Author: johnredwood

I rarely comment on Opposition parties, but today given that way important issues about Reform have been prominent in world social media I thought I should let those of you interested pass comment.

Elon Musk is a very talented entrepreneur and a titan of social media. When he speaks the world listens.
His recent attack on Nigel Farage was unexpected after reports of friendly relations between the two. It has revealed a couple of splits in Reform over the constitution of the party and over who should be allowed to join.
Mr Musk sides with those in Reform who think it should change from being a private company where Nigel Farage controls a majority of the voting shares, to being a more normal party where members have votes, can approve budgets and direction and can have a voting say in who leads them . Nigel Farage is promising change to the constitution but others are frustrated with delays.
Rupert Lowe put out a very carefully worded statement that fell short of supporting Nigel as leader. Rupert is the darling of many members and some media for his continuous strong opposition to the government. Maybe Mr Musk has him in mind to replace Nigel.

Mr Musk also seems to think Tommy Robinson should be allowed to join Reform. Nigel Farage strongly disagrees given Robinson’s past brushes with the law and his views on religion.

Mr Farage may well strengthen his ability to detach more voters from Labour by standing up to Mr Musk over the issue of the Robinson  tendency joining. He will also lose some others who want very strong messaging on religion and migration.

Meanwhile we await a possible big change to the party constitution. Who should be able to change the Leader of Reform, and in what circumstances?

The government is keen on nationalisation, pressing ahead with completing rail and regulating private utilities to get similar effects. Lifetime study of UK nationalised concerns has taught me that they are bad for employees, for customers and taxpayers. They invest badly, fail to innovate and fall behind in productivity.

Employees of nationalised concerns are more likely to go on strike. Sickness and absence rates are often high, signs of an unhappy workforce. There is more likely to be a work to rule or I know my rights Union mentality than a We are here for the customers approach. There is insufficient flexibility over pay, so there can be staff shortages where pay is below market rates alongside  above market pay for others who have benefitted from comparability awards. Management often  fails to work with employees to get a better answer for them and the customers.

Customers usually face a rules based system, not a problem solving one. Its a world of do not reply to email addresses, complex on line forms and customer inconvenience.

I recently tried  to buy stamps in a Post Office. There were huge queues for the 3 staffed positions. I queued in a shorter queue for a machine to serve me. When it did so it then took several minutes to print out one at a time a different proof of post paid to a normal stamp, Why? No wonder there were long queues.

Potential passengers for HS2 are subject to years of delays and cancellation of substantial parts of the  planned new all nationalised railway .

Taxpayers get the worst deal. Every loss and every pound of investment is  a charge on government revenues. Over the years accumulated losses have been enormous. Many investment programmes have been disastrous. Horizon and the delayed  HS2 are just the latest examples .

It is best if senior politicians avoid comments that are derogatory about their counterparts abroad in case they end up in government. The old rule of do not interfere in the politics of a foreign country usually is wise, unless in government you need to respond in our national interest to actions or statements of a foreign country.

The UK government is led by senior Ministers who ignored these rules when in Opposition. They welcomed President Obama’s endlessly cited intervention in the Brexit referendum for Remain, which turned out to be a clumsy mistake that backfired. They went on to make nasty personal attacks on President Trump which have now come back to haunt them.

President Trump did not intervene in our General election despite their provocations. He has not made personal attacks on them .He is now as an ally and trade partner criticising their energy and industrial policies. This poses a further problem for the government . They had hardly complain about him commenting given their track record.

When President Trump points out US companies are pulling out of North Sea oil and gas investment owing to penal taxes he is stating a fact. When he says a strong economy needs to use more of its own oil and gas rather than importing he is again stating an obvious truth.

Why can’t  the government see its energy policy of relying on imports which increase world CO 2 is bad for jobs, for energy security and the environment? Giving away all that potential tax on home produced energy stretches budgets and means the Uk can afford less defence to contribute to NATO where the US assumes a large burden to help us and Europe.

Political parties have spent years talking to each other, off and on, about finding an agreed system of social care. They all claim they want a system they all accept, unlike other policy areas. They fail to find one, with Labour, Conservative and coalition governments backing the existing system in the absence of agreement on change.

There are a number of different issues and aims to consider. Most people wanting reform are not considering the needs of those in care , but are considering who pays the bills. They think taxpayers should pay more and the people in care should pay less so their families can inherit more.

Social care is largely administered for the state by local government. The NHS is a national service, so there are border  disputes over who needs medical care in a hospital and who should be discharged to a care home  with GP support. Healthcare and  stays in hospital are free for all whilst social  care has to be paid  for if you have savings and or a private pension on top of the state pension. Councils pay for those without means, arguing over the  adequacy of government grant to do so.

The current system rests on a central distinction between hotel services, lodging and food provided by a care home which remain an individual responsibility, and medical services which are paid for by taxpayers. There is a good case to make that it would be neither affordable nor fairmotivated workforce.  to provide full hotel style board and bed in a care home free whilst other elderly or disabled have to pay  for  their own home, heat and meals. Both those at homes and those in care homes should only have the bills paid if they lack capital and additional income. The review needs to consider the current system as a serious runner to continue with a few tweaks.The important issues are quality of care and how to recruit a skilled and

In 1981 The General Post Office was split into two nationalised businesses,the Post Office and British Telecom. They both needed to modernise to adapt to the coming computer, communications and data revolution.

BT was short of capacity. There were long waits to get a phone installed and some had to share so called party lines. That meant if your neighbour was on a call you could not be. UK switching was way behind US, relying on electro mechanical switches when the US had gone electronic. The UK had copper cables, with insufficient reliable capacity for data.

The Post Office counters business was labour  intensive and dependent on government business to handle benefits, driving and car licences  and passports.

BT was sold to new shareholders in 1984. It changed over to electronic switching, developed mobile telephony, greatly expanded its network and allowed many more devices and services to be run over its wires.

The latest annual  figures for BT show profits of £1.2 bn on turnover of £20.8bn. It invested an additional £4.9 bn in the year, extending its broadband coverage. It paid substantial taxes.

The latest annual figures for the Post Office recorded a loss of £414 m, with £133 m of investment paid by taxpayers.

What exactly are the benefits of nationalisation meant to be?

MPs are right to tell the government to speed up the compensation to sub Post Office managers who were wrongly accused of theft and fraud by their employer. It is taking far too long, with inbuilt complexity to allow Post Office delays and big fees for lawyers.

MPs should  also be critical of the continuing dire performance of the Post Office as a business owned by the state . It runs up huge  losses which taxpayers have to pay for. In the most recent year the business lost £414 million. It brings accumulated losses to a staggering £1.8 bn, and total net liabilities to £1.21 bn.In order to carry on trading with this insolvent balance sheet the Post Office relies on government continuing to pay  bills for whatever losses they make.

These losses have been going on for a long time and are not  just the  result of the need to compensate wronged staff.  £72 m of this years loss is underpaid tax and tax penalties because they did not follow the governments own IR 35 tax rules! Surely the highly paid Finance Director knew the rules?

In 2021/2 the Chief Executive presiding over these disasters  was paid £816,000 including a £401,000 bonus. Why? Last year the CEO was paid £436,000 salary, almost three times the PM but was wise enough not to take a bonus.

Taxpayers have to pay all the extra bills for capital investment and losses. The big investment in Horizon  computing lumbered us with a massively  negative return. Last year there a further bill for £133m of investment, mainly in IT. lets hope it was better managed.

Why do MPs fail to expose the disastrous financial mismanagement of nationalised industries? Why do they put up with high executive pay for lamentable performance in these concerns? If government got control of the finances of these bodies they would have money for tax cuts.

Labour’s plans to change the national curriculum have been set in the context of wanting to pursue diversity over race and sexuality. The UK is a diverse society with toleration as one of its main characteristics.

The national Christian religion expressed by the established Church of England does not condemn other religions, does not seek to make windows into people’s souls  nor require conformity. The UK does not prosecute people for heresy. Consenting sexual relationships between adults are legal and of no concern to others. The law recognises same sex marriages.  There is no mandatory dress code.

In recent years under the last government’s reforms the UK has greatly improved standards of literacy and numeracy, which was much needed. Any reform of the curriculum should  reinforce this progress. It should not make it more difficult or regard it as job done. There are still pupils unable to read and write to a satisfactory standard, limiting their prospects of prosperity and success.

The issues to be examined should start with absenteeism from class. Too many children and teenagers fail to turn up at school. It should be concerned about schools with low attainment letting pupils down. It should question whether expectations of pupils especially from disadvantaged backgrounds are in some cases set too low.

The cultural issues that need discussing are acute in the way literature and history are taught. There should be a home country bias. Everyone living here has chosen to do so. Many have crossed continents and broken laws or applied for legal entry and citizenship to do so. We should assume they are proud of their new homeland, not keen to convert it to their old one  which they left as a choice and could always return to,

Our history syllabus should encompass the great achievements of our early  adoption of democracy and free speech, equality under the law, relatively early adoption of religious toleration and our sacrifices to defend liberty and the right  to the self determination of countries in the 3 great European wars ending in 1815, 1918 and 1945. It should include the giant strides to greater prosperity through the Industrial Revolution and twentieth century scientific and technological advance.

Our literature courses should be based on Shakespeare, the  world’s greatest dramatist, on Jane Austen and George Eliot, great  novelists, and poets  like John Donne, Shelley, and Wordsworth.  If you want to write and think well, read well.

Overseas literature should not be limited to European but should include an introduction to American and Asian works.

2025 will be a year of decision for the United Kingdom. Will we cling to an old and unavailable  dream of a free trading more prosperous faster growing Europe, or will  we have the courage and the self confidence to take a global view, adopting a path of free trade and more free enterprise?  The truth is the so called Single market was always more customs Union than free trade area It was always more a hook to justify too much regulation and legislation rather than a simple free trade framework.  The EU opted for higher taxes, more government and many more rules. The USA opted for lower taxes and fewer restrictions on enterprise.  As a result the US has grown so much faster than the EU all century so far, and has reached twice the level of output  and income  per head as the EU average.

The new UK government has got off to bad start, with an austerity budget for the private sector and an inflationary one for the public sector. It has pledged to woo the EU to unspecified improvements in our Free Trade Treaty with them, only to  be met with the predictable demands for more surrenders of powers, fish and money.  It has  failed to draft a Free Trade Agreement to put to President Trump who wanted Mrs May to agree one soon  after the Brexit vote only to be told the EU would not approve before we left!

I want the government to succeed with its chosen aims of giving us the fastest growth in the G7 and with public service reform so we achieve productivity growth after 27 years of no progress. With productivity growth can come higher real wages and  more and better service. With the US growing more than twice as  fast as the EU it is the US we need to catch up with . Their growth is led by three strengths. They have lower business and individual taxes. They have been  growing their oil and gas output to give them an abundance of cheap energy. They have dominated the digital world with their brilliant technology giants. Government in the UK can do much to achieve the first two. It should reverse its bans on UK oil and gas, which drive us to import and gives the world more CO 2 as a result. They need to cut taxes on earning, employing  and investing.

2025 could be a great year for the UK if we worked alongside the USA as it embarks on its policy of 3% growth. It will be another disappointing year if government here remains bogged down in futile negotiations with the EU as they struggle to get to 1% growth. The UK seems to be  looking  for more ways to run up big bills by giving more money to foreign governments and institutions. Today Chagos and the World Health organisation, tomorrow the EU are supplicants . If we do more of this it will confine us to the slow lane and the government to continuing unpopularity.

I wish you all a very happy  and successful 2025. May your personal journeys bring you to places you wish to be, whatever the government serves up by way of a future.

One of the worst features of the government’s actions so far has been the determined attack on industry, trying to root out all use of fossil fuels to rely on imports instead.

1 They reversed the last government’s policy of granting exploration and development licences to U.K. oil and gas. They want to close our industry down as quickly as possible.
2. They reversed the previous governments delay to phasing out new petrol and diesel cars to 2035, bring it forward to a crippling 2030. They refuse to relax or abolish the penal taxes on selling too many petrol and diesel cars. Expect plenty of factory closures.

3. They confirmed the ending of all new steel making, despite criticising the former government for agreeing to this.

4. They have lifted the costs of energy higher, with higher managed prices, higher taxes and the introduction of carbon capture and storage, an extra large cost on burning energy.

5.They have accepted the closure of the Grangemouth refinery.

Why create all this carnage? Why import when you could make at home?