Predictions for the Euro elections

OK, I’m off on holiday this weekend so this may be the last chance I get to blog before the Euro-elections unless I get access on the continent.

For the last few weeks, I’ve been making predictions for the Euro-election results, which my friends think are mad. The latest Populus poll this evening shows things moving in my direction. So I thought I would declare on the blog before I become Mr Conventional. So here goes:

1. UKIP (mid 20’s)
2. Tories (low 20’s)
3. Greens (15%)
4. Labour (14%)
5. Lib Dems (11%)
6. BNP (8%)

Am I completely off the mark? Possibly, but I do think the minor parties are going to inflict far more damage on the mainstream parties than the current polls suggest.

Who’s winning the poster battle?

Having spent a bank holiday weekend travelling the country visiting relatives, friends and the Hay Festival, my question of the day is where are the political posters?

The street where my in-laws live normally has a splattering of Lib Dem and Tory posters. This year, despite having county elections, there are none.

Indeed, from the hundreds of miles I have covered in the last few days, the scores on the doors in the poster battle are:

Tory 1
Labour* 1
Lib Dem 1
UKIP 1
Green 1
Plaid Cymru 1

* It should be noted that this voter is certifiably mad. In addition to displaying Labour posters at every election time, he also displays photos of Lady Di to commemorate the anniversary of her death.

What strange times we live in. Real anger on the doorstep but no display of that anger in the windows.

Douglas Carswell – a radical reformer

Politics is being turned on its head. There is now a new breed of so called Conservative politicians that are anything but small ‘c’ conservative.

Douglas Carswell is the best example. Listen to him and he seems to have no conservative bone in his body. He is a radical. He is a reformer. He has no respect for tradition or institutions. He believes in change and reform.

It is Labour politicians and the Liberal Left that are the new conservatives – desperately trying to hold on to the remnants of the institutions of a by-gone social democratic age: the NHS, the BBC and the welfare state.

Not the time for a Lib-Lab stitch up

No politicians have had their reputations enhanced in the last two weeks, but the three C’s – Clegg, Cameron and Carswell – have fared better than most.

I have been particularly impressed by Clegg over the Speaker’s downfall. There is no doubt that Clegg’s intervention was a decisive factor and it was good to see a Lib Dem Leader taking the political initiative on the national stage.

But I was also perturbed when Clegg appeared on Newsnight and was unable to give a straight answer to Paxman’s question on whether the Lib Dems would support David Cameron’s call for the dissolution of parliament. To me, it was a no-brainer – the quicker this Parliament can be wound up, the better.

Cameron is now making a General Election a central theme of his European election campaign. It is a populist position which carries the support of two-thirds of the population. The Lib Dems are dithering, calling for political reform and the holy grail of proportional representation first. Even my friends at Liberal Vision appear to be supporting this position.

Apart from the fact that it remains a pipe dream, there are two reasons why this strategy is fatally flawed.

First, this is the most discredited parliament in three centuries. It has no mandate to impose a new political process on the people.

Second, even if Gordon Brown could be persuaded to come to the view that PR is a last ditch effort to save Labour from meltdown and possibly prevent a Tory-led Government, the people will see it for what it would be: a squalid and cynical Lib-Lab stitch up carved up by self interested politicians. It would be a disastrous way to launch the new system and disastrous for the future of the Lib Dems.

There is only one way to draw a line under the present crisis and that is a general election.

Brown still doesn’t get it

Pathetic. I’ve just read Gordon Brown’s article in tomorrow’s News of the World. He still doesn’t get it. He has nothing new to say. He apologises for all parties and says that outer London MPs won’t be able to claim the second home allowance and that’s about it.

Oh, he says that anyone who has abused the rules will not be able to serve in his government – but that misses the main point. It is not that MPs have defied the rules – we have been told all week that everything they’ve done has been within the rules – it is the rules themselves that people think stink.

Brown is a good week behind public opinion. His statement may have worked if he’d provided it last week. But today, public opinion has moved on. It is now demanding that all of those that have abused the system should be sacked as MPs. They are demanding a General Election immediately and want to sweep away crooked MPs.

Brown’s article doesn’t get anywhere near articulating the mood of the country. Neither does it set out a programme of action which could start to heal the chasm that has opened up between the public and our ruling class. Brown’s article is so dreadful, I have decided to publish it in full.

I AM appalled and angered by this week's revelations.

Appalled because at all times people should expect the highest standards from people in public life.

Angered because I was brought up to believe you did the right thing - and that trust, integrity and honesty are the most precious assets of all.

And for all those striving hard in these difficult times to do the best for their families, working long hours to give a better life for their children and to improve our public services and communities I apologise - on behalf of all parties - that the political system has let you and the public down.

I want to assure every citizen of my commitment to a complete clean-up of the system. Wherever and whenever immediate disciplinary action is required I will take it.

The bottom line is that any MP who is found to have defied the rules will not be serving in my government.

The action must be swift and comprehensive. On the whole politicians do work hard for people but MPs who have abused the expenses system will have to make reparations for the past. I have called for independent scrutiny for every claim made over the last four years and an independent means of deciding how much should be paid back.

Westminster cannot operate like a gentleman's club where MPs or parties alone decide themselves whether your money should be paid back.

It is absolutely right that each MP will need to justify to the public, not just the authorities or their party, the money they have spent on allowances.

Transparency to the public is the foundation of properly policing this system.
I am under no illusions that repayment will not necessarily be sufficient sanction.

Unacceptable behaviour will be investigated and disciplined. I do not rule out any sanction.

But for the future we need even more fundamental change. Already I have asked Parliament to ensure - and MPs have agreed - that outer London MPs cannot claim a second home allowance.

MPs should not themselves come up with the future system that should govern their allowances. Therefore we are agreed that the Committee of Standards in Public Life should come forward with much needed reforms.

It is clear that the revelations of the past week will have a lasting impact on our politics.

As well as righting wrongs and cleaning up the system, there is now a clear need to go much further, as we start the process of rebuilding trust in our political system.

We must all now come together to make that happen.

Some good news for Labour at last

Two polls out tomorrow show that Labour support is still at or above the 20% mark. That is one in five voters. Where the hell did the pollsters find them? Maybe they were polls of people attending Labour Party constituency meetings.

Could Labour come sixth?

Today’s polls show that Labour is fighting it out with the Lib Dems and UKIP for second place at the Euro elections – all three parties are tied on 19%.

I am a strong believer that elections are about momentum and it is clear that one party has momentum: UKIP. From being an irrelevant, fringe party two weeks ago, they are now commanding one in five votes if the polls are to be believed. I now suspect that UKIP will be fighting it out with the Tories for the top spot at the Euro-elections.

Add turnout rates into the equation and it is difficult to see Labour getting the 19% the polls predict. Who the hell will be voting Labour at the current time, particularly for a set of completely irrelevant elections which the Euro ones are? Daniel Hannan has published an interesting blog today saying that after nine days of canvassing, he has not found one Labour voter. He is predicting that Labour will come fifth in the South East elections (behind the Greens) and fourth nationally.

That is where I am at the moment, but I think it is also feasible that Labour’s vote could now collapse to the low teens. Could it fall it to single digits in percentage terms? That would be quite something – a governing party securing just 9% of the national vote, but it is not beyond the realms of possibility anymore. Am I right? I would love to hear from my northern readers – is this just a southern perspective or are Labour in as big a hole as I’m painting?

Charlotte Gore, a good northern liberal, has a fantastic blog this evening about Labour’s problems. If they are at these depths of despair , Labour won’t be battling it out with UKIP and the Lib Dems for second place, but will be fighting it out with the Greens and BNP for fourth.

If you think I’m mad, just take a read of the blog I wrote twelve days ago when I was predicting a Labour vote as low as 15%. It may be too early to start saying I told you so, but it goes to prove how important momentum is at elections.

Thurrock – Burnley – Isle of Dogs – Millwall – Surrey?

The BNP have got to Surrey. I know they have a full slate of candidates in Essex but Surrey? The BNP?

Yes, I received my first ever BNP leaflet today, entertainingly entitled “The New Battle for Britain”, nicely emphasised by a black and white photo of a flying Spitfire.

The backpage is the best with a headline “British jobs for British Workers (where I have heard that before ?) – because We’ve Earned the Right!” which is justified by:

TRAFALGAR – THE SOMME – DUNKIRK – D-DAY – THE FALKLANDS

I don’t know whether that disqualifies me from a job in BNP eyes as I never contributed anything to those war efforts.

Three wonderful women

In any normal year, these three women would be up for prizes in Channel 4’s Political Campaign Awards. In this remarkable week, all three of them have dominated the media and political spotlight.

Joanna Lumley has led the campaign for Gurkha’s rights and totally embarrassed the Government

Heather Brooke, the Taxpayers Alliance campaigner who has fought a long battle to get the parliamentary authorities to publish MPs expenses has finally seen her work come to fruition with the expense claims published in the Telegraph

Beckie Williams has led the successful campaign to get M&S to drop the excess costs of DD-plus bra sizes

Joanna Lumley has probably had the biggest impact this week. Heather Brooke’s campaign will have the biggest impact in the longer term. While Beckie Williams is bigger in many other respects.

I’m not sure who I’d vote for as campaigner of the year, but I hope all three are on the shortlist.

‘We’ve boobed’: the Government could learn from M&S

You have probably read about the campaign against Marks and Spencer’s policy of charging £2 more for bra’s that are sized larger than double ‘D’ – which the Sun helpfully labeled the ‘Hands of our boobs’ campaign’.

Well the campaign has won. Today, M&S have taken out adverts in many of the national newspapers saying:

"We've heard what our customers are telling us - that they are unhappy with the pricing on our DD-plus bras and that basically we've boobed. So from Saturday May 9 no matter what size you buy, the price is going to be the same. We're not going to cut the quality though - they'll still be made to the same high standards so you get the best support on the high street. From Saturday, the chain is also offering 25% off the price of any bra in any size. The promotion will last until May 25.”

Now that’s a strategy this Government could learn from. We were wrong. We admit it. We’re sorry. We’ll put it right straight away. And to apologise, we’ll cut your taxes.

If I can find an electronic version, I’ll try and publish a copy of the M&S advert later. Failing that, I’ll just have to add the photo of the Sun’s Page 3 girl that was supporting the campaign!

10 reasons to Vote Labour

Anyone who has run a local election campaign will know that it is not the level of support you have that matters but the number of supporters you can get to the polling station.

With turnouts as low as 6% in some wards, getting a couple of dysfunctional families on side can make all the difference between winning and losing.

There is therefore still a slither of hope for Labour on June 4th, so long as they can motivate their supporters to go out and vote.

This has got me thinking about how they do it. What would be the messages that could get the Red vote out? Here’s my starter for ten:

1. I want to send a message to Gordon Brown to keep up the good work
2. I want to register my support for Gordon’s economic stimulus
3. Gordon cuts a dashing figure on You-tube
4. OK, Gordon’s not doing a great job, but the women in the cabinet are – people like Jacqui Smith, Harriet Harman and Hazel Blears – I’m voting for them
5. I want to vote for my Labour MEP, I forget his name, but he’s making a real difference in the European Parliament
6. Um, I’m struggling now......
7. Um, I’m still struggling so I’ve taken some inspiration from www.bnp.org.uk; Oh, here goes:
8. I think the Gurkha’s can f*** off back to Nepal
9. I think British jobs should be for British workers
10. For Manchester voters only: I want an ID card so we can tell the Brits apart from those foreigners

Hmmmm. It’s a difficult job. Maybe Labour could task Alan Sugar’s contestants on The Apprentice with the challenge of signing up voters – although I guess all of them would come back to the Boardroom with blank canvass cards.

This isn’t liberalism, this is communism

The Social Liberal Forum, not my favourite of websites, has just published a truly dreadful article by Layla Moran on School Choice. I tried to submit a comment but I’ve been told that ‘my comment is awaiting moderation’ – hardly a very liberal mechanism. Anyway, if they don’t publish it, this is what I said:

This isn’t liberalism, this is communism - a truly awful justification for the state knows best. While you are at it why don’t you tell me what I should eat, what I should wear, what I should listen to and who I should date. It may help you deliver a more equal society.

As a parent, I think I am best qualified to judge what’s best for my children. Sadly I don’t get the choice under the current system because there is no mechanism in the state system for popular schools to expand and crap schools to contract.

Why is there a shortage of school places, but no shortage of nappies?

Douglas Carswell, the Tory MP for Harwich and Clacton, is quickly establishing himself as one of my favourite MP's. He has a fantastic blog that I have been linked to now for a few months.

He wrote a great entry the other day about the thousands of children that will be forced to accept second, third or even fourth choice schools, and some four and five year-olds who could be left without any place next September. He wrote:

We are being encouraged to believe that it's all the fault of rising birth rates, economic downturn and an unexpected increase in the number of four and five year olds. Nonsense.

Do you think there has been a shortage in toys for four and five year olds? Or clothes? Or, when they were toddlers, was there a shortage of nappies? Of course not. There may have been more demand for all the things young children need, but guess what? Along came the market and supplied them.

The only reason there aren't enough places for primary school children is that we leave it to the state to allocate places. And the state is never as good at deciding what's best for us as we are ourselves.

If the state ran supermarkets there would be a shortage of cereals and waiting-lists for fruit and veg. It's because the state runs education that we have shortages and waiting-lists galore.

Quite. It’s a pity then that so few Councils agree. My own (Tory) Council has been one of those that has been unable to provide enough school places. Tory Councillor, David Munro, wrote on his blog:

The number of children wanting to go to Surrey's state and church schools this Autumn have far exceeded expectations: the reason is not so much a greater number of children being born 5 years ago (because Surrey, as the Local Education Authority, can predict those) but more families entering the county and, above all, extra families choosing state, rather than private, education - presumably because of the credit crunch.

Or Tory run Merton Council that tells its parents:

Offers for places in Merton Reception classes were posted first class on 20 March 2009 and you should have received your letter. Due to the high number of calls received over this period we are unable to tell you the outcome of your application over the telephone; please wait until 27 March 2009 before calling School Admissions.

Or even the Tory flagship of Wandsworth. One of their Councillors, James Cousins, writes:

The recession has played a part, there are undoubtedly parents who would have moved or opted for the private sector but now find the economy means putting their children into a Wandsworth school.

Excuses, excuses. As Douglas Carswell writes, “The only reason there aren't enough places for primary school children is that we leave it to the state to allocate places. And the state is never as good at deciding what's best for us as we are ourselves.”

Parental choice will never become a reality until local councils are stripped of education control and we have a competitive market system which is responsive to parental wishes.

Is Osborne there to make Cameron look good?

Now we will work until 70

Today’s Telegraph reports that the independent think tank, the National Institute for Economic and Social Research (NIESR) has suggested that the next Government has three options for getting the public finances back into shape:

1. Raising the state pension age to 70 for both men and women from 2013.
2. Raising the basic rate of income tax by 15p in the pound. Taxes would have to rise by as much as 8p in the pound even if the retirement age was increased.
3. Cutting government spending by a tenth, which would hit the NHS, education and other front-line services.

Even if we follow these policies, it will still take until 2023 to return Britain's total public debt to 40 per cent of gross domestic product.

These are staggering figures which demonstrate the extent to which Labour’s spending spree will cause real long term pain for millions of people.

It’s time the political parties came clean on how they would tackle this debt crisis. Sadly, I doubt any of them will this side of the election.

Political realignment – we need a market

Some Lib Dem blogs are getting all excited about a potential split in the Labour Party after the next election, opening up the prospect of a new realignment of the ‘progressive’ left.

The Labour Party certainly looks hopelessly divided. The Blairite’s support for the abolition of the 50p tax rate, privatisation of the Post Office and more market reforms of our public services is a million miles from the traditional Left’s calls to hang bankers and nationalise the construction industry. With splits like that, they really do look buggered.

However, before you get too excited about finally breaking the mould of British politics, I should warn you there is a flaw with this realignment plan and it is this: which group would the Lib Dems re-align themselves with?

The assumption is that the Lib Dems natural alliance is with the Blairite wing but most of the Lib Dem activist base would be much more comfortable in the company of Livingstone, Harman and co. There is a reason why the Liberals have been out of power for 100 years and I think I may have stumbled on it, for 100 years we have been as split and divided as the Labour Party are in 2009.

What is needed to overcome this dilemma is not a mass defection from a disgruntled wing of ex Labour people but a mechanism for exchanging individuals and factions in a two way direction - a sort of market, a political transfer market.

And here is my opening offer to Labour: we’ll give you Norman Baker for Mandy and take James Purnell for Paul Holmes. And we’ll throw in the Social Liberal Forum for free.

Hell, if this idea takes off, we’ll be able to sell David Laws and Jeremy Browne to the Tories and pay off our Michael Brown debt to Manchester United.

Fleecing the new media to pay for the old

The News of the World is reporting that the Government is thinking of levying a new tax on companies like Google and Facebook to help raise additional cash for the ‘bloated’ BBC and other public sector broadcasters.

If true, this is despicable. It is bad enough that we have a state run media and broadcaster that is 100% subsidised. New media companies (that you would have thought the Government would want to encourage) have enough difficulties establishing themselves in this competitive market at the best of times. The idea that they would have to carry (or fund) their state run opponents as well is morally repugnant.

The best thing to do with the BBC is to break it up and let its offspring stand on its own two feet without any public subsidy whatsoever. I imagine most people would appreciate the saving from the abolition of the TV license.

Brown’s leadership: what is the tipping point?

How badly will Labour have to do in June’s local and European elections for Brown to realise the game is up or for the Party to move against him?

The current polls are saying Tories 45%, Labour 26% and the Lib Dems 17-22%. Run those figures through local election predictions, and I guess you get three headline figures on June 5th:

1. Labour will come third, behind the Tories and the Lib Dems
2. The Tories will poll in the high forties, and possibly touch the 50% mark
3. Labours vote will slump to the low 20’s and possibly not even get past the 20% figure

I’m no psephologist, but I guess that would be the worst electoral performance by a governing party in history, even eclipsing John Major’s dismal results in the mid 1990’s.

At least it is a record that would only stand for two days, because on Sunday 7th June, when the Euro-results are counted, Labour will do even worse.

Five years ago, at the height of the protests against the Iraq war, Labour suffered a drubbing at the Euro-elections and polled just 22%. My instinct is that they are even more unpopular now, so one can assume that they won’t reach the 20% mark this time. The Sunday Telegraph reports that one Labour insider is predicting the Party’s vote will slump to 17%. This may be part of the Party’s campaign to dampen expectations, but such a result would be disastrous for the governing party.

The Euro-elections are much harder to call as the proportional system encourages voters to choose from an array of freak fringe parties of fascists, nationalists and greens. If Labour secures a second place with less than 20% of the vote (which is probably the best they can hope for now), Brown’s position looks precarious. If Labour’s poll ratings fall further into the teens, they could then be slugging it out for fifth place against the Lib Dems, UKIP, Greens and BNP. At that level, Brown would surely be a goner.

Even if he does survive, Brown has the publication of the MPs expenses to contend with in July. According to today’s press reports, one Labour MP bought a sauna on expenses, and three others are said to have been put on ‘suicide watch’ by party whips as their expenses will reveal that they had affairs.

I doubt No.10 are humming Labour’s theme song for the 1997 election, “Things can only get better”, anymore.

Could the Tories introduce a ‘Gordon’ tax?

Whatever happens at the next election, one thing is certain: public spending will be cut and taxes will rise. The public finances and national debt is so dire, (with each man, woman and child owing the equivalent of £30,000), that the double whammy of spending cuts and tax increases is now inevitable.

David Cameron is already preparing the public for this with his warnings about the ‘age of austerity’ and the need for Britain ‘to live within its means.’ He is absolutely right although he is unlikely to spell out the details of what a Tory Government will actually do until it gets into office. To get a better idea of what may happen, we need to monitor the likes of the right-wing think tank, Reform, who are doing some good work on putting forward ideas for tackling the bloated state.

For those of us on the libertarian right, let us hope an incoming Tory Government focuses its efforts on cutting spending. But as taxes rises will also form part of the programme, one idea being talked about in Tory circles is a tax that is introduced in the new Government’s first budget that would be time limited, possibly three years. It will be there to remind voters of Gordon’s debt – a sort of ‘Gordon’ tax.

Politically, it would be a smart move. But in reality, we are going to be paying off Gordon Brown’s debt for many more years than this.

Boris scraps 50,000 homes target

You have to admire Boris Johnson’s press team. At 5pm on Wednesday, the GLA issued a very dull press release entitled “Mayor sets out 20 year vision to make London the envy of the world” to launch a document on the Mayor’s progress in revising Ken Livingstone’s London Plan.

I thought this was slightly odd. Why publish this document, which is a sort of draft of a draft, and why publish it at 5pm on a Wednesday? What is more, the press release was dull and the 94 page document itself didn’t even have an executive summary.

Planning is probably the Mayor’s most important power so you would have thought that the release of a document relating to the Mayor’s London Plan would be a major press event. So what was he hiding?

Well deep in the report is a reference to the fact that his target of providing 50,000 affordable homes by 2011 will be reviewed due to "available resources".

So Boris is retreating from one of his central manifesto commitments. To be fair to BJ, the 50,000 figure was never going to be reached in the current economic climate. But this is a significant story and it doesn’t seem to have been picked up by any of the press. Instead, all the media focus is on the anniversary of Boris' first year in office.

Once again, Boris and his press team have proved rather adept at managing the media and burying bad news. Maybe Gordon Brown should offer Guto Hari a job in the Downing Street bunker.

A bit late to drop the ‘swine’ from the flu

The World Health Organisation (WHO) is reportedly no longer using the term ‘swine flu’. Instead, it will call the virus influenza A (H1N1) as it is unfair to blame little piggies now that it is being transmitted from human to human. Somehow, I don’t think the new name will catch on.