ConservativeHome's ToryDiary

Tories promise 45 minute rail link to Birmingham (but not until 2027)

The Conservatives will not build a third runway at Heathrow airport - so cutting 66,000 flights a year - but will instead work with the private sector to build a £20bn, 180mph rail link between London and Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds.

There would also be a high speed link between King's Cross St Pancras and Heathrow airport - (although Boris Johnson may have moved London's airport to the Thames estuary by then!).

Theresa Villiers, Shadow Transport Secretary, told The Guardian that the move was "seriously green".

The good, okay and ugly guide to Conservative economic policy

The main story in The Sunday Telegraph focuses on calls by "Leading Tories" to end Labour's "overtaxing, overborrowing and overspending".  Lord Forsyth, John Redwood and CentreRight's Simon Chapman are all quoted.  We have long argued that George Osborne was wrong to match Labour's overspending but public expenditure is only one ingredient of economic policy.  What does the rest of Tory growth policy look like?  Here's our good, okay and ugly guide to where we are...

GOOD

Monetary policy: The Conservatives will strengthen Bank of England independence.

Free trade: The Conservatives are probably the most anti-protectionist party in Europe.  Long may that remain so.

Long-term bills: The Conservative Party's social reforms - reducing welfare, strengthening the family and reducing drug dependency - should deliver progressive reductions in the demands on the welfare state. The reforms will also encourage economically and socially creative citizens.

Education and skills: Far too many children in Britain are trapped in underperforming schools.  Michael Gove's Swedish-inspired revolution will start to change that.  Also welcome are Mr Gove's concerns about science and maths teaching and John Hayes' work on skills.

OKAY

Taxes: This ingredient almost deserves to be in the ugly category but for some interesting ideas on tax simplification and promises on stamp duty, inheritance tax and the adoption of Andrew Lilico's Fair Fuel Stabiliser.  The overall picture, however, is that Brown has levied 100+ extra taxes, many falling most heavily on the poor.  The Tory response is timid.  This timidity flows from a white flag policy on supply-side economics (ie rejecting the fact that certain tax cuts at least partially pay for themselves by generating growth and discouraging avoidance) and more importantly adherence to Labour's spending plans (see below).

Regulation: We can hope that Conservatives will operate a lighter touch and even adopt some of John Redwood's reforms as set out in his Competitiveness Report.   Also welcome are Tory ideas to undo some of the damage done by Gordon Brown's financial regulatory regime.  What we don't need however are headline-chasing announcements like the one on Chapter 11 bankruptcy.  Chapter 11 stops bad companies from failing (customers of US airlines will know what we mean).

UGLY

Transport: Theresa Villiers has been congratulated by others (Charlie Elphicke and Dan Hannan) for her campaign against the BAA monopoly but overall Tory transport policy  is disappointing.  On Radio 4 last Saturday Ms Villiers said that the party will have radical ideas by the time of the General Election; including on high-speed rail.  Let's hope so.

Energy: Alan Duncan should be commended for forcing the party to abandon its 'nuclear energy is a last resort' policy but there's little sense of urgency from the party leadership about Britain's looming energy crisis.  A few micro generation projects will not be enough to keep British industry going.

Public spending: This is the ugliest of our economic policies.  Conservatives should not be pledging to continue the biggest ever peacetime increase in public spending when ordinary Britons are having to cut their own budgets.  A flexible freeze on public sector recruitment, scrapping of centralised IT projects, abolishing ineffective quangoes like the RDAs and market-based reforms of the public sector could all be introduced to start bringing spending under control.  Dan Lewis has suggested other disciplines.

Has Ruth Kelly just handed the Conservatives a winning issue in Greater Manchester?

BBC is reporting that Ruth Kelly has told the Commons that she backs congestion charging for Greater Manchester.  There will be a charge of up to £5 from 2013 combined with £2.8bn to create a "world-class public transport system".

Theresa Villiers, Shadow Transport Secretary, has wasted no time in seeing the political danger for Labour and the political opportunity for the Conservatives:

"Ruth Kelly is so desperate to push Greater Manchester into being a guinea pig for national road pricing that she is willing to stake her own parliamentary seat on it. At a time when fuel prices are at record high, and the Government is punishing drivers with sky high VED increases, Mrs Kelly is now going to hit low income earners in Greater Manchester with a 8 per cent tax on getting into work. Bullying Manchester into congestion charging is a high risk strategy for Ruth Kelly and she may find her Bolton West voters punish her at the general election for the plans she is announcing today. She needs to decide if she is going to stand up for her constituents or for her failing Government’s road pricing agenda."

Altrincham and Sale West MP Graham Brady attacked the whole scheme as "absurdly complex".  There will be two charging boundaries, rather than London's one.  Cars will be charged every time that they cross the boundary.  And rather than copying London's simple discount for residents there may be a means-tested discount for low income people.

Other 'local' issues playing to Labour's disadvantage: Post office closures, Polyclinics, A&E wards, Heathrow expansion, Ecotowns.

Villiers criticises BAA's "monopolistic grip" on airports

Shadow Transport Secretary Theresa Villiers has commented today on competition in the airport market, following a Competition Commission report on the issue:

"BAA’s monopolistic grip of so many of the UK's major airports has not been serving passengers or airlines well – as can be seen from the debacle at Terminal Five and the yearly Heathrow hassle during the summer months.

The Competition Commission’s thinking looks like a step in the right direction. Tough action is needed to inject much needed competition into the airport market and to give consumers and airlines the option of voting with their feet if the service they receive is poor."

BAA’s seven airports together account for over 60% of all passengers using
UK airports, including a near monopoly in the South East and Scotland. The Commission criticised a number of aspects of BAA's ownership of the airports for not serving the interests of either airlines or passengers.

Trains win central place in Tory transport policy

Margaret Thatcher never liked them but David Cameron is planning to put trains at the heart of Tory transport policy.  "If we are to meet our international obligations on climate change, it is clear that we need a major increase in rail use. Trains are the most environmentally effective way of getting around," he said yesterday. The Independent:

"The Tories will try to overcome their record as the architects of rail privatisation with a challenge to ministers to spend up to £8bn from increased franchise deals on tackling overcrowding. Chris Grayling, the shadow Transport minister, will call on the government to back projects such as the expansion of Birmingham New Street station and the expansion of the London Thameslink service to make an immediate impact on journeys."

Statement on conservatives.com.

Grayling: "We do not need and do not want a national, spy-in-the sky, pay as you drive scheme"

There has been some debate on this site about the Conservative Party's views on road-pricing.  Chris Grayling has drawn my attention to an eleven hundred word article that he penned for the Evening Standard on 13th February.  The article pasted below - Listen To The Protest And Just Go Local - essentially says that the party is opposed to a national programme of road-pricing but in the spirit of the party's new emphasis on localism, it supports the freedom of local government units to choose their own models - like Ken Livingstone's congestion charge.