Monday, 15 May 2017

The "This had better not really be the Brexit election" election - day 27


Not much longer to "wait for the manifesto"

We now (think we) know the publication date of the post-leak Labour manifesto (Tuesday 16 May) and the Conservative offering (Thursday 18 May).  Any more for any more?

The Brexit election


Robert Peston interviewed David Davis, Secretary of State for Leaving the European Union, this morning.  I know the department name actually says "Exiting", but that's execrable English. It does make jokes possible though.


My main observation about David Davis since he was appointed to this position is that he's enjoying it far too much.  Even he admitted that the process he oveersees is "the defining issue of the age" (and I'm involved in it, yippee!).  A successful Brexit is the basis for successful economic strategy, he argued, and therefore the basis for provision of public services.

"In the last nine months," he said, "we have taken through the House of Commons the Article 50 bill."  He neglects to mention that they had no intention of taking anything through parliament until the supreme court told them that was their job.

This election, Davis told us, is to get a mandate for the kind of Brexit a Tory government would go for.  Which suggests that the manifesto should be specific.  Not necessarily detailed - there will eventually be negotiations after all - but specific.  No free movement, no ECJ is specific.  "Best possible deal" is not.

Davis dismissed the "hard" and "soft" labels as propaganda, but was quite happy to recognise that there isn't total agreement on what Brexit means (apart, of course, from Brexit).  Sorry mate, while you were unwilling to talk to us, we carried on and we had to come up with some terms.

"That's what the public voted for" - no single market, no customs union, no European Court of Justice, control of immigration.  "They knew... Both sides said we'd have to leave the single market..."  Which is presumably why Brexiters have to keep on telling us "what the public voted for", and it's rarely exactly the same thing.

May & co will be "seeking a comprehensive free trade agreement, covering all products and all services" plus a customs agreement guaranteeing "frictionless trade", the "most beneficial economic outcome".  They have to retain the option to walk out, because it is possible to imagine a deal which is worse than having no deal at all.  I wish they'd give me a clue about what that might be like.

Unfair screenshot catching Davis between facial expressions

Peston asked if the government accept the structure of negotiations set out by all the institutions of the EU - "sufficient progress" on the formula for a financial settlement, citizens' rights and Ireland before any thought can be given to the future.

"Not entirely," replied Davis, "and that'll be the first discussion."  He saw no problem on citizens' rights, but in his view "not entirely" obviously means "not much at all".  "There will be arguments of fine detail,"  he went on,  "like whether the ECJ oversees these rights..."  Sorry, that's not a detail either to them or to you.  And as was pointed out during the show...




"What we're after is a very generous outcome,"  was another familiar formula.  During the referendum campaign that usually meant that "we" would be generous to "them", but the EU27 will surely see the outcome Davis described as "them" being generous to "us".  He proposed that the rights which expats have now would be frozen, not acknowledging any disagreement over what family rights that would imply.

On the subject of who would oversee these rights Davis affected to be insulted by the idea that British courts wouldn't be qualified - "We have some fine courts".  Our supreme court could be assumed to be up to the job, he maintained, as indeed it could if there was a treaty to that effect, which is the subject of some negotiation.  And British expats in an EU country won't be able to seek redress in a British court.

Davis was able to dodge the money issue completely, and quoted Article 50 as saying negotiations would proceed "taking into account the ongoing relationship".  The text is actually "taking account of the framework for [the withdrawing member state's] future relationship".  May & co never remember the word framework but the EU do, and that's the basis on which they are proceeding.

On Ireland Davis had a good point.  It's difficult to see how progress could be made on border issues until a customs relationship has been covered at least in principle.  But his casual accusation that the EU were using the "wrong interpretation of the treaty" and that there'll be a "row over the summer" (as I said in my post on 4 May) means that the ECJ might have to expect a referral.

A  "lot of nonsense" is talked about trade deals and how long it will take, claimed Davis.  (I'd suggest the main nonsense is that two years.  There's no time limit on a trade deal, since it's not part of the Article 50 process.)  He was casual about wasting yet more months agreeing a new negotiating structure (=tearing up the guidelines) over the summer and anyway "if they wanted to they had have another summit" before autumn to agree it all. But why would they "want to"?

Peston pressed him, suggesting that his recent conversations with European leaders didn't back Davis's line.  Even friendly countries like Poland won't talk trade until they know about the money.  Davis shrugged the question off - either they receive money and don't want to lose it or they're net contributors and don't want to pay more - as if that dealt with the issue.

He quoted the EU's "Nothing is agreed until everything is agreed" and proclaimed that he is "quite happy with that".  Except for the "detail" of expats' rights of course.  "We want to see everything packaged up together and that's what we're going to do."  Well that's all right then.

Overall, Davis's approach was jovial and untroubled.  He never actually said everything is going to be straightforward but that was the impression given.  "Flippant" was one Twitter comment.

Critics of Davis's attitude and legal assertions queued up.









More evidence that David Davis and his crew have a lot more  to think about than they admit in public keeps coming up.





Davis should be reminded frequently of his recent contribution to the DExEU select committee.








But an undertaking from the leader herself casts doubt on any argument that "no deal" might be acceptable.







Other things did happen, but 1150 words will have to do.

Here's @Adamstoon1 take on recent stories coming out of Downing Street .... pic.twitter.com/RiLIvaPrfK




at

Sunday, 14 May 2017

The "Who says government is responsible for the NHS?" election - day 26


NHS held to ransom

While 48 English NHS trusts and 11 Scottish health boards worked to get their computers and networks up and running (NHS reported that all but six were back to normal by Saturday evening), media and spectators begin to learn things about the dark world of malware and cyber attacks that they never expected to be interested in and will probably forget by Tuesday.

There are several reasons for many computers across the world becoming unusable on Friday, and probably many more being closed down as a protective measure.  We know by now that it wasn't an "attack on the NHS", though the health service seems to have been particularly vulnerable in this country. 

Organisations in dozens of countries have hit the problem including, interestingly, Nissan in the UK and Renault in France.  These allied companies are reported to have halted production at some plants, though they're not really telling.  I'd like to see an account one day of how something random like this hits a cross-border supply and product chain with heavily computerised and integrated production lines.

Colin Lawther, Nissan's Senior Vice President, Manufacturing, Supply Chain Management and Purchasing for Europe told the House of Commons International Trade Committee in February that their plants hold stocks of parts sufficient for only half a day:

“Take Sunderland. We hold about half a day’s stock inside the plant itself, and that’s continuously replenished. Every day we use about 5m parts; 5m have to come into the plant, they have to get fitted to the right car and we build two cars every minute.

“We talk about minutes; we’re talking two, three, four, six minutes’ downtime a day interruption is a disaster.”

That was in the context of a discussion about post-Brexit customs procedures interrupting production.  This weekend millions of parts might have been delivered through our open EU borders and not used.  Was there somewhere to store them?

What happened?


The creators of malware dream up clunky names for their little bits of code, in this case WanaCrypt0r.  If you really want to see how the dirty deed is done, here is one of no doubt many descriptions.  Suffice it to say that your data will have been put out of reach using pretty heavy encryption.

At least part of the problem has probably been down to people clicking a link in an unexpected and unrecognised email, seeing something they aren't interested in, and probably moving on without a thought.  In that brief time the malware has been copied onto the computer, to copy itself via email and other routes to the user's contacts.

Another facet is the age of the software running on some NHS computers.  We hear that 90% of NHS organisations had PCs running Microsoft's Windows XP in December 2016.  XP was released in 2001 and general support was withdrawn in April 2014, though Crown Commercial Services, an agency of the UK government, paid £5.48 million to extend that to April 2015.  (I bet other large and lazy customers did the same, though the price for any more years would have risen sharply because Microsoft really didn't want to do it.)

90% of NHS organisations?  But how many machines?  I can't find a definitive number but 5% is quoted more than once, which could still be many thousands.  And it's not just these really old ones which are vulnerable.  Microsoft issued a fix for the problem on more modern systems two months ago, but some large organisations insist on managing (=delaying) the application of fixes.

Note also that it was reported in March 2013 that more than half of local councils in the UK would still be running Windows XP after it's "end-of-life deadline".  You might want to ask how your local authority is doing now.

And now it looks as if the problem is just about over, and it's possible the worst that has happened is that one day's notes have been lost, one day's appointments have been disrupted, and many staff and patients have been frustrated and frightened, though I'm sure we'll hear of a few GPs or dentists here and there who don't have proper backups and have lost more.

Upgrading those last few systems is going to look even more urgent. even with the squeeze on NHS funding. Why might those systems be outstanding?  A Twitter contact who has worked in IT integration for several large NHS trusts came up with a few suggestions.

Quite apart from the cost of training and getting used to a very different set of Microsoft office software there are the specialist applications which might be vital to the organisation's operation but no longer supported.  The situation in some cases might be similar to banking software - established systems whose innards nobody really understands, and with all sorts of bits tacked on.

But let's take it that we're now down to the last few (and the most complicated or they would have been fixed by now) systems, and hope that the urgency of this weekend's attack will concentrate minds and get the job finished soon.

The nearest to a scandal I could find


People were shouting for Jeremy Hunt to tell us what was going on, but perhaps he was a bit busy.  In the event it was Amber Rudd who did the media rounds and convened the COBRA emergency committee.  The committee brings different people together for different disasters and would perhaps not have such a stirring name if it met in Cabinet Office Briefing Room B.

One thing Amber Rudd is good at is sounding authoritative on radio and TV.  Until you listen to what she's saying.  "It is the type of virus that works particularly effectively on systems that are connected" really doesn't help.  Systems are connected. That's the point, really.  However, let's give her the benefit of the doubt and hope that her stewardship of COBRA was just as a reporting centre for what the professionals were doing.

When figures like"90% of trusts" can easily be heard as "90% of computers" and everybody but the government knows that the NHS is short of money, the best a minister can do is fend off the accusations.  Why are we still using such old software?  Why hasn't the government made sure we're protected?  And Rudd did her best.

In one of the background pieces I found for this post, there's a link to "http://ccs.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/i-am-buyer/categories/ict/special-agreements/custom-support".  Special agreements, custom support, looks exactly the thing we need, but it redirects to something much more boring.  I wonder when that page redirect was put in place.



There's a very straightforward government question.  The coalition bought an extra year of support, but more than a year was required.  Yet this weekend's attack comes when the remaining old systems in the NHS (and other government departments?) have gone two years without protection.  Did it slip Conservative minds?  Is the redirection above just a crude attempt to cover up inaction?

There's a big, international question about the US National Security Agency discovering the weakness in Windows which made this particular attack possible and not telling Microsoft about it.




And there's a smaller question about why England and Scotland had this problem but Wales and Northern Ireland apparently didn't.








Campaign snippets







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Saturday, 13 May 2017

The "Trespassing on others' territory" election - day 25


Catch-up

I've caught up with the full leaked Labour manifesto, and it's still causing ructions today.

It's actually quite an old joke, but a relevant one today:  The government (and most of the papers) are quite happy with state control of British industries;  as long as it's a foreign state.  Rail "renationalisation" is probably the easiest such proposal to achieve, though it does assume (at least) two Labour (or sympathetic) terms in government.  Who are the current franchise holders?


Abellio has three franchises or part-franchises and is owned by the Dutch government.  Deutsche Bahn, whose largest shareholder is the German government, owns Arriva, which has six franchises or part-franchises. Trenitalia has one franchise and is owned by the Italian government, and Eurostar is part owned by the French and Belgian governments.

Then there's energy.  Of the big six gas and electricity suppliers, EDF Energy's parent company is largely owned by the French government.  EDF and Chinese government finance are responsible for the Hinkley Point C project, and a Chinese government company has options on two further British nuclear plants.  And the Qatar state investment authority is a major share holder of the Spanish company Iberdrola, which controls Scottish Power.

Oh, and the British government is already part owner, with the Dutch government and two German power companies, of Urenco, which enriches uranium. 


Do other European countries, with their major state industries, live in the 1970s (© Telegraph, Mail and all points to the right)?  You know, that time when there were boy jobs and girl jobs.

The Daily Mirror has the latest in a series of similar polls which basically tell us that Labour's leaked proposals are popular but Corbyn isn't.

Is it because I is not a pacifist?


Emily Thornberry (Labour, Islington South and Finsbury, majority 12,708) put her name to a scene-setting article for Labour's day, while the party primed journalists with "what Jeremy Corbyn is expected to say", which boiled down to "I am not a pacifist".

The BBC's Norman Smith opined that Corbyn had voted against every military engagement imaginable, including the Falklands war... which happened the year before he was first elected (though I'm sure he would have voted against it). "Perhaps some preconceptions to clear up" on Corbyn's military stance, said newsreader Annita McVeigh later.

Corbyn's speech when it came was a thoughtful tour d'horizon of things defence, development and diplomacy.  He quoted Eisenhower's 1961 "military-industrial complex" speech and lamented the lack of progress on Ike's warning not to "let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes".  He observed that current thinking is presented as being either for or against strong defence, with anything but the former "unreliable".

He criticised Theresa  May for having a "coalition of risk and insecurity" with Donald Trump, and promised that under Labour there would be "no more hand-holding" with the US.


"The war on terror has not worked" was a main point, leading to a stress on diplomacy - fine, but several invocations of the United Nations were formulaic and uncritical.  Perhaps with the weight of leadership on his shoulders, perhaps with the weight of conference decisions contradicting his own views, Corbyn pressed for the 2% defence spending target to be maintained with a view to building troop numbers back up and looking after them better.

What everybody was waiting for was the passage on nuclear weapons.  The question "would you order use  of nuclear weapons" was "an extraordinary question when you think about it – would you order the indiscriminate killing of millions of people? Would you risk such extensive contamination of the planet that no life could exist across large parts of the world? If circumstances arose where that was a real option, it would represent complete and cataclysmic failure. It would mean world leaders had already triggered a spiral of catastrophe for humankind."

I hope it's hard to argue against that analysis objectively, but nuclear deterrence theory for NATO (and several other countries with nuclear weapons) has moved beyond "you hit me and I'll hit you back" to "you look like hitting me and I'll hit you first".

Many military operations might be judged to be war crimes but it would be hard to class a nuclear strike in any other way, if any courts survived.  As Michael Fallon (Conservative, Sevenoaks, majority 19,561) has told us before today "In the most extreme circumstances, we've made it very clear that you can't rule out the use of nuclear weapons as a first strike."


Corbyn left it to be inferred that he would never order such a strike, and explicitly stated the party's opposition to a first strike.


"A high level of strategic illiteracy" was the judgement of a former senior naval officer.  Declaring no first use is "absolute nonsense... the man can't be trusted".  Then, in order to appear "unpolitical" he observed that "even the present prime minister" isn't too good at stepping up to help the US.


Theresa May revisits an old stamping ground

#MrsME was in northeastern England, hoping to appeal to wavering Labour voters and those who had already transferred their support to UKIP.  Not that she was actually going to met any of them of course.  In her speech to Tories in Tynemouth she mentioned another election campaign in 1992, when she contested Northwest Durham against a young Tim Farron... and lost to Labour's Hilary Armstrong.



May, in Tynemouth, accused Labour of turning against the "proud and patriotic working class", but most of the speech was familiar stuff, much of it set out in the letter I discussed yesterday.  "The EU 27 are determined to work together,"  she says, and  "They mean business".  Can anybody be surprised by that?

Northern Echo chief feature writer Chris Lloyd told Sky News they're "on the cusp of something" with regard to Tories making progress in the northeast.  The election of a Tory mayor for Tees Valley, the effect of the Leave vote and the dwindling UKIP vote all mean that otherwise surprising seats being targeted.


Since coverage was going to be dominated by Corbyn's speech, May made a few soundbites available - Labour voters "are increasingly looking at what Jeremy Corbyn believes in, and are appalled" - an attack on Corbyn on defence, economy and leadership, very little actual Tory policy but #StrongAndStable™ generalities.


David Cameron appeared on the campaign in Chester to argue that May needs a big mandate to escape being manoeuvred into an “extreme Brexit”. David Davis on the other hand , claimed the European commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, was trying to force him out of his job.

The Economist analysed #MrsME's chances with the older vote (spoiler: it should be safe):
"Fortunately for Theresa May … her retirement-age base currently looks rock-solid. Before the Brexit referendum last year, around a fifth of over-60s supported the UK Independence party. But after the surprise vote to leave the EU stripped Ukip of much of its reason for being, nearly three-quarters of that group have abandoned the party, with the vast majority shifting their allegiances to the Conservatives. As a result, the Tories are currently some 50 points ahead of Labour among the old – an advantage roughly double the size of their already-large margin with that group in 2015. Labour may have chosen a relatively aged leader in the 67-year-old Jeremy Corbyn, but the polls suggest he shouldn’t count on his sexagenarian peers for any help."


Over the last few days I've seen a few demands for more detail on Brexit (or indeed anything) but this one seemed to go well with May's criticism of Labour's policy costings.




Lib Dems on drugs

BBC World At One featured the periodic "debate" about drugs, prompted by a Lib Dem pledge to legalise cannabis.  The war on drugs has not worked,  so...





Saboteurs department

After Michel Barnier's speech to the Irish parliament yesterday, the EU's chief Brexit negotiator moved on to the border with the north to hear first hand how the wrong sort of Brexit would hit businesses and individuals in that area in particular.  He told us that some form of customs checking would be needed between an EU country and one outside.  Most of the proposals for this border seem to have been around since the referendum campaign a year ago.

"I'm not a super-technocrat from Brussels,"  said Barnier.  "I have been chosen for this extraordinary job - and I hope it remains extraordinary - because I'm a politician."  He continued,  "We want to find solutions without rebuilding any hard border."  The job is to maintain the Good Friday Agreement but it must be compatible with the single market.

Accused by a journalist of being an agent provocateur by approaching the border from the south (!) he shifted to diplomatic nothings, refusing to talk solutions, listening and showing he's totally involved.  "Everything is complicated...  There is always an answer..."  But of course the BBC cut away as soon as a French journalist started talking furrin.

At Barnier's right shoulder, Irish foreign minister Charlie Flanagan said, perhaps pointedly, that he hopes Article 50 talks can get underway "as soon as possible after June 8".

Meanwhile Tony Blair was addressing a European People's Party meeting in County Wicklow.  “A hard border between the countries would be a disaster,"  he said,  "and I am sure everyone will and must do all they can to avoid it...  Some disruption is inevitable and indeed is already happening. However, it is essential that we do all we possibly can to preserve arrangements which have served both countries well and which command near universal support.”

One thing I thought might blow up during the referendum campaign was the promise, led by Priti Patel, that Brexit would allow the UK to bring more people from the Indian subcontinent than at present.  In part this followed Eric Pickles' ill-fated attempt to train British curry chefs.  George Osborne's ever-helpful London Standard now reports that "Brexit ministers misled us over immigration, say furious curry house bosses".


Snippets

Thursday's cyber attack prompted Helen Jayne Stokes-Lampard, chair of the Royal College of General Practitioners to complain about NHS underfunding on BBC World Tonight and tech people to observe that a huge number of NHS systems are running Windows XP, which is no longer supported.  This could become an election issue.
Edward Snowden among others pointed out that the NSA had discovered this Windows weakness but not told people about it.

The final numbers show that UKIP is standing in many fewer constituencies than in 2015.






And the Greens will be seen in rather more places.




The effect of UKIP's choice's (though they might have been forced on the party by lack of time, willing candidates and money) could be serious for Labour.




And here's a beaut!  The conspiracy theorists will be out in force.



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Thursday, 11 May 2017

The "It all goes on around us while we look at other things" election - day 24

[Updated 12 May]

A letter


Having been mostly incommunicado today I might not manage the usual summary of the day's election excitements, so I'll have a detailed look at a letter which has fallen into my hands.  It was addressed to an elderly person, and I've redacted names, constituency names and details of the person's address in a pleasing Tory #MrsME blue.  It's signed - apparently - by Theresa May.

Page 1 -  click to read

It might be that every one of us will receive a letter like this, or it might be that different communications will be directed to different groups of voters.  Note, for example, the mention of a postal vote on page 2.

Page 2 - click to read

For a moment I thought it was Commons notepaper - it's the same colour - but it's lighter weight and doesn't have the letterhead.  The envelope shows it to be handled by UKMail (and delivered by Royal Mail).  [update] There is no other marking on the envelope.  The "if undelivered" address on the back of the envelope is CCHQ - Conservative central office.

The letter is "promoted by Alan Mabbutt on behalf of the Conservative Party" and printed in London, so I'll assume it isn't a constituency-related communication from the local candidate.  Names, addresses and whether a person has a postal vote is information from the electoral roll, which a few quick searches confirm is held by the electoral registration office of the appropriate local council.

I know there's a national system for registering online (remind everybody to use it if they might not be registered) and what's known as the open roll is available for general viewing.  A large number of people withhold their details from the open roll, and the recipient of this letter is one of them.

Gov.uk tells individuals that they can access the open roll by enquiring at the local council but another quick search yields a wide range of services allowing you to track people down using this information.  The names and addresses might be combined with other databases to provide other information - phone number, property price... - but not, surely, whether you have a postal vote.

The full version of the roll, with all the names and presumably postal vote requests, is available to local political parties and candidates to support their work during an election.  In this case it seems that the national Conservative party has access to the full roll.  I assume that's OK.......

And of course it will all be paid for by the national party account.  Won't it?



It's nice to be noticed

(and I know it's not the real one)







at

Wednesday, 10 May 2017

The "This election will not be interrupted by court cases, I hope" election - day 23



Labour education day


Jeremy Corbyn addressed another friendly audience at Leeds City College on Labour's proposed National Education Service.  He namechecked the "brilliant" local MPs Richard Burgon (Labour, Leeds East, majority 12,533) and Hilary Benn (Labour, Leeds Central, majority 16,967) and hoped everybody in the hall and every student at the college was registered to vote.  "Use your democratic rights."

"The Conservative party looks after money and money looks after the Conservative party,"  he told them, while "the rigged system holds people back".  "Without an upgraded economy there can be no fairer Britain,"  he said, which sounds rather close to the Tories' "we can only provide the good services we want with a strong economy".

Today he was pledging to raise corporation tax to 26% over four years, which would still keep it the lowest in the G7 (not if Trump gets his proposals through it won't), which raised a lot of questions throughout the day.

Angela Rayner presented Labour's ideas for a National Education Service, from cradle to grave at the same meeting and in several media interviews in the morning.  The main points of the press release were:
  • Stop the cuts to school budgets with a real terms increase in funding
  • Reduce class sizes to under 30 for all five, six and seven year olds
  • Free school meals for all primary school children
  • Restore education maintenance allowance for college students
  • Restore student grants for university students
  • Scrap fees on courses for adult learners looking to re-train or upskill
She was confident that £6bn could be found for this by raising corporation tax, or rather for everything but the scrapping of tuition fees/restoration of grants.  For that we have to (all together now) wait for the manifesto.  That odd outlier suggests the party might still be fighting over a hot caculator.

Paul Johnson of the IFS judges that Labour's sums in this case add up (not including the tuition fees bit I think) so long as they don't spend it 11 times of course, which the Tories and Lib Dems are still teasing them for.  But he warned that such a large increase in corporation tax would have consequences, taking money out of investment:
Two important things about corporation tax – first, it’s not a victimless tax. This would increase taxes by about 1% of national income, so it would leave us all in the long run about 1% worse-off.

And of course, it is people in the end who pay it and it would reduce incentives for companies to invest in the UK ....

The risk is that whilst this would raise knocking on for £20bn in the short run, it’s probably going to raise rather less than that in the long run as companies invest less and take other opportunities to reduce the amount of tax they pay. So the long run behavioural effect of this tax would result in revenues being less than the immediate headline increase.
Even if you take it back it back up to 26%, as the Labour party are suggesting, it would not be particularly high by international standards.

But there have been other increases - not to the main rate of corporation tax, but to other elements of corporation tax - over the last few years and whilst we have a low headline rate, we have a very broad base. So the effective rate of corporation tax in the UK would start to look relatively higher by international standards. In a world where we are particularly worried about investment into the UK, and a Brexit situation, to significantly increase the rate of corporation you would have to say is taking some risk with the productivity and investment in the economy over the next decades.

Johnson's IFS put out briefing notes on education spending  ("it will make a positive difference") and corporation tax.

There are questions about the effects of the corporation tax changes on small businesses, as they have been told different things recently.  The Tories jumped on this, naturally.  The Federation of Small Businesses was "pressing Jeremy Corbyn to honour the commitment he made when he met with FSB members last month, for no increases to corporation tax for small businesses under a future Labour government."  The IFS puts it like this.


Labour had countered the IFS warnings by the end of the day, arguing that the stronger (and probably more stable) education and training their scheme would support would contribute to productivity improvements.

LibDems 

Tim Farron (Lib Dem, Westmorland and Lonsdale, majority 8,949) did the interview rounds in the morning, then was pictured in various southwestern locations, making jam tarts in a primary school among other things - always a great idea when wearing a dark suit.

It was striking that Farron was happy with his party's increase in vote share last week, despite their loss of 40 council seats.  He was also content to campaign to be (part of) a strong opposition, assuming that the Tories were on their way to a large majority.  I'm not sure that's a great tactic Timmy lad.

The Lib Dems propose to raise corporation tax as well, though only to 20%, and scrap the married couples' tax allowance to bolster the education budget.  Farron argued that the sums added up, not least because, "unlike Labour", they had only promised to spend this money once.

More controversial for some is the Lib Dem assumption that the UK will stay in the single market as the only way to keep the economy strong enough to guarantee the continuing tax take.


A policy announcement slipped out separately was to instruct the NHS to supply pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) to those "at risk of HIV" as is already available in Scotland.  NHS England is reluctant to do this at present because of cost implications (and perhaps also concern that they will be accused of supplying "lifestyle drugs") but it should save money in the longer run. Prevention is cheaper than treatment and all that.



Tories


#MrsME was touring workplaces again, including Mansfield (pictured), delivering THAT speech.  She must be gaining in confidence, though, because real people were allowed to ask questions again, before the journalists.  Judging by the bits the TV will show before it all gets too boring and familiar, that confidence isn't really justified.  And she will keep on claiming to be out and about, meeting real people.

Captivated or captive

One question was on homelessness.  She quoted the spending promised by the current government and some vague ideas about preventing people from becoming homeless in the first place, but strangely neglected to mention the Homelessness Prevention Act, a private member's bill helped through by the government.

We're all used to the way #MrsME (and many other politicians) answers questions by not really answering the question but spouting a half-relevant formula.  If enough people see her doing it to real people that might eventually tell against her.


Earlier in the day #MrsME met Jens Stoltenberg, secretary general of NATO, in Downing St as he requested extra troops for Afghanistan.  I bet the other NATO members were contacted by phone. Perhaps #MrsME invited him over for the cameras.  It's always good for a prime minister seeking re-election to be seen doing the big, important things.

When I saw Andrea Leadsom's name I wondered whether she had actually been allowed out, but no, she'd just written a letter to reassure fishing leaders that the UK will “look to disapply” the most unpopular parts of the Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) when the UK exits the European Union.  The Press Association reported:

"In a private letter to the Scottish Fishermen’s Federation (SFF), Leadsom said 'no decision has yet been made' on the extent to which the CFP would be incorporated into British law post-Brexit.

"She pledged that as the UK leaves the EU 'we will look to disapply the key elements of the CFP that are most unpopular and unworkable for the UK as a coastal state' - with this including the EU quota-setting regime and the right of European boats to fish in UK waters.

"'It is essential that we take the opportunity to develop a fisheries regime that is better-suited to our seas and industries,' the environment secretary said.


SNP and UKIP spokespeople, from different viewpoints, both predicted a "gigantic sell-out".  Eilidh Whiteford (SNP, Banff and Buchan, majority 14,339) said:

"The letter couldn’t be clearer - for all their rhetoric, the Tories are planning to incorporate key parts of the CFP ‘into domestic law’.

"They are also ‘committed to ongoing co-operation with other countries over the management of shared stocks’.

"That means that they are planning to use Scottish waters and our fishing industry as a Brexit bargaining chip.

"In doing so, they are also taking an enormous gamble with the livelihoods of those fish processors that depend on European exports by jeopardising our position within the single market."

Not being in either party I'm not as frightened of cooperating on managing shared stocks, but one day some actual proposals will emerge.
 


Not so presidential today?


But another one of those "we have no plans to..." answers sparked a lot of concern.



Court news

The CPS put out a statement on the year-long election expenses investigation.  Apart from one case which was still being considered, there would be no prosecutions.  That case concerns Craig Mackinlay (Conservative, South Thanet, majority 2,812) and is larger and more complex.

Official responses started with Patrick McLoughlin:

"After a very thorough investigation, we are pleased that the legal authorities have confirmed what we believed was the case all along: that these Conservative candidates did nothing wrong. These were politically motivated and unfounded complaints that have wasted police time. We are glad that this matter is finally resolved.

"A number of false and malicious claims continue to be spread on the internet. People should be aware that making false claims about a candidate’s personal character and conduct is an electoral offence, as well as being defamatory.

"Notwithstanding these false claims, Conservatives want to strengthen election rules to safeguard electoral integrity – in light of the real and proven cases of electoral fraud exposed in Tower Hamlets in 2015."

The "Conservative candidates did nothing wrong" theme was the baseline of all Tory responses. Not all of them repeated McLoughlin's apparent threat to tweeters and others who might make the #ToryElectionFraud theme more personal, but some turned the heat up higher.


Corbyn was "interested and surprised" by the decision but strongly supported electoral law and the independence of the electoral commission and CPS.  Farron said:  "The observation I would make of the Conservative party is it appears to have stayed on the right side of the law by the letter of it, but has driven a battlebus and horses right the way through the spirit of it.   It’s a shame.  In one sense, it would appear there is a cloud hanging over British politics."

The Electoral Commission has already fined the national Conservative party £70,000 for failing to properly declare £275,000 of election spending.  Much of this wrongdoing concerned incorrect classification of spending as national rather than local.  Many payments should have been reported by the local candidate and agent but were recorded centrally or not at all.

But the way UK election law works means that local cases have to be reported to the police and evaluated against a strict, criminal test of knowing dishonesty.  Each local party was supplied with a "comfort letter" stating that the payments in question were not their responsibility.  This seems to have resulted in the CPS's decision that, though constituency spending declarations “may have been inaccurate”, there was insufficient evidence to prove dishonesty.

The account by Morecambe and Lunesdale MP David Morris is illustrative.

 





Last summer David Allen Green, the FT’s legal commentator, posted a lengthy blog explaining why he thought prosecutions relating to the election over-spending allegations were unlikely.
And today he posted a series of tweets in response to the CPS decision

To quote an extract:  "That there was wrongdoing was beyond doubt - but this fell to the Electoral commission to deal with by fines. Which it did.  This would leave the police/CPS to deal with offences which required proof of dishonesty.  As election law is a muddle (even to election lawyers) it was going to be difficult to have sufficient evidence to show dishonest intent."

#MrsME's repeated line that the candidates have done nothing wrong and that the Conservative party has paid its fines is, shall we say, disingenous.  They played the system, paid the fine (=cost of doing business) and supplied each local party with a letter telling them that the battle bus expenditure would be declared on the central party returns.

Now all they need is the Thanet case to be decided on.  Oh, and the treasurer at the time of the 2015 election is still being investigated by the Metropolitan Police.

Another public lawyer put it quite simply.





Stop press, er... blog


The Labour manifesto has been leaked to theTelegraph and Mirror. That'll be tomorrow's story.
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The "Lynton Crosby's hidden hand" election - day 22

The Me Show


It's as if somebody is actually planning #MrsME's election.  The latest episode of the "ruthless, scripted campaign" (Norman Smith, BBC) was a "Meet the Mays" session on the One Show couch.  Luckily I was doing something else at the time and didn't even have to decide not to watch it.





“There’s boy jobs and girl jobs, you see,” said Theresa May, prime minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.  And "I quite like ties, jackets, stuff like that."
A lot of people watch the One Show, and their defences will be down, at least in comparison to the Six o'clock News audience, and there are other audiences to exploit.






Labour

It was campaign launch day and somebody had driven a big red bus into an exhibition hall in Salford to kick things off (as if it hasn't been going on for weeks already).  Ian Lavery (Labour, Wansbeck, majority 10,881), one of the election coordination twins, took the stage to thump a few tubs in front of an enthusiastic Labour audience.

Lavery referred to "Jeremy Corbyn's Labour party", which seemed to ape the #MrsME approach, and used "it doesn't have to be this way", which reminded me of Ed Miliband.  At least some of it came from the heart:  "They don't call it the struggle for nothing".

The gossip among journalists was that Andy Burnham had taken a seat in the front row alongside Lucy Powell (Labour, Manchester Central, majority 21,639).  These are the two who were reported missing when Corbyn visited Manchester on the day of Burnham's election as Manchester city region metro mayor (it's important not to say just "Manchester mayor"; there's a lot of worry that the centre will get all the attention and the money).

Corbyn called Burnham onto the stage.  "Andy will be a great mayor," he said, "but think how much better with a Labour government."  Then began the Corbyn speech - not as tedious and shallow as #MrsME's but still much the same every time.


Corbyn didn't answer questions after his speech but went on to do TV interviews and a session with journalists.




On presidential elections


A series of tweets from Michael Crick was worrying.




Then, as Andrew Sparrow reported in the Guardian,


I imagine this made Crick less likely to be called to ask a question later in the day.


Campaign snippets

The local UKIP candidate in Clacton, blessed by Arron Banks on his flying visit two weeks ago, has been rejected by the party's NEC "after social media messages emerged from accounts linked to him which disparaged Muslims".

The Greens on the Isle of Wight derided the Tories' "cruel shock therapy" of the NHS.

NATO has asked the UK for more troops to perform training roles in Afghanistan.  When asked, Corbyn told reporters he would reject such a request if it came to him.

The fallout from #MsME's energy price ban continued, with Martin Lewis (moneysavingexpert) telling the BBC that Greg Clark (Conservative, Tunbridge Wells, majority 22,874, currently Secretary of State for Business etc) was a disgrace for recommending that we should all switch energy suppliers even if he'd never got round to doing it himself.

Labour complained that their policy has been nicked, and their 2015 manifesto did indeed have a very similar policy.  LibDems say the cap will hit investment and raise prices (if the variable rate is held down, suppliers will raise the fixed deal tariffs to maintain their profits). The industry agrees with the LibDems.


Perhaps Ofgem could establish a real price comparison site.  You know, one which isn't actually an agent or broker for energy supply companies who pay the right fees to get preferential placings.




Progressive Alliance news

Labour has expelled three members for joining a campaign to replace Jeremy Hunt with an National Health Action party MP.

The Greens are standing aside to help Labour win Ed Balls' old seat from Andrea Jenkyns (Conservative, Morley and Outwood, majority 422).  They're also giving Mary Creagh (Labour, Wakefield, majority 2,613) an easier run, and supporting the Women's Equality Party's Sophie Walker as she stands against Philip Davies (Conservative, Shipley, majority 9,624).

Tim Farron (Lib Dem, Westmorland and Lonsdale, majority 8,949) has "made it very clear" that there will be no pacts or coalitions.  But he's "relaxed" about local parties deciding to stand aside somewhere like Brighton Pavilion and less relaxed, by the sound of it, about Vince Cable's support for Rupa Huq (Labour, Ealing central and Acton, majority 274).

Heading in the opposite direction, are rumoured "potential mass defections" from Labour, as reported by the Telegraph and denied by a likely "suspect".


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Tuesday, 9 May 2017

The "Every day seems like the last" election - day 21

The BBC came out to tell us about TV "debates".

Tuesday 9 May: Theresa May and her husband Philip interviewed together on the One Show.
Wednesday 31 May: Mishal Husain chairs a seven-way debate with senior figures from the Conservatives, Labour, the SNP, the Lib Dems, Plaid Cymru, the Green and Ukip.
Friday 2 June: David Dimbleby hosts a Question Time leader special with May and Corbyn facing audience questions consecutively.
Sunday 4 June: Dimbley hosts a second Question Time leader special with Tim Farron and Nicola Sturgeon.
Andrew Neil will also be conducting a series of one-to-one interviews going out on BBC One at 7pm with May, Corbyn, Farron, Sturgeon and Paul Nuttall.

 At first some of it looked high value, but then...


The pre-manifesto pledges kept coming - Tories waking up their "tens of thousands" pledge on immigration, Labour talking about junk food advertising  and car park charges!  But the progressive alliance didn't seem to be getting anywhere - Labour and the LibDems not playing, Caroline Lucas for the Greens pleading.  There is a handful of local initiatives, the latest with the National Health Acton party against Jeremy Hunt (Conservative, South West Surrey, majority 28,556).


Tories

May was out at another standard campaign meeting in Harrow West (Gareth Thomas, Labour, majority 2,208), with candidates from London and the southeast leaping obediently to their feet when #MrsME entered the room.


Laura Kuenssberg reminded us of what we've been discussing from the start.



May: we remain committed to reaching 100,000 but I won't say when and I won't commit to ending free movement at Brexit.  She maintained that Corbyn wants to keep free movement as it is, for which there seems to be very little evidence.

Here are extracs from a couple of Tory manifestos.




Labour and the LibDems criticised the immigration proposal for being inflexible, unachievable and unfair as you'd expect.  Some Tories don't like it but won't say much. The Institute of Directors said

"A target is a poor substitute for a proper immigration policy. All parties should instead see Brexit as an opportunity to come up with a new system that is good for the economy, but also addresses voters’ concerns.

"The next government must improve the education system so young people are ready to fill roles in developing industries, and workers of all ages can re-train as needed to find fulfilling jobs. This is the only sustainable way to reduce the demand for skills from abroad."

Asked about the nurses' pay cap, May responded with her "Some nurses have had big rises because of progression pay", avoiding, of course, the point that every new intake of nurses at low grades is poorer than the last.

One of the questions she answered concerned the le Touquet agreement on border controls between the UK an France - an odd thing to explore in a campaign Q&A.  What had she talked about with Macron the night before?




The stump mantra is evolving.

"A vote for me and my team is a vote to secure strong and stable leadership through Brexit and beyond.

"A vote for me and my team will strengthen my hand in the Brexit negotiations.

"A vote for me and my team will lock in economic security for our whole country.

"The alternative is to risk making Jeremy Corbyn our prime minister ...

"We must take nothing for granted, leave no stone unturned, no door un-knocked on.

"It is only by working flat-out, every day, from now to 8 June that we can gain the trust of the British people and earn their support on polling day."

She had earlier suggested she wanted a mandate as strong as Macron's, (a 66% vote share seems unlikely in this country), though of course the intended structure of the talks doesn't include country-to-country negotiation.


Labour

John McDonnell attracted criticism yesterday when he responded positively to Andrew Marr's Sunday questions on Karl Marx, but he was also criticised by former Corbyn adviser Richard Murphy for being not left-wing enough.  Murphy is no longer one of the crowd, but lamented McDonnell's restraint.  Don't forget that McDonnell is proud of quoting his record of balancing the books at the GLC under Ken Livingstone.

Labour have adopted a Philip Davies/UKIP policy - ending NHS parking charges.  They feel they have to say how they'll fund it, this time by increasing insurance premium tax on private healthcare insurance.  Last month, a Freedom of Information request by Unison revealed some hospitals are charging staff, including nurses struggling with low wages, nearly £100 a month to park, resulting in reports of nurses having to rush out in between appointments to move their cars and avoid fines.


Jeremy Corbyn is enjoying his first general election as Labour leader, and he wants to "make something very clear":  he intends to remain in the job, even if he doesn't win.  "I was elected leader of this party and I’ll stay leader of this party," Corbyn told BuzzFeed News during his visit to Leamington Spa, referring to himself again as "Monsieur Zen".




News from France



Following news from the Macron camp that there did appear to be a Russian angle to the leaks of emails, and that campaign staff had been subverting the attackers, we were told that Facebook is moving to suppress fake news during the election.  You might wonder how they hope to close certain newspapers down, but...





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Thursday, 4 May 2017

The "There are local votes as well, you know, so let's get them out of the way" election - day 17


Election day (local)

Off to the shops, hoping to return in time for shock announcements from the palace.  Speculation ranged from reduncancies or a pay freeze, through royal stuff like abdications and weddings, to really important possibilities like the first royal Dr Who or...






Discussing mothers and anniversaries with the taxi driver.  It's 41 years just about to the day since I encountered my first computer, and nearly 40 years since he arrived from Pakistan.  He sets a good example - "Will you celebrate?"  "I celebrate every day."

The Stockport Express was an impulse buy - I've been picking up a few examples of the dead tree press recently, just to check what you see if you don't get all your news online.  And that wrap-round!  The only election here today is for the Manchester "metro-"mayor, which doesn't get a mention.  Apart from the promoter's message in tiny light grey letters, the word "Conservative" doesn't appear until page 4.

      

Somehow I didn't get round to voting for HER candidate locally.




On my return I discovered what the royal news is.  Somewhere mid-range on the scale I mentioned above, but not at all surprising.  A boon to the TV news schedules though, filling hours in which they would have had to explain repeatedly why there's nothing about elections on today.  Adam Boulton regaling Sky viewers with observations about the royal black cab hardly excited anyone, but then he has been sounding bored with everything recently.

It's so predictable though, stepping down from public duties to avoid the appalling Trump in October.


Saboteurs department


#MrsME's outpurst yesterday attracted a varety of responses from the other side of the negotiating table.  The EU commission's chief spokesperson Margaritis Schinas said:

"We are not naive. At the moment there’s an election taking place in the UK. People get excited when we have elections. The election in the UK is mainly about Brexit. We here in Brussels are extremely busy with our policy work. We have too much to do on our plate."

In other words... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

EU Council president Donald Tusk, reported to be sombre (he does sombre well), said:

“These negotiations are difficult enough as they are.  If we start arguing before they even begin they will become impossible.

 “The stakes are too high to let our emotions get out of hand because at stake are the daily lives and interests of millions of people on both sides of the Channel. We must keep in mind that in order to succeed we need today discretion, moderation, mutual respect and a maximum of goodwill.”

A measure of patronising disappointment then, but the message is definitely "when you've finished messing about with your election, we've got things to do."
Does anybody remember?  The Tories have MEPs in Brussels and Strasbourg to represent their parts of the UK (the actual tally is UKIP 24, Labour 20, Conservative 19, Green 3, SNP 2, LibDem 1 - use now, while stocks last).  Unfortunately it was one of David Cameron's bright ideas to leave the main conservative grouping in the EU parliament, so #MrsME's contacts over there are more likely to be with the Ordinary People's Party of Slovakia than the parties of Tusk, Juncker and Merkel.


This could be why #MrsME is treading less than carefully in her speeches from the middle of Downing St (or it could be that she just wants to ride roughshod over good sense and maximise the size of her One Nation Party to make a One Party Nation), but her placeman Syed Kamall should at least have briefed her on the European People's Party's Brexit redlines.






Back to electioneering tomorrow!

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The "This election is at the mercy of evil foreigners" election - day 16


Old-fashioned campaigning

Philip Hammond (Conservative, Runnymede and Weybridge, majority 22,134) and David Davis (Conservative, Haltemprice and Howden, majority 16,195) came out with a very familiar pictorial backdrop to illustrate Labour's latest "tax bombshell". You have to get these things in at the right time, before the opposition manifesto is out, to fix the idea of their irresponsibility in people's minds.

Needless to say, some of the policy items which contribute to the "£45 billion black hole" (they could do these events in their sleep) won't actually be in the manifesto when it comes, but the number will stick.  John McDonnell (Labour, Hayes and Harlington, majority 15,700) can splutter about "lies" all he wants, but he'll have to brief his fellow spokespeople better to have a chance of countering these stunts.

Hammond and Davis didn't point to their own record, and many Labourites will probably forget to mention it as well.



Meanwhile, nominations for constituencies in Northern Ireland suggest that the various Unionist parties have agreed a deal to allow a single candidate a free run in each of "their" seats.

And the BBC has been out vox popping again, finding people (8 out of 30 interviewed) who don't know there's an election in June.


The Michel Barnier Show

The EU's lead Brexit negotiator came out for a press conference in Brussels to introduce the documents released by the Commission today which define a negotiating process in two stages.  Pointedly, Barnier only has a mandate for the first stage, plus the responsibility to recommend when "sufficient progress" has been made on stage 1 to proceed to stage 2.

Stage 1 - elements necessary to ensure an orderly withdrawal
  1. Citizens' rights
  2. Financial settlement
  3. Northern Ireland
  4. Governance and dispute resolution
Stage 2 - framework for a future relationship, and transition to it

To these I'd add a Stage 0, in which the two sides will argue about whether this structure is acceptable.  May &co have maintained that the future UK-EU relationship must be negotiated in parallel with the withdrawal agreement if not actually as part of the same process.  Any change would presumably need the approval of the EU Council, so we could see weeks of negotiating time taken up by talks about talks.

Barnier said at least twice that the British referendum had led to ten months of uncertainty, which needs to be resolved as soon as possible.  He warned that leaving the EU would have consequences, in the personal, social, financial, legal etc fields, and that the British "know the complexities".


Issues to be resolved on citizens' rights in the UK and the rest of the EU include the cut-off date (EU wants rights for anybody making the move up to the date of withdrawal;  various earlier dates have been mentioned in the UK), how long the rights should be protected (for life is the EU demand) and which law should enforce them (May &co aren't going to accept the ECJ).  We could end up with some people in the UK who retain free movement rights and EU citizenship protections and some (merely British citizens) who don't.


Barnier denied that the financial settlement being requested is any kind of punishment or "exit tax".  It's just "settling of accounts" based on commitments already made.  He refused to mention any particular figure - not the "up to €60bn" hinted at by Ivan Rogers, or the "maybe €100bn" floated by the Financial Times on Wednesday morning - but insisted that a "methodology" for the calculation must be agreed as a precondition for moving on to any later discussions.


Little was said about the other main objective of stage 1 - Northern Ireland - but Barnier said he would be in Dublin next week.


Several questioners mentioned the leaks from last week's dinner but Barnier talked of that evening being the first time he had "had the honour" of meeting Theresa May and that he had attended with the attention of establishing an entente cordiale.

Sky's commentators on the session included Yanis Varoufakis, who recognised the Brussels technique - you give us everything we want, then we'll talk about what you want - and Gisela Stuart who said there is pressure from countries including Ireland and Holland which would ensure that trade is discussed earlier than the current EU timetable would allow.


The Theresa May show


#MrsME seems to have a cunning plan (thanks to @davidallengreen for the initial idea).
  1. Kick off the Article 50 process at a time of your own choosing.
  2. Call an election at a time of your own choosing.
  3. Invite Juncker and Barnier for dinner to show you're still doing the important things.
  4. Worry them with apparent unpreparedness so that they brief newspapers (this might not have been planned).
  5. Dismiss the leak as "Brussels gossip".
  6. Go to see the queen (those important things again) so the cameras are all following you.
  7. Make a speech complaining about interference in your election (no longer just "gossip" apparently) by an EU negotiator who's carrying on with the process you started at 1.
  8. Wait for the howls of outrage and endless TV repeats which that nice Mr Crosby assured you would come.
Job done!  "Standing up to Brussels" is now established in the public mind along with "Vote for ME and MY candidates".  The cult of personality must be worrying even some Tories.




Saboteurs department

Osborne's at it again.  The Standard looks likely to become required reading for a while at least.



The Economist's man in Berlin, Jeremy Cliffe, who brought us an account of the dinner leak story in the Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung queries the declared purpose of #MrsME's election.  Others have observed that a bigger majority would give her more chance to compromise with those evil, election-fixing foreigners, while yet others fear that all the new Tory MPs will be ardent young Brexiters.



Not everything is going #MrsME's way.  Let's see whether ITV have the guts to go through with this one.




And I'm not alone in putting #MrsME in the saboteur column.


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Letter to the Laura Kuenssberg programme - Farage, Musk and "free speech"

Dear Ms Kuenssberg, I hear from BBC TV and Radio News that you will this morning be giving a platform to Nigel Farage to defend attacks on t...