Get The Basics Right

The absolute howler made this morning by Shadow Chancellor Alan Johnson, who failed to be able to name the rate of employers NI contributions, for me is an absolute clanger and will end up ranking alongside Clegg's misfire over the value of the state pension for political error making.

You can watch the clip here (4 minutes in!)

When politicians take up their jobs, be it as a Minister, Shadow Minister or even just an MP there are always basics you need covering. I think it was Tony Blair who was always kept up to date with the story lines on Eastenders and Corrie should anybody ask. A very senior Conservative once told me he was always briefed on the price of milk or a gallon of petrol (and the like) before doing a political interview; being caught out on stuff like that makes you loo out-of-touch. Today made Johnson look economically illiterate.

I had my own "version" of this at the General Election. One resident asked me to direct him from his house to Strangers Hall by foot as my test of local knowledge. He wouldn't vote for anybody who couldn't do it. I got it right, including the short cuts because you were walking rather than driving. I still wonder if the others did and who he voted for? Radio Norwich did a similar quiz about the constituency, including naming the destinations of various bus routes, where various shops are and local events; I got them all correct and then fell down on naming the singers in Girls Aloud ...

Thanks for the cheque, Mr Blair

I have been a little frustrated today by the response to the news that former Prime Minister Tony Blair is to donate all of the money from his autobiography to the Royal British Legion. Even he admits it is to support the amazing work done by those who serve in our armed forces. And so the media ask - an act of amazing generosity or a plea for forgiveness?

In my view those who oppose and opposed the war will never forgive Blair. If this is his way of making up for what he did, it won't work. And why would a man which such political skill as Blair think it would? I know we live in cynical times but ...

So it leaves me to conclude that, just for once, I want to give Tony Blair the benefit of the doubt. That he wishes to do some good with his auto-biog and for it not to be seen as a way of cashing in on his political career. Just think fo what that money could do for the RBL and all of our service people that it works with.

I haven't lost a loved-one in conflict so I cannot imagine how they feel. But would they really want the RBL to go without what could be a £4m+ donation?

I know it's hard but can't we just thank Mr Blair, cash the cheque, and get to work providing for those people who have made sacrifices for our country?

In the small print of the government reshuffle...

With all the fuss about the return of the Prince of Darkness (isn't that one of the Harry Potter books? Maybe JK had more influence for her million than we thought) a few stories about life in the middle and junior ranks of the government have been missed - like the sacking of blogging MP Tom Watson. The Glasgow Labour MP has been a junior transport minister and now there will be some inquest into the role of his blog in that decision.

Also worthy of note is thew rewards being handed out for those who took part in the failed September 06 plot to remove Tony Blair. Tom Watson gets a job at the Cabinet Office, Chris Bryant is the new Deputy Leader of the House of Commons, Kevan Jones goes to Defence and Sion Simon (probably the most ridiculed Labour MP) is now Skills Minister. Nice to see how Brown rewards his friends.

And talking of which, Quentin Davies is now part of the Defence team. The Grantham MP quit the Tories and joined Labour when Brown became Leader in 2007. It is worth remembering that Davies served in the Shadow Cabinet under IDS and the quit Cameron's team for being too right-wing. His promotion has dismayed Labour MPs and amused Tories.

The BBC Report is here.

The best thing about the net is sharing jokes

Tony Blair's phone rings.

“Can I speak to the prime minister please?”

Blair says he is no longer prime minister and tells him to try another number.

Half an hour later, Tony’s telephone rings once more. “Can I speak to the prime minister please?”

“Look, I’ve told you once I’m not prime minister any longer now p**s off and leave me alone.”

Ten minutes later he calls again. “Is that the prime minister?”

Blair says, “I’ve told you repeatedly that I am NOT prime minister any longer, why are you doing this to me?”

“I just enjoy hearing it,” says the caller.

Compare and Contrast

Compare this thoughful and considered piece from David Cameron to the utterly meaningless pap spouted by Blair today. I know which one I'd rather be in the position of being our Prime Minister.

The "shock" of the Prime Minister's resignation has led to reels of reflective pieces on the last 10 years. Here's mine...

Tax, spend, tax, balme the tories, waste, spend, tax, spin, waste, tax, tax, spin, tax, waste, spend, blame absolutely everyone else but us, tax, waste, tax, spend, waste (continues for 10 long, long, hard years...)

The 1997 General Election

I am ashamed to say that I have had the BBC Parliament replay of the 1997 election result on as background noise for most of the day. Well, 14 hours of it, actually. And in between council work, school marking, playing with Emily and feeding Olivia I have caught up on the results from 10 years ago. This was my first election where not only could I vote (and, yes, I voted for Uxbridge's Tory candidate Sir Michael Shersby) but also the first where I showed an interest in campaigning. I remember sitting at home, as an 18 year old, wondering what ever happened to the goold old days.

I look back now and think how totally unexpected that landslide was. After voting, I spent polling day in Hayes & Harlington where the Tories were defending a 56 vote majority (yes, fifty six). That seat went Labour by 13,000 votes (Leadership challenger John McDonnell won it) whilst my own seat of Uxbridge was only just held by 748 votes. Phew! If only I had known, I might have been a few miles north!

A few things have made me think today. First of all, how little has changed with the BBC coverage (Paxo, Dimbleby exactly the same!) but how dated it all looks. The hairstyles, the clothes and the standard of political debate. The Tories spoke in English, rather than soundbite, which was refreshing.

The second thing was knowing the outcomes - knowing what happened to people. Knowing how few of Labour's warm words were to delivered upon.

I wonder how those people jumping up at down at the Royal Albert Hall to repeated versions of "Things Can Only Get Better" feel now?

Surprisingly I felt the Tories took their pounded with good grace and humour. Watching Defence Secretary Michael Portillo, Education Secretary Gillian Shepherd and Trade Secretary Iain Laing being open and honest with interviwers felt good ... "I'm not in government," said Portillo to Paxo, "so the good thing is I don't have to answer questions like that!" Most Tories thought that our length of time in office was the big factor behind the 14% swing against us. How simple it seemed then, and how different now.

Interesting that Dimbleby picked out Hague for leader on the night - and how little interest was played in Clarke, Lilley and Shepherd (all of whom stood).

But most of all, I got the warm sense of somebody who was right all along. I knew, even at aged 18, that this government would turn into the mess it is today. As all those people cheered out John Major, they really thought Blair would save the nation. When they look at the NHS, schools, crime, immigration, levels of tax or pensions I wonder what they think now?

How wrong they were. But why did the nation have to go through 10 years of Blairism to find out? Easy - because we, as a party, drove them to it. We are to blame and we must never drive people into voting Labour again. Cameron, take note.

Brilliant or Boring? Will Gordon's last budget be his greatest deception?

The real story of this budget is the tight spending rounds that are on their way for our public services, the below inflation pay increases for public sector workers and the terrible lack of reform for schools and hospitals.

Yet brilliantly, the next few days will be dominated by Brown's greatest tax fiddle - the cutting of the basic rate by 2% to 20p in the pound whilst scrapping the 10% starter rate and raising the NI threshold. All these leads to ... absolutely no change whatsoever.

Of course, the budget is revenue neutral but will anybody notice? Some people will think its a tax cut but the media (and the opposition) aren't stupid and most people will therefore see this as the con it really is. This arguement will go on for days, and days, and days etc etc etc.

And nobody will notice what Labour - Blair and Brown - are doing to our precious public services.

Cameron does it again!

Tory Leader David Cameron and his aides must have thought long and hard before launching his call for Blair to resign. It is true that the excellent soundbites at PMQs this week got Cameron some of his best headlines since being elected over a year ago. It put the Blair succession issue back on the media agenda and compounded another bad week for the Premier.

But I cannot help thinking that this wasn't just some short-term headline grabbing initiative. Cameron toured the media handing out the same "hello, just go" line for a few days and the Sunday Express poll today picked up the same theme (53% want Blair gone now, including 43% of Labour voters.)

So is there a longer-term strategy in place? The more I think about this, the more I think there is. When Dave was elected I said that his real USP was being able to "out-think" Labour on a number of issues. I feel he's done it again.

Blair is the Tories best asset. We want him to stay in place long enough for his to lead his party to one last (and maybe the greatest) slaughtering at the polls this May. We want meltdown in England, a battering in Scotland and a thumping in Wales. We want Blair to be the man who leads Labour into the oncoming electoral machine gun fire and watch as Labour Councils and Councillors are defeated.

So when then demand he quit? Because the one thing he now cannot do is resign - because we've told him to. If Blair quits now, Cameron will claim the scalp and will be the Tory Leader who finally got rid of Blair. The Tory media will declare that the Witney MP will have been instrumental in ousting the Sedgefield MP. Hence Blair cannot quit now and give Cameron that boost. He must hang on and go in his own time and in his own way. And in the time being, lead Labour to that May defeat.

Win-Win for the Conservative Leader.

My Predictions for 2007

Wales: Labour will lose their majority in the Welsh assembly with the Tories becoming the second party winning some surprising seats. At this high Nick Bourne will resign and the party will elect a younger, more Cameronesque leader.

Scotland: Labour will face a difficult election but will remain the large party in the parliament. Other parties will attempt to form a coalition but will fail, leading to a fragile Labour / LibDem administration limping on.

Labour Leadership: John Hutton will be the only candidate to take on Gordon Brown for the top job, with the election coming in June or July. Brown will win by a decent margin and Hutton will then refuse to serve in a Brown-led cabinet. Despite a big bounce in the polls, Labour's finances mean that Brown cannot go for a snap poll.

The cabinet: At least seven current ministers will go - (obviously Blair and Prescott) but I think Armstrong, Straw, Smith, Beckett, Hutton, Jowell and Falconer as well. How about this - Brown is elected Leader and Hilary Benn his Deputy. In a move that angers a lot of people (and the Daily Mail), he appoints fellow Scot Alistair Darling as the new Chancellor. John Reid takes a lower profile role as Leader of the House, which allows Alan Johnson to be the new Home Secretary as a reward for not taking on Gordon. Ruth Kelly is shifted over to somethin like International Development as she is given more time to defend her marginal parliamentary seat. David Milliband will be given a promotion to a major spending department like Education. Hewitt will survive as Health Secretary. Dull but loyal Stephen Timms will creep up the ladder again - maybe to Trade Secretary? Des Browne will move on from Defence into a less potent job like Constitutional Affairs. As he failed to be elected Deputy Leader, Peter Hain is appointed the new Foreign Secretary. Hazel Blears is shifted out of the Party Chairmanship and is replaced by Douglas Alexander. Blears is given a difficult role such as Work and Pensions.

Shadow Cabinet: Cameron will flesh out his version of Conservatism and it will reassure both the right of the party and the Daily Telegraph. David Davis will take on a much higher profile role. Cameron will use the summer as a chance to set in stone the team he wants to go into the next election. Hague will take the title of Deputy Leader byt both he and Osbourne will keep their present jobs. May will be downgraded again but will stay in the shadow cabinet. Grayling will be promoted again, as will Villiers. Some of Cameron's key players such as Gove, Vaizey and Herbert will make the shadow cabinet.

Norwich: Labour will hold on at the 2007 poll but only as a result of a split opposition. The Greens will continue to make gains (plural) and Labour will hold their key seats. Conservatives to hold onto Catton Grove and make further gains.

National: Cameron will score very well across the country, partly because of his strength in England and partly because of the introduction of STV in Scotland. Labour have a bad night - another factor in Brown's decision not to call a snap election. The LibDems will score a net reduction in seats.

LibDems: Following a bad May poll, Sir Ming Campbell will retire citing ill-health. A leadership election will follow that will be fought by Clegg, Huhne and Lamb. Huhne will win - only just and the two losers will be his Home and Foreign Affairs spokespeople. Cable will carry on as Deputy Leader and Treasury Spokesman. They will be forced to repay the £2.4m Brown money but it will not bankrupt the party.

Are we voting for ends or means?

The level of debate in the pastoral office at school has been raisied this week, as we move on from the future of the penny-sweet industry to political ideology and thought.

My good friend, colleague and Eaton resident is threatening not to vote next May. He is classic LibDem fodder (young, caring, pro-environment, basically a bit left wing but hates New Labour) but as I have scratched the surface of his beliefs he shows worrying signs towards authortarian Toryism.

Anyway, his complain was that the parties were "all the same these days." "Nonsense", I declared. I believe that is the lazy answer for people who don't want to think things through. Are you honestly saying, I went on, that all three parties have the same education policies, the same tax proposals or the same ideas on immigration?

"Ah-ha", he quickly rebutted, all of those things are about the micro-management of the system not about broad based ideological differences. Such an arguement got me thinking. In the 80s we had the classic Conservativism versus Socialism debate, personaified (if you like) by Thatcher and Foot. A classic cold-war battle being fought in British politics.

Name any three major party frontbenchers and I'd bet you they'd agree on the projected outcome for the country. We all want a strong economy, good education, a working transport system etc. However, where we disagree is how to achieve that - so politics is becoming about the means rather than the ends.

So, says my friend, he is being asked to vote for slightly differenent versions of management rather than for political leadership. Before he votes he wants to see a real battle of ideas - not the day-to-day policy of school funding, but of where we want British edcuation to go and do.

Maybe he has a point, I concluded. After all, Cameron, Blair and Campbell could probably draw up a "vision statement" on which they could all sign up to. So we, the voters, have no choice about where UK plc is going - just a choice of vehicle to get there.

Any interesting arguement and so much more worthwhile than guessing whatever happened to all those 80s bands you just don't hear of anymore.

The future of parliamentary debate

After school I organised the first parliamentary debate for my A Level Politics group and I have to say that all of them did brilliantly - more confident, better prepared, wittier and straight to the point. They made a lot of our current MPs look like amateurs! The subject of debate was "Tony Blair's 10 years in power have been a sparkling success" - the motion was lost 7 votes to 5, which says a lot about the impact of Blair on 16-17 year olds who have only really known a Labour government!

Two girls took the role of Labour frontbencher and the Tory Leader of the Opposition. They not only made their own speeches but also took a barrage of interventions from backbenchers and from the other dispatch book. The two whips on either side took on the role of a cross between a cheerleader and a pitbull terrier.

The speeches were thoughful and based upon fact. It was interesting that Blair's fans took his record on crime and public services whilst those who opposed him concentrated on two key issues - Iraq and the NHS. The Labour supporters got rather annoyed by the constant Iraq references. Their frontbencher snapping from her seat: "Don't you lot have anything else to talk about?".

The opposition wanted to stick to Iraq, Labour wanted to move on ... more like real life than you'd imagine.

They soon got snappy as fellow MPs tried to put them off their stride and kept trying to refocus the debate to their point. Just like parliament!

Really this was the best I've seen in many years of teaching and I am now determined to work with these kids and, who knows, ending up at the National Parliamentary Debating Competition?

Best line: Labour whip: "I bet you Tories wish you hadn't had thrown all those mentally ill people onto the streets during your time in power - look, they've all ended up on your frontbench!"

Strangest point to make: Tory Leader: "20,000 years ago there were a fewer people than there are today."

Most disagreements: Labour and Tory frontbenchers: Has crime fallen or risen since 1997? Everyone had statistics to prove their point.