Iain Dale's Diary

Timetable for the Election

2009-11-30T16:26:00.004Z

This is from a House of Commons Research Paper and shows the timetable for a general election assuming the five most likely dates in 2010. Conventional wisdom says that the election will coincide with the local elections on 6th May. That's what most commentators believe. There is another reason to suppose it will be held then too - Labour can't afford two lots of elections within weeks of each other.

I still maintain the view that any sensible Prime Minister would not hold an election the week after people receive much lighter than usual paypackets. April sees the introduction of all the new tax rises imposed in the 2009 budget. People seem to have forgotten about those.

Perhaps the way round this is for local elections to be postponed until 3 June, to coincide with a general election.

But then again, more and more people seem to be talking about March.

Frankly only one person knows, and he ain't tellin'. But then again, perhaps he doesn't know yet, either.

Hattip: Mark Pack

LibDems Try to Mitigate Effect of Mansion Tax on LibDem Marginals

2009-11-30T11:03:00.004Z

I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Nick Clegg has taken some risky and sometimes brave decisions as LibDem leader. He appeared to have shifted the party to a low tax, market based approach - away from the more social democratic approach of his two immediate predecessors. In fact, he seemed to be trying to move the Liberal Democrats back to being a truly liberal party - at least from an economic viewpoint.

But today's tax announcements leave me wondering. Having moved the party from being a party whose instincts were to put up taxes (remember a penny on income tax for education and the 50% rate for high earners), he then extolled the virtues of tax cuts. But his party were less than gruntled. And then at last year's conference Vince Cable's halo was severely tarnished when he announced a whole raft of measures which appeared very ill thought out. These included a Mansion Tax of 1% of the property's value on all properties worth in exess of £1 million. Susan Kramer and others were incandescent. After all, in her marginal seat there were thousands of people who owned houses in that bracket but who were not cash rich.

Today's tax announcements by Nick Clegg and Vince Cable have some superficial attractions about them as they cut taxes for many of the lower paid - something the Conservatives are committed to doing too. But their means of balancing the books will attract huge controversy. The Mansion Tax stays, albeit it will now only affect properties worth £2 million or more, but at 2%, rather than 1%. Will that placate Susan Kramer and other south west London MPs? In some ways, who cares, as it is clear that this policy is mired in LibDem politics rather than proper economics.

The cost of the LibDem tax cuts is £16.5 billion. The Mansion Tax will raise £1.7 bn. So where;s the rest coming from? They want to restrict tax relief on pension contributions to the basic rate (£4.7 bn). Capital Gains tax increases will bring in £4.1 bn. Taxes on aircraft and passengers will raise a further £2.1 bn, while a massive £4.67 bn is said to be raised through closing various tax loopholes.

For a party which wants to make " savage cuts" in public spending, you might imagine that their tax policies would be more radical than this.

Of coruse the fact of the matter is that the LibDems won't form the next government, so in some ways I don't know why I have spent so long discussing their tax plans, as it would take a political earthquake for them to be in a position to implement them.

Still, makes them feel wanted, doesn't it?

Book of the Day: British Electoral Facts

2009-11-30T10:14:00.004Z

How many ethnic minority candidates stood for the LibDems in 1983?

How many people spolied their ballot papers in the 1979 election?

Which parliamentary session has experienced the most by-elections?

What was the weather like on polling day in 1964?

How many votes did Labour get in 1906?

If you want to know the answers to those questions, buy this book! When I was at Politico's I got fed up with academic publishers publishing books priced outside the range of normal bookbuyers. When Rallings & Thrasher brought out their book, British Electoral Facts in hardback, it was priced at a massive £85! My company Biteback have now published a paperback edition priced at £19.99 (available HERE at £14.99).

Essentially, the 300 pages contain a treasure trove of historical political facts about every conceivable aspect of British electoral politics. As well as the expected election results, going back to 1832, it looks at party votes, turnouts, swings, size of electorate, changes inn electoral law, postal vote turnout, boundary reviews, demographics of election candidates, by-elections, European election data, regional differences, devolution, local government and referendums.

In short it is a book which is surely a must-buy for anyone interested in elections and electoral statistics. Let's put it this way. If you gave it to Davd Dimbleby, he'd probably keep it by his side during the election night programme.

What About the Planet?

2009-11-30T08:19:00.000Z

As preparations mount for the Copenhagen summit, which will be attended by more than 15,000 delegates and diplomats, The Independent reports that up to 30,000 environmental activists will be going along for ride too. The hypocrisy is astonishing. [sticks tongue in cheek] Do they not care about the planet? Do they not think about their carbon footprint? Clearly not. And they have the cheek to lecture the rest of us about how we should cut down on the number of flights we take.

Scottish Parties Are Blind to the Obvious

2009-11-30T08:09:00.000Z

Blinkered. That's the only way to describe the idiotic decision by the three main parties to oppose a referendum on Scottish independence, which the SNP promised in their manifesto and are delivering on today, when they issue a white paper. If there's one way to whip up separationist tendencies Tavish Scott, Iain Gray and Annabelle Goldie appear to have found it.

The SNP have a mandate for the referendum. Perhaps I am missing something, and no doubt you will tell me if I am, but the SNP would lose a referendum of it were taken within the next year, so what have the three main parties got to lose by allowing the SNP to press ahead? If the vote is lost it would kill the SNP's electoral fortunes for a decade or more.

The simplest path when it comes to a vote in the Scottish Parliament is for the other parties to abstain. But it looks as if they will continue to act like ostriches and use the referendum as a stick to beat the SNP with. Alex Salmond may have had a bad year, but he is not to be underestimated. As a political tactician he is in a different league to his opponents, and they would do well to remember that.

The 7 Days Show Podcast: Episode 4

2009-11-29T23:27:00.005Z

The latest edition of the Seven Days Show is now online. In this week's episode the raffish Sir Jonathan Sheppard talks to me, the distinctly posh Iain Campbell-Dale, about the last seven days in politics.

In this week's edition we discuss Zac Goldsmith; being posh and whether “Tory Toff” attacks will succeed; localism and direct democracy and whether such an aim is ever achievable; issues in the NHS; UKIP and the election of their new leader; and an exclusive as to whether I made it onto the Beckenham shortlist after Daniel Poulter's selection in Suffolk (short answer is, no I didn't - that bit's at about 20 mins in); and what a waste of time Early Day Motions are.

To listen to the podcast click HERE, or you can also subscribe to the show in the Tory Radio section in the podcast area of Itunes.

Norwich North Labour Party Gives Up On Seat

2009-11-29T23:21:00.003Z

Chloe Smith may be forgiven for having an extra tincture tonight. Antony Little is reporting that Norwich North Labour Party have selected - wait for it - an Ipswich councillor to fight the seat at the next election. In Norfolk there are limits to their inclusiveness, you know.

UPDATE: It seems some of my readers are unaware of the rather bitter rivalry between Ipswich and Norwich. Let's put it this way. It's a bit like Celtic signing a Rangers player. Geddit?

The Week Ahead

2009-11-29T21:04:00.003Z

The BBC Politics Show is introducing a new regular feature at the end of each show, where someone from the political world looks at the week ahead in politics. I was the guinea pig today and talked about LibDem tax plans, the unemployment figures and the Gosport Open Primary.

Click HERE to watch the three minute segment and then scroll in to 56 mins 20 secs.

The Daley Dozen: Sunday

2009-11-29T21:00:00.002Z

1. People's Republic of Mortimer thinks the Iraq Inquiry is toothless.
2. Ellee Seymour on how the NHS should clean up its act.
3. Matthew Sinclair says the Conservatives can't avoid the big issues on climate change.
4. Graeme Reid asks if Spelthorne is jinxed.
5. Rumours of Tom Harris's defection have been greatly exaggerated.
6. Letters From a Tory on how Climategate is going legal.
7. Tim Worstall on why Socialists are idiots.
8. Paul Waugh on the Goldsmith memo to Blair in the Mail on Sunday.
9. Tim Montgomerie on double barrelled names.
10. Raedwald on why the Scottish Tories should split.
11. SNP Tactical Voting on the SNP's 'Damian McBride moment'.
12. Your Freedom & Ours examines rthe EU's 10 Year Plan.

And as a special bonus, read the PJC Journal for news of the election of Chris Mounsey aka Devil's Kitchen, as the new leader of the Libertarian Party UK.

'Trust Us' Say Climate Change Scientists

2009-11-29T18:09:00.004Z

Sunday Times Environment Editor Jonathan Leake has written a brilliant summary of the Climategate scandal HERE. Anyone who is interested in the continuing debate about the science around climate change should read it. Here is an extract...

Al Gore, the former US vice-president turned green campaigner, has described the climate debate as “settled”. Yet the science, say critics, has not been tested to the limit. This is why the climatic research unit at the University of East Anglia is so significant.
Its researchers have built up records of how temperatures have changed over thousands of years. Perhaps the most important is the land and sea temperature record for the world since the mid-19th century. This is the database that shows the “unequivocal” rise of 0.8C over the last 157 years on which Mann’s hockey stick and much else in climate science depend.

Some critics believe that the unit’s findings need to be treated with more caution, because all the published data have been “corrected” — meaning they have been altered to compensate for possible anomalies in the way they were taken. Such changes are normal; what’s controversial is how they are done. This is compounded by the unwillingness of the unit to release the original raw data.

David Holland, an engineer from Northampton, is one of a number of sceptics who believe the unit has got this process wrong. When he submitted a request for the figures under freedom of information laws he was refused because it was “not in the public interest”.

Others who made similar requests were turned down because they were not academics, among them McIntyre, a Canadian who runs the Climate Audit website.

A genuine academic, Ross McKitrick, professor of economics at the University of Guelph in Canada, also tried. He said: “I was rejected for an entirely different reason. The [unit] told me they had obtained the data under confidentiality agreements and so could not supply them. This was odd because they had already supplied some of them to other academics, but only those who support the idea of climate change.”

IT was against this background that the emails were leaked last week, reinforcing suspicions that scientific objectivity has been sacrificed. There is unease even among researchers who strongly support the idea that humans are changing the climate. Roger Pielke, professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado at Boulder, said: “Over the last decade there has been a very political battle between the climate sceptics and activist scientists.

“It seems to me that the scientists have lost touch with what they were up to. They saw themselves as in a battle with the sceptics rather than advancing scientific knowledge.”

Professor Mike Hulme, a fellow researcher of Jones at the University of East Anglia and author of Why We Disagree About Climate Change, said: “The attitudes revealed in the emails do not look good. The tribalism that some of the leaked emails display is something more usually associated with social organisation within primitive cultures; it is not attractive when we find it at work inside science.”

There could, however, be another reason why the unit rejected requests to see its data.

This weekend it emerged that the unit has thrown away much of the data. Tucked away on its website is this statement: “Data storage availability in the 1980s meant that we were not able to keep the multiple sources for some sites ... We, therefore, do not hold the original raw data but only the value-added (ie, quality controlled and homogenised) data.”

If true, it is extraordinary. It means that the data on which a large part of the world’s understanding of climate change is based can never be revisited or checked. Pielke said: “Can this be serious? It is now impossible to create a new temperature index from scratch. [The unit] is basically saying, ‘Trust us’.”

No thanks.

UPDATE: Neil Hamilton has written a good column in this week's Sunday Express on this issue HERE.

Tofftastic

2009-11-29T10:02:00.004Z

There was lots of sanctimonious guff on Twitter from assorted lefties last night about the Sunday Times story that Zac Goldsmith is a 'non dom'. They even tried to suggest that he should resign as a candidate or David Cameron should sack him. Er, on what grounds exactly? What law has he broken? Yup, that's right, none. His tax status is a matter between him and the tax authorities. If they are satisfied with it, it's rather difficult to see why Kerry McCarthy (for it is she) shouldn't be. In any case, Goldsmith has decided to withdraw from 'non dom' status before the election so that's rather spiked the guns of those who seek to do him down.

There's another Tory Toff story in the Mail on Sunday. Apparently David Cameron is trying to persuade Tory candidates with double barrelled names to change them to single surnames. Or not. He made a jokey remark to Annunziata Rees-Mogg about the benefits of changing her name to Nancy Mogg. She didn't, it appears see the funny side of it. I think Jake Mogg has a certain ring to it too. If I had followed my mother's advice when I was 17 I would now be called Iain Campbell-Dale. She advised me to make my middle and surnames into a double barrelled name as it "would help me get on in life". And who can say she wasn't right? The trouble is, I have always hated by middle name so there wasn't a cat in hell's chance of that happening.

So here's a challenge. Make up some double barrelled names for some of our politicians and leave them in the comments.

More Hospitals as Dangerous as Basildon

2009-11-28T22:26:00.003Z

In my Eastern Daily Press column today I wrote...

How is it possible for Basildon University Hospital to be rated “Good” on the very same day that it was established that dozens of people had needlessly died due to the filthy conditions on its wards. Blood was found spattered on curtains and chairs in the A&E ward, patients were not being fed properly and patients were being treated on trollies. Mortality rates were a third higher than comparable hospitals. It is clear that the entire management of the hospital needs to be replaced quickly. But what it also shows is that hospital ratings are worth nothing. If Basildon is rated ‘Good’ be very worried about hospitals which are only rated ‘Satisfactory’.

Today we had news that the Chairman of the Colchester PCT has been sacked after serious deficiencies were found in the area's general hospital. Tonight The Observer has revealed findings of a Doctor Foster's hospital report, which shows that 18 hospitals have equivalent or higher death rates than Basildon and 39% fail to investiagte causes of death properly. Assuming one can trust the results of this survey, this is all deeply worrying for everyone.

But one thing is clear. All this is the result of the tick box mentality which Labour has instilled into NHS managers. As long as boxes are ticked, a hospital can be classified as 'good', even if standards of cleanliness and patient care leave a lot to be desired.

Daniel Poulter Selected for Central Suffolk

2009-11-27T23:51:00.003Z

Consultant gynaecologist Daniel Poulter has this evening been selected to succeed Sir Michael Lord as Conservative candidate for Central Suffolk & North Ipswich. Graham Dines has the full story HERE on the East Anglian Daily Times website.

Poulter was also a finalist for Beckenham, which selects next week. He beat five other candidates: Katy Bourne, Tim Clark, Joanna Gardner, Dominic Schofield, and Claire Strong.

The Daley Dozen: Friday

2009-11-27T21:00:00.000Z

1. Liam Murray wonders why Alastair Campbell is crying foul.
2. Craig Murray on the dispensable Jeremy Greenstock.
3. Tim Montgomerie thinks Gary McKinnon should be extradited.
4. So does Tom Harris. I don't.
5. Devil's Kitchen thinks Climategate cannot be swept under the carpet.
6. Danny Finkelstein on John Major, Neil Kinnock & PPBs.

UKIP Gets a New Leader

2009-11-27T15:12:00.002Z

News has just broken that Lord Pearson has been elected leader of the UK Independence Party, succeeding the buccaneering Nigel Farage. Malcolm Pearson only joined UKIP a few years ago, having been a leading light (and donor) in the Conservative Party for many years.

He was clearly the most talented of the five contenders for the position (not difficult), but he has a very hard act to follow. Nigel Farage was a terrific leader for UKIP and gave them a profile they never had before. He certainly suffered setbacks along the way, but UKIP has many reasons to be grateful to him - not least that they still exist.

Farage now has the time to concentrate on his campaign to oust John Bercow from Buckingham at the next election, and I don't expect his media profile to diminish very much. If anything, freed from the shackles of office, he may actually become even more prominent.

But Lord Pearson is a powerful advocate and isn't shy himself in the media stakes. He hasn't got the man of the people appeal of Farage, but it will be interesting to see what the media makes of him. I can't say I wish him luck, but he is a fundamentally good man and it's always good to see decent people rise to the top of political parties, even when you disagree with them.

Mandy Gets Another Title

2009-11-27T14:52:00.002Z

Excuse me if I am coming to the party late on this one, but I haven't seen a reference to it anywhere else. Apparently Peter Mandelson has been appointed as a Church Commissioner! No, really. Here's Lord Hunt from the Lords Hansard...

Lord Hunt of Wirral: I thank the noble Lord the First Secretary of State, Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills and Lord President of the Council for introducing this very important debate. I also welcome the latest expansion of his portfolio. I know that his role as Minister for Information has not yet been publicly confirmed but, having presumably become dissatisfied with the domain temporal, I understand that the First Secretary of State has now extended his remit into the domain spiritual as well. I apologise to him for not mentioning this before, and I sense a slight flurry of unease on the Bishops' Benches, but the noble Lord is to be congratulated on becoming a Church Commissioner.

A number of jokes come to mind. But I'd best keep them to myself...

Note: Mandelson's title is now First Secretary of State, Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills, President of the Board of Trade and Lord President of the Council and Church Commissioner.

Programmes You'll Never See on the BBC

2009-11-27T13:17:00.010Z

From now on, BBC1 is to be rebranded DAVE. And here's the programme schedule for Day One*...

6am The Big Breakfast with Eric Pickles
10.00am Bargain Jeremy Hunt
10.30am This Morning with Ann & Nick Winterton
11.30am Grumpy Old Tories with Sir Peter & Sir Patrick
12.00noon The Saint and Dominic Grievesey
1.00pm Fox News with Liam and Jesme
1.30pm Keith & Mrs Simpson
2.00pm The Darling Buds of Theresa May
2.30pm Just William Hague
3.00pm The Graham Brady Bunch
3.30pm Biker Gove with PJ & Alan Duncan
4.00pm Skippy the George W Bush Kangaroo
4.15pm Blue Peter with Richard Bacon
4.30pm Bill Cash in the Attic
5.00pm The Weakest Spink
5.30pm The ToryTubbies with Nicholas Soames
6.00pm Judge John Reid
6.30pm How do you solve a problem like Maria Miller?
7.00pm IainDale Farm
9.00pm Liddington Britain
9.30pm I’m a Conservative, Get me out of Here
10.00pm The Ten O'Clock News with Nadine Dorries
10.30pm Bluesnight, presented by Paul Goodman
11.20 The George Osbornes
10.30pm Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Isaby
11.00pm Blue Dwarf
11.30pm Michael Howard’s Way
12.00 Conservative Love Island hosted by Ann Widdecombe & John Hayes
1.00am John Randall & Hopkirk (Deceased)
1.30am Candid Cameron

If you can think of any more to include in the schedules, leave them in the comments!

* based on a blogpost published on this blog in August 2006.

Gyimah Trumps Gosport Candidates With Google Ad Campaign

2009-11-27T10:08:00.006Z

Gosport is hosting the second all-postal Open Primary next week. I haven't followed it much, to be honest, but I noticed that one of the four candidates, Sam Gyimah, had a Google Ad on my blog, so I decided to click on it. It linked to his campaign website, which I think is one of the most impressive I have seen. You can have a look HERE. He's been very clever with his Google marketing, as if you search for two of the other candidates, James Bethell and Caroline Dineage, the first site to come up is that of Sam Gyimah himself!

The other candidates also have good sites and it is clear that several of them are spending every waking hour in Gosport, campaigning for the selection.

The three other candidates are Julia Manning, Caroline Dineage, James Bethell.

It will be interesting to see if the turnout in this Open Primary is as high as the one in Totnes.

PS Just for the record, the posting of this story does not mean I endorse Sam Gyimah for the seat. I know him a little and he would be an excellent candidate, but I also have a soft spot for Julia Manning, who I got to know in the Bracknell process. I don't know James and Caroline as well but I am sure all four would make great MPs. There, have I covered myself?

Lord Falconer Speaketh With Forked Tongue

2009-11-27T09:33:00.002Z

I thought Question Time last night was one of the better ones of late. But I thought Lord Falconer went a little far in one of his comments. At best it was misleading, at worst it was, well, make up your own minds. This is what he said aboutthe War in Iraq about six minutes in...

The British government never at any time suggested there was a link between Al-Qaeda and Saddam Hussein.

This is far from the truth. Tony Blair did exactly that in his speech to the Commons when the vote was taken to support military action, on March 18 2003. Here is the quote:

Those two threats [terrorism and states with NBC weapons] have, of course, different motives and different origins, but they share one basic common view: they detest the freedom, democracy and tolerance that are the hallmarks of our way of life. At the moment, I accept fully that the association between the two is loose, but it is hardening. The possibility of the two coming together of terrorist groups in possession of weapons of mass destruction or even of a socalled dirty radiological bomb is now, in my judgment, a real and present danger to Britain and its national security.

Tony Blair, 18 March 2003, House of Commons"

Blair quite clearly says the association is 'loose but hardening'. Lord Falconer put in an otherwise impressive performance last night in his defence of Tony Blair and the War in Iraq. But he should have been pulled up on this misleading statement.

An Evening With The Man in a White Suit

2009-11-26T22:03:00.002Z

Every time I go to a West Ham match I pop in to the Newham Bookshop, which is a few yards away from the ground. It's a wonderfully chaotic bookshop but is fantastically successful and plays a real role in the local community. Tonight they hosted an event at Wanstead Library with Martin Bell and I played the role of interviewer. I left Tunbridge Wells at 4.45 but due to horrendous traffic problems on the M25, A2 and A20 I arrived a little late but no one seemed to mind. The audience was very lively and engaged in the issue we were there to talk about - restoring the reputation of parliament.

As you can imagine, I don't agree with everything Martin Bell says on the issue - I think he can sometimes be overly simplistic and is too eager to tar everyone with the same brush. But he has some valid arguments which very much resonated with the audience. It was a very good humoured event and the audience seemed just as interested in my views as they were in Martin's. They especially liked it when I read out a tweet from Christine Hamilton who expressed the hope that my traffic problems would continue but that if I did eventually arrive, would I please kick Mr Bell in his non existent balls! Even Martin had to laugh at that.

I found it very encouraging that around 150 people were willing to turn out on a damp, dark night to listen to a debate about the future of politics. Few of them were political activists but all were deeply concerned by what is happening to our politics.

The Daley (Half) Dozen: Thursday

2009-11-26T21:00:00.002Z

1. Quaequam Blog gives its views on a Lib/Tory coalition. And it ain't pretty.
2. Letters From a Tory asks if Eric Pickles would relish a March 25th election.
3. Conservative History Journal on Thanksgiving Day.
4. Mark Pack on a bit of MP Twitter panic.
5. Tom Harris foresees Lord Griffin of Barking.
6. PublicAffairsCentral on how lobbyists are undergoing a Tory rebrand.

UPDATE: Have a read of this speech by Will Straw of Left Foot Forward about blogging. Very preceptive.

All Change at the Telegraph

2009-11-26T11:50:00.003Z

There has been some musical chairs at the Telegraph this morning. Will Lewis, the editor, is moving upstairs to be Managing Director of the Telegraph Group and is replaced by his deputy, Tony Gallagher (a fellow West Ham fan!), who masterminded the expenses revelations. Ben Brogan (not a West Ham fan) replaces Gallagher as Deputy Editor. Both Gallagher and Brogan came to the Telegraph from the Daily Mail, so some will see this as the completion of the Telegraph's 'Mailisation' project - if it ever existed.

I have also been hearing rumours of a big departure from another broadsheet paper, but so far I have been unable to get the rumours confirmed. You'll be the first to know if I do.

Interviewing Martin Bell

2009-11-26T09:24:00.004Z

Tonight I am interviewing former MP Martin Bell about his new book, A VERY BRITISH REVOLUTION.

It charts the expenses scandal and looks at possible solutions. The event takes place at Wanstead Library and I am told that it is a sellout. Always nice to have a big audience.

If you have any questions you think I ought to put to Mr Bell - not just aboiut expenses, but his career, do leave them in the comments.

You can buy Martin Bell's book HERE.

Bringing Sylvia to Heal

2009-11-26T08:12:00.000Z

Click on the image to enlarge

Sylvia Heal is a Deputy Speaker of the House of Commons. She is meant to be politically impartial. But the above email puts this into doubt. Her House of Commons assisant, Phil Harris, has used his parliamentary email to urge Labour Party members in the Halesowen constituency to book tickets for a Cameron Direct meeting "to give him some difficult questions".

Dear Member attached are details of the visit by David Cameron this Friday. If any of you are available to apply for tickets please can you. So that there is a mixed audience that may give him some difficult questions.

Sylvia Heal now has some difficult questions to answer herself. Like what is her parliamentary assistant doing using his parliamentary email address to email Labour Party members in this manner?

The Daley (Half) Dozen: Wednesday

2009-11-25T22:52:00.002Z

1. Richard Willis on the Supreme Court and bank charges.
2. Next Left on Red Toryism.
3. Robin Cook is remembered by Paul Waugh.
4. Charles Crawford praises Dominic Raab.
5. Luke Akehurst launches a Spot the Difference competition.
6. Cranmer imagines what a Hung Cabinet would look like.