CentreRight

How not to be Prime Ministerial on a PM visit

Today, Gordon Brown and Ed Balls visited a school in my constituency, I was told to help launch the Government's new White Paper on schools. With my constituency being the closest marginal to Westminster, we are used to a few ministerial and shadow ministerial visits over the last ten years, but never I have I seen such manouvrings and political jockeying by officials as with today's.

As has become traditional with this Government - and contrary to the Commons Conventions and Courtesies - neither Brown nor Balls notified me of their visit. I found out from the Local Education Authority. When I arrived at the school 10 minutes early, waiting for me was a Ms Izzet from Ed Balls's office, who loudly announced, in front of an ITN camera crew, that I was "not invited". This was a new first - not only not told of a ministerial visit to my constituency, I was actively disinvited. The head Teacher of the excellent Fulham Cross School was being put in a very difficult position. Clearly, nobody had ever heard of a civil servant attempting to ban a Member of Parliament from a public facility in his own constituency. Realising that I wasn't moving, and in front of dozens of children eagerly awaiting the visit, Ms Izzet then tried to entice me to an office for "some refreshments". She was trying anything to get me out of the way, in a way that is outrageous to a Member of Parliament in his own constituency. Ms Izzet told me that I hadn't even myself visited the school, which was a lie, and that I would make the visit "political" - which was a bit rich coming from a Balls adviser.

Stephen Greenhalgh, Leader of the Council arrived, and Ms Izzet was remarkably and improbably even more confrontational towards him, even though the School was Council property and the Council is the Local Education Authority. She then proceeded to try to dupe Stephen and me into believing that Brown and Balls were coming in by a different entrance, and there was even a decoy posse of security people to help do the job.

We eventually got back into our own school, and were then treated to an hour of pure pantomime. The children, mainly 15 or 16 were on great form and were clearly thrilled by the visit. Brown's chatter, however, was embarrassing. Balls asked in the most patronising way he could about the quality of the food and about school sport, and seemed to have limited interest in the educational achievements.

Brown made a number of faux pas. His worst was to meet the same Italian teacher twice in 15 minutes and attempt to have the same conversation with her, forgetting he had already met her. Each time he told her he was looking forward to going to Italy next week (presumably on some official business, hard to imagine he is going on holiday), and he suggested she take the children to Rome "as that is where they have the ancient...." (he didn't finish the sentence, searching for the word monuments or sites, I suppose). Sometimes Balls had to add the words Brown was searching for, like "ambition" at one point.

Brown and Balls learned that the school is a specialist language school. I told them that French, Spanish and Italian were taught. One of the staff added that Arabic is also taught to those for whom it is a home language. "Arabic, that is a difficult langauge" said Brown; er, but not if it is your home language I suggest.

It has been much commented on before, but Brown's chatter at this sort of event is dire. Balls is little better. The school did a fantastic job under some pressure from the officials, but the overriding memory of this Prime Ministerial visit to my constituency is that Brown and Balls surround themselves with officials who might be even more hectoring and bullying than their masters.

Obama goes to Moscow next week. Will Brown ever make it?

Whatever one thinks about Vladimir Putin/ Dmitri Medvedev's government in Russia, one cannot deny that Russia is an important player in its own right, as well as in current hotspots like Iran, Afghanistan and North Korea, all of which border Russia or its former empire.

President Obama clearly sees this, and is making his first visit to the country next week less than six months after taking office. The talks will cover non-proliferation, disarmament and the key regional issues where Russia is an important player.

This is in stark contrast to Gordon Brown, who, as I blogged here in February, has not visited Russia for years, and hasn't met Vladimir Putin anywhere since he became PM in 2007.

As David Hughes at the Telegraph pointed out last year, in 2000 Blair made sure he was the first Western leader to meet Putin (rather like he was with Obama too, for that matter!). So as British relations with Iran hit an all-time low, Brown has no friends in the region to call on who might help.

Walked to work today - and after an an hour and a half of listening to Gordon Brown, I wonder why I bothered

In recent weeks, I have appreciated that there have been some advantages in not having a taxpayer-funded second home! Nevertheless, despite being an Inner London MP, it can take a while to get to Parliament when there is no tube and the buses are full - about a 90 minute walk from Fulham. Many of my constituents were making similar or even longer walks, faced with the tube strike.

By chance, 90 minutes is the length of time the Prime Minister has been talking today, first at PMQs, and now making his incredible statement on "constitutional renewal". Brown's rhetoric has reached new levels of unreality and hypocrisy. He says he wants the Government and the House of Commons to be "more accountable to the people" - only days after appointing 7 members of the House of Lords to the Cabinet. He says that "we must all face up to the expenses issue" - he's a bit late on this one. He is going to publish the expenses of all MPs going back the last three years. He does need to keep up here, that's what the Daily Telegraph have got already, and even they, after 22 daily instalments, had to conclude that the news agenda had moved on. Brown's statement was met with derision from the Opposition parties, and resigned boredom from his own side.

The only man in the Chamber who looked at all active was Ed Balls, who was moving around, catching little conversations with any Labour MP who would give him the time. With Damian McBride's departure, and Ian Austin's promotion, Balls is the main Brown cheerleader. In fact, Ed Balls is to Gordon Brown as Andrei Lugovoi is to Vladimir Putin - a guided assassin, dripping poison wherever he goes, and contaminating the environment for everyone else.

As Sir George Young accurately describes, the Commons these days only meets for two meaningful days a week, Tuesdays and Wednesdays. Tonight, as I do the long walk home, I will wonder if even those days are worthwhile. The malaise around the place has reached a new high, and anyone watching today's events will wonder what course of action could lead to proper reform other than calling a General Election, leading to the convening of a new Parliament

Why Germany can take some pride in how it has dealt with its Nazi past

Der Spiegel reports that Germany is still actively pursuing a small number of alleged Nazi-era war criminals, although U.S. authorities have just granted a temporary stay on the extradition of the accused John Demjanjuk to face trial in Germany. I know some ConHome readers will disagree, but I say 'well done, Germany' for pursuing these cases, but this is not the main point of this post.

The Demjanjuk case highlights a problem I have been observing for some 25 years now, which is how Germany has been dealing with its difficult and abhorrent past, and what lessons there might be for other nations which are seeking to come to terms with their own history, a process for which the Germans have a characteristically long and precise compound noun, Vergangenheitsbewältigung. I write this as someone who is neither German, nor Jewish, nor Eastern European, but I am going to try to draw on the experience of all of these in writing this piece.

This post is not about the merit of pursuing war criminals from the 1940s per se, nor about the evils of the Holocaust, but about how I believe that Germany, or more specifically, West Germany, has done a pretty good job of securing a proper understanding by its people of the magnitude of what happened in 1933-1945, of the depth of human depravity reached in those years, and of the proper significance of Jewish culture in German history overall. Others might well take note.

Where spin meets the politics of envy - Labour's new policy to publish Council chiefs' salaries

In its death throes, this Government is combining the worst aspects of Old Labour (like class war and the politics of envy) with the worst of New Labour (such as spin and deceit).

Take for example this new announcement, "Councils to reveal bosses pay". The Government, we are told, is planning to make local councils publish the salaries of their chief executives. Now, I have some sympathy with the sentiments here. I for one have been saying for years that local authority senior officers in general are overpaid.

But why are they paid so much? And why have their pay rates hugely accelerated under this Labour government, especially in the period when the majority of Councils were also Labour controlled, in the years 1994 - 2004? Now that most of these Councils are Conservative-controlled, Labour thinks it has a ready-made campaign on its hands - effectively to throw stones and envious glances at senior officers in Tory-run Councils.

All eyes on when Brown will meet Obama - but when will he meet Vladimir Putin?

Speculation has been rampant in recent weeks on who amongst world leaders will be the first to meet President Obama, when and where. Gordon Brown, in particular, has been desperate to attach himself to the world's new star attraction.

But what about Britain's other important international relationships? Surprisingly, I can find no concrete proof that Brown has ever met Vladimir Putin since he succeeded Blair in June 2007. There is a single uncorroborated report that they met in the sidelines of the April 2008 NATO summit in Bucharest. In response to my Parliamentary question, however, Brown is opaque to say the least on whether he has met Putin since June 2007. Other than that, it seems Brown met Putin when he was Chancellor in early 2006. If I am wrong, and if they have met more often than this, then why is Brown so unwilling to say so?

German Finance Minister considers a possible collapse of the Euro

Der Spiegel is this weekend carrying a fascinating article speculating in some detail about what might happen if a Eurozone country needed to be bailed out by the other members. Peer Steinbrück, the German Finance Minister, who had some choice words about Gordon Brown's VAT cut and budget deficit in December, has spoken out again, this time saying that

"We have a few countries in the euro zone who are getting into difficulties with their payments."

He added that Ireland, especially, is currently in a "very difficult situation". Der Spiegel examines in some detail how and in what circumstances a Euro member could be bailed out.

But the really tough questions have not been asked - would the German public, at a time when they were themselves facing a deepening recession, countenance paying for a costly bailout of a country the size of Italy? Ireland maybe, but surely nothing larger. And if the German public have no appetite, then surely none other will?

Yet another posting on the bonus culture

A lot has been said in recent days on banking bonuses, including two interesting posts on CentreRight from Mark Field and Andrew Lilico yesterday. We have heard condemnation yesterday from leaders of all three political parties for proposals from some of our state-owned banks to pay substantial bonuses.

I worked for eight years in derivatives on a trading floor. Even as a former banker, whose remuneration in the 1980s and 1990s was very dependent on bonuses, I have to agree with the anti-bonus argument, and I agree with much of what was said by Mark Field.

Those arguing for the bonuses make various points. Some say that bank employees in divisions which were or are profitable should not have to carry the can for those who came close to bringing down their institutions. Others argue that ending all bonuses would merely leave good quality and productive employees to seek a job in another (e.g. non-UK) bank, at a time when our banks need to keep hold of productive and revenue-generating employees (and it is worth remembering that the 12% coupon on the Government's preference shares has to be re-paid somehow). One also needs to bear in mind that in the case of many employees, the so-called "bonus" is something of a misnomer, as it can constitute a very significant percentage of the total compensation. A "discretionary element of the salary" might be a more accurate description.

The first of Germany's big year of elections is this Sunday

I have previously blogged on CentreRight about key elections last year in the German bellweather state of Hessen, which saw the two main German parties level pegging after a remarkable campaign when the CDU declined by 12 points, widely attributed to clumsy anti-immigrant rhetoric.

This Sunday sees a re-run. Hessen is a key swing state in Germany, and this time the CDU is set to win comfortably, mainly due to an incompetent dalliance of the local SPD with the far-Left Linke Partei. For more, see this article in Der Spiegel.

The main German federal elections occur this September. Der Spiegel draws a similar conclusion to the one I drew last March, that Germany is struggling with the mathematics of a five party system. The current "grand Coalition", where more than 80% of voters end up having voted for the government, is unwieldy and sometimes unable to make tough decisions, and probably not healthy for democracy, not least as the "opposition" tends to be formed by small, disparate parties which have no chance themselves to put forward any realistic alternative programme for government.

The German stimulus package is more inspired by us than by Labour

Controversy raged last month over whether the German government was following the same economic approach as Gordon Brown or not. German SPD finance minsiter, Peer Steinbrueck, memorably remarked that Brown was introducing "crass Keynesianism" and that on Brown's VAT cut, "all this will do is raise Britain’s debt to a level that will take a whole generation to work off." CDU/CSU budget spokesman Steffen Kampeter, Angela Merkel's right-hand man on the budget, went even further, calling Brown's approach "a complete failure of Labour policy".

Today, Brown has been meeting Merkel in Berlin. The German Government has this week outlined a further fiscal stimulus package. Brown's people are claiming that the Germans have now been converted to his approach of borrow and spend.

Having gone through the entire document agreed by the German coalition partners, I can tell ConHome readers that nothing could be further from the truth.

The troubled BBC World Service

Three years ago, the BBC World Service embarked on radical change. Radio services to Eastern Europe were closed down and the Russian service pared back, all to fund new TV stations in Arabic and Persian.

I cannot disagree in principle with some of this. It seemed to make sense that countries like Poland and the Czech Republic now being fully-fledged democracies, in NATO and in the EU, and with lively independent media of their own, that they were no longer in need of a UK taxpayer-funded BBC World Service. I did suggest at the time that a memorial be created to those like Georgi Markov who gave their lives broadcasting for freedom. Meanwhile, there were strong foreign policy reasons to bring alternative voices into the Arab world and into Iran.

Harman's PMQ gaffe: "We need debt to rise"

In an otherwise low-key PMQs today, there was an excellent question from my colleague Shailesh Vara, reminding us of Brown's speech as Shadow Chancellor to Labour Pary Conference in 1995, when he said that "we cannot build a new Jerusalem on a mountain of debt".

Harman told us in response that "we need debt to rise".

Now, I think one might be able to make an argument that debt tends to rise in a recession, or that one could follow a Keynesian approach (which I and most readers would strongly disagree with) that a rise in debt is a consequence of a fiscal stimulus or growth in public spending or both.

But I had yet to hear anyone suggest that a rise in debt is in itself a virtue. Given that Harman, on matters economic, tends to parrot the words of her boss, I can only assume that these words are likely to be straight from the horse's mouth. We have had a national debt for 350 years or so now - I doubt if any monarch or government in that time has made its increase a deliberate act of policy. Or maybe what she really meant to say is this: "we need debt to rise to make life as difficult as possible for David Cameron's incoming government."

Ever wondered what John Prescott is up to?

According to his speaker's biography on the agency website offering him up as after-dinner entertainment, he

"continues to advise the Chinese government on their plans to build a thousand new 'sustainable' cities"

Most UK observers would consider this a reckless move by the Chinese, but it seems to me to make sense. Any recent visitor to China will tell you of the bulldozing of the historic centres of urban areas (like the former Deputy PM's Pathfinder scheme), the rush to build hundreds of thousands of small, box-sized flats which are already falling to pieces (which characterised Prescott's regime as Secretary of State for the Environment) and the dreadful environmental problems caused by failing to prepare enough infrastructure for huge new developments.

I am hoping for the sake of the Chinese that this c.v. has been embellished by the speaker agency, but I ask this question: have any readers visited one of Prescott's 1,000 new Chinese cities?

From the CDU's Conference - Angela Merkel starting to sound like Margaret Thatcher

With the UK economy in crisis and with the unfolding drama of the Damian Green arrest, the CDU annual conference (or Parteitag) in Stuttgart might seem an unlikely destination for me in the last few days, but the CDU is our German sister party, and with the change in leadership in the U.S., Angela Merkel has become the world's leading centre right figure.

Relations with our sister party remain strong, especially after David Cameron and Angela Merkel set up joint working groups this year on economic competitiveness, climate change and security. I believe that the CDU now understands that we will be leaving the EPP, but that we can nonetheless have warm and good relations, and it is this bigger picture that will count in the long run.

What is more, I know that many Conservatives here would have been impressed as I was by Chancellor Merkel's conference speech.

Disciplinary proceedings quadruple at the UK Borders Agency

It is hard to find many positives about the deeply troubling arrest of Damian Green, but one of them might be the renewed spotlight it casts on Britain's shambolic immigration system.

Forget about leaked documents for a moment, just the information that has been authorised for disclosure can be shocking enough, like the case I have highlighted of Hammersmith resident Hany Youssef being both on the UN Al-Qaeda list and being granted Discretionary Leave to Remain in this country, or of the awful consequences of a system that is not fit for purpose. and the effect it has on crime and other social problems.

In the Summer, I visited Lunar House, the headquarters of the UK Border Agency. I was impressed with the quality of the workforce, often very young people in senior positions, struggling manfully with the load. The offices were chaotic, however. Files were everywhere, and when I say files, I mean huge wads of paper with tatty cardboard covers, literally held together with pieces of string and rubber bands. Many of these files were thicker than they were wide. Those at Lunar House were clearly under pressure in an extremely unappealing working environment, obviously suffering from poor supervision and weak organisation.

I wasn't the least surprised to learn that staff disciplinaries are on the rise, but I was staggered this week to discover by how much. In response to my Parliamentary Question, Ministers revealed that disciplinary proceedings have QUADRUPLED at the UKBA in the last TWO years. This isn't a small number of staff causing it either - the number of staff involved has also nearly quadrupled, to more than 1,500.

The statistics confirm what I can see for my own eyes, and especially in my constituency casework - Britain's immigration system is close to complete collapse, and, yes, in support of Damian Green, the public does deserve to know.

A curious statement from Gordon Brown about the Damian Green affair

Iain Dale is right, it is always difficult to comment over breaking news stories, but there are two eye-catching things about the Downing Street statement on the arrest of Damian Green, which Sky News is reporting here.

According to Sky, the word from Downing Street is this:

"This is a matter for the police...The Prime Minister had no prior knowledge of the arrest of Mr Green and was only informed after the event."

Two classic Brownisms here. First, the washing of one's hands of any involvement in a controversy if it seems that negative publicity might result, by saying it is in the hands of an outside quango/ agency/ the courts/ investigation/ report/ independent adjudicator/ study, etc (delete as appropriate). In this case, it is the police.

The second is this - there is a denial of involvement, but the denial relates only to a specific part of the chain of events, in this case, the actual arrest of Damian Green. There is no denial that the PM knew of the investigation or knew that a senior Conservative was allegedly involved. Important questions like whether the PM or other senior ministers gave a go ahead for action are not covered in the statement.

For the sake of our democracy, I would love to be proven wrong, and be shown that the PM genuinely knew nothing about the police action against Damian Green. 

Was World War One a "good war " or a "bad war"?

I have two major events this weekend in my diary.

The first was yesterday afternoon, when I was a guest speaker in Trafalgar Square (following a mass in Westminster cathedral) for the 90th anniversary of Polish independence. This was an amazing experience, as I have never given a speech before in Trafalgar Square, and I doubt if I have ever had a larger audience, as more than 5,000 Poles braved the cold and wet to be there with Cardinal Glemp and others.

The second event for me is laying a wreath at the Fulham war memorial later this morning for Remembrance Sunday. The service in Fulham is always moving, but probably typical of thousands all over Britain.

Will the Euro re-enter British political debate?

Addressing a mixed group of UK and German parliamentarians at the weekend, I raised a few eyebrows by predicting that Britain's possible membership of the Euro is likely to re-enter our domestic political debate.

I have no personal enthusiasm for joining the Euro, and believe that in both the short and long terms such a move would be very much against our economic and political interests. But others think differently, and will feel that their time is coming.

Sure enough, Steve Richards in a lengthy article in the Independent takes up the case.

The Serious Fraud Office is investigating

Further to my letter to the Serious Fraud Office calling for an investigation into leaks from the heart of government and resulting insider trading, the SFO has responded in writing (right) by telling me that "we will carefully consider the points that you have raised, and will provide you with a full response as soon as we have done this."

At the very least, I believe that this SFO investigation will put a halt to the unhelpful and possibly illegal leaking of market-sensitive information from the heart of government - at least for the time being.

By the way, this isn't the first time I and others have drawn attention to suspicious market-moving leaks at the heart of government. I wrote this on CentreRight in January.

Where is our debate on the banking bail-out?

Probably like you, I found the US Congress debates on the banking bailout a couple of weeks ago captivating. Yesterday, the German Bundestag voted for their banking bailout by 476 votes to 99, after a detailed and vigorous debate, which one Bundestag member called "an unprecedented tour de force".

Meanwhile, a number of my constituents last week and this have asked me if Parliament is an exciting place to be at the moment, debating the banking crisis. The only problem is this: we haven't debated the banking crisis at all, except for a three hour debate on the fiscal rules, undertaken during Opposition time, and an hour and a half topical debate on "financial stability" in Government time. And definitely no votes on the bailout. Want to find out whether your MP agrees with the bailout? Tough.

A deeply mistaken banking regulatory change

Let me start with an analogy.

In football, as we know, the league table throughout the season is ordered by which team has accumulated the most and the least number of points and scored or conceded the most goals. Suddenly, the league managers association protests that due to external circumstances beyond its control (say, a flu epidemic has struck down half the league's players) that the league table is terribly unfair, and instead says that league positions should be based on the manager's expectation of how many points (plus goal difference) his team would achieve that season if normal conditions prevailed. Each manager declares what he himself describes as his realistic expectation, and the table is drawn up accordingly. Unfortunately, and inevitably, most managers will over-estimate the value of their team, and the estimates made will total significantly more than the total number of points available for the whole league for the season. Who gains? The league managers (for which, in this analogy, read the banks) on a somewhat short-term basis - at least until those overestimates are uncovered. Who loses? Everyone for whom it is important to know which team is doing well or badly (for which read bank share investors, regulators and governments).

Well, this may not be a perfect analogy, but it is what new banking regulations will mean in the world of financial accounting. Many of us have been warning of ill-conceived or counter-productive regulatory changes, and the changes outlined a small article tucked away in the corner of the Companies and Markets section of yesterday's FT will, in my view, be counter-productive and potentially disastrous. It may not be in the same league as the 1930 Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act, but the importance may come in showing the danger of hastily-conceived regulatory changes. I expect that this won't be the last such change.

Everyone likes the idea of a Swedish model, even in banking

Gordon Brown has been claiming the credit for the idea of Governments taking equity stakes in banks as a way out of their insolvency. He said in the Times on Friday that

"We must lead the world to financial stability"

and challenged other world leaders to follow his supposedly bold and innovative example. As other commentators have pointed out (like Nick Robinson), the model for this proposed solution actually comes from Sweden in the early 1990s.

Carl Bildt, who is now Swedish Foreign Minister (pictured here with me at last year's Swedish Moderaterna Party Conference in Gävle), was then the Prime Minister who devised a far-reaching solution. I worked on a trading floor in London in the early 1990s, and remember the Swedish banking bail-out quite well, although it was overshadowed ironically by the collapse of the ERM at about the same time in late 1992.

An important PMQs today

The accepted wisdom of the events of last October focuses heavily on a chain of events starting with Labour's election speculation, the George Osborne conference announcement on Inheritance Tax, David Cameron's own conference speech and Brown's Andrew Marr interview on the Saturday calling off the election. I remember one other key event in helping to define the renewed view that Brown was a disaster, and that was the first PMQs after the recess, where Brown was on the back foot from the beginning, and David Cameron's very first question was to effectively accuse Brown of not being truthful. The whole exchange is worth re-reading in full, as it defined the relationship of the two leaders with each other and in the eyes of the public for the rest of the year, and cemented Brown's image as a ditherer and a bottler, and Cameron's as the man in the ascendancy.

Some commentators might feel that the banking bail-out this morning will overshadow anything the party leaders might say to each other in the noon face-off. And, let's face it, in the two days since Parliament has re-assembled, the atmosphere in the House has been lethargic and off-beat, as Iain Martin and Jonathan Isaby have both pointed out. Nevertheless, David Cameron will face the choice today between being more low-key and consensual, or hammering Brown for his Government's part responsibility for the mess we are in, and particularly the Prime Minister's reputation for economic competence, which has been severely shaken but is not gone completely, at least according to the polls. Looking back to last October, and the lessons to be drawn from it, I hope and expect we will see David Cameron hit the PM hard this afternoon, despite the apparent consensus on the bailout package.

The Met needs a change in philosophy, not just leadership

Mark Field's post yesterday on the departure of Sir Ian Blair and the comments thread revealed one of politics' worst-kept secrets: that Sir Ian Blair was very unpopular amongst Conservatives. Nevertheless, I for one believe that there was no politics at all in Boris's desire to see change, and that complaints from Jacqui Smith and (God help us) Ken Livingstone simply show Labour's failure to realise that Boris really did win the election and that the London Mayor is the right democratically-accountable person to make the decision on who is in charge of the capital's policing.

More important than who is in charge, however, is how we change the Met's culture and philosophy of crime fighting.

Germany's take on the financial crisis - blame the U.S.

Further to Ruth Lea's excellent post, two speeches from European politicians in the last 48 hours on the credit crisis are worthy of note. Gordon Brown's speech in New York yesterday, as noted by Simon Chapman, called for an end to the "Era of Irresponsibility" - a strange way of describing the ten years when Brown was in charge of this country's public finances and was personally instrumental in setting up the "tripartite" regulatory regime of our banks.

Equally outrageous was the speech on Thursday by the German Finance Minister Peer Steinbrück of the Leftist SPD. Germany has had some banking failures of its own, and Steinbrück put the blame squarely on the US.