With the new practice of trailing the Queen's Speech in advance, and testing the water on various proposals, people could perhaps be forgiven for not getting as excited as is traditional about the Bills laid out yesterday. After all, the issues are all fairly recognisable and much-debated already, agree with... Read more...
It’s that time again, the weekly painful trawl through the pages of the Guardian Society jobs section to find yet more cringe-worthy jobs you couldn’t make up but ones that you certainly are paying for. We look this week to North Norfolk District Council, spending your money on a ‘County... Read more...
It’s been an exciting two days for the TPA grassroots campaign. Yesterday activists from Hatfield, St. Albans and Stevenage got together for another meeting to organise yet more campaign activities in Hertfordshire. They have already handed out well over 400 leaflets in a month, with more on their way. If... Read more...
Yesterday’s Shropshire Star reported some profligate spending of the most ridiculous kind by Shropshire County Council. The council, who tender out contracts to taxi firms taking local children to and from school, have been paying for a taxi to travel around 600 miles per week in order to take... Read more...
Comrades- we will build ten million more Labour has spent billions of our cash on increasing the quantity of state education.In 2006-07 it spent £74bn, more than double the £36.4bn spent ten years ago (a 60% increase in real terms). And that leaves out of account the much greater debts... Read more...
Oh Deer… This is an actual job from the Scottish ‘Government’: “Deer Officer £21,292 - £28,520 This post is responsible for delivering Deer Commission for Scotland (DCS) work across the Central Belt, the Borders, Dumfries and Galloway, and Fife, and for helping to develop new policy,... Read more...
One of the main reasons taxpayers are opposed to identity cards is the sheer cost of them and the potential spiralling cost to administer a scheme that may well not work as well as the politicians foresee. Is it any wonder we suspect the costs will grow when the... Read more...
Hard-working activists in Hertfordshire have dug up some superb taxpayer-funded non-jobs in the area. Just a few from their campaign site include: £42,000 for a ‘Head of Community Empowerment’ at the Watford Community Housing Trust. The job description reads: “You will work with our tenant and leaseholder members... Read more...
Residents in Fenton, Stoke-On-Trent, have been wondering (rightly) what on earth they pay their council taxes for as they now have to drag their heavy wheelie bins to end of the uneven and cobbled alley behind their houses as the council has changed its collection policy (The Sentinel). One... Read more...
Congratulations to Peter Webb and the South West Surrey TPA branch. TPA South West Surrey Organiser Peter Webb hit the front page of the Surrey Times with comment on his local MP’s expenses. This is how our branches are expanding their campaigns. Peter has been working to recruit taxpayers... Read more...
The Adam Smith Institute have published an excellent study (PDF) on the vitally important subject of welfare reform. It shows how the US has managed to fight poverty by getting people into work. In stark contrast, Britain's over-complicated welfare system masks incentives and tries to spend the poor out of... Read more...
A report published by the Cambridge Primary Review, the biggest inquiry into primary education for decades, has found that the National Literacy Strategy has had almost no impact on children's reading skills. The research was carried out by academics at the universities of Bristol and Durham and the National Foundation... Read more...
Buiness Link West Midlands, a quango ‘whose visibility in the business world is poor’ now has its own staff revolting in opposition to it wasting taxpayers' money (Birmingham Post). Despite staff contracts stating that the organisation will remain in the Black Country, the wheels are in motion for a... Read more...
We are about to be hearing a lot more about The Public, the vastly over budget arts centre in West Bromwich that has been nicknamed the ‘pink elephant’ by detractors. From today it has a new captain at the helm who is attempting to steer it towards a successful... Read more...
An excellent blog over at An Englishman's Castle (via Devils Kitchen) explains that the report that too much red meat is giving us all cancer is massively overblown: "I have actually downloaded the report , all 537 pages of it. It is a vast data dredge. I have failed to... Read more...
Because I'm worth it Lord Falconer is scuffling with Gordon Brown over how much money we taxpayers will be forced to shell out to keep him in comfortable retirement. Brown's offering £50 grand pa: Falconer's demanding £100 grand. They'll be meeting in court.Meanwhile, the head of the Post Office- yes,... Read more...
Apparently it is Threatening Schools Week. Yesterday the Charities Commission threatened to remove charitable status from private schools they didn't think were doing enough to help poorer students. Today the Telegraph reports that Gordon Brown is threatening to close schools that don't reach a sufficient standard in GCSE results. ... Read more...
In what appears to be at least a partial climbdown, the Government is considering re-introducing a capital gains tax retirement relief of £100,000 for small businessmen who sell up and retire. The Times reports: "Three weeks after Mr Darling announced his plan for a single 18 per cent rateof capital... Read more...
It is reported in the Birmingham Post today that Birmingham City Council are looking to sponsor a proposed ‘media festival’ to the tune of at least £150,000. Read more...
The Telegraph reports that the Charities Commission are threatening to get tough with private schools who they believe don't provide sufficient benefit to poor students: "Charity officials may carry out snap inspections of independent schools to make sure they are benefiting poor pupils, it has emerged. They will have the... Read more...
The think tank Reform has released an updated version of its important report on the IPOD generation. This time, it focuses on government policies, or lack of them, to deal with the central problem that young poeple are facing - higher taxes to deal with an ageing population, but no... Read more...
A morbid and depressing display... funded by taxpayers Meet Alison Goulding. She has "five tellies - including a £1,000 widescreen - a hi-fi, Sky TV, two Play-Station 2s and four DVD players. Her huge garden boasts a full-size trampoline, two sets of swings and FIVE mountain bikes. She also has... Read more...
Better value at 40p "More than £50,000 has been spent on the famous "red boxes" used by government ministers over the past few years, according to an MP's survey.Prices of the boxes, which are used to store government papers securely, ranged from £385 to £750 each." (BBC: HTP Heather)The biggest... Read more...
Margarent McCartney's article in the Financial Times on superbugs is well worth reading. In particular, this section gets at how the inexperience and lack of subject knowledge associated with political management is crucial to the failure to control hospital infections: "Politicians are tackling MRSA with campaigning zeal. Gordon Brown has... Read more...