Brooks Newmark MP: Five ideas from the Million Jobs Campaign to help young people get and keep work

Brooks Newmark MP is MP for Braintree and a member of the Treasury Select Committee. Follow Brooks on Twitter

If we needed more proof that plan A is on track then this week’s labour market statistics are it. The latest figures show that employment continues to rise, with more men and women in work than ever before. Furthermore, unemployment is down by 24,000 for May-July 2013, and July’s revised fall of 36,300 is the biggest fall since June 1997. The Government’s economic plan is beginning to bear fruit; we have repaired the damage inflicted by 13 years of Labour’s financial mismanagement, and our economy has started to recover. As the Chancellor, George Osborne, has stated, our welfare reforms are helping more people into work, and inequality is falling.

Yet as we carry on towards economic renewal it is important we pay special attention to young people, especially as yesterday’s jobs market analysis reveals that whilst the unemployment figures continue to drop, youth unemployment has not been following the overall employment trend in the UK. There are 960,000 unemployed 16-24 year olds, which is around one in five who are in need of a job. A Manifesto published this week by the Million Jobs Campaign, of which I am a founder, seeks to address this problem. The Million Jobs Campaign was established to address the problem of youth unemployment, and our manifesto sets out five key policies that will help young people across Britain move into jobs:

1) Get rid of employer National Insurance Contributions for unemployed under 25s.

2) Make sure school pupils know all about apprenticeships.

3) Get rid of rules that stop employers from giving honest feedback.

4) Encourage more companies to take on a young person.

5) Help every young person to find a mentor.

Brooks Newmark MP: Remembering Srebrenica - and supporting the work of the ICMP

Brooks Newmark MP is MP for Braintree and a member of the Treasury Select Committee.

Last year, I travelled to Bosnia and, while in Sarajevo, visited the International Commission on Missing Persons (ICMP). This unique and highly effective organisation has revolutionised the international community’s approach to addressing the issue of missing persons.  In doing so, it has made a genuine contribution to justice and peace building in the Balkans and elsewhere.

President Clinton founded the ICMP in 1996 as an ‘ad hoc’ organisation to clarify the fate of missing persons following the Balkan wars. Confronting the scale of the problem, ICMP developed state of the art DNA identification technology and has helped resolve 70 per cent of missing persons cases from the 1990s conflicts, including 7,000 of the 8,100 missing from Srebrenica.

These unparalleled results provide the means to end the desperate uncertainty that families have endured.  It also provided irrefutable evidence to the domestic and international courts that hear war crimes cases, including those of Karadzic and Mladic. For the first time in history, DNA evidence is being used to convict the architects of genocide.

The distinctive expertise that the ICMP brings to this field is reflected in the growing contribution it is making beyond the Balkans. It now assists Cyprus, doubling the annual rate of identifications in less than four months. And this year, having just opened an office in Libya, the ICMP received funds from the UK (announced during the Prime Minister’s visit to Tripoli) to start DNA testing.  Within one month it had identified over 100 victims of Gadhafi’s forces. The ICMP has also been working in Iraq for several years and, sadly, it is clear that in the future, Syria  will also require similar assistance.

Brooks Newmark MP: Rwanda's accession to the Commonwealth is an encouraging sign for the organisation's future

Brooks Newmark MP has been MP for Braintree since 2005 and is an Opposition Whip.

At the Commonwealth’s biennial summit recently held in Trinidad and Tobago, the much anticipated news that Rwanda was to be admitted as its fifty-fourth member was announced. The significance of this decision should not be underestimated – neither for Rwanda, as a tiny, landlocked country in East Africa, nor for this international association encompassing one quarter of the world.

For many, Rwanda echoes in our consciousness as a country ravaged by a genocide perpetrated on its people 15 years ago. This appalling episode left one million dead, three million refugees, a region riddled with insecurity and a country and people struggling to comprehend the enormity of the horror inflicted upon them.

The lessons of the genocide have been harsh and the many memorials to the dead continue to remind survivors of the terrible price paid by the majority of Rwandan families. Yet visitors to Rwanda can now see an enormous amount of progress, and the overriding feeling that I get every time I visit the country is of a people wanting to move onwards and upwards to a better future.

Brooks Newmark MP has been MP for Braintree since 2005 and is an Opposition Whip.

Brooks Newmark MP has been MP for Braintree since 2005 and is an Opposition Whip.

Brooks Newmark MP: The Government must re-introduce cervical screening for twenty-year-olds in England

Brooks Newmark MP has been MP for Braintree since 2005 and is an Opposition Whip.

Cervical cancer is the second most common cancer in young women under the age of 35 in the UK. This is an important issue for young women and I was surprised to learn that in 2004 the Government increased the age at which cervical screening begins from 20 to 25. This puts us out of step with Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland, who all begin screening at the age of 20.

Last month I tabled a Ten Minute Rule Bill in Parliament seeking to reverse this policy and make NHS bodies in England provide cervical screening for women aged 20 and above.

I am conscious that this issue arouses strong sentiment on both sides of the argument. Just as I have received impassioned letters of support from families who have lost a young woman to cervical cancer, I have also heard well-informed arguments from medical professionals firm in their belief that screening should begin at 25. But, fundamentally, this is a question of choice, and Marie Stopes, Jo’s Trust and the 178,000 signatories to The Sun’s petition on the issue all agree that the Government should lower the age of screening back down to 20.

We currently operate a two-pronged attack on cervical cancer through screening and vaccination. Regular cervical screening can detect and treat early the abnormalities which, if left untreated, could lead to cervical cancer. Over 90% of screening results come back normal, but for the few that do not, this test can, quite simply, make the difference between life and death. Additionally, the new HPV vaccination is given to all girls between the ages of 12 and 18.

Yet, there is a gap in coverage here – the vaccination programme ends at the age of 18 and the screening programme begins at the age of 25 – this leaves 1.3 million young women caught in medical limbo.
Screening and vaccination share a common purpose yet there is a contradiction in the Government’s policy. Even by its own admission, the Government does not yet know the full risks of the HPV vaccine, but it is nevertheless pressing ahead with the programme. Yet, the same lack of certainty exists in the risks outlined in the Government’s argument against reducing the screening age to 20. You cannot use the same rationale to support one cervical cancer prevention scheme yet deny it to another.

Brooks Newmark MP has been MP for Braintree since 2005 and is an Opposition Whip.

Brooks Newmark MP: Exposing the true scale of Labour's hidden tax bombshell

Brooks Newmark MP has been MP for Braintree since 2005, is an Opposition Whip and has just written The Hidden Debt Bombshell, a paper published today by the Centre for Policy Studies.

Gordon Brown has proven himself the master of obfuscation when it comes to the public finances. Over the last 12 years he has claimed to have single-handedly ended boom and bust and been the architect of a prudent financial and fiscal policy. Yet, in The Hidden Debt Bombshell, a paper published with The Centre for Policy Studies (click here to download it as a pdf), the true scale of this Government’s catastrophic mishandling of the nation’s finances is laid bare.

The Government claims that Britain’s debt stands at an already shocking £805 billion, equivalent to 57.5% of GDP. This is a significant underestimate. In truth, Britain’s public debt is an astronomical £2.2 trillion, equivalent to 157.2% of GDP. This means that, in addition to grappling with the effects of the recession and credit crunch, every single British household is being hobbled by the ball and chain of public debt to the sum of £85,610.

The Hidden Debt Bombshell brings onto the balance sheet the full cost of projects financed through the PFI, unfunded public sector pension liabilities, contingent liabilities, and the estimated cost of the recent interventions in the financial sector. It reveals that for every £1 Gordon Brown is putting on the balance sheet, he is hiding another £2 off.

Yet this debt figure of £2.2 trillion is only a conservative estimate – the situation may be worse. Most uncertain of all is the impact on the public finances of the Government’s interventions in the financial sector. In his wildly over-optimistic Budget figures in April, the Chancellor suggested that such interventions would, at the very most, amount to 3.5% of GDP. The IMF disagrees, suggesting 9.3% of GDP, equivalent to £130 billion. Yet the figure could be much higher, reaching £3.84 trillion, or 274% of GDP. During unstable times such as these, contingent liabilities can easily solidify into actual liabilities, and it is only fair that the taxpayer knows the size of the potential debts the Government is foisting on them.

Brooks Newmark MP: Central African Republic - A forgotten crisis

Brooks Newmark has been Conservative MP for Braintree since 2005 and is an Opposition whip. He writes here about the humanitarian crisis in the Central African Republic, which he witnessed at first hand at the end of last year.

Last year I spent a week in the Central African Republic (CAR) with international health relief organisation, Merlin.

If you are wondering exactly what and where CAR is, unfortunately you are not alone. Some may have heard of the self-styled Emperor Bokassa and his alleged penchant for cannibalism, but today this landlocked country at the geographical heart of Africa and its 4.4 million people are the least reported on in the world. Even the estimated 300,000 who have been forced to flee their homes as a result of conflict have not registered on the global radar.

Yet, statistics alone make CAR worthy of attention: one of the lowest GDPs in the world at nearly $1.8 billion, the same as Sierra Leone and only one fifth of Haiti, with a male life expectancy lower than Somalia and the highest HIV/AIDS prevalence in the region. The country ranks 172nd out of 177 countries on the UNDP Human Development Index and 67 per cent of the population live on less than 1 dollar a day.

I arrived in the rusting capital, Bangui, on the only weekly flight from Europe, as the first British MP to visit this intriguing country in recent memory. While flattered to be a first, this lack of interest only hints at the deep abyss CAR has fallen into, far from the scrutiny of the international community and the popular conscience.

Brooks Newmark MP: In debt to Brown

Brooks Newmark is MP for Braintree, Essex, was a Member of the Treasury Select Committee and is now the Conservative Treasury Whip.  This Platform summaries a paper that Brooks has written for the Centre for Policy Studies, available of the CPS website.

The Government has hubristically congratulated itself on its efforts to keep public finances on a stable and sustainable footing. Yesterday Gordon Brown even claimed:

"Debt is considerably lower than a decade ago.”

However, Britain’s public debt is actually an astronomical £1,866 billion, which is equivalent to 125.5% of GDP, nearly three times larger than the Government’s published figure of £645 billion or 43.4% of GDP. This equates to each British household being hobbled by the ball and chain of public debt to a sum of £76,475.

The Government has shrouded its public finances in an opaque blanket of manipulations and masquerades, hoping the British public would be as short-sighted as their own economic policies have been. Yet, in ‘The Price of Irresponsibility’, a report published with the CPS, the Government’s claims of a prudent financial and fiscal policy have been proved flagrantly wrong. ‘The Price of Irresponsibility’ brings onto the balance sheet the full cost of projects financed through the PFI, the extent of unfunded public sector pension liabilities, the debt incurred by Network Rail and the recent nationalisation of Bradford and Bingley. It also includes the £87 billion Northern Rock debt that the Government claims should not be included in the official debt figure of £645 billion.

The Government’s recent bail-out of the banking sector could imply a further addition of as much as £500 billion to the balance sheet. This would increase public debt to a massive £2,366 billion, which is 159.1% of GDP, or over £96,967 per British household.

Hiding substantial liabilities off the Government balance sheet has enabled it to circumvent Gordon Brown’s much lauded ‘Golden Rule’ and ‘Sustainable Investment Rule’. Yet, short-term political expediency has been exposed as the true Government debt of £1,866 billion tears holes in the ‘golden rule’ and emphatically obliterates the ‘sustainable investment rule’. It is time the Government recognises these failings and looks towards the future with an entirely new and forward-thinking fiscal framework.

Brooks Newmark MP: Private inequity?

Brooks Newmark, MP for Braintree, defends the private equity industry.

The private equity industry is in the process of being tarred and feathered with accusations that it is secretive, privileged and harmful to UK plc.

The overwhelming majority of the industry would refute those accusations vigorously.

But then why is the industry in the dock?

It is there because of some legitimate concerns about the way in which it has developed and expanded over the last few years.

But the industry is already facing up to these concerns and it is quite right that there should be a forthright debate about the challenges that it faces and the opportunities that it continues to present.

Brooks Newmark MP: Syria is part of the solution, not part of the problem

Brooks Newmark, pictured in Lebanon with Tobias Ellwood, is MP for Braintree

Last week when President Bush committed “America’s full diplomatic resources to rally support for Iraq” he excluded Syria from the list of potential interlocutors. The Minister for the Middle East seemed keen to distance himself from that decision during Foreign Office Questions on Tuesday when he said that “the Government are responsible for British foreign policy, not American foreign policy.”

Nevertheless, the Foreign Secretary did confirm that the Government has made a “deliberate decision” not to engage in talks with Syria at a Ministerial level.  Even with the caveat that the decision is being kept under review, we must now ask whether it is justifiable.

The Prime Minister’s tour of the Middle East in the latter part of 2006 gave some cause for hope. His key-note address in Dubai affirmed that “we must mobilise our alliance of moderation in this region and outside of it to defeat the extremists. Nothing matters more. Nothing should stand in the way of it. Nothing should be more galvanising of our collective will.”

But we might be forgiven for thinking that the Prime Minister’s ‘alliance of moderation’ is to be mobilised without any actual forward movement.

Brooks Newmark MP: Gordon Brown - Iron Chancellor or Enron Chancellor?

Brooks Newmark is MP for Braintree.

Gordon Brown's buzzwords since 1997 have been prudence, transparency and accountability.

But there are increasing signs that the Chancellor is systematically understating the true extent of the Government's debt because of lax accounting standards.

In a study co-authored with Stephen Hammond MP, entitled Simply Red: The True State of the Public Finances, we have looked at two of the main problems.

Our study has found that the total public sector net debt is not £487bn, as the Government claims, but well over a trillion pounds. Using some cautious, assumptions we have pegged the true public sector net debt at a staggering £1.34 trillion.

Not only does this figure exceed Gross Domestic Product, but also the UK's £1.2 trillion consumer debt mountain; and it is equivalent to £53,000 of government debt for every household in the UK.

The first cause for concern is the way in which the Chancellor has financed public sector investment through the use of the Private Finance Initiative. When the last Conservative Government developed PFI in the early 1990s, Gordon Brown hailed it as "a cynical distortion of public finance" – and that is just what it has become on his watch.

PFI works very simply by transferring the risk of projects failing, from the Government to the private sector. This is a fine principle which ought to lead to tighter project management and better value for taxpayers.

But all too often the risk of failure is not actually transferred because the Government still has to step in to bail out failing public services like hospitals and schools.

Brooks Newmark MP and Charlie Elphicke: Next steps on tax for the Tories

Brooks Newmark MP is Conservative MP for Braintree and a member of the Treasury Select Committee.  Charlie Elphicke is a research fellow of the Centre for Policy Studies and Vice Chairman of the Cities of London & Westminster Conservative Association.

Tax cuts of £21 Billion were proposed by the Tax Reform Commission last week. The proposals represent one of the most radical tax shake ups in history. However, Shadow Chancellor George Osborne is right when he says that economic stability must come first.

Yet, those who worry about whether we have gone soft on taxes should draw comfort from the fact that George Osborne has made it clear that he does believe in cutting taxes, when affordable.  And quite right too as all this tax is not holding back our pockets and our choices - it is slowing the future growth and prosperity of our nation.

As has been commented on this web site before, what happens with the deficit in the public finances and the scale of public spending is going to be critical, but would obviously be a premature debate at this stage. So the Commission cannot be seen as a ready-made agenda to be taken off the shelf, dusted down and implemented in 2009. For that would result in an unfunded mandate and would run counter to Shadow Chancellor George Osborne's quite proper determination not to be reckless with the public finances.

The Commission report is best seen as an expression of priorities to be engaged in as and when affordable by a Shadow Chancellor that does believe in lowering taxes when possible.

Brooks Newmark MP: Increasing the number of female Tory MPs

On the Platform Blog yesterday Kate Jackson considered the limited number of female bloggers.  Today Brooks Newmark MP considers what might be done to increase the number of women Conservative MPs.

Westminster is often seen as a Gentleman’s Club. I will freely admit that when I sat on the green benches during my first session of ‘Treasury Questions’ there was little evidence to correct that reputation. Just one Member on the Conservative benches was a woman, and yet I counted at least 12 women sitting opposite me.

There has been plenty of media coverage – most of it critical – about Labour’s initiatives for increasing their tally of Women MPs. But I can honestly say that nothing brings the issue home quite as well as sitting in the House of Commons and seeing such a glaring disparity staring back at you. This is one of the most serious issues that we face as a 21st Century party and, before we sling too much mud at Labour’s recruitment policies, we must examine our own with just a little more honesty and humility.

I am not alone in being an MP with a background in business. But how quickly we all seem to have forgotten what the world outside Westminster is like these days. In any professional or business meeting women are now pretty much fully represented, but at Westminster we have simply not caught up. The scale of the challenge would be laughable if it wasn’t so serious:  I’ve recently read one report which claims that, if current trends continue, women will not be equally represented on the Tory benches until 2309.

So what has happened to the party which was the first to return a sitting woman MP? Nancy Astor took up her seat in 1919 and yet by 2005 there are only 17 Conservative women in Parliament. One problem has been in encouraging women to stand as Conservative candidates. This is partly because of the changing demographics of party membership which has led to what I believe is a truly frightening statistic: that only 1.6% of female Conservative party members are under 45. How can we attract more candidates when grass-roots membership of young women is so woefully lacking?

There are many issues which we need to think about when considering how to encourage more participation from younger people, and women in particular. But, focusing for the minute on Parliamentary candidates, one problem stands out. Although the percentage of women offering themselves as candidates seems to match those being accepted, the number who are offered ‘safe’ seats is disproportionately low. Women candidates contested 40% of the least winnable 30 seats, but only 10% of the most winnable seats at the last election.

Where does this leave us when we try to claim to be a modern and inclusive Party? Simply that we should admit to having a problem – and volunteer for rehab. That process could take one of several forms, some of which are, admittedly, more radical than others.

I would like to see us examine several options for change. The first would be to follow Theresa May’s proposal of an ‘A’ list split 50:50 between men and women for our safe or target seats. Alternatively, we could pair off constituencies so that one selects a man, the other a woman. Most radically of all, we could consider adopting all-women shortlists.

But before we are accused of social engineering or positive discrimination we must admit that there is more that could be done within the existing system to encourage women candidates. I would, for example, like to see some headhunting and mentoring of talented women candidates.

Conservative Central Office should reinstate a full-time Women’s Officer (a woman, of course) to coordinate women’s organisations, provide information and be proactive about attracting suitable women who might not have thought of standing for Parliament. Let us not forget that the Conservatives have more women local councillors than Labour. This is a huge pool of politically interested and experienced women that we should target.

Finally, and most importantly, we should continue the reforms of selection procedures which were begun by Theresa May in order to help ensure some consistency and accountability. I’m not suggesting needless interference in the autonomy of local associations. But it is clear that selection procedures which take account of the skills which women have to offer, and which are not based on outdated expectations, would benefit all of us. So perhaps the least controversial solution is to leave Associations with autonomy in candidate selection; but insist that they have a responsibility to present a balanced short-list to their members comprising of 50% women and 50% men.

Unfortunately, for the time being, there is still a self-perpetuating norm for Conservative candidates who are “white, male, professional, middle-aged and with a family”. Since it is one that I fit so well, I am conscious that perhaps I ought not to bite the hand that has fed me. That feeling is surely part of the problem. But I believe that breaking the stereotype once and for all can only strengthen our Party in the long-run. Change has never been more necessary than now, but there has never been a better time for it. What do you think...?