Uk politics

Wednesday

Fraser Nelson

Britain’s welfare families

From our UK edition

We have a new facts and figures column in the magazine, Barometer, and I thought CoffeeHousers might like a preview of one of the data series we have dug up for tomorrow’s edition. George Osborne has this week pledged that, from 2013, no family on benefits should receive more than the average family does through work. But how many will it affect? Those living in expensive areas, for example, but also those with large families. CoffeeHousers may remember Karen Matthews, who lived on benefits with seven children. She was demonised, understandably, but I was left thinking: we paid her to do that. The more kids she has, the more money she received – so shouldn’t the system take some of the blame?

David Blackburn

A hard-headed case of <em>déjà vu</em>

From our UK edition

It was as if we’d been transported back a week – here was William Hague talking about ‘hard-headed foreign policy’, the very phrase that David Miliband had used before he swanned-off into the wilderness in a floral shirt. The details of the two speeches had much in common – an emphasis on free trade, a promise to garner new strategic and economic partnerships in South America and the Near East, balance in the Israeli and Palestinian dispute, global solutions to climate change and a promise to export human rights. Hague differed in not mentioning liberal interventionism and laying historical and partisan claim to free trade, arguing that the European Commission’s protectionist bent was ‘backward-looking and doomed to fail’.

David Blackburn

Fox to the rescue

From our UK edition

The best form of defence is attack. Liam Fox distracted conference from the various rows that have afflcited it by castigating Labour’s abysmal record on defence. He was helped enormously by the terrorist outrage in Sanaa, the Yemen – a cowardly atrocity that reinforces his observation that ‘the country's finances are wrecked and the world is more dangerous than at any other time in recent memory.’ He recited the refrain that cuts are regrettable but necessary, before adding that, thanks to Labour, Britain has to fight on with less.

Peter Hoskin

Cameron stumbles onto the stage

From our UK edition

Who'd have guessed that David Cameron would go into his conference speech on the backfoot? This was supposed to be a moment tinged, if anything, with jubilation: the first Tory PM for thirteen years addressing a party that seems to have fallen in love with him. But instead we've got the child benefit row, and with it apologies, rebuttals and hasty repositioning. It is to Cameron's credit that he can breath the two words that evade other, more culpable politicians: "I'm sorry". But on the eve of his big speech? Far from ideal. This exercise in damage limitation may have slightly eased Cameron's situation today – but it has put him in a more difficult long-term position.

Tuesday

David Blackburn

Scottish Tories won’t oppose AV

From our UK edition

Annabel Goldie, leader of the Scottish Conservatives, made an odd admission at a fringe event last night. Asked how she would campaign against AV next May, she disclosed that there wouldn’t be a concerted campaign because ‘people have already made-up their minds’. I’m told that David Mundell, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland, sat in impassive agreement while the audience raised its collective eyebrow. Conservatism hasn’t scaled Hadrian’s Wall for twenty years. Representation is thin because residual loathing for Thatcher and Major runs deep. Loud partisanship against AV may incite the hostile populace to vote for it out of spite. Discretion looks the better part of valour.

Peter Hoskin

IDS sets out his vision for combating poverty

From our UK edition

There was a quiet momentousness about Iain Duncan Smith's speech in Birmingham today – even before he started speaking. When IDS resigned the Tory leadership in 2003, he could barely have imagined that he would one day address his party as a leading member of the government. Even a few weeks ago, he couldn't have been sure that the coalition would implement the policy agenda that he developed during his time at the Centre for Social Justice. Yet here IDS was, receiving a standing ovation for his efforts. What a difference seven years make. And then to the speech itself. Much of it reverberated to the same reforming drumbeat that we've heard throughout this Tory conference.

Peter Hoskin

Boris well ahead in the first Mayoral poll

From our UK edition

The first Boris vs Ken poll of the season carries an obvious health warning: there are other candidates to come, not to mention another one-and-half years of the current mayoral term. Yet Tories might still be pleased that their man is 9 points ahead of his predecessor and main rival at this stage. And that's even with Labour beating out the Tories, in the same poll, when it comes to London's general election voting intentions. Andrew Gilligan puts two and two together to create a striking parallel: Boris is more popular than the Tory party in London, whereas Ken is less popular than Labour. Stir in the fact that Livingstone is polling lower than he did in the 2008 election, and his enforced spell on the sidelines has clearly done little to bolster his reputation.

Peter Hoskin

Cameron says “yes” to the Trident upgrade – but questions remain

From our UK edition

Courtesy of Ben Brogan, one of the most noteworthy passages from David Cameron's appearance on Today this morning: 'Jim Naughtie: Is the Trident upgrade untouchable? David Cameron: We do need an independent nuclear deterrent… JN: Is that a yes? DC: Yes. Basically I was going to give you a longer and fuller answer but the short answer is yes… To me and the Coalition government, yes, Britain’s independent nuclear deterrent is being replaced.' It is certainly the most assertive that Cameron has been on the subject since the advent of the coalition, but a couple of questions remain that prevent it from being utterly unequivocal. First, what timeframe is the PM operating along?

David Blackburn

Gove re-emphasises his reform agenda

From our UK edition

Michael Gove means business. His case is simple: standards have fallen; it is time to be radical. Under Labour, Britain fell from 4th to 14th for science, from 7th to 17th for literacy and from 8th to 24th for mathematics. With a fervour that was nothing short of zealous, Gove promised that the ‘injustice will end’. His ministerial career has had a difficult start - his message often lost under Ed Balls' righteous indignation. Having faltered, he is beginning to re-direct his rhetorical emphasis to more fertile ground. Where once he wanted to empower parents, he now wants to empower teachers - no doubt to attract recalcitrant teaching unions to his cause. Gove re-introduced his New Deal for Teachers.

James Forsyth

This is not a 10p tax moment

From our UK edition

Last night, one minister came up to me nervously and asked, ‘is this our 10p tax moment?’ He was talking, obviously, about the decision to take child benefit away from households with a higher rate taxpayer in them.   My answer was no. The comparisons with Brown’s removal of the 10p tax rate miss a crucial point: Brown tried to hide what he was doing. In his final Budget statement to the Commons, the abolition of the 10p rate wasn’t even mentioned. Instead Brown boasted about a 2p reduction in the basic rate, to huge cheers from the Labour benches.   By contrast, the Tories have been upfront about the fact that there are losers from this change.

Peter Hoskin

Cameron tries to defuse the child benefit row

From our UK edition

Whether you agree with the plan to restrict child benefit or not – and, broadly speaking, I do – there's little doubting that it has met with some fiery resistance in the papers today. The Telegraph leads the attack, calling it "a hastily conceived about-turn bundled out on breakfast TV". The Daily Mail highlights the "blatant anomaly," currently riling up the Mumsnet crowd, that a single earner family on £44,100 a year might lose the benefit, while a dual earning family on £87,000 can keep it. And the Independent does likewise. It should be said, though, that the Sun, the Times and the Financial Times are considerably more generous about Osborne's proposal. The FT even calls on the Chancellor to go further.

David Blackburn

Clarke ups the ante

From our UK edition

Perceptions count and the coalition are perceived to be vulnerable on crime. Its policy of reducing the number of prisoners on short-term sentences has been caricatured as a reduction in sentencing per se, a liberal assault on the consensus that prison works. I don’t agree with that analysis (which overlooks that excessive sentences in disorganised and overcrowded prison can create habitual criminals, who cost society in perpetuity thereafter) but readily concede that it’s easy to traduce the government as soft on crime, and I was surprised that Ed Miliband didn’t do so last week – as were plenty of Tories. In fact, opposition comes from within the Tory party, even from the government.

Monday

James Forsyth

Withdrawing child benefit at 16 would be the wrong call

From our UK edition

In the last few weeks, there has been much speculation that child benefit would be stopped when a child reaches 16. Today’s announcement suggests that this is not going to happen, although the Tories are refusing to rule it out. If there are to be changes to child benefit — and given the financial situation there need to be — then removing it from households with a higher rate taxpayer is a better move than stopping it at 16. Child benefit ending at 16 would send out a message that at 16 a child should start earning its way in the world. This would, for obvious reasons, have a negative impact on social mobility as it would likely lead to fewer children staying on at school post 16.

James Forsyth

The beginning of the end of universal benefits

From our UK edition

The most important line in George Osborne’s speech was this one: “It’s very difficult to justify taxing people on low income to pay for the child benefit of those earning so much more than them.” Logically, this argument applies equally to all other universal benefits. Why should someone on £12,000 a year be paying tax to help cover the cost of Ken Clarke’s pension? Personally, I’m quite happy to see universal benefits go. The end of universal benefits would, though, change the nature of the welfare state. Quite rapidly, it would become a safety net not a contributory system. This is why Labour will oppose so vigorously taking child benefit away from those on the higher rate of tax.

David Blackburn

Is there an alternative to cutting child benefit?

From our UK edition

Beware a mother scorned. George Osborne’s copping some stick on Mumsnet, social forum for the Latte-drinking classes, and with good reason. 'Hard-working families’, many of them far from rich, will feel abandoned by the party that ought to be theirs. IDS, Cameron and Osborne have taken a huge a political gamble, as James noted earlier, and they have also taken an enormous social risk. It is telling that the Centre for Social Justice, IDS’ think tank, are lukewarm about the proposal, describing it as ‘probably appropriate’ but calling for an alternative.  Skipping through the comments on Mumsnet and you can see why.

Peter Hoskin

Boris vs the unions

From our UK edition

It was all so Osborne-a-go-go earlier that we didn't have chance to mention Boris's speech to the Tory conference. By way of rectifying that oversight, here's footage of the Mayor of London taking on the trade unionists who have organised a Tube strike today.

Peter Hoskin

Welfare dominates Osborne’s speech

From our UK edition

George Osborne delivered everything we expected, and then some. This was a confident and wide-ranging speech from a Chancellor who has suddenly discovered a central message: what's right about burning £120 million of taxpayers' cash in debt interest payments every day? Wouldn't it be better to get to grips with that waste as soon as possible? And that message percolated down through everything from his attack on Ed Miliband to his case for reforming our public services. "It's like a credit card," Osborne growled, "the longer you leave it, the worse it gets." But if that was the theme of Osborne's symphony, then the motif was certainly welfare.

James Forsyth

Osborne’s benefit risk

From our UK edition

George Osborne’s announcement that child benefit will be taken away from any family with a higher rate taxpayer in it to help fund welfare reform shows how far Cameron and Osborne were prepared to go to keep Iain Duncan-Smith on board. During the campaign and in the Budget, Cameron and Osborne had strongly implied that child benefit would remain universal. The move carries it with considerable political risks. The measure takes effect from 2013, so before the country will have seen the benefits of welfare reform.

Fraser Nelson

Osborne can go even further on middle-class benefits

From our UK edition

George Osborne had been expected to subject child benefits to tax. Instead he is to abolish them entirely for higher-rate taxpayers. I've spent this morning talking to friends, whose judgment I respect, who are furious about Cameron hitting the squeezed middle. I cannot agree, and here's why. We are not talking about the "squeezed middle" here – of the 30.5 million income tax payers in Britain, just 3 million pay the top rate of tax (figures here). They're the best-paid 10 percent – and I have never worked out why the tax of the average worker (who's on £22k) should be higher to afford the payment to those on twice as much money. Osborne reckons he will save £1 billion by this measure. If there are to be cuts, this strikes me as a fair cut.

Peter Hoskin

Osborne takes to the stage, armed with cuts

From our UK edition

Rewind the tape to last year's Tory conference, and David Cameron was assuring us that, "It will be a steep climb. But the view from the summit will be worth it." Today, it falls to George Osborne to tell us more about both the arduousness off the ascent and the beauty of that view – although I expect that there will be a heavy empasis on the former. Already, the main passages are spilling into the papers and, as you'd expect, it's mostly cuts and debt. On that front, the main argument seems to be similar to that made by Nick Clegg in Liverpool: that the longer it takes us to pay down our debts, the more money we waste thanks to interest payments and the like. Or as Osborne will put it, "Delay now means pay more later. Everyone knows it's the most basic rule of debt.