Think-tank say Trident should be scaled back
The government should scale back the UK’s Trident nuclear deterrent to save money, a think tank has said.
The Royal United Services Institute urged ministers to consider dropping the requirement of always having a nuclear submarine on patrol at sea.
Earlier this month, Defence Secretary Liam Fox said the four submarines could be cut to three.
The MoD said a review was under way but the government was committed to maintaining the nuclear deterrent.
The call from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI) comes as the Ministry of Defence is having to contemplate cuts in its budget of between 10% and 20%.
Hunt says job cuts like losing ministerial cars
The Daily Mirror has this story today:
Hunt, 43, outlined the impact of cuts, which he admitted could halve the workforce of nearly 600, to senior staff at the department’s HQ near Trafalgar Square.
He said: “The best-case scenario is still going to be a scenario in which there are going to be bigger cuts than any of the areas we represent have ever had to face, probably in their history.
We’ve made a small start with changes in policy on ministerial cars which is an absolute pain, but we’re all getting used to it.”
Mark Serwotka, of the Public and Commercial Services Union, which represents 300,000 civil servants, said:
This must go down as one of the most crass and insensitive comments a new cabinet minister has ever made to his staff.
via @GaryDunion
Govt uses tabloid lies in police white paper
This really is getting silly:
You might remember the story last November about police being issued with a 90-page elf ‘n’ safety manual on riding a bike. It was rubbish, as the Association of Chief Police Offers was quick to point out:
This work was neither requested nor drawn up by ACPO and we do not endorse it.
It was put forward by a group of well meaning police officers with an interest in this area. ACPO will not be taking it forward.
Some enthusiastic cycling policemen proposed a cycling guide for the force and it was rejected. Just another non-story (albeit one that snuck into the Independent). Except that, er, it’s now popped up in the government White Paper on police reform:
Whole shopping trolleys’ worth of guidance is loaded onto the police during the course of a year. Whether this is guidance for officers on how to dress or 92 pages on how to ride a bike – this has to be reduced.
It’s not the first time a Tory’s used tabloid rubbish to make a point, but you’d think a government document laying out policy proposals might have better standards of evidence.
I hope Jamie doesn’t mind this being exerted in full but this needs to be publicised. There is no reason to base policy on lies, there are enough real problems in the world to worry about.
Hey look over there!
This is why, despite my occasional scepticism I am still convinced of the need to blog the media until they are honest. I’ll leave the conclusion to the ever excellent Angry Mob:
My point is, as it always is, that tabloid journalism has real consequences for all of us – whether we read a tabloid newspaper or not. We are all passive tabloid readers, unavoidably inhaling the hatred, the outrage and the distorted media narratives on a range of topics that impact on our lives.
You cannot stop inhaling tabloid messages by turning your head any more than you can stop inhaling a rank smoke that engulfs us all. In the end we all have a choice, we either quietly gulp it down and pretend it does not exist, or we do everything in our power to challenge it and stop it at its source.
BBC journalists now sound like the Taxpayers Alliance
As highlighted by the strident Paul over at Though Cowards Flinch, the BBC are running a “fun” competition on Radio 5 and online at the BBC’s moron pit Have your Say.
MPs will be breaking up for the summer tomorrow, 27 July, but when they return they will still have to deal with the £156 billion deficit which looms over Britain. This week, BBC Radio 5 live Drive is looking for your big ideas to drive down the deficit. Today the focus is on home savings, including on health, education and local services.
As Paul says the deficit is not looming over Britain. We have run deficits through a recession which have helped mitigated much of the worst of it. As the employment situation continues to stagnate deficits don’t loom, arguably they shine.
continue reading… »
Why is the government protecting the Pope from arrest?
contribution by Adam Wilcox
The Pope’s proposed visit to the UK in September is costing the UK taxpayers as much as £12m for the four-day tour (not including the policing and security costs). How a man who claims to be the right-hand man of God could possibly need security is beyond me.
Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and human rights lawyer Geoffrey Robertson QC were planning to bring a private prosecution in relation to the Pope’s alleged cover-up of sexual abuse in the Catholic Church.
However, it seems the UK Government didn’t want the embarrassment of having the Pope arrested on our shores, so the new Justice Secretary Ken Clarke has moved to prevent the possibility of an arrest warrant being issued against the Pope during his state visit in September.
continue reading… »
Does David Miliband believe in his own campaign?
Much attention has been paid to how much money David Miliband has raised, on whether he can beat Cameron and the sibling rivalry.
But very little has been said about the most interesting part of his campaign: the plan to train up 1000 community organisers across the UK and develop that as a model for the Labour party.
So let me explain briefly what’s going on, why this has huge potential for the Labour party and what it means for David Miliband.
DM’s campaign has recruited three community organisers from the CitizensUK (London Citizens), who have sort-of loaned them for a few months, to bring in outside expertise. It’s very likely that James Purnell had a hand.
It’s their job to train up to 1000 ‘Future leaders‘ in community organising by Labour party conference. The recruits don’t have to be, but mostly are, Labour party members. They are being trained and encouraged to start organising in their local communities to try and build an infrastructure.
But the campaign is also focusing on short-term ‘deliverable outcomes’ on local issues that can be used to boost DM through the publicity those stories will attract. Those examples of community organising successes will be hailed by the campaign in two ‘assemblies’ (rallies) – before and during the Labour conference.
People in the campaign say that whether he wins or not, they want to hand over the infrastructure as a legacy to the Labour Party (likely to be Jon Cruddas if he becomes chair) to take it forward.
Why this is important
I’m guessing there are several overlapping motivations here for DM’s campaign:
(a) to get the left-wing base of the party excited (especially Jon Cruddas);
(b) to boost DM’s campaign through local success stories, new recruits and media-friendly rallies.
DM’s campaign also say he is creating a model for the party to connect again with local communities.
To reconnect with voters again, not just by occasionally sounding tough on immigration, community organising should be an integral part of the Labour party. And so this is a very welcome move by David Miliband, and remains the most innovative part of his campaign.
If it genuinely takes root it could revolutionise the party.
The challenges
But does David Miliband believe in his own campaign? He has been remarkably silent about the community organising part, which may suggest it’s just a PR tactic in the run-up to party conference.
Other concerns have also been raised.
One source no longer with the campaign disclosed that ‘Future Leaders’ who want to attend the rally at Labour conference will have to join the party. This will be touted as a successful way to bring new party members. But the emphasis on party loyalty goes against how organising usually works, said my source.
Another said it wasn’t clear David Miliband’s team had found the right mixture of local organising and election campaigning. After all, the Labour party is a political machine with time-dependent goals, a model that isn’t necessarily compatible with traditional organising.
There has also been scepticism over whether the quota will be fulfilled. Organising is a long and arduous process where leaders are not developed and honed overnight. My guess is that around half of that 1000 quota will be fulfilled. Plus, their quality will not have been tried and tested.
Where next?
But all this groundwork also needs a plan to take it forward whether he wins or not. That would signal that DM is serious about community organising, and it’s not just a stunt.
This aspect of DM’s campaign has potential and I hope it succeeds in convincing more Labour MPs this is the way forward. But it needs serious pushing from DM himself.
—
Articles based on sources within and outside the campaign. I plan to get involved myself and see how it pans out.
Polls shows voters turn on the Coalition
Voters fear the return of recession and are divided on cuts in state spending, according to a Guardian/ICM poll published today. A narrow majority also believe the economy is likely to go back into decline.
As parliament breaks up for the summer, economic worries appear to be cutting support for the coalition, with Labour now only four points behind the Conservatives in a theoretical general election.
Overall, the two coalition parties are still popular, sharing 57% support between them. But the Conservatives, on 38%, are down one point on last month’s Guardian poll and three points on another slightly more recent ICM survey.
…
The poll reports a divided nation. While 51% think Britain is likely to fall back into recession, 43% do not. And while 50% say they feel confident about their current financial circumstances and ability to keep up with inflation, 49% are not.
Asked to award the coalition marks out of 10 for its performance so far, voters are lukewarm: the total score is 5.1. The highest score, 6.6, comes from Conservative voters, followed by LibDems on 5.5 and Labour on 4.2.
The latest polls are a sharp fall from weeks ago when the government was highly popular.
Why civil servants are angry with this Coalition government
contribution by ‘State of Red’
One particular area that seems to be taking heavy fire, under the guise of austerity, at the moment is the Civil Service. Yes… those bowler-hatted bureaucrats in Whitehall [sic].
Francis Maude is happy to point out the PCS union’s folly at daring to take the previous government to court – and win – over redundancy packages by simply saying “We’ll just change the law, it’s the unions fault we’re doing this”.
All in the name of bringing public sector redundancy into line with private sector ‘best practice’(!). If they’re using BP’s chief executive Tony Haywood’s redundancy package as the example of best practice then I’m all for it. No, I didn’t think so either.
continue reading… »
Former defence minister calls for Trident review
Former defence minister Des Browne has today said that Trident must be reviewed within a new Strategic Defence Review.
In an article for the new blog Labour Uncut, he says “the world has changed since we made our original renewal decision” in 2007.
In recent years we have endured and are now dealing with the consequences of the worst financial crisis since the 1930s. Treasury statements to the effect that the full cost of Trident will now have to be met out of the core defence budget rather than from a Treasury reserve set aside for Trident as a ‘national strategic asset’ have enormous implications for the rest of our defence capability.
There is no way of examining the necessary trade-offs between nuclear and conventional capability in this defence review if Trident is left out of the process.
This would be a major departure from the Labour party’s policy on Trident.
All the Labour party leadership contenders, except David Miliband, have called for the renewing of Trident to be reviewed again. Diane Abbott MP is the only candidate who has called for it to be scrapped outright.
Will Des Browne’s statement today signal a shift in Labour’s stance on Trident?
Nick Pearce to become director of ippr
Leading UK think tank, the Institute for Public Policy Research, has appointed Nick Pearce as its new Director.
Nick Pearce is returning to the directorship after spending three years at Number Ten Downing Street where he was Head of the Policy Unit, it announced today.
Commenting on his appointment, Nick Pearce said:
I am delighted to be joining James in leading ippr at this critical time in British politics. We have a once-in-a-generation opportunity to rethink and renew progressive ideas in this country and it is my ambition that ippr will be at that heart of that process: unashamedly reformist, open and pluralist, but always grounded in strong values and rigorous research.
Our goal will be to shape public debate on the big challenges faced by the country, as well as to develop radical new policy agendas for progressive politics.
Nick Pearce will be taking up his post as Director on 6th September.
ippr also recently appointed James Purnell as its chair.
From a press release
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