ConservativeHome's ToryDiary

Cameron is accused of posturing on HRA

The Sun is delighted at David Cameron's intention to scrap the Human Rights Act and replace it with a new British British Bill of Rights.  The nation's top-selling red top claims that the Tory leader is singing from its songsheet.

Other newspapers disagree about the wisdom of Mr Cameron's plan but The Telegraph and Independent - coming from very different starting points - tend to agree that it is a half-hearted measure if it is not also accompanied by a willingness to withdraw from the European Convention on Human Rights:

"If the Conservatives stopped short of withdrawing from the Convention, the European code will still ultimately override domestic British legislation. Contentious cases such as those of foreign terror suspects under threat of deportation would still end up being decided in Strasbourg. If the Tory leader regards the present legal situation as an impediment to the proper functioning of the criminal justice system, it is hard to see how anything he is proposing would make much difference." (The Independent)

"While laudably keen to repeal the Human Rights Act, Mr Cameron has also set his face against withdrawing Britain from the Convention that inspired it, a logical contortion that leaves much to be desired in the "common sense" department.  The Prime Minister himself has acknowledged that the real source of the judicial perversion that has left him and his various home secretaries foaming with frustration over the years is the Convention, not the Act, but has shrunk from repudiating it. If Mr Cameron cannot show the courage to take his convictions to their logical conclusion by pulling out of the ECHR, he will be nothing more than a lightweight Tony Blair." (The Daily Telegraph)

"Mr Cameron's criticisms of human rights law are very well made.  But his proposals for dealing with it seem to owe more to the impulse to strike a political pose than to produce a workable policy... Since the European Convention would still apply, whatever Mr Cameron's Bill did or did not incorporate of it would be irrelevant." (Melanie Phillips, Daily Mail)

Speaking on this morning's Today programme Mr Cameron rejected the idea of leaving the European Convention.  The Tory leader said doing so would send a message to certain nations that human rights were in some way incompatible with, for example, the war on terror.

Please also use this thread to identify what you would like to see in David Cameron's 'British Bill of Rights'.

Full text of David Cameron's speech is now at conservatives.com.

Conservatives enjoy 7% lead in YouGov poll

The persistence of the Conservative Party's post-May 4th lead over Labour is confirmed this morning by a YouGov survey for The Daily Telegraph.  YouGov gives the Tories a 7% lead (up 1% on last month).  All pollsters  have given the Tories a similarly-sized advantage since 4th May.

There is a little bit of comfort for Gordon Brown in this poll.  ICM recently found that the Tory lead doubled if Brown was Labour leader.  YouGov, a month later, find David Cameron's lead down by 1% with Brown was in charge.

This morning's Times finds that Labour's current parliamentary majority would be wiped out by a 1% swing.  This finding - which underlines the increased danger of a hung parliament after the next General Election - reflects the positive impact of boundary changes on Tory prospects.

American compassionate conservatism can still teach us a thing or two

It's fashionable to knock George W Bush and attacking America is the surest way of raising a cheer on BBC1's Question Time.  It is understandable, therefore, that the defenders of David Cameron's modern compassionate conservatism should want to distance themselves from George W Bush's compassionate conservatism.   Distancing Project Cameron from Project Bush was one of the themes of an excellent Radio 4 investigation of compassionate conservatism (broadcast tonight on the Westminster Hour).

In November 2004, when I was still with IDS at the Centre for Social Justice, I wrote Whatever happened to compassionate conservatism?  I concluded that the promise of compassionate conservatism had been unfulfilled but I also noted that enormous progress had been made before President Bush entered the White House and since (at state level).

If David Cameron's compassionate conservatism is to mean anything we have more to learn from America than we have to dismiss.  I would highlight six top learnings:

(1) The 1996 welfare reforms enacted by a Republican Congress and signed into law by Bill Clinton.  These reforms put a huge emphasis on limiting entitlements and getting people into work.  They also emphasised family structure.  Fewer American families depend on welfare than at any time since 1969.

(2) Rudy Giuliani's zero tolerance policing.  Overall crime fell by 57% and murder rates dropped by 65% and who benefited most?  The poorest New Yorkers.  Crime has always been a regressive social force  and a July 2002 opinion poll for New York’s Citizens Crime Commission showed that the city’s poorest voters were most supportive of the ‘quality of life laws’ that targeted graffiti and aggressive begging.

(3) Support for freer charities.  The state fails to tackle  society's most stubborn social problems because it is invariably risk averse and bureaucratic in method.  Many of Britain's biggest charities - because of their closeness to government thinking-and-funding - are not much better.  Americans have been experimenting with forms of stakeholder-directed funding that ensure money gets to more mission-driven and innovative voluntary organisations.  Britain has many such voluntary organisations and, if you really want to know what compassionate conservatism looks like, you should attend Wednesday's night second Centre for Social Justice awards evening when Britain's most effective poverty-fighters are saluted. 

(4) Support for healthy marriages.  President Bush has eliminated the marriage penalty that disadvantaged the institution that does more than any other to raise children and care for the elderly.  Just as significantly his 'family minister' - Dr Wade Horn - is overseeing a major programme of investment in marriage education and support for fatherhood.

(5) School choice.   Slowly but surely, key US states are giving parents choice over schooling and slowly but surely, the poorest children, in particular, are breaking free from failing school monopolies.

(6) Economy-boosting tax relief.  This is the most controversial ingredient of American compassionate conservatism but noone needs a healthy, job-creating economy more than those living on the margins.  The Bush tax cuts were skewed towards the wealthy - arguably too skewed - but they have helped to create a strong economy that is lifting millions of families into work.

Has America got everything right?  No.  Should British Tories talk about America as an inspiration?  Perhaps not.  But should we learn from America's successes?  Yes, absolutely.

Home-building

Yesterday saw the launch of LabourHome (with an article from Guido Fawkes).  The famous Chad Noble has now launched UKIPhome.

David Cameron reaffirms human rights act pledge

The last time that David Cameron was on national television he was asked some very crude questions by Jonathan Ross.  As highlighted on today's frontpage, the Mail on Sunday is very unimpressed with the Tory leader's decision to take part in that interview.  Mr Cameron  was in a more familar interview setting this morning.  He was cross-examined by Andrew Marr in the garden of his Oxfordshire home.

The headline to emerge from the interview was a reiteration of Cameron's intention to scrap the Human Rights Act and write a new British bill of rights.  The existing human rights laws were hindering the fight on crime and terrorism, Mr Cameron said, and failed to stop the Government endangering fundamental liberties such as the right to a jury trial.  Mr Cameron said that he did not support withdrawal from the European Convention on Human Rights.  This would mean that people could still appeal the same issues to the European Court of Human Rights.  Some believe that scrapping the HRA but remaining an signatory to the Convention is pointless.

Here are some of the other highlights of the interview:

• It was important for the Conservatives to show that they didn't want to undo many of Labour's post-1997 achievements.  He highlighted the Tories' renewed commitment to the NHS and the promise to put tax cuts second to stability as examples of the changes he is making to the Conservative Party.
• Discussing 'libertarian paternalism' (without using the term) he said that it was important to understand that politicians don’t have all of the answers to major problems and that popular culture, for example, often had to lead the search for certain solutions.  He said that the family was the answer to many social problems - including poor housing, drugs, education and poverty.
• Mr Cameron said that he had no plans to change the ways in which English taxpayers subsidise Scottish residents.  He was a Unionist and funding decisions should only ever be based on considerations of need.
• The Tory leader reaffirmed the party's commitment to replace Trident.  It is needed as a long-term insurance policy against blackmail from a hostile foreign power.
• He offered no solutions to the pollution effects of growing air travel and declined to say what role nuclear power had in Tory energy and environmental policy.  Mr Cameron pointed to decentralised power sources and energy efficiency as 21st century ways of delivered environmentally sound electricity security.
• The Tory leader said that there was a strong case for an early election because Blair had gone back on his promise to serve a full-term.  Voters, he said, aren't going to get what they voted for.

Gordon Brown's attacking options look a little Sven-like

Nearly every recent opinion poll has shown that the Tory lead over Labour increases if Brown replaces Blair.  Against that background, and after Gordon Brown's 'I'm a regular kind of guy' stunts have flopped, The Sunday Times lists some of the ways in which the Chancellor may yet strike at David Cameron's popularity.  ConservativeHome examines The Sunday Times' principal suggestions below:

1. Cut taxes.  This seems an incredible tactic given that Chancellor Brown has raised taxes 80 times.  The extent to Brown has fattened government is underlined in today's The Business: "The gap between public spending in the UK and in the euro zone will fall to a record low of 0.9 percentage points of GDP next year, compared with 8.8 points just six years ago."
2. Pull out of Iraq.  This policy - linked with some Prescott-style rubbishing of George W Bush - would be superficially popular but fleeing UK troops would very possibly leave a bloodbath behind.  Such an opportunistic policy could badly backfire on Brown.  Such a retreat might also be criticised by Tony Blair (or/and TB's advisers).
3. A new public holiday.  This may win a few headlines for 24 hours but it will not really alter Gordon Brown's standing or Labour's reputation for incompetence.  More likely to tackle the competence problem would be the promotion of competent but dull frontbenchers to signal the end of the headlines-and-spin-ministers of the Blair era.  Alastair Darling, John Hutton, Des Browne and Hilary Benn could all expect big, grey jobs in a Brown Cabinet.
4. Democratise the Lords.  This would make Mr Brown look more digital, less analogue and also - as part of a wider package of constitutional modernisations - might encourage Ming into coalition talks with any minority Brown-led Labour government.
5. Tackle the Scottish question.  Voters are unhappy with England's subsidy of Scotland.  There may be a Nixon-in-China attraction for Brown in sorting this question out.  He might calculate that Scottish voters have nowhere else to go and that English voters will respect him for levelling the financial settlement.  This may prove to be a breakthrough issue for Alex Salmond's SNP, however?
6. Take on the unions.  Another Nixon-in-China opportunity for Brown to show that he is tough.  Every time Brown acts tough he may also be playing into his wider narrative of being 'the tough leader for tough times' - in contrast to the green, inexperienced, never-achieved-anything Mr Cameron.  Within this narrative expect more we'll-replace-Trident announcements and lots of tough crime policies.
7. The economy, stupid.  The Sunday Times still thinks that this might be Brown's best card: "If house prices are up, unemployment down and the economy bowling along nicely, would anybody want to risk it on the untried David Cameron?"  Furthermore, will voters trust the boyish George Osborne with the economy - particularly if it is looking a little in need of careful nursing?

Andrew Rawnsley, from his regular Observer perch, thinks that Gordon Brown is undertaking a major repositioning:

"For years, the Brown camp has scorned Blair for pandering to Middle England and the right-wing newspapers which claim to speak for it. Suddenly, it is Mr Brown who wants us to know that he adores Middle England so much that he shares a bed with it every night. 'My wife comes from Middle England,' he recently told a right-wing tabloid whom the Chancellor had invited to watch him watching England play Trinidad & Tobago."

Mr Rawnsley thinks that a "left-wing challenge" to the Trident-wielding Mr Brown would suit the Chancellor "perfectly".  Insofar as it will present Gordon Brown as 'Mr Moderate' that might be true but it is a dangerous tactic.  The battle for the next Labour leadership may leave the party looking divided.  Whatever the outcome, the Tories will be able to suggest that the left will be the tail that wags the parliamentary Labour dog.

There don't appear to be many forward options for Gordon Brown.  It may be the econorooney or bust. 

William Norton's Charity Appeal: Can you help?

Conservative Home is one of the most successful and widely read political blogs in the UK, and every day we have thousands of affluent, intelligent visitors who want to add some excitement to their drab, boring lives by reading our dazzlingly brilliant articles.  But we don't let that success go to our heads, and we're always prepared to spend time and effort both to remember and to help out those less fortunate than ourselves.

So we're asking you today to consider helping a total charity case: the Home Office.

The Home Office is in Crisis and desperately needs Shelter.  Every day in Britain 1,000 dangerous criminals are on the run and have to conduct their nefarious thieving on the sly and at the risk of being deported because the Home Office let them out of jail.  But we don't want you to think about them.  Stop thinking about them immediately. 

Every year 80,000 people are stuck in over-crowded out-dated accommodation because the Home Office forgot to build any new prisons and thousands of illegal immigrants get into the UK because the Home Office can't defend our borders -  we certainly don't want you worrying about either of those groups.  Everything is under complete control.  Honest.  Just on the law of averages, sooner or later the Police are bound to get lucky and shoot someone who's actually a terrorist.

No, we want you to spare a thought for some people trapped in a dilapidated, sub-standard, ramshackle Victorian edifice.  Disorientated and totally unable to distinguish various parts of their anatomy, such as their elbow and their arse, they wander aimlessly round in circles, unfit-for-purpose, and they end up picking fights with judges and policemen.  Being a Home Office minister can seriously damage your mental health and rob you of your basic human dignity.

70% of English voters want to end subsidy of Scotland

The Scotland-England relationship - and its implications for Gordon Brown's ambitions - comes under renewed scrutiny in this morning's Telegraph.

A YouGov survey for The Daily Telegraph finds that most voters are happy for a Scottish MP to become Prime Minister.  More difficult for the Chancellor is public support for 'English votes on English laws' and even stronger support for ending the England-to-Scotland-subsidy.  74% of Scottish voters want the subsidy from England to continue but 70% of English voters want it to stop.  That support could easily grow if an English politician starts to describe what new services and projects might be affordable if the subsidy is scrapped.

A leader in The Telegraph thinks that everyone has lost out from the current spending settlement:

"The true losers are the Scots, trapped in the squalor of dependency. A people who were once a byword for enterprise and thrift are now reliant on handouts. More Scots look to the taxpayer for their income than don't."

Voters are also unimpressed by last week's Gordon-Brown-supports-England photo stunt.  45% thought it a political ploy.  David Cameron is good at the Desert Island Discs/ Jonathan Ross politics.  Mr Brown should probably avoid more Arctic Monkeys interviews and stick to traditional politics.

Is DC a libertarian paternalist?

James Harkin, in today's Guardian, looks at David Cameron's speech to the National Family and Parenting Institute and decides that he is a "libertarian paternalist". The apparently oxymoronic term conjures up an image of a disapproving father who makes clear what he thinks but doesn't use coercion.

Cameron made a clear case for marriage in the speech but did fall short of advocating incentives - hopefully waiting for the social justice working group on the family to report its findings. Last night on Jonathan Ross, he made a clear stance against drug usage whilst signalling a higher emphasis on rehabilitation and education and an end to the "war on drugs".

What would a libertarian paternalist government be like? Would it engage in public information drives whilst allowing people to make the wrong choices? Most politicians outside of North Korea are libertarians to a degree, but at what point do you draw the line?

According to Harkin we don't have far to look - Labour's third term has already been based on this "astute piece of politicking". He points to its "second-guessing our behaviour through soft policy tools for moral persuasion", such as last week's "Dad Pack wheeze".

This approach is very useful to Cameron while he is still creating an image and waiting for the policy groups, but come election it is unlikely to satisfy neither libertarians nor paternalists.

Deputy Editor

David Cameron on Jonathan Ross

David Cameron is a brave man.  He may have triumphed over Paxman but could he beat £6m-a-year Jonathan Ross?

Jonathan Woss airs after the watershed and the first line of questioning concerned whether he masturbated at the thought of Margaret Thatcher.  Mr Cameron looked uncomfortable.

David Cameron recovered his fluency when talking about the open primary process for London Mayor and he jokingly invited Jonathan Ross to be the Tory candidate.  Mr Ross didn't think that the Tories could match his salary.

David Cameron then reiterated his support for the Iraq war.  "I voted to go to war - I voted to get rid of Saddam - Iraq is better off without Saddam" was the Tory leader's message.  It was the clearest defence he has made of the Iraq war since winning the Conservative crown.  He was very authoritative.

He then faced lots of questions on drugs.  "We shouldn't legalise drugs," he insisted, "we need more treatment for addicts."

Jonathan Ross ended the interview by saying that DC's hand movements were too Blairite.  The tieless Tory leader laughed.

Rudy 2008

This is the website of a man who is running for the White House.

John Hayes MP pursues Cardinal's call for abortion law reform

John Hayes, Chairman of the Cornerstone Group of Tory MPs, yesterday urged Leader of the House Jack Straw to facilitate a Committee of both Houses to examine Cardinal Murphy-O’Connor's call for a review of abortion law.  31 MPs have, so far, signed a Commons motion backing the call.  Before last year's General Election Michael Howard expressed sympathy for a lower abortion limit.

The abortion laws were once coupled with the Infant Life Preservation Act which was interpreted by some to mean that foetuses that could survive outside of the womb, independently, could not be aborted.  Advances in the technologies that treat premmaturely-born babies mean that many of the 3,000 unborn children aborted after 20 weeks' gestation could probably survive.  The current abortion limit is 24 weeks.  A recent Observer/ MORI poll found that "47% of women believe the legal limit for an abortion should be cut from its present 24 weeks, and another 10% want the practice outlawed altogether".

Mr. Straw rejected Mr Hayes' request for a Joint Committee but suggested that the Select Committee on Health could establish its own inquiry.  Mr Hayes has told ConservativeHome that he now intends to petition the Health Select Committee to hold such an enquiry.

***
Related link: Bob Spink MP calls for a review of abortion laws

Who is the biggest influence on David Cameron?

I asked this question before and promised a readers' vote to find an answer.  I never delivered on that promise but, perhaps, six months into Project Cameron it is worth asking the question again and finally holding that vote?

The question came back to me because of Fraser Nelson's interview with David Willetts in this week's Spectator.  This is how Fraser begins his article:

"Any attempt to trace the intellectual origins of today’s new Conservative party leads fairly quickly to the space between David Willetts’s ears. For the best part of two decades, he has been arguing for the need for a softer-focus social agenda which would resonate with voters who were convinced that hard-edged Thatcherism had nothing to offer them. In the early 1990s he called this ‘civic conservatism’ — yet it was lost in the messy decline of the Major years. Now, it is called Cameronism and is universally lauded. But rather than be fêted, Mr Willetts must watch like an inventor without a patent as his ideas are put to use by other people."

There will be plenty of people who would line up to dispute Fraser's suggestion that David Willetts might have invented Cameronism.  Oliver Letwin MP, if he wasn't so modest, would be near the front of the queue.  Unlike David Willetts, who backed David Davis for the Tory crown (a decision he explains to Fraser Nelson), Oliver Letwin was Mr Cameron's first major sponsor.  Since then Mr Letwin's caution on tax and support for a Kyoto-based approach to the world's environmental problems have hugely influenced David Cameron.  Mr Letwin, as head of the policy review process, certainly has much more day-to-day influence on Mr Cameron than the Shadow Education Secretary.

Steve Hilton must also be a lead influence.  His background in corporate responsibility has inspired Mr Cameron's happiness agenda and his questioning of some aspects of big business.

There is nothing more important in terms of David Cameron's long-term legacy than the candidates that become MPs during his leadership.  Could Francis Maude, Bernard Jenkin and Theresa May - as guardians of the A-list - be seen as the biggest influences, therefore?

In January, when I last asked this question, a number of you (Frank Young, in particular) suggested that David Cameron's own family was the biggest influence on his politics.

What do you all think now?

Kitchen cabinet annoys shadow cabinet

A number of MPs have long complained that David Cameron's inner circle of advisers is too small.  Frontbenchers have told ConservativeHome that the leader's office doesn't involve them in key decisions.  David Cameron certainly doesn't have the structured policy groups or mini-shadow cabinets that IDS and William Hague used to involve leading shadow ministers in the decision-making process.  These things do not matter too much when things are going well but they come to matter when the going gets rougher.

Within the last fortnight two episodes have highlighted the dangers of the Tory leader failing to consult beyond his immediate circle.  Firstly, there was the muddle over the environmentally disastrous Common Fisheries Policy.  Westminster's Conservative leadership decided to abandon the 'let's leave the CPF' policy without consulting Edinburgh's Conservatives.  Scottish Tories were furious at the lack of communication from London.  Scotland accounts for 50% to 75% of the UK fishing industry and the SNP are rushing to suggest that the Conservatives cannot be trusted with Scotland's interests.  Edinburgh Tories are responding by asserting the previous/ existing policy whilst London remains silent.  Ted Brocklebank MSP, fisheries spokesman for the Scottish party, uses a letter to today's (Glasgow) Herald to describe the Scottish Tories' intention to "restore local and national control of fisheries and reserve the right to withdraw from the CFP if negotiations fail".

Back in London a number of shadow cabinet members have protested about Tuesday's family policy speech.  The speech covered the portfolios of a large number of shadow cabinet ministers who were not asked for comments until the speech had been partly briefed out to the press.  Those shadow cabinet members have complained to David Cameron and now to ConservativeHome.

Every leadership has its shortcomings - the best leadership teams learn to address them.  Now is a good time for Team Cameron to think a little more carefully about how they involve the shadow cabinet, in particular, in decision-making.

The rise of the English lion

MPs Angela Browning, Peter Lilley, Bob Spink, Andrew Turner, James Brokenshire, Simon Burns, Angela Watkinson, Shahid Malik, Lindsay Hoyle, Geraldine Smith and Bob Russell all backed yesterday's parliamentary attempt by Andrew Rosindell to make St George's Day a national holiday.  The MP for Romford, whose Staffordshire bull terrier, Buster, occasionally wears a St George's Cross, told the Commons:

"Australia, New Zealand, Canada, the United States and scores of countries, particularly in Scandinavia, celebrate their national day in style, with great pageantry as well as great parties. In Switzerland, 1 August is a wonderful day in the calendar of that proud independent nation at the heart of Europe, with the sound of alpine horns and cow bells echoing throughout the land as the distinctive Swiss flag flies from every building and, indeed, every home. It is no accident that all those nations have a strong sense of pride in their national identity, which is a source of strength and unity in any country. I hope that England follows their example and gives our country an annual day to remember and cherish."

Mr Rosindell made it clear that he was also in "favour of extending the same rights for St Andrew’s day in Scotland and St David’s day in Wales".

This debate is only the latest sign of 'the rise of the English lion' and it is a source of huge concern for Gordon Brown.  Yesterday's Daily Mail editorialised on the subject:

"After years of dormancy, English nationalism is being reborn, on an ocean of St George's flags. And that is very bad news for our very able Chancellor."

Iain Dale thinks it is time for the Conservative Party to "allow a referendum in England on the creation of a Parliament for England".  Iain was responding to Alice Thomson's suggestion that the Barnett formula be scrapped - the public spending formula that sees UK taxpayers spend £1,473 more on the average person living in Scotland than on the average person living in England.  Ms Thomson quotes The Economist's recent verdict on the English-Scottish relationship:

"Scotland has regressed into an inward-looking, chip-on-the-shoulder, slightly Anglophobic country... It has gained self-doubt, while clinging to an old dependency on England."

***
Related links: There isn't enough concern about asymmetrical devolution and Falconer rejects English votes for English laws.

63% vote for the Oak Tree

The Oak Tree (right) has won the overwhelming support of the more than 600 people who participated in yesterday's ConservativeHome vote on a new Tory logo.

58% voted for Krieg Barrie's Oak Tree - three times as many who voted for the Four Nations idea.  The Dolphins attracted just 34 votes.

Many of you used yesterday's comments thread to explain why the oak tree had won your approval.  Others also added an explanation to their email vote.  Here are some of the adjectives and phrases you submitted...

"Strong" - "Rooted" - "Environmental/ Green" - "English/ British" - "Protective" - "Reaching to the sky" - "Providing shelter".

ConservativeHome will send this result - and all of your logo designs - to Steve Hilton, David Cameron's top communications adviser.

Tories warn against BBC dominance

The BBC - like the NHS and the United Nations - is an institution that it is dangerous for any politician to criticise but the Conservative Party is right to point out its faults.  ConservativeHome recently welcomed George Osborne's critique of the way the BBC crowds out competition and David Cameron's complaint about Tim Westwood's violent playlist.  Hugo Swire's intervention of today also deserves praise.

Speaking in a Commons debate, Mr Swire, Tory Culture & Media spokesman, acknowledged that there was "huge support amongst the public for the BBC but," he warned, "an unacceptably high level for the Licence Fee will undermine that support".  There are plans for the licence fee to grow from £131.50 a year to £180 by 2014.  This would be an increase of inflation plus 2.3% every year - at a time when more and more people are turning to satellite TV and the internet for their entertainment and news.  Mr Swire thinks that £180 would be "simply too high for many families on low incomes".

Mr Swire has called for the National Audit Office to undertake "full and transparent scrutiny" of how the Corporation spends the licence fee (levied regressively on every household as a poll tax).  There has been controversy over the high salaries being paid to top BBC presenters like Jonathan Ross (£18m over three years).  Independent rivals to the BBC - not fortunate enough to have its unique source of compulsory income - complain that the BBC could cause super-inflation in the industry and make it harder and harder to compete.  Mr Swire also noted that "recent Beethoven downloads exercise saw the BBC make available one million free downloads".  This, he said, would carry an £8 million price tag in the marketplace and "if repeated could severely damage the commercial market".

John Whittingdale, the Tory chairman of the Commons Culture committee, came to Mr Swire's support: "The BBC is already by far the biggest player and an increase of this kind will distort the market further and place the BBC in too dominant a position".  Even the LibDems agreed that the proposed increase was too high.  Shaun Woodward, Labour deputy to Tessa Jowell (who skipped the debate), said MPs risked playing politics with one of Britain's most trusted institutions.  Labour, who fell out with the BBC after the Hutton Report, may see the licence fee debate as a way of rebuilding bridges with the Corporation.

The Daily Mail covers the Commons debate on the BBC here.

PMQs: Home Office, Home Office, Home Office

David Cameron had an assured style, although it looked like he decided to ask his last two questions straight after his first four out of annoyance at Tony Blair's fourth answer. He used all six questions on Home Office issues:

• Tackling knife crime
• No forced amalgamation on police forces until a review is complete
• Establish a seperate border police force
• Shouldn’t have abolished embarkation controls
• If it’s all going so well why is the home office being reformed so much
• "9 years, 54 pieces of criminal legislation – isn’t it the fact that the prime minister has no-one to blame other than himself"

The loud Labour benches contested DCs assertion that they had abolished embarkation controls, so much so that the Speaker intervened with this statement:

“Being wrong doesn’t deny the right of a Member to speak – it would mean very few Members would be able to speak!”

Tony Blair answered with lots of clenched fists and jabbing fingers – he didn’t seem particularly rattled but he mixed up his words a few times, most notably with this Freudian slip:

"They attack us in public for not being toff enough".

Vote for a new Tory logo

William Norton: "Following press reports that the current party logo was to be replaced, Conservative Home last week launched its own campaign to suggest an alternative.  We wished to demonstrate the wealth of creative talent to be found among the wider conservative movement, and to rescue this story from the sneering clutches of the BBC Today Programme.  It was also an interesting experiment in the wisdom of crowds to see what a large and diverse group of people thought (or, were prepared to claim in public) represented the best future image for the Tories.

The response has been impressive, and has provoked a lively debate about the image of the Conservative Party and the values for which it stands.  Whether this exercise is approached as a serious re-branding project or as light relief, the various submissions received on this blog, and on a parallel thread on Iain Dale's Diary, covered a wide sample of written and visual submissions to an exceptional standard and broadly broke down into a number of themes.

 

Just like the leadership election, the great and the good have whittled these down to a short-list, and this is your opportunity to select the final winner.  Each one is the submission which the judges considered best represented a particular theme emerging out of the debate (and also just like the leadership election - the judges' decision on the short-list is final)... "

John Redwood's policy group "likely" to recommend tax relief

John Redwood, Chairman of David Cameron's Economic Competitiveness Policy Group, once said that "the Conservative Party is a party of tax cuts or it is nothing".  In a Q&A for ConservativeHome (published today), Mr Redwood reaffirms that understanding of the Conservative Party's purpose and agrees that it is likely that his "policy group will recommend reductions to the biggest tax burden in British history".

That tax-cutting attitude is certainly needed.  A new paper for the Centre for Policy Studies by Charles Elphicke - some findings of which are summarised in the graphic - notes that the nation's tax burden is having serious consequences for economic growth.  Mr Elphicke talks of a double whammy where people have (1) less money today because of Gordon Brown's 80 tax rises and (2) less money tomorrow thanks to the ways in which taxation depresses economic performance.

Editor's note: "George Osborne's talk of putting stability before tax cuts does nothing to increase public understanding of the dynamic role that tax relief can play in creating a strong economy.  Labour win the tax debate when Conservatives fail to present tax relief as an instrument for job and wealth creation.  Small government conservatives will never prosper so long as the public believe that every tax cut requires service cuts.  We can only start winning the tax debate when it becomes framed as a choice between a growing, low tax economy versus a sickly, high tax economy."

Support for heterosexual marriage and gay partnerships

"Gay couples in a civil partnership should get the same tax benefits as married heterosexuals, the leader of the Conservative Party will announce today... The move is expected to rile the more traditional members of the Party."

That's the view of PinkNews.co.uk.  I'm not so sure.  I'm probably one of the "more traditional members of the Party" and I am not at all riled at the prospect of gay couples getting the same benefits.  I remember talking with Daniel Finkelstein, when I was at CCO and he was head of policy, saying I'd happily see 'the gay vote' get almost all it wanted tomorrow if we could also get a government that was serious about supporting marriage.  Since that conversation Parliament has devoted a lot of time to gay rights issues.  I think of the abolition of Section 28, adoption rights for gay couples and the Civil Partnership Bill.  This is all settled law and the Conservative Party's acceptance of this has boosted its standing in the gay community.  Over these Labour years, however, little has been done to help marriage despite the massive role that married families play in raising children, caring for the elderly and knitting communities together.

I was looking for signs in David Cameron's speech to the National Family and Parenting Institute that he was determined to help the vast majority of young people who sill aspire to marriage (Download pdf).  The Tory leader certainly emphasised the empirical case for marriage:

"More and more of the evidence that’s coming in shows that the institution of marriage has a good record in terms of delivering a stable family background.  This is not about preaching.  It’s not about religion.  It’s about the evidence of what works.  Our Social Justice Policy Group is investigating families and family breakdown in depth, and it recently produced a ‘state of the nation’ report drawing the evidence together.  Within five years of the birth of a child, 8% of married couples split up, compared to 52% of cohabitees and 25% of those who marry after birth.  Overall, the 1999 Hart report for the then Lord Chancellor’s Department estimated the annual costs of family breakdown at £5 billion.  Other estimates have put the figure as much as five times higher.  But whatever the financial cost, there’s no doubting the emotional and social cost of family breakdown."

My overall reaction to the speech was that it didn't tell us much about Tory family policy.  It contained something for everyone and almost nothing bankable.  There were, for example, hints of tax allowances for marriage and tax relief on childcare for working parents.  For a party that is reticent about lowering taxation it would be a big deal to deliver meaningful tax incentives for married couples and for childcare.  If it comes down to a choice between cutting tax on married couples or giving tax relief on childcare for working people I hope that the party will choose the former.  "Tax relief on childcare for working parents" is not going to help mums to have a free choice between going out to work or staying at home.  It's also regressive as it helps wealthier people already in employment.  Tax relief for married couples (and gay couples) who are caring for children or another dependent relative would be more in tune with David Cameron's leadership election pledge and his commitment to social justice.

Would you like to edit conservatives.com?

An advert has just gone online to recruit a designated editor for the Conservative Party's official website.  A £22,000 salary is offered.  If you're interested please click here.  Please use the thread below to suggest how conservatives.com might be improved.  CCHQ's new 'internet guru' - Sam Roake - has promised to read your comments...

Fox to build anti-federalist defence coalition

Liam Fox is to tour Eastern European capitals later this year to cement links with like-minded political groups opposed to EU control of security and defence policy.  This news emerged in answer to questions following his speech The European defence tide: can it be turned? to the Centre For Policy Studies last night.  The Warsaw Pact had sought to drive a wedge between the US and Europe, he said, and "it would be a tragedy if the EU achieved what the Warsaw Pact didn't".

Earlier, in a thoughtful and well-balanced speech, Dr Fox had explained that NATO should remain the cornerstone of British defence policy.  He had no objections to the ostensible aims of the European Defence Agency for boosting overall military expenditure - and it made sense for the UK to develop a portfolio of suppliers (especially in light of disputes with the US over the sharing of software codes for the Joint Strike Fighter project) - but at present the EU was living in a "mindset of denial" and bent on establishing new institutions without any real increase in defence capacity.

The EU is currently failing the three tests set by Madeline Albright: EU plans would duplicate existing provision, sought to decouple the US from Europe, and discriminated against non-EU members of NATO.  Dr Fox robustly denied, however, that a "threshold of irreversbility" had been crossed.  If the European Defence Agency strayed from its remit, by trying to construct a common European defence policy or seeking to introduce qualified majority voting, then a future Conservative Government would have no hesitation in "not co-operating and not funding" that body.

The special relationship with the US would remain central to Tory security policy, but not from the position of a supplicant.  Dr Fox endorsed William Hague's criticism of Guantanamo - "Frank friends make better partners".

William Norton

Hello LabourHome

There has been much recent talk of the failure of the left to initiate a significant blogosphere (see here and here) but Alex Hilton of Recess Monkey appears to have taken a pregnant step to change that this morning.  Alex and friends have established 'labourhome.org' citing this site as an inspiration.  I wish labourhome every success and hope that it seeks to do what this site does... and give a voice to the grassroots activists of the party.  Thanks to Guido for alerting me to labourhome's birth.

Related links: Labour's new Let's Talk online chat and Why aren't Labour's webroots mobilising against Tony Blair?

Tories 4.8% ahead in ConservativeHome's poll of polls

The Tories enjoy a 37.6% to 32.8% lead over Labour in the latest ConservativeHome poll of polls.  The CHPoP incorporates a new ICM survey in The Guardian which gives David Cameron's Conservatives a 5% advantage and Sunday's MORI survey for The Observer which gave the Tories a 41% to 34% lead.

Last night's post on YouGov's daily BrandIndex tracker suggests that Labour may find it difficult to recover from the incompetence of Triple Whammy Wednesday.  It also found that David Cameron's continuing-to-improve ratings may owe more to the 'halo effect' of May 4th's results rather than the huskies-and-cycling strategy.