Cameron on Marr

I caught the Andrew Marr interview with David Cameron this morning. Having asked Gordon Brown the previous week if he was on drugs, Marr clearly felt that he had to give David Cameron a kicking as well in the interests of balance. So, we had a question if a man from an upper middle-class family could really represent ordinary British people, guesses at David Cameron's net worth and a demand for the exact number of people who would be made unemployed by a Conservative government's cutting of public spending. Well, there is a name for the assumption that someone's worth in entirely defined by their parentage; it is called bigotry, and it doesn't matter if the key factor is taken as race or social class or whatever. You either believe that people can be taken or their own merits or you don't, and Andrew Marr clearly does not. In the case of David Cameron you could not possibility argue that he has escaped the travails and tragedies that we all encounter in our lives, and if you don't know what I mean by that then look it up, because I am not going to spell it out here.

As for his net worth, who the hell knows that at the drop of a hat? I certainly don't, and if an interviewer asked me about it I would probably tell them to shove off anyway. The irony here it that Andrew Marr is probably richer than David Cameron anyway, especially using the tax avoidance scams that the BBC arranges for its better paid staff, whixh the Times revealed today.

Then we come to revealing the precise number of people who would lose their jobs in an effort to curb Labour's disastrous national debt. It was never likely that David Cameron was going to answer that one, because the basic premise of the question is wrong. The reason that we need to cut government spending is because Labour is funding a large part of it by borrowing the cash on the international money markets. If this carries on the interest rates and taxes will have to rise in order to service both capital and interest payments. If that happens then the UK economy will not grow as much as it might, which means prolonged high levels of unemployment. So, the net unemployment levels where government spending is not constrained will be higher and for longer. What would also probably happen is that eventually UK debt could not be financed via the international markets, which would lead to forced cuts in services anyway. This is what the Labour government brought us to in 1976, and the repeat proves the old adage that the problem of socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money.

The key point made by David Cameron was that it was extraordinary for the opposition to be making the running on economic policy, while the government was sticking its head in the sand and pretending that it could run astronomic levels of debt indefinitely. Compare Gordon Brown and David Cameron in front of the same interviewer and only one sounded like a Prime Minister, and it wasn't the one with the job title.

Gordon Brown claims that he is going to cure cancer!

Just listened to Gordon Brown's conference speech. He claimed that Labour was going to 'beat cancer', unbelievable. Cancer is a complex series of diseases that are and have been the subject of intensive research by some of the best brains on the planet for decades. The idea that a government can wave a magic wand and just do away with it is just garbage. Actually, it is just a lie that plays on the fears of people facing such an appalling disease. You just have to wonder about the cynicism of someone who would do that.

Marr pops the Question to Brown on his health

Andrew Marr asked Gordon Brown about his heath in an interview on BBC1 this morning. This is after speculation in both the internet and the print media that Gordon Brown has some sort of a problem. He said:

A lot of people use prescription painkillers and pills to help them get through, are you one of those people?

The Prime Minister answered basically 'No'. Now, Marr was dead right to ask the question. I am the Deputy Leader of a Council, bit I suffer from a very serious condition, that requires me to pop a great many pills. I have been asked on a number of occasions about my health in relation to my post, and I don't resent it. It's a fair question to me and it was a fair question to the Prime Minister, especially as his job is much more demanding. I think he could have given a much clearer answer though.

As for the rest, he spent all of his time knocking the Conservative Party and trying to fudge issues like public debt and his u-turn on cuts. If he came across as just a bit less bitter and partisan and was just a bit more straight than he would be a great deal more credible. Instead, he just sounds glib.

Marr was pretty tough by the way, in a way that he never had been before with Gordon Brown, when he could interrupt Brown from reciting very, very long lists of bullet points that is. When I was taught public speaking it was put to me that spoken lists should have no more than three items, because people will forget the first by the time you get to number four. Clearly no-one has mentioned this to Gordon Brown.

Water on the Moon

Spacecraft have confirmed that there is water on the moon, both in ice form, but also in the regolith, or moondust. So what? you are probably thinking, and what has that got to do with politics? All right, space policy is not very high on the political agenda, but there are signs that this might be changing, with some limited debate on the UK joining the manned space exploration effort. Certainly, there is no argument about the importance of space, at least in terms of Earth's orbit. Satellites are now integral to everything from communications to navigation. Hell, my phone has GPS. The fact is that space policy is increasing in importance and that in the very long term it could have a strategic significance similar to deep ocean exploration by European powers in the renaissance.

Water on the moon is important because the two basic materials needed to support human life are energy and water. Energy is abundant on the moon in the form of direct and continuous sunlight. Water means that oxygen for air can be electrolysed and food produced, without total dependency on supplies from Earth, which is critical given the mass limitations of current rocket technology. Basically, water on the moon means that a moonbase and economic exploitation of the moon becomes much more practical.

What is astonishing is that the Apollo astronauts also found water, but NASA thought that was due to contamination and so announced that the moon was completely dry. I do wonder if that mistake had some effect on US space policy. If NASA had got that right and so the moon had seemed more interesting, would the Apollo programme still have been halted? That makes an interesting road not taken at least.

Daniel Finkelstein on saving the Labour Party

Daniel Finkelstein, who I met when we both did the Conservative Candidate's board, has written an excellent article on how to save the Labour Party. It is spot on in every regard, and it is very much at odds with what Labour is actually doing.

I really liked this bit:

Advising Labour on how to improve its position without advising it to get rid of Mr Brown is like advising someone how to deal with their cheesy feet problem without advising them to stop wearing shoes made out of brie.

There have been many hundreds of thousands of words written about Gordon Brown and the Labour leadership, but I return to my usual theme. There is no theory of organisational leadership, none, that suggests that there is any benefit in keeping a failing leader in post. Different poll ratings for possible alternative leaders or worries about the length of the leadership election process are all irrelevant. What is comes down to is if the man at the top can to the job, or not. If not, then he should go and go quickly.

Even assuming the Labour party is not inclined to follow that advice, Daniel's article is still very well worth a read.

LSC funding and New Campus Basildon

Basildon underperforms in further education. This is not a matter of opinion, rather a matter of fact, sadly written in the statistics for educational outcomes. So, some of our 16-19 year-olds are not getting the futures that they deserve, and that is a tragedy. There was a solution though, a £90m brand-new college in Basildon Town Centre, run by a consortium of existing educational establishments that would bring a first-class education to thousands of our young people. The money was coming from the national Learning and Skills Council, and the hugely successful New Campus Basildon pilot had already been established in the Icon building.

Now, the troubles with the LSC are now old news in that they promised vastly more capital to projects up and down the country than they actually had. So, it has all come to a halt and we have to recognise that this Biblical level of incompetence has put paid to our most ambitious plans for the education of our young people. They have been comprehensively betrayed by a combination of a stumbling quango and an indifferent Labour government, who both seem to have missed the point that these young adults are our future. We have to provide for them, because one day they will be running the world, and we need them to run it well. We aren't giving up though. Our local education providers, and the local LSC to be fair, are doing their best and Basildon Council will also do what it can. We clearly need an alternative plan for our young people's education, and we are going to have one.

Brown snubbed by Obama

This morning, I mentioned to my wife that Gordon Brown had failed to have a one to one meeting with President Obama at the UN. Her reaction was 'well, what did he expect?' followed by a few choice words on the idiocy of the Brown circle. As we know, Gordon Brown presided over the release of the Lockerbie bomber. He claimed that it was all the Scottish Government's doing and nothing to do with him, but the reality is that if Edinburgh had thought that they wouldn't have the tacit support of London then Al Megrahi would still be breathing the air of bonny Scotland. Releasing him was always going to cause a political row and the Scottish Government would not risk Labour, their main electoral rivals, making political capital at their expense on an issue like this that speaks to their basic competence in government. Grown-ups didn't take much time to figure this out, including President Obama, who probably didn't like being taken for a fool in addition to watching the release of a terrorist murderer of 200 US citizens. In fact, being seen with Brown could have been taken as an endorsement the terrorist release, and the President wasn't going to do that.

It is one thing to make a choice and accept the consequences, but it is quite another to make a choice oblivious to the likely fallout. One is principled, the other is idiotic.

Time to arm Military Padres in Afghanistan

Interesting article in the Mail, on a request by military padres to be armed during the current war in Afghanistan. Apparently medics and chaplins have already removed their red cross armbands, because the Taliban do not respect the Geneva Convention and so use such things as targets. Now the Royal Marine chaplins want weapons to both protect themselves and to provide a last option in case of capture. The subject is under discussion in the Ministry of Defence, but surely if there ever was a subject for a quick decision then this is it. Other countries arm their chaplins, the men on the ground want it, what's to discuss? Do we have to wait for some horror story to get Bob Ainsworth moving? Unfortunately, that's how it usually seems to go.

Where have Basildon's flags gone?

Some people in Basildon District may have noticed that the Union Flag and the Cross of St. George have disappeared from their customary place over the Civic Centre. Do not be alarmed, the Conservative Council's policy of flying the flags has not changed, it is just that the flagpoles need a bit of work. So, when the contractors have finished a few bits and pieces both flags will be restored to their rightful place. We are also taking the opportunity to get them cleaned.

It is a mystery to me why other public buildings are not similarly adorned with our national flags. In the US, for example, you cannot move without seeing a Stars and Stripes.

Brown's line on cuts collapses

The headline on Evening Standard kiosks this evening was 'Labour's secret plan for cuts'. This, and the associated coverage marks the end of Gordon Brown's attempt to define the economic debate as 'Labour investment versus Tory cuts'. Everyone has known for months that public spending is going to have to come down in order to pay back the incredible debts Labour has run up for tha nation. This is true regardless of whoever wins next year's general election, but Gordon Brown refused to admit it, sticking to his line like a speak your weight machine despite his own colleagues reluctance to back him up. They didn't want to parrot the boss for one very good reason: he was lying. Not only was he lying, he was lying in a way that was easily disprovable and so had no credibility at all. So, instead of helping Labour's rough position in the polls the fiction dragged them down further.

Yesterday, Gordon Brown at least came clean, sort of, in his speech to the TUC conference. Now there has been a leak from HM Treasury that shows the government has been considering cuts of around 9.3% for months. Some Mandarin there clearly had had enough. The leak doesn't really show that Gordon Brown was lying, because we know that, but it is documentary proof that he misled parliament, and just about every other audience in the land.

The thing is mum was right, lying is bad. Human interactions require a degree of integrity in serious matters, and in politics lying nearly always the wrong thing to do. People tend to respect the truth, even if it is an unpalatable truth. Lies, on the other hand, tend to get found out, and do not command respect. There is also the small problem of a loss of credibility. If people start to distrust you then it doesn't matter what you say, because you won't be believed. In fact the Prime Minister's behaviour is jaw-droppingly silly. I have seen Parish Council issues run with more political sophistication. You have to ask what sort of man he is and what sort of people are giving him advice?