Former Conservative leader Michael Howard has accused all the mainstream parties of failing to do enough to challenge the British National Party.
Mr Howard said it was important for politicians to confront the BNP in the run-up to the general election.
But this was not being done to the extent necessary, he told the BBC.
Mr Howard said there was no room for complacency because there were a number of constituencies where the BNP could be a "potent threat" at the polls.
'Potent threat'
Mr Howard told BBC Radio 4's The World This Weekend: "I think I am still the only party leader who went to Burnley and devoted an entire speech to confronting the BNP and saying that we've really got to take them on and we've got to take their arguments on.
"I don't think we can afford to be complacent. There are one or two constituencies where they are said to be a potent threat.
"I think you have to take them on, you have to confront them and you have to expose the appalling evil of their arguments."
BNP leader Nick Griffin announced last month he would stand for Westminster in the east London constituency of Barking at the next general election.
'Honest' party
Mr Griffin said that his party was not racist, but won votes because it "spoke openly about the problem of immigration".
He told a news conference: "It's all phoney with the other parties.
"Sometimes we can be a little blunt, a little politically incorrect, but we're always honest and people know that now."
The BNP won its first two seats in the European Parliament in June - Mr Griffin in the North West and Andrew Brons in Yorkshire and the Humber where it got 10% of the vote.
Never before in the history of our elections has a party spent so much to help so few
I've now been offering this prize for weeks – at open-air meetings in my Blackburn constituency, at Labour Party dinners around the country. And still it's unclaimed.
It can't be the prize – two tickets to Burnley Reserves – which are clearly the height of generosity. So it must be the question: "Name one Conservative councillor who in the last 12 years has complained publicly that too much central government money has been invested in their area" – ie, that the new schools, health centres, sports facilities, those extra police officers and teachers, should never have been provided.
But that is precisely what David Cameron and George Osborne are saying, when they claim now that there's been too much public spending, for it's on these key services that much of the money has been spent – though they both, and all the other Conservative MPs, have been as silent as their local representatives have been shameless in claiming credit for the achievements which have flowed from this investment, like a doubling in good GCSE results in many areas, and a sustained drop in crime.
Just as Conservative wards would have suffered had Mr Cameron and Mr Osborne been in charge, so it's been as well for the country, and its families, that these two were not at the helm when the world recession took hold just over a year ago.
There were dire predictions about what this global meltdown would mean for the British people in repossessions, bankruptcies and job losses. Mr Osborne's advice was to do nothing, to let the recession take its course. But Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling took action to save savers and boost the economy. A tax deferral scheme was set up to help businesses stay afloat and keep people in jobs – and 200,000 agreements with businesses have been made so far.
I've seen the direct benefits in my own constituency. There's been far better advice and assistance for those struggling to avoid repossession. In consequence repossessions and mortgage arrears are running at around half the rates at which they peaked in the early Nineties.
Proportionately half as many businesses have gone under as in the last recession. The rate of job losses has been four times less than if we had repeated the experience of the early 1990s. The dire expectations have been confounded, but this didn't happen by accident. It happened because of the choices we made.
Now, as we start 2010, we face another big choice. Mr Darling has made clear that our first task for the new year must be to secure the recovery. We need to get the economy growing in order to get the deficit down. Mr Osborne, by contrast, threatens to choke off the recovery with cuts at the worst possible time. He and Mr Cameron promise an "age of austerity" – one in which ordinary families and the public services on which they depend would suffer.
But this week we discovered that there is one glaring omission from Mr Cameron's "age of austerity". There is one group for whom 2010 will not be a year of belt-tightening, but of big spending on an unprecedented scale. I am not just talking about the wealthy few who would benefit from George Osborne's £10bn-worth of unfunded and unfair tax cuts. I am talking about the Tory party itself.
At the same time that Mr Cameron tells the British people we face "austerity", he has ordered his party to fight the most expensive election campaign in British political history. It is an American-style campaign, costing millions, with wealthy suitors each paying £50,000 to join David Cameron's dining club, and British high streets covered with billboards bankrolled ultimately from Belize. Mr Cameron says the Conservatives have changed, but what we are seeing is an attempt by his party to buy the next general election.
And why? It is because Mr Cameron will say, do and spend almost anything to stop the general election campaign being about policy beyond a slogan on a billboard. For he knows that the substance of his policies will not stand up to scrutiny; that his policies stand principally to benefit the privileged few – and that the mainstream majority would end up paying the bill.
That is why, when Labour supports the aspirations of families from low and middle incomes, he wrongly accuses us of "class war"; and why, when Labour exposes the fact that the Tories want to spend billions on tax breaks for the three thousand wealthiest estates in our country, he criticises us for creating "dividing lines".
These ridiculous claims are a deliberate Conservative smokescreen to conceal the unfairness of their policies. From record-breaking, expensive advertising campaigns to the phoney rhetoric about class war, it's clear that Mr Cameron's strategy is to do everything he can to deflect attention from scrutiny of what a Conservative government would do. Ultimately, regardless of whether it's free flights from foreign companies or billboards bought ultimately from Belize, it doesn't matter how much money Mr Cameron throws at this campaign. The closer we get to the election, the more the Tory policies will come under scrutiny.
And as they do so, we are confident that the choice facing the British people about the future of this country will become clear. The truth is that the Conservatives made the wrong choices on the economy: on Northern Rock and on help for businesses and families. Now they threaten to choke off the recovery. And all of this is at the same time as they pledge a tax giveaway to the three thousand wealthiest estates.
Never before in the history of British elections has a political party spent so much – to help so few.
Meanwhile, I'm upping the prize on offer to one almost beyond price – two tickets to Blackburn Rovers first team. Any takers?
It is for this very reason why I call on the Chinese & Pakistani communities to continue with their good relations in this country and call on the Governments of both the UK & China to redouble their efforts to being about the justice to the Akmal Shaikh family in the UK by finding the criminals and let them face the death penalty. If You Have any information please contact the police and the Home office. See article below:
Amnesty International has joined a chorus of criticism of China over the execution by lethal injection of Akmal Shaikh, a British convicted drug smuggler said by friends and family to have been mentally ill.
Amnesty said Shaikh's execution again highlighted the "the injustice and inhumanity of the death penalty, particularly as it is implemented in China". Amnesty estimates China executes at least three times as many people as every other country put together.
Sam Zarifi, Amnesty's Asia programme director, said: "Much information about the death penalty is considered a state secret but Mr Shaikh's treatment seems consistent with what we know from other cases: a short, almost perfunctory trial where not all the evidence was presented and investigated, and the death penalty applied to a non-violent crime.
"Under international human rights law, as well Chinese law, a defendant's mental health can and should be taken into account, and it doesn't seem that in this case the Chinese authorities did so.
"It's simply not enough for the Chinese authorities to say 'we did the right thing, trust us'. Now there can be no re-assessment of evidence, no reprieve after a man's life has been taken.
"The UK, the EU and the rest of the world should continue to press the Chinese government to increase the transparency surrounding the death penalty in China and to improve the due process offered all defendants, particularly those facing charges punishable by death."
Clive Stafford Smith, the director of the human rights group Reprieve, which supported Shaikh's family through the case, said: "Sad to say I have watched six people die in execution chambers, and it is as ghastly as it is pointless. Is the world somehow a better place today because China refused to show compassion for an obviously ill man? Of course not. China's refusal to even allow a proper medical evaluation is simply disgusting."
Sally Rowen, the legal director of the death penalty team at Reprieve, said: "The death of Akmal Shaikh is a sad indictment of today's world and particularly of China's legal system. Akmal was a gentle man who suffered from a tormenting illness; he slipped through the cracks of society and was betrayed and deliberately killed by one of the most powerful nations on earth. We at Reprieve are sickened by what we have seen during our work on this case."
Through Reprieve, Akmal's family issued a statement: "The family express their grief at the Chinese decision to refuse mercy; thank all those who tried hard to bring about a different result – including Reprieve, the FCO, those who attended the vigil, and the organisers of the Facebook group who garnered more than 5,000 members in a few short days; and ask the media and public to respect their privacy as they come to terms with what has happened to someone they loved."
Philip Alston, a UN special rapporteur, told Radio 4's Today programme that the refusal to allow doctors to assess Shaikh's mental health was "clearly in violation not only of Chinese law but also international law".
"International law points very strongly in the direction of only carrying out the death penalty for crimes which have led to deaths," he said.
He said China "has made noises and made some efforts in terms of specific measures" to improve judicial processes around the death penalty, such as requiring them all to be ratified by the supreme court. But he rejected the view that China deserved credit for tackling the drugs trade.
"It's not the people who are profiting, its the idiots who are picked on and gullible enough to engage in this sort of behaviour [who are punished]. It is time for the international community to mount a much more concerted effort to put an end to these sorts of executions, and not only to react when one individual cases arises which is particularly troubling to us."
David Cameron, the Conservative leader, backed the efforts of Gordon Brown and other ministers to secure a reprieve. "I deplore and deeply regret the fact that the Chinese authorities have executed Akmal Shaikh and did not heed the pleas for clemency made in his case by the British government, by the opposition parties, by his family and by others.
"There were serious concerns about Mr Shaikh's mental health. It is appalling that these concerns were not independently assessed during the more than two years Mr Shaikh was in custody and taken properly into account in the judicial process.
"We supported the government in the efforts they have made and I join with them in sending my sympathy to Mr Shaikh's family and friends."
THE Conservative Party is trying to “buy” the result of the general election by pouring huge sums of money into the fight, it was claimed last night.
Labour MP Nick Ainger has represented Carmarthen West and Pembrokeshire South since 1992 but is facing a tough battle to keep his seat as the Tories invest large sums of money in his main opponent’s campaign.
Mr Ainger said the law should be changed to place a limit on the amount of cash that can be poured into a constituency. Under current arrangements, there is no limit on campaign spending until a general election is called.
And under the existing laws governing political donations, it is impossible to establish how much money is channelled into a particular seat.
Mr Ainger, who will be defending a majority of just 1,910 over the Conservatives at next year’s general election, said: “I am very concerned that we are heading in the direction of the United States, where the candidate with most money can effectively buy an election. In my seat there has been a huge increase in the amount of campaigning by the Conservatives in the last couple of years. The local Tories have received £40,000 from a businessman who runs a hedge fund and, we understand, £25,000 from Lord Ashcroft [the party’s wealthy deputy chairman].
“There has been a lot of telephone contact with voters and a lot of literature sent out, including a recent glossy publication sent to every household in the constituency which encouraged people to respond by freepost. That is very expensive, and we just can’t match it.
“I really think there should be strict limits placed on how much campaigning should be permissible at any time, not just in the several weeks running up to an election.”
Mr Ainger said it was clear that “Ashcroft money” was being directed by the Conservatives to other marginal seats in Wales.
“A friend of mine, Peter Bradley, who lost his seat, The Wrekin, at the last election in 2005 has told me he has no doubt that it was Ashcroft money spent by the Conservatives which was crucial in the result. It’s too late to change the law before the next election, but this is something that should be changed before we go further down the American route,” he said.
A recent poll in The Daily Telegraph showed the Conservatives had a higher proportional lead in marginal seats over Labour than in Britain as a whole. This was attributed to the “Ashcroft factor” of pouring money into crucial marginals.
A spokesman for the Electoral Commission confirmed that if a donor gave money to a political party’s headquarters, the party could pass it on to local units. Yesterday, the Welsh Conservative Party denied a specific “Ashcroft unit” had been established in Wales to channel funds to marginal seats. Such a unit does, however, exist in Conservative Central Office in London, where it is controlled directly by Lord Ashcroft himself.
A Welsh Conservative Party spokesman said: “Instead of trying to make cheap political points, Labour should be more honest about their ‘non dom’ donors and peers that reportedly include Lord Paul, the man who bankrolled Gordon Brown’s leadership campaign and who was recently elevated to the Privy Council.”
On Saturday 5th December, Barking Labour Party and Margaret Hodge MP held a day of action as part of our campaign to expel the BNP from the borough.
We had a really good turnout and Margaret Hodge MPis particularly grateful to those people who came from across London to show their solidarity and lend a hand.
Her team and herself have spent the last 2 years reconnecting with voters on the doorstep every Saturday and through our work locally, and the decrease in the BNP vote at the European elections this year we've shown that we are having an impact. But there is still much hard work to do.
So we are starting the New Year as we mean to go on with a second day of action on Saturday 9th January.
And we need even more volunteers on the ground next time if we are to meet our target of an 80% contact rate between now and the General Election.
We are asking for just a few hours of your time and will be providing a buffet lunch to keep you all going.
Please book Saturday 9th January in your diaries now – and pass the message on to any family, friends and colleagues who might be interested in joining us.
If you think you may be able to join us or if you would like to be added to our campaign mailing list then please call our campaign hotline on 07576 323 109 or send an email to liz.bradshaw.07@googlemail.com.
If you were still in any doubt that climate change scepticism is largely fuelled by rightwing ideology, along come the British National party to drive the point home. The far right extremists yesterday published a "sensational 40-page briefing paper in which the case for calling into question 'man-made global warming' is presented in detail".
"As the information in this paper demonstrates, the claim that the world is warming on account of greenhouse gases is based upon limited, prejudicial and manipulated information. Much of the evidence has been extracted from a tiny part of the Earth's climatic cycle. This is equivalent of the prime minister having based his spending plans on the most productive day of the economic cycle, when tax receipts were highest. But as Dr Goebbels once observed, if you repeat something often enough, even the most sceptical will believe it."
As has become the norm in recent months with sceptics (interestingly, the document proudly refers to them as "deniers"), Ian Plimer is quoted chapter and verse, particularly in a section labelled, "Professor Plimer's Killer Statistics":
"The hypothesis that human activity creates global warming contradicts what we know of solar physics, astronomy, history, archaeology and geology, according to Professor Plimer… In a lecture delivered at a conference in London in early Dec 2009, Professor Plimer stated that in five of the past six major ice ages, atmospheric CO2 was up to 1,000 times higher that today. In two of these ice ages, ice was present at ground level at the equator. The corollary of this, therefore, is that CO2 does not drive global warming."
Elsewhere, there are some delightfully ironic pronouncements made throughout the document, but none more so than this:
"The BNP, like all interested bodies, must weigh the evidence carefully and reach an opinion. In so doing, it must also identify, within the debate, vested interests and influences, both covert and overt."
And, as you might expect, the document regularly veers into cranksville:
"Global warming is the new secular religion, many of whose proponents doubted Christianity and whose political philosophy was destabilised with the collapse of communism in 1989."
"Truebrit" says: "This BNP paper is a miracle of common sense and sound reasoning. I applaud the clearly stated and concise wording of this document which absolutely debunks the whole fraudulent hoax of man made global warming."
"Pete K" says: "They are going to spend hundreds of millions on African roads which will allow the Africans a speedier journey to the UK to pick up their passports, benefits, housing, healthcare and become Labour voters for life."
"EnglishLady" says: "Just the sort of thing we come to expect from the BNP – facts, truth, evidence, common sense, reasoning – and above all ...............NO LIES OR COVER UPS !!!"
And "MrDoodles" says: "Fantastic work guys! Bit of a weighty document, but at least it shows we're serious about the science!"
As much I believe in the civil liberty & human rights movement I strongly believe if any human being whether it be a Member of Parliament(MP) that they have a right to challenge the process if they are not happy with the outcome of the inquiry into the MPs expenses.
The powers to be needs to to provide the evidence that is requested by the MPs to clear up any misunderstanding and not one individual deciding on how much you should pay back without providing hard evidence.
Eighty MPs are challenging the results of the review process set up to ensure the repayment of expense claims allowed in the past but now deemed questionable, it was revealed today.
The figure, which is higher than expected, illustrates the extent to which the Commons auditor, Sir Thomas Legg, has infuriated MPs by effectively imposing retrospective rules that have led to some members being asked to repay tens of thousands of pounds.
Sir Paul Kennedy, a former appeal court judge, will consider the appeals and report early next year, although he will only consider submissions made in writing and he will not be able to overturn the broad principles established by Legg.
Legg, a former civil servant who was appointed to audit claims in the wake of the expenses scandal, angered many MPs because his review went much further than expected. It has reportedly resulted in around 250 MPs being asked to repay money, partly because Legg imposed retrospective rules declaring that some claims that had been allowed at the time were now unacceptable.
On Tuesday Legg submitted a 168-page report to the Commons members' estimate committee recommending how much individual MPs should repay. Many MPs have already complied with Legg's demands, but today – after the deadline passed for MPs wanting to appeal – the Commons authorities revealed that 80 MPs are challenging Legg's findings.
One senior MP said that Legg had antagonised MPs because some of his "final demand" letters asked for repayments without giving full reasons.
"I'm staggered that Legg has asked people to give money without providing comprehensive reasons. A lot of people are really pissed off that their reputation is being tarnished and that they are being put through some extraordinary financial discomfort on the basis of one sentence," the MP said.
The Legg review has cost between £1m and £1.25m. It is thought that the amount being repaid by MPs will cover most of this cost, but there is unlikely to be a net saving to the taxpayer.
Among those who have declared publicly that they are appealing are:
Bernard Jenkin, a Tory asked to repay £63,250
Jeremy Browne, a Liberal Democrat asked to repay almost £18,000 in mortgage interest
Frank Field, the Labour former minister ordered to repay around £7,000 in gardening and household bills
Frank Cook, a Labour MP asked to repay £600 for a fridge
Patrick Hall, a Labour MP asked to repay £260 in mortgage interest payments, and
Roger Gale, a Tory Mp who said that he also was appealing against a demand from Legg relating to £2,100 claimed for mobile phone calls and £400 claimed for rent.
Gale claimed that Legg had wrongly accused him of claiming for 13 months' rent for last year. "I told him the situation and he is still knowingly releasing false information," Gale said.
"I do not view this as an issue about money. It is about my financial probity. I am not prepared to have my reputation traduced ... on the back of factual errors. Am I angry? Yes, I am."
Legg said decided to impose retrospective caps of £2,000 a year for cleaning and £1,000 on gardening. He also said that claims involving MPs paying rent to a close relative were "tainted" and that MPs who bought goods unnecessarily would be asked to repay money.
The rule about relatives explains why Jenkin, the MP for Essex North, has been asked to repay so much. He used his expenses to rent a property owned by his sister-in-law.
Jenkin said today this arrangement was within the rules until 2006 and explicitly authorised by Commons officials. "I am lodging an appeal. There is no question being raised by Sir Thomas about my integrity and honesty. I will pay back whatever is finally decided," he said.
I have been campaigning on the issue of black education for many years. For more than two decades I have talked with black parents about the problems they have with the education system, their children’s underachievement and how these problems can be overcome. The complexity of black underachievement has become apparent.
So the publication of a report suggesting that teachers are underestimating black Caribbean pupils in their SATs tests did not come as much of a surprise. Dr Steve Strand of Warwick University looked at statistics from 15,000 Key Stage 3 results (those that come from 14 year olds’ SATs results) broken down by ethnicity. He found that Pakistani, Bangladeshi, black Caribbean and black African children aged 14 score on average three points below their white British counterparts. In National Curriculum terms, this is about equivalent to these pupils being a whole school year behind their white British counterparts. When other factors are taken into account this statistic improves — social class, family type, eligibility for free school meals and special educational needs are all important causes of educational under-achievement. However for black children, these factors do not greatly change the picture — they were still 2.5 points below.
Looking to explain, the study discovered that black Caribbean children were the only pupils to be under-represented in being put forward for the higher tiers in their SATs tests. Even when accounting for other factors, the study found that for every three white British students entered into higher tiers, only two black Caribbean students were. Despite showing the same academic ability as their white British counterparts, black Caribbean pupils were more likely to be denied the opportunity to take on a more difficult SATs test that would garner higher marks. It suggests that something about black Caribbean students, that had nothing to do with their academic ability, was stopping them from being put forward for the higher tiers. It suggests that what many have been arguing for years may well be true: that the negative perception of black children — especially boys — has a direct affect on their educational performance.
There have been many reasons given for the underachievement of black pupils, but for me it seems that there is a process of labelling and demotivation taking place. Teachers may be more likely to expect bad behaviour from black boys and less likely to expect high academic results from them. Black pupils may be more likely to disengage from their education — either because they sense they are not expected to do well or because of some cultural factors that mean they are pressurised not to do well by their peers.
Reactions to the report have been unsurprisingly mixed. Some activists have called for the introduction of black schools to cater specifically to black pupils’ needs. Whilst I can see that addressing a specific problem with a specifically designed school seems like a good idea, I think that the debate around black schools is a diversion. Some 99 per cent of black children are going to be educated in the mainstream state sector, so the most urgent question is reforming mainstream education to ensure that working class children and black children can achieve. Taking black children out of mainstream education would run the risk of legitimising the notion that they are somehow educationally ‘subnormal’.
I advocate a focused approach on black children within the current education system. In a recent poll only 50 per cent of teaching students said they felt ready to teach black children in a multi-cultural setting. In 2006 whilst 22 per cent of pupils in London were black, only seven per cent of teachers were. We need better teacher training so that all teachers are equipped to deal with a multi-racial and multi-cultural pupil population. And we need to increase the number of black and ethnic minority teachers and a drive towards encouraging black and ethnic minority parents to become governors. With a two-pronged approach the progress that has already been made at GCSE level can continue. This means rejecting the notion that black pupils are innately worse academically and the notion that all schools and all teachers are racist, and it means rejecting the notion that social class is the only factor affecting educational outcomes.
The Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has been urged to continue fighting to help people reclaim unauthorised overdraft charges.
Consumer website MoneySavingExpert.com said it had taken legal advice that suggested customers could challenge the fairness of the charges under the Consumer Credit Act.
The website said that, under the Act, it was up to the banks to prove that the charges were fair, rather than for consumers to prove they were the opposite - shifting the burden of proof on to the banks.
But the law only applies to new charges from April 6 2007 and any charges before this date are included only if borrowing was still outstanding 12 months later.
MoneySavingExpert outlined other legal routes which could possibly be used to people challenge the fairness of the charges, but it called on the OFT to take up the fight for consumers.
The website's founder Martin Lewis said: "We believe there are substantial legal avenues available for it to challenge fairness - the OFT cannot give up."
Customers who incur an unauthorised overdraft or breach their agreed limit can be charged as much as £35.
This could include processing a bounced transaction, when the actual cost to the banks is as little as £2.50.
But in a recent test case the Supreme Court ruled that unauthorised overdraft charges were not subject to regulation by the OFT under unfair contract rules, dashing the hopes of millions who had tried to claim refunds.
The watchdog is currently considering the details of the judgement before it makes a decision on whether to continue its investigation into the charges.
How sully can the BNP get when they have two representatives in the European Parliament when the leader of the BNP makes stupid statements like World Leaders Mass Murderers when the BNP refuses to acknowledges that Jews were persecuted in the second world war by their almighty brain washing leader Hitler. Nick Griffin has accused world leaders at the Copenhagen climate conference of the “biggest hoax in history” that will kill more people than the great famines under Stalin and Mao.
The leader of the British National Party and MEP is at the international summit as a representative of the European Parliament.
But he said global warming was a “hoax” designed to impose tax increases on the citizens of the world through putting up the price of energy.
He said world leaders and advocates of action on climate change such as Al Gore are “mass murderers” by supporting biofuels.
He said land for growing food is being taken to grow fuels for crops and it will cause starvation greater than the famines caused by Russian dictator Stalin during the 1930s and Chairman Mao in the 1950s.
"It is a crime against humanity which in future will be seen as an enormous man-made famine. Under Stalin 20 million people died, under Chairman Mao 30 million died. This will be the third and the greatest famine of the modern era and I regard that as a crime.”
However Mr Griffin’s own party would not give more money to the third world.
“Britain is bankrupt. We cannot afford to go giving money to the third world,” he said.
Mr Griffin has no official role at the conference but will be speaking to delegates in an attempt to “stop the juggernaut”.
“My message is stop and think before imposing the most outrageous tax increase on people ever proposed by a group of nations on the basis of an unproven theory that is contradicted by an increasing number of scientists,” he added.
Ben Stewart of Greenpeace said Mr Griffin will bring nothing helpful to the talks.
“Mr Griffin’s conversion to cause of the developing world is surprising as it is cynical,” he said. “In reality the environmental and development groups he has been disparaging have been in the forefront of concerns about biofuels. Griffin’s claims that climate change is a hoax is one of many curious things going on between his ears.”
There's been much speculation circulating over the past few days that the Tories - and Labour - are preparing for an early election on March 25th. This could be a media ploy by the Tories to try and motivate complacent activists, or it may just be newspapers filling column inches as Christmas approaches.
But it is now being discussed as a serious proposition around Westminster and amongst lobby journalists. David Cameron today called it a "likely date" for an election, and Ray Collins, Labour's General Secretary, is reported to have told Number 10 that the party machine is ready to go.
I think an ballot on any day other than May 6th would be the wrong move for two main reasons. First - and most importantly - with council elections already mandated for May 6th, the cost of holding two elections within 6 weeks of each other would be excessive - and would be deemed to be excessive by the public.
The second, related, reason is that an election on any other date would dramatically reduce voter turnout for the local council elections - and after the decimation of Labour's council position last June, that would be very unhelpful to Labour Groups who are battling to maximise support.
So unless the May 6th council elections were also brought forward, which would be difficult to do at this late stage, it would be seen as a crude and unnecessary move which wouldn't play well with either grassroots activists or the wider electorate.
It’s a common criticism from Conservatives that Labour has created its ‘client electorate’ in the form of people drawing state benefits, that is, people dependent on the state for their beer, baccy and bingo money.
The reality is different. The Conservatives, between 1979 and 1997, created “welfare dependency” on a scale hitherto unseen. Take a look at the following table (numbers obtained from the Annual Abstract of Statistics for various years):
* (i) SSB: total social security benefits, cash
* (ii) RP: retirement pensions, cash
* (iii) total payments minus retirement pensions payments (cash paid to those commonly called ‘social security scroungers’, ‘layabouts’, ‘spongers’).
Now, if social security payments to the ‘scroungers, layabouts and spongers’ (SLS) increase as a proportion of GDP, only two possibilities exist: (i) the number of SLS has increased, or (ii) we are paying the SLS more. Personally, I would have thought that neither possibility would be an attractive contemplation for a Conservative.
National Statistics (ONS) changed the way that it reported Social Security spending (‘cash benefits’) after 2000/01. Table 10.24 in Annual Abstract of Statistics, 2009 shows that ‘total Government expenditure on social security benefits and administration’ was 11.5% of GDP in 2000/01, rising to 12.0% of GDP in 2003/04, and falling to 11.4% of GDP in 2006/07.
Then, take a look at the rows for 93/94 and 96/97, and compare to 78/79.
Labour won three by-elections yesterday in Nuneaton, Dorset and Hampshire, with big swings from the Tories to Labour in both Westminster and Hastings.
Labour’s Ian Lloyd gained from the BNP in Camp Hill Ward for the Nuneaton and Bedworth Council, increasing the Labour vote by 17%.
Another gain for Labour was made by Kate Wheller in the Wyke Regis Ward by-election for Weymouth and Portland Council, who took the seat from the Conservatives with a swing of 17% since 2008.
In the Heron Wood Ward by-election for Rushmoor Council, Labour’s Alex Crawford won the seat from the Liberal Democrats, increasing the Labour vote by 11%.
Labour also held the seat in Queens Park Ward for Westminster Council, with Patricia McAllister increasing Labour’s vote by more than 10%.
In the St Helens Ward by-election for Hastings and Rye Councl, Michael Ward increased Labour’s vote by 12.5%.
Top UN officials kicked off crunch climate change talks in Copenhagen on Monday, telling delegates that they must agree a way to raise and channel funds to developing countries.
The 10-day summit, which gathers members of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, aims to hammer out a blueprint for tackling man-made greenhouse gases, blamed for trapping solar heat and disrupting the Earth's climate system.
On December 18, world leaders are scheduled to sign a political deal that sets down the course of action, including a raft of national pledges.
Further negotiations are expected to take place in 2010 to fill in the details, before a legally binding treaty would take effect from the end of 2012.
UN chief climate scientist Rajendra Pachauri declared that the "evidence is now overwhelming" that the world needs early action to combat global warming.
Mr Pachauri defended climate research in the face of a controversy over emails, pilfered from the University of East Anglia, which global warming sceptics say show scientists have been conspiring to hide evidence that doesn't fit their theories.
"The recent incident of stealing the emails of scientists at the University of East Anglia shows that some would go to the extent of carrying out illegal acts, perhaps in an attempt to discredit the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change," he told the conference, referring to the leading UN scientific body for assessing climate change.
Conference president Connie Hedegaard said that the key to an agreement was finding a way to raise and channel public and private financing to poor countries for years to come to help them fight the effects of climate change.
In Vienna, another senior UN official warned that the fight against climate change must not "cannibalise" development financing.
Director-general of the UN Industrial Development Organisation Kandeh Yumkella said that developing countries needed "fresh money" to combat global warming not funds diverted from efforts to improve maternal health or fight world hunger.
Chinese state media renewed calls on Monday for rich states to provide adequate funding.
The People's Daily reiterated Beijing's stance that the emissions of Western states were far greater than the vast majority of the world's countries after centuries of industrialisation, putting the onus on the developed countries.
"And of course, this industrialisation process has led to developed nations taking the lead on other nations on the technology front," the newspaper observed, adding that a low-carbon lifestyle was an "unprecedented" issue for mankind.
This decade has been the warmest on record and this year is likely to be the fifth warmest, according to the World Meteorological Organisations’s (WMO) assessment of global average temperatures.
There were sharp differences between regions, with central Africa and parts of southern Asia having their warmest year but the United States and Canada experiencing cooler than average conditions.
The WMO released the preliminary data at the Copenhagen climate summit in what the Met Office, which contributed to the figures, admitted was an attempt to influence the negotiations over cutting greenhouse gases.
The WMO is also anxious to quell doubts about the scientific analysis of temperature records raised by the publication of stolen e-mails in the “Climategate” scandal.
The WMO and the Met Office base their reports partly on data and analysis supplied by the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit.
Phil Jones, the unit’s director, has stood down while an investigation takes place into allegations that he manipulated data, attempted to block publication of alternative scientific views and tried to delete information requested by climate change sceptics.
The WMO, which has data going back to 1850, said that the ten years from 2000 to 2009 were 0.44C warmer than the annual average of 14C between 1961 to 1990.
The Met Office, one of three main sources for the WMO figures, said its records showed that each of the last six decades had been warmer than the previous one.
Since the 18th century, the global temperature has risen just over 0.7C.
The Copenhagen summit is trying to agree global action to prevent the temperature rising more than 2C above the pre-industrial average.
The Met Office said: “These figures highlight that the world continues to see global temperature rise most of which is due to increasing emissions of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, and clearly shows that the argument that global warming has stopped is flawed.
Vicky Pope, head of climate change advice at the Met Office, said the final figures for 2009 would not be available until early next year but the preliminary estimates based on January to November data were being released today to influence the debate at the summit.
The Met Office is more certain about this being the warmest decade than it is about 2009 being the fifth warmest year. The WMO said 2009 might only rank in the top 10 warmest years, depending on temperatures this month. This year has been warmer than last year, which was the eleventh warmest on record. The warmest year was 1998.
The Met Office predicted last month that there was a 50/50 chance that next year would be warmer than 1998.
This is largely because of the natural El Niño cycle, the warming phase in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean which began this summer and is expected to continue for at least another six months.
The WMO said this year had been the third warmest in Australia, which experienced three exceptional heatwaves that contributed to a disastrous bush fire that killed 200 people.
China suffered its worst drought for five decades and the monsoon season in India was one of the weakest since 1972, damaging the harvest in 40 per cent of districts. A drought in East Africa “led to massive food shortages”.
Spain had its third-warmest summer and parts of Germany, Austria and the Czech republic reported the warmest May on record.
The Met Office today responded to criticisms about lack of transparency by releasing land temperature records gathered from more than 1,500 stations around the world.
It said it would release the data from the other 3,500 other stations as soon as it received permission from the national meteorological offices which owned it.
The Met Office said: “We intend that as soon as possible we will also publish the specific computer code that aggregates the individual station temperatures into the global land temperature record.
“The University of East Anglia fully supports the Met Office in making this data publicly available and is continuing to work with the Met Office to seek the necessary permission from national data owners to publish, as soon as possible as much of the data that we can gain permission for.”
Ms Pope said the Met Office analysed land temperature data using a computer code developed by CRU. She said CRU also supplied the Met Office with original data from some remote weather stations which had a significant impact on the global average.
'We Won't Let Sceptics Hijack Climate Talks'
It has been billed as the most important meeting for half a century, and yesterday, with 15,000 people in attendance, the Copenhagen Climate Conference opened with a robust and angry defence of the science of global warming by two of the world's leading climate science figures.
Dr Rajendra Pachauri, the Nobel-Prize winning head of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel On Climate Change (IPCC), and Dr Jonathan Pershing, the head of the US delegation to the conference, both hit out at the theft of emails from the Climatic Research Unit of the University of East Anglia, which has been used by climate sceptics in Britain, the US and elsewhere to allege that global warming is not man-made.
There has been widespread speculation that the timing of the theft represented a specific attempt to destabilise the conference, in which the world community will attempt to construct a new treaty to cut back on the emissions of carbon dioxide causing the atmosphere to warm.
But yesterday Dr Pershing said that all the incident had done was to "release a barrage of further information which makes clear the robustness of the science." He said it was "shameful" how some of the scientists involved were now being pilloried.
Dr Pachauri told the conference opening ceremony, presided over by the Danish Prime Minister, Lars Lokke Rasmussen, that some people clearly found it "inconvenient" to accept the inevitability of the changes that would have to be made in the face of the climate change threat.
"The recent incident of stealing the emails of scientists at the University of East Anglia shows that some would go to the extent of carrying out illegal acts perhaps in an attempt to discredit the IPCC," he said. "But the panel has a record of transparent and objective assessment stretching back over 21 years, performed by tens of thousands of dedicated scientists from all corners of the globe."
The conference, being held at the giant Bella Centre in Copenhagen's southern suburbs, is bringing together 192 countries, all of whom accept the verdict of the IPCC's most recent report, published in 2007, that the warming of the climate system is "unequivocal" and that there is a better than nine out of 10 chance that it is being caused by human actions – principally the emissions of carbon dioxide from industry, transport and deforestation, which retain the Sun's heat in the atmosphere.
The 2007 report said that if CO2 emissions continued without being checked, the Earth's temperature would be likely to rise by between 1.8C and 4C over the coming century – with an outside chance that it could hit 6C, which would be disastrous for the natural world and human society. But more recent scientific assessments have suggested that emissions are now rising so fast that the Earth is firmly on track to hit the 6C rise if action is not taken.
Dr Pachauri listed for the conference – and for the world – some of the consequences global warming would lead to if it were left unchecked. They included widespread increases in droughts and floods, greater stress on water resources, increases in tropical cyclone intensity, more extinctions of wild species and the eventual melting of the Greenland ice sheet, which would cause sea levels around the world to rise by more than 20 feet.
Cutting back on the emissions responsible was now the urgent task of the "historically important meeting", he said. But it will not be a matter just for the thousands of delegates. Mr Rasmussen announced that the number of world leaders who would be attending the finale of the conference at the end of next week had now reached 110. He said: "Their presence reflects an unprecedented mobilisation of political determination to combat climate change. It represents a huge opportunity – an opportunity the world cannot afford to miss."
This morning the negotiations proper get under way, with the aim being an agreement in which the industrialised countries such as the US and Britain make strong commitments to cut back their CO2 by up to 40 per cent by 2020, with the leading developing countries such as China and India making firm pledges to move away from "business as usual" in terms of their emissions growth.
Underpinning the deal will have to be a major new financial agreement which provides the developing nations with billions of dollars from the rich world in new climate aid, to help them cut their emissions and also adapt to climate change which is now probably unavoidable, such as widely increased flooding.
Day One: The highlights
*UN Climate Conference, two years in preparation, opens in Copenhagen with 15,000 delegates, observers and media personnel in attendance.
*United Nations climate chief and head of American delegation attack climate sceptics and defend science behind global warming.
*110 heads of state and government, including US President Barack Obama, now preparing to attend conference finale next week.
*European Union says it wants stronger commitments from the US and China to cut CO2 before raising its own ambitions.
*South Africa is final big developing country to announce a climate target.
*Danish Prime Minister apologises to delegates for lack of Little Mermaid figurine in their conference kits.
A new ICM poll for tomorrow's Telegraph shows the recent Tory slipping has stuck - but that Labour have failed to take full advantage. The poll shows the Tories down two points on 40%, with Labour unchanged on 29% and the Liberal Democrats on 19%.
The poll would suggest recent hopes for a hung parliament may be premature; transferred to an election these new numbers would result in a Tory majority of 20. If the Tories hit 40% in the general election - which is likely - Labour will need at least 31% for a hung parliament. To retain a majority, Labour will need to change the game completely.
The task now will be for Labour to take advantage of the Tories' failure to seal the deal. While recent polls have shown the Conservatives support is fragile, Labour has yet to capitalise with its own consistent increase. The gap is likely to continue to narrow over the next six months, but time is shortening.
In a second poll for tomorrow's Times, the Tory lead has reverted back to 13 points, which is much the same place it was immediately after conference season.
Today is the fourth anniversary of David Cameron's election as Leader of the Conservative and Unionist Party.
I think we should all just have a moment's reflection, and ask ourselves what we consider to be the most telling moment, thought, image or (honestly, come on, let's try) 'policy' of those four years.
For me, I am still struck by some of his early environmental image work...the wind turbine on the Notting Hill roof, the cycling to work (albeit weakened by the gas-guzzler following on behind), the brief flirtation with 'vote blue, get green' and above all that great picture of him all bright-eyed and rosy-cheeked at the Arctic Circle on a sled pulled by huskies.
I am now however even more struck by the paucity of environmental policy and the thin-ness of environmental voice that he lends to the debate in advance of what could be one of the most important events of his political lifetime, namely the Copenhagen Summit on climate change.
The contrast between huskies back then, and near silence now, does lead one to the conclusion that there is something to the charge that he is more worried about pictures than he is about policy and substance.
I was talking to someone the other day who is on the fringes of the Tory strategic debate (he works for one of the pollsters the Tories use) who said that Cameron's current strategy was to make a bit of noise every now and then but a lot of the time to keep his head down.
His health and safety speech would fit in the 'make a bit of noise every now and then' category. His lack of a big message pre-Copenhagen or pre-Pre Budget Report falls into the 'head down' side of the ledger.
It suggests he really does believe governments lose elections, rather than that oppositions win them. But while it is true that back in 1997 we were helped by the Tories, and might have won whatever we did, I doubt it, and I am sure the size of the majority was down as much to what we did as to anything the Tories did.
Indeed, when you look at the scale of change led by Tony Blair in his three years as Opposition Leader, and the extent to which we dominated the political debate as the Party went through a major process of change to policy, Constitution and pretty much everything else, Cameron's four years of leadership seem pale and inactive by comparison.
The notion that as we enter an election year the Leader of the Opposition should opt to coast, and keep his head down, is bizarre. But it is to some extent confirmed by the approach to his team, something Andrew Rawnsley writes about in his Observer column today. Cameron is deemed by the Tory image-makers to be just about palatable to the public, WIlliam Hague and Ken Clarke are already well-known public figures from their previous incarnations, George Osborne is bound to have a profile as shadow chancellor. But apart from them, every single one of the shadow cabinet could walk down any street in the UK pretty much unerecognised and unmolested. It is pretty odd to think they could within a matter of months be running every department in Whitehall.
Enough from me though...what do you see as the thus far abiding image, comment, observation or policy?
Tens of thousands of people are expected to join in demonstrations calling for action on climate change ahead of crunch UN talks.
World leaders will meet next week in Copenhagen with the aim of securing a new deal to tackle rising temperatures.
Environmental campaigners, aid agencies, trade unions and organisations including the Women's Institute are travelling to London from across the country to take part in "The Wave" to demand a strong deal on climate change.
Similar protests - all organised by the Stop Climate Chaos coalition - will also be taking place in Dublin, Belfast and Glasgow.
In London, an ecumenical service with an address by Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams will take place in Westminster Central Hall, before campaigners march from Grosvenor Square to Big Ben.
A "climate emergency" rally will also take place at Hyde Park Corner, organised by the Campaign Against Climate Change, with MPs including Michael Meacher, Simon Hughes, Jon McDonnell and MEP Caroline Lucas addressing protesters before they join The Wave march on Parliament.
Meanwhile, there is a "climate emergency" bike ride being planned from Lincoln's Inn Fields. Hundreds of students will perform a "splash dance". Elsewhere, members of the Camp for Climate Action are planning to camp out at an as-yet secret location in the capital.
The march on Parliament will be led by an open-topped double decker bus, and will feature a ukulele-playing trapeze artist, cycling bishops, an 18ft long blue dragon and a coal monster. The Co-operative is supporting the protest and has chartered two trains from Manchester to London and one from West Yorkshire for its members to travel to the event, along with scores of buses from other locations.
The event, in which people are being asked to dress in blue, is being supported by pop group Blue's singer Antony Costa, who said: "Climate Change is the most important issue facing us all and so the politicians must get it right in Copenhagen."
The Stop Climate Chaos coalition, which includes groups such as Oxfam, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth and WWF, is demanding the UK government increases its targets for EU-wide efforts to cut emissions.
Hundreds of nurses, hospital porters, social workers and home carers will join climate campaigners today to march on the Houses of Parliament to demand action to stop global warming.
Prior to next week’s crucial UN climate summit in Copenhagen, tens of thousands of people from all walks of life will march through the streets of London to demonstrate their support for a safe climate future.
The Wave march will call on world leaders to take urgent action to secure a fair international deal to stop global warming exceeding the danger threshold of 2?C.
Public-sector union Unison is calling for an official recognition of the role trade unions can play in fighting climate change.
“Key to helping countries cope with the worst effects of climate change will be increasing investment in their public sector,” a spokeswoman said.
Unison head of business and environment Mike Jeram explained that it was only right that world leaders commit to a “just transition” when they meet in Copenhagen.
“This must include green policies that are worker-friendly, including good green jobs and training,” he said.
“Key to tackling climate change is making sure people change their behaviour at work.
“Unions have a network of branches, reaching into workplaces all over the world. Using this network to promote efficient green practise would be a good place to start. Unison thinks this role should be officially recognised.”
He added: “Some countries will be hard hit by the effects of climate change. As a public-sector union, we know that these regions will need to step up their investment in public services such as disaster prevention, energy efficiency, healthcare and water management.
“We hope that world leaders will help make this possible in their negotiations.”
Join me and friends who are at the climate change demonstration as this one of the biggest event in the world followed by millions of people.
In an unprecedented move, 56 newspapers from around the world have today published a common editorial - "14 days to seal history's judgement on this generation" - aiming to speak with one voice to the leaders negotiating a deal at Copenhagen this week.
The papers signing up to the editorial include The Guardian, El Pais, The Miami Herald, Le Monde, The Toronto Star, The Brunei Times and 50 others from countries including Rwanda, Tanzania and Bangladesh.
Ian Katz of the Guardian, who largely coordinated the editorial, says the purpose of the joint editorial is to show:
"if all of us who disagree about so much can agree on what must be done, then surely you can too...If the editorial lacks the detail that will have to be cracked over the next 14 days in Copenhagen, it should be a source of encouragement that such a diverse coalition was able to agree about so much - not least the precariousness of our situation, and the need for Copenhagen to deliver a full treaty by summer 2010 at the latest."
The editorial says:
"Climate change has been caused over centuries, has consequences that will endure for all time and our prospects of taming it will be determined in the next 14 days. We call on the representatives of the 192 countries gathered in Copenhagen not to hesitate, not to fall into dispute, not to blame each other but to seize opportunity from the greatest modern failure of politics. This should not be a fight between the rich world and the poor world, or between east and west. Climate change affects everyone, and must be solved by everyone.
The science is complex but the facts are clear. The world needs to take steps to limit temperature rises to 2C, an aim that will require global emissions to peak and begin falling within the next 5-10 years. A bigger rise of 3-4C — the smallest increase we can prudently expect to follow inaction — would parch continents, turning farmland into desert. Half of all species could become extinct, untold millions of people would be displaced, whole nations drowned by the sea. The controversy over emails by British researchers that suggest they tried to suppress inconvenient data has muddied the waters but failed to dent the mass of evidence on which these predictions are based."
It continues:
"Social justice demands that the industrialised world digs deep into its pockets and pledges cash to help poorer countries adapt to climate change, and clean technologies to enable them to grow economically without growing their emissions...The transformation will be costly, but many times less than the bill for bailing out global finance — and far less costly than the consequences of doing nothing."
