The Conservatives have today set out plans for a supply side "revolution" in education. Below are the proposals: "Provide over 220,000 new school places. That would meet the demand from every parent who lost their appeal for their first choice school in our most deprived boroughs. "Allow educational charities, philanthropists,... Read more...
It is hard to really get your head around just how complete the failure at the HMRC today is in losing the unencrypted records of 25 million recipients of child benefit. These records include names, addresses, national insurance data and even bank account details. There are a few things to... Read more...
TPA activist Barbara Lockwood, who also organises a local campaign against council tax (known as FACT), has informed us that Norfolk’s county councillors are increasing their pay by a whopping 28%, roughly an extra £2,000 – of your money in their pockets - a year. Just for comparison, the... Read more...
Worth £300 grand of anyone's money We've blogged the state equality industry several times. In particular, we looked at the amalgamation of the Commission for Racial Equality, the Disability Rights Commission, and the Equal Opportunities Commission, to form Labour's new super equality quango- the Commission for Equality and Human Rights... Read more...
Junk bonds at least give you a nice certificate to hang on the wall So following Darling's statement on Northern Rock this afternoon, are we any the wiser?Not really- "it would be quite wrong to dismiss any option now without proper consideration as some suggest," doesn't really tell us anything.More... Read more...
Liam Byrne, Minister for the West Midlands, has revealed plans for a major new Birmingham acting school according to a report in the Birmingham Post today. Negotiations are underway regarding the ‘Brit School’, a school with an ‘arts led curriculum’ for 950 students aged 14 to 19, and designed... Read more...
BBC correspondent doubts We currently spend some £26bn pa on incapacity, disability and injury benefits. We have 2.7m people of working age drawing IB.Everybody agrees* that many recipients are claiming for pretty dubious reasons (eg see this blog), and this morning we get some more detail: "Almost two thousand people... Read more...
£25 grand brekkie In the news this week:Fry up costs us £25,000- "When Denis Breading went for a fried breakfast at his work canteen it was meant to be a short break before getting on with his job. Instead he has been suspended for the past six weeks during an... Read more...
The draft 2008 Budget passed the Italian Senate yesterday. The Budget sets out plans to lower housing taxes, while at the same time the main rate of corporation tax will fall from 33 per cent to 27.5 per cent. The main rate of corporation tax does not include regional... Read more...
As offers to buy Northern Rock come in, a key question for taxpayers is how to minimise our losses from the debacle. This is a lengthy blog, but in summary we conclude: Total taxpayer exposure is already £35-40bn (loans plus deposit guarantees) Underlying security is questionable NR shareholders are seeking... Read more...
No sooner have we praised Coventry City Council leader Ken Taylor for pushing to keep the rise in councillors’ allowances below inflation, than a Freedom of Information response reveals that the council have spent over £50,000 in travel over the last year. The amount, revealed by the West Midlands... Read more...
Yesterday the Telegraph reported that police complaints are at record highs. That isn't much of a surprise and the police themselves saw it coming. In May the Police Federation warned that targets and other symptoms of political management were turning people off the police force: "A spokesman for the federation... Read more...
This week, in the wake of the Public Sector Rich List and our growing grassroots campaigns, two new organisers have stepped forward looking to set up TaxPayers’ Alliance branches. The first is Shipley MP Philip Davies. He contacted me a week ago volunteering to become an organiser to help... Read more...
Booming independent schools You see it's like this- when customers call the shots, suppliers have to provide what they want.Hence the current moves by independent schools to abandon the government's increasingly whacky National Curriculum and implement one based on what parents want. For primary level pupils this would include more... Read more...
Sandwell Council will be opening its doors on 1st December in the hope of luring a whole new crop of bureaucrats to their ranks. The date for their careers event is advertised in the Halesowen News, where deputy council leader Pauline Hilton also boasts: "As the largest employer... Read more...
Our campaign director Mark Wallace noticed this from the BBC Website: “A panel which reviews councillors' allowances in Lancashire is looking for two new people to sit on its board. The independent remuneration panel monitors Lancaster City Council's members' allowance scheme and makes recommendations on potential changes. ... Read more...
We investigate Government Shopping The Simple Shopper features regularly on BOM. Every year his antics cost us taxpayers billions. Not only that, he often fails to bring home the actual overpriced bacon at all. From PFI, to GPs' contracts, to military kit, to IT systems, to post-it notes, the Shopper... Read more...
A recent National Audit Office report into sustainable employment reveals the inadequacy of the government’s efforts to keep people off welfare. A key finding is that the the proportion of people moving repeatedly between work and the dole queue has barely changed since the early 1980’s. More than a... Read more...
The Conservative government in Canada has just delivered a budget which cuts both personal and business taxes. Key changes include: The federal corporation tax will fall from 22.1 per cent to 15 per cent by 2012. The small business corporation tax will fall to 11 per cent from... Read more...
It’s not a good week for NHS Trusts. Yesterday the 5 Boroughs Partnership NHS Trust disclosed they spent £6,000 of taxpayers’ money on 1500 annual reports of which only 40 were distributed to residents in the North West. Today the East London NHS Foundation Trust is in our sights because... Read more...
The Conservatives have today laid out their new plans for giving people direct democratic control of Council Tax rises. The proposal is that any Council wishing to raise Council Tax by more than a nationally determined threshold would have to hold a referendum to get the electorate's permission to do... Read more...
Ken Taylor, the Conservative leader of Coventry City Council should be applauded for his comments in the Coventry Telegraph, stating that he will urge his group to reject the above-inflation pay increases recommended by an outside panel. Many general council staff are still in dispute over single-status pay packages,... Read more...
In a response to a tip off from a TPA activist, I issued a Freedom of Information request to the 5 Boroughs Partnership NHS Trust in the North West. The issue was over their annual report, not so much the content of the report itself, but the brochure produced at... Read more...
Suddenly I feel unwell Lifelong union man Alan Johnson was put into the Department of Health for one reason and one reason only: to buy off the fractious strike-minded NHS unions after the disastrous regime of Patricia Hewitt.Obviously, your traditional union buy-off simply comprises dishing out taxpayers' money in the... Read more...