IAIN FAIL DUNCAN FAIL SMITH

By all rights, at the reshuffle of the UK cabinet last year, Iain Duncan Smith should have been fired for incompetence. The Quiet Man is quite simply hopeless.

But he's an ex-leader and therefore a man of some "standing" in the party despite his somewhat dubious past, plus he's a right winger and a possible focus for other, lesser known, right wing nut jobs, so, he was allowed to stay. In short because Cameron lacked the authority to sack him and get away with it.

But he has made an almighty mess of running his department, he has used doubtful statistics, and on several occasions he's just plain lied. 

Liam Byrne (another incredibly unlikeable soul) has summarised IDS's performance in an article for the Telegraph.

And like or dislike Byrne, you have to admit that he is right on this. That said, Byrne is pretty much behind the policies. It's just the way that they are being implemented and the fact that it's IDS and not Byrne himself getting the ministerial salary and perks that bothers him most.

So what does he say?

He points out firstly that the Work Programme has missed every single target that it set itself for the last 3 years. That's a pretty damning indictment. 

Then he moves to Universal Credit. The DWP promised only last year that a million people would be on this credit by 2014. Now they say that it is being rolled out to 10 jobcentres from October... and they are all in low unemployment areas. No one from the department is commenting on the number of people that this will cover, but it seems unlikely to be a twentieth of the number promised.

The Youth Contract has been a failure. It has missed 90% of its targets and the unemployment number for young people remains at around a million. A massive failure to the country and its young people.

Finally the Work Capability Programme has probably been the biggest ever fiasco. 

We had people being taken off benefits only weeks before their death from cancer. There are stories of vulnerable people being told by someone they accept as a doctor (although they may be a nurse or paramedic or hospital cleaner from what I can tell) telling them that they are fit for work, them believing it (some people take what a "doctor" says as gospel), and dying of heart attacks because of over exertion brought on by the belief that they are now well! 

Additionally, we have learned from whistleblowers, that Atos is working to targets and staff are under pressure, trained or not, to fail people to in order to keep to the company's profile. Both the BBC and Channel 4 have made documentaries (Panorama and Despatches) showing this. Of course these claims are denied, but I've never heard of a government department that doesn't work to targets and budgets, and I doubt very much that any outsourcing organisation doesn't have the same.

Atos has been audited independently and found to be failing to work to its contract. Hundreds of cases were found to have been determined without any logic or application of the rules (presumably in an attempt to meet the targets that the DWP and the Atos management swear do not exist). The company has done so badly that its monopoly is being taken away from it.

(It has, of course, only joined a long list of outsourcing companies which have been found to be dodgy, incompetent and stealing from the taxpayers.)

And of course the cost of tribunals and appeals has tripled since 2010.

So basically IDS 0/10.

Will the prime minister take his future in his hands and sack the monstrously incompetent cabinet secretary?

Probably not.  After all, who else has he got to put there?

PS... BBC report that there is a 5% increase in people dying in England and Wales this last year. I wonder if IDS has anything to do with that.

GORDON PRUDENCE BLOODY BROWN.... THANKS A LOT.

First he said that Britain wasn’t in recession. (Lies of course!) Then, when he admitted that it was, it was only because every other country in the world was in recession. (Lies of course!) Then he said that it was the best placed nation to lead the world out of recession because of his prudent management of the economy. (Lies, of course...unless by leading he means from behind, and after everyone else!)

Britain is the last of the G7 economies to emerge from economic decline. The slump, lasting six consecutive quarters, represents the UK’s worst recession since comparable records began in 1955. It is also a ridiculously slight emergence at an estimated growth rate of 0.1%.

So much for the financial genius of Mr Gordon “I’ve ended boom and bust” Brown.

According to the Times: There are growing fears that Britain could tip back into recession after figures showing that the economy staggered to growth at the end of last year. The tiny 0.1 per cent uplift achieved from October to December, far worse than most City economists expected, threw Labour and Conservative election tactics into confusion. Gordon Brown’s hopes of hailing a lasting recovery were dashed amid signs that the next three months could be as difficult as the last.

Conservative plans to promise immediate spending cuts also looked questionable as analysts suggested a double-dip recession, in which the economy moves out of negative growth briefly only to go back into a second downturn soon afterwards.

So it’s back to the drawing board for both of the major parties. (The SNP doesn’t count remember: Mr Murphy says so.)

But worse still: Sterling fell on foreign exchanges and fresh concerns were expressed over the government’s ability to tackle Britain’s budget deficit.

Bill Gross, co-founder of Pimco, which runs the world’s largest bond fund, urged investors to steer clear of UK government bonds. He wrote on his website: “Gilts are resting on a bed of nitroglycerine. High debt with the potential to devalue its currency present high risks for bond investors.”

Given that the finances of the UK have been in the hands of the same man for the last 13 years, is it not something of which he should be heartily ashamed? Has he not completely and utterly cocked up our whole financial situation and subjected us, and our children, to a hitherto unimagined debt?

Is he not a complete and utter failure, and the worst Prime Minister this country has ever had, bar none?

DO YOU REALLY WANT THIS MAN AS THE PRESIDENT OF THE EUROPEAN COUNCIL OF MINISTERS?

As time goes on it becomes more and more likely that the Czech president will sign into law the Lisbon Treaty, albeit against his better judgement, but in line with Czech law, and his duty. And as time goes on, it seems equally more and more likely that we shall have as the first President of the European Council one Anthony Charles Lynton Blair, millionaire and ex-Prime Minister of the UK.

There have been many reasons offered as to why Blair should President:

*That he is known all over the world;
*that he has clout;
*that he is a consummate negotiator.

Equally many reasons have been offered as to why he should not be President:

* that his home country is one of the least EU-friendly counties;

* that when he was Prime Minister he was not particularly EU positive;

* that his home country does not use the single currency, that is to say that there may be a conflict of interest;

* that his home country is not a member of the Schengen group;

* that his potential status as a war criminal is enough to preclude him. There's an investigation going on which could potentially call him out on that. Of course we know it won't and he will be found to be whiter than white and it will be everyone and anyone's fault but his. But the truth is that, whatever the result of the whitewash, we know that he went to war on the flimsiest of pretexts, when experts advised against it, and because George Bush told him to. We know too that Shock and Awe killed, injured and maimed tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians for no gain whatsoever. It’s not like Sadam was going to still be in Baghdad when all that was going on....just like Blair and the Queen would not have been in central London if the boot had been on the other foot;

*that his fascination with America and his propensity to do what the President of America instructs could provide yet another conflict of interest.

Whilst researching this piece I came across this information in an article in the Telegraph

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthcomment/geoffrey-lean/6418553/Why-boys-are-turning-into-girls.html

“Yet gender-benders are largely exempt from new EU regulations controlling hazardous chemicals. Britain, then under Tony Blair's premiership, was largely responsible for this – restricting their inclusion in the first draft of the legislation, and then causing even what was included to be watered down. Confidential documents show that it did so after pressure from George W Bush's administration, which protested that US exports "could be impacted".”

I hope that Mr Blair does not become the President of the European Council. I’m not particularly pro-Europe these days, but it is where I live, and I would have to live with the consequences of this man’s appointment. I believe he will bring dishonour to the role and the Union if he is “elected”to it.

James of “Scot goes Pop” and I have already had some chat on his blog about this and he makes interesting points. I’d be interested to hear what others think.


Update: I hear on the news that Mr Blair's chances in the race to become President have become unstuck or derailed or scuppered. I attribute this in part to the wise words of this article, doubtless read by all the leaders, but far more to the fact that yesterday evening Gordon Brown (the loser) spoke up for him.... Revenge is a dish best eaten cold Gordon, isn't it?