Too many people accept Council lies when they say government grants have been cut as they usually go up, and when they say they have to spend all the money under government orders. Councils have wide ranging discretion over spending in many areas, and usually overextend their remits and spending to indulge themselves, employ too many staff and seek to compete with private sector leisure and sport facilities with subsidised offers. They are keen to draw down grants for spending items they do not have to do just because there is a grant available. They are often wanton with capital as they have access to plenty of subsidised borrowing.

If you want to make your Councillor more accountable, ask them a simple question. What is the total spend of your Council this year? Most will confess they have no idea. A few will venture a figure. The figures given are usually well below the true total. They often miss out all the capital spend and borrowing. They often miss out the Education budget as it is usually covered by a full government grant. They sometimes offer a figure that is net of all government grants. They rarely know if you ask a supplementary what the actual definition of the spending figure they have been given is.

The officers often produce extremely complex figures making it difficult for Councillors to see just how much spending they are in practice approving. Years ago when I was a County Councillor I needed to insist on simple total cash spend figures, as the officers in inflationary times always wanted to show us inflation adjusted so called real figures to disguise the large increase in cash outgoings. Looking at  Council websites on finance today there are a variety of ways of netting off grants, trading  income, and borrowings to give the impression of a lower total.

Councils are usually desperate to spend more. They grab any grant going, however undesirable the purpose of the spending as it does not directly bear on the Council tax. They are desperate to get up their trading income by milking motorists with high car park charges.  They ignore the fact that their Council tax payers are also national taxpayers having to pay for the grant, and ignore the way the grant may buy a capital asset or put in a service which then comes to impose costs directly on Council taxpayers in later years.

I did persuade the last government to get some control over wanton buying of commercial property as “investments” just before a likely collapse in shop values from the growth in on line retail. There need to be stronger controls on municipalisation, on buying up property in the Council area, and on “investing” in green technologies which should be done by the private sector under a market test.

NB Government grants, business rates, Council tax and schools grant for English  local government was £77bn in 2019 and £145 bn 2026. What cuts?

The media are not good at local elections. They want to turn them into referendums on the state of the government, and spend most of their time discussing national issues and following national party leaders. Much of this campaign  has been about the chronic unpopularity of this let down government and its leader Keir Starmer.

There are important local issues to discuss which do often dominate the doorstep conversations and some of the candidate literature. Meanwhile national political debate and national media usually infantilises Councils, seeing them as victims of government requirements hindered by “ underfunding”.

The truth is very different. Every  year government grants go up and Council taxes are jacked up more than inflation  in most places. Every year Councils add to their huge debt piles, burdening  future taxpayers. As I drive around the country I see many Councils spending on closing roads, installing  cycle lanes, putting in 20 mph zones, narrowing carriageways and imposing congestion charges, reducing car parking and putting up the charges. Motorists are ripped off and pilloried. People who need vans and cars to get to work and to serve the local community are treated as villains and greatly inconvenienced.

I read about Councils who waste money on buying properties at high prices, then lose money on them. The dire Lib Dem misled Wokingham Borough wants to spend £20 m on a solar farm. It has recently spent £5.5 m on wrecking a local road junction  and painting leaves on the roundabout against local wishes. It leaves Council property empty and draws up an expensive plan  for new offices. Then it claims poverty when it comes to social care provision.

Councils spend huge sums, waste far too much and blame the government.Kent County spends billions yet the Reform Council could not find overall cuts and so it put the tax up by more than inflation. In Worcestershire Reform put the tax up by 9%.

These results did show how unpopular the PM and Labour are. The usual abstention of far more  than half the voters shows many people do not think councillors make a difference. The trouble is when it comes to Lib/ Lab Councillors you know you will get ever higher bills and more potholes.

Government pretends to offer more  devolved power but instead propose a new higher layer of bureaucracy and cost. This government is determined to prevent local people saying No to migrant camps, to building on greenfields or to solar arrays destroying food growing farms.

The first big saving should be to scrap their  costly reorganisation with all the extra bodies and Mayors they want to grandstand over us. Far from devolving power they will thwart our wish to  have less, cheaper and better government.

 

 

They are about to stop us buying the kind of tumble dryer we want. They will tell us if we must have one it has to be a heat pump based type, entailing longer drying times especially in winter if you keep your machine in a cold place. They are dearer and may be costly to run in cold times.

They will ban new petrol and diesel cars as soon as 2030, forcing us to buy nearly new ones imported from abroad or to buy battery cars , many of the cheaper ones from   the Chinese.

They are hovering over banning gas boilers more generally and have already banned them for new homes and want them out of rented property.

The government works to close roads, narrow carriageways, introduce more traffic lights, more low speed controls and other devices to try to get us out of our cars. Instead of cutting CO2 these measures greatly increase congestion, increasing fuel burn and low gear movement.

The government imposes big fuel taxes, windfall and additional rate profits taxes on oil and gas companies, VAT on fuels, carbon taxes and emissions trading costs. These all make us worse off and to destroy many UK industrial jobs.

There is a rout going on in many industries from ceramics to glass, from  steel to petrochemicals, from plastics to ICE vehicle manufacture. None of this will reduce world CO2. It will just ensure the CO2  created by manufacture is made somewhere else, with additional CO2 from shipping the products and goods to us as imports, travelling many more delivery miles.

Please government put a stop to it. End all the special taxes, levies and rules. Let customers decide. We will choose more  wisely than government. We will ensure many more industrial jobs stay in the UK making things we are proud to buy.

The PM spent our money and his time flying to Yerevan to attend the European Political Community meeting, without a thought for all the extra CO2 he could have saved by joining on line. After the meetings there we can read a full statement of the parallel EU-Armenia Summit  which also took place set out by the Commission. This is a  report of a very detailed meeting setting out how Armenia can conform more with EU rules and participate in more EU programmes in preparation for eventual membership.  It is set in the context of the EU wanting Armenia to complete a Peace Treaty with neighbouring Azerbaijan, and improve relations with Turkey. The EU has a political vision of the future of Caucasus region which it wishes to enforce.

The President of Azerbaijan attended the European Political Community on line and is reported to have been critical of the EU for taking a pro Armenia stance and for taking provocative actions as he sees them  with one sided intervention in the  disputes between his country and Armenia. The Turkish President was invited, but instead Turkey’s Vice President joined on line. Two of the key themes of the meeting were ” Regional stability in the south Caucasus” and ” Building the future: Unity and Resilience”

The Ukraine President  attended and made a plea for more military and financial help in resisting Russian aggression. The meeting favoured a negotiated solution for the Middle East, whilst  continuing with the war against Russia in Ukraine.

So what was the UK’s view on these important issues? Did the PM support the conclusions on how to bring peace to the Caucasus? What does he think about the further extension of the EU eastwards and the impact that will have on the region?  What is the proposed UK defence and Co-operation Agreement with Poland going to include?  Why can’t we see a draft text? Co-operation on weapons procurement is fine as long as it helps both sides.

The UK government needs to understand it is not in any position to take on any more defence obligations or responsibilities. This government is running down our defence forces all too quickly, standing down and decommissioning four of our frigates and withdrawing military capabilities from the Middle East and  the Falklands and failing to give timely support to Cyprus. The PM needs to be at home finding ways to afford a stronger defence. The priorities for more spending must be a proper anti missile and drone defence for our home islands, a naval capability which can better protect our overseas territories and trade routes, and an updated independent  nuclear deterrent.

Labour 2024: “Defending our security also means protecting the British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies, including the Falklands and Gibraltar. “

“Labour will always defend their sovereignty and right to self-determination.”

So what happened to that pledge?

Chagos  Attempted give away with absurd £30 bn plus dowry to Mauritius.

Falklands Withdrew crucial refuelling plane from Falklands airport. Failing to reinforce defences with naval commitment despite new Argentine claims

Gibraltar Sell out Treaty with EU to make Gibraltar a colony of EU, taking rules and tax/ charges imposition from EU, allowing Spanish officials intervene in border control and making Gibraltar pay money to EU.

Cyprus base Failed to send naval cover and to provide full defence to Middle Eastern threats.Aroused Cyprus discussion of asking UK to leave.

Bermuda and Cayman islands  Stated wish to change their locally determined tax policies to drive business away from them.

 

 

 

 

At last government Ministers agree there could  be shortages of jet fuel in the summer holiday season. They should know, because their high taxes,  high energy prices and carbon tax policies have closed two refineries leaving us only 4. Both Lindsey and Grangemouth were important suppliers of jet fuel to UK airports. The government in its mad net zero way wanted to stop that and import it instead, taking its production out of our CO 2 figures to put into another country. Now it is getting difficult to get hold of imports that doesn’t look so smart.

Ministers say they are talking to remaining refiners to see if they can get more jet fuel fractions out of the oil they are processing. They should open negotiations with the new owners of Lindsey and the owners of Grangemouth to see what changes to carbon taxes and general taxes would get them to restart their works before they set about demolishing or re purposing. The UK needs these refineries. It would  add employment, some extra tax revenue and some more reliable fuel supplies if they did a deal. They also need to lighten the tax and price load on the remaining  4 refineries as they could close as well if they get into heavy losses.

It would also be a good idea to add to our oil production at the same time and encourage UK supply contracts to UK refineries to add further to security of supply.

How many more times  do we have to warn them of the huge damage they are doing to UK industry and to UK national security?

The government is wilfully wrong in saying we lost 4% or 8% of GDP through Brexit. The graphs and charts of our GDP versus France, Germany and Italy show that is nonsense.  The government  is hopelessly misled in thinking its growth strategy will spring into life if we re set with the EU.

How will paying even more for energy once in the EU carbon trading and emissions scheme help? It is ultra dear energy that is deindustrialising us at pace.

How will imposing a carbon border tax on imports from non EU help? That makes business inputs dearer and squeezes consumer spending power.

How will adopting more EU rules make us more prosperous? Their rules add costs and impose bans and limitations on business activity.

How does bringing in lots of low paid and no paid young people to the UK boost per head incomes?

How does paying ten times as much for student support to help EU students much more than UK ones help us? Why stop supporting UK students to go to non EU universities?

How does giving away so much of our fish for so many years do anything but damage to our coastal communities and fishing grounds?

If aligning with EU laws makes you richer why is Northern Ireland worse off than GB, as NI does align?

Why did the UK growth rate plunge in the Uk’s  first twenty years in the EEC, and fall further when we joined the single market in 1992?

Given how stretched our budgets are, why will paying more money to the EU help? Won’t that put up taxes or put up borrowings more, with higher interest rates as a result?

How does seeking more EU trade help GDP, when we run a large deficit with the EU and imports subtract from GDP?  We run a surplus on non EU trade which is growing faster.

The EU re set could undermine or prevent our trade deals with the TPP, US and other large overseas economies. Why risk it?

People voted for UK MPs to decide our laws and run our government, answerable to the UK voters. Making us accept EU laws we cannot change or influence undermines democracy.

 

The UK government is about to double the tariffs on imported steel to 50%,and to reduce the tariff free quotas by a massive 60%. This means imported steel  will become a lot dearer for all those steel using industries and for construction where they rely on imports. The government is using a Brexit freedom to do this.

The reason I presume they want to make steel so much dearer, raising business costs, is to protect the UK domestic steel industry. This is probably driven by their decision to make the taxpayer pay all the losses on the two remaining UK blast furnaces at Scunthorpe where the government intervened and took over managing these facilities from their Chinese owners. They did so to avoid closure and job losses, without bothering to reach an agreement on the transfer of the assets and the handling of the past debts from the Chinese company. At the time I urged them to sort out ownership and to ensure the UK would not be liable for past losses, for past debts, or have to pay any compensation on the transfer. When I last asked Ministers about how they are getting on sorting out the ownership and debt issues they declined to give details but acknowledged it remains a set of problems they are discussing with the owners. There are reports the Chinese are asking for compensation.

The most recent figure for the losses is £1.3m a day at Scunthorpe, well up on the reported  losses at the time of the transfer of management. The payments for these losses are state aid, and would require EU consent if we were still in the EU or if we realign this sector under re set. The government needs to present a Business Plan with numbers to Parliament, as this is becoming a large commitment of public spending.

They also need to explain what their longer term plan is. They seemed to be pledged to close all blast furnaces as they burn coal, and substitute electric arc steel recycling. If this is also still the plan for Scunthorpe, when do they expect to close the blast furnaces? How long do they think they can and should keep these jobs given the loss rate and the longer term plan? There is of course a case to keep blast furnaces in the UK rather than importing virgin steel, but to do so economically requires a very different approach to energy provision and costs.

What impact will the new steel tariff and quota regime have on  the losses at Scunthorpe? Will it make a big difference? Will Scunthorpe be able to sell more steel as a result? What is the estimated impact on the rest of UK industry and construction from dearer steel? The government’s attempt to save jobs could prove very costly to taxpayers, could end in the loss of the jobs, and could in the meantime just push up costs for steel users.

I am sorry the site was down yesterday. The server had problems affecting various sites. I am grateful to EccentricCoder who handle the technical functioning for me for getting it up and running using new arrangements. I  am glad  it did run a bit yesterday. There has been no interruption to my routine of a post a day.

On Wednesday  I was in the Lords for an historic ceremony. The PM decided he wanted to end the long first session of this Parliament and start again on May 14 th with a State Opening by the King of a new session. This ancient practice  allows the PM  a breathing space, the chance to relaunch the government with a new legislative  programme with  the theatre of royal ceremony to back the government.

The event takes us back to the medieval hierarchy of King, barons, knights, burgesses. The Lord Privy Seal, the senior Cabinet Minister who is Leader of the Lords, presided alongside the Lords Speaker. She told Black Rod to summons the Commons to hear  the prorogation by standing at the bar of the Lords. Once their representatives led by the Speaker were  assembled the Clerks read out recent Bills that have passed both Houses and announced royal consent. Then the Leader read a speech on behalf of the King summarising the government’s view of its legislative successes and main policies.  At the end the Commons departed and the Lords session ended.

All was done in the name of the King, though all was of course decided by the PM and cabinet. What was disappointing was the content of the speech the Leader had to read. Whilst it obeyed the rule of not making any party political points, it wallowed in complacency , often departing from reality.

It stressed the government’s commitment to growth, skipping over the reality of little growth achieved. There was no understanding of how anti growth many if its policies have been. It stressed nationalisation of rail, steel and parts of energy, without seeing how these changes will mean big losses, big taxpayer bills and disappointing results. It talked about the UK helping solve world crises without seeing the lack of engagement  with either Iran or Russia busy prolonging their wars.

I will talk about the next Kings speech  nearer its delivery. The old session dies with Labour at a historic low in the polls for a governing party, with growth stuttering, worklessness and benefits soaring, illegal migrants still coming and the cost of living squeeze still bad.