Author: johnredwood

Hong Kong is in recession. Germany probably is in recession. Italy was in recession last year and still performing weakly.  The US and Chinese economies have slowed. It is time for a UK stimulus to boost our economy.

The government is right to increase spending on schools and hospitals. It also needs to provide some tax cuts for all to increase take home pay, make it cheaper to buy a home and a car and take VAT off items like female hygiene products, home insulation, and other ways of improving home fuel efficiency.

The UK economy has been slowed by the world background and by its own tight monetary and fiscal policies. It’s time to relax sensibly. The aim should be prosperity for the many, with more and better paid jobs.

All MPs lose their jobs when Parliament dissolves. This is not an official MP website so it makes no great difference to this site. I will continue with the blogs and will declare the costs of the site as an election expense.

I have amended my biography. All past references to my role as MP will stay in the archived materials but are of course references to my last service and not to my current position.I am the Prospective Conservative candidate for Wokingham and will write some blogs about the election. I will continue to provide general commentary about other issues where appropriate.

I will not be publishing contributor exhortations to vote for other parties or overtly partisan anti Conservative material during the election period. There will be plenty of that elsewhere. Contributors should not name candidates or particular seats in pieces either to promote or denigrate. National campaigns, policies and arguments are of wider interest.

All articles will be written and published by John Redwood of 30 Rose Street Wokingham RG40 1XU

The Conservative election agent is David Edmonds of 30 Rose Street Wokingham RG40 1XU

Promoted by David Edmonds on behalf of John Redwood, both of 30 Rose Street Wokingham RG40 1XU

The government wants an election because it wants to end the impasse of this Parliament. It rightly sees that it is kept in office but not allowed to govern. There is no alternative government on offer in this Parliament that would have a majority to govern. The election should be about who is best suited to form that government.

Elections are the ultimate democratic act. The government may wish to define the debate its way. The Leader of the Opposition may wish to define it in a different way. In practice it will be defined as a result of a jostle of forces and voices trying to shift or dominate the agenda of the debate.

On this occasion it may well be that there is some shared interest between Conservative and Labour over what they want to talk about. Both want to pose the same choice of a majority government led by one or other of the main parties of the outgoing Parliament. Both will look beyond Brexit to issues of tax and spend, their approach to public service quality and reform, nationalisation and privatisation. There will be a genuine choice between a more socialist government than has been on offer for many years, and a Conservative government.

The Lib Dems and SNP will wish to make it an argument about Brexit, peddling their view that the public got it wrong in 2016. They will advance various ways of overturning or cancelling the Brexit vote and will seek to bring the conversation back to this single question that has consumed the last two Parliaments.

What do you want the election to be about , as it your election too?

In recent discussions I have been having about the costs and timetable for getting to zero net carbon dioxide as various governments now want, I have been asking about who will be paying for the electric vehicles and the heat pumps it will take.

Millions of people in the UK on below average incomes will need to replace their cars and vans with electric versions. They will be expected to replace old gas and oil boilers with  heat pumps and new boilers or with all electric systems. How easy will it be for them to afford the new machines and systems?

One person responded to my query by saying  buses and trains will all go electric thanks to taxpayer and public sector financed investment. People can then take the bus and dispense with the car they said. Many people do not live in cities with frequent bus services.

They seem to have in mind a them and us world, where the better off will still be able to afford the new vehicles and the all electric systems, whilst many others will in their view no longer have personal transport. Let them take the  bus, is a paraphrase of their position.

This is a poor answer at best, as surely the many should have access to higher living standards and greater convenience. It is  no answer to the needs of the small business person who needs a van to get to each appointment, taking the tools and spares needed for the assignment. Everyone from plumber to builder, from delivery business to mobile service provider needs personal transport tailored to their work. Many families need a car to get food back from the shops and to take the children to school as well as to get themselves to work.

For those places wanting zero net carbon as they call it by 2030 it will be soon that people need to spend the money on completely transforming their domestic heating, and to start thinking about new vehicles for the end of the next decade. We are talking about a colossal joint investment, where those just managing on current incomes will find it difficult to find the cash  for potentially large expenditures.

I also  see there is consumer resistance to some of these changes even where there is no direct additional cost involved. The electricity companies are urging   people to allow works in their  homes to change over meters. People with busy lives find it difficult to book out a day to supervise the work, and many are apprehensive about works in their home when the current system works just fine. The absence of any perceived personal benefit from the new meters has put lots of  people off. Some circulate rumours the firms strenuously deny that there is some ulterior motive on future  tariff and supply interruption that the new meters might bring. Indeed part of the case for these meters is that in future there could be variable tariffs with higher charges at certain times of day, with more control over energy supply by the utility. It will need a stronger case as to the benefits to get more people to allow these installations,.