Tag: Tories

TORIES CAN BE NORTHERN CHAMPIONS

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I never expected to say this after Eric Pickles destroyed our regional development agencies, but the party has a chance next week to position itself as the defender of the North.

 

The private consensus in Brighton was that Ed Balls was preparing us for a Labour government to scupper HS2. His remarks, and those of other party spokesman after his speech on Monday, went beyond legitimate worries over escalating costs. Balls has got his eyes on the £50bn projected cost of HS2 for other projects. The problem is that in practice that money has been assembled for this scheme and would not automatically be available for health or schools.

 

How depressingly familiar all this is. I thought the Olympics marked an end of timid party squabbling Britain unable to take the big decisions at the right time. In fact we are late with this scheme. The West Coast main line is already over capacity south of Rugby. That’s why places like Blackpool are denied a direct service. North of Rugby HS2 would connect our great northern cities like Leeds and Manchester and crucially allow the existing rail network to improve the service to towns and cities not directly on the HS2 line.

 

There are broadly three groups opposed to HS2. There are the small but vocal number of people directly affected by the line who’s homes are already blighted. We must sympathise with them and compensate them very generously. I know how it feels. My home was demolished for a roundabout in the 1960s.

 

There is the London lobby already campaigning for Crossrail 2 oblivious to the historic scandalous imbalance in transport investment between the capital and the rest of the country.

 

And now we have elements of the Labour Party and others who want to spend the money elsewhere. Their argument ignores the point I made above that £50bn won’t be available to be transferred, and it fails to answer the question of what will happen when we are trying to use a Victorian railway two hundred years after it was built.

 

So in Manchester next week I would suggest the Tories seize the initiative. They will be meeting in a building that symbolises the need to move on when it comes to rail investment. Manchester Central station closed in 1969 and is now their conference centre. The government are investing in the Northern Hub, the Ordsall Chord, and electrifying the Liverpool to Manchester line to dramatically improve services on the existing network across the North.

 

The Transport Secretary Patrick Mcloughlin should burnish his credentials as a former miner and claim that it is the Tories who have the best interests of the North at heart in backing HS2. They certainly need some arguments after Labour’s conference in Brighton.

 

RED ED.

 

I asked last week for some distinctive policies for Labour to campaign on and to be fair we got some. The promise to scrap the bedroom tax and the energy price freeze are the best indications yet of how different an Ed led party is from how his brother would have run things.

 

These are concrete proposals with a definite left wing thrust. The more the energy companies squeal the more will people identify with Ed. The claim that, in response to world market forces, energy prices go up like a rocket and down like a feather rings true with hard pressed families in the North.

 

The question is how broad this appeal will be? Are there enough struggling voters in the South to join Ed’s crusade or will they be frightened off as they were when Neil Kinnock was in charge?

 

 

 

ARE WE AT THE END OF OUR TEATHER WITH LIB DEMS?

 

 

Last year in a Scottish local council ward a penguin got more votes than the Liberal Democrat candidate.

Actually it was an independent dressed in a penguin suit, nevertheless across the country they lost 74 councillors in elections that mirrored their performance in recent polls across the north of England.

 

Whether the site of sassanach Lib Dems heading for Glasgow this weekend for their party conference will appease the Tartan Army of Scottish voters remains to be seen.

 

The decision of the “catastrophically depressed” Lib Dem MP Sarah Teather to quit at the next election might be dismissed as a fit of pique by a sacked minister, but her declared reasons for going bear some examination. This is because they address the major problems Lib Dems have had in Leeds, Liverpool and Manchester since the coalition was formed.

 

Before 2010 the party managed to be an organisation that disaffected Tories could vote for in the South while fed up Labour voters could switch to the Lib Dems on the basis that they were sort of on the left and were reasonably progressive.

 

Now in office the Lib Dems have been tainted in many of their ex supporters eyes by the difficult decisions of government. It will ultimately be a decision for the whole electorate in 2015 whether the pupil premium, lifting the poorest out of income tax and other Lib Dem backed measures will be enough to save them from electoral oblivion, but Teather has highlighted some problems they will face in getting a reasonable vote in the North and Scotland.

 

Her central charge is that Nick Clegg’s party no longer fights hard enough on issues like social justice and immigration. She cites Lib Dem support for a cap on welfare, a £1000 visa charge plan for immigrants and the government’s vans touring London urging illegal immigrants to “go home or face arrest.”

 

A large number of Lib Dems are deeply worried about association with the Conservatives but feel it is a price worth paying to have some influence in office. However one has the impression that there is a faction who have enjoyed their time in office and are quite happy with the party moving right.

 

The Lib Dem conference is by far and away the most democratic of the three gatherings we shall witness this autumn. It remains a place where real policy is made but there is nothing on the agenda about the strategy for the crucial period coming up for the party.

Do they stick with the coalition till the end? What will they do if the Tories emerge as the largest party in 2015?

 

There will be plenty of talk about this in the bars of Glasgow but on the conference floor the theme will be the creation of jobs. The Lib Dems say a million have been created since 2010 and they want a million more. They want to double the number of businesses and train the apprentices for them. They will be debating an end to Britain’s four boat Trident nuclear submarine fleet and only want an in/out EU referendum if more powers are planned to be devolved to Brussels.

 

Good progressive stuff but the hand of the party’s right can be seen in the resolution on whether to restore the 50% tax rate for those earning £150,000. Conference can vote to endorse George Osborne’s cut to 45% or go back to 50% only if a review indicates that the tax take would exceed the cost of its introduction.

 

The improving economy is strengthening the position of right wing Lib Dems who would feel quite comfortable with another deal with the Tories, but that approach will be hard to sell in working class areas of the North.

 

 

YOUR MEP IS BEING CHOSEN NOW

 

 

You may think the verdict on who will represent Yorkshire and the North West in Europe will be decided on May 22nd next year when the European Parliamentary elections take place.

 

In fact 90% of the decision making is taking place now as the political parties in the two regions are deciding in what order their candidates will be on the party lists. Next May voters will only decide which party to vote for. Who gets elected will depend on the total per percentage vote the party gets in the whole Yorkshire and North West regions. Therefore your place on the list is crucial. If you are below fourth, forget it.

 

So how is this playing out, who is likely to represent the North in the European Parliament 2014-19 when crucial decisions are taken about the shape of the EU and our membership of it?

 

UKIP are on course to win these elections. They are on a role domestically and this set of elections will be fought on their territory. It will be an ideal platform for their charismatic leader Nigel Farage to taunt the other parties with his clear message, vote for us to get out of the EU without the ambiguities of renegotiating the terms.

 

NORTH WEST EURO CANDIDATES.

 

The North West has eight members in the European Parliament. There is a chance they could take three places next May. Their sitting North West MEP is Merseysider Paul Nuttall. He is arguably the UKIP politician with the highest profile after Farage with his frequent national media appearances as Deputy Leader of his party. Unlike the Tories and Labour he is not guaranteed top place on the list by virtue of being a sitting MEP but is certain to be elected in number one spot by North West UKIP members. If UKIP do get two others elected, the will be complete unknowns to most people. I am told that we should keep our eyes on Louise Bowers, a former Tory mayor of Congleton and Andrew Fairfoul, a Warrington teacher.

 

The Conservatives will be losing one of the great characters in North West politics. The cricket loving Sir Robert Atkins is retiring. A former Preston MP and Minister under John Major he represented a dying breed of Tories who wholeheartedly supported our membership of the EU. So top of the Tory list will be Saj Karrim who first represented the Lib Dems in Europe from 2004-07 before defecting to the Conservatives. He recently spoke powerfully at a Downtown debate on the value of the EU in trade negotiations with countries like India. Jackie Foster will be second on the list. She is the comeback girl having represented the North West from 1999-04 when she was defeated only to return five years later. If the Tories win their bitter battle with UKIP for a third seat, then seven other candidates are currently being voted on. They include Deborah Dunleavy who failed to take Bolton North East in the General Election having been fast tracked by David Cameron. Another is Cheshire West and Chester councillor Charles Fifield.

 

Labour will also be losing a long serving member. Brian Simpson first sat in the European Parliament for Cheshire East in 1989. He has done good work for the region on transport matters, but is now standing down. Arlene McCarthy MEP is guaranteed top slot on the list and there is a fierce battle going on for the number two position. Former Liverpool councillor Theresa Griffin has tried for years to win a European seat but she faces formidable opposition from former mayor of Manchester Afzal Khan and Kevin Doran Editor of the informative NorthWestinEurope.org website.

 

Will Chris Davies retain his seat for the Lib Dems? A dedicated campaigner on European issues, often controversial and a fell runner, Chris has represented the North West for 15 years. His party is at a low ebb.

He’ll be hoping there are enough Lib Dem votes in places like Cumbria, East Lancashire and Liverpool to keep him in Brussels.

 

Another party at a low ebb is the BNP and it is very likely that their leader Nick Griffin will lose especially because UKIP are making the running on immigration.

YORKSHIRE AND THE HUMBER EURO CANDIDATES.

 

In this vast region which embraces Leeds, The Dales and Hull the Tories have lost Edward McMillan Scott who defected to the Lib Dems. Tim Kirkhope will top the list with seven candidates contesting the vital second place on the list.

 

Labour had a poor showing when these elections were last contested in 2009 under Gordon Brown’s leadership. Linda McAvan will be hoping to be joined by a second Labour representative.

 

UKIP’s Godfrey Bloom is almost certain to be re-elected despite his views about the employability of women of child bearing age and is likely to be joined by a second UKIP representative.

 

As in the North West there has to be a question mark over continued Lib Dem representation. Sitting MEP Diana Wallis announced she was standing down after failing to be elected as President of the European Parliament.

 

Andrew Brons, elected as a BNP MEP has now joined the British Democrats and is hopefully destined for political oblivion.

 

TORY MADNESS AND LABOUR GLOOM

No wonder UKIP is doing well, the three main parties are in bigger crises than many people realise.

 

If you define leadership by who’s got the authority,who’s making the running, then the Tories are not being led by David Cameron but by a bunch of anti EU fanatics.

 

The problems of the Lib Dems are well known. They are paying a heavy price for being in Coalition with few people giving them credit for restraining the worst excesses of the Conservatives.

 

But Labour’s difficulties get less publicity. I was at a conference of one of the party’s main think tanks last weekend. Gloom and pessimism were all around. There was discontent with Ed Miliband and a recognition that their performance in the county elections had not provided the springboard for government. Commenting on the Labour leadership spin put on the results pollster Peter Kellner told the Progress gathering “If a 29% share of the poll is called a success, I’d like to see what failure looks like.”

 

Although I wasn’t around (just) British politics has the appearance of the 1930s with weak leaders, a disillusioned electorate and a few people with dangerous ideas about how to sort it out.

I am not for a moment equating those that want to get out of the EU with the fascists of the thirties. Wanting Britain to sever its ties with the EU is a perfectly legitimate political position. However it would be a dangerous gamble with our economic prosperity.

 

What is more worrying is the complete obsession Tory eurosceptics have about the subject. Warned by Cameron not to bang on about Europe, they do nothing else. They care not a jot for the damage they do to the credibility of the Prime Minister.

 

Just look at the events of this week. While Cameron was in America negotiating a EUROPEAN trade deal, he was forced to offer concession after concession to the Euro clowns back home. What good did it do him publishing a draft Euro referendum bill? None, and we end the week with 116 Tories regretting its absence from the Queen’s Speech and the prospects of a Tory backbencher introducing the bill through the Private Members’ Ballot.

 

When will Cameron learn there is no appeasing these people. They will take every concession and up their demands. The Tory MPs who are making the running on this issue aren’t interested in renegotiating terms, they’re not really interested in a referendum. They want us out of the EU.

 

Why don’t pro European Tories speak up? I had an interesting conversation with a senior pro EU Minister in the Commons this week. The gist of his answer was that that pro European Tories value party unity. If they were to confront the Euro sceptics, it really would be civil war in the Conservative Party.

 

I’m afraid that smacks of appeasement.

 

What everyone needs to remember is the finding of IPSOS/MORI, one of our leading pollsters on this matter. Unprompted, British people, when asked what their top priorities are, reply health, jobs, immigration and education. Europe is not in the top ten.

 

The out of the EU mob are trying to whip up a frenzy, so that we all come to believe that leaving the EU will solve all our problems. It wouldn’t and some of us are going to stand up against them with as much vigour as they display. Viva Europa!