Well done to our superstar in the West Midlands, Russell Booth. He has recruited 547 new supporters for us. You can see just a few of the many, many sign-up forms Russell sent us in the photo below. It’s supporters like Russell who keep the grassroots engines turning over,... Read more...
The Ministry of Defence have announced a 15-year contract worth £230 million a year with the ship builder BVT Surface Fleet Ltd. The contract is designed to provide the company with a reliable income after the current contract to build two new aircraft carriers is completed. Most procurement processes... Read more...
The Government’s Air Passenger Duty (APD), introduced in 2006, is once again in the headlines for all the wrong reasons. In times of recession the average taxpayer would expect any reasonable Government to encourage consumption. But it is becoming increasingly clear that the Government’s response to the downturn is anything... Read more...
They may well be tempted to shrug their shoulders and blame the chaos caused by the elected mayor fiasco, but Stoke-on-Trent City Council have experienced a rise in complaints this year with regards to the services they provide. Perhaps more shockingly, this disaster-prone council have also seen a drop in... Read more...
This week we see more local government jobs from the table on the right and, to go with it, the eye watering news that government revenues are falling. Again, the government are squeezing the productive sector of the economy to subsidise the government sector at an ever higher cost. Our non-job... Read more...
Three quite different news stories, one all-too-common theme: the absence of proper scrutiny in some processes of UK governance. Of course MPs, Lords, journalists, the public, civil servants and campaign groups all subject the Government to the most critical scrutiny, but the problem that unites the three stories is the... Read more...
As a successful businessman Digby Jones should know a thing or two about management. A former GOAT – part of Labour’s Government of All Talents – Lord Jones recalled on his time in Whitehall by saying that some ministers were not fit to govern. After Jacqui Smith’s confession that she... Read more...
The Building Colleges for the Future programme has been consistently panned for its spiralling cost and insufficient management. Now a report by the Innovation, Universities, Science and Skills Select Committee has joined in to heavily criticise the budgeting and project monitoring of the LSC and its now defunct parent,... Read more...
Great news for Woverhampton residents as the authority publishes a draft budget indicating that there will be a 0% rise in council tax next year for the city’s 136,000 homes (E&S). Though they’re keen to emphasise that this is an ‘aspiration’ and a ‘target’ they have put in place... Read more...
Yesterday, Tessa Jowell, the Cabinet Office Minister, announced in a statement to the house that Phase 2 of SCOPE, the Governments new I.T system, is to be scrapped at the cost of £24m to the taxpayer. The system was an information technology programme intended to improve “the way sensitive information... Read more...
Yesterday, I learned that the government is now using taxpayers’ money to supply methadone to prisoners in the UK. That’s £4million of our money to get prisoners high. This has to top the list as one of the most appalling ways to waste taxpayers’ money. It’s such... Read more...
After calling for ‘wage restraint’ at the BBC, it has been revealed that the chairman of the BBC Trust, Sir Michael Lyons, earns £213,000. This represents a 33% pay rise from last year and places him comfortably in the top 0.6% of earners in the UK. Lucky him. The only problem:... Read more...
For some reason the Department for Transport's offical vid forgot to ask him about the outrageous costs A few days ago, Transport Minister Sadiq Kahn visited a field in Buckinghamshire where the M25 is being widened. Standing in front of the DfT's corporate banner, he said: "Today marks a major... Read more...
The Charity Comission, which is meant to have the kind mission of assisting good causes, has gone a bit Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde all of a sudden. Its new, aggressive drive against independent schools threatens to make private education more elitist and place an unsustainable burden on the state education... Read more...
Today’s Times carries a must-read account of the difficulty that can be encountered when pursuing Freedom of Information (FoI) requests. Martin Sixsmith, a former senior Civil Servant, was ousted from Whitehall after being blamed for the misbehaviour of Stephen Byers and his spin doctor. Keen to find out who had... Read more...
Many thanks to the activists and members of the public who supported the WMTPA in Birmingham on Saturday! Luckily the weather held out just long enough for us to collect some signatures and hand out many leaflets to residents, visitors and shoppers from our pitch in Victoria Square! Read more...
City AM reported this morning that McDonalds is joining the growing ranks of firms leaving the country. They are relocating their European headquarters to Geneva from Finchley in North London. As the newspaper shows in a graphic, they join WPP Group plc, Henderson Global Investors and Shire that have left for... Read more...
"Our aim is to spend more on what works, and end funding for what doesn't." The Conservative party's International Development green paper has a lot to commend it (to read in full, click here). An acknowledgement that economic growth is vital to broader social improvement is married to an appreciation... Read more...
The business of Government, just like any other, often takes people out of the office. Whether for a meeting or an event, civil servants and ministers frequently have to travel, and sometimes a taxi or chauffeured car is the most appropriate way. But in 2008, 19 (of the 20) Government... Read more...
Today the Qualifications and Curriculum Authority have stated their intention to introduce a new ‘Use of Mathematics’ A-Level by September 2011. In response to this, dozens of academics have signed a petition denouncing this new A-level and it seems they are not alone in their objections. Educators for Reform, a... Read more...
Walsall Council will look to the private sector for guidance after the number of sick days taken by employees rises 13,000 on last year, despite the fact they have fewer staff on payroll. The Express & Star revealed that staff at the authority took 169,493 days off between them... Read more...
More evidence has emerged today of the popularity of cuts in the level of public spending, from the most unlikely source: Harriet Harman. New research by Guido Fawkes suggests that the public are not only enthusiastic for tax cuts, they are actively in favour of lower spending. Guido ran... Read more...
It’s unlikely many are shocked by today’s news that the Arts Council have granted The Public gallery in West Bromwich the £3million it all but promised, “subject to business plans”, as a sort of sorry when it ‘reluctantly’ withdrew from bankrolling the project in January this year. Now the... Read more...
Trevor Phillips, the Chairman of the government’s Equality and Human Rights Commission, was yesterday in the dock charged with discrimination by a member of his own staff. Irish-born Brid Johal (an aide to the aide of Phillips) accused the Chairman of over-looking her for promotion as a result of her... Read more...