David Blackburn

Friday

David Blackburn

Field gets to work

The Times leads with the story that Frank Field, the government’s independent poverty advisor, is recommending that child benefit be stopped at age 13, arguing that: ‘at that age mothers feel even more engaged with work than they are with children.’ Currently, the benefit is paid until children are 19 - £20 is paid for the first child and £13.40 for each subsequent child. The benefit costs the taxpayer £11bn per year; Field’s proposal would save £3bn a year and there would be considerably larger savings if the cut was extended to child tax credits.

Thursday

David Blackburn

Select committee chairmen in full

Courtesy of PoliticsHome, here is the full list of the new chairmen of select committees: 'The following candidates have been elected unopposed as select committee chairs: - Culture, Media and Sport: Mr John Whittingdale - International Development: Malcolm Bruce - Justice: Sir Alan Beith - Northern Ireland: Mr Laurence Robertson - Procedure: Mr Greg Knight - Scottish Affairs: Mr Ian Davidson - Transport: Mrs Louise Ellman - Welsh Affairs: David T. C.

David Blackburn

Coulson on £140,000

The list of Special Advisors pay is out. The headline grabbing figures are that Andy Coulson is on £2,500 less than the PM, and that the overall bill is allegedly £1.9m less than Labour’s. Also, George Osborne appointed Rupert Harrison and Eleanor Shawcross to the Council of Economic Affairs, but they will claim no extra salary. And, for those interested, there are 5 SpAd vacancies in government. Still, £4.9m is a lot of money for unaccountable, party officials. Some time ago, I asked if Cameron would govern any differently. Transparency and cost-cutting are welcome, but wearing fewer garments doesn’t change the innards of a government.

David Blackburn

What can Cameron do about Obama’s war against BP?

Very little is my immediate answer. The President’s approval ratings are biting the dust. Powerless to stem the tide of oil and unpopularity, Obama can only victimise a ‘foreign’ oil company. Obama may be embattled at home, but if any doubt the US President’s ability to influence global events, they need only look at BP’s share value and the pension funds derived thereof. BP is mired in an expensive oil disaster, but the President’s rhetoric about the ‘habitual environmental criminal’ and threatening BP with criminal proceedings demolishes market confidence. If the British government had condemned AIG, Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch in similar tones, the US administration would have retorted. Cameron can do nothing.

David Blackburn

Trouble on the horizon

If you want an indication of just how unpopular the coalition will be, read this morning’s Guardian. Splashed across the front page is an unemployment forecast from the Chartered Institute of Personnel Development. The predicted figure touches 3 million – a psychologically shocking and politically important number, allowing the opposition to chant: ‘Thatcher’s cuts’, which remains a call to arms in parts of the country. The bulk of unemployment will follow the necessary squeeze on public sector jobs and pay. The CIPB estimate that 750,000 public sector jobs will go. The size of the dole welfare bill is unknown because the government plans wholesale welfare reform.

Wednesday

David Blackburn

Simon Hughes elected Lib Dem deputy leader

As expected Simon Hughes, has won the race to be Lib Dem deputy leader, congratulations. Both candidates pledged to assert the party’s independence within the context of supporting the coalition. Hughes intends to appoint Lib Dem spokesmen for all government departments to improve accountability in parliament. A renowned left-winger, Hughes’s inclination must run contrary to the Conservative dominated coalition, and I wonder how he will take Patrick Wintour’s news that the coalition is beginning to act as one politically, mastering a strategy to deflect Labour’s political assaults.

David Blackburn

Ed Miliband pitches at change

Obviously, the Labour party must change and make a clean break with the era of Blair and Brown. I have my doubts if any of these candidates, other than incredible Diane Abbott, can escape the politics that moulded them. None have said anything substantively new. They are not wedded to the past; they pine for it. Today, however, Ed Miliband has suggested that he would break from New Labour. He has written an article for the Mirror, arguing that he would keep the 50 percent tax rate. His analysis is: ‘There is something wrong with a society where nurses earn less in a year than bankers - whose botched deals caused the credit crunch - pay themselves every week.

David Blackburn

BREAKING: Abbott has made it onto the ballot

David Miliband's patronising ruse has worked. The rumours that have circulated for half an hour or so have now been confirmed by the BBC. I wonder what damage Abbott will now cause the other candidates? Also, what does it say for the case for diversity and Labour's internal policy debate if Abbott's election was a stitch-up?

David Blackburn

PMQs Live-blog

12:00 Stay tuned for coverage As a prelude, the House stands for a minute's silence in memory of those killed in Cumbria. 12:02: And we're off - 3 more soldiers killed in Afghanistan over the past week. 12:04: Labour MP Albert Owen asks for a referendum on giving further powers to the Welsh assembly. Cameron has pledged a 'respect agenda', which means there will be such a referendum but next year rather than this. Cameron says there is a debate about institutional issues but people in Wales want to hear about schools and hospitals as well. 12:06: Lib Dem MP Tim Farron (deputy leadership hopeful) wants a pledge to protect local health services in rural Cumbria. Cameron says this and an extension of local services is included in the coalition agreement.

David Blackburn

The Labour leadership race descends into farce

Perhaps it’s just me but this morning’s Labour leadership machinations are a farce of political correctness. Everyone is falling over themselves to be as nice as possible and essentially rig the ballot so that Diane Abbott receives a nomination. As James notes, it's a peculiar tactic as Abbott will cause no end of trouble for the ‘serious’ contenders for the ultimate prize. Needless to say, David Miliband, that auteur of absurdity, planted the banana skin. Attempting to be magnanimous but excelling in pomposity, he has voted for Abbot and urges all to do the same. My hunch is that there are many on the right of the party who will resent this move and conclude, finally, that David Miliband is not a leader.

David Blackburn

A day of elections at Westminster

By the end of the day, we will know the identity of the Liberal Democrat Deputy Leader and the chairmen of Select Committees as well as a sense of the shape of the Labour leadership contest. The races for the Select Committees are a mix of near certainties and unknown quantities. Keith Vaz is expected to return to the chair of the Home Affairs Committee. Michael Fallon is understood to have the backing of the members of the Treasury Select Committee, whilst his rival Andrew Tyrie is in with a shout of winning the cross party vote. The leadership races are clear cut. Simon Hughes' team have briefed that their man has up to 60 percent of the parliamentary party's support. In the Labour stakes, Andy Burnham is expected to join the current nominees.

Tuesday

David Blackburn

Will the coalition rue ring-fencing health?

George Osborne has unveiled his plans for a comprehensive spending review. In addition to the pledge to broaden the base of consultation, the most significant announcement was that health spending “will increase in real terms in every year of this parliament”. The oft repeated objection to this pledge is that of the IFS. Spending in other departments will have to be cut by a savage 25 percent to pay for it. In view of Britain’s current commitments, could the defence budget sustain such a cut? David Cameron defines his politics with three letters: NHS. But think of the political damage caused by mass resignations over, say, the relationship between swingeing cuts and problems with defence procurement.

David Blackburn

In response to Alex Massie 

Alex Massie has written a thought-provoking post in response to my accusation that Obama’s opprobrium for BP is rooted in desperation and prejudice. Alex and I are agreed that Obama’s rhetoric is foaming because he is desperate politically. That’s no excuse – it is not stemming the disaster and action is required. Already, Republicans are jumping on Obama’s calculation that he can get away with blaming BP. For such a canny politician, it is a high-risk strategy. It is, of course, coincidence that a British oil company is to blame – although legal action will reveal that a host of international subcontractors are equally liable, or that is what BP’s lawyers will argue.

David Blackburn

From targets to results

As I wrote last week, momentum is important if the coalition’s reform agenda is to avoid stagnating. So far so good and the latest morsel of progress is Andrew Lansley’s pledge to hold hospitals accountable for outpatients’ health for one month after discharge. The plan is designed to prevent the early discharge of patients in order to meet waiting list targets. NHS trusts will be fined if a patient is re-admitted with related symptoms. Lansley will also seek the abolition of non-clinically justified targets, which were introduced by the previous government. The emphasis is on results, not targets; transparency, not ruses; efficiency, not waste.

David Blackburn

Obama’s antagonism to BP is rooted in desperation and prejudice

To all bar Tony Hayward, it is clear that BP is finished in America. A Macarthyite degree of opprobrium has been cast against the interloper. As Matthew Lynn notes, BP’s PR flunkies are grovelling across the networks, apologising in that singularly lachrymose British fashion. They should stop demeaning themselves and fight back. BP is to blame for the leak, but it is being demonised by an American President whose desperate populism and prejudice is masquerading as principled leadership; it is the latest British institution to be victimised by Barack Obama. Owing largely to the demands of the insatiable US market - which Obama has done nothing to abate, despite his green credentials - oil exploration has never been so risky as companies drill in deeper and rougher seas.

David Blackburn

How long can Cameron blame Labour?

Understandably, David Cameron is blaming Labour for the age of austerity he must inaugurate, and will continue to blame Labour. Dominic Lawson asks a simple question in this morning’s Independent: how long can that tactic soften the opprobrium his government will incur? ‘After all, when Margaret Thatcher's government cut the unsustainably vast subsidies to public sector industries – from coal-mining to car manufacturing – which her Labour predecessors had not dared to confront, it established her reputation among millions as a cruel and heartless prime minister.

Monday

David Blackburn

The Prince of Darkness passes into night

If Ed Miliband wins, it’s curtains for Peter Mandelson. Michael Crick reports this exchange between GMB president Mary Turner and Ed Miliband. ‘"As Labour leader, would you invite Peter Mandelson to join your shadow cabinet?" "All of us believe in dignity in retirement," replied Ed Miliband.’ Is Mordor mobilising? You bet your sweet life it is. No. In reality, I think that Mandelson, the uncompromising diarist, is finished with frontline Labour politics, and it with him.

David Blackburn

The previous government’s economic failure laid bare

As Ben Brogan notes, there was a clean symmetry to David Cameron’s speech this morning: the crisis was Labour’s fault; therefore, Labour is to blame for the painful measures needed to restore stability. As Cameron put it: ‘I think people understand by now that the debt crisis is the legacy of the last government. But exactly the same applies to the action we will take to deal with it.’ Cameron made constant reference to the actions of the ‘previous government’. As a foretaste of what the Independent Office for Budget Responsibility will expose, Cameron alleged that Alistair Darling withheld estimates that Britain will be repaying £70bn per annum in debt interest by 2015.

David Blackburn

D-Day (plus one)

Cuts are here. The most important news of the weekend was the G20’s official backing for spending cuts. It was a significant volte face, and doubtless the sight of violent uprisings in Greece concentrated minds. Finally, George Osborne has been vindicated; but having convinced finance ministers, he must now carry the coalition and the country with him. The first thing to do is ignore Nick Clegg and his claim that cuts will not be savage. Cuts will re-configure government in Britain, the current invasive Leviathan will be dismantled; but the process will be painful in the short-term, it must be.