The 100 People Who Are Trying To Put Britain Back Together Again

Iain Dale has had an inspirational idea.  He's considering writing a book on The 100 People Who are Screwing Up Britain.   His idea is based on  Bernard Goldberg's 'The 100 People Who Are Screwing Up America' book. 

It's never as much fun to be positive but someone has emailed me to suggest that ConservativeHomies draw up a list of 'The 100 People Who Are Trying To Put Britain Back Together Again'.

His suggestions were...

• Frank Field MP – For telling the truth about poverty
• Gisela Stuart MP – For her devastating ‘inside job’ on the British establishment’s efforts to merge itself with the EU establishment
• Jamie Oliver – For alerting us to the poison we feed our children
• Zac Goldsmith – For his part in turning the Conservative Party into a party of conservation
• Quinlan Terry – For keeping alive the ideal of life-enhancing architecture
• David Willetts MP – For his intelligent and compassionate defence of the family
• Debbie Scott – For proving that it is possible to get the ‘unemployable’ into work and keeping them there
• Greg Clark MP – For putting an entirely new issue on the political agenda i.e. garden grabbing and the way it’s debauching the planning system
• Iain Duncan Smith MP – For championing a Conservative approach to social justice.

Who would you suggest?

Comments

[Guido Fawkes]

Bob the builder.

"Can he fix it? Yes he can!"

[CCHQ Spy]

ConservativeHome for empowering party members and showing that political debate is still alive in Britain.

[libertorian]

Many of the architects I've ever met foam at the mouth in anger at the thought of Quinlan Terry.

As amusing as it may be he's an odd choice for your list.

[michael mcgough]

Bob4bromley for championing portfolio careers and multitasking.

[Andrew Woodman]

Roger Helmer, Chris Heaton-Harris, Dan Hannan, David Sumberg, Den Dover, Geoffrey Van Orden, Martin Callanan, Nirj Deva and Syed Kamall for their work in trying to halt the European Conservative Party sell out to the EPP and EU.

[Serf]

Roger Helmer, for standing up for Britain's interests.

Stelios for giving Guardian Readers apoplexy.

[william]

Jesse Norman for constructing and publishing Compassionate Conservatism

[Jonathan Sheppard]

I'd like Lord Coe - for bringing the Olympics to London - and the country as a whole

[Editor]

Jonathan Sheppard for ToryRadio!

[Louise Bagshawe]

David Davis, for cementing party unity and never letting the government get away with failing the public.

Apolitically, JK Rowling, for bringing an entire generation of children back to reading.

[malcolm]

What did stelios do to upset Guadian readers Serf? My vote would probably go to the Queen for being a figure of unity and good sense in an increasingly divided Britain.

[Chad]

Nigel Farage and David Davis

:-)

[JT]

James Bartholomew - for his mixture of intelligence and bravery in writing a devestating critique of the nature and effects of state welfare and public services, The Welfare State We're In.

[JT]

Richard North and Chrisopher Booker - for their penetrating account of the origins and history of the EU and Britain's entanglement with it: The Great Deception.

[Henry Edward-Bancroft]

I'd have to agree with James Bartholomew, I’m currently reading "The Welfare State We're In" and it's immensely interesting.

I'll put forward my own nomination for Prince Charles who does so much for charity and the betterment of his country, often in the face of quite unjust criticism.

[comstock]

"Greg Clark MP – For putting an entirely new issue on the political agenda i.e. garden grabbing and the way it’s debauching the planning system "

Given the acute housing shortage I hardly think 'garden grabbing' is a threat to Britain as we know it!

Agree with Jamie Oliver though.

[Hmmmm]

Frances Maude for taking the flak from a party reluctant to change....

Iain Duncan Smith for realising almost too late that he was in politics for the wrong reasons, but still changing tack

[Gareth]

Gisela Stuart??

That's really not a very helpful suggestion for those of us who have to campaign to replace her with a decent Conservative MP.

[Bystander]

I wonder why everyone is talking about "Britain" when we really should be talking about the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Or don't we care what happens to Her Majesty's Loyal Subjects in Northern Ireland any more?

[Tory Bunny]

Agree on Lord Coe & JK Rowling from previous posts.

Tim Berners-Lee for showing Britains can still be the most inventive people on the planet.

Not sure if the list can only include the living but I think there is a case for the late Peter Law for showing no political party can take the people for granted.

Maybe the Arch-Bishop of York?

[Ted]

Gareth
Gisela Stuart is so obvously a Tory who wondered into the wrong party by mistake (and Frank Field is becoming more at tune with IDS's approach) - perhaps we need to concentrate on bringing them over rather than replacing them.

Bystander
Blame Harold Wilson - until the 60's a lot of people outside the UK thought they were British (British & Canadian, British & Australian etc.) then Harold started talking about Britain and the British as only the people of these islands (and he wasn't bothered about Northern Ireland).

[James]

Ted, having seen and heard Gisela Stuart quite a few times, going back to when she was a candidate in 1997 and I was a sixth former doing politics A-level, she certainly isn't a Conservative. A Euro-realist certainly, but not a Tory. The lady is passionate about the state's power to micromanage our lives for the better.

Deirdre Alden for Edgbaston!

[Annabel Herriott]

Rory Bremner for bringing every politician down to size.

[TaxCutter]

Terry Leahy for Tescos success
Patience Wheatcroft for leading the right's voice in the press and not liking the state much
JK Rowling is a great suggestion, for the reason given.
Mrs T - for still inspiring people 15 years on
Ruth Lea

The lack of Tory Shadow Cabinet Ministers with good policies that obviously spring to mind is worrying.

Lord Coe should not be thanked for the Olympic burden

[sjm]

The Derby pensioner who got given £1000 by the Government for her community work and then got given 3 months in jug for withholding her council tax because of a criminally inept Council.

[Anthony Brodders]

ConHome, David Cameron, Bishop James Jones, Iain Duncan-Smith, John Prescott, Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, Melanie Phillips (delete one of the above)

[Richard]

Bystander,

The term "Britain" is usually used to refer to the UK as a whole as opposed to "Great Britain" which is just the non-Irish part. When I refer to "Britain" I certainly consider NI to be part of that entity.

[Jon White]

Well said taxcutter. Why should Coe be honoured for saddling this nation with the burden of the Olympics? We all know the human disater that occured on 7/7. The finacial disaster of 6/7 (when we won the bid) is nothing compared to the human misery of the bombings the next day, but ultimnately will will hurt the UK more. (Or at least the London Council Tax payers).

[Julian Morrison]

The thing with garden-grabbing is really trying to solve the wrong problem. The actual problem is the ridiculous practise of cooping all development up inside established town and village boundaries. The result is ant-hill multiple-occupancy development, boring corporate estates, houses and even flats priced out of the reach of the ordinary 9-to-5 worker, social division into tenant and landlord castes, the disappearance of gardens, and rapacious developers in cahoots with the council. The core conceptual mistake here is a fundamental mistrust in the individual that says that free development would become "sprawl", and that the cure is an essentially Stalinist system of land allocation.

[Julian Morrison]

By the way, I approve far more of this version than its "screwing up" counterpart. One can validly praise heroes, but it's generally a bad idea to blame the maggots for the wound.

[Julian Morrison]

I'll take a swipe at those:

1.
Don't try to legislate morality. Take a libertarian stance in law as a baseline. Strive hard to notice where the law stymies private moral action (example: chastising yobs ought not to be a crime of assault) and make repairs. Do likewise with private social organisation, free association, and mutual assistance. Repair socially important institutions that have been damaged by intrusive or neglectful government.

2.
The primary driver of a conservative approach to terrorism has to be a changed society-wide attitude that leaves malefactors with no breathing room. This covers (a) taking a moral interest in others, (b) an emphasized ethical duty - and sufficient powers in law - for the ordinary citizen to intervene and prevent a crime, (c) getting the law out of the way of the right to defend self and others, and the derived right to keep and bear arms.

3.
The mass media are going away and the blogs are much less biased. Worry more about the ability to keep secrets, which is probably doomed.

4.
Immigration doesn't need to be a policy, it just needs to be handled effectively. The core problems of immigration are: (a) cultural dilution and clannishness, (b) sponging off freebies, and (c) if you keep them out, you lose potential entrepreneurs. Solutions respectively: for (a), not only a cultural assimilation test, but encouraging a native culture that /expects/ assimilation. For (b) and (c) together: institute a system of probation as a fast track. Almost anyone of good character can immigrate as a probationer. During their probation they have very limited NHS access (A&E only) and no welfare or council housing. They get deported immediately for any arrestable offense or any three non-arrestable. If at the end of their probation they are solvent and productive above a threshold, then they can swear in as new citizens. That sort of a system would automatically attract and filter the natural entrepreneurs.

5.
Yes. Or, more usefully, consider /founding/ and promoting a counter-union of diplomatically allied but totally non-federalised free trading nations. It's both a good idea and a positive policy.

6.
One holds ones nose, and does the needful. If the parliament is to be hung, cut it down quickly with a snap election as soon as the polls change.

[Julian Morrison]

...wrong tab...

[Gareth]

I'm not sure I'd even call Gisela Stuart a 'Euro-realist'. She's actually all over the place of the issue and highlights the semi-sceptic aspects of her multi-faceted view for the benefit of the electorate.

I can assure you that she is no tory. She is nauseatingly new Labour, with more than a full compliment of the self-righteousness that goes with being part of that clan.

I wholeheartedly agree with James: Deirdre Alden for Edgbaston!

[Simon Chapman]

Liam Fox, for his campaigning on Mental Health.

[David Belchamber]

The new tories would do well to harness the views of the Archbishop of York, Shaun Bailey and Shami Chakrabati in the quest for political answers to deep rooted social problems in our society that have totally defeated Nulab's effosts.