Now that the local and European elections are behind us I am going to become tougher over what I allow people  to post on this site. In the long run up to the General Election on May 7th 2015 I wish this site to continue to be independent. I pay for it out of my own income. It is not an official Conservative party site, nor is it an MP’s website funded by the taxpayer. I will not post any item which is blatantly party political and has in it a exhortation to vote for a particular party, or which rubbishes people from other parties in the hope of gaining party advantage. There are plenty of other sites that do this, and the best place to promote your own party is on one of its own approved websites. I will no longer edit pieces to protect their authors from possible libel or retaliation for remarks hurtful to particular groups, religions and institutions – I will instead simply delete the whole comment as it takes too much of my time to check it out or amend it.

The underlying principle of the main public services which is popular is the principle that the service is supplied free to the user, and paid for by taxpayers. This is true of most healthcare, of most school education, and many social services. No political party with serious aspirations to govern either locally or nationally will challenge this popular base to much public service provision.

This does not mean that users of these services are all happy with what they get, or against improvement. It does not mean that because they are free to the user they have to be monopolies delivered by public officials. The Conservatives, the Coalition and Labour in government have made some moves to allowing charities and private sector companies to provide some of these services. There have also been limited moves to give users some choice.

In education Labour developed an Academy programme which has been taken further by the current government. They have added free schools. Parents and older schoolchildren value having some choice of school. The complaints I get as an MP are where a popular school has too few places, forcing some to go their second or third choice school. I rarely get complaints about the possibility of choice. The issue for the next election is how much further should we go in offering more choice? What other types of school should we permit? How can popular schools expand to provide the desired places?

In the NHS Labour let some contracts to private health suppliers to carry out certain operations and procedures where waiting lists were too long. Patients still received a free service, but at a with profit provider paid for by the NHS. This was broadly popular with patients, and did help reduce waiting lists in the areas targeted. How much  more of this should we do? Should patients have more choice of GP, Consultant and hospital when they need treatment. How much should they be told about success rates and availability when sorting out their diagnosis and  treatment? Was the big idea behind Choose and book a good one?

In social care Councils vary in their approaches, but many do understand the need to tailor care packages to individual needs, and to help people live for longer in their own homes with assistance before having to consider  moving into a home. Is there enough choice and flexibility?

More choice should mean better value for money as well as a service tailored to individual needs and preferences. Having a variety of providers will help deliver value and drive innovation, two things monopolies are usually poor at achieving.

For most in the EU it will be business as usual. In large countries like Germany and Italy the mainstream parties won the Euro elections. Overall federalist parties of the centre left and centre right which belong to the main groupings won 70% of the seats. They will claim a mandate and continue to pursue their integrationist strategy. The so called socialists and the so called centre right in the EU will grow more and more together, becoming a united federalist team, exploiting all the manifold divisions in the anti and less EU parties in the rest of the Parliament.

In France where the NF came first with just one quarter of the vote the Socialist and pro EU President will try to gain concessions about growth and budgets but hope the rest of the problem goes away. The President’s main right of centre opposition remains damaged and weak.

In the UK UKIP’s first place on 27% of the vote gave them 24 seats to Labour’s 20 and Conservative’s 19 is a rare case of a country where voters have by a majority preferred two parties (UKIP and Conservatives) that do not belong to either of the two main federalist groupings. The vote will reaffirm the Conservatives decision to offer a negotiation and a referendum on the result of any negotiation in the next election. UKIP say they would simply withdraw from the EU, but they could only do that if their party held at least 326 seats in Westminster and if they thought they could do it without any referendum to ask people if they agreed. The idea of trying a renegotiation first makes it more likely the Out side will win a referendum if critics of the strategy are right and the EU offers little or nothing to the UK. If instead the EU offers us a good deal then people will have the chance to decide if it is good enough to warrant the continuing surrender of various rights and powers of self government which will still be needed as a sacrifice under any likely deal.

As Conservative MEPs and UKIP do not belong to a federalist grouping, so the UK offers the biggest block of anti federalist votes in the Parliament. UKIP does not wish to work with the National front in France. It will be interesting to see if UKIP does work with AFD in Germany. UKIP will presumably offer immediate pull out from the EU again in the General Election, whilst Labour is still wedded to putting up with all the current EU powers and measures, and remains against a referendum. Labour hopes UKIP will do more damage to the Conservatives than to them and will allow them to win on a small share of the total vote. This would cement the federalist position and rule out a referendum.

In future posts I will examine more issues surrounding the role of the new MEPs, the best way for Eurosceptics to unite their forces from here instead of fighting each other to a standstill, and the ways in which the UK could start to wrestle powers back in crucial areas before we have the chance to settle the matter at the 2015 General Election.

 

The UK is producing a new wave of entrepreneurs. Self employment is rising swiftly. Many more people now have more than one job, splitting their time between differing paying activities. THis is making our economy more flexible, giving more choice and better service in many areas. What more can be done to encourage others to tread this helpful path?

Most entrepreneurs will not make a fortune, and many will do it for a bit of their lives before moving into an employer based job or retiring. It needs to be relatively easy to do this. This means reviewing the paperwork and compliance involved, especially by the VAT and Income Tax authorities.Someone who is good at gardening or plumbing and provides a good service is unlikely to be a tax expert or to have money to spend on an accountant. Simplification of the demands on them for financial information would help.

Many entrepreneurs aspire to financial success. They do not want to feel that if they are successful too much of their hard earned gains will go in Capital Gains Tax or higher levels of Income Tax. Taking down the rates of both Income Tax and CGT could raise more revenue, partly by encouraging more to venture. At the moment a new business is an asymetric bet. If you lose the taxpayer does not help with yous losses, but if you win, the taxman expects a large share.

One of the most difficult things to do is to hire your first employee. Most businesses remain as one man or one woman bands, fearing the amount of work they would have to do to take on, pay and look after an employee. I am all in favour of good pay and conditions for employees.However, the very bureaucratic requirements which larger companies can handle are difficult for small businesses. The govermentn needs to review whether there can be more flexible rules for one person businesses making that first step.

 

The present government got rid of the most offensive parts of Labour’s attack on civil liberties when it reduced the time people can be held without charge or trial, and ditched the Identity card scheme. More can be done to restore lost civil liberties, which used to define an Englishman’s rights – and came to include an Englishwoman’s rights too as the twentieth century rightly enfranchised women.

Civil liberty would be strengthened by fewer but better laws. Our freedom rests in part on supporting an independent police force and prosecution service, where politicians cannot interfere in individual cases, and on a supreme Parliament which can police the independence of the law and change the Statutes as required.  This system is under threat from the European Convention on Human Rights, which has been extended from a sensible set of general proposals to encourage freedom loving states, into an alternative system of law which judges our own Parliamentary process and our own freely chosen laws. Reform of this system is needed to restore UK Parliamentary authority over what the law is, and to restore the independence of our courts over how the law is applied and interpreted.

A democratic state should not take powers to remove money from people’s bank accounts if the taxman thinks they owe some. It should avoid further drift towards  the pocket money society of some Labour imaginings, where government regards all income in the state as its to distribute, leaving what it thinks appropriate for the individuals who earned it.

The government is rightly looking at how it can reduce the use of stop and search powers. These are necessary but should be used where there is reasonable suspicion that someone may be about commit an offence or is committing one.

The fundamentals of our system are good, and need restoring. Everyone is innocent until proved guilty. No-one should be detained for a long period without charge and the prospect of an early trial.The presence of a few nasty potential terrorists in our midst should never be used as an excuse to remove the ancient liberties of the English.

 

As we run up to the manifesto launches for the 2015 election , who will adopt a manifesto for motorists? The last couple of decades have seen motorists in the dock,  blamed almost solely for wrecking the planet with their CO2 emissions, and held to account for any problem on our inadequate road system. Despite all this, 86% of our journeys are by car or van, and we need road transport to supply us with food and other necessities, to get people to school and hospital and to get many to work.

A freedom manifesto for motorists could begin with the decriminalisation of parking offences within car parks and designated parking areas on highways which the government is pursuing. If someone overruns at the shops or gets detained on the way back to the car they should have to pay for the extra parking time, but not end committing an offence and having to pay a fine. Parking charges should be like the BBC Licence fee – a debt you owe a public body, not a tax you have to pay. Parking in places which blocks the road or causes danger to others is another matter where you should still be charged with an offence if you have broken the rules.

It could go on to incorporate common sense over road works. When will a party take up the idea that utility pipes and wires should in future be  buried in easily accessible conduits under the verge or pavement, with access points, so we do not have to dig up the main road every time a pipe or wire needs mending or improving? New construction should include these friendlier arrangements as a matter of course, and when pipes and wires need renewing the issue should be raised to see if they can buried somewhere more accessible than under the middle of a main road. The government and local authorities should improve their work with the utility businesses over hours of working, length of contract  and arrangements to allow maximum use of the highway when works are being undertaken.

It needs to offer motorists some respite from ever higher taxes and charges. Cutting the planned increases in fuel duty has been a popular action by the current government. Motorists still pay a disproportionate amount of the tax in the country, and further reductions would be welcome as the public finances improve.

Transport capital budgets need to be better balanced to allow more improvements on the highways. Improvements are particularly needed at busy junctions, where more segregation of different types of user of the junction allied to more capacity can make these crossing points safer for all and speedier. There should be more bridges to get over railway lines and rivers in busy towns and cities.

 

I have often sought to debunk the myth that splits within parties stop them forming governments. The large wet-dry civil war in the Thatcher Tory party accompanied three election wins. The rancorous and public Brown/Blair split in Labour did not prevent three good wins for a Blair led Labour party.

Since 1992 and the last Conservative General Election win, there have been stories of a split between modernisers and traditionalists in the Conservative party. Today I wish to explain why I am neither, and why I think the future of the party rests with those of us who see ourselves as post modernisers.

I agree with the modernisers’ central  perception. The Conservative party cannot win an outright victory in the next General Election by simply reassuring the core vote and stressing  just  the views of the core on Europe, immigration and social policy as some suggest. The Conservative party has to reach out beyond its core, to attract new and different voters to a broader coalition who think on balance a Conservative government is right for them and better for the country than a Labour one.

I agree with the traditionalists that the Conservatives will not do this successfully if the party identifies a few causes or issues that are different which annoy its core support sufficiently to put some of them off voting. Reaching out must add voters, not run the risk of producing net losses of voters. Some ultra modernisers have suggested policies in the past which they think are doubly good because they not only win over a few new people, but they wind up the old guard. That is bad politics, a misinterpretation of Mr Blair’s triangulation. A party needs to have some intellectual coherence. It will be a coalition of people and causes, but the causes have to be compatible.

Mrs Thatcher’s three big victories did not come from concentrating on a narrow Conservative agenda. The broader coalition came from her obvious support for all who wanted to get on in the world and saw the UK had to change the way it worked to earn a higher standard of living. Giving people with little or  no capital the chance to buy their own Council home or a share in their business popularised a Conservative message about saving effort and enterprise  in a way which brought new voters to support it. Abolishing a tax every  budget and cutting the rates of Income Tax for all was also an inclusive policy that built wider support. Enfranchising employees in the ownership of their firm and giving them more voting rights in their unions empowered more people. Standing up for the UK abroad and negotiating the EU rebate was popular beyond the confines of traditional Conservative support.

So what are today’s equivalents? I think the Conservatives should offer a freedom coalition. Our policies should embrace personal freedoms, civil liberties, and greater freedom of choice in public services. I will suggest more detailed policies soon  based on my idea of a manifesto for freedom.

You may be interested to know that the Immigration Act received Royal Assent earlier this month. I give below a Ministerial  summary of what it does:

• reduce the number of immigration decisions that can be appealed from 17 to 4, whilst introducing a quick and cost-effective system of Administrative Review to correct case-working errors – preserving appeals for those asserting fundamental rights;

• ensure the courts have regard to Parliament’s view of what the public interest requires when considering Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights in immigration cases;

• reform the removals process, replacing the current multiple decision points with a single decision notice to ensure individuals are in no doubt as to their immigration status and their liability to removal;

• reinforce our commitment to end the detention of children for immigration purposes by putting key elements of the family returns process into law;

• restrict the ability of immigration detainees to apply repeatedly for bail unless there has been a material change of circumstances;

• require private landlords to check the immigration status of their tenants, to prevent those with no right to live in the UK from accessing private rented housing (this will be implemented in one geographical area first and the results evaluated before it is extended);

• introduce a new requirement for temporary migrants with a time-limited immigration status in non-exempt categories to make a financial contribution to our National Health Service;

• require banks to check against a database of known immigration offenders before opening bank accounts;

• make it easier for the Home Office to recover unpaid civil penalties;

• introduce new powers to check applicants’ immigration status before issuing driving licences and to revoke licences where immigrants are found to have overstayed in the UK;

• clamp down on people who try to gain an immigration advantage by entering into a sham marriage or civil partnership;

• allow the Home Secretary to deprive a naturalised British citizen of their citizenship in cases where they have conducted themselves in a way which is seriously prejudicial to the vital interests of the UK, where the Home Secretary has reasonable grounds for believing the person is able to become a national of another country;

• correct an anomaly in nationality law to enable certain children born before 1 July 2006 to a British father but whose parents were not married at the time to apply to be registered as British citizens and acquire their father’s British nationality. This rectifies a historical anomaly and provides all children with the same rights, irrespective of whether their parents were married when they were born.

 

This new legislation deals with some of the complaints bloggers here and others have been making about a lack of control over our borders. It remains true that control over who comes here to work from the rest of the EU cannot be changed without renegotiation or exit from the EU, which depends on the result of the 2015 General Election.

 

There have been lots of bids and deals.  Wages are picking up. Consumer spending is rising. House prices have been going up. The Bank should of course want to keep this recovery going, but it is time to start raising interest rates.

I have talked before about the very poor returns for savers. I have explained how the ultra low official interest rates have not been fully reflected in borrowing costs for companies or mortgage holders. I favoured mending the commercial banks more quickly to avoid the need to create so much new money and buy government bonds with it. Now the Bank is sitting on so much government debt, it needs to ensure that as the commercial banks get stronger it does not allow too much of this created money to  find its way into new credit. So far wider money growth has not been excessive, and the tighter regulation of commercial banks has avoided inflation becoming a problem. We should now see faster progress in mending the weaker banks, as profits are retained, allowing more credit to be advanced.

In these conditions, making a start in getting rates up would send a signal to lenders and borrowers alike. It would begin to make saving more worthwhile. A balanced economy will need higher levels of saving and investment.

It may also strengthen the pound a bit against the Euro. As we import so much more than we export from the Euro area this would be helpful overall to our balance of payments, making the imports cheaper. Many of our exports are not that price sensitive, being based on good technology or service quality. A rising or stable currency prevents imported price inflation, the problem which helped cut living standards at the end of the last decade.

I see the Monetary Policy Committee of the Bank is moving towards action. It is a long road to a world where saving is more worthwhile,and the journey will start with  modest steps which will not undermine the recovery. It is important that this cycle the Bank gets it right. In the last mega cycle, the “NO more boom and bust cycle”, I was permanently an opponent of what the Bank was doing.

Between 2004 and 2007 I wanted them to have higher interest rates, and to control bank credit by tougher requirements for cash and capital. I included this in the Economic Policy Review I wrote for the official Opposition in Parliament.  In 2008-9 I was an outspoken critic of the Bank’s failure to put enough liquidity into the markets to avoid major disasters at several leading banks. In 2009-10 I was against the purchase of large shareholdings in RBS and Lloyds, favouring short term loans against security to prop up the important parts of their business which mattered to the solvency of the whole system whilst they sold assets and businesses to raise cash  and the shareholders and bondholders took the hit for the losses. I was an opponent of the ABN Amro/RBS merger, and of the Lloyds/HBPOS merger. Let’s hope in this cycle the Bank acts ahead of problems and shows it has developed an understanding of the cycle.

 

 

I have been asked to comment on the results. They show Labour in  top place, winning 1764 seats with 31% of the vote (controlling 76 Councils), and the Conservatives in second place with 1216 seats and 29% of the vote (controlling 30 Councils) . In third place come the Lib Dems with 399 seats, controlling just 6 Councils. Some here also want to know about the fourth placed party, UKIP. Their vote share  fell compared with the last local elections, to 17%, giving them just 155 seats and no Councils.

The biggest losers on the night were the Lib Dems. Labour made some good gains, but many pundits think they should have been winning much more to put them in a good position to win the General Election in 2015.