So according to the Commons Standards and Privileges Committee there won’t be any obligation on MPs to release details on what family members who they employ have been doing for their money. I wonder, will that make it more or less likely that MPs will abuse the system in a Conway-esc fashion in the future?
Hmmm
One of my favourite political maxims is that you should never ‘make the perfect the enemy of the good’. For many years the Conservative Party did just that; arguing in favour of an ultimate ambition not shared by the majority of people and so preventing that ambition from being achieved - the party it seemed was incapable of taking baby steps, winning the war by winning smaller battles over time.
Today though with the proposal that the BBC licence fee should be ’shared’ with other broadcasters we see the Conservative Party heeding the maxim and ensuring that the perfect is far from the the enemy of the good.
It’s no secret that the bulk of the Conservative Party is opposed to the licence fee. After all it’s anti free market and accordingly offends the most basic of conservative economic principles. Of course the desire to see the end of the licence fee and the achievement of the end of the licence fee are two completely different things. The latter is not something that chimes with the public (if it did the fee would have been removed long ago) and accordingly an end to the licence fee cannot be achieved in one go. The end can come however through an incremental process and today we have seen the first step in that process being taken.
By proposing such a fundamental change in the way the licence fee works the Conservative Party has ignited the debate over the very nature of the licence fee and its legitimacy. The proposal itself is relatively innocuous; after all what can possibly be wrong with sharing? But it goes to the heart of how broadcasting works in this country. And with it the Conservative Party has set in motion a chain of events that ultimately leads to an end of the licence fee.
It’s fair to say the opening of Terminal 5 at Heathrow has been an absolute and unmitigated disaster. Flights have left without luggage, others have been cancelled, passengers have been stranded for hours on end, and one 25-year-old woman had to stuff her wedding dress into hand luggage to get it on the place because they couldn’t get her other baggage on the plane (oh yeah, she had to pay a taxi driver to take the baggage BA couldn’t check back to her flat).
But what did BA chief executive Willie Walsh have to say about it all? Did he try to play it down? Did he try to shift the blame? None of the above:
"British Airways has not delivered and we need to deliver [and] I am accepting responsibility, the buck stops with me."
Perhaps every single one of the certain Labour ministers could take a leaf out of Willie’s book and start taking responsibilities when things in their department don’t go quite right <cough>HMRC</cough>…
On the 11th August last year 20 year old Sophie Lancaster was kicked to death and her boyfriend was left for dead by two thugs who attacked them because of the way they dressed. In the eyes of Sophie’s killers she, and her boyfriend Robert deserved to die because they were goths. One attacker admitted guilt and the other has finally been convicted (having dragged out the ordeal for Sophie’s family, boyfriend, and friends by maintaining his innocence rather than acting with honour and admitting his guilt).
The final tragedy though is that the killers, aged 15 and 16 will ultimately be released from jail before their 40th birthdays, leaving them free to enjoy life despite denying another their own.
Many times in the past I have argued in favour of restorative justice, but I’m afraid when it comes to murder of the kind in this case there is no place for anything other than a sentence of life (where life means life).
Sophie was killed because she dressed a certain way, and one day her killers will go free and unhindered; where is the justice in that?
[In an aside it’s often not realised the extent to which individuals who belong to particular sub-cultures do come under physical and verbal assault. Just last weekend for example two close friends of mine (one a goth and one a metal-head) walked out of their local Tesco and noticed a car slow down as it approached them, the rear window was wound down and a man with a bandana covering his face leaned out. He proceeded to produce a paintball gun, fired it rapidly in their direction, hitting them repeatedly. Why were they hit? I wonder… could it have had anything to do with the way the looked? The BBC has an interesting piece on this issue.]
Dizzy has drawn my attention to something deeply worrying, an attempted act of authoritarianism that would make even those of the old-Left blush, an attempted act of authoritarianism though that New Labour (or rather New Brown Labour) is entirely comfortable with.
Some time ago there was a campaign, called the Save Parliament Campaign, to prevent the passing of the then Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill which if enacted would, in the words of CPS, "grant any minister the ability to amend, replace, or repeal existing legislation." Parliament would effectively have been neutered.
Fortunately the Bill did not pass (is it any wonder given the potential ramifications?), but that hasn’t stopped Labour swinging round for another shot (did somebody just say EU Constitution?).
Step forward the Draft Constitutional Renewal Bill.
Hidden deep within the Bill is the following:
"Part 6
FINAL PROVISION43 Power to make consequential provision
(1) A Minister o the Crown, or two or more Ministers of the Crown acting jointly, may by order make such provision as the Minister or Ministers consider appropriate in consequence of this Act.
(2) An order under subsection (1) may –
(a) amend, repeal or revoke any provision made by or an Act;
(b) include transitional or saving provision.
(3) An order under subsection (1) is to be made by statutory instrument.
(4) A statutory instrument containing an order under subsection (1) which amends or repeals a provision of an Act may not be made unless a draft of the instrument has been laid before and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament.
(5) A statutory instrument containing an order under subsection (1) which does not amend or repeal a provision of an Act is subject to annulment in pursuance of a resolution of either House of Parliament."
With this one section the very idea of parliamentary democracy would be swept away and replaced with an all powerful executive. What’s perhaps most disgraceful of all is that a provision with such staggering constitutional ramifications was to be sneaked in through the back-door; New Labour, New Britain, No Democracy.
Something tells me the Save Parliament Campaign is about to go through something of a re-birth.
This might come as a bit of a surprise but I supported the idea of ‘Blair Force Ones’. My position on it is pretty simple, when travelling around the world the Prime Minister and the Queen are representing the United Kingdom. From the moment they land on a foreign airstrip to the moment they take-off their job is to create the appropriate impression about our country - and to be fair that’s somewhat impeded by the fact they land in a British Airways plane.
I’m not saying that the mere fact of landing in a branded plane will suddenly revolutionise how we are viewed in the world, but there’s something to be said for the kind of effect Air Force One has; and there’s no reason we shouldn’t replicate it.
Anyway, that’s the first and last time you’ll hear me disagree with Brown over a decision not to increase public spending.
Listening to PMQs at the moment and Brown indirectly attacked the French government’s handling of their economy by comparing the rate of inflation in the UK with that in France. I wonder what Sarkozy might be thinking about that?
It seems Brown is taking the same approach to diplomacy as he does to the economy.
The Royal College of Nursing has expressed alarm at the number of British nurses leaving the UK to work in Australia. But is it really any surprise given the better work/life balance on offer, better working conditions, better pay, and better fringe benefits.
A friend’s mother is in charge of recruitment for one of the private health corporations in the US, and they’re about to start a big drive in the UK. Why? Because they know they’ll be able to hoover up nurses with what they can offer compared to what’s on offer here.
Welcome to the world of competition.
Just when you thought the Left’s hatred for the UK couldn’t get any worse the NUT decides to take a leaf out of UCL’s book and urge a ban on military recruitment in schools. You see according to the NUT the army et al are exploiting children from less affluent backgrounds. No really.
Apparently the armed forces aren’t making students fully aware of what they are getting themselves in for. It’s rare that I use this word, but on this occasion I shall - what absolute tosh. Certainly the army, and other branches of the armed forces, play up the advantages of joining (such as learning new and transferable skills), but they leave potential recruits in no doubt as to what might lie in store if they join.
I remember sitting in a room in Warminster being given a talk on life in the infantry, and the one thing I remember to this day was the office saying "but be in no doubt, as an infantry officer you may be ordered to hold a position in the full knowledge that to hold that position will mean your death." Needless to say the room was completely silent, and nobody was in any doubt as to what they could be letting themselves in for.