Uk politics

Tuesday

Isabel Hardman

Truss’ truncated childcare announcement highlights mid-term review weaknesses

From our UK edition

Controversial though her proposals to relax quotas for childminders and nursery staff may be, no-one disagrees with Liz Truss' central mission to reduce the cost of childcare. The opposition know affordable childcare will form an important part of their 2015 offer, and have also been visiting countries such as Denmark to pick up some tips. It's also worth noting that Truss is only relaxing quotas in so far as childcare providers can take on one or two more children per staff member: a nursery worker will be allowed to look after four babies instead of three, and six under-fives rather than four. Similarly, a childminder will be able to look after two babies rather than one, and four under-fives, rather than three.

Simon Hart

As the most persistent private prosecutor, the RSPCA has questions to answer

From our UK edition

Parliament debating how laws are prosecuted is not a rare event, unless that is, MPs are pondering the role of the country’s most persistent private prosecutor. Alongside its role as a prosecutor, the RSPCA also campaigns for new legislation and changes to the existing laws it is prosecuting under what seems like an increasingly radical agenda. That is why I have sponsored a debate today about their role as a prosecutor to which the Attorney General will respond. This debate is not about the 95 per cent of the RSPCA’s work directly protecting animals which we all support and applaud, indeed I was a member of the RSPCA for many years.

Alex Massie

Morrissey and Johnny Marr Explain Scottish Independence… – Spectator Blogs

From our UK edition

There are only 600 or so days to go until Scotland has its referendum on independence. The excitement is almost palpable. Fortunately The Smiths back catalogue is all you need peruse to have a keen grip on the defining stramash de nos jours. Morrissey has always fancied himself, I think, as a kind of prophet. Johnny Marr wrote the tunes. Astonishing as it may seem, all sides in this rammy are, essentially, taking their cues from The Smiths. A Scottish independence playlist-dialogue might run something like this: Nationalist: Is It Really So Strange? Unionist: Barbarism Begins At Home. Nationalist:  London. Unionist:  Paint A Vulgar Picture. Nationalist: I Know It's Over. Unionist: I Don't Owe You Anything. Nationalist: How Soon Is Now?

Monday

Isabel Hardman

Webb vs Byrne on the ‘bedroom tax’

From our UK edition

One of the most frustrating things about being a policymaker must surely be when something that sounds so very sensible and straightforward in your ivory tower ends up being a bit messy in practice. Take the 'bedroom tax': it's not actually a tax, but Labour enjoy calling anything they don't like a 'tax' (odd, given their own penchant for taxation). This is a housing benefit cut for social tenants living in homes with more bedrooms than they need. It was announced in the 2010 emergency budget and comes into effect from April. Very sensible, you might think, especially when private tenants don't get extra housing benefit for spare rooms. The policy is in theory a no-brainer.

Alex Massie

Are High Speed Railways for the North or for London?

From our UK edition

I used to think High Speed Rail was an excellent idea. Now I'm not so sure. I suspect the economic case for the proposals is weaker than its proponents allow. More importantly, I'm not at all sure the government's plans for fast trains linking London and Birmingham are the right or most useful possible idea for high-speed rail. Knocking ten minutes off the London to Birmingham route seems like relatively little gain that comes at quite a price. Eventually, of course, the plan is to extend high-speed rail to Lancashire and, perhaps, Yorkshire too. Sometime, one would guess, towards the middle of this century. You can't accuse modern Britain of rushing large-scale infrastructure projects. It is good that the government is paying some attention to northern England. About time too.

Isabel Hardman

Senior Tory mulls changes to secret courts bill

From our UK edition

After publishing a paper highly critical of the Justice and Security Bill this morning, Andrew Tyrie is now considering making amendments to the legislation, I understand. MPs in a Bill committee will scrutinise the legislation line by line this week, and are expected to report to the House of Commons by mid-February. Tyrie, who also chairs the influential Treasury Select Committee, is considering tabling amendments to the Bill to be debated at that report stage. The Centre for Policy Studies paper which Tyrie has co-authored with Anthony Peto QC says that 'part 2 of the Bill should, preferably, be withdrawn, at least until the government can come back with more balanced proposals, accompanied by a more rigorous explanation of the need for them'.

Isabel Hardman

Grey launch day for Green Deal

From our UK edition

The Tories in opposition were very keen on their 'Green Deal' for making existing housing stock energy efficient. It formed the cornerstone of their pledge when the Coalition formed to be the 'greenest government ever'. It had its big full launch today, with new loans available for homeowners to insulate their properties and pay back the money through their energy bills. The only problem is that the Green Deal isn't quite the big all-singing all-dancing deal the government envisaged. The idea was that big businesses would lead the way in providing the scheme, but one of the leading retailers who expressed initial interest in the scheme, Marks and Spencer, isn't involved.

Alex Massie

The government’s attitude to Romania and Bulgaria is contemptible – Spectator Blogs

From our UK edition

Pity the staff at the British embassy in Bucharest. Only last month they were cheerfully banging the drum for Great Britain, telling Romanians what a swell country this rain-soaked archipelago is. You see: The GREAT campaign invites the world to take a fresh look at the UK, and is designed to promote Britain as one of the very best places to visit, live, work, study, invest and do business. Oh dear. Time to reverse ferret. Brother Forsyth reports that the government is so spooked by the appalling thought that plucky Romanians and enterprising Bulgars might think the United Kingdom a land of opportunity that they are considering a new advertising campaign targeting the EU's newest members: Britain is crap. Don't come here.

James Forsyth

Why is Adam Afriyie being touted for leader? Expenses.

From our UK edition

The Adam Afriyie leadership stories this Sunday confirmed several things. First, there’ll be no shortage of candidates when David Cameron goes. A large tranche of backbenchers have become increasingly irritated at what they view as a magic circle of ministers, special advisers and journalists who, they claim, are deciding who is and isn’t considered a serious player in Westminster. A result of this will be a determined effort to bust this alleged cartel come the next leadership contest. The second, and more important, thing is that the whole issue of pay and rations for MPs is still shaping our politics. Many of those most hostile to Cameron are those who feel that he hung them — or their colleagues — out to dry during the expenses scandal.

Tim Knox

The secret courts bill won’t enhance justice or make us more secure

From our UK edition

'That Britain allowed itself to be dragged into complicity in extraordinary rendition – the kidnap and torture of individuals by the state – is a disgrace. That, nearly a decade later, the extent and limits of Britain’s involvement are still unknown is almost as shocking.' So opens  a new report, Neither Just nor Secure, by Andrew Tyrie MP and Anthony Peto QC which shreds the Coalition’s Justice and Security Bill, a Bill which this week to go into Committee Stage in the House of Commons. The Bill has already had a rough ride through Parliament. Deservedly so, for it is damaging legislation that will neither enhance justice nor make us more secure.

Isabel Hardman

HS2 announcement ignores airport problem

From our UK edition

George Osborne, Patrick McLoughlin and Simon Burns have been flying the flag for the second phase of High Speed Rail 2 this morning. Politically, Osborne and Co see rewards in a project aimed at closing the North/South divide, rewards clearly so great that the Chancellor doesn't mind the second half of the route zipping through his own constituency and irritating local councillors and campaigners. Osborne was careful to underline this when he appeared on breakfast television this morning, saying: 'Our country has become so unbalanced and for the last 15 years as a country we gambled on the City of London and its prosperity and look where that got us.

Fraser Nelson

See no crime, hear no crime and speak no crime

From our UK edition

In the current issue of The Spectator, we put on the cover four words that sum up the coalition government's approach to crime: pretend not to notice. Today's Birmingham Mail offers a snapshot of what we mean: 'The data, released under the Freedom of Information Act, showed the crimes were committed by 11,422 lawbreakers – meaning on average each carried out three offences within 12 months of being released on licence or receiving a community sentence.' That's an astonishing 33,000 offences in West Midlands committed over two years by those on the alternatives to jail: suspended sentences or community sentences. Or by those released from jail early, in what's supposed to be a cost-saving strategy. The symbol of England's failure in the fight against crime is the tag.

Sunday

James Forsyth

Europe Minister won’t give renegotiation specifics

From our UK edition

There’s ‘no secret plot to get Britain out of the EU’ declared David Lidington on the Sunday Politics. In an interview with Andrew Neil, the Europe Minister was determinedly vague on the issue of what powers the next Conservative manifesto will seek a mandate to repatriate. But he made clear that the free movement of people is not going to be part of the renegotiation nor will Britain seek the right to strike its own trade deals with other countries. Having given the speech, David Cameron and his team don’t want to give a running commentary on what they might or might not seek to change about Britain’s terms of EU membership. Indeed, I suspect that they would like to go into the next election seeking as vague as possible a mandate.

Isabel Hardman

Nick Clegg leaves door open to Lib-Lab coalition

From our UK edition

Nick Clegg was careful in his interview on the Marr show today to leave the door open to a Lib-Lab coalition - which bookmakers regard as more likely (4-1) than another Con-Lab coalition (6-1). It was interesting that so much of his description of coalition referred to himself: He told Sophie Raworth: 'I’ve never, ever seen any of this as an issue about what one individual thinks of another individual. It is really all about what the British people think about the parties who are asking for their votes. David Cameron and I said lots of disobliging things before the last general election, disagreeing with things you’ve just highlighted. We still work together in a coalition government. That is coalition government.

Isabel Hardman

Adam Afriyie ‘coup’: a false start for the stalking horse

From our UK edition

The camp supporting backbench Tory MP Adam Afriyie in a possible leadership bid have been busy, managing to get whispers of their planned coup into three Sunday newspapers (the Sun on Sunday, The Sunday Times, and the Mail on Sunday). Whether or not Afriyie is a popular backbencher who managed to soothe colleagues over toasted teacakes in the Pugin room, and whether or not he's the ideal person to lead the Tory party after Cameron, the timing for the Windsor MP of the plot appearing in print couldn't be worse. This time last week, it wasn't difficult to find a clutch of MPs who would gloomily mourn the direction their party was going in.

Saturday

Carole Stone

The view from Davos: Boris Johnson’s economic adviser on infrastructure

From our UK edition

As the speaker for yesterday's Davos British business leaders’ lunch, Boris Johnson had the audience in his hand in his usual colourful way. I grabbed his very new Chief Economic Adviser, Dr Gerard Lyons, former Chief Economist at Standard Chartered, on the way out. How did he think we are doing economically? He told me the last big economic gathering was the IMF last October in Tokyo.  There, he said, the mood about the global economy was pessimistic, but now, three months later, the mood had improved, if only slightly.  There was more confidence about China and the US but still a lot of caution about Europe.

Alex Massie

The Unbearable Self-Pity of Britain’s Rich and Privileged – Spectator Blogs

From our UK edition

Is there anything more pathetic, more risible than rich and privileged Britons whining that their cadre fails to receive a fair shake in the matter of admissions to this country's most prestigious universities? Oh, sure, I suppose there must be but the smugness and evident sense of entitlement on display in these matters remains enraging. Today, for example, Anthony Seldon, headmaster of Wellington College, complains that his pupils are suffering unreasonable discrimination. Worse still, apparently, a presumed "bias" against public school pupils is a "hatred that dare not speak its name". As the Americans say, cry me a river. The evidence for this notional bias is, needless to say, emaciated.

James Forsyth

The Americans accuse the French of being too ambitious in Mali as British involvement grows

From our UK edition

It might have been pushed down the news agenda this week by David Cameron’s Europe speech and the bad economic news, but the situation in Mali is offering us a preview of the next decade in international relations. This decade will, William Hague warns in The Times today, be far more dangerous than what we have seen so far this century. This is a sobering statement when you consider that in the last 13 years we have had 9/11, 7/7, Iraq and Afghanistan. One of the striking things about the Mali mission is it shows how the US is far less interested in playing the role if global policemen these days. The New York Times reports today that the Obama administration thinks that the French aims in Mali are too ambitious.

Fraser Nelson

Why The Guardian has got it wrong – on cuts and on Boris.

From our UK edition

'George Osborne is under pressure to tear up his austerity programme after Boris Johnson called on the government to drop its ‘hair-shirt, Stafford Cripps agenda,' reports the delighted Guardian today. Even Boris is against it! Even he can see that the obvious solution to our debt crisis is even more debt! Except, as you’d expect, it’s all nonsense. Kamal Ahmed at the Telegraph got it right: Boris’s problem is with Osborne’s language: talking about pain, rather than recovery. He quotes Boris: 'We need to junk the rhetoric of austerity and be confident.

Alex Massie

Scottish Tories: It’s Time To Man Up – Spectator Blogs

From our UK edition

Ruth Davidson became leader of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party in large part because she was the candidate favoured by the party establishment. Where Murdo Fraser suggested - rather too boldly as it turned out - the party should fold its tent and start again under a new banner, Davidson preferred a more cautious approach. Moreover, she said it was time to "draw a line in the sand" on the matter of transferring further powers to the Scottish parliament. A little more than a year later it seems as though that line has been washed away by the tide. Perhaps it was a mistake to draw it in the first place.