Vince Cable lined up as a “bookend” for the Prime Minister at his question time today. One had a feeling, then, that university funding would be high on the agenda. And so it was.
In the first section of Q&A (with Ed Miliband) I think Miliband edged a points win – perhaps in decimal places. A “Rizla” win – a fag paper’s width between them.
Cameron failed to pick up Miliband on some obvious points. The opposition leader referred to English students likely to have the “highest tuition fees” in the world. But presumably that involves a comparison with tuition fees paid during study in other countries – rather than after graduation as in the case of the government’s proposals, which suggest “graduate contributions” rather than fees.
Miliband also referred to the system causing debt for graduates, but the system really can’t be described as instilling “debt” in the conventional sense. Cameron missed that one also.
In fact, Cameron only seemed to be warming up with Miliband but went on to score some corkers when Labour backbenchers asked further university funding questions.
Quite rightly Miliband highlighted the “80% cut” figure. He seemed more on top of his game this week and made an excellent joke:
Things are so bad that the hon. Member for Birmingham, Yardley (John Hemming) is offering his own unique solution to the votes tomorrow. He says that if you run quickly, you can vote both ways. I have to say that if the Kremlin were spying on the Liberal Democrats, we would know why: they want a bit of light relief.
Miliband quoted back David Davis on social mobility and the university funding plans. He also quoted back Cameron from last week “not so much waving but drowning”.
Cameron then gained a bit of composure with this rally (yes, it’s like tennis):
We are introducing a situation where nobody pays fees up front, including part-time students—which is 40% of students—and nobody pays anything back until they are earning £21,000. Under the new system, everyone will pay back less than they pay under the current system—They will pay back less every month; that is the case. The poorest will pay less, the richest will pay more. It is a progressive system, but the right hon. Gentleman has not got the courage of his convictions to back it.
We’re now getting an obligatory minimum of four mentions of the “blank sheet of paper” by David Cameron at each Prime Minister’s Questions session. I may be firing off prematurely, but Ed “Blank sheet” Miliband struggled today. Given the Office for Budget Responsibility forecast was generally sanguine, he had weak material to play with. But one wonders: who is he trying to kid?
Ed Miliband pointed out that the OBR say that unemployment will rise next year. This is because they’ve reduced their forecast for unemployment this year and left next year as it was. They’ve reduced the forecast of …
By Paul Walter
| Thu 25th November 2010 - 10:49 pm
There were signs this week that Prime Minister’s Questions was getting serious and considered at long last.
Ed Miliband asked a very anorakky question about the government taking away “all the funding from the highly successful school sport partnerships”
There followed an almost scholarly exchange of statistics which left me none the wiser. Miliband’s stats said Labour improved school sports. Cameron’s said they ruined it. Was Miliband right? Was Cameron right? It was beyond me. Except I did notice that Cameron seemed to be almost exclusively quoting figures on “competitive sports”. Ah. The old Tory Daily Mail rant. “Schools don’t do races …
What a relief! For a change, Prime Minister’s Questions gave more cause for Tories to be uneasy than it did for LibDems. Don’t get me wrong, LibDems care passionately about frontline policing. Of course they do. But the Tories tend to see it as more of a cojones (or should I invent the adjective “cojonal” here?) measurement issue – it’s closer to the nerve with them. So I think there must have been a lot of uncomfortable shifting around on the benches behind David Cameron today. “Squeaky bum time”, as Sir Alex might put it.
There’s an interesting short video from the BBC’s Politics Show South East, featuring the new Liberal Democrat MP for Eastbourne, Stephen Lloyd.
“Every single decision I take goes through the prism of Eastbourne,” says Stephen, as he shares his thoughts on coalition government and tuition fees.
You can also read about a typical Westminster work day for Stephen:
His Wednesday starts at 9 am with a two-hour long Work and Pensions select committee.
He goes straight from there to Prime Minister’s Questions and the big topic of debate is the government’s decision to allow universities to charge tuition fees of up to £9,000.
Dizzy Thinks has been on the case again about the costs run by Early Day Motions in Parliament. As he delicately puts it:
Yes, we really do have to spend £150K alone on the salary, pension and NI contributions for the poor sods that have to sort out the latest self-congratulatory bollocks that our MPs want to spout off fruitlessly about.
The combination of cost and triviality of many EDMs has caused some people to call for their abolition. I think this is going too far, as some EDMs do provide a useful mechanism, as a focus for external campaign groups, …
Rarely, both the Prime Minister and the Opposition leader had reason to be absent from Prime Minister’s Questions today. So it was dear Harriet versus the Cleggster.
As an added twist, it turned into a “Higher Education Special”, in part spurred by the student demonstrations outside parliament as the session was unfolding. There were no less than ten questions on higher education. My, the Labour whips had been busy. Sadly this meant less time for the constituency issues often raised by MPs.
I witnessed the session live via Twitter, where Nick Clegg received a rather jaundiced reception – to put it mildly. When I look back on the video, it seems to me that Nick Clegg did a remarkably good job of what was probably the most difficult parliamentary session of his career. Indeed, he looked terrified beforehand, as Northern Irish questions overan.
Harman started by asking how Clegg’s April pledge to end university tuition fees was going.
Nick Clegg replied that:
..we have stuck to our wider ambition to make sure that going to university is done in a progressive way, so that people who are currently discouraged from going to university—bright people from poor backgrounds, who are discouraged by the system that we inherited from the right hon. and learned Lady’s Government—are able to do so. That is why our policy is more progressive than hers.
Harman said he hoped he’d tell that to the protestors outside and quoted him saying that fees of £7000 would be a “disaster” – so how would he describe fees of £9,000?
Nick Clegg said that there was a consensus that graduates should pay some contribution and added:
The proposals that we have put forward will mean that those who earn the least will pay much less than they do at the moment—while those who earn the most will pay over the odds to provide a subsidy to allow people from poor backgrounds to go to university—and will, for the first time, end the discrimination against the 40% of people in our universities who are part-time students, who were so shamefully treated by her Government.
Harman, rightly, said that none of the Labour party agree with fees of £9000 a year. I think Harman was spot on when she said that this is not about the deficit. It will be cleared by the time the new tuition fees scheme starts. It’s about the proportion of graduate (what she described wrongly as “student”) funding versus public funding. Clegg was rather disingenuous when he referred to a consensus that graduates should pay “some” contribution. The government plans implies 100% graduate funding in some cases and 80-90% graduate funding in many cases. That’s all but getting rid of public funding.
Harman threw an attempted joke in: “We all know what it is like, Mr Speaker. You are at Freshers’ week. You meet up with a dodgy bloke and you do things that you regret. Is not the truth of it that the Deputy Prime Minister has been led astray by the Tories?”
We all know what that is like do we, Hattie? Ummmm let me think. I didn’t actually meet any dodgy blokes in Freshers’ Week, personally. I spent most of my entire year at University trying to find a dodgy woman but, sadly, failed.
Clegg then had an excellent riposte to Harman’s general thrust:
I know that the right hon. and learned Lady now thinks that she can reposition the Labour party as the champion of students, but let us remember the Labour party’s record: against tuition fees in 1997, but introduced them a few months later; against top-up fees in the manifesto in 2001, then introduced top-up fees. Then Labour set up the Browne review, which it is now trashing, and now the Labour party has a policy to tax graduates that half the Front-Bench team does not even believe in. Maybe she will go out to the students who are protesting outside now and explain what on earth her policy is.
All in all, I thought Clegg did an excellent job of outlining the fairness of the coalition’s plan while obviously being on the back foot, due to going back on the promise.
But an emailer to BBC Live called Robert Taylor put it very well: “Nick Clegg is not breaking his promise to the electorate regarding tuition fees; the LibDems did NOT win the election – had they done so they would not have increased the fees thereby keeping their promise.”
Quite frankly, whatever Nick Clegg does or says on this topic, people will always associate him and the Liberal Democrats with “breaking their promise on tuition fees”.
We can argue until we’re blue in the face that it was a daft promise to make in the first place, that Labour introduced tuition fees and increased them, that politics is the art of the possible, that the government plan is progressive and (as John Hemming has ingeniously put it) “a graduate tax in all but name”.
But, whatever we do or say, still the Tuition Fees Albatross will remain around our necks and that of Nick Clegg in particular for at least a generation. So we need to get used to that.
And for Monty Python fans: no, it doesn’t come with any wafers.
Since so many of us have fought elections against extremely well-funded opposition candidates, Liberal Democrats are naturally and rightly exercised by the matter of campaign finance. Though Labour made some modest progress with its Political Parties, Elections and Referendums (PPERA) Act, back in 2000, the Act’s focus was transparency, rather than regulation.
When I chaired the party’s policy group on Better Governance in 2007, we set out an objective that no donor should be able to buy influence in the political process, and no party should be able to buy elections. This was the approach we took in the cross-party talks …
“Appalled and embarrassed” – that is how Liberal Democrat peer and Constitutional Affairs Spokesperson Paul Tyler described his reaction to the attitude and behaviour of some members of the House of Lords:
I have been appalled and embarrassed by the number of Peers, even including a few former Cabinet Ministers, who use the place as a convenient private club, with good parking and subsidised catering. They never speak or even ask a question, let alone contribute to a debate.
His comments were made when discussing the publication of the Consultation on Members Leaving the House, which looked as the views of peers as part of a review to identify options for allowing people to leave the House of Lords other than through death or misconduct.
As Paul pointed out, with the use of block capitals, underlining and an exclamation mark, there are 79 peers who did not turn up (let alone speak or vote) even once in the 2009-2010 Parliamentary session. There are some very rare cases where long-term non-attendance in justifiable, and in the past some peers have spoken out over the lack of an option to retire if their health is no longer up to attending. Yet the overall picture, especially when you extend the figures to include peers who almost never turn up or who turn up but do not participate, is of large numbers who do not carry out the role of being a Parliamentarian in even the most minimally reasonable way.
There are also practical problems about the sheer size of the Lords, as Paul also commented,
The case for reducing the number of Peers is compelling: increasing costs, not enough room for all to get into the Chamber or have desks, excessive size compared with the Commons and (most persuasively) “damage to the credibility of the House occasioned by the large number of members who take no active part in proceedings.”
Lovely dining club – with a Parliament attached
So with Lords reform in the air and promised in the Coalition agreement, you might expect peers to be thinking sensibly about how to leave behind the idea that the upper house is a lovely dining club, great car park and a mark of social distinction – with a Parliament attached.
Alas, not everyone – for the suggestions made by some of Paul’s fellow peers show how out of touch many of them are with the idea that Parliament is a place to work on holding the government to account and governing the country:
In the circumstances I cannot take seriously some of the suggested remedies to this serial non-attendance. Giving retiring Peers “dining rights”, let alone offering the opportunity to speak but not vote, seems totally inappropriate. As for the idea that they should be awarded an honour “on the lines of the armed services’ Long Service, Good Conduct medal”, or that their “life peerage might be converted into a hereditary peerage”, I can only suppose that somebody was taking the mickey.
Yes really: there was the suggestion that the ‘reward’ for not turning up and doing a job in the Lords should be to be given a medal. The Order of the Free Car Park perhaps?
Paul’s pugnacious attitude towards the views of other members of the Lords is very welcome, especially as there is a very strong rearguard action being fought by many members of the Lords against having democracy in the Lords. Or if there really must be democracy having it in as weak and diluted a form as possible – and certainly not moving any time soon to the idea that all members of the Lords should have to do a job of work there.
The political debate within Parliament and within the coalition on this is finely balanced at the moment. It may yet tip either way, as the report last week in the The Times illustrated when it talked of how:
A 300-strong mini Senate would replace the House of Lords under plans being drawn up by Nick Clegg. However, the Deputy Prime Minister is facing setbacks as he tries to deliver constitutional reform. He is having to surrender the Liberal Democrat ambition of a wholly elected Upper House amid stiff resistance from peers in all parties and will struggle to ensure that a reformed second chamber will be mainly elected.
Superficially that sounds a bad news story (and contrasts with the tone of The Times in August – “Absent peers face sack … The least active and least effective peers could be ejected at the end of each Parliament”). However a much smaller house would also up the pressure to only have minimal ‘grandfathering’ – that is letting existing members of the Lords continue in place without having to face elections – as otherwise it’d be a house dominated by the unelected.
As on so many other issues in the Coalition, it is not a simple case of Lib Dems versus Conservatives, because Cameron has no great love of many of the ranks of the Tory peers. In this case it is more a case of MPs versus peers, with honourable exceptions on the peers front including many Lib Dems such as Paul Tyler.
People such as Paul deserve our full support in those debates.
In recent months, LDV has been bringing its readers copies of our new MPs’ and Peers’ first words in Parliament, so that we can read what is being said and respond. You can find all of the speeches in this category with this link. Last week, Baron Allan of Hallam, of Ecclesall in the County of South Yorkshire (Richard Allan) made his maiden speech in the House of Lords, during a debate on the Comprehensive Spending Review. His words are reproduced below.
My Lords, I thank all those officials and Members who have helped our class of 2010
The Australian Parliament building in Canberra is a gem of democratic political architecture. Australia’s capital city was facing the need to expand and replace its existing Parliament building. But where to put the new one? The old one had deliberately been placed at the foot of the hill in Canberra, so that politicians would not be looking down on the public. Now the only suitable free space left was on top of that hill. The solution was clever: chop the top off the hill, build the new Parliament and then stick the top of the hill back on top of …
Ed Miliband had an unusually deep voice at Prime Minister’s Questions today. I don’t know whether he had a cold, or perhaps he’d been gargling with liquid chocolate on the advice of his spin doctors. But it sounded as though he could do a passable Barry White voiceover. He started in a very subdued way about “Friends of Yemen” and I was expecting the Speaker to turn down the lights and play “I’m Gonna Love You Just A Little More” in the background.
Ed Miliband’s main point was about a breakage of trust based on tuition fees. He talked about anger in “Sheffield, Twickenham and Eastleigh” over the betrayal of solemn promises made to vote against increases in tuition fees. A good point – which is difficult, if not impossible, to answer.
These days, Ed Miliband is getting a lot of advice on how to deal with Prime Minister’s Questions. A leaked memo advised him to “get to your feet looking as though you are seizing on something new”, and to ensure that he has a “cheer line” so his speech can be “clipped by the broadcasters”.
David Cameron, of course, reminded Ed Miliband of this advice today. But the best advice came in the form of an example of excellent questioning by Bob Russell, Liberal Democrat MP for Colchester.
In the last question today, Bob referred to the “fun and games” that …
Yesterday in Parliament Adrian Sanders and 22 Conservative MPs voted to reduce the maximum number of ministers allowed in the Commons in line with the forthcoming reduction in the number of MPs:
If the number of constituencies in the United Kingdom decreases below 650, the limit on the number of holders of Ministerial offices entitled to sit and vote in the House of Commons referred to in section 2(1) must be decreased by at least a proportionate amount.
Reducing the number of ministers is something I’ve supported …
Conservative MP Nadine Dorries says her blog was ‘70% fiction’ – The Guardian. Surely the weirdest successful defence against expense allegations we’ll see.
It’s not unusual for me to be less than impressed with Parliamentary debates on election law matters as so many of those deciding on what legislation should say have so many large gaps in their own knowledge. It’s particularly galling where the subject under debate is something piloted in the long-running series of electoral pilots under Tony Blair – because you get MPs who voted to spend money on the pilots then, a few years later, debating the same topics without any apparent knowledge that the pilots took place or what lessons were learnt from them.
Unlike last week, when it took me several days to work it out, I could work out what Ed Miliband was trying to do at Prime Minister’s Questions today. Though she is happily on the road to recovery in hospital, the Labour leader skilfully raised the political spectre of Maggie T.
Miliband started by quoting the Justice Secretary, Ken Clarke, about the risk of a “double dip recession”. He asked the PM if Clarke was right – “yes or no?” (which is rapidly turning into Miliband-E’s catchphrase). Cameron very effectively batted that one away by asking Miliband to read out the whole quote from Clarke, which makes clear he was talking about a world recession.
For a moment, it was as if the bottom had fallen out of Miliband’s world just after Cameron had accused him of not having “bottom”). A bit like Enfield and Whitehouse’s characters on Dragon’s Den when one of the dragons asks them a simple but devastating question like “Who is going to buy your pussy cruncher when everyone likes pussies?” and then there is a terrified silence while the two pussy cruncher salesmen start involuntarily pouring perspiration from beneath their armpits. They don’t have an answer.
Well, the only answer Miliband had for Cameron was to ask the same question again. He needed time to think.
Ed Miliband made a reasonably good start at Prime Minister’s questions today. However, ultimately he failed to score a substantive point against David Cameron. Indeed, Ed Miliband painted himself into a corner. He is now basically defending the retention of child benefit for the top 15% earners in the country. Since Osborne’s breakfast announcement of the child benefit changes, up until now, Labour have avoided this stance.
Miliband started his questioning today focusing on the unfairness for families with one earner over £43K losing child benefit against families with two earners of £40K keeping their child benefit. However, he lost this …
The party has just issued the text of Vince Cable’s statement to the House of Commons, responding to the publication today of The Browne Report on higher education and student funding in England.
“With permission Mr Speaker, I would like to make a statement on the future funding of higher education and student finance, in the light of the report published today of Lord Browne’s independent inquiry.
Lord Browne was asked to undertake his review in November last year. The review was set up by Labour on a cross-party basis, and that is how we want to proceed.
In recent months, LDV has been bringing its readers copies of our new MPs’ and Peers’ first words in Parliament, so that we can read what is being said and respond. You can find all of the speeches in this category with this link. Today, Baroness Benjamin, of Beckenham in the County of Kent, made her maiden speech in the House of Lords, during a debate on the role of the charitable sector in strengthening civil society. Her words are reproduced below.
My Lords, it is an honour and a privilege to address this House for the first time, in a debate that is very close to my heart—I thank the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, for initiating it. I also thank all noble Lords. It is an honour to sit with you in this House.
My family motto is, “Who would have thought?”, because you never know where life’s twists and turns will take you. Mine have taken me on a spiritual journey. I was born in Trinidad and came to Britain as a 10 year-old child 50 years ago. I was spat on and told to go back to where I came from, but how differently things have turned out. I believe that I am now the first Trinidadian female Peer and I follow humbly in the pioneering footsteps of another “Trini”, the late Lord Learie Constantine. I will always remember that memorable day when I was introduced to the House, my family watching over me. I thank my sponsors for being part of that day—my noble friend Lady Scott, and my noble friend Lord Dholakia for his continued support and guidance. I thank noble Lords for welcoming me with such warmth and affection and the numerous members of staff who work so diligently and have taken care of me so efficiently.
I love being part of this establishment, and as I wander round the maze of corridors, soaking up the rich symbolism, I think to myself, surely I have reached the summit of life’s mountain, the zenith of a career stretching over four decades. Like the coat worn by the Garter King of Arms, my life has been a rich tapestry of experiences which have led me to a lifelong mission of ensuring that children’s well-being is at the heart of society’s thinking. That has not always been easy but my philosophy is to keep smiling and never give up. Like other noble Lords I have had to face adversities, but I have used them to make me stronger and more resolute.
The appointments of various LibDem MPs to be PPS to ministers have been rather low-profile, so in case you have missed any here is the complete list:
Gordon Birtwistle – PPS to Danny Alexander
Mike Crockart – PPS to Michael Moore
Duncan Hames – PPS to Sarah Teather
Jo Swinson – PPS to Vince Cable
Jenny Willott – PPS to Chris Huhne
and in addition Norman Lamb as Chief Parliamentary and Political Adviser to Nick Clegg is also his PPS.
The coalition government is pledged to introducing a package of reforms to our electoral system, including extending it to cover the House of Lords. Quite what the impact of these changes will be is an issue addressed in the Litmus newspaper jointly produced by Lib Dem Voice, Left Foot Forward and Conservative Home. Here is my piece on the topic, and you can read the full newspaper, including the other pieces on this topic from Lord Norton and Will Straw, either via the hard copies in conference registration packs or online at www.litmustest.org.
The present House of Lords model gives a seat in Parliament for life without having to face any election. We need constitutional reform and an electoral system that reduces the number of safe seats, argues Dr Mark Pack.
The Commons public administration committee, chaired by Conservative MP Bernard Jenkin, has launched an inquiry into “What ministers do?”
The MPs are investigating whether there are too many ministers, what they actually do, whether they should be appointed from Parliament or outside and the impact that the number of ministers has on the public purse and effective government if the number of MPs is cut from 650 to 600.
Mr Jenkin added: “Clearly if the House of Commons gets smaller and the number of paid ministers increases or stays the same, it means that
Last week Malcolm Jack, the Clerk of the House of Commons, got a little flurry of media coverage for his evidence before a Parliamentary committee considering the proposed legislation for fixed-term Parliaments. “Parts of the government’s plans to bring in fixed-term parliaments are vulnerable to legal challenge” was how the BBC reported it.
It is understandable why that got the headlines, but lurking in the detail are important questions about how Parliament operates and whether its administration is competent. Jack’s evidence, and concerns about the legislation, really fall into three parts.
First, as might be expected from an official whose …
NickClegg.com has noted the significance of today’s legislation to establish the principle of fixed-term parliaments, removing from Prime Ministerial whim the timing of future general elections:
“Establishing parliaments of fixed-terms is a straightforward, but fundamental, change in our politics. It is a simple constitutional innovation, but one that will have a profound effect.”
Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg has pledged the introduction of a five year fixed term parliaments will have a “profound effect” and lead to greater stability in the political system.
The Fixed term Parliaments Bill faces its second reading in the House of Commons this afternoon.
Due to the sad and sudden illness of David Cameron’s father, Prime Minister’s Questions had an unexpected, almost surreal, feel to them. Instead of Cameron v Harman it was back to where we were on 21st July: Clegg v Straw.
Adding to the sombre mode, Nick Clegg read out a list of no less than a dozen servicemen who have been killed over the summer, plus a doctor and a policeman who have also perished in the war zone.
The Speaker asked for “pithy” responses from the front bench. This surely could not have been a reference to the Deputy Prime …
Plans to change the way MPs are elected have cleared the first Commons hurdle. A bill introducing a referendum on changing the voting system, changes to constituency boundaries and fewer MPs, was backed by 328 votes to 269.
Labour says the changes would affect Labour-supporting areas and said the bill was “political skulduggery”. Tory opponents of the referendum said it could cost £100m but deputy PM Nick Clegg said it would restore “people’s faith in the way they elect their MPs”.
Despite criticism, the bill passed with a majority of 59 and a Labour bid to kill it off
Welcome to a series where old posts are revived for a second outing for reasons such as their subject has become topical again, they have aged well but were first posted when the site’s readership was only a tenth or less of what it is currently or they got published and the site crashed, hiding the finest words of wisdom behind an incomprehensible error message.
I was one of the contributors to Great Liberal Speeches. Here is my introduction to the selected speech from George Tierney, followed by the speech itself. The issues are arguments are still very pertinent …
The last couple of months saw a battle emerging between science geek MP Julian Huppert and homeopathy fan David Tredinnick, and one of the battlegrounds was the Early Day Motion – those petitions that only MPs can start or sign.
Five times, David Tredinnick put down an EDM such as 284 (BMA ANNUAL REPRESENTATIVE MEETING MOTIONS ON HOMEOPATHY) or 285 (EFFECT OF HOMEOPATHIC REMEDIES ON BREAST CANCER CELLS), in each case singing the praises of homeopathy or lauding some study that generated a positive result. Five times Julian Huppert launched an amendment to the EDM pointing out what he saw …
Simon McGrath This seems a surprising decsion. The problem in the London housing markets is not ' deevlopers arent building affordable homes' is that noone is building homes ...
Jana “ and argued that local people deserve to be able to afford to live in the communities they grew up in.”
So, is the plan that local people who ‘grew up...
Peter Martin @ Paul R ,
The EU Treaties may not explicitly use the term "political union," but they legally codify the core objectives of "ever closer union among the pe...
Peter Martin Andy Burnham does seem to have a knack of choosing constituencies which don't have a railway station -at least not for their major town. Neither Ashton-in-Maker...
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Family: Scene Through the Eye of a Lens
Brexit: The Uncivil War - the TV drama with Benedict Cumberbatch
A power vacuum?
I am liberal, woke and proud of it. We should all accept such descriptions with pride
Simon McGrath 
Jana 
Peter Martin 