Author: johnredwood

ALL MPs CEASE TO BE MPs ON DISSOLUTION

March 29, 2015 40 Comments

I cease to be an MP tomorrow. Once Parliament is dissolved all MPs lose office and cease to qualify for salary or expenses.
This website is not an MP website, but my personal website paid for out of my own income. I will continue to run it during the election period. Any previous reference on this site to my work or role as an MP remains on the historical record but relates only to my past role.
I become the Conservative Parliamentary candidate for the Wokingham constituency. I will use my local pages for the Wokingham campaign. There will be a daily piece on local and party matters. This will be my voice as Wokingham’s Conservative candidate.

I will  continue with the  general  blog as well. This will provide commentary on  UK matters  and on wider international issues as before. This will not be an official Conservative site, and will not change style because there is an election on.

M4 motorway improvements and noise.

March 28, 2015 1 Comment

 

I received no less than three letters from Transport Ministers this week as they cleared their desks ahead of the Election. They were writing in response to conversations I have had with them, and in response to formal submissions I have made, about motorway improvements and noise reduction.

The Minister of State, John  Hayes, wrote to confirm that the Highways Agency are submitting an application for development consent for the smart motorway M4 junctions 3 to 12  by 30 March. If the Planning Inspectorate accepts, individuals can register with the Planning Inspectorate as an interested party so they can engage with the rest of the planning process.

John Hayes also wrote about the Junction 10 M4 Pinchpoint improvement scheme, currently being paid for by central government. He said completion had been delayed until June 2015, owing to concerns to look after wildlife at the site.

The Secretary of State wrote to confirm that all M4  lanes, as requested, will be treated with the noise reducing surface, and to show  his personal interest in the discussions I and my office are currently having with Transport Department officials about additional noise barriers.

Can you live on a zero hours contract?

March 28, 2015 134 Comments

This is one of the sillier questions in modern politics. All sensible parties and politicians want people to have well paid jobs. We all recognise you need a decent income to meet all the household bills, and all main parties support a range of top up benefits to help those in low paid employment. No party recommends outlawing all zero hours contracts, as for some people and for some tasks these might make sense. All do agree that they cannot be used to break minimum wage laws, nor does working under such a contract render you ineligible for top up benefits and other state financial support.

Whether a particular zero hours contract is bad or not depends on its terms, and on how many hours of work materialise in practice. What is unfair would be lock in contracts  which stop someone working elsewhere when no work is available under the zero hours contract. Some people like their zero hours contract. Others see them as a steeping stone to a contract with specified hours. Labour often condemns them ,yet uses them within Labour Councils and Unions.

The answer to the question is simple. No, you cannot live on a zero hours contract if the rate of pay is low and the hours on offer are limited. If you are a student, if you want limited hours work, or if there other reasons why you are not seeking a fulltime job, a suitable zero hours contract might  work.

The work of an MP – as local advocate

March 27, 2015 26 Comments

One of the important parts of an MP’s job is to act as advocate for his or her local area to government. It may necessary to take up financial issues like the level of Council grant or access to government programmes. It may require lobbying for some change in rules or regulation that are impeding progress. In Wokingham’s case it is often seeking to secure financial assistance with projects needed to  support Wokingham’s growth, as with new schools, roads, flood prevention  and health facilities.

In recent years Wokingham has done  better, with three new primary schools, a new station, a new doctors’ surgery and the start of the Shinfield and the Arborfield bypasses. Now we need to work on the northern and southern distributor roads for Wokingham, further flood prevention measures as more homes are built, and on secondary school provision. I also wish to see considerably more progress with fair funding between Wokingham schools and the schools elsewhere that receive considerably more per head.

Seats and votes – the two main parties start to rise

March 27, 2015 110 Comments

The last General election brought a new low for the combined vote of the Conservative and Labour parties. It was no wipe out or complete meltdown, Euro style, but it left the two sharing just 65% of the total vote. The remaining 35% of the vote meant 57 Lib Dem MPs and 28 others, mainly nationalist or regional party MPs, arrived at Westminster. The UK ended up with a coalition government no-one had planned or argued for.

The latest polls suggest that the two main parties are now polling around 70% together. That’s well up on 2010 and may lead on to further gains in vote share for one or both  as more people may wish to directly help fashion the choice between a Cameron and a Miliband led government.

The two main parties remain  close in the polls, and the vote going to others though down is now much more powerfully concentrated in Scotland in favour of the SNP. So on the present reduced 30% vote for others, the number of MPs from outside the two main parties could stay quite high  if the SNP gets 40 plus MPs to Westminster and if the Lib Dems still keep enough  of their seats.

The election should get more competitive from here, as the campaigns proper kick in with full manifestoes after Easter. Will UKIP supporters who want out of the EU really let a chance for an EU referendum slip through their hands by not voting Conservative ? Will recent Green voters stick with their new party? Will some  Scottish Unionists vote SNP in the hope of a still better deal for Scotland, or will they see the damage that can do to the Union?

What is for sure is that England can no longer be ignored. The politics of the next Parliament may well be dominated by the business of Scotland, which will also trigger the business of England.

The work of an MP – running the complaints department

March 26, 2015 0 Comments

 

The biggest category of incoming emails from constituents other than lobby based campaign emails concerns poor performance by various parts of the public sector. The MP is the person individuals turn to if their benefit is wrongly calculated, if their tax demand is too high, if their passport or visa is causing problems  and if the government is being unfair on their business. The MP is also often the person they come to when the mistake is made by the local Council. MPs get a lot of work about social housing, planning, social care and local licencing, where Councillors are in some ways better placed to take the matter up and demand improvement or apology.

One of the features I like about the UK system is the local MP, with one member for each place. He or she has every reason to want to help a constituent, and the role of the MP is understood by most people in the public sector who will wish to co-operate with his enquiry. The simple rule all MPs follow is we only take up the cases of our own constituents. Chaos would result if MPs started picking and choosing which cases they took up from a variety of different constituencies. We are motivated to help our own constituents, and the system understands the MP’s right to make demands on behalf of those he or she represents.

There is always a difficult question over how much an MP should get involved with Council matters. Take no interest and some will allege you are  not doing the job. Take too much interest and you make yourself a nuisance to elected Councillors who have powers from their office  to demand papers and require answers from local officials which  MPs do not have. It is always a good idea  to find a working balance. I wish to see stronger local democracy, so it is important not to try to swamp it by too constant a presence and too much attempted interference.

Some people also wish MPs to help them sort out complaints with private sector companies. MPs have no special powers to do so and no privileged position, in the way we do with national government through our right to question and demand of Ministers. Parliament can fire the Minister if all else fails. However, Parliament does have some powers to summon and expose wrongdoing or bad practice  by large companies through its Committees, so there may be occasions when an MP letter can help.

 

The cost of living

March 26, 2015 122 Comments

The UK used to have a bad inflation problem. UK politics in the 1970s and early 1980s was fought over rises in the cost of living and which party had the best way of  controlling it.

Mr Miliband wanted to take his party on a trip down Memory lane, by making a central issue out of what he called “the cost of living crisis”.

This followed hard on the heels of his forecasts that the UK economy under the present government would go into double and treble dip recession and would end up with worse unemployment than it had suffered under Labour government. He abandoned that attack as the news gathered momentum of many more jobs being created, and many people getting out of unemployment into work.

This week the government announced that the present rate of inflation is zero. For the whole of the last year prices overall have stayed the same. Forecasters expect prices to fall a  bit from here. Wages are rising, so people are now experiencing some increase in living standards, after the sharp fall in real incomes at the end of the Labour period in office, and the continued squeeze in the early Coalition years when inflation remained high.

The government and Bank do wish to see better pay rises and further progress in raising people’s spending power. For the time being none of this threatens low inflation, which remains as a welcome achievement which eluded most post war UK governments.

 

The work of an MP – helping shape national policy and the national debate

March 25, 2015 0 Comments

Parliament is first and foremost the greatest official platform in the country to advance a good cause and to condemn a bad one. Parliament on good days leads the national debate and figures strongly in the national news. On a bad day Parliament may still be in the news for the wrong reasons.

Each MP has to help Parliament stay fresh and topical, in touch with public opinion, but also capable of leading the national debate in a positive way. Each MP can make a difference, and many do. Each MP does the job somewhat differently. It is not a  nine to five office or factory. It is a way of life, where an MP is on call every day of the week, where work comes in every day of the week, and where each day an MP has to judge how he or she might advance his constituents’ interests and the related national causes he or she stands for.

The national debate can be altered by an individual MP through articles, pamphlets. speeches and his work. It can be altered by groups of MPs using Parliamentary opportunities to advance their ideas.It can be changed by political parties, operating within the Commons and outside.

Euro 2 billion to help Greece

March 25, 2015 81 Comments

 

The EU came to Greece’s aid, with Euro 2bn to ease the Greek “humanitarian crisis”.

It’s all part of their “too little, too late” strategy towards the Euro. Forcing Greece into the Euro prematurely was a mistake by Greece and the other members. Offering the new government 2bn Euros of charity is not going to tackle the underlying structural faults of the scheme, nor will it get Greece back to work. Once you have allowed unsuitable economies into your single currency scheme, the whole zone has   a problem as well as the problem country.

The recent meeting between Mrs Merkel and the Greek Prime Minister may have defused a few  of the extreme tensions between Germany and Greece, but it did nothing to resolve the fundamental issue – who will pay the Greek bills coming up. Mrs Merkel was doubtless  sincere in saying she wants Greece to experience economic recovery and rising employment, but such words create no jobs.

The Greek state and economy needs more money. The Greek PM says he does not want to borrow more, yet that is exactly what he has to do if the rest of the Euro area will not give him the cash he needs. The Greek commercial banks are dependent on support from the European Central Bank, and have had to borrow from the ECB to handle deposit loss. The Greek state needs to borrow more cash to pay its day to day bills, as it seems a tax shortfall once again leaves the government spending more than it raises in taxation. The Greek state also needs to find the money to repay some of the older borrowings as they fall due.

Greece cannot just print its own cash for its banking system as a country with its own currency can. Nor can the Greek state simply issue more Treasury Bills or bonds to borrow more to carry on spending, as all of Greece’s borrowings are under control as part of the loan agreement called the Master Financial Assistance Facility.  The truth is Greece can run out of money, and can be squeezed by borrowing rules, loan covenants and by the European Central Bank.

Mrs Merkel’s fine words about growth, and the EU’s 2bn assistance is a sign of some willingness to compromise. It is still way off the scale of the debt relief or new money that Greece needs to repair the damage to its recession ridden economy with mass unemployment at worrying levels.

More trains on Great Western

March 24, 2015 2 Comments

I have received the following letter from the Transport Secretary about improvements now planned for Great Western train services, summarising the arrangements for the new train franchise following consultation and negotiation;

23rd March 2015

we are grateful to all those who took part. A summary of the responses

received, and how they have been incorporated into the new Franchise, is

now available on the Department’s website at Gov.UK.

The franchise overall will see an increase in capacity of around 25 percent,

or 3 million seats per year as well as significant increases in service

frequency and journey time savings. This will include a 2 trains per hour

service to the South West of England, an earlier arrival into Plymouth, and

double the number of trains to Cornwall. My Department will also work with

FGW to improve the performance and quality of the rolling stock serving

the south west of England, particularly for intercity services, during this

Direct Award; to complement the introduction of the IEP trains.

Other benefits secured by the Direct Award include investment of £30m to

create 2,000 more car park spaces, additional customer information

systems, CCTV, ticket gatelines, and fund of £2.5m for station access

improvements a £3.5m station development match fund, as well as

extension of Station Travel Plans at a further 20 main interchange stations.

The operator will also support the government’s commitment to get more

people into work by providing an annual fund and training opportunities for

young and unemployed people, as well as providing 85 modern

apprenticeships by the franchise end.

New passenger satisfaction, punctuality and cleanliness targets will be

introduced on the franchise. We expect FGW to continue to provide

improving standards for its 99 million annual passengers including the

provision of free Wi-Fi on all train fleets. In addition the company will

deepen its engagement with communities and stakeholders so that all the

users of the franchise can continue to have a real influence over how

services can be improved. This includes a £2.2m Customer and

Communities Improvement Fund to help areas of real social need.

I thought it would be useful to highlight some specific benefits from this

award that may affect you and your constituents more directly. The busy

commuting routes into London will see a significant increase in capacity

and better journey times from Thames Valley stations into London

Paddington with seats for over 29,500 passengers arriving into Paddington

across the morning peak in December 2018, operated by a fleet of modern

Class 387 electric trains, supplemented by a fleet of Class 365 trains. The

number of services along the North Downs route from Reading will increase

from 2 trains per hour to 3, with through trains to Gatwick increased to 2

per hour, providing much needed additional capacity and improved

frequency on the line. There will also be additional trains from Oxford to

London and fast trains will operate to and from Didcot during the morning

and evening peak hours from December 2018. From December 2017 there

will be electrified services operating on the Windsor branch and Henley

branch. Improvements on routes in the region will see the line speed

increase to 110mph from December 2018, when 12 car trains will provide

further capacity and faster journeys to Oxford, Newbury, Swindon and

Didcot.

In addition to these service and rolling stock enhancements, a number of

stations in the Thames Valley region will benefit from improvements. A new

multi-story car park is planned at Didcot for delivery in 2016/17 and FGW

are working with partners on further improvements to the station. Goring &

Streatley will also benefit from improvements to the car park from 2016 and

CCTV will be installed at Windsor and Eton station. Stations on the Marlow

line will see a package of improvements that FGW plan to deliver in

partnership with Buckinghamshire and Thames Valley Local Enterprise

Partnership and will also see new Ticket Vending Machines installed at

Cookham and Marlow stations. The new franchise will also provide

improved passenger information and retail/ ticketing systems. I’m very

pleased too that FGW will work in partnership with Network Rail and

Reading Borough Council to see the aim of a new station at Reading Green

Park realised by December 2018. FGW has committed to working closely

with TfL and the new Crossrail train operator to ensure seamless transfer

of stations and introduction of the new train services.

Reaching this agreement with FGW marks a new chapter for the Great

Western railway and a step change in capacity, frequency, and the quality

of service.