Ambassador’s Secretariat
Tel: 020 7470 3700
Ann.Willems@diplobel.fed.be
Katja.Wauters@diplobel.fed.be

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Cross-posted from the Red Pepper blog [ hat-tip Ben Six]

Why Labour desperately needs Yvette Cooper or Ed Balls as shadow chancellor

Ed Miliband is today expected to let the elected shadow cabinet MPs know what portfolio they will be looking after.

It’s obvious that both Yvette Cooper and Ed Balls are in the running for big prize – shadow chancellor. I’ve made the case before for Yvette, though I believe her husband would also be a good choice.

I have two worries: that Ed M wants Yvette but fears the move will create bad blood between all three (Ed Balls wants the post really badly). Or that Ed M wants someone to mirror his own non-combative style. If either of these considerations come into play, then John Healey suddenly looks like a very good bet (not just because of previous articles, but because of his strong showing).

But here’s why I believe either Ed B or Yvette, and their economic positions, are necessary.
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Our priority should be free childcare, not child benefit

One reason why lefties are concerned about George Osborne’s plans to restrict child benefit is that they think it will be the beginning of the end of universal benefits, and that once the principle has been conceded, it will lead to the dismantling of the NHS, state pension etc etc.

But if we want to build support for universal benefits, we shouldn’t just react to the Tories and oppose every cut that they make. 4 in 5 Labour voters agree with the principle of taking child benefits from the richest families. Lining up on the other side to them won’t help save the universal welfare state.

Instead, we need to understand the priorities of middle and lower income people in Britain, and how a welfare state built on the principles of universality can best help them. In some cases, that will mean accepting that some services or benefits which were universal should be removed or means-tested. But in other cases it will mean setting up new universal services or benefits. continue reading… »

Poll: Ed-Miliband ‘more convincing’ than Cam

A poll by ITV ‘This Morning’ programme today found that Ed Miliband “convinced [viewers] the most at the recent party conferences” by a substantial margin.

Ed Miliband was favoured by 58% while David Cameron was picked by just 42%.

The Labour leader today came out in defence of child benefits and said the principle of universality needed to be defended.

All families need support. I am against the changes that the government is making to child benefit. The way they have gone about them has caused huge anxiety, particularly for mums who are staying at home while maybe their husbands are going out to work.

I will look at the changes the government propose on welfare. We do need to get more people into work and I will look sympathetically at some of the changes that they are making. But when it comes to child benefit which has gone to all families for 60 years in this country – it was a legacy of the Second World War – I think it is really important to support families in this country and I think child benefit is a good way of doing it.

Spot on.

Ed Miliband once again apologised for the war in Iraq, saying that we were wrong to go to war.

He also said it was too early to talk about industrial action regarding the John Hutton approach.

I don’t think we should be talking about industrial action. I think it’s very premature to be talking about that, I’m going to look at John Hutton’s report because people want us to deal with this in a responsible way and I think John Hutton is a responsible person. I’m going to look at what he’s got to say.

I’m afraid if we try and divide the country, that somehow the public sector is some sort of drain on the public sector then I’ll think we’ll be making a big mistake. John Hutton said in his report, as I understand it, the average pension for someone in the public sector is £7,000. These are not gold plated fat cats.

(via LabourList) — once again spot on. He is right to make the point that public sector workers aren’t ‘fat cats’ as Cameron pretends, while saying rightly that talking of strike action now is irresponsible.

Also, spot on regarding the economy and the deficit:

I don’t think that David Cameron is right when he says that the deficit is our fault because actually the deficit was caused by the huge banking crisis. You see it around the world. Of course we take responsibility for not regulating the banks properly, of course we should take our responsibility but what I’m trying to do, is to be as honest as possible about what I think we did right – which is quite a lot – and what I think we did wrong. I think that’s the right thing to do.

Watch the interview on video here.

My average life as an average whore

This post is part of an article I wrote about my time as prostitute in New Zealand in the 1990s.

It’s a story of prostitution from the perspective of someone who wasn’t forced into the work. I wasn’t trafficked, or there to finance a drug habit (although I was a very heavy drinker). I was there for the money.

I wanted to post it as an alternative to the modern socialist narrative that has all prostitutes pressed into trade – by traffickers, by drug and alcohol addiction and/or by personal experiences of sexual abuse. In that narrative, all johns are brutes and all brothelkeepers are bloodsuckers.
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Osborne could be planning to disrupt Labour’s plans again

Potentially very big news. The FT is reporting that the Coalition is considering slowing the pace of deficit reduction.

The Treasury is working on plans to “reprofile” spending cuts next April, spreading the pain of deficit reduction more evenly over the next few years, senior Whitehall officials have told the Financial Times.

Confronted with the difficulties of quickly cutting spending – including financial penalties for breaking contracts and redundancy costs – ministers have been forced to consider delaying some of the big savings until later in this parliament.

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