly has also reportedly been trying to get religious groups out of the new adoption rules concerning homosexual couples, although her lobbying for such a dispensation has failed.

Kelly remains in her local Government role for now, but come an election it is widely hoped that she will no longer be a minister. She has the smallest majority of all cabinet ministers just over 2,000, so fingers crossed she will be out sooner rather than later.

8. Charles Clarke – Poor old Big Ears. He is so desperate to find a successor to Tony Blair that is not Gordon Brown because he himself has been exposed as another inept New Labour minister.

Clarke took over as Education Secretary from a minister who just misses out on the top 10, Estelle ‘I’m not up to the job’ Morris in 2002. Clarke oversaw the passing of top-up fees in 2003, which allowed Universities to increase the amount of money they charge per student. Whether the policy itself was right or wrong is beside the point, this policy introduction was in direct contradiction to a manifesto commitment not to introduce such fees.

He was moved to the Home Office in 2005, where he championed stronger powers to detain terrorist suspects. The 90-day detention proposals Clarke proposed threatened to undermine the legal strata which has been a key tenant of our society since the Magna Carta. They were rightly defeated mainly thanks to the inept whipping of Labour ministers and MP’s instead voted for a 28-day period of detention instead.

This humiliation was followed by the foreign prisoner scandal which rightly cost Clarke his job. In April last year it was revealed that over 1,000 foreign prisoners had been freed without being considered for deportation. Clarke denied knowledge of this and then proceeded to blame the whole thing on the ‘system’. His refusal to take personal responsibility for the debacle ultimately brought about his downfall when it was revealed that 288 prisoners had been released in the time since the Government had been told by an independent watchdog about the problem.

When some tabloid newspapers revealed that some of those released had committed serious offences Clarke offered to resign but Blair refused his resignation. However in a farcical U-turn Clarke was axed just weeks later after Labour’s pathetic showing at the local elections.

With his own career in tatters he continues his pursuit for a rival candidate to Brown for the leadership. If he doesn’t find one don’t be surprised if he throws his hat in the ring, which would be quite amusing.

7. Tessa Jowell – Jowell enters the top 10 thanks to recent embarrassments and sleaze. Her position in this list would have seemed unthinkable 18 months ago when London was announced as the host city for the 2012 Olympics but since this triumph Jowell’s stock has fallen dramatically.

Firstly there was ‘Jowellgate’. This concerned her second husband David Mills and his links to former Italian PM Silvio Berlusconi. Mr Mills is being investigated in Italy for tax fraud and it is alleged that some of the monies procured from such means were used to purchase a mortgage on the Jowell’s London home. Jowell was investigated over the affair by the Cabinet Secretary Sir Gus O’Donnell, which has left a cloud over her position as the head of the Department for Culture Media and Sport ever since.

Secondly the funding of the Olympics has led to serious question marks over her handling and management of her department. The budget for the games has spiralled well beyond the initial budgetary figure so much so that the extra funds are to be procured from the National Lottery. Worse still is the fact that Jowell has the front to appear on national television and deny that other good causes that need the Lottery for funding will not be affected. This is both nonsense and disingenuous.

Finally there is Jowell’s handling of the supercasino bill. Jowell’s lust for these Mecca gambling halls is incomprehensible given the negative social ills many in social services see every day from those experiencing gambling addictions. Her bungled attempt to get the legislation through Parliament back fired when the Lords rightly kicked out the Bill by three votes. With no plan-B in place Jowell was left firmly with egg on her face.

6. Keith Vaz – How could we forget Keith Vaz.

After all it was Vaz who was part of New Labour’s original cash for peerages scandal in 2000.

Vaz is nothing more than a populist crook, who revels in the limelight.

In 1990 before the publication of Salman Rushdie’s Satanic Verses Vaz urged the writer not to publish it through fear of causing offence and he argued that there was no such thing as absolute freedom of speech.

Having entered Parliament Vaz leapt to prominence in his role as Minister for Europe under New Labour. His career however was curtailed by allegations of financial wrongdoing. He was investigated by the Filkin commission over allegations of corruption involving taking money from constituents trying to buy political influence. Vaz was censured following the investigation after it emerged he had taken money from a constituent and later put them forward for an honour (ring any bells!!) Vaz was also admonished by the commission for apparently interfering with the investigation and not co-operating fully with its enquiries.

Following the initial investigation the Filkin commission announced a new inquiry which would focus on whether or not a company connected to Vaz received a donation from a charitable foundation run by the Hinduja brothers. The results of the inquiry were published in 2002 and it was concluded that Vaz had "committed serious breaches of the Code of Conduct and a contempt of the House" and it was recommended that he be suspended from the House of Commons for one month.

Vaz was also a director of the company General Mediterranean Holdings. Vaz resigned his post as director when he became Minister for Europe, but it was later discovered that he had remained in contact with the company's owner and had made enquiries on his behalf over a French extradition warrant.

Away from the front bench Vaz has been engaging himself with a range of other populist issues. He attacked Jade Goody following Celebrity Big Brother and met Shilpa Shetty at Parliament before she visited Tony Blair for tea and cakes. He has also condemned violent computer games, particularly a game called Bully, raising this issue at Prime Ministers Questions, I’m sure his constituents are glad to know he is spending his time wisely.

Thanks to his unabashed populism and sleaze he is unlikely to return to the front bench any time soon. The Parliamentary watchdog is busy enough.

Who should be in the top 5? Check back soon when I’ll publish the top 5 most inept ministers who constitute another of Blair’s major failings.

Cameron attacks Blair on Pensions to win PMQ's

2007-04-18T11:47:00.000-07:00

I think that I'm getting the hang of this prediction lark! I correctly predicted that DC would go after Blair and Brown on Pensions. DC did not tackle the issue of the Iranian hostages. But 1 out of 2 isn't bad (particularly as the second one was about the succession, which I semi-tipped and which once again was very dull and uninteresting!)

DC kicked off with a brilliant attack on left-wing hack Dennis Skinner after the latter launched a verbal attack on him when he tried to speak to Blair about those who have lost their pensions. DC showed that he is getting the knack of these sessions with the brilliant line: 'I wish those who are going to retire on fat pensions would take a moment to listen about the plight of those set to retire on nothing. A brilliant put down.

DC was at his best in these early exchanges criticising the Government over its handling of the pensions system, expressing sympathy for those affected and trying to work out a cross party method for resolving the problem. DC also quoted campaigner Ros Altmann, who I have personally met, praising her campaign and demonstrating the wider desire outside Westminster to help these people. Ms Altmann used to be a Labour MP, but has turned against the Government after its negligence on the lost pensions issue.

Blair said he was prepared to listen to 'other' voices on this issue, but defended the Government's current relief system (despite the fact it has only helped 1,000 of the 125,000 people who have lost their pensions since 1997) and argued it was the first of its kind (despite the fact that after the Maxwell scandal in the early 90's a similar system was set up, which worked a lot better, based on treasury loans).

DC one this bout and I feel that the issue of pensions will run and run until the next election, mainly as it is an issue directly overseen by Blair's assumed successor. Look out for the Blair pensions failure on my blog shortly.

The less said about the second half the better. I'm really bored of DC's drumbeat will he endorse Brown or not PMQ angle, it is tired and has run its course. DC can do better than this and should be addressing the failures of Blairism rather than the personalities of potential successors.

Still despite this, I think DC's exemplary performance on pensions led him to victory in this one. He now leads 2-1, role on next week and please no more talk of the succession!!

PMQ's predictions

2007-04-17T12:56:00.000-07:00

With Parliament back in session this week, Prime Minister's Questions returns this wednesday when DC and Tony Blair clash at the despatch box.

This will more than likely be one of Blair's final PMQ's and DC should expect to find a PM more than up for an argumentative tussle.

My feeling is that DC's 2 most likely angles this week are:

1) Sailors - We got an apology and an inquiry from the Defence Secretary on Monday for the Iran hostage debacle, but is it enough? I expect DC to come out and reaffirm the positon of Shadow Defence Secretary Liam Fox that Browne has to go for his incompetent handling of the affair.

2) Chancellor - There will be an attack on the Chancellor although what form this will take is hard to say. It could focus on the above 3% level of inflation announced today by the Bank of England. It could be the pensions crisis precipitated by the Chancellor's pensions tax raid, for which the Tories have called for a full inquiry. Or it could be Brown's general dour personality and how he is not suited to the Premiership (I hope its not the latter as I'm bored of that its been done). I hope Cameron goes after the inflation issue, its at its highest level since 1994 and many are starting to feel the pinch in their pockets, with higher bills etc. Blair will beat the usual record on economic competence but I think this is territory on which DC will get sympathy from the viewers who are effected by it on a daily basis.

What do you think Cameron will go on?

Tune in tomorrow and find out whether I was right, or more than likely hopelessly wrong in my predictions and read my verdict on this first post-Easter PMQ's.

Blair's biggest failure 1: Law and Order

2007-04-17T06:00:00.000-07:00

One of Blair’s pledges when he entered no 10 ten years ago was ‘to be tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime’. With the Home Office lurching from scandal to scandal in the last few years of his premiership, TB has in my view failed to properly address the law and order problems facing the United Kingdom today and research shows that I am not alone.

In the Observer’s supplement ‘The Blair Years’ published a week ago a poll of over 2,000 adults found that over two-thirds felt that Britain was a lass secure place to live than ten years ago, whilst nearly three quarters said that the PM was too lenient on criminals.

This research is interesting and in part contradictory. It is not surprising that people simultaneously feel less secure whilst worrying that the government is not punishing criminals severely enough. But what is interesting is that such a feeling appears to go against the statistics on prison numbers.

The UK has the largest prison population (80,000) in Western Europe and per 1,000 population locks up more people than any country in the developed world bar America. Despite the fact that record numbers of criminals are being locked up (a fact that should make the general public feel safer), the public both feels less secure on the streets and that criminals are getting off to lightly when they cross the law and order boundary.

Such a finding highlights the lack of trust the public has in New Labour’s crime figures. Blair is always at pains to indicate that overall crime is falling, but whilst this is true for some crimes, such as burglaries and car thefts which I will come to later, the feeling of insecurity in the general public can be linked to a jump in violent crime since 1997.

Violent crime involving muggings, robberies, gun crime and assaults has shot-up 80% since New Labour came to power. The threat of becoming a victim of such a crime is what drives the perceptions at the start of the article in which people feel less safe than they did in 1997. The Government alone are not to blame for this rise, but they do bear a great deal of the responsibility.

Whilst the Government has had some success with specific operations such as Operation Trident in London, targeting the black community, it has been very slow to react to the spiralling gang culture across many of the UK’s main cities. Every other day it now seems we here of a new teenage victim of one type of violent assault whether it be a stabbing in Clapham, a shooting at a Streatham ice rink or a mugging on Oxford Street.

The issue of gang crime is multifaceted and incredibly complex but from a law and order perspective, which is where I am writing this article from, it needs urgent attention. This can only come about through better types of policing. It is all well and good Blair pointing to a rise in Community Support Officers, but these are not fully fledged police officers and do not have the same levels of protection or powers as ordinary officers, as happened when one was gunned down in Nottingham, not from where I lived a year ago. What is needed on the estates where these gangs operated is a stronger and more visible police presence to reassure law-abiding citizens and to try to stop the gang’s from ruining people’s lives. News this week that front line police numbers are to be cut in the coming year for budget reasons do not inspire confidence. Particularly when we find police wasting their time (a familiar gripe I know but one which is well founded under the bureaucracy and regulation imposed by this Government) trying to catch speeding motorists on motorways or filling in 6 pages of forms to report someone for a minor offence. Police should be policing not filling in pointless forms.

As I have said earlier, the Government alone cannot be responsible for the jump in gun crime as it is linked to more deep-rooted elements within our wider society which also need to be addressed.

However if the Government may not be wholly to blame on violent crime they certainly cannot take all the credit for drops in burglary and car crime since 1997.

Whilst recorded crime in these areas has dropped, the importance of Government action to bring this about has been minimal. This government has let burglars (a premeditated crime) and car thieves off very lightly indeed, giving them reduced sentences or community service orders, in part as a means to reduce the chronic over crowding in UK jails. In taking away this deterrent the Government have not done anything productive to help reduce burglary. What has helped reduce burglary is the actions of individual citizens and private companies. Better burglar alarms and security systems, neighbourhood watch schemes and safety boxes in homes have all made burglary a far less attractive option for thieves.

Car security has followed a similar pattern, the more modern models of cars are protected by sophisticated anti-theft devices and are not able to be hot wired and joy ridden off round the streets as in the past. Car stereo systems can be removed easily by the owner on leaving the vehicle making the car less of a target for thieves.

Why risk running the gauntlet of these sophisticated systems, when you can just walk down the street and mug a £180 i-Pod off a teenager?

It is this that helps explain the trend in crime outlined above. Crime has NOT reduced, rather it has become differently spread across the various crime-types. Thus whilst burglary and car crime have gone down due to better security systems, muggings have shot up as thieves target the mobile phones and i-Pods of those on the UK’s streets rather than the defended homes of the middle and upper classes.

Other practical factors also undermine Blair’s case to have reduced burglary, for example ten years ago TV’s were about the size of my rather small computer monitor, today they can be as big as your wall. How do you fit such a tele in a SWAG bag, get it out through the window and cart it off down the street? The answer is you don’t and many burglars understand this and have given up their trade as a result. It’s a similar issue in many parts of the NHS where improvements in science and technology independent of Government action since 1997 have helped lower hospital deaths from some diseases……MRSA aside of course.

As I mentioned earlier the prison population has now reached record levels. This has resulted in a prison’s crisis which Government planners have failed to spot and properly prepare for. We now face the imminent prospect of jailed victims being held in temporary holding facilities in locations as diverse as local police stations to prison ships.

This negligence is hugely embarrassing and comes despite regular warnings over the last few years that the prison population was set to reach full capacity from opposition parliamentarians, pressure groups and those from within side the system itself.

The overcrowding problem led to John Reid last year issuing a polite reminder to judges to not hand out sentences involving prison unless they were absolutely necessary. The determination of whether a criminal should go to prison should depend on the nature of the crime, not on whether he can fit into one of our prisons.

Government arguments that they have built ‘record’ numbers of prison places do not wash and the Tories have rightly pledged to scrap the ludicrous ID card scheme and use some of the £20bn saved to build more prisons.

Over crowded jails themselves are hazardous and cannot perform the functions of rehabilitation and reform which are needed if we are not to have a cycle of crime whenever prisoners are let out of jail. Currently over two-thirds of prisoners re-offend in their first two years out of jail.

The ways to solve this are simple. Firstly, we need to build more prisons.

We need to re-examine who we are sending to prison. The mentally ill should be treated at separate designated facilities with proper care and attention and not just lumped in with hardened criminals. We also need to regulate and properly resource a community service scheme that works. Right wing campaigns poo-poo community service as a soft-option. Recent pictures in the Sun newspaper did nothing to assuage such doubts with petty criminals lying around in the sun, smoking and chatting instead of doing the gardening in the local park they were supposed to be doing as part of their sentence.

The fact is that community service can work and does very well in America, one only has to look at the likes of Naomi Campbell and Boy George cleaning the streets to see this in action. If community service works and is given the proper backing everyone benefits in the long run, the prisoner learns the value of a hard days work, the community reaps the reward of his endeavour and it is a far cheaper way for addressing those who commit minor offences than locking them up in jail. Further the offender will not get in touch with other criminals through being placed in the prison system, which often results in criminals being ‘hardened’ on the inside.

Prisoner to work schemes must also be improved. 60% of employers immediately rule out employing anyone with a previous conviction. Such high rates mean that the job prospects for offenders are very low and result in many turning to crime as a way to get by.

These practical steps will all start to address the prison problem, easing overcrowding and rehabilitating offenders all things that will benefit society at large in the long run.

The Blair Government’s approach to drugs has been haphazard at the best of times. 70% of all crime is drug related and it follows fairly logically that stopping the drug problem should bring crime down.

The problem with Blair’s drug policy is that it has not looked at the facts. In a recent list of drugs and their level of harm to the individual published by scientists alcohol and tobacco came above cannabis and ecstasy.

Talk of legalising weed or pills evokes uproar in the suburbs of Middle England, but no-one would even consider introducing prohibition despite the multiple hospital beds being taken up with those suffering from liver problems.

Despite the scientists findings it is ecstasy not alcohol that is a class-A drug with possession punishable by a lengthy prison sentence. Further the police are still wasting valuable time pursuing OAP’s who are using cannabis for medicinal purposes (one was jailed recently).

This cannot be right. What is needed is a full review of the drug classification process, not one off re-classifications of individual drugs as happened with Cannabis under then Home-Secretary David Blunkett when he downgraded it from a B to a C.

Those who argue that moving drugs down the list is dangerous and sends a signal of respectability to potential users mis-understand the problem. Drugs should be classified according to their harm done and the impact on those around them, not on outdated myths.

A re-classification would have further benefits as it would allow the police to tackle those hard drugs at the top end which result in most of drug-related crime such as heroin and crack. I am not for one moment advocating an Amsterdam style system, of course not, that creates its own problems and more is needed to see the long term effects of taking cannabis and ecstasy regularly.

But in the drugs war which we are losing it is the hard drugs which should be the focus of the police’s attention, not University students having a joint in their dorm, a 25 year old raver having a pill on a Saturday night or an OAP trying to cure herself of arthritic pain.

We also need to look at better ways to treat junkies so that they can come off drugs and be rehabilitated. In Germany they offer heroin walk-in clinics with give users a shot of heroin. Not endorsing the use of heroin, this stops heroin users committing crime to fund their habit and allows them to be monitored by those treating them. Advice is offered and treatment and help are available. DC toured one of these facilities last year and was impressed by what he saw.

I believe that if we are smarter with where we target our resources on drugs then we can tackle the hardened users and start to turn the tide on drug related crime, a tide that this Government has been swept away in. Drugs are a blight on all our lives and we need to have a mature debate about how to best go forward in tackling them in the future.

Law and Order was one of Blair’s top priorities when he came to power. Before becoming Labour leader he was the Shadow Home Secretary. This article looking at crime, prisons and drugs demonstrates that he has filed to make Britain, a safer place to live after ten years of governing. This is a massive failing.

Is this Blair’s biggest failure? Please post your comment and look out for the next Blair failure later this week.

What is Blair's biggest failure? You decide

2007-04-15T07:29:00.000-07:00

After a quiet blogging week I am using this post to launch a new initiative on my site to run over the coming weeks... namely to find the biggest failure of this Blair government over the past ten years?

I expect this to be a heated and passionate debate and I'm sure that everyone will have an opinion on what they perceive to be an area of policy which has been mishandled or neglected under this PM.

Whilst some may look at this as just more negative Blair-bashing, its purpose is actually to look at the most pressing issues left unsolved or mishandled by Blair and to see how the next Government (hopefully led by DC) would go about addressing these problems.

The way this will work is that over the coming weeks I will write a series of proposals on the ten policies/policy areas that I believe constitute Blair's biggest failures. In each I will list the arguments for why each area has been a failure and why it could constitute the 'biggest' failure of his premiership. I will also conclude each piece by looking at a range of new policies which could be implemented to help the address the problems resulting from these failures.

Once all ten have been outlined I will in a democratic spirit encourage fellow readers and bloggers to vote on these ten and after the votes have been counted and verified be able to then crown Blair's 'biggest' failure.

I look forward to all contributions in this debate. Blair's first 'failure' will be posted shortly....

Browne's lamentable apology cannot hide another Government disaster

2007-04-11T14:40:00.000-07:00

Just when I thought that this Government could not sink any lower it did. Allowing the captured sailors to sell their stories to the tabloid press stinks. It should never have been allowed.

Virtually everyone I have spoken to on the matter agrees, so Im not sure what Defence Secretary Des Browne was thinking when he allowed the sailors to speak to the press after they returned home at the weekend.

Some have argued that his idea was to control the flow of information coming from the hostages themselves, making sure it was verified and accurate, rather than being leaked out by friends, family or associates.

Thus the MOD by allowing the hostages to give firsthand accounts of what happened and monitor them would be able to stop any damaging or uncredible rumours from emerging.

It beggars belief that a Government so seasoned in the art of spinning could mis understand the nature of the media to this extent.

Rather than giving an accurate picture of the hostages' ordeal the gutter press have had a field day blowing up often incidental details into full blown stories (Faye I thought they were going to rape me). Thus rather than leading to accurate accounts, Browne's actions have had the opposite effect putting the rumour mill into over drive.

His apology today was delivered in his typical monotone style. Browne claimed to take full responsibility for the decision to allow the hostages to speak to the press, which is rubbish, because if he truly did and given the disrespect it shows to other soldiers still fighting gallantly and to their comrades who have died in the region he should, he would do the decent thing and offer his resignation.

I believe that DC was dead right today to order an enquiry into the whole affair, to find out who was responsible for this catastrophic misjudgment from an inept and out of touch Government. The whole episode has undermined the excellent reputation of the British Armed forces both at home and abroad.

If you didn't think New Labour could go lower...... I'm sorry to say they just did

Talking CCTV shows that the Government's respect agenda is a joke

2007-04-09T13:36:00.000-07:00

The introduction of CCTV cameras into 20 areas across England demonstrates that we have slept walked into a Big Brother style society.

The 'talking' cameras currently operate in Middlesborough and as a result of their success are now being rolled out into other cities and areas across the country. The government's respect 'tsar' (God, it's so New Labour and pathetic I could vomit) says that these cameras are effective at nipping problems in the bud and dealing with anti social behaviour.

The draconian night-club bouncer/ home secretary, who I swear spends his weekends manning the doors of some of Glasgow's toughest pubs, claims that those who are against such an intrusive policy are in the minority and do not fully understand or regularly experience the problems of anti-social behaviour.

Well guess what Mr Reid I do care about and have had regular experience of anti social behaviour over the past year: My dad's car has been broken into, my girlfriends car met a similar fate, my girlfriend's brother's partner was mugged in the west end and one of my friends was burgled. Having people spying on British citizens in a remote call centre barking orders at people in the street for dropping litter is unlikely to be the most effective way to tackle the problem of anti-social behaviour in the long term.

What is needed ultimately is more police on the street. The police must be freed from their bureaucratic minefield of form filling introduced by this Government (DC has made this one of his priorities in this area) and allow them to do what they do best, walk the streets of communities engaging with local people and seeking to PREVENT crimes and antisocial behaviour from taking place in the first place rather than admonishing those via a camera who break the rules.

CCTV is a joke anyway, the film is rarely of a good enough quality to secure convictions (when my brother was assaulted in Guildford the CCTV was inadmissible as evidence and the yobs who attacked him just walked free despite the injuries he suffered) and cameras on transport in particular are just their for show, many do not have any film in. The criminals know this and do not bat an eyelid about the cameras, continuing to carry out offences such as vandalism at will.

Surely the money for this, and other stupid schemes such as ID cards (some £20bn of tax payer cash down the drain here), could be better spent on front-line policing and its associated resources. This could both act as a deterrent for anti-social behaviour and as a more effective means of punishment if such behaviour occurs.

Talking cameras are just another short-term solution to the problem of anti-social behaviour, a problem which has many faces and needs to be addressed through a range of channels, one of which as I outlined above is more police on the street. It is a fact that this is the best form of deterring potential offenders and catching actual offenders. It also makes people int eh community feel safer.

We also need to look at ways to better engage with young people. Rather than criminalising many young people and targeting them in such a blatant and intrusive fashion as this does, we should be looking at ways to engage with them in a more productive manner, which will provide a long term solution to this problem. Of course young people who cross the line should be punished and dealt with properly. But handing out ASBOs and shouting at them through a camera is not going to PREVENT anti-social behaviour or address its causes thus stopping it from recurring in the future.

The Government's respect agenda is a failure; a longer term strategy needs to be employed to tackle the problems of anti-social behaviour. Shouting orders through a camera is unlikely to help stamp out this blight on so many people's daily lives.

Balls Cock up shows he is not ready for no 11

2007-04-06T04:22:00.000-07:00

Whilst Gordon Brown has been left reeling by the events of the past week or so regarding his 1997 pensions tax raid, the whole episode has perhaps been just as damaging for one of his closest aides.

Ed Balls has been with Brown since it all began. In 1997 he is widely credited for crafting the idea of Bank of England Independence after a visit to the US, where he saw how this process works in practice.

Ever since he has been Brown's most dependable aide working with him at the Treasury as an adviser and in 2005 he was given the safe seat of Normanton and became a Labour MP. He is now a junior minister at the Treasury, once again serving under Brown, who it appears cannot be without his trusty lieutenant.

As the events started to unravel regarding Brown's tax grab over the past week it was Balls that was frog-marched in front of the cameras to defend the embattled Chancellor. The way Balls handled the event backfired dramatically and smacked of immaturity and naivety.

Balls claimed that Brown's decision to raid UK pension funds was approved at the time by the CBI and that it was on the back of this advice that Brown made his decision.

It did not take long for the CBI to issue a strong denial of this absurdity and rubbish Balls' claim by saying that they had issued no such support and published their own advice from the time which indicated that they believed that it would be damaging to a great many pension schemes.

Balls' comments only served to escalate the row and forced Brown finally to defend his decision a full four days after the story first broke.

Brown obviously defended the decision flanked by Blair, saying it had been part of his overall economic strategy and strong record, which is frankly ludicrous.. as if bankrupting pension funds is a good way to ensure a strong economy and economic stability!

The whole episode and the amount of time it has been allowed to rumble on for have damaged Brown. He has appeared slippery, elusive and unprepared to defend one of his core early decisions when entering the Treasury (At least Blair always defends his decisions with a certain vigour and passion even if I disagree with them, Brown appears too arrogant to engage with 'normal' citizens)

Yet the episode has damaged Balls to. His statement that the move was approved by the CBI and the CBI's quick and brisk denial smacks of ministerial naivety and ignorance and demonstrates that for all his chumminess with Brown, that it would be a bad move for Gordon to appoint this crony as his first Chancellor.

Balls may have been a useful aide, but we need real leaders at the top of Government and Brown should resist the temptation and go with an experienced hand as his first Chancellor, Jack Straw would be a far safer bet.

Cretinous Meacher represents the true failure of Labour's leadership 'contest'

2007-04-04T14:11:00.000-07:00

A slightly random post today coming on the back of something I discovered only last night. I was looking through amazon.com scanning for any potential new purchases when I saw the name of Michael Meacher MP as a forward to a book. The book in question is called the New Pearl Harbour and is written by David Ray Griffin.

The book basically concerns itself with arguing that the events of 9/11 were a conspiracy by the US government to provide an excuse to invade first Afghanistan and then Iraq. Such theories include the idea that the plane that flew into the Pentagon was in fact a missile (they don't then explain what happened to the other plane after that!!!) that the WTC towers were brought down by pre-arranged explosive charges and that 4,000 Israelis informed of the plot somehow failed to turn up for work on the day of the attacks.

Regardless of whether you support the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq I'm sure you will agree that such theories are absurd. The other interesting fact is that these same people who propose such theories argue that Bush is the dumbest US President in history, when if he had managed to manufacture the chain of events that day he would have to be a lot brighter than his critics care to give him credit for.

Now onto Michael Meacher, who is he you may ask? Well step forward 1 of only 2 declared challengers to Gordon Brown for the Labour leadership.

Meacher is a loony lefty regularly harking back to a socialism which has long been discredited whilst simultaneously owning 8 houses of his own. Yes Meacher is like most avowed socialists a hypocrite of the highest order, preaching to the common man to give more of what he owns and works hard for, for the benefit of others whilst sitting most comfortably himself.

The fact that such a cretin as Meacher has declared (he is unlikely to get the 44 MP's necessary to get him through to a formal contest with Brown) and is only one of three candidates is a reflection on the current woeful state of the Parliamentary Labour Party. Those high ranking officials in the PLP should stop jostling around for the deputy position (frankly who would want to take over from John Prescott and who cares!), get some balls and stand against Brown for the top job and make him work damn hard to become not only leader of the Labour party but also the leader of this country. This is an honour that should not just be handed to him on a plate as it current is.

I thus welcome any new and serious challenges to our dour Scottish Chancellor.

Meacher's candidacy I'm afraid in such a narrow field is a blight on the PLP and a matter of the highest disrespect to ordinary voters who want and deserve the best man to run the country.

I don't believe that that man is Brown... I know for certain it is not Meacher.

Scottish Poll defeat spells bad news for Brown

2007-04-03T12:54:00.000-07:00

Barring a minor miracle this will be Tony Blair's last political campaign. You have to hand it to the man who has ran British politics for the last 10 years that he can still be 'bovvered' to turn up to campaign launches such as the one he attended with Scotland's first minister Jack McDonell and Gordon Brown today. (I'm not quite sure why Brown was there he is still supposed to be the Chancellor but mere number crunching seems to play a very minor role in his daily portfolio thes edays as the desperate Labour party tries to make him appealing to target voters)

Anyhoo despite the smiles at today's launch Labour is in trouble north of the border. Indeed under current polling if there was an election today the SNP would beat Labour by about 5%. This would probably leave them free to join in a coalition with the Lib Dems (who currently govern the assembly north of the border in coalition with Labour), leaving Labour truly and firmly on the sidelines. The Tories, who appear a spent force in Scotland I have to say, have said that they will not join a coalition with any other parties so both Labour and the Tories would strangely find themselves in opposition.

This is bad news for one man, Gordon Brown. Brown's Scottishness is not the main reason why people dislike him. But there is a growing feeling in the heartlands of 'middle England' that the Government in Westminster is being held hostage to Labour's Scottish MP's who are dominating the front benches. After all policies like top up fees only got through Parliament with Scottish Labour MP support (top-up fees interestingly do not apply in Scotland). Further it seems that you only have to turn on the tele to hear a Scottish MP lecturing you on the economy, transport and law and order.

Worse still if Brown takes over after a bruising defeat he will no doubt constantly be reminded that Labour would have won less votes in the most recent General Election in England in 2005 (yes Michael Howard won more overall votes in England than TB) and the most recent assembly elections in his homeland of Scotland.

Such a situation would undermine any supposed mandate he had following his coronation as Prime Minister after Blair steps down destined to be after the elections.

This could well force him into calling an early election, which should he lose and we can but hope, he could leave office as one of the shortest premiers in history.

Oh well at least it would save him scrambling around for a legacy...... unlike others I could care to mention......

DC maintains the style as the substance of the new Tory Government starts to take shape

2007-04-02T11:26:00.000-07:00

Good news for DC today as men's magazine GQ has named him as second in their list of the most stylish celebrities for the past year.

The award proves that in developing policy Cameron has not taken the eye of his wardrobe.

In fact DC was only beaten to the top prize by the new 007 Daniel Craig. Craig's sharp suits whilst portraying a new edgy Bond won widespread plaudits from those in the fashion and design world.

His position in the rankings will I'm sure lead to charges, particularly from cynics in the media that DC is more style than substance, which as I hope to demonstrate on these pages is in fact utter rubbish.

Cameron's second place position shows he has what it takes to make it as a leader in a world of 24 hour media and news. He is able to combine his style and presentable nature with an emerging list of policies which are designed to take Britain forward into a new post-Blair era.

For those who say what policies here are just a few:

Scrapping ID cards

Building more prisons

Marriage tax allowance

Annual targets for climate change

Limits on the number of individual internal UK flights to help cut emissions

Scrapping ridiculous targets in the public sector, in the NHS and in the police.

Cutting corporation tax

Scrapping Brown's increase on corporation tax for small businesses

Installing a dedicated border police form

Creating a 'head of homeland security' to tackle organised crime and terrorism, this person would sit in the cabinet

Reducing the tax burden on individual families.

These are just some and many more policies will follow once the policy groups report in the summer.

DC's award proves he's got both style and substance.... there was interestingly no sign of Brown in this poll.. I wonder why that is?

Pensions failure is Brown's true legacy at the Treasury

2007-03-31T08:51:00.000-07:00

Whenever asked to comment on the record of the Chancellor at the Treasury over the last 10 years Tony Blair confidently rolls off a rehearsed script of 'record growth, low inflation, low unemployment'. We've heard it all before... and it is very dull. What Tony, as he likes to be called, does not mention is the Chancellor's performance with regard to pensions and savings.

Since New Labour came to power in 1997 pension saving has dropped dramatically. In 1997 there were 11 million workers who had final salary pension schemes, these are schemes which give a guaranteed annual payment to the retiree as a percentage of their final salary. Today just 4 million workers are involved with such schemes.

This dramatic drop is chiefly the result of one person and one person alone, Gordon Brown.

In 1997 Brown scrapped the tax free status of dividends in private pension funds. Economists have since estimated that this has cost UK pension funds a total of £5bn every year, resulting in some schemes going bust and being unable to make their payments, while others have had to close schemes to new and potential members. The number of people in any form of private pension schemes fell from 57% in 2002 to just 44% in 2005.

Why am I discussing this now? Well documents from Treasury sources published today indicate that Brown ignored advice from those in the department who suggested that such a move could have devestating consequences for millions of savers.

Brown did this I believe as he saw those who had and could afford a private pension as in some way wealthy and privileged and that this could be a good 'socialist' way to redistribute wealth by his preferred mechanism of stealth. What his move failed to realise is that many ordinary middle-class men and women working in a range of sectors took out private pensions with companies in the 80's and early 90's as a way to top up their paltry state retirement funds.

The result of Brown's move has been to fatally undermine the savings culture in this country, with New Labour proudly taking Britain from a position as one of the developed world's leading nations for individual pension saving to one of the worst.

Further the Government was found guilty of 'maladministration' by an independent parliamentary ombudsman with regard to its handling of pension saving. This related to the production of leaflets by the Department of Work and Pensions that were deemed to be misleading to investors. The Government has failed to even admit the charge, and has actually appealed against it, despite being recommended by the highest law courts in the land to accept the charge and resolve the matter properly.

Many who lost their pensions thanks to this mis-selling continue today to fight for compensation, conducting marches, protests and other campaign events to highlight their plight, yet the Government has so far refused to yield to their concerns.

This is Brown's pensions legacy which him and Blair are keen to keep very quiet.

Behind the spin we find stealth taxes, Government mis-selling, bankrupt funds and worst of all poorer pensioners. I hope that these elder men and women give him a bloody nose come the election.

Scandal ridden Jowell's humiliation

2007-03-29T06:37:00.000-07:00

My opinion of the Lords may be changing. Last night the unelected chamber did the right thing and threw out the Government's plan for a supercasino in Manchester and 16 other smaller casinos across the country. The Government had earlier survived a rebellion in the Commons to pass the bill by 24 votes.

This was a huge embarrassment for the scandal ridden Culture, Media and Sport Secretary Tessa Jowell. Another abject Blairite failure she is certain to lose her job come the arrival of Brown into number 10 in the summer, frankly the summer is not soon enough she should quit now.

The whole concept of the supercasino is ill though out and misguided. The idea that these places will serve as a form of regeneration for run down and deprived areas is ludicrous. Casinos play on vulnerable people lured by the prospects of glamour and big winnings who end up loosing what little wealth they have. I think it is sad that the only way the Government thinks that they can regenerate deprived areas is through casinos. The old staying always rings true that the house always wins.

The splurge in internet gambling over recent years has helped contribute to soaring debt levels in this country. It has become a problem for all generations. When I was at University I came across people who would spend hours on the internet trying to make a few quid, often losing quite large sums of money.

The Government's position is both naive and irresponsible and the Lords did the right thing in booting it out, Jowell should go to.

Blair comes out fighting on Iran

2007-03-28T05:57:00.000-07:00

So I finally got one right! Thank goodness! Its taken a couple of weeks but I landed one hit out of two this week as Cameron began his exchanges by asking the PM on Iran.

DC was keen to see what the PM was doing to get our sailors back, whether we could go through the UN to get an effective resolution to the crisis and whether the PM could clarify the 'rules of engagement' for sailors in the Shatt-al Arab waterway.

Blair's response was exemplary, calling on his many years of experience at the dispatch box. He appeared like he was very much on top of the situation. He read from a written statement on the matter in response to DC's first question giving a summary of the incident, where it took place and what the Government was doing diplomatically to try to resolve the crisis.

Blair came off the better particularly after question three where DC probed him on the rules of engagement. Blair used this question to his advantage, thanking DC for the opportunity to debate this and then making his opponent appear unpatriotic by questioning the engagement tactics of the sailors when they were surrounded. Blair then moved in to pledge full support for the conduct of our forces in the incident, saying that he trusted their judgement on the ground and agreed with their decision not to fire when surrounded by Iranian forces.

Cameron did better on the small business question. One I did not predict (makes a change) DC was keen to attack the Government and particularly Brown on the corporation tax hike for small businesses announced in last weeks budget.

DC won this round quoting from a range of small business providers who were dismayed at the announcement. DC said he believed them and not the PM which got a good cheer from the Tory backbenches.

Blair was reduced to talking about a cut in capital gains tax for small businesses since 1997 and the general strength of the economy. Frankly we'd heard it all before and it wasn't particularly convincing.

So with that assessment I think Ill award the point to Blair this week, his performance on Iran was v.good and confirmed his position still as a formidable opponent in the House. Further as this is the more pressing issue of the day, I think it is only fair to award him the spoils from today's exchanges.

What did you think? Please join the debate and post a comment

So its one each going into recess which begins on Thursday. PMQ predictions and assessments will return after Easter!

Final PMQ's before recess

2007-03-28T02:54:00.000-07:00

Right final PMQ's before recess today. After last week's budget day tie, Cameron still enjoys a 1-0 lead over Blair and I have still failed to accurately predict any of the questions the Leader of the Opposition has chosen to go on.

This week I think that Cameron will lead with the following:

1) Casinos - Rebels could defeat the Govs plans for Britain's first supercasino in manchester tonight. DC may well look at ways in which Tessa Jowell the scandal-ridden culture, media and sport secretary has flip-flopped on the principles behind the bill and her u-turn on pledges that there would be only one such project.

2) Iran - Beckett is due to make a statement after PMQ's, but DC is likely to call TB to account and demand a full outline of what is being done to get our sailors back safely.

Other issues DC could go on:

Child Poverty - Figures yesterday say this is up by 100,000 in the last year damaging Government's ability to meet its child poverty target.

N.Ireland - Peace deal - praise for Blair but stressing the importance of the next few weeks for the future of the new NI assembly.

Crime - Blair's speech on crime yesterday, chance to list the Gov failures on crime.

Beckett not the right woman at Foreign office

2007-03-27T08:44:00.000-07:00

When Jack Straw was replaced at the foreign office, many people from all sides of the house were disappointed. Mr Straw is a shrewd political operator and was a credit to this famous role. Rumours that he was removed because he did not sign up to US neo-con plans to nuke Iran made sympathy for his removal all the more pertinent.

Sadly his replacement Mrs Beckett has been an unmitigated disaster. Beckett is the least convincing person to hold the job in my life time. She pales in comparison to past heavyweight occupiers of the position such as Hurd, Cook and Straw and she has such a poverty of knowledge that she has even recruited her husband to help advise her. Apparently when she was offered the role by Blair her first two words were: 'oh s***'!

Her nightmares include:

1) Her handling of the Lebanon crisis was appalling. She took far too long to come out and say anything meaningful on the Israeli bombing campaign and it was obvious that when she pledged support for Israel that she really didn't believe what she was saying.

2) Her refusal to commit to even a retrospective inquiry of the Iraq war. This was an act of unashamed arrogance that failed to take into account the feelings of frustration in the country at large at how we were misled in the way to war.

3) Her performance at Foreign Office questions. She acts like a stuck-up school mistress hissing and scowling at those who disagree with her, rather than acting as an ambassador of the state engaging in informed and intelligent debate with those of all sides. She looks irritated when people question her faulty judgement.

4) Her handling of European issues. This has been badly undermined by Geoff Hoon's appointment to Europe Minister and their squabbles over who controls what policy area and who attends which seminars/conferences etc has not been productive for promoting Britain on the European stage.

Mrs Beckett's latest crime is her inept handling of the Iran crisis. Whilst talks are going on behind the scenes it has taken her over four days of the crisis to release a statement calling for the 'speedy release' of our brave soldiers. Four days, four days!! What's she been doing for all that time, maybe her husband's been spending all that time trying to point out where the Shatt al-Arab waterway is!

The first thing Brown should do when he takes over is boot her out and never let her represent us on the world stage ever again.

Right wing clap trap from a right wing nut

2007-03-27T02:07:00.000-07:00

Last night's attempt to discredit DC's suitability to be the next prime minister on a channel 4 programme entitled 'Toff at the Top' presented a rehashing of all the old charges against Cameron.

The programme made by right-wing ideologue Peter Hitchens made many accusations against Cameron many of them bogus and hopelessly misrepresentative.

The main charge Hitchens levelled was that in remodelling the Conservative party DC has abandoned traditional Tory party principles in favour of electoral victory, much like Blair did with the Labour Party in the nighties.

The fact remains, although Hitchen's in his programme seemed oblivious, that DC's move to the centre ground was needed after three crushing Tory defeats at the polls. Messrs Major, Hague and Howard (Duncan Smith never fought an election) were only able to carry the core Tory vote and were unable to bring others into the Tory tent in order to win an election.

Cameron and his people realised this and thus began the re-branding process that Hitchens loathes so much. If Cameron had merely continued on the path Hitchens seems to favour, which has cost the Tory party 3 election defeats, banging on about immigration and Europe, it is highly unlikely he would be doing so well in the polls. What Hitchens fails to realise is that in politics, ultimately power is everything (working in an opposition MP's office I know this) and that it is far easier to effect the changes you want when in power, than when in opposition. Cameron's ability to reach out to non-traditional supporters thus represents his key asset to the party and the democratic process rather than a liability as argued by Hitchens. This has resonated with party members and activists, for example on right wing blog Conservative Home 71% of party members say they approve of DC's current performance as leader.

Hitchens went on to claim that Cameron's repositioning of the party has left many in the country without an alternative to vote for. This is frankly nonsense. Cameron's re invigoration of the party has given many people a new person who embodies their hopes for a Britain based on lower taxes, pro-marriage, better and more local public services and social responsibility. He has now steered the party to over 40% in countless opinion polls, making the charge that he is stifling choice and debate rubbish. He is in actual fact where a great deal of the electorate is.

What Hitchens failed to mention is that there is an alternative for those with the racist, anti-immigrant, anti-asylum seeker, anti-Europe such as his own and it can found in the UK Independence Party or worse the British National Party. Hitchens won't vote for them simply because he knows they aren't big enough to win, not because he disagrees with their politics as can be regularly read in his nutty Mail on Sunday column.

Hitchens also claims that Cameron is too posh to be in touch with the concerns of real voters. Hitchens used Cameron's 'hug a hoodie speech' as an example of his out of touch Notting Hill liberalism and then transported himself to that well-known Tory area of Birkenhead in Liverpool to talk to one woman about the problems of anti-social behaviour.

What was not mentioned was that Cameron himself never said the phrase 'hug a hoodie' (it was the media spin from the event) and that what he really wanted to do in the speech was to look at other ways of tackling the problems of youth crime and behaviour (Hitchens referred to this as treatment and gave it 5 seconds of air time in his programme). Whilst this government wants to criminalise all young people by giving them asbos for standing on street corners or putting them in jail for not being at school when aged 17-18, Cameron wants to shift the debate forward. Both by tackling the direct effects of the disorder, but also its causes and ultimately trying to find ways to stop this form of behaviour being repeated.

One way he has sought to do this is to encourage a greater role for young people in society by promoting the family unit. He has also set up a commission to investigate the state of childhood in the UK today, after a report by Unicef found that the UK was the worst place to live for children in the developing world.

Hitchens also criticised the number of old-Etonians, thirteen, who currently sit in Cameron's shadow cabinet. This vacuous charge, after all who cares where people went to school for goodness sake? should not forbid somone from taking up a role in the shadow cabinet. Eton itself has in fact been very successful at producing prime ministers, 19 I believe to date. To not utilise some of the talent from this institution for reasons of political correctness would be ludicrous.

The charge also ignores Cameron's attempts to diversify the party through promoting more women candidates and those from ethnic minorities. One, Priti Patel made an appearance on question time a fortnight ago and made a good fist of it. Hitchens tried to undermine such efforts by claiming that the majority on the list were form the 'KNC' (Kensington and Chelsea) set and were far from representative of the wider population up and down the country. Whilst I am not partial to the birthplace of all prospective Tory candidates such a charge ignores high-profile and prominent Conservative figures such as David Davis and William Hague who certainly do not emanate from the KNC set.

Finally, there was the predictable charge that Cameron has no substance and believes what ever he thinks people want him to believe. The evidence presented for this was the 2005 party manifesto which he 'co-ordinated' on behalf of then Tory leader Michael Howard. In the manifesto were calls for widespread tax cuts, private sector involvement in the NHS through 'contracting out' and tighter immigration controls. Positions Hitchens argues Cameron abandoned on becoming leader.

Such a charge fails to stand up however as in co-ordinating the review of policy Cameron was not giving orders on policy direction (he was only a junior minister at the time), he was following them by bringing them together in one place (this may sound like clever semantics but it is an important difference). Party discipline was paramount at the last election for the Tories given previous election cock-ups and off the record boobs and it was thus imperative that there was a 'follow the leader' type mentality within the upper echelons of the party. Once outside this structure, after the election DC began to express himself and his own opinions.

Hence he began talking about the issues that matter to him such as the environment, which no-one was talking about before he took over. Finally, the idea that Cameron is all style and no substance fails to take into his position on any of the following issues:

ID cards - Pro civil liberties

Marriage tax allowance - Pro-family

Green taxation - Tackling the threat of climate change

Annual targets - Holding the government to account on climate change

Building more prisons - Tough on hardened criminals

Scrapping NHS targets - More localised health care

More police on the street - Scrapping bureaucracy and paperwork to free up police where they are really needed.

Border police force - Special dedicated force to stop the ills caused people traffickers and illegal immigration.

Life skills education - Better life skills education in schools: cooking, financial management etc which can improve the quality of life for all easily and cheaply.

27p corporation tax - pro-enterprise and business.

The fact is DC has both style and substance and he will know that he's winning the battle when he is getting attacked by such 'right wing nuts' as Hitchens.

Cameron batters Brown's tax and waste Chancellorship

2007-03-21T06:56:00.000-07:00

So Gordon Brown did it. He pulled a rabbit out of the hat by announcing a 2p cut in income tax from 22p to 20p beginning in April next year.

Adam Bolton on Sky described this as Brown's tax cutting budget as corporation tax and inheritance tax were also both cut.

These were certainly good political moves and all form part of his attempt to shake off his image as the tax and spend Chancellor who has wasted everyone's hard earned cash on failing schools and closing hospitals. Evan Davis on the BBC made the point that most middle income families would not see much of a benefit as they would end up paying more in National Insurance, with Brown lifting the level of the NI cap. Small businesses will also be fuming, hit by a 2p rise in their tax rates.

On the environment taxes on 4x4's were predictable as was the grant to pensioners to insulate their homes. The marginal increase in fuel duty was also widely predicted. As one Sky viewer said Brown's policies 'tinkered' with the issue of the environment rather than tackling the issue head on as he could have done by adding tax on flights as DC suggested.

Finally having raided billions from pension funds since 97, Brown's increased help to pensioners who have lost their pension through the Financial Assistance Scheme should be greeted with scepticism.

Brown's announcement, dour and rambling as usual, failed to knock DC off his feet and he came out fighting. Lambasting the Chancellor as someone who was 'out of date who believed in state control', DC cut a confident figure as he whacked the Chancellor's record at the Treasury.

Cameron's main point about tax cuts was that this was what the Conservatives have been saying for a long time, long time and that this Brown budget actually reflects their own belief in sharing the proceeds of growth between tax cuts and investment in public services.

Despite having to react on his feet to the income tax cut, which Brown saved right until the very end of his speech, I thought DC did well and held his own in the cauldron of the chamber. He balanced the need to be witty and engaging with the hard facts of the Chancellor's stealth taxes and tax and spend policies over the last 10 years.

The headlines will be grabbed by Brown, but DC today proved that he has arrived in the league of the big political heavyweights.

Cameron v Blair A Damp squib

2007-03-21T06:42:00.000-07:00

Today's PMQ's was really just a warm up event as DC saved his energy and Stalin jibes for his battle with Brown.

Once again my predictions weren't accurate, neither the environment or education were tackled by Cameron. Instead he focused on the increasingly desperate situation in Zimbabwe and the bi-centennial anniversary of the abolition of slavery.

In truth there was nothing in it and it was a real damp squib, not worth talking about any more, as a result neither side picks up any points this week.... Till the next time folks!

Budget day PMQ's

2007-03-21T03:07:00.000-07:00

This Wednesday is a very special PMQ's as it is budget day. Yes the day when Gordon Brown rants on and on about record growth, low interest rates etc and how things after 10 years of Labour have brought the longest period of growth since the big bang.

Before Brown takes centre stage however, Cameron will get his usual 6 questions to the current Prime Minister, Tony Blair.

This week it certainly is not obvious as to what Cameron will choose to lead with, as he will most likely save the jibes about Brown bring 'Stalinist', which were made by former civil servant Lord Turnbull yesterday, to his budget statement reply.

This makes it harder to predict DC's direction at his weekly event with Blair, which precedes the Budget statement at 12.30 (although I can't do any worse than last week!)

I think the 2 most likely topics Cameron will lead with are:

1) Environment - This is supposedly going to be a green budget and what better way to kick off the festivities by giving the Government a good shoeing regarding its woeful Environmental record. Green taxes as a percentage of taxation have dropped since 1997.

2) Education - A piece in the Sun reports that 6 in 10 teenagers (16-18 year olds) on Government inspired apprenticeships, championed by Brown, fail to finish their courses. This is despite record investment and in spite of this Brown wants to force all kids to stay in school or training to 18. A good attack point on Brown.

More Poll woe for Beleaguered Brown

2007-03-20T02:59:00.000-07:00

More bad news for the Chancellor Gordon Brown as an ICM poll in today's Guardian puts the Tories under DC's leadership 15 points ahead of a Labour Party in the hands of the Chancellor.

Close aides to the Chancellor say that such numbers do not concern them (despite their increasing frequency) and that middle England will warm to Brown after he has finished his magical 100 day crusade after taking over.

However such optimism is unlikely to quell the feeling amongst some Labour MP's that a Labour Party under the Scot is doomed for electoral oblivion and failure against a rejuvenated Conservative Party. A story in today's Express newspaper reports that Alan Milburn and Charles Clarke (building on the launch of their anti-Brown website last month) have begun their own policy review process to rival the formal process currently being undertaken by number 10 and number 11. The conspirators, who have said to have the help and backing for the review from 20 current Labour MP's, suggest that this process will seek to promote more radical ideas for reform of public services and the economy.

In private, many Labour MP's are concerned about the lack of serious leadership challenges to Brown and feel that a cake-walk for the Chancellor will not serve either himself or the party very well at all. Currently only left wing loons John McDonnell and Michael Meacher have offered themselves as candidates with both struggling to even get the 44 MP's necessary to formally challenge Brown. Neither have a hope in hell's chance of winning.

Meanwhile other serious contenders have ruled themselves out, most notably Blair-protege David Miliband, who joined the number ten policy unit as a fresh faced 29 year old and has worked closely with Blair ever since. Many Blairites see him as Blair's natural heir and someone with the necessary appeal to crucial voters to pull off an unlikely fourth straight Labour victory at the polls.

Other senior cabinet ministers have bolted at the chance to run off against Brown, displaying a cowardice endemic of the politicians in this government. Instead 6 of them are now in the running to become deputy leader. Why they want John Prescott's job seems to defy logic. This is a pointless position, with little to no power, which Brown could well turn round and scrap anyway once he takes over.

If these politicians want to help the Labour party they should put up or shut up and stand against Brown for the big prize. They may well lose but if they perform well at the hustings and stimulate important debate within the party then they are likely to do their own career and the standing of the party the world of good. After all in the American Presidential election no-one initially stands for the position of Vice President, they go for the Presidency and take the V-P job if they stand out and exceed expectation in the primaries but fail to land the nomination (I feel that this may well be what happens to Barack Obama in 2008).

For the Tories, whilst some senior cabinet members are briefing the press that any battle with Brown will be 'tough', many secretly can't wait to begin attacking the Chancellor and seeing how he stands up to the intense scrutiny of being PM. Brown has been able to hide in Blair's shadow when things have got tough, but as PM there is no place to hide. If he is not properly tested before taking over, he is likely to lead the Labour Party back to the opposition benches, where they belong.

Which US President are you most like?

2007-03-19T07:41:00.000-07:00

With the runners and riders off an running for the US election in 2008, the following link gives you the chance to see which US president you are most like?

http://www.blogthings.com/whatmodernuspresidentareyoumostlikequiz/

Quite fun really, though I was George Bush I, not sure if that's a good thing or not......

NH Yes

2007-03-19T07:08:00.000-07:00

After a few days off, the Cameron for PM blog is back and I thought I'd start this week by focusing on Cameron's NHS speech at the Conservative Spring Forum.

Cameron used his speech to reiterate his belief in the NHS and its position at the heart of the Conservative's election strategy at the next election.

This speech followed up his commitment at the party conference last year in Bournemouth that a Conservative Government under his leadership would take the National Health Service seriously.

In prioritising the NHS in this way Cameron is cleverly moving himself onto traditional Labour territory, as Blair did with the Economy and Crime in 1997. This is likely to prove a successful strategy particularly given Labour's failure to address the problems of the NHS over the last ten years and there are signs that it is already working.

Speaking at a rally for junior doctors on Saturday Cameron was cheered when he took to the stage and announced that he would hold the Government to account on its pledge to give all junior doctors a position within the NHS. Current statistics show that a third of trained doctors each year may miss out on NHS places, with many going overseas to get work. We have spent millions training them, but will not see the benefits thanks to the incompetence of this Government and its health secretary the pathetic Patricia Hewitt (Cameron labelled her the worst ever on Saturday).

Such failures, particularly in light of record investment mean that we are likely to hear a lot more from Cameron and the health service in the coming months. It is beginning to look like a real election winner.

Constructive Tone helps DC to first win

2007-03-14T04:53:00.000-07:00

So my PMQ's predictions were completely incorrect!

In truth, it was a pretty dull series of exchanges, more conciliatory than fiery and fast paced Punch and Judy.

Cameron started with Trident, trying to position the Labour Party as hopelessly divided on the issue, with the Tories a more united and more trusted on this issue of our national security.

I think DC mildly got the upper hand in this segment, and demonstrated his statesman like ability at the dispatch box. But because both him and Blair agree on this issue, the exchanges were quite cordial.

In the second half of his dispatch box appearance DC switched his attention to the shocking care of soldiers at Sellyoak hospital. However once again I think his tone was more constructive than destructive ,asking Blair for timelines for the imposition of an exclusive military hospital responsible for caring for soldiers.

With all this in mind I think DC just nicked this one. His constructive tone allowed him to portray himself as responsible and prevents Blair from banging on the same old record about lower waiting times etc, and I think it works quite well, even if it is a bit dull.

Cameron then takes a 1-0 lead in the PMQ table, a chart of which will shortly go up on this blog.

I will as always be interested to hear from those who disagree or agree with my assessment.

PMQ's: What will DC go on today?

2007-03-14T03:34:00.000-07:00

Another Wednesday another Prime Minister's Questions. This is the weekly parliamentary forum where David Cameron tackles Tony Blair on the main issues of the day.

For those not familiar Cameron has 6 questions he can ask the Prime Minister. He can either ask the PM 6 questions in a row, or split them up (3 and 3, or 4 and 2, or 5 and 1).

Cameron's preferred style has been to split his questions 3 and 3, looking at 2 different issues in each set of questions.

Each week parliament is in session I will be using my blog to speculate on what topics Cameron will choose to question the PM on. I will then add a post after PMQ's where I will comment on my predictions and analyse who won the day's debate.

My feeling today is that in a fairly slow news week so far , the 2 topics Cameron is most likely to go on are:

1) The Environment - Climate Change Bill - Annual Targets vs Longer-term targets; green taxes etc.

2) The Trial of British Servicemen over death of Iraqi detainee - Waste of money, lack of support for soldiers etc.

Others that could come up are:

Trident

GP out of hours care

Labour leadership

Labour deputy leadership

NHS Dentists (Brown visited a private one this week)

House of Lords reform

N.Ireland

I will welcome any of your own predictions, and please check back here at 1pm where I will be analysing how the event went.

My Chat with a Greenpeace protestor

2007-03-13T02:27:00.000-07:00

Workers such as myself were greeted with a protest on arrival at Parliament this morning. The protest undertaken by Greenpeace involved at least 4 activists mounting a crane and hanging a large banner with the words 'Tony loves WMD' on it (see picture left)

Greenpeace workers were gathered outside Portcullis House ,where researchers and MP staffers work, handing out leaflets calling for no more nuclear weapons.

When I refused to take a leaflet, the female campaigner asked me why and I said that I supported the renewal of Trident. She asked me why, and I gave my reasons, outlined below:

1) The global security environment changes very quickly (if in 1987 you would have said that the Cold war would be ending in 2 years most people would have laughed at you ) and we cannot just conjure up a nuclear deterrent from nowhere. These things take time and planning.

2) I do not believe that getting rid of our deterrent will suddenly lead to others around the world abandoning their attempts to acquire WMD. One of the consequences of the Iraq war and the N.Korea deal, is that those states who have WMD can feel fairly safe from any possible outside attack, whilst those without it know they are at threat from an outside invasion and potential destruction. As a result, rogue states will continue to pursue WMD as a means for self-preservation, regardless of our stance on the matter.

3) Not renewing our nuclear deterrent could in the future make us hostage to rogue states and harm our interests. Would we want to be threatened by a nuclear armed Iran and allow it to bully others in the Middle East to follow its branch of radical fundamentalism?

4) Those who argue that renewing our weapons system sends the wrong signal about disarmament fail to note the great strides Britain has taken to cut back its nuclear weapons systems and stock over the past twenty years. Further, our system is a defensive system not an offensive system only to be pushed in the event of an attack not as a pre-emptive measure.

5) Finally possessing nuclear weapons allows us a seat at the main table when key international decisions are being taken. Without such a deterrent we would gradually fade into the background and lose a great deal of our influence in world politics.

I believe that renewing Trident is very important to the long-term security interests of the United Kingdom and support Cameron's position of supporting the Government on this. He could give the Government a bloody nose tomorrow given the wealth of discontent on the Labour benches, but by not making this issue party political he has shown strong judgment and himself to be up to the task as Prime Minister come the next election.

Save the Lords

2007-03-12T06:45:00.000-07:00

I have just been shown an article from a fellow researcher in this Sunday's Mail on Sunday by William Rees-Mogg regarding Lords reform.

The article advocates saving the lords as it is and mentions a facebook group called save the lords which has already attracted over 1,000 members in under a week. The group can be found by registering with facebook and searching under groups with the search 'save the lords'

Whilst this number of members is certainly impressive, I myself will not be joining. I have been asked twice to do so, once by the creator of the group, and have both times adamantly refused.

I feel that in the 21st century the House of Lords needs to be modernised in order to keep pace with the democratic changes in our society. The current mainstream aspiration for a 50% elected, 50% appointed is thus untenable. I feel that the majority of the upper house should be elected and that this would be a very progressive constitutional move and send the right message about the direction of our democracy. The whole issue of appointing peers still has a strong whiff of buying influence and this has been most notably seen in the cash for honours inquiry.

Whether or not the whole house should be elected or not is very debatable, and I am currently leaning towards the idea of an 80% elected house, with 20% appointed as cross-bench (with no specific party affiliation). I think that this cross-bench element should be kept as they play a vital role in checking and scrutinising the actions of MP's in the House of Commons.

Jack Straw has repeatedly said that he wishes to reform the Lords during this parliament and should the Government back an 80:20 split then I will support it.

Cameron and Osborne dead right on climate change

2007-03-11T15:03:00.000-07:00

I thought I would christen the launch of my new blog with my reaction to Conservative proposals in this Sunday's newspapers for a carbon tax on air travel.

I happen to believe that this is an excellent idea and a very effective and fair way to tackle the problem of climate change. The proposals due to be announced formally by the Shadow Chancellor George Osborne tomorrow are set to look at ways to give everyone an annual air travel allowance which will be tax free. Those who exceed their allowance will have to pay a supplementary carbon tax for each journey they take that exceeds the limit (this will be subject to the distance and the cost of the journey of course, thus those travelling to Sydney will have to pay more than those travelling to Paris).

I think this could be a very effective policy tool, as it will not hit low income families who typically take just one holiday a year (in fact with the scrapping of air passenger duty their flights will in fact be cheaper). Instead it will most likely draw its revenue from wealthy businesses and banks who choose to fly their passengers around the country, rather than taking other more environmentally friendly forms of transport. Such businesses can in my opinion afford to pay a little more for every flight they choose to take. This revenue could then be earmarked for a whole rnage of green initiatives such as better public transport, cleaner fuels and cleaner technologies.

I feel that it is important to note that this 'tax' would not be an added tax to the overall tax burden and is likely to be offset by a cut in other taxes, including air passenger duty and in the wider tax bracket, probably IHT and Stamp duty, which I think DC may well look to cut come the time of the next election (I will not go into much detail here on this but I'm sure that I will revisit this topic later).

In general I feel that this proposal is a very progressive step from Cameron and adheres to his principle of taxing bad things such as air pollution, rather than the good things such as wealth creation.

Already though the ideas have proved divisive as the trustworthy BBC website readers have launched into tirades about introducing such a 'stealth' tax, whilst others have attempted to under significance of carbon emissions, claiming that they do not in fact cause global warming (following Ch4's program if it can warrant the term last week). What I find typically amusing is how these same people are likely to say that they are doing all they can to limit their carbon emissions (buying a Prius is the latest craze), yet when a politician talks about a tax and making them put their hand into their pocket to help solve the problem, they seem loath to do anything about it.

I think that this mood will change once DC announces some tax cuts. I think that the public is generally sick of the idea of paying any new form of tax following 10 years of this Chancellor's introduction of a range of new 'stealth' taxes at every possible opportunity.

What Cameron and Osborne have demonstrated in this proposal is the ability to take tough decisions to tackle a serious problem. The Government meanwhile are downplaying the suggestions calling them a mere gimmick. This is a bit rich coming from a Blair government built on gimmicks and spin, which refuse to sign up to annual carbon targets for the most punitive of reasons and failed to persuade Bill Clinton to sign Kyoto in 1998.

As the Tories come out with more proposals and policies in the next few months it will be quite clear to the electorate who is willing to make the big decisions on such matters and who is not. Since Cameron rode a bike to work the Tories have set the pace on the environment and climate change, after this weekend they contie to do so.