Fraser Nelson

Shortly before Michael Gove organised a strike for journalists in Dundee, I crossed a school picket line with my mum, a teacher at my local school (Nairn Academy). She was a member of a teaching union, the PAT, that didn't believe in strikes, so when the school closed the two of us went in. It was a perfectly friendly affair: my teachers (and her colleagues) were at the gate, with no one else around. One of her colleagues handed her a leaflet and we went on inside. We never discussed politics at home, and I still have no idea what my mum thought about Thatcher (it was 1985). But then, she and thousands of teachers like her took the basic view that kids should not be dragged into disputes between adults.

I was on the panel of Any Questions last night in Saltaire, the most beautiful town I’ve seen outside of the Highlands. Jonathan Dimbleby always warms everyone up with a test question, which lets the panelists make their mistakes early. The first question was this: the town of Saltaire was founded by a philanthropist, Sir Titus Salt. What can be done to make today’s rich pay their fair share? Lucky for me that it was not recorded, because I went on for ages. Sir Titus was living in an era before the welfare state, where welfare was provided voluntarily, by people in the community. Had he been alive today, the government would be confiscating 52 per cent of what he earned – thanks to George Osborne’s recently increased tax.

Last week, Ed Balls warned against the effect of George Osborne’s vicious, front-loaded cuts. Today, we have an update in the form of monthly state spending figures. In cash terms, a new record has been set in state largesse. The UK government’s current spending was £51.7 billion in May, up from £50.6 billion in May last year (the last month of Gordon Brown). George Osborne has so far outspent Gordon Brown every month that he’s been in the Treasury. Even adjusted for the runaway inflation, the Chancellor has on average outspent Brown during his first 12 months:     To fund this extra spending, the Chancellor borrowed £27.4 billion from the public for April and May. Labour chirp today that this is more than the £25.

As James says, it’s been a day of high passions here at The Spectator. He feels strongly that many of the problems in Britain are societal, and require a cultural shift. Maybe so. I disagree with James when he says a Prime Minister's role is to “lead society". I disagree. We pay him to run the government, not offer his advice (or, worse, condemnation) on how society is running itself. Sure, society is shaped by government incentives. Cameron can fix these. But shaping society by exhortation is not what we expect of limited government. Fundamentally, it confuses what I see as the natural pecking order. In Britain, the people pass judgment on politicians. Not the other way around.   Tim Montgomerie is on James’ side, and chastised me yesterday.

Ed Balls’ problem is his killer instinct. If he were a Twilight vampire, he’d be a Tracker: someone whose uncontrollable bloodlust takes him to places he should avoid. His position on the deficit is so extreme — more debt, more spending — that he’s pretty much isolated now. People are mocking him. John Lipsky, the acting IMF chief came two weeks ago and rubbished Balls’ alternative (as Tony Blair did) — so Balls, ever the fighter, has today given a long speech where he sinks his fangs into Lipsky and says (in effect) "I’ll take on the lot of you!" But Balls is brilliant. Often George Osborne seems not to bother arguing, and instead seeking approval from an alphabet soup of external agencies ("I must be right, the ABCD says so!

So what does George Osborne mean by "flexibility"? Do we hear the quiet sound of a gear change, prior to a u-turn? No, I'm told, it's Plan A all the way. And here are the details. The government's five-year departmental budgets (the so-called DEL limits) are set in stone. They won't change (in cash terms) until April 15, after which no figures have been set. If inflation continues to be high, then this will exacerbate the real effect of the cuts (Osborne has already seen trouble caused by with this as inflation has turned the tiny NHS budget increase into a tiny NHS budget decrease). The OBR reckons it may deepen them from 13 per cent to 19 per cent." What might change is the cost of debt and dole. This can't be budgeted for: you never know how many folk will claim.

Today’s papers are full of comment on the brilliant Panorama exposé of care home abuse. But none have mentioned what jumped out at me: the parallels between this and the Stanford Prison Experiment. The way that the tattooed Wayne treated his mentally ill patients is sickening — but, to me, this is not just a story about human evil. It’s a story about how institutionalisation brings out the evil in people, and that this evil is far closer to the surface than we like to admit. Philip Zimbardo, a psychology professor at Stanford, randomly divided 25 volunteers to play the roles of prisoners and guards in a poorly-regulated, mock prison.

Another month, and another all-time record for state spending in Britain. The government splurged £1.8 billion a day in April — of which £332 million a day was borrowed. Up goes the national debt. All of which leaves us with the question: where is this austerity that George Osborne keeps talking about? He's been in No.11 a year now, and each month state spending has been — on average — 4.9 per cent higher than the same month under Gordon Brown. He seems to be taking the St Augustine approach to fiscal conservatism: Lord, give me spending restraint. But not yet. The below graph shows state spending, per month. The amount in red is how much the government had to bum from the City: This does not look so much different to Labour's plans.

If the Big Society were a horse, it would be shot. The wounds are too deep, the contamination too great, its legs are broken. And, worse, the Big Society is giving a good idea a bad name. David Cameron tried manfully today, but we only ever hear about the BS (as most Tory MPs call it) when he’s trying to relaunch it. No agenda can be sustained with such thin support. It has become hopelessly confused as an issue. Myths have crept in that volunteering relies on heavy state spending, so Cameron is talking out of his hat. It ain’t so — Jonathan Jones did the digging — but people still believe it. Cameron gives multiple definitions of the BS, confusing the issue further. Does it mean families? Diversity of public service providers? More volunteering?

I’ve always rather admired Hugh Grant, so it was almost a pleasure to be beaten up by him on Newsnight last Friday. He was attacking the celebrity-hunting media, whereas I set out to defend free press and self-regulation of the media. If you’re going to have sympathy with any Hollywood figure, you’d have sympathy with Hugh: he’s a single man who has never tried to moralise, and has cameras pointing at him everywhere he goes. Besides, he made an impassioned and powerful case against the intrusion of the paparazzi — while yours truly was left defending the Press Complaints Commission. But I didn’t know, until I met him that night, that Hugh is also a Spectator subscriber — and has been for years.

Is Britain's growing national debt a matter of national security? In a speech this morning, Liam Fox said so. Sure, he said, you can protest at the defence cuts — but strength comes from having a strong economy and strong national accounts. "Those who are arguing for a fundamental reassessment of the Defence Review are really arguing for increased defence  pending. But they fail to spell out the  inevitable result — more borrowing, more tax rises, or more cuts elsewhere. The bottom line is that a strong economy is a national security requirement and an affordable Defence programme is the only responsible way to support our Armed Forces in the long term.