CentreRight

London Mayoral Candidate drops out

It would seem that the wheels have come off the English Democrats bandwagon, as Matt O'Connor steps down as their candidate and sledges the Party to boot.

What do you mean, my headline grabbed your attention unjustifiably..?

Brown on 26% without a recession

There's a lot of excitement over today's YouGov poll.

Even with all the usual caveats, 44% is an encouraging result for us and 26% is an abysmal rating for Labour.

It's worth noting that all this is happening in the absence of a recession. The economic mood may be darkening and the credit crunch biting hard, but so far growth rates remain positive, the latest unemployment count was down a bit and we've yet to see a bona fide crash in either the stock market or the housing market.

That doesn't mean that things won't be getting worse, of course. But here's my point: If Gordon Brown is doing this badly without a recession, what on earth would happen if, God forbid, the economy goes off a cliff?

Calling a spade a spade

Allegra Stratton on the Guardian News Blog reports that the Bush Administration has decided to use more "culturally sensitive" phrases to describe Islamic terrorism.

The reason given for not using the word jihad is that there are a different types of jihad, which seems fair enough. But what about not using Islamic terrorist, Islamofascist or Islamist?

Do these "call a spade a spade" terms cause unnecessary confusion and tension? Should this be primarily a tactical issue or an academic one? It seems to be an endless debate.

Our resident experts Dr Martin Parsons and Douglas Murray recently criticised Brian Paddick and others for claiming that Islam and terrorism are mutually incompatible. Also worth reading is an article on the City Circle blog recently in which Mohammed Amin, Vice-Chairman of the Conservative Muslim Forum, rebuffs the arguments of those who complain about the term "Muslim terrorists".

The Competitiveness of London

Some readers may be interested in a Europe Economics report out today, for the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry, which considers the competitiveness of London versus emerging rivals in Dubai, Moscow, Mumbai and Shanghai, and the appropriate policy responses.

 

Master Website

Executive Summary

Full Report

The LCC "Blueprint for Action"

Slightly confused FT article

On the virtues of Constitutional Monarchy

I believe in constitutional monarchy.  I do not consider it a pleasant anachronism that there is little point in removing.  I believe in it.  Here’s why.

First, two distinctions.  I am not a royalist.  I feel no particular attachment to the current family of royals, nor any personal loyalty to them as such, beyond that respect the Queen has earned through doing her job well.  Neither am I a believer in hereditary monarchy.  My fealty, insofar as it exists, is to the role, not the person or the family.  I see no reason why a monarch from another family might not, in principle, do the job just as well.

What is that job?  I see it in three parts.  First, the constitutional monarch is the resolver.  Any constitution must offer us ways out of various impasses.  One way to proceed is to have a document in which are written the many complex situations that might arise and how they should be resolved.  Unfortunately for such a scheme, one cannot anticipate every eventuality and what will be the best way to resolve matters then, and even for some situations one can anticipate it may be too complicated to specify exactly what should be done, depending on the details, for it to be practical to write it down in advance.  Worse than this, as time moves on, the responses/solutions that seemed best at the time the constitutional document was written may become obsolete as society’s values and expectations change.  So systems that rely on written constitutions tend to need two additional features: some small set of individuals, such as a constitutional court (or, in a theocratic system, perhaps some college of senior religious leaders), to deal with the unanticipated and unspecifiable situations by “interpreting” what the constitutional document would have said; and some process by which the constitutional document can be amended to take account of the changes in society’s needs.  In such a system the font of the constitution is the written document.

Images from today's anti-war, anti-privatisation march

My apology.  It was actually striking teachers marching.

"They're still standing there, slugging it out. Everybody's getting bloody and there's no knockouts."

Tennessee Governor Phil Bredesen's frank words are drawn from this Washington Post article, which will bring joy to the hearts of those who wish the Republicans well as it points to the pains felt amongst Democrats at the continuing primary campaign struggle.

The unthinking environmentalist embrace of wind power

It won't come as much of a surprise that I think Tim is right on the money in his treatment of 'unthinking environmentalism'.  Most 'green' policies are so poorly constructed they achieve very little at prohibitive cost.  Plenty have been actively counterproductive.

Tim is right to give the DDT ban and biofuels subsidies centre stage.  The human toll in the developing world is shocking.  However, we don't need to look to the poor world to see how dangerous misconceived environmental policies can be.

The Renewables Obligation, CERT and the European Emissions Trading Scheme all increase the cost of energy.  They are quietly constituting 8% of a household electricity bill, according to Ofgem (PDF).  This hits the poor hardest (Chart 6.1, PDF) and, particularly, the elderly.

In the winter of 2006-07 statistics from the Office for National Statistics (XLS) show that there were 23,900 excess winter deaths in the United Kingdom.  Anything that makes it more expensive to turn up the thermostat will increase the number of elderly people who take risks and will kill people.

The Renewables Obligation costs taxpayers and costs lives.  The big winners are renewables firms.  The Financial Times reported some of the figures earlier this year along with this telling quote:

"Peter Atherton, head utilities analyst at Citi Investment Research, said: “It’s a bonanza. Anyone who can get their nose in the trough is trying to."

What do we get in return for lining the pockets of renewables firms with vast amounts of money taken from the poorest taxpayers?

Fiddler on the hoof

We're used to the Bottler's, the Ditherer's the Fiddler's, that's the word for the day, we are used to the Fiddler's budgetary tricks unravelling fast, but the speed of crumpling under scrutiny of the deal he struck only yesterday with Frank Field is still astonishing.

Here are all the hallmarks of something scrawled down by a desperate man in a desperate hurry on the back of the nearest fag packet (he'll have some chain-smoking aides right now), then on his cuff, then on an old envelope, then on anything that came to hand whilst running around in ever-more erratic confusion.

On The World at One just now there was total uncertainty: will payments be "offset" or "back-dated" and what on earth's the difference; when's it going to happen (cash flow is of some importance for low-income families - telling them they will get some back-dated payment in November or whenever won't help them with bills and debts and interest now); what about the impact of the minimum wage on employers? (somebody helpfully pointed out that the government had decided within the last few months not to increase the minimum wage for people under 25; is this another U turn?); what do "average" losses mean? (surely a concession that there will still be some losers able to show the Fiddler their wage slips). That's even before we get to new forms of tax credit and "using" the winter fuel allowance mechanism.

The best thing is that because he is so incapable of admitting fault, his hapless crew are having to present this deranged complexity as being a more effective way of addressing poverty. Of course! This back-dated Gordian knot is just what people on low incomes have been calling for.

This is the true Brown, unspun and now completely unwound and unravelled. A fiddler on the hoof. For some reason Frank Field blinked yesterday. I bet he's having second thoughts now.

Update at 4.00: Oh, and the Low Wage Commission needs to be persuaded to change the rules on the minimum wage, and it appears the government has no idea how much this is going to cost, or how many people are affected. I would like to think this might mean the end of nonsense about "Conservative unfunded tax cuts", but of course it doesn't.

When is polling day again?

There is all this talk of Polling Day for the local elections being on May 1st but for me polling day was on Monday when I posted off my ballot papers. (By the way I voted for Boris.)

Much of my time at present is taking up ringing up people who are already known to be Conservative supporters to persuade them to send back their postal votes before they get lost or accidentally thrown out amidst a sea of pizza menus and newspaper supplements.

I rather miss going to the polling station and clutching "that stubby little pencil tied to a straggly bit of string" as John Major used to describe the process. But I am told such sentimentality is an indulgence. May 1st will be entirely devoted to imploring others to vote - no sloping off to vote myself.

Crying wolf

Was anyone else caught up in the closure of King's Cross underground station this morning?

Having trudged through packed tunnels and squeezed onto a creaking tube train, I had hoped that the worst of the journey this morning was done - but when my train got to K's X, there was a blaring alarm, and an ear-piercing announcement:

"ATTENTION.  BECAUSE OF A REPORTED EMERGENCY, PLEASE LEAVE THE STATION IMMEDIATELY."

My European U-turn

Given that we are now in the season of U-turns, I have a U-turn of my own I would like to pursue with regards to my recent postings on Conservative European policy.

Although I have some reservations on the supremacy of Parliament issue, I am under no illusion as to who has been the real opposition to the Treaty of Lisbon in the House of Commons: the Conservative Party. Ninety nine per cent of the amendments on the Lisbon Treaty were put down by the Conservative Party, Bill Cash and David Heathcoat-Amory.

To follow up, and to be entirely clear, only the Conservative Party has a realistic chance of saving Parliament from Europe for the nation. For the avoidance of any doubt, and as I have made quite clear on this site, it is the Conservative Party that will affect real change in the renegotiation of Britain’s relationship with Europe.

Ken Livingstone uncovered

Andrew Hosken's interesting biography of Ken Livingstone (The Ups and Downs of Ken Livingstone, Arcadia, £15.99) is balanced with lots of comments and material provided from friends and foes. It also provides a reminder of some important points that were already in the public domain.

Here are some of the bits that prompted me to scribble in the margin:

1. Once he stepped down as TfL Commissioner Bob Kiley was retained by Livingstone on £700,000 a year of Council taxpayers money as a consultant. When asked what he did for the money Kiley said in an interview: "If you ask me what I actually do to earn my consultancy, I'd have to tell you, in all honesty, not much." He complained that the lack of any work to do had contributed to his alcoholism.

2. The cost of Livingstone's visit to Cuba in November 2006. Originally Livingstone was due to head to Venezuela to see their Marxist dictator Hugo Chavez. In the end neither Castro or Chavez were available. "All in all, including Livingstone, nine people from City Hall had been sent to either Caracas or Havana, the total bill was roughly £29,000."

Re: Tory MP defects to UKIP: the shape of things to come?

Following on from my blog piece yesterday on Bob Spink’s defection to UKIP, I want to offer a defence: I said nothing about Bob Spink’s individual views, I did not quote him but I simply speculated with a degree of inevitability that this kind of problem resulted from a Tory European policy which needs to be reformed. My words: “I hope it isn’t the shape of things to come.”

My position is entirely clear. I work at The European Foundation, where the working principle is “Yes to European trade; No to European government”.

The objective is to reform the EU into a European free trade area – that is, a Europe consisting of free-trading associated sovereign states. That pits me directly against the ideas of a federal Europe.

I fully endorse the Conservative view that we need to safeguard the supremacy of Parliament, a UK Parliament acting as a voice for the people, which was the centre point or framework for my blog pieces/comments yesterday.

I also edit the European Journal at the Foundation, which may interest you – and if you would like a copy, do get in contact with me.

Even conservative critics are praising Hillary's stamina

Top line: Clinton wins Pennsylvania by 10%.  Simon Burns MP will be pleased!

She's been beaten in so many small states.  She's behind in the popular vote.  Key aides to her husband have backed Barack Obama.  It's very hard to see her path to winning the nomination given Obama's delegate lead.  There are constant calls for her to stand aside for the sake of the Democrats but she just keeps on going.  This is the Wall Street Journal's take:

"First in bellwether Ohio, and now in another crucial swing state, the New York Senator has shown her tenacity. She and her husband are nothing if not relentless, and Mr. Obama can be forgiven if he wakes up at night thinking he's in one of those "Terminator" movies where the machine in the form of a human being just keeps coming. Nothing – not Bill Clinton's gaffes, not the Bosnian sniper-fire fantasy, not even being outspent 3-to-1 – has been able to stop her."

Bill Kristol at The Weekly Standard has similar thoughts (my emphasis): "Maybe we should acknowledge that Hillary Clinton is a pretty impressive candidate. She’s tough, disciplined, and not unappealing. She’s a good debater and adapts pretty quickly (if a bit clunkily) to campaign developments. Her campaign organization and strategists have been inferior to Obama’s--but she’s gotten more total votes than he (counting Michigan and Florida--the voters there are people too!). And she’s done this while bearing the burden of her husband."

Her challenge is to convince voters - as she did in Pennsylvania and Ohio - that her fighting instincts will be put to the service of ordinary Americans and aren't self-serving.

We need to engage ex-Islamists

Today, I had the privilege of attending what I believe was a profoundly important occasion - the launch of the Quilliam Foundation. At long last, the voices of moderation within Islam - led by ex-Islamists such as Ed Husain and Maajad Nawaz - have united, even if only in embryonic form, against extremism and Islamism. The words of peace, tolerance and common sense echoed around the room - from speakers as diverse as Sheikhs and Imams from different parts of the world, Jemima Khan, and Timothy Garton-Ash. 7/7 survivor Rachel North was perhaps the most moving speaker.

Some, I anticipate, will critique the event as superficial. Critics will say there were too many speakers making too many easy platititudes. But that is unfair. A launch by nature is unlikely to provide space for great substance. A launch is inevitably a public awareness exercise. The test will be in the substance to come - and I have every hope that it will indeed come. Already there are serious policy proposals put forward in the launch publication of Quilliam.

Has McCain peaked?

I've just read this Atlantic piece by Ross Douthat.  Mr D is worried that McCain has peaked: "Even with the Democratic Party locked in a fierce civil war, John McCain still hasn't pulled ahead of either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama in national polls."  I've become a fan of McCain.  He understands the importance of prevailing in Iraq.  He is a free trader.  He's socially conservative.  But can he win?  I'm now worried.

McCain's best hope may be continuing Democrat acrimony (although I worry that he's suffering from a lack of publicity because of the extended Obama-Clinton contest).  The Democrat contest reaches a crucial stage tonight... in Pennsylvania.   Hillary Clinton is expected to win but needs to win by at least 6% according to Americano's James Forsyth.  With a lead of 8 to 12% James thinks wonders if real doubts about Obama's ability to win the working class will emerge.   If Clinton bests Obama by 12% or more then it's real "game on" again.

The videos out of the US campaign keep getting better.  To watch all of the best'n'latest click here.  The video below starring my friend Reihan Salam summarises the different tactics of the two Democrat Senators:

More Reihan here.

Why Patrick Moore left Greenpeace

Not THE Patrick Moore but the Canadian Patrick Moore that actually founded Greenpeace.  In an article for the Wall Street Journal Mr Moore points to the anti-science prejudices of Greenpeace leaders.  Here's one key example:

"After six years as one of five directors of Greenpeace International, I observed that none of my fellow directors had any formal science education. They were either political activists or environmental entrepreneurs. Ultimately, a trend toward abandoning scientific objectivity in favor of political agendas forced me to leave Greenpeace in 1986.  The breaking point was a Greenpeace decision to support a world-wide ban on chlorine. Science shows that adding chlorine to drinking water was the biggest advance in the history of public health, virtually eradicating water-borne diseases such as cholera. And the majority of our pharmaceuticals are based on chlorine chemistry. Simply put, chlorine is essential for our health.  My former colleagues ignored science and supported the ban, forcing my departure. Despite science concluding no known health risks – and ample benefits – from chlorine in drinking water, Greenpeace and other environmental groups have opposed its use for more than 20 years."

Read the full piece.

Hamas - the west needs to understand the Islamic foreign affairs paradigm

Former US president Jimmy Carter yesterday claimed that Hamas will now accept a Palestinian state in only part of the territory that it claims. However, the actual words used by Hamas illustrate the need for western politicians to understand the Islamic paradigm of foreign affairs that middle eastern organisations such as Hamas and even Fatah operate under. What Khaled Meshaal, the leader of Hamas actually said in Damascus yesterday was:

"We agree to a (Palestinian) state on pre-67 borders, with Jerusalem as its capital, with genuine sovereignty, without settlements but without recognising Israel."

The cost of family breakdown

The social cost of family breakdown, especially its impact on children, is nowadays widely understood, as research evidence mounts in both Britain and the US. Attempting to assess the economic cost of transitory relationships and father-absent families is a more difficult task. However, as Jennifer Marshall of the Heritage Foundation reports on her blog for the Centre for Policy Studies, four American institutes have combined to produce the first-ever US survey (over all 50 states) of the total annual cost of family break-up. They have come up with a figure of  $112 billion, which they describe as a 'conservative' estimate.The intention is clear: to strengthen the case for funding marriage-support programmes and to ensure that welfare systems do not penalise couple families.

Given that UK rates of family breakdown, non-marital births and one-parent households all rival or outstrip US rates, there's no doubt that a UK audit of this kind would present some dramatic figures. The Conservatives under David Cameron have made commendably clear their commitment to removing the 'couple penalty' from the welfare system and to supporting marriage through the tax system, although they remain cautious about the means of funding both intitiatives. A UK investigation into the cost to taxpayers of family breakdown would undoubtedly make both of those commitments look remarkably good value.

Griffith University: 'An agent of extreme Islam'

Ladies and Gentlemen, I present - my Australian alma mater.

Pay less for politicians?

A wonderfully refreshing report out today by Policy Exchange challenges various lazy assumptions about party funding.

"Paying for the Party" reveals that the notion of a funding "arms race" between the major parties is a myth. Often used to legitimise State-funded politics, the notion that without taxpayer funds, the costs of politics will spiral ever upwards, is simply wrong.

More interesting is the idea that the costs of doing politics might actually be coming down.  Given how the internet lowers distribution costs elsewhere, perhaps we ought not be surprised if we start to see the cost of politics starting to fall, too.

Tory MP defects to UKIP: the shape of things to come?

So, Bob Spink, ex-Tory MP has defected to UKIP. I said it at the time and I’m still saying it – if the Tories had been honest on Europe, they would have gone all out on the Lisbon Treaty debates beyond a call for a referendum whilst explaining why, they would have voted on Bill Cash’s supremacy of Parliament ‘New Clause 9’ (on which the majority of Tories abstained), they would have engaged the public with the contents of the Treaty, and they would honour a post-ratification referendum even after the European Union (Amendment) Bill goes through Parliament.

People in general, including Spink’s constituents, are getting tired of this stuff – on Europe, immigration, etc.. due to the failures of Parliament – and I am positive they will not stand for it. As it happens, all we have had during the Lisbon debates were vague offerings of “we will not let matters rest there” which means nothing (ask any Conservative MP). I am very conscious that similar controls by the Tory Whips have also been used in the Lords this month – meaning, there is no real intention to stop this Treaty by the majority of Tories and the opposition has been a complete farce. Sounds like Spink knew exactly what was going on.

Muslims4Ken and the racist slur

Ken Livingstone campaign has established an offshoot to win Muslim votes, called Muslims4Ken. Part of its effort is to smear Boris Johnson as a racist. They highlight a quote from Boris Johnson that "racism is natural". Politicians often complain about their comments being taken out of context but this example is particularly outrageous. The full quote is:

"It is common ground among both right-wingers and left-wingers that racism is 'natural', in that it seems to arise organically, in all civilisations. It is as natural as sewage. We all agree that it is disgusting, a byproduct of humanity's imperfect evolution. The question is, what to do with the effluent?"

Not quite an endorsement of racism, is it? The Muslims4Ken website goes on, in their section, headed "Boris Johnson in his own words" to include the quote: "Black people have lower IQs." But they are not his own words. They were the words of Taki Theodoracopulos. A lie is half way around the word before the truth has got its boots on.

One of us, One of them?

In last Sunday's Telegraph magazine, Damian Thompson had an excellent piece about those being chosen as candidates by the Conservatives. Damian concentrated on three 'new style' PPCs, but it was his observations about the detachment of 'team Cameron' which were most interesting.

The feeling that the leadership of the party is remote is certainly there amongst many local activists. Even before Cameron was elected leader in 2005, one had the distinct impression that many in the so-called Westminster village, who were seeking to influence the future direction of the Tory Party, would really have perferred it if the party in the country would just disappear, and that it was an embarrassment.

While at the conference that elected him, I recall going to a think-tank meeting on the fringe which was attended by some senior party members, where it was discussed how the party should distance itself from so-called 'white man van' , who, in any case, was in demographic decline. That may well be true, but it was the sentiment behind it which took one aback.   

The most successful leaders of the Tory party - in fact, any party - have been those who have managed to inspire in their activists a sense that they are are fighting for each other, that they are one and the same. Thatcher never, ever forgot this, and to the end, the wider party members never lost their belief that she was one of them.

Do they feel this about Cameron? Or more importantly, does Cameron even want them to?