Isabel Hardman, Author at The Spectator

Monday

29 October 2012

EU budget: Cameron’s leadership under pressure

David Cameron is already irritating European leaders with his refusal to support any real-terms increases in the multi annual EU Budget, but this week, the Prime Minister is going to come under pressure to go even further and force a real-terms cut. This morning, he has Ed Balls and Douglas Alexander breathing down his neck, with a piece in the Times arguing that a cut is 'difficult but achievable with the right leadership and the right approach from the UK'. In his own party, Liam Fox says it is 'obscene' to 'even increase for inflation the inflated wages of the eurocrats' and is arguing in a speech today that weaker members of the eurozone should leave the currency at the same time.

Sunday

28 October 2012

Isabel Hardman

The childcare battleground

The coalition wants to remove blockages to people returning to work, and one of the most complex problems is the cost of childcare. The Observer covers a report due out this week by the Resolution Foundation, which claims that it is barely worthwhile for a second earner in a family to work full-time because of the high cost of childcare. But though ministers from both parties agree that the costs of nursery care and childminders are a problem for parents who want to start work, or increase their working hours - and have set up a commission on childcare to investigate this issue - the solution may not be one that the coalition finds easy to agree on.

Saturday

27 October 2012

Isabel Hardman

Ken Clarke’s 2015 campaign slogan

It was not a huge surprise when Ken Clarke rowed back this afternoon on his comments to the Telegraph about tax breaks for married couples. The minister without portfolio was hardly going to get through the first interview he has given since the reshuffle without saying something he would later have to 'clarify'. But he made another interesting observation to the newspaper about the Tories' 2015 strategy. He said: 'If we are back to strong growth by the next election, we probably won’t need to campaign. If at the next election, the economy is in strong normal growth, George Osborne will be given the Companion of Honour or something and we will all get safe back.

Friday

26 October 2012

Isabel Hardman

Is the government being inconsistent on teacher training?

To be fair to Kevin Brennan, he seems to have updated his attack line on Michael Gove since his 'don't-call-teachers-names' press release that Labour sent out overnight. The party's shadow education minister is now attacking the Education Secretary for inconsistency, arguing that his announcement today on improving teacher training contradicts the decision to allow academies and free schools to employ unqualified teachers. He has just told BBC News: 'But what's rather strange about what the Government is doing is at the same time it's saying there should be more rigour in the testing of teachers as they go in to the profession, it's saying more and more schools can hire teachers that are unqualified.

Isabel Hardman

Rising energy bills add to pressure on government

EDF's announcement that it is raising gas and electricity bills by nearly 11 per cent will increase pressure on the government in two ways. The first is that these sorts of hikes in the cost of living mean that while ministers have been cheered by recent pleasing statistics on growth, jobs and inflation, voters might not feel as though things are going so well for them. If their own experience of the economy is one where their rent, shopping bills and energy bills are soaring while their wages are frozen, then they may not feel quite as sympathetic to the government as official statistics suggest they should.

Isabel Hardman

Michael Gove to toughen up teacher training

Michael Gove is announcing tougher tests for trainee teachers today, with calculators banned from maths assessments, and the pass mark in tests for English and Maths being raised to the equivalent of GCSE grade B (which still doesn't sound that taxing), along with a new test in verbal, numerical and abstract reasoning. The Education Secretary says the changes 'will mean that parents can be confident that we have the best teachers coming into our classrooms. Above all, it will help ensure we raise standards in our schools and close the attainment gap between the rich and poor'. It's part of the government's drive to demonstrate that it is, in David Cameron's words, spreading privilege.

Thursday

25 October 2012

Isabel Hardman

David Cameron rebuked by statistics chief over PMQs comments

David Cameron's taunt at Ed Miliband yesterday during Prime Minister's questions that the 'good news will keep coming' was taken by some as a hint at today's GDP figures, which the PM has early access to. Now the chair of the UK Statistics Authority Andrew Dilnot has written to Cameron to rebuke him for the line. The letter, which you can read in full here, says: 'The Pre-Release Access to Official Statistics Order 2008 states that recipients of pre-release access must not disclose 'any suggestion of the size or direction of any trend' indicated by the statistic to which the recipient has been given such access. It is clear from media reports that although this may not have been your intent, your remarks were indeed widely interpreted as providing an indication about the GDP figures.

Isabel Hardman

Herman van Rompuy’s revelatory Downing Street lunch

David Cameron had lunch with Herman van Rompuy in Downing Street today to discuss the UK's position on the EU budget. Despite the Prime Minister's tough talking in public about his determination to veto any real-terms increases in the money available for the multi-annual budget, the Downing Street spokeswoman refused to confirm that there was in fact any mention of this threat at today's meeting, which Nick Clegg apparently popped into briefly. She said: 'Discussions focused on the multi-annual budget. Both the Prime Minister and the Deputy Prime Minister made clear the Government's position that we do not support a real-terms increase in the EU budget.

Isabel Hardman

Iain Duncan Smith’s latest welfare cut kite

It is strange that the government has chosen to trail a speech by Iain Duncan Smith on an issue popular with voters on the same day as good economic news. The Work and Pensions Secretary has already reached an agreement with Chancellor George Osborne that it is possible to cut a further £10 billion from the welfare bill (when he originally said he would block those cuts), and is now starting to prepare the ground for some of those cuts to take place. He knows that while the public supports further welfare cuts, the Lib Dems will not without a credible package which ensures the rich are paying more. One of the proposals that Duncan Smith is flying as a kite today is limiting benefits paid to families with more than two children.

Wednesday

24 October 2012

Isabel Hardman

Labour prepares for the worst (good news on the economy)

Whether or not he did accidentally suggest that he knew what tomorrow's GDP figures will be at Prime Minister's Questions, David Cameron did have a jolly good point about the way Labour responds to good news on the economy. He told Ed Miliband: 'It's only a bad week if you think it's bad that unemployment's coming down, it's only a bad week if you regret inflation coming down… every piece of good news sends that team into a complete decline, well, I can tell him, the good news will keep on coming.' As Fraser blogged at the weekend, Ed Miliband's strategy is predicated on the government continually cocking up.

Isabel Hardman

Did David Cameron break an embargo on GDP figures?

Last week David Cameron found himself in trouble after Prime Minister's Questions over a slip of the tongue about energy bills: this week he's managed to get himself into trouble over what looks like yet another slip of the tongue at PMQs. The Prime Minster appeared to suggest that tomorrow's GDP figures, which are under strict embargo, will be good news for the government. The heat was on for Cameron, as Ed Miliband was performing reasonably well, with some good jokes (including 'I asked him a question about the railways - I have to say the Chancellor shouts, it's not the ticket that needs upgrading, it's the Chancellor of the Exchequer').

Isabel Hardman

Nick Clegg to tell business leaders: we’re your friends

Nick Clegg is giving a speech this evening in which he will try to re-sell the Liberal Democrats as friends of business. Admitting that he hasn't 'said enough' about the party's pro-business policies, he will tell the guests at Mansion House: 'Many in the corporate world do not - automatically - see the Liberal Democrats as natural allies. Perhaps that's because, most recently, we've rightly earned ourselves a reputation as loud critics of corporate irresponsibility… Not least in financial service following the crash in 2008. Yet, historically, the Liberal Democrats are a party of industrialists and small business… And, since coming into government, we've been taking decisions, day in, day out, to promote British business.

Isabel Hardman

Sir Mervyn King: Quantitative easing is reaching its limit

Quantitative easing isn't an eternal elixir of economic health. That was the admission from Bank of England Governor Sir Mervyn King last night at a speech in Cardiff. Sir Mervyn said there were limits to the BoE's policy of printing money to buy bonds, which could not 'continue indefinitely': 'One thing we can see clearly is that the recovery and rebalancing of the UK economy are proceeding at a slow and uncertain pace. At this stage, it is difficult to know whether some of the recent more positive signs will persist. The Monetary Policy Committee will think long and hard before it decides whether or not to make further asset purchases. But should those signs fade, the MPC does stand ready to inject more money into the economy. 'Printing money is not, however, simply manna from heaven.

Tuesday

23 October 2012

Isabel Hardman

Alex Salmond branded ‘liar’ over legal advice row as two MSPs resign

It has been a disastrous day for the Scottish National Party. Its majority at Holyrood has been cut to just one this morning after two MSPs - Jean Urquhart and John Finnie - quit the party in protest at its decision at its conference in Perth this weekend to end its opposition to Nato. Then Nicola Sturgeon gave a statement to the Scottish Parliament which led to her boss being branded a 'liar' by Labour as she admitted that the Scottish government has not yet sought legal advice on whether an independent Scotland would continue to be a member of the European Union.

Isabel Hardman

George Entwistle’s quietly savage attack on Newsnight editor Peter Rippon

George Entwistle seemed rather mild-mannered at his first appearance before the Culture, Media and Sport select committee this morning. But after listening to him for two hours, MPs were starting to suggest that the BBC director general was making a quietly savage attack on one of his juniors. It will be astonishing if, after Entwistle's evidence, Newsnight editor Peter Rippon is not called before the committee. Entwistle told the committee that he had asked Rippon to 'step aside because of my disappointment at the inaccuracies in the blog… he hasn't stepped aside to prepare or the Pollard review, he's stepped aside because of it'.

Isabel Hardman

Government to postpone badger cull

Conservative backbenchers will be wondering this morning whether they should bother replying to any letters from their constituents about any unpopular government policy. Environment Secretary Owen Paterson is to announce today that the planned badger cull will be postponed following concerns about its mounting cost. Defra is insisting that the delay, until next year at the earliest, is not a U-turn. This is accurate: the vehicle hasn't turned around in the road, it has run out of fuel and ground to a juddering halt. Studies had found that there were perhaps twice as many badgers as originally estimated, and many farmers feared they would not be able to afford to kill 70 per cent of this much larger population.

Isabel Hardman

Five questions for George Entwistle about Jimmy Savile

George Entwistle is appearing before a select committee for the first time this morning. It won't be a gentle start for the new BBC Director General, though. He is giving evidence to the Culture, Media and Sport committee from 10.30 on the Jimmy Savile scandal, and will face a slew of awkward questions from MPs. Here are five of the most pressing: 1. Why did he hold such a brief conversation about the implications of the Newsnight investigation for the rest of the BBC's output? Entwistle held a conversation with Helen Boaden last December in which she warned that the report would impact on the BBC's tribute to Savile. He will be grilled on the content of that conversation: particularly whether he asked for more details on the allegations themselves.

Monday

22 October 2012

Isabel Hardman

Government defeated on ‘poll tax mark two’

The government suffered an awkward defeat in the House of Lords this afternoon on its changes to council tax benefit. Rebels on an amendment to the Local Government Finance Bill calling for an independent review of the changes to be carried out within three years of their introduction included 16 Liberal Democrats. Labour has dubbed the changes, which will mean councils will have to design their own local schemes to help low-income households with council tax bills, the 'poll tax mark two' because two million families will have to contribute towards their council tax for the first time. Liberal Democrat Lord Shipley told the Chamber: 'The problems for individuals could be very severe in the face of so much change at once.

Isabel Hardman

Prime Minister auditions as his own press officer after shambolic week

In between confusing the Chamber just a little bit more on his European policy this afternoon, David Cameron appeared to be auditioning to work as his own press officer, reading out a list of the government's achievements such as falling unemployment and lower inflation figures over the past week to MPs, just in case they'd missed them, as evidence that Britain does have a great deal to offer to Europe. He had already taken pains to emphasise this earlier today after his crime speech, saying: 'We need to focus on the big picture. What actually happened last week is that unemployment fell, inflation fell, waiting lists in our hospitals fell, crime fell, the right decision was made about Gary McKinnon.

Isabel Hardman

Dave vs Angela, round 2

David Cameron appears to be looking for a suite of examples for his party that he's still fighting their corner. He's about to deliver his speech on offenders, and his spokesman has just suggested he's up for a real scrap on the European Union budget, too. The FT's splash this morning is that Angela Merkel is threatening to cancel next month's European budget summit if Britain refuses to approve any other deal than a total freeze on spending. The paper reports that Merkel believes there is no point in holding the summit if Cameron is going to veto any deal on the table. The problem for the German Chancellor is that if Cameron vetoes a deal, it will be good for him politically, but bad for Merkel as Germany will lose its rebate and therefore will have to contribute more.