29 32 Tory MPs rebel against Britain's £9.3 billion EXTRA contribution to IMF bailouts

By Tim Montgomerie
Follow Tim on Twitter. 

Last night at least 32 Tory MPs (listed below) voted with Labour against an 88% hike in Britain's contribution to the IMF. The hike is to partly fund the IMF's ability to fund bailouts. I write "at least" because I've only quickly scanned the voting list. Please email [email protected] if I've missed anyone off the list.

1. Steve Baker
2. Brian Binley
3. Peter Bone
4. Douglas Carswell
5. Bill Cash
6. Chris Chope
7. James Clappison
8. Philip Davies
9. David Davis
10. Zac Goldsmith
11. James Gray (added at 9.30am)
12. Gordon Henderson (added at 9.30am)
13. Chris Kelly
14. Edward Leigh
15. Julian Lewis
16. Anne Main
17. Karl McCartney
18. Nigel Mills (added at 11.30am)
19. David Nuttall
20. Matthew Offord
21. Andrew Percy
22. Mark Reckless
23. John Redwood
24. Simon Reevell
25. Richard Shepherd
26. Henry Smith
27. Graham Stuart
28. Peter Tapsell
29. Andrew Turner
30. Martin Vickers
31. Charles Walker
32. John Whittingdale

The Government won the vote to increase Britain's contribution from £10.7 billion to £20.15 billion by 274 votes to 246. This is the first time that the Labour frontbench has voted with Tory Eurosceptics. Labour was voting against an increase in the IMF subscription that was largely agreed during Gordon brown's time in office.

On his blog John Redwood suggests that the 29 rebels are only one sign of Tory discontent. Given that there are more than 300 Tory MPs he calculates that AT LEAST 80 Conservatives were unavailable, abstained or voted against the government. He writes:

"Some of us want the UK government to use the influence it says it has at the IMF to halt the futile bail outs of Eurozone members. The debt markets show the markets do not believe that Greece can repay all its debts in full and on time. Yesterday was a day when market worries spread beyond Greece, Ireland and Portugal to Italy. Those in  charge of the Euro scheme need to get a grip. It is doing a great deal of financial and economic damage, and they no longer seem to be in control of their project. The IMF should decline to bail out rich countries that have shackled themselves to a currency scheme that was badly put together and needs a thorough re think."

10.30am Douglas Carswell has just blogged this:

"The decision to raise our IMF subscriptions by 88 percent was first mooted when Gordon Brown was in charge – but was okayed by the current government last October.  While Canada, Switzerland, Holland and Belgium all managed to keep the increase in their subs low, whoever negotiated the deal on our behalf seems to have preferred to have UK taxpayers assume greater debt liabilities so that they could sit on a bigger chair at the various international summits they attend on our behalf. Alongside fiscal policy and monetary policy, our approach towards the bailouts and the IMF shows that there has been remarkably little change in economic policy at the Treasury since Gordon Brown was in charge." 

More from Douglas Carswell.

Tory MPs debate 4,500% interest rates charged by legal lenders

By Tim Montgomerie
Follow Tim on Twitter.

Yesterday in the Commons Tory MPs voiced concern about legal financial companies that charge very high interest rates. They were speaking in response to proposals from the Labour benches.

Learning the lessons from anti-smoking campaigns, Neil Parish MP called for health warnings to be added to the advertising of companies such as Wonga: "[Wonga] can charge up to 4,500% interest on its loans. Uncle Buck can charge 2,500% and PaydayUK can charge 1,200%. With a base rate of 0.5%, how can charging such inordinate interest be justified? These companies—I call them all loan sharks, to be blunt—travel around our poorest areas... I know that Ministers are not keen on dealing with this problem through regulation, but perhaps we should consider our approach to smoking: we do not stop people smoking—although we have banned it in public places—but we put large health warnings on cigarette packets. The Financial Services Authority, or whichever body will be responsible, should at the very least take action so that there are serious health warnings for those considering taking out these loans."

The MP for Tiverton and Honiton also supported greater support for credit unions: "About 50% of the population in Ireland are involved in credit unions. In the US and Canada, the figure is about 40%, in Australia and New Zealand it is about 25%, but in the UK it is only 2%. I know that the Government are looking into increasing the availability of credit unions across the country, but we need to act much faster. In the meantime, we have to act against these companies, the loan sharks, because people who take out the loans sometimes have to pay back 10, 20, 30 or 100 times as much as they originally borrowed."

Continue reading "Tory MPs debate 4,500% interest rates charged by legal lenders" »

Lansley under supported on front bench, but strongly supported from backbenches

by Paul Goodman

This morning's reports of Andrew Lansley's Commons statement yesterday haven't missed that he was unsupported in the Chamber by the presence of senior Cabinet colleagues.  (The Prime Minister was en route to Pakistan.)

What some may have missed is the strong support given to the Health Secretary by Conservative backbenchers.  Some it, clearly, had been organised in an operation by the Whips - but not all.  By my count, Lansley received ten questions specifically supportive of his plans -

"Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con): As the Secretary of State may know, I still have a faint link with the NHS and medicine in general. The GPs I have met in my constituency and elsewhere are very much in favour of the proposals. In contrast, the complaints are circular letters that have been well organised. Does the Secretary of State agree that GPs will be devastated if there is any reversal and backtracking?

Continue reading "Lansley under supported on front bench, but strongly supported from backbenches" »

Tory MP calls for more combined police, fire and ambulance stations to save money

By Jonathan Isaby

At DCLG Questions yesterday, Andrew Percy, the Conservative MP for Brigg and Goole, called for more resource-sharing between the emergency services as a way of saving money. He told the House:

"It strikes me as a bit bonkers that many communities have separate fire, ambulance and police stations, many of which have been built recently. What is the Minister doing to encourage emergency services to work together to cut costs and to get rid of three lots of electricity bills and the such like? Also, what is he doing to ensure that they work together so that when one service is pressed, another can help and support it"

The Local Governemnt minister, Bob Neill, replied as follows:

"In fairness, a good deal of work is already being done at local level on closer collaboration and joint working between fire authorities and other emergency services, and I commend that. At the time of the settlement, I wrote to the chairmen of all fire and rescue authorities and their chief officers to set out the way in which closer joint working, collaboration, better procurement and the stripping out of back-office services could save money that could be made available to the front line."

Caroline Spelman formally cancels the forest sell-off consultation: "I am sorry. We got this one wrong."

By Jonathan Isaby

Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Secretary Caroline Spelman has just made a difficult statement to the Commons, making a full U-turn on the Government's proposals to sell off some state-owned forests. She announced

1. The forestry clauses will be removed from the public bodies bill;
2. The consultation on the forest sell-off - due to have been going on until later in April - has been called off after two weeks, owing to the sheer volume of opposition from the public and MPs;
3. An independent panel will be set up to consider future forestry policy for England.

Mrs Spelman said that she takes "full responsibility" for the situation and in particular takes the message from this experience that people cherish the forests and woodlands and the benefits they bring. She concluded:

"I am sorry. We got his one wrong. We have listend to people's concerns."

Later on I will try and include some of the reaction from Tory backbenchers.

In the meantime, do read my post from last Friday: Lessons for the Government to learn from the forests fiasco.

5.30pm update:

Nick Watt from the Guardian has already blogged to commend Caroline Spelman's execution of the U-turn and to criticise Labour's spokesman, Mary Creagh, for a laboured and ineffective performance.

He rightly observes that Creagh managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory by speakng for far too long and claiming that Labour was the party of the countryside, which prompted Tory MPs all the more to go into bat for Spelman and aid her in attacking Labour's hypocrisy on the issue of forests.

Here's a selection of the contributions from the Conservative backbenches in response to her statement:  

Nick Boles (Grantham and Stamford): The Secretary of State has had the honesty and guts to come here to say that she presented ideas to the British public, but the British public did not much like them, so she said sorry and came up with a new approach. Is it not instructive that that is in such amazing contrast to the behaviour of that lot on the Opposition Benches who, no matter how many acres of woodland they sold and no matter how much gold they sold and at what price, nevertheless ran our economy into the ditch, from which we are trying to dig it out?

Continue reading "Caroline Spelman formally cancels the forest sell-off consultation: "I am sorry. We got this one wrong."" »

20 Tory backbenchers back Peter Bone's amendment calling for a trigger on an in/out EU referendum

By Jonathan Isaby

At the end of proceedings on the European Union Bill yesterday, there was an opportunity for the Commons to debate and vote on the amendment from Wellingborough MP Peter Bone, which he wrote about here on ConHome last month.

The thrust of his amendment was that an in/out referendum on British membership of the European Union would be triggered if people voted against a transfer of a competency to Brussels under the terms of the new EU Bill.

Bone summarised:

"Let me explain why the Committee should support my new clause. First, it would not alter in any way the purpose of the European Union Bill. The Bill is designed, under certain circumstances, to give the British people, through a referendum, a say on our relationship with the European Union. My proposal would merely extend the referendum lock, under certain circumstances, to whether we should remain part of the European Union.

"Why do I think that this would improve the Bill? If the British people have a chance to approve or disapprove of a transfer of power in the future, and they say yes, then there is clearly no need for an in/out referendum, as it would show that the British people are happy with their relationship with Europe. If they say no, clearly they are unhappy with a proposed change to the European Union. Surely it is right that the alternative question is then put as to whether the British people wish to remain in the European Union.

"An added advantage is that the in/out referendum would be triggered by an event, not by politicians. In the past, referendums have been timed to favour the proponents of the referendum, not necessarily for the benefit of the British people."

Continue reading "20 Tory backbenchers back Peter Bone's amendment calling for a trigger on an in/out EU referendum" »

Tory MPs argue over whether increasing fees will discourage school leavers from going to university

By Jonathan Isaby

One of the fears expressed by the six Tory rebels who voted against the Government on tuition fees last night (full breakdown of who rebelled is here) was that the increase would deter people from poorer backgrounds fro going to university.

It became an issue over which Conservative MPs argued during the debate in the chamber yesterday.

Brigg and Goole MP Andrew Percy, a rebel and member of the new intake (who used to work for fellow rebel, David Davis) expressed his fears thus:

"I speak from my own experiences as a former schoolteacher, which I have mentioned on many occasions, and as the first person in my family to attend university-I know that I am not unique in that among hon. Members. I went to university on a full grant with all my tuition paid, shortly before tuition fees were introduced. I can only think about the impact that the proposed fees would have had on me and my family when I was growing up. Would my parents have encouraged me to attend university, had they thought I would come away with debts of £40,000 or £50,000? I do not think so. Similarly, many of the students whom I taught in deprived schools in Hull wanted to go to university, but when I encouraged them to do so, the response was often, "My dad says that we can't afford to go to university." That was after fees were introduced.

"Since fees were introduced, the evidence has shown that although there has been widening participation, students from some backgrounds are not attending the best universities, as I said to the shadow Secretary of State. They choose where to attend based on money and finances, rather than on what is best for them. They often choose to stay at home."

In reference to similar arguments made by Labour MP Barry Sheerman, Surrey East MP Sam Gyimah responded:

"He reminded the House of the debate on tuition fees here in 2004. That Bill passed by five votes. However, he did not say that, during that debate, we heard the same apocalyptic messages that we are hearing in the Chamber today. The issue then was fees increasing from £1,000 to £3,000. No Government Member says with relish that we should increase fees, but it is important to note that six years on from those debates, 45% of people go to university and 200,000 people want to but cannot go. The hon. Gentleman should therefore have told us that, although we were worried at the time, many of those worries proved unfounded."

This argument was developed with more statistics by Grantham and Stamford's Nick Boles:

Continue reading "Tory MPs argue over whether increasing fees will discourage school leavers from going to university" »

A full breakdown of who voted which way and who rebelled in tonight's votes

By Jonathan Isaby

Both divisions tonight - on increasing the upper tuition fees limit to £9,000 and on raising the cap on basic tuition fees to £6,000 - saw identical results: 323 votes in favour and 302 votes against.

Factoring in two tellers from each side, you had 325 MPs backing the Government line and 304 opposing it, meaning that 629 out of a possible 640 MPs participated in the divisions (the remaining ten are accounted for by the 5 Sinn Fein MPs, the Speaker, 3 Deputy Speakers and the vacancy in Oldham East and Saddleworth).

So who voted which way?

IN FAVOUR

Conservatives
297 of the 305 Conservative MPs, comprising:

• All 77 Ministers and Whips
• 39 PPSs (no longer including Lee Scott, who resigned to abstain)
• 181 of the 189 backbenchers

Liberal Democrats
28 of the 57 Lib Dem MPs, comprising:

• 17 of the 18 Ministers and Whips (Chris Huhne being at the conference in Cancun)
• The 3 remaining PPSs (no longer including Mike Crockart and Jenny Willott, who resigned to vote against)
• 8 of the 36 backbenchers (namely: Sir Alan Beith, Tom Brake, Malcolm Bruce, Don Foster, Stephen Gilbert, John Hemming, David Laws and David Ward)

AGAINST

• 6 Conservative MPs (namely: Philip Davies, David Davis, Julian Lewis, Jason McCartney, Andrew Percy and Mark Reckless)
•  21 Liberal Democrat MPs (namely: Annette Brooke, Sir Menzies Campbell, Mike Crockart, Tim Farron, Andrew George, Mike Hancock, Julian Huppert, Charles Kennedy, John Leech, Stephen Lloyd, Greg Mulholland, John Pugh, Alan Reid, Dan Rogerson, Bob Russell, Adrian Sanders, Ian Swales, Mark Williams, Roger WIlliams, Jenny Willott, Simon Wright)
• All 253 Labour MPs
• 7 of the 8 DUP MPs
• All 6 SNP MPs
• All 3 Plaid Cymru MPs
• All 3 SDLP MPs
• The 1 Alliance MP
• The 1 Green MP
• All 3 Independent MPs

ABSENT FROM THE VOTE (DELIBERATELY ABSTAINING OR OTHERWISE)

• 2 Conservative MPs (namely: Tracey Crouch and Lee Scott)
• 8 Liberal Democrat MPs (namely: Loreley Burt, Martin Horwood, Simon Hughes, Chris Huhne, Tessa Munt, Sir Robert Smith, John Thurso, Stephen Williams)
• 1 DUP MP (William McCrea)

Of the six Tory rebels, most have quite a lot of "form" when it comes to walking through the lobbies against the Government line:

• Philip Davies - Tonight's rebellions were his 26th and 27th rebellious votes
• David Davis - Tonight's rebellions were his 13th and 14th rebellious votes
• Julian Lewis - Tonight's rebellions were his 11th and 12th rebellious votes
• Andrew Percy - Tonight's rebellions were his 13th and 14th rebellious votes
• Jason McCartney - Tonight's rebellions were his 4th and 5th rebellious votes
• Mark Reckless - Tonight's rebellions were his 11th and 12th rebellious votes

Of the two Tory abstainers, as a PPS until yesterday, Lee Scott, has no history of rebellion; meanwhile, Tracey Crouch, who also abstained, has still never actively voted in a division lobby against the government line.

Should the fixed-term Parliament last for four or five years?

By Jonathan Isaby

During Tuesday's proceedings on the Fixed Term Parliaments Bill, amendments were tabled by Plaid Cymru - and also backed by Labour and the SNP - that would reduce the proposed term limit of this and future Parliaments to four years, and not five, as the Government proposes in the Bill.

Two Tory MPs gave speeches in favour of the four year term. Richard Shepherd began by quoting Asquith's speech from 21 February 1911 on the Parliament Bill which was to change the Septennial Act 1715:

"In the first place we propose to shorten the legal duration of Parliament from seven years to five years, which will probably amount in practice to an actual legislative working term of four years. That will secure that your House of Commons for the time being, is always either fresh from the polls which gave it authority, or-and this is an equally effective check upon acting in defiance of the popular will-it is looking forward to the polls at which it will have to render an account of its stewardship."-[ Official Report, 21 February 1911; Vol. XXI, c. 1749.]

"Asquith's reasons have been borne out in all the years since then. The average length of a Parliament is not far off four years, and his points relate to the electorate. None of the constitutional proposals of the Deputy Prime Minister-who I again note is not following his own Bill on the Floor of the House of Commons-strengthens the position of the electorate versus the Crown as represented by the Government. The proposals are therefore abandoning the principle that a Government have the authority to govern but must be mindful that there is a time after which the electorate should make a judgment on the actions, activities and success of that Government. That is all being cast out for what I believe to be a profoundly cynical purpose: the entrenchment, or attempted entrenchment, of a particular Parliament for five years."

"What distresses me most about this constitutional arrangement, and the actions of the coalition Government, is that they think that we are all back-of-the-envelope legislators who set aside the traditions and history of our own constitution. They are trying to legislate for something that I believe is unnecessary. A Government last for as long as that Government can command a majority in the House of Commons: that is a fundamental constitutional proposition in the Parliament Act."

Then there was a contribution from Brigg and Goole MP Andrew Percy:

Continue reading "Should the fixed-term Parliament last for four or five years? " »

In their maiden speeches former teacher Andrew Percy signals his intention to champion the cause of excluded children as Craig Whittaker raises the educational attainment of looked-after children

Andrew Percy gained Brigg and Goole at the election and made his maiden speech during Thursday’s debate on poverty:

“Before becoming a Member, I was a schoolteacher, and I intend to champion the issues of school funding, deprivation and exclusions. I am delighted to have been called to speak in the debate on poverty because although I represent a large rural constituency I was brought up in a neighbouring constituency of Hull as a proud comprehensive boy, and I am pleased to say that there are two comprehensive boys now in Parliament, one on each side—[ Interruption. ] I meant two Hull comprehensive boys. I have taught in some of the most deprived schools in Hull, so the issues of child poverty and deprivation are dear to me.

“In my time in Parliament I wish to champion the cause of excluded children, who under the last two Governments—and perhaps also under previous Governments—have not received the attention that they deserve. In particular, children who receive free school meals are three times more likely to be excluded from school. As a practitioner in the last few years, I know that we had fine words from the previous Government, but we were hamstrung in schools by a commitment to social inclusion. The social inclusion agenda was introduced for good reasons, but it had the opposite effect to that intended in secondary schools, because it tied the hands of schoolteachers who wanted to deal with discipline, which is at the core of many of the problems we face in schools today. I do not have time to go into great detail today, but I intend to champion the cause of excluded children in the future. We are moving in the right direction with the pupil premium, but we must accept that dealing with excluded children is expensive. We need to follow the examples of excellent practice around the country and make progress on this issue.”

Craig Whittaker, who gained Calder Valley, also has expertise when it comes to educating children in care:

“I want to talk about the educational attainment levels of looked-after children in our country. This is about poverty on an amazing scale—educational poverty. Incredibly, Sir Donald Thompson, in his own maiden speech some 31 years ago, talked about the attainment levels of children through education back then. Although the percentage of year 11 looked-after children who achieve five A* to C grades at GCSE has doubled in the past 10 years, it is incredibly sad that that number still only accounts for 14% of them. Nationally, more than 13% of our looked-after children still miss more than 25 days of schooling, sometimes because of exclusions. A third of previously looked-after children are not in education, employment or training at the age of 19. A total of 22% of persistent young offenders were being looked after by social services, and a staggering further 27% had been looked after previously.

“Earlier, a colleague talked about aspiration. In 2005, a research report by the Frank Buttle Trust showed that only one care leaver in every 100 children goes to university—a staggering 1%. In 2008, “Care Matters”, the ministerial stock-take report by the then Department of Children, Schools and Families, showed that 7% of care leavers went to university. Whatever the current figure is—whether it is 1% or 7%—it compares with 43% of all other children. Frankly, that is not good enough.

“In Calderdale, where I have spent the past three years as lead member for children’s services, I am glad to say that our looked-after children do significantly better than the national picture. Sadly, however, it is still not good enough. We have a fabulous team in Calderdale who strive for excellence in attainment for our looked-after children. I am incredibly proud of two of the last things that I did as lead member before coming to this House. First, I secured money to fund a virtual head teacher for our looked-after children in Calderdale. In itself that is not unusual, but it is an important and significant step forward for those children. Secondly, under the superb leadership of Councillor Stephen Baines, the Conservative leader of Calderdale council, last year we became only the second authority in the United Kingdom, after Rotherham, to introduce a virtual library so that every child under the age of five gets a free book monthly. That is unusual in itself, but in conjunction with the facilities at Sure Start children’s centres, where parents who cannot read are also taught to do so, it is a perfect way of starting to break the cycle of poverty.”

Jonathan Isaby