IT'S NOT EASY BEING HMRC

Sometimes, while glancing through the papers, you feel inclined to ask yourself if it’s April 1st again.

It was thus when I read the story in the Telegraph financial section about the tax office....again.

It seems our beloved Inland Revenue have been sending out letters telling people that they are owed sums of between a few pounds and £24,000. And of course like most of the stuff that comes out of that office ... it’s all rubbish!

They just don’t know how it happened. It’s a complete mystery to them doubtless. But they are looking into it very urgently. Yawn.

The trouble is that, as we already know from the last cock up, there are tens of thousands of people who ARE owed money, and if you get this letter, how are you to know which category you come into... those who ARE owed money because they made a mess of things, or those who are NOT owed money but got a letter anyway, because they....made a mess of things....?

Butt...Elbow....Elbow....Butt.... Nope, we didn’t think they’d be able to tell the difference.

As the picture at the top says "Check you're paying the right tax". They tell you to do that for yourself, because for sure HMRC won't have a clue.

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MARGARET MORAN MAY FACE CRIMINAL CHARGES

Oh Joy.....

At last the police are to investigate the behaviour of Margaret Moran, surely one of the worst offenders when it came to expenses.

Of course when the Telegraph released some details of how she had been fiddling, she was tout de suite on the telly saying that she would sue. That bravado (like Phil Woolas’s) disappeared when someone a bit brighter than her pointed out that...well, as she was guilty of all the Telegraph had printed and a good deal more, it might be better to shut up and hope it would go away.

It didn’t.

So today the Telegraph gets its own back on Mrs Moran for her little outburst by celebrating the fact that she is likely to be the 5th MP to be charged with abuse of taxpayer funded expenses. And in a lengthy article goes back over all of her little misdemeanours, including her most recent one, which unfortunately was caught on camera by undercover reporters working for a television programme.

The litany of alleged crimes for which she may be charged would make a lifer at H M Prison Barlinnie blush. False invoices, nonexistent companies, invented VAT numbers, work transferred from one address to another, some in houses which were not even hers, invoices for work which was never done, rejected claims re-presented with different wording...

...And of course turning up on a tv programme, being secretly filmed applying for a job as a lobbyist where she could use her influence (all girls together with Harriet Harman and Tessa Jowell) to help a private organisation seeking to have influence with the government. And all this, if you please, when she was signing off long term sick from parliament on full salary (having supposedly had a nervous breakdown over the expenses affair)...

Ho Hum... I can’t wait for this trial. I wonder if she will wear one of these idiotic hats (she must have got a job lot on expenses, orange, red....) to impress the judge...

A BITTER WINTER IS FORECAST

I’ve just read in the Daily Telegraph that long range weather forecasters are expecting a very cold winter with temperatures falling as low as -20C.

At the same time Ofgem is predicting that energy prices may rise by as much as 13% during the winter.

So if you put these two things together it looks like this winter will see many poor families and of course older people in real difficulties. The reduction in services forecast by many after the announcement by the Finance Secretary on the 20th of this month will also mean that pensioners will have a harder time coping. It is also a possibility that, despite a categorical denial prior to the election, winter fuel payments, or their scope, may be reduced.

It makes me sad, and ashamed to live in a country where on average somewhere between 2500 and 3000 old people die of cold related illness every winter, with a higher proportion being in Scotland due to the longer and colder winter.

Why can’t the British government do what the French government does and limit the increase in fuel prices to the inflation rate? That would at least put people’s minds at rest a little.

Private companies are only in the supply of energy business for one reason... and that is to make a profit. If they do it on the backs of pensioners, or poor people, who have to choose between eating and heating, so be it. Shareholders still expect their dividend and directors need their bonuses. Governments have to step in and make sure that their people don’t die of cold. We expect no less of them. Labour didn’t. Perhaps the Tories will

The article linked here gives some very obvious advice about getting boilers checked and insulating homes, so it may be worth a read if you can afford the expense involved in the suggestions.

Let’s hope that the weather forecasters and Ofgem are wrong... and that the government has the decency to look after the poor.

THE JOYS OF ISLAND LIFE...

There’s a really funny story in the paper copy of today’s 'Press and Journal' concerning a school on the Shetland island of Papa Stour which is to reopen after 5 years to accommodate a family coming from England to live on one of the crofts.

Shetland Council agreed to appoint a teacher, a relief teacher, and a part time clerical assistant for the tiny school which serves the island with a population of just 12, after a request from the local councillor requested it. The English family’s coming was dependent upon there being educational facilities available for their two children. He said that a price could not be put on the rebirth of a community on the edge of extinction. (There is only one remaining native “Stourian” left on the island.)

In fact the law requires that adequate provision be made for education, so the authorities were advised that there was no alternative to re-opening the school.

It was closed in 2005 after Jane Walker, the mother of the only children in it, withdrew her two offspring after a “difference of opinion” with the teacher. It seems that this teacher Simon Calvin had given a statement to the police after her (Mrs Walker’s) husband had emptied a bucket of dog dirt over the head of a local minister. Mr Walker was subsequently fined £600 at Lerwick Sheriff Court after pleading guilty to assault on the Rev Adrian Glover.

The story does not relate what the poor minister had done to deserve such treatment, what happened to the poor teacher who was left with 100% withdrawal of his pupils, or if the Walkers remained on the island after such reprehensible behaviour.

And you probably thought that life on a tiny island was hard but idyllic.

Huh!

....

MORE TROUBLE AT DEFENCE?

Tory supporting paper The Mail on Sunday reports today that Liam Fox’s ministerial team at the Defence Ministry is a hundred per cent behind him in his fight to retain the funding necessary for the armed forces to retain current strength.

It appears that the three Tory ministers, Gerald Howarth, Peter Luff and Andrew Robathan are prepared to walk if Mr Fox doesn’t get his way against George Osborne. (The other ministers in the department are Liberal Nick Harvey and Tory Lord Astor.)

Last month a letter from the Defence Secretary to the Prime Minister, complaining about the draconian cuts, was leaked to the press, possibly with the tacit agreement of some of the ministers. Cameron was said to be furious about the leak and Osborne was incandescent that Fox was going over his head.

Fox at that time was supported by retired and current military chiefs. Now it appears his ministerial team two of whom have military backgrounds, is with him, whereas “a” Conservative MP is quoted as saying that Cameron and Osborne are a different breed of Tory with no connection to the armed forces.

Of course this is an article in the Mail on Sunday, and as such comes with the health warning “this article may have been written to sensationalise the situation and may have absolutely no connection whatsoever with the truth”. But if it is true, it means either a painful about turn for Osborne, or an embarrassing walk out by the Defence Team. We kind of expected it to be the Unions that were doing the walking out this winter... not ministers.

The trouble, I suppose, is that we are all for the cuts that will affect other people and against the ones that will hurt us. Mr Fox and his team are no different to anyone else in that respect.

POOR BANKERS

The Committee of European Banking Supervisors’ recommendations for new rules to contain the worst excesses of the people who nearly brought our country and many others to the brink of ruin, and whose debts we will be paying for a generation or more, contain the following points:

• Curbs to apply in all parts of company inside and outside EU
• Non-performance related golden parachutes banned
• Up-front bonuses subject to claw back
• Big bonuses not to be awarded purely in up-front cash
• Should be an appropriate rate between base pay and bonuses
• 40%-60% of variable remuneration to be deferred for 3-5 years
• Governments must be repaid before bonuses paid
• Contracts must be subject to regulations
• Information on remuneration to be made available to shareholders
• No multiple-year contracts.

This has apparently left the City in an uproar.

Angela Knight, chief executive of the British Bankers’ Association, and patronizing woman, has told us that companies might very well relocate elsewhere outside of the EU and that the UK will lose the millions that they pay in taxes every year, perhaps forgetting that we had to bail them out with billions, and there is no guarantee that it won’t happen again in fairly short order.

I can’t see anything unreasonable about the regulations. The bankers remind me of BBC executives and civil servants with their “We could get more elsewhere” attitude. Frankly I doubt very much that many of them want to live in Mumbai or Hong Kong, and if they do, in order to satisfy their extreme greed, then good riddance.

I’m sick of us ordinary people having to pander to other people’s greed in order to retain their incomparable services... the British Civil Service who seem to be incapable of getting anything right, the BBC, for which we have to pay if we want to watch any television at all, on pain of criminalization, and bankers, who light cigars with £100 notes.

So GO, I say, if you can't behave like human beings, but you don't go until you pay every halfpenny back and if that breaks you...so be it.

HAPPY RETIREMENT DESMOND

One of the truly inspiring men of the last century turns 79 this week and steps down from public life in order to spend some time with his family. Actually he is going to take his wife round the world.

Archbishop Desmond Tutu is surely a great man. His bravery fighting against the apartheid regime in South Africa is legendary; as legendary as his giggle.

I don’t think I will ever forget seeing him vote in 1994 in the first elections in the liberated South Africa: the first time he had ever voted in his life. It was a joy to see the enthusiasm and excitement of this then 62 year old man doing what all of us had been entitled to do since we were 18, and he, intelligent and educated man though he was, had been barred from doing, because of the colour of his skin.

His sense of humour must have sustained him through the hard years of being a second class citizen.

One of the little tales he tells goes like this:

"When the missionaries came they had the Bible and we had the land. And they said 'Close your eyes and let us pray.' And we dutifully did so, but when we said 'Amen' and opened them, we had the Bible and they had the land."

I hope he has a wonderful holiday, and then comes back to spread his infectious enthusiasm for life a little bit more.

FIRST MINISTER'S QUESTIONS: OCTOBER 7, 2010

First Minister’s Questions started with Alex Salmond paying tribute to the memory of Donald Dewar on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of his death.

And so to business:

Well, after the drubbing that Iain Gray took after last week’s performance, a concoction of confusion and mixed up facts that caused disquiet in Eire, you might have expected him to have done some double checking for this week’s session. But no, in typical Elmer Fudd style he started, and continued for the entire time to insist that nurses in Grampian have been asked to work for nothing. This despite the First Minister pointing out on four occasions that this simply was not true. However, it gave the First Minister the chance to point out that patient satisfaction was at an all time high, and waiting times at an all time low. The English government has guaranteed that health spending will be maintained and the SNP has said that the “consequential” will be protected in the same way. The FM was able to point out that Iain Gray had not been able to make the same commitment.

Annabel Goldie’s questions focussed on the serious drugs problems in the country and in particular the number of methadone scripts being issued. Alex replied that that he was pleased that politicians had achieved a cross party co-operation on drugs strategy which was centred on recovery. £26.8 million was being spent on frontline recovery programmes. He was, however, happy to look at any proposals to increase effectiveness of translating the strategy into successful practice.

Tavish’s question about Cabinet meetings prompted the First Minister to pay tribute to Eilish Angolini, Scotland’s Lord Advocate, who has been in post for 10 years. The Liberal leader went on to question the FM on the possibility of a single police force for Scotland, which he said would be unpopular in the North, South and East of the country. This gave Alex a chance to point out that current statistics show a 36% reduction in crime and a record clear-up rate. He refused to rule in or out changes to the structure of policing, but he pointed out that 25% of the total police budget is spent on head office functions, over eight forces, and that that was far too much.

Backbench questions included a discussion (based on various questions across the chamber) on the problems of children of alcoholic parents, which give the first minister the opportunity to demand support from the chamber on minimum pricing, a policy which, he said was widely supported by health professionals, and to point out to a Conservative member that it was rather inconsistent to call for more heath visitors whist calling for less public spending. Business rates’ appeals was another question which gave Alex the opportunity to show the improvements in the situation which had occurred since the SNP took power.

Once again sensible questions were dealt with in a serious manner, but where the questioner attempted to make political points the FM demolished their arguments.

A rather dull question time all in all.....

YOUR COUNTRY NEEDS YOU

So, my country needs me. And if I help David Cameron create the Big Society, then within a few years we can reap the rewards and we can all be rich and successful.

But we must ALL pull together in the (British) national interest and soon everything will be peaches and cream.

Right.

And then the fairy god mother gave me a big kiss and, in keeping with the season, I turned into a pumpkin.

Jam tomorrow. I’ve heard it all my life. It never happens.

This afternoon Mr Cameron gave his conference speech which even his biggest fans would have been hard pressed to call stirring. He told the faithful (and the not so faithful, still angry that they were going to lose some money in the child benefit) that "The big society is ................ an attempt to create a citizenship that is not simply a transaction in which you put your taxes in and get your services out. When we say 'we are all in this together'", he intoned in a serious voice, "that is not a cry for help, but a call to arms."

A call to arms? What on earth is he on about?

I had no part in causing any of this mess. It is a mess caused by bankers, finance people, government and a compliant parliament. It’s all very well blaming Labour, but where was the opposition to credit gone crazy? Did the shadow chancellor not realize it was happening? Did he not understand it? Or was he making too much money from it all?

In a mad rush to get rich bankers and their management took wild mad gambles and made obscene amounts of money. The government truly believed its own spin, in a mind blowing conceit and incredible stupidity, that it had delivered the impossible: an end to boom and bust, and the back benchers were too busy filling in their expense forms, buying, selling and flipping their houses to bother with that kind trivia.

They got us into this mess. I, like everyone else, will have to pay, through higher taxes and fewer services, but that’s an end to my participation in whole nasty mess. I’m certainly not taking any part in his Big Society. So he can stuff it!

.........

PS: Is it me, or does Mrs Cameron have a hole in her dress?

David Cameron wants Independence Poll? Either that or he does not know what he is talking about: You choose!

David Cameron has been to a Scottish reception at the Tory's Birmingham conference where he has said he is ready to fight an independence referendum if the SNP "ever have the courage" to call one.

This begs a few questions, not least of which is that it finally seems to lay to rest the spectre of the Scottish Parliament not actually having the competence to call a referendum on Scotland’s future. A lot of quislings have argued that the Scotland Act does not allow the Scottish Parliament to decide its own future in this way and that only the Westminster Assembly has this competence. The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom seems to disagree with that supposition and is clearly of the opinion that the Scottish Parliament can decide for itself re independence. Thanks for clearing that up David!

Either that of course or he does not know his armpit from his proverbial and has just opened his mouth a made Scottish policy on the hoof rather as he is doing in England by bribing married couple the day after he pinches their universal child benefit and gets a bad headline in the Daily Mail.

Much more likely that it is one of these gray areas that will only be decided when it is decided if you know what I mean! Rather like Wallace Simpson not being made an HRH because once given it can’t be taken away until of course they do when they take away Princess Diana’s.

This is all great fun I know and raises a question about whether the much talked about coming independence of his Scottish colleagues is going to be anything like that at all, when he seems to be able to decide policy for them, without reference. (Rather like Wendy Alexander did when she unexpectedly bounced the Labour party into wanting a referendum for a short while with her “bring it on” moment.)














He went on to show that he has no real grasp or respect for Scotland and its issues by saying that the nationalists did not look likely to hold one soon. Clearly he is not aware that his own party north of the border are part of the reason for the SNP reluctance to have a referendum. They were after all part of the Unionist block that said they would vote against the proposal without even reading it first.

He also said he wanted to see a "full recovery" of the Scottish Tory Party. Huh fat chance! When he clearly has no idea whether he is coming or going north of the border and wont even give his own Scottish party the respect due never mind that agenda much talked about in Tory circles but more evident in gas than in actual “respect agenda”.

The SNP rather predictably said that if Mr Cameron wanted a referendum he should call on the Scottish Tory leader to support one QED. Another own goal by the Tories!

When will the Unionists wake up and smell the coffee? Instead of these never ending mixed messages, why don’t they just give the SNP its referendum and let them lose it? If I were them I would stop dancing to the SNPs tune push through a referendum bill, attach a clause that says there wont be another one for 25 years and let the SNP lose, as all polls show they surely must. Would that not be the end of the SNP?

"Nothing will remain intact": There's a cheering thought!

The country has accepted that there would have been cuts regardless of which party was elected.

Many people are happy that government will become smaller, and Tories in particular have been rejoicing that the size of the state, which no one would deny has grown hugely over the last 13 years, is to be cut drastically.

By the same token no one is dreadfully happy when the cuts affect them.

I’ve heard pensioners complaining about the tax they pay for all wasted services for “these young people”, or the “unemployed”, and who have welcomed the cuts with open arms, point out that of course they mustn’t cut anything for them.

Yesterday I heard a Tory activist at the conference say that whist she was all for the cutting agenda of Mr Cameron’s government, she was very angry at the cuts in child benefit because she had just had her first baby. She seemed totally oblivious to how utterly selfish that made her sound. “Cut everything but me”.

Today’s carry on, for I can’t think of much else to call it, has been an unedifying spectacle. Upset by the reaction of middle England, as represented by the Daily Mail, it seems to have been a mad scramble to recoup lost ground with the core support.

First of all it was announced that there is to be a married couples allowance brought in before the next election, but Tory ministers knew nothing about it, much less their Liberal colleagues (indicating that it had been dreamed up overnight by the damage limitation team). Then we have had Dave doing a series of television interviews to tell us that he is sorry; he really should have said before the election that he was going to cut Child Benefit, whereas, in fact, the tv stations easily found the clip of George telling conference last year that it would NOT happen.

Confusion abounds as no one is sure how much this married couples allowance is, with various people saying that it will be as little as £150 per annum and others saying it will be much more; and now it seems that the reduction in Child Benefit will affect more people than previously thought because of coming changes in tax thresholds.

Now (according to the Times) a senior Cabinet Minister talking about universal benefits has said that nothing will remain intact. So there are pensioners all over the country worrying about free tv licences; or whether the winter fuel payments of £250, (or £400 for over 80s) will be abolished, or cut, or means tested.

Additionally, it has been pointed out that, if these cuts are being made to assure the international money markets that Britain means business and the economy is in safe hands, then today’s confusion, back pedalling and policy making by the Daily Mail, will have done the AAA rating no earthly good!

If they know what cuts are to be made it’s time we were put out of our misery and told about them.

And it’s time the government got a grip. They are running around like headless chickens more reminiscent of a government which has been in power for 10 years and has run out of talent than one which is fresh off the opposition benches.

NADINE WOULD RATHER DIE....

Lordy, oh Lordy. Nadine Dorries ^^ is a corker.

At a fringe meeting at the Tory conference she announced that she would rather die than fight the next election with the Liberals, whom apparently the dear old soul has been fighting all her life.

She went on to describe her latest Liberal opponent as being like a Japanese prisoner of war...still fighting the war. I thought that prisoners of war didn’t actually fight any more, but it’s a small point.

She said that there was no future after the next election for a Liberal-Conservative alliance, however, I suspect that she may change her mind if the Tories require the Liberals, once again, to keep them from opposition or minority government and continual defeats.

Still Nadine is a bit of an old drama queen. You’ll remember she promised us suicides over the expenses scandals.

Suicides? Nah, I should say not. They might have been miffed that they had been caught out and even angrier that the gravy train had been temporarily halted, but most of them had loads of lovely lolly to spend... ours... They weren’t about to top themselves!!

Known variously as "Mad Nad" and the Conservatives' answer to Heather Mills or Sarah Palin, Nadine doesn't like Cameron as party leader: "He represents everything that through my life I'd been suspicious of." she said of her new leader.

Ew er... I'm sure not "everything" Nads. Most people are suspicious of second hand car salesmen, and people trying to sell double glazing on the phone.

Dorries's somewhat inventive interpretation of "facts" undermines causes supported by Cameron. In her fight against late-term abortion, she propagated an internet rumour that a 21-week-old foetus could punch through an incision in a womb.

And boy does she hate John Bercow, which is pretty much at odds with the Tory leader's recent support for him.



So maybe Cameron is hoping that this time she actually means it.... and he and Nick are plotting a long term relationship.

TERRORIST THREAT IN EUROPE GROWING

The Foreign Office has warned of a high level threat of attacks in France and Germany as it followed the USA, telling its citizens to take care when travelling.

The Foreign Office advice is that the attacks could be indiscriminate, including in places frequented by expatriates and foreign travellers.

Apparently authorities in Britain last week intercepted an al Qaida-linked terror which would reportedly have been similar to the deadly commando-style raids in Mumbai.

On Tuesday night the Eiffel Tower had to be evacuated for the second time in 2 weeks following a bomb threat. On Friday, even Sweden announced it has raised its threat alert to the highest level ever because of an increased threat of terror attacks.

It seems that Osama bin Laden could be masterminding these latest plots himself.

The UK Home Secretary said Britain was working closely with other countries including the US on counter-terrorism. The USA’s advice included the warning that particularly vulnerable sites might be public transport systems and other tourist infrastructure.

We should all be a bit wary and keep our eyes open. Of course the smaller and more insignificant the town you live in the safer you are likely to be. But areas where there are likely to be large numbers of tourists, Edinburgh, Inverness for example are apparently most vulnerable.

Let’s hope that Mr Obama, the Palestinian President and the Israeli Prime Minister can sort something out that will bring forward peace in the near east very soon, and that we have the good sense to get ourselves out of Afghanistan in short order.

The plight of people in Palestine and Israel and the interference of NATO in Afghanistan together with the needless killings and torture of civilians there, are the main reasons that this terrorism will not go away.

DARK LOCHNAGAR: THE UK HAS SQUANDERED SCOTLAND'S OIL WEALTH-JOSEF STIGLITZ

DARK LOCHNAGAR: THE UK HAS SQUANDERED SCOTLAND'S OIL WEALTH-JOSEF STIGLITZ

You just have to look at this post. It's 3 minutes of your life well spent.

AN OBVIOUS SAVING WITH NO PAIN

Apparently (well according to the Daily Mail on Sunday rag) Labour used to spend £4000 on Christmas trees for numbers 10 and 11 Downing Street.

A large Christmas tree stands each year in the hall of No 11 Downing Street, and George Osborne was asked if he wanted the same as they had every year. It would cost £800. He said “No. I will go down to the market and buy one myself”.

I applaud that Mr Osborne. That will indeed save us £800. However, I suspect that you won’t go down the market. An £800 Christmas tree is something that will have to be delivered, then it will have to be dressed and the lights on it alone will cost a fortune of our money in electricity to run.

And this is for what is essentially an office. Mr Osborne doesn’t actually live downstairs at No 11. There’s a flat at the top (a rather splendid one, but a flat none the less), and the personal accommodation is there. The rest is office space.

So, if we really don’t want to waste money, why don’t we have a policy that no government department, no state office, will have a Christmas tree this year. That will save a fortune in tree purchasing and in lighting. And it has the advantage of being good for the environment.

And no, it's not anti-Christian. People can still have their Christmas trees at home, and if businesses want to buy them for town centres to encourage more spending, then that's fine too. As long as it is not public money being spent on unnecessary baubles.

As a Christmas tree has actually nothing to Christmas, I’m sure that Christ would have preferred the money to be spent on the poor.

I’d encourage our government to adopt the same policy!

I should be the Finance Minister!

Pics: Mr Osborne, and trees, where they look best, in the wild.

THE V & A AT DUNDEE BUILDING DESIGN

The V&A at Dundee’s main function will be, according to their website, to showcase Scottish design talent, provide a UK base for major international touring exhibitions, and promote a wider understanding and application of design.

The design of its own building is at present under discussion and there are now 6 “finalists” from whose work the building will be chosen.

As suggested by somepapfaedundee in an earlier post, I took a trip down this afternoon to Abertay University’s library to have a look at models and details of the designs. Having only previously seen poor quality pics in the local evening paper, it came as a bit of a surprise to me to see the models up close.

Out of geographical context (and it has to be, because the building will be in a totally redeveloped waterfront area of the city), it is difficult to make a sound judgement about which building is the most aesthetically suitable or pleasing. Interestingly the new building will actually be built out into the river itself and it’s important to take that into consideration when considering the design and materials.

Of course whatever design is chosen, it will displease more people than it will please, but at least the authorities (The V + A, our two universities, the local council and Scottish Enterprise) are giving the public a say in which of the shortlisted designs will be built.

My preference is for the offering from “Rex”, a design company based in New York City, or the Norwegian Snøhetta’s design. Unfortunately, given the remit of the facility to promote Scottish design, the only Scottish offering is, in my opinion, dull and looks more like an electricity generating plant than a museum of art and design.

Better photographs and more details of the architects, the buildings, and how they might fit into what may be there when the whole waterfront is redeveloped, can be seen on the website linked here.

I’d be interested in anyone else’s opinions....

The pics here show, 1 Sutherland Hussie (Edinburgh); 2 Steven Holl (New York + Beijing); 3 Snøhetta (Oslo); 4 Rex (New York); 5 Kengo Kuma (Tokyo and Paris); 6 Delugan Meissl (Vienna).

THIS WEEK'S FMQ'S IS OVER AT SUBROSA'S PLACE

Subrosa and I have agreed to take week about at writing up a short report on the spectacle of comedy that is First Minister's Questions at Holyrood.

This week it's her turn. You can find her report and a video of the proceedings here

HAZEL BLEARS CAUGHT OUT, YET AGAIN

Hazel Blears must be one of Labour’s biggest liabilities in their search for a new path and a return to government. Having fiddled at every turn, (although the police found nothing over which they could prosecute her) and good Blairite as she is, done her best to undermine Gordon Brown, she went on tv to wave about a cheque for £13,000 that she had “withheld” from the Inland Revenue, as if she was doing us all a massive favour.

Despite all that she did; all the nest lining and troughing, she was re-elected to her constituency, albeit with a reduced majority. What hope is there for the country if we elect that calibre of MP. And that calibre of MP is promoted to Cabinet level.

I’ve never come across a less able or seemingly less intelligent cabinet minister. And Mrs Blears is also a not to terribly accomplished liar. The above video shows her being caught on lying though her teeth in another “rock the boat” moment on the Daily Politics Show.

ROW OVER DEFENCE CUTS DEEPENS

It would have seemed reasonable to suppose that the first threat to David Cameron’s authority would have been from a Liberal Democrat (and let’s face it the only one with the balls to do that is Vince Cable).

But it appears that that challenge has come from Liam Fox whose letter to Cameron about cuts to the Armed Forces was leaked to and published by the Daily Telegraph yesterday. The public support for Fox from military commanders has angered Cameron, but he has issued a statement saying that he supports the Defence Secretary.

But for all that support Cameron and George Osborne told Fox to find even more cost-cutting measures and rejected Fox’s attempts to shield the Navy from the brunt of the cuts.

Mr Fox's letter warned of "grave consequences” if the defence budget were to be cut by 10%. But the next day the National Security Council met and ordered Fox to make even deeper cuts. It looks like Cameron has decided that the navy and naval equipment is not to be spared, which may be very bad news for shipbuilding on the Clyde.

However it seems that there is, as you would expect, massive support within the senior ranks of the military for what Fox is doing. This may be the first time for a very long time that the senior officers are behind the defence secretary, even if that puts them at loggerheads with the prime minister. Big name after big name, Dannatt, Jackson, Muxworthy, Williams have backed Fox, and of course Labour’s Ainsworth joined in to make a political point, as if he wasn’t a complete dead loss as Defence minister.

Given all the publicity, and indeed criticism of the last government for starving our soldiers of the funds to do the job in Afghanistan, it seems almost unbelievable that the prime minister will not go along with Fox’s demands.

And what a bonus we are throwing the Taliban. Now they know that the US has a timetable for withdrawal and they know that Britain is too broke to stay in the country, they must be rubbing their grubby hands with joy at the thought of getting rid of the enemy and then their corrupt, mentally unstable president, whom you will remember we helped them elect, and going back to exactly where they were in 2001!

Cameron is unmoved by all the pleading and Osborne is incandescent with rage telling ministers not to go over his head to the Prime Minister.

I make no bones about it; Liam Fox is, from everything I have ever read about him, one of the most unappealing men you could hope to meet. He is a bigot and he is a fiddler and he tried to cover who paid his expenses on trips to Sri lanka. But this time i think he is right. No matter what kind of a mess the Labour government left the country in, we are at war. It is utterly vital that the men we have sent fight in this idiotic conflict are given the very best equipment and support possible.

If not David Cameron will find himself in the same position as Gordon Brown, when troops turn their backs on him and refuse to speak to him or shake his hand.

If you and your chancellor, who have never served, insist on 10% cuts Mr Cameron, I think that the country will expect you to remove our troops from the war immediately. Nothing less will do.

Just as an afterthought. The MoD has to make savings of 10%. Cabinet ministers took a pay reduction of 5%. Is it me or is there an us and them situation going on here?

Pics: Liam Fox, Richard Dannatt

SO WHAT REALLY IS WRONG WITH ED?

I hope you will excuse me returning to the same subject today. I promise not to become obsessed with it....

It’s just that I’m not sure why it is that people are so surprised, shocked and hurt for poor wee David Miliband, and why they think that Ed is some sort of evil Enver Hoxha or Kim Jong Il figure waiting to collectivize our farms and have the workers march to victory sweeping the aristocracy away in their efforts to create a Stalinist of Maoist state.

Dealing with David’s hurt feelings is easy. He’s in politics for heaven’s sake. At the age of 29 he was head of the Blair policy unit, and at 41 the youngest Foreign Secretary since David Owen. He didn’t get there by being sensitive. He has some wounded pride. He needs to get over it. He’s got the punching power to end up in charge of something else, somewhere else. Don’t waste your sympathy on him. His type could fall off the top of the Scott Monument and walk away. Clearly his wife wanted it badly enough to cry, but she’ll get over that too. Like I say, he’ll survive.

Of course, in a way I can see why the Conservatives would rather have had David Miliband. There would be no serious opposition to anything they are doing. Miliband wouldn’t much mind how quickly the deficit is paid off; he would side with Cameron on constitutional issues against Clegg. One would wonder if Labour wouldn’t just join the coalition and leave opposition to the Celtic fringe countries.

The Daily Mail (of all papers) summarized Miliband the younger’s speech at the bottom of a particularly vitriolic piece by the chateratti commentator Quentin Letts (see above; click for readable size). What is terribly “Red” about any of this stuff?

* He says that it was wrong to go into Iraq. So did the Tories before the election. They said if they had known all the facts they wouldn’t have agreed to the invasion(!)

* He says he will have no truck with gratuitous striking and tells the unions they should not either. Can’t argue with that.

* He says that it’s wrong that a banker (of the gambling type) can earn more in one day than a care worker does in a year. Well, is it right, remembering that both these sets of people are state employees in many cases?

* He wants to see the banks lending to medium and small businesses. Doesn’t everyone, given that they provide jobs and are, or should be, the life blood of the country?

*He points out that there is no merit in paying off the entire deficit if we do not build a society worth living in. Can’t argue much with that, can you? Getting the economics right is no good if everyone hates living here.

* He agrees that Labour let too many foreigners. Most Tories must be pleased about that, surely? (Even if Vince Cable has pointed out that a sad lack of indigenous skills training over 30 years does mean that we actually do need them, and he is backed in that by the Tories’ friend, big business.)

The rest is navel gazing, but frankly no one would have said anything different. I mean, it isn’t our fault we don’t like Labour. It’s Labour’s fault we don’t like Labour.

Any thoughts?

THE LABOUR PARTY STARTS TO UNPICK BEFORE OUR VERY EYES

Ed Miliband's first conference speech as Labour leader may have been slightly overshadowed after David Miliband, who was sitting in the audience, was caught mouthing something to Harriet Harman who was sitting next to him.

Despite his public show of loyalty it’s clear that David is far from pleased, and his wife is said to be raging about the election.

In his speech Ed disowned a huge amount of what New Labour had done. He condemned tuition fees, lack of any real regulation of the City, and Brown's idiotic claim to have ended boom and bust.

However, when he got to the Iraq war, he described the decision to invade as "wrong". That was when his brother reacted. Miliband Snr turned to Labour deputy leader Harriet Harman who was sitting next to him applauding and said: "You voted for it, why are you clapping?"

Harman replied: "I'm clapping because he is the leader. I'm supporting him."

Shortly after that Ed mentioned that he had been nicknamed Forest Gump by some of David’s supporters, and the cameras swung to David who was shaking his head.

I doubt that in all honesty David Miliband will stay as a member of the shadow cabinet, but if he goes, and particularly if he resigns his seat so that he can carry on his ambitious career elsewhere, he is going to look like a huffy little man who didn’t get what he wanted, and surely Labour has had enough of that kind at the helm.... so they may have had a narrow escape.

After his own speech on Monday, when he made an appeal for Labour to unify behind Ed, his wife Louise was spotted in floods of tears backstage, and it is said that she is extremely angry that Ed stood, after he apparently advised David not to try to oust Brown a year and more ago. That he won by the narrowest of margins, and thanks to the section of the party that these people like the very least...the trade unionists....must be the saddest of blows to the Milibands Senior.

When asked about it, Ed said he hadn't seen it. He went on to praise his brother for his support in response to his speech.

David Miliband may not be the only person to have trouble with things that were said. Ed made it clear that he was against the tight restrictions the last government introduced, curtailing personal liberty with the excuse of the Bush/Blair “war against terror”. This put him at odds with Postman Pat, another trade unionist. And Ed has backed Ken Clarke’s policies of intelligent sentencing, which Jack Straw described as madness. (Jack Straw is more of a Michael Howard type of man.)

We shall see what the next few days bring, but as the papers are totally obsessed with this, now might be a good time to bury bad news as Labour comes apart at the stitches.

(In the second picture wee Spud looks as if he doesn't even recognise the guy on the platform, don't you think?)

THE OPPOSITE OF 'NOBLE' IS 'IGNOBLE'

Our last story featured two men who have given a reasonable amount of money from their salaries to charity. Yes, they could afford to do it, but they most certainly didn’t have to. Their acts not only have benefited the charities that they favoured, but will have put pressure on other people in the Edinburgh scene to copy their acts of generosity.

Then there is “Lord” Ashcroft.

He was given a seat in the House of Lords, in the parliament of the UK, in 2000 after agreeing that he would live here and pay tax on his worldwide income. He gave his word to that effect to William Hague, the then leader of the Opposition, who boasted that Ashcroft's decision would benefit the Treasury to the tune of tens of millions of pounds a year.

However, 10 years later, Mr Ashcroft admitted that he had lied to his friend and had, in fact, never bothered to fulfil the conditions of his peerage, safe in the knowledge that, once given, a life peerage cannot be revoked.

Some friend! His actions, or rather inaction, has caused doubt to be cast on the judgement of Hague, who accepted him at his word and did not bother to check that these tens of millions were pouring into the Treasury coffers.

On April 6 of this year, as a result of the revelations in the Daily Telegraph and Times about the criminal activities and near-the-knuckle goings on in “their Lordships’ House”, Labour brought in a new law forcing Lords to pay tax on their worldwide income and assets.

So..... on April 5 of this year "His Nobleness" did what any money grubbing, second rate tightwad would do. He transferred ownership of his main UK company to a trust for the benefit of his children, who otherwise, of course, would be penniless when he died, thus saving the Treasury the bother of collecting millions in tax.

Interestingly, a month before the new law took effect Ashcroft said that he agreed with the new tax rules for the House of Lords. He left out that he didn’t agree with them for himself... only for other lesser lords.

None of this has strictly been illegal. Certainly, putting your money into a Trust so the Treasury can’t get their greedy hands on it, is perfectly legal. Many people have done it, including famously the Wintertons, so that they could avoid tax and continue to receive rent payments on an apartment they now owned (because we had paid the mortgage for them). It’s greedy, it’s despicable and it’s tax avoidance, which the government is pledged to reduce, but it’s legal.

The earlier stuff about lying to the leader of the Opposition in order to have him recommend you for a peerage is also probably not illegal. Ashcroft did some sort of a deal with the Treasury behind Hague’s back so he covered himself there. Our man is far too smart to actually break the law.

But doesn’t it contrast sharply with the previous story of decent men?

No wonder he is set to stand down as deputy chairman of the Tory party. He is not a credit to them, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Cameron had put his foot under the ignoble lord’s fat backside.

BBC’s Panorama, tonight at 8.30 is entitled “Lord Ashcroft’s Millions”. It should be worth an hour of our lives.

CHARITABLE MOVES BY TWO TOP LEGAL FIGURES IN EDINBURGH

The Sunday Post carries a story which shows three people in rather a good light.

The first of these is Paul McBride QC, who as a member of the Scottish Legal Aid Board (SLAB), working a few days a month for them, is entitled to a salary of £9,000 + expenses for each of the next four years.

He has decided to do the work pro bono and, as such, has given up in the region of £40,000. The work of SLAB is to administer civil and criminal aid payments in Scotland.

Mr McBride, who is one of Scotland’s top QCs, said that he thought that, with the level of constraint in the country at present, it was appropriate for those who could afford to, to set an example. He had been highly critical of Kenny MacAskill’s decision to release the Lockerbie bomber last year, and his re-appointment to the board, a post in the gift of the Scottish government, had come as a surprise to many in the legal profession not least himself.

Mr McBride said that he had appreciated the “non-partisan” gesture by Mr MacAskill, and had decided that he would donate his salary and expenses to charity. He said that it was unfortunate that so many people thought that people in public service were there for the money, rather than to provide a service and he wanted to help reverse that view. He was following in the footsteps of his colleague, the chief executive of SLAB, Lindsay Montgomery, who donated £20,000 of bonuses to charity.

So credit is due to both these men. It’s fair to say that they both receive very generous salaries and payments and Mr McBride has certainly earned a good deal of money over the past years, but nonetheless, their gestures are examples to others who are rich enough not to need their entire salaries... and frankly will make people who are paid vast amounts and do not need the money, but keep it all the same, look rather greedy.

Credit too, is due to Kenny MacAskill. Whatever you think of his politics, or indeed his decision to release Al Megrahi, it would be easy for him to favour only those who agree with him when it comes to public appointments. And he didn’t.

It’s a real change to discuss good news. But it’s a nice one.

CONGRATULATIONS TO ED MILIBAND

Winner Ed Milband..... and, pictured below, the other contenders

So it’s Ed.

If I’m honest, I don’t really care much for him, but he was the best of a mediocre bunch.

Diane Abbot and Andy Burnham were frankly ridiculous outsiders. The more Abbot said the more I realized why she was and always had been a back bench MP. And the more that Burnham said the more I was glad that his Cabinet remit was England only. (Compare him with Nicola Sturgeon and rejoice that you are Scottish, regardless of politics.)

Ed Balls was, if you strip away some of the probably undeserved reputation (and the daft wife), a man with some decent and sensible policies.

But of course, from the beginning, as Tony Benn had predicted many years ago, it was clear that it would be a Miliband who led the party once the Blair/Brown ‘partnership’ was truly over.

So, as they were all applauding and cheering the man who lost them the election yesterday we all wondered which one it would be. Should we be glad that the choice was Milly junior, rather than Milly senior?

I think so. David is Blair’s creature. Blair and Mandelson! The south-east of England is all that matters, the north has nowhere else to go, and half the country lives in the prosperous belt around London. I’m pretty sure that you wouldn’t have been able to get a cigarette paper between the policies of Miliband Snr. and Camerclegg.

Does that mean that Ed is left wing? Well, not by historic standards, no. He’s not a Tony Benn or a Michael Foot. He’s not even a Denis Healy. He may be to the left of his brother and Tony Blair; he was against the Iraq war and for the 50p tax band, but so was most of the country. He’s no firebrand.

Is he a creature of the unions? To an extent, yes, but it has to be remembered that despite the fact that it was union members’ votes that swung it, gone are the days of the block vote. Individual members sent in individual votes. And union members are no longer the wild radicals that struck because they had carbolic soap and hard toilet paper; whist the management had Lux and soft tissue.

So will he be a slave of the unions who put him where he is? No, I don’t think so, mainly for the already stated reason that the block vote is history. It wasn’t the unions who put him there, it was the union members. Smart Tories are avoiding the union argument, as it can be so easily blown apart the first time that he condemns unnecessary strike action.

When the cuts come, and the unions take action (as they undoubtedly will), of course there will be times when Labour will support them; there will be times when we all support them, I suspect. But the new leader has been swift to point out that he will support reasonable cuts, and the government will have his backing where it is in the interests of the country.

In the days, weeks and months to come of hardships like people of my age, indeed people under 70, have never endured, it will be necessary for the country to have an opposition which is ideologically capable of opposing where it is appropriate. The alternative would be unthinkable. The Liberals have been lost (at least for the present) to the opposition and the nationalist parties in Westminster are too small to have any major impact.

Camerclegg unopposed would be frighteningly dangerous.

So I wish Ed Miliband success in the difficult task ahead of him.