Origin North West

The Daily Telegraph sent two reporters to masquerade as young mothers worried about child benefits to visit Vince Cable and recorded the proceedings. Vince didn’t do himself any favours and there was more to the story as the Telegraph held back some of the information that was later leaked to the BBC’s Robert Peston.

Yet this could be a lightning rod for the coalition. It has seemed that the LibDems weren’t getting their own story across and were being blamed for policies that were more Conservative driven. Some of their MP’s and supporters are frustrated by this, so the leaking that the LibDems are increasingly looking for their policies to be given more emphasis and their increasing annoyance needed to be made more public.  Yet it could also be said the LibDem MP’s are now committed to the coalition and any backsliding before better results will cause their demise, so really they’re between the devil and the ….   High level politics is a rough game and what seems the decent thing at a personal level can be nothing of the sort strategically. Though it does seem like the LibDems need to get some clear wins soon and the Conservatives need to heed those who say they’re the nasty party and win some ‘niceness’ points with at least some better presentation.

In reality David Cameron seems to be a genuine different face for the Conservatives and someone who is willing to give the LibDems some room.  Hope this is true, and that this event is a shakedown that re-calibrates and strengthens the coalition.

On December 2nd FIFA will announce where the 2018 World Cup will be hosted. England are in with a good chance of being that place.  November 29th the BBC broadcast a Panorama programme alleging significant corruption among members of the selection panel.

The BBC say they have only just firmed up their analysis although it has been trailed for a number of weeks and seemed planned that it would be shown when there is no time to recover or investigate and annoyance would still be fresh in the committees minds.  They also argue it is better to show it before the decision although it isn’t particularly clear why that should be the case unless FIFA take immediate action which seems unlikely.

It seems unfortunate that all over the world there is corruption and yes it is very annoying and measures to stamp it out are needed. Yet the BBC find it relating to a matter of great interest to the country practically on the date when a major announcement is due. It seems very wilful of the BBC, arrogant and anti-English.

It is possible that the committee will be unswayed by the allegations although if I was on the committee England would be the last place I’d want to visit or to do any favours. If the decision goes against England the BBC is almost certain to be accused of playing a part.  If I was a member of the FA I’d put obstacles in the way of BBC ever showing a football match again.

Listening to the BBC Today programme this morning reminded me of when I started a monthly donation to Shelter the homeless charity.  After a while they started sending me recordings of homeless people in tears about their predicament and asking me for more money through the mail and by telephone.  Now the BBC has taken up this heart-tugging on the Today programme in the guise of news even these problems have been there all the time. 

Week after week special interest groups are telling us of the terrors awaiting us because of their new budget.  Organisations we didn’t know existed are appearing on TV, today we had the National Flood Forum on BBC News telling us about increased rainfall and budget cuts.

Forecasting disaster is a popular passtime that we all like to do from time to time.   Despite all the money spent on welfare there is likely to be a job for charities like Shelter now and forever more.

Apparently we are now a lot deeper in debt than 6 months ago and will continue to get deeper for several years.  Flood, welfare, defence, tuition fees are all good causes but the wasted money spent on interest on the debt is getting more and more.

The Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development has today published some research that claims the government cuts and increase to VAT will produce 1.6 million extra unemployed. These include 725,000 public sector workers, 650,000 private sector workers because of the cuts and 250,000 private sector workers because of the VAT increase.  Of late there seem to be no end of horror stories using what appear to be extreme extrapolations sometimes of questionable data.  It seems worth recording this statement as a potential case of how wrong experts can be or how right they were. Certainly an organisation with a title containing the terms ‘chartered’ and ‘institute’ is to be given a large degree of credibility so it is an interesting statement.

Harriet Harman thinks red hair is something to make a joke of calling Danny Alexander a Ginger Rodent.   We read about people with red hair being picked on and this can’t help. Surprising coming from someone who introduced equality legislation and regularly speaks about how certain groups are subject to prejudice.

After the announcements of last week Labour are focussing on Child Benefits and Housing Benefit changes.

On the former the BBC has just interviewed Douglas Alexander and a lady from a family welfare group who are both saying that a family earning £80,000 in total is getting child benefits where-as one earning £44,000 from a single earner is not getting benefits, and this is unfair.  It sounds unfair but how many families are we talking about in this extreme case,  and the comments are all negative without suggesting how it could be improved.  The government position does sound credible that to use another method will add so much bureaucracy that the gains will be lost.  There are a lot of spurious comments around.  Like the lady on the radio the other day who said she earned £50,000 and kept child benefits in a box to buy shoes for her child – what she didn’t say was that it probably enabled her to run 2 bigger cars.  That someone on that level of salary is upset about losing benefits shows how addicted to handouts many have become.

On housing benefits it is said that there will be an exodus from London of people on benefits in expensive privately rented properties.  Others say that the rents are deliberately high as the state has never minded paying excessive rents, so it is landlords who are being hit as well.  It is easy to see both sides of this subject and somewhere a line has to be drawn, a cap at £20,000 a year sounds very generous, particularly for someone who may be earning much less than that. Has it been drawn too low or is it political posturing. It seems likely that over the years this benefit has become distorted and probably many people are living in places they shouldn’t be. Yet as usual no-one wants change and there are so many scare stories that they are becoming the subjectof jokes. Unfortunately there will be those who are caught up in a genuinely bad situation.

At the Conservative Party Conference it was announced that child benefit is likely to be stopped for those on higher rate tax. Also that a cap on some benefits equal to the average wage will be made.

No doubt the welfare budget can be reduced. For some time it has seemed strange that people who are wealthy get benefits, but the principle of universality was said to be sacrosanct.  Another feature was that many people didn’t realise they got benefits. Older people who get free bus transport and winter fuel allowance often don’t see it as a benefit.

Now the spell of universality is to be bravely broken and it will be interesting to see where it leads and what objections are raised.  Already Labour are saying it’s an attack on hard pressed families and not family friendly. 

On child benefits if people earning over £44,000 a year are struggling things must be unbearable for the vast majority who are on a lot less.

The other subject of limiting benefits seems a bit more contentious as there are 4 million children living in poverty and there should be an objective to reduce this. To do so would be a major coupe for the coalition as Labour did nothing to improve matters  in 13 years. Whether the incentives to private industry and for people to be able to work will help we wait to see.

Finally as a recipient of winter fuel allowance and a bus pass I’ll be happy to give them up but not voluntarily.  Freebies are always nice to have.

This week the news has reported that junior doctors are not being trained properly because they are limited to 48 hours work a week under the EU Working Week Directive.  The argument being that junior doctors have to cover at night when there is no consultant to teach them. Normally they can work nights and then continue on a day shift to overlap the consultants day hours, sometimes up to 100 hours a week.  This seems to be peculiar to British doctors at least in the EU.

The previous government signed up to the Directive after years of resisting it so they should have been prepared to ensure funding is available for additional staff.   In an ideal world such a directive should be unnecessary.  How surprising it must be for many that it takes the EU to bring the UK into the 21st Century.  Surely someone working a double shift is a danger. Doctors who work such long hours and perform any medical procedure on a patient should be brought before the medical disciplinary committee.

In the last few months a number of local councillors have resigned, swapped sides or gone independent.  Perhaps they always do and it’s only being reported because it fuels the ‘coalition crack’ question.

It must be difficult to be a local councillor and be asked to reduce expenditure or accept that your school won’t be rebuilt.  When you walk down the street no-one likes you anymore, you’ve no chance of re-election.  Yet who is deceiving who?   Any government would need to make cuts and the biggest cuts have not been announced.  Is it that if someone else bears the brunt it’s OK to cut. Even if there is a valid stance that you’d always have preferred something else to be cut is it right to resign over a few issues when there is a big picture.

Is it also OK that 18,000 Royal Bank of Scotland staff get cut,  and before the election 1000′s of car workers were on short time or standby and 1000′s of construction workers were sitting at home and many still are.  But it becomes a major issue of integrity when public services are cut or schools aren’t rebuilt in your own area.

There are so many issues in local politicians allegiances that it must be difficult.  If a councillor was very anti the Coalition policies when announced then an immediate resignation would be in order. However to wait several months down the line and decide it’s getting too hot seems a bit opportunist.  Yes, must be difficult, but it’s too late now and the Coalition should be given at least 2 years.

Today the IFS issued a report sponsored by two social welfare groups that concludes that by 2014 the very poorest will be hit hardest by the Coalition Budget.

The main issue seems to revolve around an outcome in 2014 which is a long way away.  Predicting that far ahead in such detail is very difficult.  The government claims their progressive forecast went to 2012 and their policies are to raise standards by getting people out of unemployment which will put different slant on the situation.

Other big points are that using CPI will have a big effect by 2014.  It also says changes to housing benefits have a big impact. Although the main change appeared to be that excessive rent can’t be claimed so if that is a big contributor to the reports findings it is one brought in by popular request.

A simple stacked bar chart showing the contribution each budget change has brought to the poorest would be useful. Presenting a finished graph without seeing the working doesn’t satisfy curiosity enough to settle the issue.

Although the IFS have a strong reputation if you use certain assumptions and limit the range of data even the best analysis doesn’t close the issue.   This is likely to only reinforce prejudice for some time, although it does provide a case to be answered.  So far the answers haven’t been that clear either.

It is commonly said that those who go to university earn £100,000 more than those who don’t so they can pay more for their education.  I know several people who went to University in the last 10 years and gained a degree but do jobs that they would have got without a degree.  They’re stuck with their education bills and it isn’t clear that they’ll ever get well paid jobs.  Two have shown mobility by moving away but even then they’ve not got jobs with any future and so the social mobility isn’t going to happen, in fact it looks like they’ll go down a level.

It is easy to think that with the degree they have a chance for a better job. Also they’ll be doing what their friends are doing. Is this what countries like China are doing, sending people to university on the off chance or for some kind of social therapy.  Probably not.

In reality employers might actually think better of some people if they took a more realistic view of their potential and started work while doing part-time study.  Many years ago it was almost mandatory for an employer to send young employees to college for one day a week.  This target for graduates is just to keep unemployment down when incentives for training should be given employers and it would be doing more for more without giving unreal hopes.