Hi all,

Sorry to write so soon again, but this is a quick update, mainly about the snow
and gritting, on which I've got a detailed briefing in point 2. First a brief PS
to the last update.

1. Bramwell PS
In my last email I forgot to give a link to my petition to ask the county to
reconsider its position on Bramwell care home. If you would like to support this
and haven't yet had the chance, please go here

http://www.broxtowelabour.org/

and follow the link "Sign Petition" on the left-hand side. Thanks! Conversely,
if you disagree with me and think that Bramwell should be sold off, I suggest
writing directly to the council leader, Kay Cutts at County Hall, West
Bridgford, Nottingham NG2 7QP – I'm sure she'll appreciate your support. Or you
can tell me and I'll truthfully pass it on when I meet her to press the issue
next week.

2. What's happening about salting the roads?
As I've had many enquiries from constituents about what the county council is
doing about the icy roads, I've obtained a briefing this morning from them which
I'm inserting in full below. I've interceded on behalf of constituents whose
roads were particularly icy, with some success in getting them added to the
gritting rota, but in view of what this says it looks as though further
additions will be difficult and if anything they will scale back what they're
already doing. I gather they are currently down to 24 hours' salt/grit supply. I
don't think they were doing most side-roads even before the stocks started to
run down – the fleet of lorries and drivers (who are working very long hours) is
also a limiting factor. I'd suggest stocking up with enough tinned/frozen food
for a bit longer than usual to be on the safe side, just in case.

By contrast the reports that we might run out of gas were just a scare story.
I'm familiar with the issue from when I was PPS to the Energy Minister.
Basically the system is that if demand increases then the National Grid bids for
more gas through the continental pipelines and also asks heavy users to rein in
(the heavy users get a discount in return for doing this on occasion). The
system has been established for years, works well and my current information is
that there is no cause for alarm on that front. The Government previously built
up LNG (liquid natural gas) facilities as a backup for this sort of situation
and this provides a further buffer.

Here's the County statement:
Our salt stock before Christmas was well up and nearly twice the recommended
minimum stock, but the continuous severe weather conditions have meant that we
have used up a lot of our stockpile and are having to be extremely careful in
conserving what remains. This means concentrating on keeping our priority
salting routes open and treated, these including all A and B category roads and
in total being about 35% of the total road length in the County.

We have had more salt scheduled for delivery since before Christmas, but due to
the very poor weather in the north and in Scotland the available salt has had to
go there and we are only just beginning to get some more salt delivered, in
smaller quantities than we would wish. You will know that this severe winter
weather is scheduled to continue for up to a further two weeks and therefore we
cannot at the moment change our present policy of prudence in salt use - should
we lose the main salting routes then all highway activity and emergency access
will be threatened.

There is national debate and concern regarding salt supply and we are talking to
other Local Authorities both locally and nationally, but all are in the same
position with only two suppliers of salt one in Whitby and one in Runcorn. Both
Leicestershire and Derbyshire are following our course of action, and we are
jointly seeking to source salt from other suppliers but this means it coming
from abroad via ship with a long lead time.

We have taken delivery of quantities of small size sharp grit, and are sending
teams out to spread this on icy footways and roads to provide a measure of grip
and help as much as we can.

3. What's happening about housing development?

All the councils in the area (of every political persuasion) have prepared a
draft document on where housing might be built between now and 2026. As you
know, I've campaigned against a number of sites, though I know from my surgeries
that there's significant unmet need for affordable local housing, so I'm not
opposed to everything. Broxtowe has deferred consideration of the proposals and
there won't be any final decisions till there has been a public consultation
period, i.e. later this year. However, you may like to know what's been outlined
in our area.

Briefly:

• The need for housing over the next 16 years in Broxtowe, as estimated by
demographers in the light of current longevity, people moving out from the city,
etc., is 5700, or about 350 homes a year.  Some of that has already been
approved or is under construction, and the councils have decided not to allocate
the full amount for the moment, since the projections are uncertain (e.g. a
sharp decline in new immigration due to the new Australian-style points system
and the return to Poland of many previous arrivals may reduce demand in the
city, indirectly reducing the spread to Broxtowe).

• The plan is to have about half of this in the area adjoining the city and half
spread around the rest of the borough.

• It's proposed to build 550 homes on brownfield Boots and Severn Trent land in
Beeston, at the north end of Rylands. In principle I think this makes sense,
since it's land that will otherwise fall into disuse, it's brownfield, there are
shops and transport nearby, and it won't do any harm to Beeston to have some
more people supporting the local shops. I am concerned about access and will be
pressing for this to be from the north (Boots) side, not via Trent Road.

• Other areas where possible development is foreseen are 480 homes north of
Stapleford (which must mean field Farm etc.) and 1000 west of Bardills,
including Toton Sidings. I have serious concerns about both of these, especially
because of the impact on local roads and infrastructure (e.g. school capacity).

• It's also proposed to look at small developments throughout Greater
Nottingham, but these haven't been specified and the idea is to look at local
proposals as they come up.
The next stage is that when and if all the councils approve the report, it will
go out to an extended public consultation. As always, I'll keep you posted on
when that happens so that you can submit your views, and I'll organise further
local meetings to discuss controversial sites and organise opposition where the
proposals are unacceptable.

I hope this is helpful.

Best wishes

Nick

Hi all –

Happy New Year! I'm back at work a few days early, since the converted windmill
sounded less attractive when we learned that it was (a) surrounded by now and
(b) had had a power failure.

I'd like say some more about the local issue of Bramwell care home, and then
return to the subject of the national economy, where it seems to me that nearly
everyone is still pussy-footing around: I've got some fairly blunt comments.

First, in election year, another kind endorsement (from the former non-party
leader of Kimberley Town Council, Colin Epton):

"When we wife and I were diagnosed as having swine flu, there was nobody who
could collect the Tamiflu for us. My wife contacted your office to complain
about the way distribution had been set up. We were both feeling pretty wretched
and wondered how we were going to manage. Not only did you get back to us
promptly, you offered to collect the prescription personally and bring it to us.
It is good to know, in this day and age, that there are still MPs who care about
the welfare of their constituents and will go out of their way to help them. You
can most definitely count on our votes."

I remember the incident well, mainly because the people at the Tamiflu centre
fell about laughing when they saw I was wearing gloves for handling the
paperwork from Colin – they didn't quite say, "What a wuss!" but you could see
them thinking it. I'd not twigged that the phone call was from Colin's wife and
envisaged a very elderly couple, but anyway I'm glad to help when I can.

On to policy matters.

1. Bramwell Care Home

Despite the controversy that's raging over this, not everyone knows what it is,
so first a short briefing. It's one the best care homes in the country (rated
Excellent in the most recent inspection, last April) specialising in looking
after people with relative severe physical disabilities or dementia, on a
residential or day-care basis. There are separate wings for the various types of
situation. If you'd like to know more you can find it here

http://www.any-care.co.uk/care-homes/118686-Bramwell/index.htm

If you'd like to read the detailed assessment of what the place is like, see

http://tinyurl.com/ycsdfh4

Note that the inspectors had no suggestions whatever for how it might be further
improved, which is really very unusual in any sort of audit. What is unusual
about the home is that they've developed real expertise in looking after people
with various kinds of relatively severe conditions.

The controversy is because the County Council wants to sell it off to a private
buyer (together with every other care home in the County). I've criticised this
and have more than 1000 signatures from constituents opposing it. So that you
hear both sides of the argument, let me put the County's case. They say:

(a) The County needs to save money. By selling the homes, the County can raise
capital, which will help balance the books.
(b) Running care homes is not really a core council responsibility. Most care
homes are private anyway, so why not let the private sector cover all of them?
(c) They will make it a condition of sale that patients cannot be forced to go
to other homes for least three years, and staff cannot be sacked for the same
period.

    My case for opposing the sale is this:

(a) Having an excellent local facility for dementia and Alzheimer's is a very
important local asset. Councils aren't only there to collect rubbish; they are
also supposed to provide good local infrastructure. If the home is sold and
subsequently closed, the concentrated expertise will be lost.
(b) The home doesn't make a profit at the moment, so it's obvious that any
private buyer will want to raise fees, lower standards or (most likely in my
opinion) merge it into a private home elsewhere with free capacity, and sell the
land for housing development. It's absolutely prime development land for
housing, at the end of a small estate off a main road with green fields behind,
and the buyer could make millions out that; I can't see anyone wanting to buy it
for any other purpose.
(c) The three-year guarantee is virtually worthless. If you got a letter saying
that you could be assured that you wouldn't be evicted from your home within
three years, wouldn't you conclude that after three years you could expect
exactly that?
(d) The one-off proceeds of a sale wouldn't address the County's long-term
finances: once it's gone, it's gone. If the County is so keen to save money, why
have they just advertised a £71,000/year post for a new communications director
to put across the County's message? Wouldn't it be better to improve the
policies that improve the communications?

I am seeing the head of Notts County Council on Friday week and will be pressing
the case.

Oddly, to my mind, my opponent has leapt into the fray on the other side of this
issue. You can normally find her blog here:

http://www.broxtoweconservatives.com/anna_blog.html

As you'll see, she hasn't commented in her blog or email on anything at all
since April (during the same period I've sent you 28 separate updates on local
and national issues – see http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxtoweInfo/messages ),
but on Christmas Eve she sent out an email passionately defending the
Conservative Council's position and describing criticism from me and others as
"scare-mongering" and "irresponsible nonsense"; she stresses the point about the
three-year guarantee. The message seems to have been put up on the site on
Boxing Day but is no longer there (if you click on it you get a blank page), so
she may have had second thoughts. When I think the Government or Labour
councillors have got something wrong, I say so (the Labour Group on Broxtowe
Council formally censured me for being critical over Green Belt housing
development plans). I don't think most people nowadays want to have their
representatives cling to the party line in every situation.

2. The  national economy

I've said earlier that I wasn't every impressed by the national debate on the
economy, and if anything it seems to me to have got more childish. Labour has
promised to halve the deficit in the next few years, but has only identified one
third of the measures needed for that, the largest part being the end of the VAT
reduction (this week) and the rise in National Insurance (in 2011). Some earlier
spending pledges seem to have quietly evaporated (e.g. the free laptops that
were planned for primary schoolchildren).
	 Meanwhile, the Conservatives have claimed to be fiercely determined to reduce
the deficit, but have only identified one tenth of the measures needed – and now
they've started announcing major spending increases, such as a new high-speed
rail network. They've also said they'll switch NHS spending more to deprived
areas: does this mean more spending overall (I thought they said we'd
overspent?), or actual cuts in NHS spending in less deprived areas (like
Broxtowe)? They've also said they'll press ahead with cutting inheritance tax
for estates over £700,000, aim to abolish the top rate of income tax and `try'
to cancel the NI rise
	 What's happened, I think, is that focus groups have advised that people don't
like hearing about cuts that affect them and they want to hear some cheerful
messages. But the technical term for this sort of thing is (excuse my language)
"bollocks". It's simply not going to happen. I have in front of me an Evening
Post cutting from May 28 a week before the County election. It says "Kay Cutts,
Conservative group leader, said, "If we win on June 4, I will make funding
available immediately so work can start on access to the IKEA retail park."
We're now seven months on. Has it happened? Of course not.
	 For what it's worth, I'm a PhD in mathematics and a former member of the
Treasury Select Committee, and I don't want to go along with this nebulous
stuff. I think voters generally like to hear realities, since if you're truthful
about the nasty bits you're more readily believed about the better bits. The
position as I see it is this:

(a) The recession so far

Contrary to some accounts, I think it could have been much worse. The
predictions of unemployment soaring towards to 4 million have proved wrong (see
The Times on this: http://tinyurl.com/ydeewuz ), no banks have been allowed to
fail, only two major companies have gone (Woolworths and MFI) and the fear of a
huge wave of home repossessions has failed to materialise. The housing market
turned last year at the point that I predicted at the time. There are painful
cutbacks in several places (e.g. the ex-Beeston Ericsson jobs that moved to
Coventry now look like being lost altogether, unless the last-minute efforts
that I and others are making help), but we appear to be past the worst without
severe structural damage.
	 It's an Opposition myth that we were especially indebted before the crisis (see
http://tinyurl.com/44q6bu for Channel 4's analysis just before it set in), but
it's also a Government myth that we were `best placed to handle the recession'.
With a large financial sector and a big mortgage market we were actually more at
risk than most. A third myth is that we've had a worse recession than e.g.
Germany – Germany's recession was much sharper than ours, though they've
recovered marginally earlier. The reality is that the world economy moves in
step together, and collectively the world's governments haven't done a bad job –
certainly much better than their counterparts in the 1930s.

(b) What happens next

There are two issues: how quickly to balance public spending, and how to do it.
On the first, there's a difference of 12 months: Labour favours cutting the
deficit starting in 2011, by which time we expect the economy to be recovering
sharply. The Conservatives favour cutting it at once. Since tax revenue rises
when the economy recovers, it's important for debt reduction not to push us back
into recession, and I'm with the Government on that one.
	 On the second issue, both sides are nebulous at best, but there are clear
differences in direction. Labour has said it will protect health, schools,
neighbourhood policing and foreign aid, but by implication will cut more in
other areas, with some proposals already emerging (e.g. the cuts in funding for
some university courses and the conversion of one of the aircraft carriers into
a much cheaper troop-carrier). The Conservatives have allowed persistent rumours
of a VAT rise to 20% and various spending reductions, including means-testing of
the Winter Allowance and the pensioner bus pass: they are committed to
protecting health and foreign aid, but not schools and local policing, and the
PCSOs who deliver much of the local presence seem likely to be scrapped. Labour
will limit new public pay settlements to 1%; the Conservatives will have a
one-year freeze.
	 My own view is that we need to stop making new spending commitments, and look
again at the ones we've already got. There are all kinds of desirable things to
do, but right now is not the moment. I've taken my own medicine on this – I'm in
favour of not renewing Trident (which I voted for in healthier times), halting
the ID card project (which I voted for) and freezing all new motorway projects.
I previously pressed for electrification of the Midland Mainline – I've scaled
that back to saying that we should be next on the list when it becomes
affordable. I'm consistently declining to support new projects, even those I
really like.

I hope this is helpful. I'm sorry if it sounds too austere, but I think we need
a balanced approach – neither carrying on as though there wasn't a problem, nor
destroying all the progress we've made in public services (e.g. 98% of people
are now getting hospitals treatment within 18 weeks of first GP appointment,
against up to 2 years in the past). We've not done badly in a very difficult
period so far, but we need to see it through in a balanced and responsible way.
By being more frank than the national leaders, I'm hoping to play my part in
promoting an adult debate, both here and in Parliament, and I think I serve you
better that way than if I just rattle off slogans and highlight the good bits.

As always, feedback welcome, but NNTR (no need to reply) appreciated if you
don't need a personal answer – life is hectic! By the way, I promised a plug for
a local church group who are deeply involved in the climate change issue – see
http://tinyurl.com/yh5kt3f for more!

Best wishes

Nick

Hi all –

This is mainly just to wish every a happy Christmas. However, a couple of items
first:

1. Jim Kenny

As many of you will have heard, Cllr Jim Kenny died recently. He was a
councillor for Eastwood (outside my constituency but in Broxtowe) and had
contributed to the community as a town and borough councillor for very many
years. He was also a thoroughly nice man – it's customary to say something like
that when people die, but I really never met anyone who didn't like him. I went
to the funeral yesterday, and was pleased to find an enormous crowd  (several
hundred people) packing the church – a tribute to his local popularity that he
very much deserved.

2. Copenhagen

Unlike some commentators, I do think that climate change appears to be a serious
threat and that we have the capacity to mitigate it, so I'm sorry to see the
summit end without more progress. While I wouldn't be totally negative about it
– there was a lot of commitment shown and the gaps narrowed substantially – it's
clearly not the deal that we need. There's a tendency for this sort of thing to
descend into finger-pointing, but that's largely a waste of time. All we can
really say is that we have collectively to pick ourselves up and keep working
till a deal is reached.

3. Kimberley Farmer's Market

Just a word to thank everyone who made this such a success, especially the
indefatigable Cllr Richard Robinson. I hope it will be possible to make this a
regular event in the future – if we can make it worth in December, it ought to
be possible in balmier times!

4. Attenborough flood protection

Since I've not heard anything for a while, I rang the Environment Agency to see
what's happening. The project is making steady progress, but they are still
reviewing the position in Attenborough to see whether they can after all protect
the playing fields as well. They expect to complete the study of that in March.
If they decide it can be done, they'll submit a fresh application after that. If
they decide it can't, then they'll press ahead with the original scheme. (My
position remains that I'll gladly support whatever leads to the fastest
protection for Attenborough and other areas threatened with flooding, so
whichever way they decide to go I do expect to support it.)

5. Holiday arrangements

I'm basically around till the 28th, though I plan not to check email on the
25th! We're going to stay over the New Year and in the first week of January in
my cousin's little converted windmill in South Devon – it's lost its sails,
sadly (it looks more like a lighthouse really), but it's a sweet place with
three rooms, one on each floor. I'll be back on the 8th. I'll check for
emergencies via my Blackberry. My team will have the office closed between
Christmas and the New Year, but it'll be open normally after that. Again, we'll
try to check messages from time to time – unfortunately, emergencies do happen
more often at Christmas than any other time, since normal services become
unavailable.

It only remains to wish you a very happy Christmas and a merry New Year (it's
usually that way round in practice, isn't it?) ! I'll be in touch again soon
after I'm back.

All good wishes

Nick

Hi all –

Catching up on three national controversies, I'd like this time to talk about
climate change, class and Europe. First this week's friendly note:

"I think people in the constituency are privileged to have the chance of keeping
in place one of our MPs who is genuinely committed to the job and the
constituents, fully deserving of our respect and admiration, and working to
restore fairness and integrity to parliament and our system of government." Ruth
Ledbury (longstanding Liberal Democrat supporter)

Trying to live up to that…

1. Climate change: what should Britain's position be?

This is going to dominate the news in the coming week. What should Britain's
position be?

I understand statistics but I'm not a climatologist, so I'm not going to offer
my own interpretation, and I'm slightly bemused by the way that some people read
an article somewhere and become instantly certain that it's the only possible
truth. But it's possible to make some objective comments:

• The overwhelming majority of climate scientists, though not all, believe that
there is a global warming process in train, that human activity is mainly the
cause, that its consequences will be catastrophic, and that it's still possible
to ameliorate it, though not prevent it altogether.
• Scientists are not always right, and there are past cases where the
overwhelming majority view turned out to be mistaken
• If the perceived problem is to be tackled, it needs to done globally. There
are things that Britain can solve on its own, but this isn't one of them.

Given this starting point, what should British politicians say? It seems to me
that we have to work on the assumption for now that the scientific advice is
correct. If it's correct and we do nothing, we are quite literally betraying our
children. If it's incorrect and we take unnecessary action, we are spending
money that could have been spent on something else. That's a pity, but not
catastrophic, and the actions generally have some useful benefits in themselves.
For example, by switching away from fossil fuels, we reduce carbon emissions,
but we also reduce dependence on imports of gas from places like Iran, Algeria
and Russia whose long-term amiability it is…well… difficult to guarantee.

There is a place here for Britain setting an example and taking a lead, as we've
done with the Climate Change Bill, but primarily we need to do all we can to
broker a global agreement, since that's the only thing that will really work. So
even if a deal in Copenhagen depends on us making painful steps ourselves, I'm
in principle in favour of it (obviously we need to look at the details).

All the main parties agree on this – David Cameron commented similarly last week
after a scientist was found to have written cynical emails: Cameron simply said
that the overwhelming majority remained convinced of the danger. So it looks as
though the policy will be similar whichever party is in power, and on this issue
I agree with Cameron. But what about the sceptics? These are grouped on the
Right – UKIP and the BNP are opposed to the whole idea, and David Davis and our
local Conservative Euro-MP Roger Helmer have broken with their party's position
on this. It's not obvious why this is – there is nothing especially left-wing
about worrying that we're ruining the planet, since if it's true it'll be bad
for everyone, left or right. But I think they react against the messengers on
this issue – because the early campaigners were anti-capitalist greens, they
feel the whole thing is just a ramp of what they see as eco-nutters and
self-interested scientists after funding for their work.

One can never be sure about trends or about science, as I said above, and we
should continue to monitor the latest findings. But I don't think we can
responsibly ignore the advice: the downside if we did and it was wrong is just
too large.

2. Does background matter?

There's been a lot of discussion of Eton and class in this week's press after
Gordon Brown's throwaway remark at PMQs about Zac Goldsmith's taxes, and I
thought it might be interesting to go a bit deeper.

	 To declare an interest, though I went to international schools myself and my
parents weren't wealthy, my wider background is not very different to Cameron
and his colleagues: my postwar family has included a general, an admiral, a
viscount, a senior Tory MP, a senior judge and diverse other things that are
generally seen as posh, including a Scottish castle. None of that is (in my
view) something to be embarrassed about – you don't choose your family, and
they're simply a fact. In the same way Cameron and Osborne and Goldsmith didn't
choose where they went to school.

	 That said, one needs to be aware of one's limitations and possible blind spots.
I'm well aware that I don't know anything from personal experience about growing
up in hardship, not getting a decent education, suffering from prejudice, being
snubbed or passed over for having a regional accent, and so on. So what I try to
do is listen to people who do have those experiences, and to adjust how I deal
with political issues to take account of them. Nobody can have experienced
everything – the important thing, surely, is to be prepared to listen and take
it in.

	 I don't think it's reasonable to have a go at Cameron over his schooling, and
I'm sure it gave him a useful education. But there's a related political point
that *is* reasonable. He and his associates seem to me not to have evolved after
they left school, and to have difficulty in relating to people outside their
circle of experience. Why, for instance, are the Conservatives still wedded to
abolishing inheritance tax specifically in the £700,000-£1 million range, at the
same time as proposing cuts to all kinds of everyday things? They know it's
unpopular and the number who will benefit is small. But they will be affected
and so, I suspect, will nearly everyone they know, so it looms much larger as
"an important thing to do in the first Parliament". In the same way, when
Goldsmith was asked about one of his tax avoidance tactics, his spokesman said
"It only saved a small amount, £10,000 or something" – well, yes, I suppose
that's small if you're a millionaire, but if you're trying to represent people
it shows a tin ear to talk like that.

	 In short, it's not your fault if you're sent to Eton. But if you want to
represent people, you need to grow beyond it.

3. Europe

I think there's something slightly ironic about the press deriding the choice of
a Belgian prime minister "whom nobody has ever heard of". Why haven't we heard
of the prime minister of our nearest Continental neighbour? Because precisely
the same press never bothered to report anything about him, even when his
apparent talent for promoting compromise prevented what appeared to be an
imminent break-up of his country.  He seems an intelligent, moderate chap who is
good at bringing people together and doesn't have illusions of grandeur: I
reckon he was a good choice as European president.

	 But I'm cheerfully pro-European, like both my opponents: my Conservative
opponent went further than me at one of our debates and said she'd support
joining the Euro if business wanted it (I might do as well, but only after
looking at the overall impact in detail and a straightforward yes/no
referendum). So if you're deeply sceptical about the EU I can understand your
feeling a bit unrepresented. What can I say to help?

	 Well, first, I'd like an EU that worked better and more transparently. While
it's obviously difficult to look after 500 million people in a down-to-earth way
that's easily accessible to everyone, I do think that the EU institutions are
mainly comfortable in dealing with each other rather than engaging with the
wider public. I'd actually like to see direct election of a European president –
that would engage people and cross national boundaries much more effectively
than any number of agreed joint
initiatives.

	 Second, the basic principle of the EU is `subsidiarity', that decisions are
taken as locally as possible (i.e. nationally or even at local council level).
That seems to me a good idea, but not one that is always followed in practice.
I'm opposed to `mission creep', moving the EU into deciding issues which are
really better considered locally, and almost every human organisation in history
has tried to expand its scope, so there's a genuine risk there.

	 But yes, it's best to be honest: I'm a pragmatist, and look at each issue on
its merits, but basically I think it's a good thing that we have in the EU an
institution that helps us take joint decisions for the good of the whole
continent. And if the new arrangements and the Belgian president will help that
work smoothly, I'm all for them.

	 As always, feedback welcome on these tricky issues, with "NNTR "(no need to
reply), please, if you don't need a personal answer!

Best wishes

Nick

Monday November 16 2009

Hi all –

Finally catching up after an exceptionally hectic period. I'm on two committees
which have been finalising very large reports, and that's left less time to
answer emails. Since they come in at around 100/day, at one point 600 unanswered
emails had piled up – apologies to everyone who had to wait a couple of weeks.

The committee reports are confidential until published, but I'll give you a
brief preview below – they're both pretty interesting. I'd also like to discuss
why I disagree with the Home Secretary about scientific advice, comment on the
County Council's draft budget, and respond to an enjoyably bizarre Conservative
leaflet. And with the election now less than six months away, I hope you'll
forgive a small partisan innovation – I'll be starting each email with a comment
or two from constituents who haven't up to now been associated with my
campaigns, mostly people who've rallied to the Independents for Palmer banner.

1. Quotes of the week

Professor Martyn Poliakoff CBE:

"I shall be voting for Nick as I consider him to be a model constituency MP who
strives to help with the problems of constituents regardless of their political
persuasion." [For more about Martyn see tinyurl.com/yg22mo9 ]

Sue Sambells:
I find Nick Palmer to be one of the few good guys around and even though I
disagree with many of the policies of our current government I plan to vote for
Nick, who I believe will best represent me and my family.

2. Why the Home Secretary is wrong about advisers

Irritatingly, most of the debate about the firing of Professor Nutt has divided
on the issue rather than the principle. People who think cannabis should be
treated as dangerous tend to sympathise with the firing, and people who think
it's relatively harmless tend to oppose it. On the whole I favour maintaining
the current classification of cannabis. But I still think it was a mistake to
fire Nutt.

First let me put the case on the other side so you're aware of both sides. The
issue of cannabis and ecstasy classifications came up a year ago. Professor Nutt
advised that they should be downgraded as less serious, on the basis that many
other legal things are more dangerous such as alcohol and even riding. The then
Home Secretary decided she disagreed, because she felt that the wider risks of
relaxing controls on drug-dealing were against the public interest. Even if
Nutt's proposals were approved, the drugs would still ne illegal, and therefore
only available from dealers, who would try to entice customers into more
dangerous drugs. Moreover, in some cases, the drugs do have serious effects, and
the fact that there are other dangers around doesn't mean we should necessarily
add to them.

Professor Nutt disagrees strongly: he feels this is an example of illogical
policy, and we always say policy should be evidence-based. A dangerous drug
should have a high classification, a not very dangerous one should have a low
one, he argues; otherwise, the system isn't credible.

So far, fair enough – one can see arguments on both sides, advisers advise,
ministers decide. But after the decision, Nutt continued to oppose it in strong
terms, attacking Ministers directly for not taking his advice. The then Home
Secretary said to him that she felt it was hard to rely on him as a confidential
adviser if he continued to campaign openly to reverse decisions he disagreed
with, and warned him that she would expect at least prior notice of future
attacks.

Some months passed and Alan Johnson became Home Secretary. The policy continued
unchanged, and Nutt returned to the charge, writing an article again attacking
the Governments policy, again without prior notice. Johnson then pointed to the
earlier warning, said he'd lost trust in him and fired him.

When this was debated in the Commons, I was (I think) the only Labour MP to
criticise the decision. The point isn't that I think Nutt is right – the wider
social issues seem to me important. But I believe it's absolutely vital that
governments of all colours get fearless independent advice, without a hidden
string attached that the adviser promises to shut up if overruled. The point
that I made is that the public needs to hear from the advisers too. Most people
don't really know the pros and cons in detail, and advisory bodies help inform
the public debate. The right thing is not to try to muzzle awkward advisers, but
to have a range of advisers with different viewpoints, so that it's clear that
all the arguments are being properly considered.

I absolutely see that it's a pain in the bum for ministers if their advisers
publicly contradict them, and a bit discourteous if no notice is given.. But the
right response isn't to fire them but to explain why their advice is not being
taken – then the public can reach a balanced view.

3. Why the County is wrong about the proposed cuts

The County Council is currently consulting on a range of very drastic budgetary
changes. Many of you will be aware of the proposals, but if not you can find
them summarised here:

http://tinyurl.com/yjftdla

with comments here

http://tinyurl.com/ycen5un and

http://tinyurl.com/ye2gnlv

I'm not in favour of councils blithely spending more every year. However, what
seems to me objectionable is that the council is spending more on itself –
refurbishment of offices, more paid positions for councillors – at the same time
as it's focusing on the elderly and disabled.

There is also one cut that's attracted little attention – they propose to stop
giving any public advice to people about their entitlement to benefits. I know
from my work that the Benefits Advisory Service is a lifeline for people who
find themselves in a desperate situation for the first time. I'm not talking
about people who've lived on benefits for years and know the system intimately,
but people from women fleeing from violent partners to people who suddenly lose
their job and/or their home due to the recession.

Save money yes – freeze higher salaries, halt major new spending. But don't try
to do it all at once, and don't focus the cuts on the elderly and vulnerable.
I'll be submitting an objection, and you might want to comment to your county
councillor too.

4. Two simmering committee reports

The first report, due out in a week or so, in Tony Wright's Parliamentary Reform
committee. I was elected to this by secret ballot of all Labour MPs (each party
elected its own representatives), and we have a mandate to report on three
things:

- Who controls Parliamentary business? How can we ensure that governments don't
suppress debate by procedural means, and yet ensure that if there's an elected
majority then it's not filibustered into impotence?

- How can the wider public influence what Parliament debates? If a million
people want something debated that all parties find awkward (e.g. withdrawal
from Afghanistan), how can the public ensure that their issue gets heard?

- How can Select Committees be strengthened? At present, membership is usually
decided by the whips of all parties, weakening their independence and
credibility.

We had an intense few weeks on this, with some votes on especially controversial
issues, but I think the outcome is good. You'll see it soon.

The second report, due out in a few weeks, is from the Justice Select Committee.
We set out to answer the question:

Under what circumstances is prison the most cost-effective way of deterring
repeat offending, and are there better alternatives?

We heard extensive evidence that short prison sentences for relatively minor
crimes are worse than useless (the offender meets more serious offenders and
learns how to get deeper into crime), but what might work better? Could the
prisons be reserved for the more serious offenders who deserve longer sentences?
We studied experience from many other countries, with penal systems from the
harshest to the most liberal, and are coming up with interesting conclusions.
Expect this report before Christmas.

5. Struggling to manage on £138,509

There is an entertaining Conservative leaflet going out claiming that I have a
`huge financial advantage' and explaining that Broxtowe Conservatives have
`only' had £38,509 of help from the central party, with other costs covered by
three local members. To be more precise, my understanding from Conservative
friends is that one of the donors has chipped in £100,000.

To put this in perspective, the largest campaign fund donation from an
individual that I've *ever* had is £100, and the money I get from the national
party is zero. The idea of their giving us £38,000 or an individual giving us
£100,000 is an idyllic pipe-dream. But if it ever happens, I promise that I will
never complain that my opponent has a `huge financial advantage'. It's on the
lines of Goliath complaining that David has an excessively large sling, and
frankly they're living on a different planet. There is a certain irony in being
so well off as to be able to afford a special expensive leaflet to say how poor
you are.

A second theme of the leaflet is that it's wrong that I employ supporters on my
staff, including two councillors (2-3 days a week) and my wife (8 hours a week).
The point I'd make here is that in their working time they are restricted to
non-partisan work, primarily helping constituents who raise problems with me or
helping me deal with local issues. It's very useful to have people inside the
council for this, since a great many of the issues relate to the council – e.g.
the whole area of planning – and they know who to talk to. My wife, who is a
freelance editor, is able to help at weekends and late at night, which as some
of you know is when I get most of my constituency correspondence and emails
done. The Kelly Report has said this should be phased out, and of course we'll
comply, but I admit that I think it's a pity, as it'll simply make me slightly
less efficient.

What I wouldn't do is employ unsuitable people because they were supporters.
What often happens is that I recruit someone because they're good, and after
they've worked with me for a while they become active supporters in their free
time. It'd be a bit sad if it was the reverse (`now I've worked with him I know
he's really rubbish').

Finally, the leaflet has a go at my use of the Communications Allowance. This
has been available to allow MPs to send non-partisan circulars to constituents.
You can find examples here:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxComms/message/1

and

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxComms/message/2

A more recent example was the letter I sent out discussing how to handle the
occupation of various sites by travellers. Now in one sense it's obviously true
that the ability to do this gives the incumbent MP an advantage, but it's
actually the advantage that arises from doing my job properly. I do know MPs who
use the Allowance exclusively to send out glossy leaflets with little content,
just lots of pictures of themselves, but to my mind that's a nonsense and voters
see through it. My basic view is what I wrote in a letter in the Beeston Express
this week:

"Whether constituents would like me to carry next May is something we should let
them decide without hassle or exaggerated rhetoric. The bottom line for most
voters nowadays is (in my view) that they like to be treated like serious
adults."

6. Coming events

Friday 11th December
7.30pm
Village Ventures presents:
The Eduardo Niebla Experience
Chilwell Arts Theatre, Chilwell School
Tickets £8, £6 (conc), £24 family (2 adults + 2 children).
Available on 0115 925 2698 or 07827 996 223 and also at the Print Shop, 153
Attenborough Lane; Bookwise, 42, Chilwell Road; the Flying Goose cafe, Chilwell
Road.
This is an amazing opportunity to hear a great flamenco jazz guitar virtuoso
with his acclaimed trio; an evening of, "hot, dark Mediterranean passion."


Sunday 13th December
7pm
Paradiso Cinema presents:
Miracle on 34th Street
Chilwell Arts Theatre, Chilwell School
Tickets £5.50, £4 (conc) in advance on 0115 925 2698 or 07827 996 223 or on the
door.
Come and enjoy mince pies and mulled wine while you watch a timeless classic
that truly captures the spirit of Christmas. Film starts at 7.30pm.

And something that isn't an event but a local phenomenon: are you interested in
libraries and reading? Have you joined Nottinghamshire Libraries and Archives
Facebook page or Twitter stream yet? Find them at
www.facebook.com/nottslibraries or www.twitter.com/nottslibraries and sign up to
find out about events, resources and all the latest news direct from your local
libraries.

6. Correction

In my last email, I reported that Tesco is removing Fair Trade products from its
shelves in favour of its own Fair Trade lines. This turns out not to be true –
the move is only for chocolate, with Divine chocolate being removed in favour of
a Tesco equivalent. In any case, a constituent points out that the best fair
trade outlet locally may well be Out of This World, in Beeston, which certainly
pioneered fair Trade locally before everyone else joined in.

Best regards

Nick

Hi all –

Quite a lot to report - please note the imminent events noted at the end. I'm
under real pressure of time this week as I've had the lengthy debate to prepare
for, two meetings of the committee preparing recommendations of Parliamentary
reform, and a half-day seminar on broadband and mobile telephony issues to
chair. To make it worse, I'm taking the weekend off! – Fiona and I are visiting
my cousin in Norfolk. So I'd appreciate patience and restraint in replying to
this one. However, I'll have my Blackberry there and will check it from time to
time (the beastly thing isn't called a "Crackberry" for nothing!): if there's
something urgent please put URGENT in the title. If there's no need to reply,
put NNTR in the title and I'll read it anyway.

1. Another revolt – this time on climate change

As I've mentioned, I stood down as PPS last year after feeling I'd traded too
much independence for too little influence, and have been taking a more detached
view of Parliamentary party politics, addressing each issue as it comes along on
its merits: I've revolted on the Gurkhas, PO privatisation, protection of
temporary and agency workers and some lesser issues. I voted against the
Government again this week on the 10:10 issue. Briefly this is a campaign to
reduce carbon emission by 10% by the end of 2010. Numerous individuals including
the entire Cabinet have promised to do this personally, but the (LibDem) motion
this week proposed that all government bodies do the same, so as to give a lead
in advance of the critical Copenhagen talks. They also asked for detailed plans
for this by the end of this year.
    Now it may be that this is a bit ambitious – I'm not sure that everything
government-owned from naval dockyards to the Ordnance Survey can fish a plan for
a 10% emissions cut out of a hat in two months. And, as the LibDems
acknowledged, Britain is already a world leader in the area, with a carbon
reduction strategy bound into law. All the same, strategy is good but getting on
with it is better, so I decided to vote for it, together with Alan Simpson and
one or two others.

2. Should terminally sick prisoners be released?

Thanks for all the input that many of you sent on this. We had a good, lengthy
debate on it, which you can find here:

http://tinyurl.com/ygcklf3

The SNP MP was rather preoccupied with championing his colleagues to the
exclusion of the broader issues, but everyone else responded in a pretty
open-minded way and we had a pretty wide-ranging discussion that I was pleased
to have initiated.

3. LibDem councillors switch to Labour

Charlie Robb, a Broxtowe borough councillor in Eastwood, and his wife, who is
also a Town councillor, have both switched from the LibDems to Labour, changing
control of the Town Council back to Labour: this seems to reflect both local
issues and a wider trend to return to the main parties as the General Election
approaches. Eastwood is mostly outside my constituency so I've not had much to
do with Charlie up to now, but I criticised him for misleading "only we can win
here" leaflets in a local election where the LibDems were third, and uniquely in
my experience had an apology from him, saying that on reflection I was right and
third-placed candidates shouldn't do that. Politicians apologising for anything
are rare (I try to apologise when I make a mistake, but most people seem to
think it shows weakness), so I've been well-disposed to him ever since!

4. Beeston Fair Trade launch

I've been asked to launch the official designation of Beeston as a Fair Trade
town in Beeston Square on Saturday 31st. Events will go on for most of the day.
I'm delighted to do this – it reflects a serious effort to ensure that in its
own dealing and cafeterias, the council tries not to exploit anyone and supports
international trade on a fair basis.
	 Incidentally, my lack of enthusiasm for Tesco was reinforced by the report
that, now they have their own fair trade coffee brand, they're going to stop
stocking anyone else's (café Direct, Clipper, etc.). Sainsbury's aren't perfect,
but they happily provide the choice of their own and other ethical brands.

5. Travellers

There have been repeated incursions over recent weeks, particularly in and near
Toton, and I'll be having a local meeting to discuss this in Toton on Friday
30th – local residents should get a direct invitation, but if you'd like to
attend please ring my office on 01156-9430721 for details. My proposal is, as
many of you know, to make rapid eviction easier (by requiring groups of caravans
to show evidence that they have permission), balanced by restoration of the
requirement by counties to provide suitable `official' sites within a day's
travel of each other. Feedback has been very positive on this, and I've also
heard from a support group for legitimate travellers, who didn't oppose the
first part (since the rogue travellers give them a bad name) and were pleased
with the second.

6. Broxtowe wins Green Heroes award

Broxtowe Council has won the prestigious Green Heroes award as the best local
partner for green efforts in the entire country. This astonishing achievement
for one out of hundreds of local councils hasn't had the publicity it deserves
yet – see http://www2.btcv.org.uk/ for details. I'll be welcoming the team from
the council in Westminster when they come to pick up their award.

7. Open-cast group

At the end of the all-party meeting that I called in Trowell on the likely
open-cast application, we invited people to volunteer for an action group to
take the campaign forward, and this now exists – contact
nottsagainstnewcoal@... if you'd like to get their updates.

8. Help medical research for older people

I've been contacted by Nottingham university to help get volunteers over 60 for
an interesting project, to act as Peer Mentors to elderly people who are trying
to keep fit. To quote their email:
The ProAct 65+ trial is a multi-centre cluster randomised trial, comparing a
community group exercise programme with home based exercise with usual care for
people aged 65 and over in primary care. The aim is to determine the effect on
continuation of exercise of two evidence-based exercise programmes designed for
older people, compared with usual care i.e. with no special interventions to
promote physical activity.

One of the exercise interventions involves home-based exercises, where patients
conduct exercises in the home supported by Peer Mentors. The Peer Mentors will
be aged 60 and above. The other exercise intervention will be delivered in
community venues by trained Postural Stability Instructors. Everything with the
trial is fine with regard to patient recruitment etc, however we are struggling
to recruit volunteer Peer Mentors and are trying all sources to advertise.

If you are interested in taking part and becoming a peer mentor please could you
contact Hannah.Carpenter@... , phone: 0115 846 6901].

9. Local events

Free Tree Spree - Beeston in Transition are hosting a party at Highfields Fire
Station, Hassocks Lane, Beeston on Sat 24 October 11.30 - 2.30 to celebrate the
International Day of Climate Action. This event will be one of over 3000 around
the world and photos from the event could end up on massive screens in Times
Square, New York! (See www.350.org for further information). This will be
another opportunity for local residents to sign up for 3 free trees provided by
Broxtowe Borough Council. There will be a Bring and Share Lunch, crafts,
quizzes, pedal-powered games, a fruit and veg swap, pumpkin recipes, a Grow Your
Own Cakes stall, information and lots more. The party is open to everyone
(please bring some food to share) and provides an opportunity to learn more
about climate change and ways in which we, locally, can play our part.  For more
information, see www.beestontransition.weebly.com

Antiques Valuation Evening at Beeston Parish Church on Thursday 29 October 7.30
pm with Mr Nigel Kirk from Mellors & Kirk.  Tickets are £5 which include light
refreshments. The Historical Food Group are providing these special
refreshments.  The Event is in aid of Church funds. As they need to have
approximate numbers for catering, tickets need to be obtained beforehand from
Gavin tel: 0115 925 0129, or Barbara 0115 917 8488, or from Church when it is
open - Mon to Fri 11.30 am - 1.3-0 pm, or from Book Wise, 42 Chilwell Road
(during normal shop hours).

Global Gifts, Saturday November 14, 2pm-5pm, Christ Church Hall, Lime Grove
Avenue, Chilwell. This is an annual event, with lots of crafts from around the
world, designed to help small artisans in the developing world and give original
gifts for Christmas.

That's it for now!

Best wishes

Nick

PS Have just been informed about this one, and thought I'd send an extra message
as many of you might like to support it. I've got a prior commitment but will
try to at least look in.

Help for Heroes Disco and raffle night
Host: Tribute to Sean Upton
Date: Saturday, 17 October 2009
Time: 19:30 - 23:30
Location: Boat and Horses PH Trent Road Beeston Rylands

Description
We are holding a raffle in aid of Help for Heroes. On Saturday 17th October 2009
at 8.30pm in the Boat and Horses in Trent Road, beeston Rylands. There will be a
disco from 7.30pm Prizes have been donated by businesses including Sainsburys,
Reydon Sports, Nottingham Forest, Notts County and Capelli Hairdressing.

Hi all -

A quick canter round some important topics:

1. New policy initiative

I'm the co-author with nine former ministers of a set of policy proposals for
discussion which we've published on the web.

    The underlying motivation was a certain exasperation with the state of
politics at the moment, with everyone obsessed with justifying their expenses
and an apparent drift towards electoral success based on a Conservative leader's
speech containing no policy proposals whatever. After 12 years in government,
Labour also has to prove that it's intellectually alive and has positive ideas
to offer, and I was pleased to be asked to contribute.

    The website is deliberately austere and unflashy, to avoid the impression
that we're launching a new campaign group, a leadership bid, or some other form
of self-promotion. Basically we are all in politics for the ideas, and we wanted
to let them speak for themselves. I hope you'll find it interesting - it's here:

www.labourfuture.net

2. Expenses

Speaking of which, to forestall the obvious question: the Legg study of five
years of MPs' expenses has in my case produced in 'nil return' - he's asked me
to send a copy of a bank statement to confirm I was paying rent  as stated, and
that's all. As I rent the flat, the flat doesn't have a garden and I generally
do my own cleaning, the issues didn't really arise.

As for other cases, while it's not ideal to have limits on gardening and
cleaning imposed retrospectively, I don't actually see why a second home (which
is essentially just somewhere to sleep) needs a garden at all. I agree it needs
cleaning sometimes and some of you would probably shake your head over how
rarely I hoover, but the limits seem reasonable and I think people should just
stop whinging about them and pay up, as all three party leaders have done. I
rather agree with Nick Clegg that the issue of unreasonable claims for mortgage
interest should be covered as well: a second home should be a small flat or
house, not a huge mansion financed at taxpayers' expense.

More generally, though, I hope we're getting to the point where those of us who
weren't implicated can put the issue to bed and get on with the job. There will
be the Kelly committee next month which Brown asked to recommend tighter rules
for the future; when that and Legg's findings are known and anyone who has
broken the law has been prosecuted, I think we should move on.

3. Release of sick prisoners

After the release by the Scottish government of Megrahi and the release by the
British government of Ronnie Biggs, I applied for a 90-minute debate to discuss
the principles that we ought to be following in such cases. The question that
arises is: if someone convicted of a very serious crime becomes extremely ill,
what factors should govern a decision on release? What should get greatest
weight?

- The gravity of the offence?
- How long he has already served?
- How soon he is expected to die?
- How the victims of the crime feel about the possible release?
- Whether he shows remorse?
- Whether he has family nearby?
- Something else?
- Or should he simply not be released, regardless?

I don't have a definite view (and I wasn't one of those who criticised the SNP
decision), except that it's genuinely difficult. It seems to me that Parliament
should sometimes have debates on difficult issues where we aren't sure of the
answers, so I was pleased to get a slot next Tuesday. I will be introducing the
debate and will have lots of time to do so (say 20 minutes), and I'd welcome
input or what you think I ought to raise.

4. Travellers

Uninvited travellers have again arrived in Toton, next to the Greenwood centre.
I notified the Council, who are seeking eviction on Friday. If this is
successful, I've invited local people to the site on Saturday, where we can
assess whether the state of the site is as bas as often alleged after such
cases, discuss how this and similar sites can be protected, and consider my
proposal on the issue discussed in a previous email and local leaflet (which has
had a pretty broad welcome so far, from local residents as well as from a legal
travellers' support group).

5. Dog rescue event

I've been asked to publicise this event for local animal-lovers, even though
it's outside the constituency:

Midland German Shepherd Rescue Centre Christmas Fare 7 November 2009.  The
location is North Lodge Kennels, Kings Corner, Derby, DE21 4RG.

sarap1@...

Best wishes

Nick

Sorry! Forgot to give the location of the October 9 tram event - it's Roundhill
School, Foster Avenue.

Regards, Nick

Hi all,

I missed the Labour conference due to a minor bug (now gone), but have been
looking into the idea proposed there of a new National Care Service and
considering how best this would work. I wanted to discuss that with you and get
your feedback, and also comment on something that often comes up in
correspondence: exactly how much money did we give the banks?

Before that, a small follow-up to an earlier theme:

1. Britain's global role

You may remember that when I was discussing possible cuts in public expenditure,
I suggested that a long-term adjustment might be a less ambitious military
stance, concentrating on defence and collective action rather than the ability
to intervene around the world. My own thinking on that is still evolving and
I've been discussing it with several of you.

    So I was interested to read an article in The Times that suggested quite the
opposite: the writer argued that it was vital to punch above our weight, and we
shouldn't shrink from using bribery to promote arms sales and other ways to push
our global influence, since otherwise we would end up as `pointless' as Norway.
As I disagree, I wrote a letter which they published today and you can click on
here:

http://tinyurl.com/ybso4gs

2. The National Care Service proposal

One of the features of Gordon Brown's speech was a proposal for a National Care
Service, which would aim to provide a general high standard for home care across
the country, with specific attention to people with high needs who would
otherwise need to go into a care home. This would differ from the current
County-based system in two ways: first, not only health care but ordinary help
with living would be provided free of charge for people in this category, and
second, there would be a minimum guaranteed level of provision across the
country, to end the current postcode lottery (Notts is actually better than most
so this second aspect wouldn't affect us much).

Now clearly there may come a point where you're just too ill to stay at home,
but most of us have had family members who had a rather agonising period when
they'd have loved to stay on in their familiar home but there simply wasn't the
support available. The cost of this is actually quite limited, since if the
alternative is to go into a home with all the costs involved in that, it's not
necessarily much more expensive to be looked after more intensively at home.
It's simply a better way of using the same money, though Mr Brown envisages
topping it up with reductions in NHS spending on advertising, consultancy and IT
(a cautionary note here: I'd like more specifics of exactly what would be
reduced – advertising, for instance, can be important in public health
campaigns).

What does "high needs" mean? It's defined as needing at least 16 hours a week of
personal care (washing, dressing, going to the loo, etc.). At present, if your
total wealth exceeds £22,500, you are not entitled to any of this except at a
relatively high charge which will quickly eat into your savings. 350,000 people
are currently paying for this level of care at home. The new system will be in
the Labour manifesto, to be introduced next September, if the government is
re-elected (a big if at the moment, but we'll come back to that question when
the election comes round!).

This seems to me a very attractive idea, but there are issues to be ironed out.
The money that goes to councils who deliver the care needs to be ring-fenced for
this purpose, as otherwise they'd have no incentive to help people stay at home.
There also needs to be provision for counties that do provide more than the
national standard to top it up easily, so that perhaps people with moderate
needs could in due course also be offered free home care.

Moreover, the idea is intended to be a forerunner of a universal care system,
free at the point of use like the NHS, in return for a payment at some point. I
think I favour taking this payment at the time of death from the estate of the
deceased (or the last survivor where there's a couple): this seems to me much
more painless than charging people when they're 65. However, let me be honest
about that: it would mean essentially more inheritance tax – what would be
happening would be that you'd get free home care when you needed it, even at
more moderate levels, during your life, but when you and your partner died and
your home was sold if you had one, a substantial one-off contribution would be
levied from the proceeds.  I know this is a sore point with many, but personally
I'd rather pay tax when I'm dead, and if I inherit some money I don't mind too
much if a deduction is made for the availability of free care during their lives
– we'd be clear that they'd got something for their money, if only peace of
mind. (That's not party policy yet – I'm just considering whether I should
propose it for the manifesto.)

In response to the Labour proposals, I understand that the Conservatives will
propose a different approach this week: rather than free help to stay at home,
if you pay £8000 when you're 65, you will be offered free care in a nursing
home. The economics of this idea are based on the fact that only about 1 in 5 of
us do in fact go into a home, so it would fund £40,000 worth of care, just like
an insurance scheme (and it might in fact be privately administered by someone
like BUPA). The attraction is that many people can put together £8000 each from
savings, but £40,000 is out of their reach.

As with all insurance, though, there are small print issues. If you're already
rather ill when you're 65, and perhaps need care imminently, do you still get to
take part? If so, won't the scheme get lots of sign-ups from people who need the
£40,000 package while people who feel pretty healthy may tend to give it a miss?
But if you can only sign up if you *don't* have a pre-existing condition, as
with most private health insurance, then it's much less attractive and people
who are ill when they retire will still have to pay.

At any rate it seems to me a healthy debate for an aspect of life which really
needs fixing – the current arrangements are too much of a lottery which can
leave you in serious hardship if you're unlucky. I've tried to put the pros and
cons of the both ideas fairly, and would be interested in comments.

3. What happened to the bank guarantees?

You may recall that in the midst of the banking crisis there were reports that
we were giving the banks trillions of pounds, creating a gigantic debt which
would take generations to repay. As we emerge from the crisis, I thought it
might be worth looking back at what was actually done and whether it's worked.
Two curious facts are that it appears in reality not to have cost very much but
that we don't actually know how much. I'll explain.

Essentially the Government gave the banks three things:

* A guarantee of UK deposits if they go bust. Since the presence of the
guarantee has stopped a run ion deposits, nobody has gone bust, so the cost of
that has turned out to be zero.

* A large injection of capital in exchange for shares. At present, the
Government is sitting on a paper loss on these shares because they fell through
the floor during the crisis, but the loss is falling steadily as the stock
market recovers. In the end it's likely to produce a profit, probably starting
with Northern Rock. This isn't trivial, since even when, say, the Royal Bank of
Scotland market price rises above what we paid for the shares, the Treasury
can't suddenly dump 70% of the shares on the market without depressing the price
again. But it looks as though this element of the apparent cost is going to go
away in due course.

* Various guarantees insuring the banks against losses if they lend money to
private businesses and don't foreclose too quickly on homeowners. These are
potentially expensive if all the businesses collapse and all the
mortgage-holders default, but as with the deposit guarantees the effect of
having the banks not foreclosing is to make it much less likely that the
defaults will happen. However, there is a cost, and we won't know what it is
until the crisis is over and we see how many firms and home-owners defaulted.
The banks are paying the Treasury for these guarantees, and are increasingly
keen to exit from them – essentially it's an insurance policy they feel they no
longer need. Given the general recovery trend the net cost seems likely to be
relatively small - and in my opinion worth it (since otherwise there would be
many more bust businesses and evicted ex-home-owners).

There's a Labour political point that the Government seems to have got this
right when others were suggesting it'd be disastrous – see

http://tinyurl.com/ybe8bbo

for a nuanced discussion of this and other matters. But the policy was put
together in a frantic scramble (it's said that several high street banks were
within hours of collapse), and the opportunity was missed to impose strict
conditions on bonuses and lending policy as part of the package. The G20 summit
was about trying to catch up with that, as you'll probably have seen in the
papers: basically bonuses will only be payable if the apparent success has
lasted for several years (rather than short-term speculative success).
The eye-watering figures for 'money for the banks' were basically worst-case
assumptions - if all banks had collapsed, the government's shares would be
worthless, and if all businesses defaulted, we'd be paying for all the loans. In
reality, both Britain and the other leading countries have got through – touch
wood! – with very little net loss. At a time when it's fashionable to rubbish
governments everywhere, it's nice to record that the world got something more or
less right.
4. Local news and events

• Friday 9th October, 7-9pm: walk-in discussion with NET on the practical
implications of the tram. I've organised this in response to requests from
numerous constituents for more information about how the project will affect
them, and also for ways to raise specific concerns (e.g. parking and through
traffic during the development): there are a lot of people who simply feel in
the dark. Having had a number of public meetings with speeches, I thought it'd
be helpful to have one with a different format – nobody will make a speech, but
there will be displays about different parts of the route and NET staff on hand
to note concerns and give answers where possible. The only thing I'd ask is that
we shouldn't go over the pros and cons of the idea again – this is intended to
be simply a helpful `fill in the blanks' event. In the New Year, I hope to help
set up groups of residents and traders along the route to discuss details with
NET contractors as things proceed. I've arranged a separate pre-meeting for
Chilwell traders to discuss with a Conservative County Councillor, Richard
Jackson, their concern about the reported withdrawal of the transitional funding
help expected from the County.

• Sunday 11th October 7.30pm Paradiso Cinema presents: Young Victoria Chilwell
Arts Theatre, Chilwell School , Tickets on the door £4.50, £3 (conc)

• Wednesday 14th Oct. 7.30pm: Beeston Free Church have asked me to say they've
organised a discussion on euthanasia and assisted suicide at their church in
Broadgate – all welcome. There is a guest speak, Dr Andy Genmill, followed a Q&A
and open discussion.

• Wednesday 21st October 6-7pm: Village Ventures presents: The Garlic Theatre:
The Sorcerer's Apprentice. Suitable for age 4+. Chilwell Arts Theatre, Chilwell
School. Tickets from 0115 925 2698 or 07827 996 223:  £6, £4 (conc) or £16
family (2+2).

5. Do you know a resident vulnerable to crime?

Constituent Linda Whitt, known to some of you for her courses about preparing
for retirement, passes on this note for people in Neighbourhood Watch areas:
Some money is available for Neighbourhood Watch members who are especially
vulnerable to the activities of burglars/bogus callers.  The amount of money is
severely restricted and once exhausted will not be replenished. Persons who
probably fall into this select category are the elderly, those  who are less
able and persons who live in older properties with little or no security, also
those on low incomes. The target hardening includes the fitting and supply of
locks, windows
> locks, shoot bolts, pad bars and padlocks and the reinforcement of lower
> door panels to houses/flats - not outbuildings or sheds.  They do not fit or
> provide intruder alarms or security lighting. To suggest someone who could
benefit and learn more call 0115 9670 999 ext 812 5650.

Feedback welcome on all these things – please add NNTR (no need to reply) if you
don't need a personal response.

Best wishes

Nick

A quick update on my earlier message. The County have now officially said they
will *not* be withdrawing support for bus pass users to use the tram. Both the
BBC interviewer and I had been told otherwise yesterday, but I'm very glad to be
able to say that the threat, if it was genuine, has been lifted.

Best regards,

Nick

Hi all,

1. The County's tram decisions

I've been asked by lots of people about the implications of yesterday's County
Council vote on the tram. They have gone further than the expected decision not
to contribute to the cost of the project, and withdrawn the expected
transitional support for traders in Chilwell; I understand that they are also
seeking to ban the use of pensioner bus passes on the tram for anyone living in
the County. This would currently mainly affect people in the north of the
borough who use the tram from Phoenix Park, but also means that when the
extension comes to Beeston and Chilwell pensioners won't be able to use it free
as expected. The County position, as I understand it, is that although they're
reluctantly going along with the project, it's now a City matter and people who
want financial assistance etc. should address themselves to the City.

The snag about that is that the City is very unlikely to fork out the £2.1
million in support which had been expected for Chilwell traders: it's not
realistic for the County to dump the problems of County businesses on them,
since in the real world each council will give priority to its own residents.
Without the County support there is a real danger that most of the traders will
go under, not because of any long-term tram impact but simply because of loss of
business during the months when the road is blocked due to construction.
Regardless of politics, someone needs to help them.

What can be done constructively about all this? As far as the traders go, I'll
approach NET and do my best to get a package of help for traders from them: it's
not in NET's interest that shops should close down all along the route. As far
as the bus pass goes, I want to investigate whether the County can actually do
this without the consent of the borough council – Broxtowe certainly wouldn't
approve. I'll keep you posted on both points (for the moment pensioners should
be able to go on using the bus pass on the tram while it's clarified).

I'm going to depart from my usual practice and add a sharp political comment.
The Conservatives campaigned in the County elections on two themes: (a) vote for
us and we'll stop the tram and (b) we'll stand up for local traders. They've now
reneged on both. The tram will go ahead, and the traders will be let down, the
casual stab at pensioners by seeking to disallow the bus pass from trams being
an unexpected extra. I really think they've been cynical about this – they knew
perfectly well before the election that it was too late to reverse the tram
decision. The current decisions won't hurt the tram project: they simply pettily
punish local traders and pensioners.

I suspect they'll try to rerun the tactic at the General Election, by claiming
that a Conservative Government "might" cancel the tram altogether. Since the
Conservatives nationally are strongly pro-tram (their transport spokesperson has
attacked the government for being too slow in extending tram networks), this
isn't plausible, and once the election was over we'd get another "Oops, sorry,
it was too late to reverse it" statement. These are examples of the tendency in
politics - not restricted to the Conservatives - of taking any old line that
gets votes and worrying about the consequences later - but sometimes, as in this
case, completely innocent people are affected badly.

2. Toton and Chilwell Meadows by-election

A pretty quiet outcome in this traditionally safe Conservative ward. Turnout was
down by a quarter to 31% and all parties lost votes, especially the BNP, who
lost nearly three quarters of their support. A widely-circulated leaflet by an
anti-BNP group had shown the candidate attending what was described as a German
Nazi festival, in front of a poster showing steel-helmeted soldiers in heroic
poises. I've not seen a denial of this, and if a party is seeking to garner
support with a claim to be super-patriotic, it's probably a tiny bit unwise to
appear to be sympathising with the army that tried to conquer us. (For details
of the allegations see http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2009/09/438530.html )

    The full result (comparisons with average vote last time in the multi-member
ward): Con 1081 (-265), LibDems 474 (-230), Labour 298 (-102), BNP 59 (-147).
UKIP, who had 149 votes last time, didn't stand this time.

    There was a 4.5% swing from BNP to Conservatives and a 1% swing from LibDems
to Labour. The Conservatives lost ground to the BNP last time and this makes it
up: their share of the vote is now back to around its 2003 level. They were
disappointed in the drop in their majority against the national opinion poll
trends, but in fairness there was a strong view among local voters, including
many who didn't support them, that they'd chosen a good candidate: Ms Hegyi has
a strong local record and I think she'll be a good councillor. We were pleased
to improve our share of the vote in national conditions that can modestly be
described as suboptimal for Labour, and to see off the attempt by the BNP to
overtake us. I'd like to say thanks to my Labour colleagues, especially Atul
Joshi, for all the hard work and to Ms Hegyi and her team and the LibDems' Bob
Pemberton and his team for a very fair campaign.

Best regards,

Nick

Hi all –

As promised I want to discuss Afghanistan, and while I'm on difficult issues I
thought I'd also return to the question of the economy with an update and a
discussion of public spending and cuts. First, though, two local political
things and one non-political one:

1. The current Positive Politics.

This is my intermittent newsletter to all constituents. For reasons I've
discussed here before, I can't afford to post it to everyone, so I am dependent
on volunteer help. If you're not already helping and would be willing to spend a
few hours on this, please let me know as it's really important that I get the
chance to stay in touch. You can see it on screen here:
http://www.broxtowelabour.org/ (click on the "Positive Politics" banner in
mid-page and it will come up).

2. The Toton by-election

If you live in the ward, you should by now have had a letter from me (or you
soon will) putting the case for Atul Joshi, the Labour candidate. The starting
position is that it's a safe Tory seat (easily their safest in Broxtowe, in
fact); Labour and the LibDems have both been 2nd and 3rd in recent years with
the LibDems ahead of us last time; the BNP are 4th, and they hope to pick up
votes from UKIP (who aren't standing this time) and overtake us, which would be
a depressing outcome.

Atul is an energetic local businessman, standing in a ward where I think some
more councillor energy would be a good thing: the current councillors are
perfectly nice people, but the obvious local issues (traffic, pavements, ASB,
housing, travellers) aren't being addressed with any urgency that I can detect.
It would be a good thing if the generally complacent air were shaken up a bit,
and I hope you'll give Atul your vote.

3. Swine flu preparations

Two constituents rang me last week to say they were stuck at home, both with
swine flu, and nobody they knew who could get them the antiviral medicine from
the nearest collection point: what should they do? I popped round to them, got
the form and picked up the medicine for them, but as that's not something I can
always do I wanted to encourage you to set up a reciprocal agreement with a
friend or acquaintance to help each other if it arises – although it's really
died down for now, everyone expects some resurgence in the winter. The
procedure's quite straightforward and the distribution centre were very helpful
when I took the couple's form, but without someone to do it if the need arises
there would be a real problem.

4. The economy

I've been trying to advise on this through the credit crunch, and you can check
my track record on this here:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxtoweInfo/message/503 (July) and

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxtoweInfo/message/475 (January).

The January update discusses how the crisis arose, and the July one advises on
the outlook – I think the information there remains valid. The July update also
anticipated the discussion of public spending reductions which has suddenly
become every party leader's favourite issue, to the point that we're getting a
sort of auction for who can sound fiercest, without boring us with the details
of what they'd actually do.

There are essentially two issues here. First, how soon the deficit should be
curbed. It's obvious that it's currently helping the economy turn the corner,
and equally obvious that it can't continue forever. The sooner we start cutting
back:

(a) the sooner we make inroads into the debt (or at least stop making it worse)
but

(b) the more we risk the recovery  (and if the recovery fails, debt will worsen
again anyway as production and taxation revenue will slump back).

The argument divides the Government (which believes we should ease back next
year and cut it seriously in 2011) from the Conservatives (who believe we should
have already cut back this year). The experience of the 1930s and the 1980s does
suggest that cutting too soon is very dangerous, and virtually all Governments
have come to a similar conclusion to Britain's that it's necessary to run a
large deficit this year. (I think the Conservatives are being a bit cynical in
saying that because the government agrees that cuts will be needed in the
future, that proves they were right to call for them during the worst of the
crisis.)

Whether one agrees or not, that issue is going to be water under the bridge
shortly, since everyone agrees we need to throttle back next year – for
instance, the campaign by retailers to extend the VAT cut past January 1 is
clearly going to be rejected as unaffordable. The more important question is
what we should scale back on when the economy recovers.

In my July update, I suggested some concrete things: briefly, stopping new
projects, reconsidering Trident, ID cards, and our wider defence stance, slowing
the renewal of new infrastructure (motorways, rail electrifications, etc.) and
raising taxation in the £50,000+ bracket (something some of you strongly
disagreed with). Quite a few of you suggested tackling public sector pension
schemes: I'd be in favour of reviewing how expensive these actually are, and I
suspect that some of them do look too generous in current conditions (yes,
including the MPs' scheme). I wouldn't support sudden retrospective change: it's
not fair to mess up people's retirement planning just before they retire.

The big debate that I think is lurking around the corner is means-testing of all
benefits. The benefits system is quite erratic in this: some things like Housing
Benefit are only available if you're more or less destitute, others like Child
Tax Credit are given to everyone into the middle or even higher income groups,
and some like the Winter Fuel Allowance are given to everyone in the relevant
age group.

The argument for no means testing *at all* is that it's hugely beneficial to
take-up – virtually every pensioner happily accepts the fuel allowance and the
bus pass since they know they're for everyone, so there's no `stigma' attached.
The other snag about means testing is that it penalises you harshly if you
increase your income – you can end up with an effective marginal tax rate near
100%, since your extra income is balanced by the benefits that you lose.

On the other hand, universal benefits undoubtedly spread the available money
more thinly. My own view is that there is a particular problem in persuading
pensioners to accept help, so we shouldn't start imposing new means-testing on
them, but that where means-testing already exists, there's scope for focusing it
much more on the poorest families (which, to be blunt, would mean that child tax
credit would stop being paid to people on higher incomes).

Finally, we need to look at what the parties are proposing on public services.
I'm surprised how little attention there's been to the Conservative announcement
that they'll abolish the service levels (`targets') that NHS managers have to
reach (e.g. no more than two weeks' delay for cancer treatment or 18 weeks for
other operations; no more than 4 hours waiting in A&E, etc.). They say they'd
like to leave it to the managers, which sounds good at first. However, coupled
with a squeeze on spending what are the managers going to do? They won't sack
themselves, will they? They'll lay off staff and let the service levels slide
back. It would undoubtedly save significant money, but it would also change the
NHS markedly for the worse, and that deserves a proper debate before, nort
after, people decide how to vote.

I also feel very strongly that we need a *complete* list of changes from each
party that we can examine and add up. There's scope for legitimate debate on how
quickly to reduce the deficit once the economy recovers, but the current
pseudo-debate is doing nobody any favours. Each party is trying `bravely' to
identify a few things they'd cut, but postponing maternity leave improvements
(Labour), making food in the House of Commons more expensive (Conservatives) or
not abolishing tuition fees (LibDems) is not addressing the issue seriously.
It's perfectly clear that more significant economies will be needed, and I think
there would be electoral benefits for the first party to treat everyone like
adults and spell them out with a costed bottom line. Don't you?

5. Afghanistan

I discussed the reasons for the anti-Taliban effort here

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxtoweInfo/message/502

but after more recent discussions I wanted to add some further thoughts for your
consideration.

First, we really need to focus on the purpose of the mission. It's to stop a
regime regaining power which openly favours and assists terrorism around the
world; in particular, it's to stop that infecting the neighbouring government in
Pakistan, with their nuclear arms. During the summer I had an extensive
discussion with a specialist in the area, and the advice was that Pakistan's
government is too weak to resist a militant regime in Afghanistan: they would
feel the need to cooperate with them and would eventually be drawn into the same
orbit. The endpoint of that could be nuclear weapons fired on Mumbai or further
afield.

What the mission is not, however, is a host of other things. It's not about
stopping the drugs trade, stamping out corruption, promoting trade, keeping
anyone in particular in power, or killing/capturing every last Taliban
supporter. All these things might be desirable and useful, but if they conflict
with the main objective (for instance, the former American idea of destroying
the poppy fields, even if it drove the farmers into the arms of the Taliban),
the main objective takes priority. And if we can do deals with some Taliban
supporters that stop short of giving them power, that's fine.

I also feel strongly that we need to cap our involvement. The normal British
stance is that we can maintain one brigade on active missions abroad at any one
time, with another for short-term reinforcement. At present, we have two
brigades fully engaged, and there's pressure for more. This leads to erosion of
our capability (one of the reasons for the equipment problems is that we've
reinforced with more troops than we expected to need), and it's too much to ask
of us as a middle-sized European power. We should give notice to our allies that
we intend to return to one brigade by next summer. (It'll save money, too.)

As always, I don't expect agreement on everything and feedback is welcome! And
if you can help at all with my newsletter delivery that'll be wonderful.

Best wishes

Nick

Hi all -

Sorry, quick correction - the "Eat'n'debate" on "Is British politics broken?" is
12.30-2.30 on SATURDAY September 19 (not Sunday as I said). That'll teach me to
write emails at 2am. :-)

Best regards

Nick

Hi all –

I'm back after a nice tour of my relatives on the south coast. They're a very
varied crowd and they're all lovely – a publishing manager, a retired
hang-gliding teacher, a social worker, a hairdresser, an astrologer, the
recently-retired general who was Chief of Army Staff, and my 92-year-old aunt,
who seems to have discovered the secret of eternal youth: she's exactly as
composed, lucid and friendly as she was when I was a child.

I count one other Labour voter, two LibDems, two Tories and two UKIP, but we all
tolerate each other amiably – life's too short to fall out over politics. I took
the opportunity of staying with my Army cousin to get a detailed assessment of
the Afghanistan position, and that's prompted me to make some other enquiries –
I'll discuss the issue more in a forthcoming email.

This is really just to let you know about several upcoming events. Residents in
Awsworth, Cossall and Trowell should read the one about the open-cast threat,
and I hope that many of you will want to come to my eat'n'debate discussion on
"Is British politics broken?' – see below, and please let me know if you can.

Before that, I promised a plug to two local blogs:

http://beestonia.wordpress.com/ has been running for some time – it's a very
personal blog by a Beeston resident, ranging from the whimsical to the political
to the lyrical. I recommend scrolling down to the (in my view) very touching "24
Hour Garage people" item. (Warning: there's a bit of swearing in it, but on this
occasion necessary in context.)

http://parishofnottinghamshire.blogspot.com/ is newer and more political in a
Private Eye sort of way: it takes a regular waspish look at the new County Hall
administration.
Coming events
--------------------
Saturday 12th September,10am-2pm. SUPER ADVICE SURGERY

Organised by Lee Pepper at Broxctowe Council, this event at Oasis Christian
Centre, Union Street, aims to offer valuable advice and support to members of
the community during the economic downturn. People will have access to experts
from welfare rights, citizens advice bureau, Nottingham credit union, loan shark
awareness experts, financial experts giving advice on basic banking for the
socially excluded, housing services, education (Open University & Castle
College), leisure promotions, mediation advice, housing benefits, home safety
and food promotions from Sainsbury's.
Free tea and coffee provided. Everyone who attends will be entered into a free
prize draw, with Sainsbury's, Argos and Lidl vouchers, as well as an exclusive
Boots gift basket. In addition, there will be fun activities for the kids.

Monday September 14 7.30-9.30pm: AMNESTY GRILLING

Beeston Library. This is my annual grilling by Beeston Amnesty, the only active
local Amnesty group in Greater Nottingham. They regularly campaign for victims
of oppression around the world, but members are also alive to concerns nearer
home, and we always have a lively debate. Entrance free.

Sunday September 19 12.30-2.30pm: IS BRITISH POLITICS BROKEN?

Eat'n'debate lunch discussion at Yum's Cantonese restaurant, 119 High Road,
Beeston (opposite Broadgate Park). This is a return to a successful formula that
we ran for a series of debates last year. The normal cost to take part is £20
(plus any drinks), of which half goes to the restaurant for a two-course meal
and half goes to my campaign fund to help me put my case on a level playing
field with my better-funded competition.

I'll argue the case that it's difficult to get honest discussion in British
politics, to a much great extent than in other countries where I've lived, and
the reasons why that is and what we can do about it. I'll introduce it and then
it'll be over to you – the basic attraction is that you can eat as much as you
like (it's normally a buffet with a choice of hot dishes, both vegetarian and
non-vegetarian) and debate as much as you like, or just listen. If the £20 cost
is a barrier, a generous constituent who is keen to encourage these discussions
has offered to help out – she'll pay the difference from whatever you can
afford.

Please let me know if you'd like to take part in this so we can reserve your
place(s) – capacity is limited.

Wednesday September 23: 6.30pm for 7 to 9: OPEN-CAST THREAT
Trowell Festival Hall (Harry's Bar).  I'm being joined at this meeting by Jane
Burd, coordinator of Notts Against New Coal, Ken Rigby, the LibDem County
Council for Kimberley and Trowell, and Anna Soubry, my Conservative opponent:
other concerned councillors will be there too. Entrance is free but we'll have a
whip-round to try to cover room hire cost.

Local residents may remember that Richard Robinson and I wrote to them in May
alerting them to what looked to us like an impending bid by UK Coal to reopen
the idea of open-casting between Trowell, Cossall and the M1 – this time on
Shortwood Farm (near the M1 service area). I also raised concern in Parliament
at Prime Ministers' Questions last December. Jane Burd has now established
through a FoI request that UK Coal are indeed pressing ahead with an application
to extract 1.8 million tons. The meeting is to brief you on the implications, to
propose that we should as a community oppose it, and to discuss our next steps.

    We have been here before: in 1997 I supported legal action against the
Government to force them to change their minds and block an application to mine
Robinettes Farm (which is next to Shortwood and will no doubt be revived as a
project if Shortwood is approved): I eventually managed to persuade the Minister
to accept our case.

    While it's been possible to agree an all-party event, the Conservatives have
also insisted on doing a separate event covering exactly the same ground (see
"Squabble News" below) – this is at the Cossall Parish Rooms on September 16 at
630.

Squabble news (yawn!)
----------------------------

One of the few sides of politics that I really dislike is the intense arguments
that we get over procedural issues, and even reading about them is tedious. But
as I've had two complaints from the Conservatives, here's the story and if you
would like all the details you can judge for yourself.

Before I went on holiday, I asked when Awsworth Parish Hall could be booked for
the open-cast meeting – it's the only suitable hall in Awsworth and Cossall for
a large event. We were told it was pretty booked up but September 20 afternoon
was free, so I reserved that.
When I got back, I started preparing invitations to all concerned and a public
leaflet, but was then tipped off by local councillors that Conservative Cllr Mel
Crow  and Anna Soubry had arranged their own meeting on the same subject four
days earlier. They'd booked the tiny Cossall Parish Rooms and were about to put
out a leaflet inviting everyone in Cossall and Trowell.

I thought it'd be silly to have two meetings on the same subject in the same
week.  I'm in London on the date of the Conservative meeting (and hadn't been
invited anyway), but I suggested we find a day for a joint meeting so UK Coal
would face a united front. Jane Burd invited me and Ms Soubry to meet to try to
agree. September 20 didn't suit the others but we found we could all manage
September 23 and I phoned Ken Rigby, the local LibDem County Councillor, who
said that this would suit him better too – as it's a County issue, Ken's
presence is pretty vital.

So I cancelled my September 20 booking in favour of a joint event in Trowell
(Awsworth hall is booked on Wednesdays). However, Ms Soubry then insisted that
she would press ahead with her meeting anyway. The very patient Jane Burd has
agreed to go to both.

The Conservative complaints are (from Cllr Crow) that "you had not had the
wherewithal to inform me" before booking Awsworth hall and (from Ms Soubry) that
I was playing party politics by suggesting that they merge their meeting into a
joint one.

I'll leave it to you to judge these matters. But at least we do have a joint
meeting now, and I hope it will form the basis for a joint campaign.

Best regards

Nick

Quick note from holiday! I was misinformed about the date of the Transition
event in West Bridgford – it's actually on August 29. See
www.transitionnottingham.org.uk/energyexpo for details.

Hi all –

This is a round-up of pending items as I'm away from tomorrow till September 1,
and I also want to run past you a proposal I'm considering for a change in the
law on travellers.

I'll be checking email from time to time but the general idea is to recharge
batteries and do non-political stuff, so I may skip reading anything that
doesn't look very urgent – if you're in trouble and it's vital that I read about
it quickly, please put URGENT in the title.

1. Is British politics broken? debate

After a pause I'm returning to the series of "eat'n'debate" discussion meals.
The formula that proved very successful was that I'd host a discussion on a
current theme over a meal in a local restaurant. The normal cost to take part is
£20, of which half goes to the restaurant for a two-course meal and half goes to
my campaign fund to help me put my case  on a level playing field with my
better-funded competition. I've provisionally earmarked lunchtime on September
19, for a discussion on

"Is British politics broken?"

I'll argue the case that it's difficult to get honest discussion in British
politics, to a much great extent than in other countries where I've lived, and
the reasons why that is and what we can do about it. I'll introduce it and then
it'll be over to you – the basic attraction is that you can eat as much as you
like (it's normally a buffet with a choice of hot dishes) and debate as much as
you like, or just listen. If the £20 cost is a barrier, a generous constituent
who is keen to encourage these discussions has offered to help out – she'll pay
the difference from whatever you can afford.

2. Dallas in Moorgreen?

Residents near Moorgreen and the edges of Kimberley and Watnall may have been
surprised to see survey work being done for what appeared to be a company
specialising in oil exploration. I thought that people might want to know what
was happening, and in fact it's exactly that – Low New Biggin Oil Ltd thinks
there might be some oil in the area and has commissioned some exploratory
investigation in soil samples. Before anyone gets excited or alarmed, though, I
should add that this sort of survey is very common around the country,
especially near the old coalfields, and the probability that JW Ewing and
friends will be arriving any time soon is very small. I'll keep an eye on
developments and report back.

3. Housing development consultation – what happens next?

After I wrote to people in the potentially affected areas about this the very
low response rate quintupled and the council now has substantial feedback which
it will reflect upon. The next stage will be a recommendation from the council
about which areas it is thinking of earmarking for possible development in the
period 2011-2026: this will be a further consultation document, and it's
expected around January. I'll report further when I've seen it. We'll then have
another chance to object if we disagree with any of it, and it will be finalised
late in 2010.

I'll just run through the process again for those of you who are new to the
issue. After the *potentially* suitable sites have been identified, developers
could propose housing developments there, any time up to 2026 – in the current
climate with the housing market just starting to recover, probably not, but it
could look quite different in 2013 or 2017, etc. It will still be possible to
oppose specific projects, but as a result of the current exercise, they'll know
that the council doesn't consider the site as out of the question in principle.

The basic idea is to avoid wasting time and causing unnecessary alarm with
projects that clearly aren't acceptable – the upside of the process is that all
areas which the council decides are unsuitable will be protected up to 2026,
failing some unforeseeable rethink. If an area is approved in principle, that
doesn't, of course, mean that anything will happen in practice – it depends
whether anyone wants to do a new development there and whether the council at
that time (say in 2020) thinks it's needed.

4. Travellers – a proposal for discussion

We've had a particularly large number of incursions from groups of travellers
recently, on sites in Beeston, Toton and Nuthall, and apart from fire-fighting
by alerting the council and landowners as soon as they're reported to me, I've
been looking into the law about this and I'm thinking of proposing a change in
the law and wanted to consult you about it.

First, I'll try to state the current position objectively as there's a lot of
emotion attached to the issue and the reality isn't always clear.

• There is a traditional lifestyle associated with the Romany (gypsy) culture of
people who live in caravans and roam around freely, doing small jobs and selling
handicrafts in one place before moving on. While there are concerns about the
educational prospects of children who grow up in that tradition, as well as
doubts whether the adults are always entirely within the law (e.g. on payment of
tax), this is regarded as a legitimate and indeed colourful tradition, and the
history of persecution of gypsies (Hitler murdered them in large numbers) has
made people wary of knee-jerk prejudices.

• However, very few groups of travellers are actually anything to do with
gypsies. Nearly all the recent groups in our area have been associated with very
serious pollution of the sites (massive litter, human waste and so on) as well
as very persistent reports of theft and other unpleasant behaviour. I don't
think that concern about persecution of legitimate travellers should lead us to
have illusions about this: it's a bad thing, it causes lots of innocent people
grief, and it gives the whole tradition a bad name.

• In the past, all counties were expected to maintain official caravan sites
where travellers would be welcome: these have water supplies, toilet facilities,
and so on, and are not usually very close to residential areas. That requirement
was abolished by the last government, and has not been reinstated by the current
one. As a result, councils maintain fewer sites, and there are gaps between
authorised sites which make it difficult even for legitimate groups to find
somewhere to stop on the way.

• A perverse effect of the "Englishman's home is his castle" rule is that the
police are not allowed simply to evict people from your land – in theory, you
might have invited them to stay, and there is in fact one local case of a
landowner who doesn't seem to care. The law requires that either (a) the
landowner goes to court to prove that he didn't authorise it and get an eviction
order or (b) the council takes action against indifferent landowners for
`maintaining an illegal campsite'.

The trouble with this is that it's expensive (an eviction order means several
thousand pounds in legal costs, rarely recoverable from the travellers as the
market for battered caravans is limited) and above all slow – typically a week
or so. The rogue groups know that and operate accordingly, staying until the
eviction order arrives and then moving on.

This isn't common sense, is it? Of course it's possible that you might have
organised a caravan festival and invited loads of people to come and stay, but
it's not very likely. So my proposal would be that any group of more than say
two caravans on one site that isn't a caravan park would need to produce written
authority from the landowner showing that they had a right to be there;
otherwise, the police would be allowed to evict without further ado. To balance
that, I'd reinstate the requirement that each county maintains an adequate
network of official sites, sufficient to allow travel from one to the next
within one day.

That would be fair to the groups (whether gypsies or just ordinary roaming
folks) who want to live an itinerant lifestyle but have no wish to break the
law, and it would make the current abuses impractical. What do you think?

5. HMRC workshops for the self-employed

A constituent, Gerarde Nixon, has let me know about free HMRC workshops for
people becoming newly self-employed or considering becoming/having to become VAT
registered. The VAT workshops are currently run regularly (monthly) at Castle
Meadow, Nottingham. Gerard's less sure how often the Self-Employment and Self
Assessment courses run, but they are regular. He says "The format is informal,
and 99% of the delegates attending leave with a little bit more useful knowledge
than they arrived with - at least their feedback forms always say so!!" You can
email him on gerarde.p.nixon@... and the web page is
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/bst/work.htm .

6. What's On


Saturday 5th September
10.00am till 3pm
Transition West Bridgford renewable energy show in Central Avenue West.  The
Energy Savings Trust, the Marches Energy `Everyone's talking about Climate
Change' van and several local companies that install  domestic renewable energy
and insulation will all have a presence, and no doubt many others.

Saturday 5th September
Stapleford carnival – parade through the town and then lots of stands on the
fields near the Jaguar all afternoon.

Sunday 13th September
9am to 1pm
Chilwell School, Queens' Road West
Outdoor Car Boot Sale (weather permitting)
Entrance fee – donations to Chilwell School Partnership
(Set up from 7.30am – no need to book
Cars £5, vans £7.50)

Sunday 13th September
7.30pm
Paradiso Cinema presents:
The Reader
Kate Winslet stars in a film that dares to ask whether a war criminal deserves
compassion.
Chilwell Arts Theatre, Chilwell School
Tickets on the door
£4.50, £3 (conc)

Friday 18th September
7.30pm
Village Ventures presents:
Melissa Western:
Ella, Marilyn, Marlene & Me
Australian jazz singer and actor Melissa Western whirls through the glamorous
and tragic lives of three icons of the Twentieth century.
Chilwell Arts Theatre, Chilwell School
Tickets from the school on 0115 925 2698 or 07827 996 223
£7, £5 (conc), £22 family (2 adults + 2 children)

Saturday 19th September
Probably the eat'n'debate lunch – see above.

And that's it from me until I'm back – and probably a few days after that as
there will be zillions of letter and emails to catch up with first.

Best regards

Nick

Hello all -

I wanted to let you know, in case you've not previously heard, that Rylands
Methodist Church will be open for up for reflection tomorrow Tuesday August 18
around the time of Sean Upton's funeral in Catterick, from 1230pm to 2pm. Sean
was a soldier recently killed in the Afghanistan conflict with only 8 days left
to serve in the army. His mother is a member of the church at Rylands and he
grew up in Rylands, so they are opening the Church to allow friends, neighbours,
fellow 'Rylanders' to pay their respects to this brave man.

I've some other updates but I'll write separately about those and let this one
stand by itself.

Best wishes

Nick

Hi all –

I see the press are saying MPs have buzzed off on an 82-day holiday, so maybe
the first thing to say is that I’m here. I plan to spend a week or so visiting
family at the end of August – they’re strung along the south coast so I thought
an old-fashioned motoring holiday might be nice. Apart from that, I’m available
as usual, and surgeries continue in August. Thanks to all the offers of help in
the run-up to the General election – I’m overwhelmed by all the encouraging
messages, such as Professor David Kendall’s:

"In other constituencies I'd consider voting Liberal Democrat or Green, but in
Broxtowe the only realistic outcome is that Nick Palmer holds the seat or is
replaced by the Conservative candidate. I think that those of us who care about
progressive politics and respect his work should rally behind him. If we just
vote for party tickets and don't support good MPs when they need it, we
shouldn't complain if Parliament doesn't meet our expectations."

This email is going to focus on practical advice on swine flu and the economic
outlook, and I’d also like to consult further on public spending and taxation.

1. Swine flu

I thought it might be helpful to update you on the current position. Basically
we do have to anticipate unusually widespread infection in the coming months,
but unless the illness mutates it seems actually as or more benign than many of
the flu strains that hit Britain every winter. The job of the Government is to
ensure that patients who are vulnerable know what to do and are given calm
advice and rapid help, without over-reacting in some of the ways that have been
suggested (e.g. closing all schools).

The National Pandemic Flu Service is a new self-care service comprising a
dedicated website (www.direct.gov.uk/pandemicflu) and phoneline (0800 1 513 100
or 0800 1 513 200 (Textphone)).  It will allow people to check their symptoms
and, if necessary, get a unique number which will give them access to
anti-virals at a local collection point.  It is intended to free up GPs so that
they can focus their efforts on helping those in at-risk groups and patients
with other illnesses.  However, people with serious underlying health
conditions, pregnant women, and parents with children under the age of one
should still contact their GP if they have swine flu symptoms. A snag here is
the limited GP cover at weekends. If you are do have an aggravating condition
and think you’ve got swine flu, and find your GP’s number is diverted to a
telephone service, don’t just wait for Monday – discuss it with the helpline,
get a friend to pick up the anti-viral medication and if you have serious
symptoms, press NHS Direct to get someone to come out, as they will if the
symptoms are sufficiently worrying.

East Midlands NHS are sending me weekly updates. In the most recent week for
which figures are available, consultations for influenza-like illness were at
the rate of 1 person in 400 across the region. Currently, local trusts are not
reporting any significant impact on services.  It is important to stress that in
the vast majority of cases, the symptoms of swine flu are so mild that only
over-the-counter remedies, fluids, rest and reassurance are needed. For those
people diagnosed as needing additional medication, collection points have been
set up across the region so that a ‘Flu Friend’ can collect the medication,
without those feeling unwell having to leave their home. All of these collection
points are linked to the National Pandemic Flu Service. I’ve been asked not to
publish the locations so that patients who need the medication don’t run into
chaotic queues if the illness should spread more rapidly, but I can confirm that
there are several locations in Nottingham. I’m asking for an additional one in
Broxtowe.

Across the region, 146 admissions to hospitals during the previous week have
been recorded as possibly swine flu-related. These admissions may not have been
caused by swine flu, but by other health concerns. Ordinary seasonal flu plays a
contributing factor in a number of deaths each year. Any case where swine flu is
suspected to have played a contributing factor in the death of an individual is
investigated. In the East Midlands there are two patients suspected to have died
from swine flu so far.

The Government ordered massive stocks of the medication in good time, so there’s
going to be enough for the entire population if needed – thus don’t order via
the Internet (which might get you something dodgy) or feel you must stock up for
fear it might run out. A vaccination is in the final stages of preparation, and
a decision will be needed in September whether to start using it: the case for
doing so is that we could inoculate people who come into contact with many
vulnerable people (such as nurses); the case against is that it would really be
better to do more controlled trials  for a few months to ensure it doesn’t have
side-effects, and then inoculate at the end of the year before the cold weather
aggravates things. There is always a risk of people being panicked by
sensationalist media coverage, or alternatively dismissing it all as something
that won’t happen to them; the reality is that it’s a serious issue but for most
people not dangerous, and on this occasion we do seem particularly
well-prepared.

2. Economy update

I’ve commented at earlier points in the credit crunch here, in particular in a
big January update. If you’re curious to see if I got it right you can read it
here:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxtoweInfo/message/475

A new update may be useful. The bottom in the housing market that I predicted in
January does seem to have happened: the market watch provided by

http://www.zoopla.co.uk/market/NG9/ and http://www.zoopla.co.uk/market/NG16/

show that prices in the 6 months since then have fallen just 1-2%. Locally, I’ve
been helping some medium-sized employers talk to banks and the Inland Revenue
and although it’s been a near thing in several cases, we seem to have avoided
any major collapses so far. There have, however, been substantial layoffs here
as elsewhere.

What’s the outlook? We seem to be in the classic later stage of a recession,
where firms begin to restock inventories (the big car firms that had temporary
layoffs are now mostly back at work), stock markets begin to rise, but
unemployment continues to go up as firms that were counting on a faster upturn
finally succumb. Export industries have been hard-hit by falling demand around
the world, but European purchasing levels are now levelling out and should start
to rise in the next three months. The number claiming unemployment benefit is
rising much more slowly than expected, possibly because some of the layoffs are
affecting non-British EU immigrants (who aren’t generally entitled to benefits),
but I do expect it to keep rising until the second quarter of 2010, when the
economy should be picking up speed. A large number of firms and individuals are
now getting help from the various Government schemes to see them through the
recession (though there are still problems in the interest on business loans –
see below), and if you run into difficulty let me know and I can supply an
overview of these.
	 While I can’t advise on individual situations, my general advice at this point
is:
• It’s now reasonable to go back into the housing market without expecting any
massive changes in current prices.

• Be wary of accepting voluntary redundancy at this point: the job market is
going to keep getting more difficult for another year before it turns.

• Don’t count on interest rates being as low as now for more than another 6-12
months. Building societies are starting to phase out the low fixed-rate deals,
and it’s unwise to take a loan or variable mortgage on the assumption that rates
will stay low for years. Conversely, if you’re dependent on savings interest,
the current drought should start to ease next year.

• If you’re running a business, plan on the basis that current overall demand is
unlikely to get significantly worse, and by next year it should start to pick up
significantly. Obviously that doesn’t mean that every individual business will
see increased sales

• If you work in the NHS, your job should be safe for the foreseeable future.
I’ve had detailed discussions with local NHS management – the budget is firmly
in the black. They are budgeting on the assumption of a real-terms freeze from
2011 and expect to be able to maintain recent improvements, avoid cutbacks, and
have a reserve for the unexpected like swine flu. Schools are also generally in
reasonable financial shape, though they are having to manage declining pupil
numbers in most areas.

• If you work for local councils, the outlook is more uncertain. The new regime
at County is ruling very little out and is talking of ‘limiting their services
to the front door’, which potentially must mean cuts in help in the home.

I hope that the advice is useful. Turning to policy issues:

3. Economic policy controversies

You’ll have seen there’s a controversy over the level of interest being charged
to businesses by the rescued banks: the Chancellor is seeing the banks about it
today.

What’s the banks’ case? They say they’re being required by the Government to
keep much large capital reserves during the crisis, which reduces their
potential loan and investment income, and also that many businesses have a
higher risk in a recession, so the banks need to charge more to cover the danger
of default.

The Government’s case is that the banks have had all the help they can
reasonably expect from the taxpayer and have given a written commitment to
maintain the level of credit to British businesses in return; that’s of limited
value if they charge up to 10% on the loans.

I expect the outcome of this to be some reduction in the loan rates, especially
in the nationalised banks, but it’s a tricky balancing act  - as with mortgages
we need to be careful not to push the bank back into high-risk speculation.

The next step will be unwinding the support measures, since emergency support
for the economy has been essential (in my opinion the Conservatives were simply
wrong on this) but it can’t turn into permanent subsidy. The stamp duty waiver
on cheaper houses will come to an end, and so will the cut in VAT. The point
about that was always that it boosted firms’ and individuals total cashflow (not
that we rushed out to buy a particular item because of the 2.5% cut, but simply
that we were paying less tax so had more money to spend at the end of the
month). It’s a major reason why we’ve not seen any major retail disasters except
Woolworths. However, it’s a subsidy from taxpayers to the economy and the
current calls from industry to continue it after January are unrealistic.

Beyond that, we have the whole debate on public spending and taxation. I’ve
passed on the feedback that you gave me in the poll on the least painful
reductions in discussions with senior ministers. The current public debate is
really unhelpful – all parties including my own are saying the others would make
terrible cuts, denying that they’d do anything very painful themselves, and even
demanding that other parties commit to spending increases for diverse worthy
causes. We shouldn’t exaggerate the hole in public finances – it’s a
significantly smaller proportion of GDP than the American deficit, for instance
– but there is of course a hole and it will need to be plugged with serious
measures. What I’m recommending to colleagues, on the basis of your feedback and
thinking it through myself, is:

(a) Stop digging! There are no end of things it’d be nice to spend more on, from
more school buildings to new road surfaces to defence. I’ve decided not to
support any of them (that is, I’m politely declining *all* the requests to sign
motions demanding that the Government spend more on something, including public
sector pay rises this year) for the current six months, and probably for longer.
That doesn’t mean we can’t spend more on one thing if we spend less on something
else – see the defence discussion below.

(b) Bring forward a defence review that focuses on current essentials. We can’t
afford to be a global superpower and we should stop trying to be one on the
cheap. That means cutting back by negotiating away Trident (cost around £24
billion) in exchange for Russian missile cuts and scaling back on our ability to
intervene anywhere on the globe (which will mean reductions in naval and air
force spending – expect real controversy over that). On the other hand, it’s
reasonable that we should want to help the UN and NATO in operations to prevent
terrorists gaining control of counties, since that would threaten security both
for the UK and elsewhere, and that means that some of the money saved should go
on the very best equipment for ground forces. The current controversy over
helicopters is an example: we were well-equipped for combat in the Afghan
plains, but the coalition decision to move into the Taliban strongholds in the
mountains has left us scrambling to adjust, and we should have a reserve for all
contingencies when we get involved.

(c) Slow down investment in new infrastructure. An enormous amount has been
spent on new schools, hospitals, motorways and rail links in the last decade.
That’s good, but we need a breathing space. I wouldn’t impose a total freeze
(not least as we need to maintain skills and jobs in construction), but a
slowdown is reasonable.

(d) Increase taxation to 45p over for incomes over £50,000. This isn’t some sort
of class warfare – I’ve been in this earning bracket for the last 30 years
myself. It’s simply a recognition that we need to increase income as well as
reduce expenditure, and people in this bracket can afford it better. Also, I
hate to say it, but I think we shouldn’t treat at the standard rate as something
that only goes down – it’s been cut twice in the last few years and is now one
of the lowest in Europe. I’ve never met anyone who thought the reduction had
meant a tremendous amount to them. Would it be the end of the world if it went
back up to 21p or even 22p, at least for the higher end of the standard range?

What *wouldn’t* I do?

• I’d be against scrapping the changes that have brought child and pensioner
poverty down – I think the Winter Fuel Allowance should be protected, as should
the Pension Credit minimum income guarantee. It wasn’t a myth that pensioners
used to have to choose between adequate food and adequate heating, and we just
don’t want to go back to that.

• I wouldn’t touch the NHS (which all parties promise to protect) or community
policing (which parties are notably silent about) – we’ve laboriously built them
up to current levels, and we should let them slide back.

• Surestart and current education budgets should be defended – one of the best
things the Government has done is improve childcare in tough areas, since there
is ample evidence that poor early years lead to health and behavioural problems
later, and good early years unlock talents that otherwise never get discovered
at all – which is something that would hurt all of us, since that home-grown
talent is exactly what we need in the decades to come.

As always, feedback welcome. There’s nothing inviolable about my opinions and
I’ll listen to any suggestions. But we badly need an honest debate, and if the
national parties won’t have one, let’s at least have it locally.

4. Local events

August 8-9: the Nottingham and Notts Fuchsia Society are holding their annual
show at Attenborough Village Hall. The colourful show with many unusual
varieties is open to the public, after judging, from 1.30 - 5.00pm on Saturday
and 9.00am to 4.00pm on Sunday. Admittance is £1.00. Tombolas, plant sales, cake
stall and refreshments are available.

Saturday August 22: The National Children’s Orchestra of Great Britain's is
giving its first-ever Nottingham concert at the Royal Concert Hall in the city,
with a West Side Story emphasis. The orchestra is nationally-acclaimed and has
an interesting social background. It runs five age-graded orchestras drawn from
children across Great Britain without regard to financial means, offering
bursaries and even providing high-quality instruments to those in need. It also
runs outreach courses giving children from non-musical backgrounds opportunities
to experience playing music for the first time. Admission starts at £10
(children £5). Details are here:
http://www.royalcentre-nottingham.co.uk/default.asp?id=363

Best wishes

Nick

July 10 2009


Hi all -

1. County gives tram go-ahead

As foreshadowed on the night of the County election, the new Conservative
council administration has now dropped the idea of impeding the tram extensions
– see:

http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/news/Tories-promise-impede-tram-extension/arti\
cle-1156678-detail/article.html

The effect of this, as discussed in earlier emails, is almost certainly that the
project will go ahead, with construction expected in the period 2011-2014.

You can find a discussion of what happens next here in my earlier update:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxtoweInfo/message/490

Note that I plan to organise a walk-in discussion with NET in Beeston in
September for everyone who has individual issues they'd like to raise.

As I said before the County election, I think the Conservatives were naughty in
soliciting votes on the basis of opposing the tram, since it was pretty clear
that they wouldn't really stop the project. That said, in fairness I'm glad
they've not kept everyone in limbo for months and have actually made a decision.

2. Why are we in Afghanistan?

The continuing tragic flow of casualties has prompted many people to ask what
we're trying to achieve in Afghanistan, and why all the major parties are still
supporting our involvement there. I thought it might be helpful to summarise the
position as I see it.

The genesis of the war is that the Taleban, when in power, acted as willing
hosts to terrorist groups operating around the world. The attacks on 9/11 are
the best-known case, but there were many others. A sitting Government has many
opportunities to assist terrorism, both through its diplomats and embassies
around the world and by providing secure training and weapon manufacturing
facilities at home. The nearest historical parallel is perhaps the old pirate
states on the Mediterranean, who provided bases for marauding ships across the
entire sea area. Ironically, the West had a lot to do with the rise of the
Taleban, since during the Cold War we systematically armed the fundamentalists
and helped them undermine the old Soviet-backed secular regime.

After 9/11, a very broad coalition of countries decided that this was
intolerable, and a US-led coalition with UN endorsement intervened and installed
the Taleban's old enemies, the Northern Alliance, in power. The Taleban were
driven into the remote border area next to Pakistan, and gradually established a
strong presence in Pakistan itself. There are around 20 countries with troops in
the coalition, though the fighting is overwhelmingly being done by US and
British troops, with other countries (whose troops are less trained in
counter-insurgency) patrolling and keeping the peace in the less contested
provinces.

Afghanistan has since had free and fair-looking elections, and the Parliament
has a very varied range of MPs from fundamentalists to feminists to communists,
but the dominant power remains with the warlords of the old Northern Alliance.
Corruption remains common, as does opium production in the hinterland (the
problem in stopping this is that it drives the farmers into the arms of the
Taleban – one can fight drugs or terrorism but it's hard to fight both at once).

The current flow of casualties is mostly because the coalition has taken the war
to the remote Taleban-controlled areas, deliberately coinciding with an effort
by the Pakistani government to crack down on their side of the border. As in any
offensive, losses are much higher than if one remains in defensive positions,
but the hope is to neuter the Taleban as a long-term threat.

The reason why it still has the support of all parties (and indeed of virtually
all countries – even Iran) is simply that the alternative appears to be to allow
the Taleban to win, in which case we will in due course be fighting their
sponsored groups here instead of fighting them there. The Karzai government is
clearly not ideal, but unlike the Taleban it's not assisting anyone in planting
bombs in Britain and elsewhere, and that's an important difference.

My personal view is that this is right as far as it goes, and I don't favour
suddenly pulling out, but by agreeing to play such a major role we are letting
the rest of the coalition too much off the hook. We should, in keeping with the
general scaling back of our global ambitions that I argued for recently, set a
reasonable limit on our involvement, and invite our allies to fill the gap as
needed. They have the same interest as we do in preventing a terrorist state
from re-emerging.

3. Mobile numbers directory

There is a considerable row brewing over the new 118 800 service, which is a
private initiative offering the same sort of directory enquiries that services
like 118 500 offer for land lines. There's no legal reason why they can't do
this (mobiles are no more `secret' than landlines) but as with landlines they're
required to allow opt-outs. In principle you can do that by going to

http://www.118800.co.uk

and following the instructions, but the site claims `technical difficulties' and
says they won't accept more opt-outs until the service is up and running. This
is unacceptable, in my view – they should not offer the service until people
have had the chance to opt out, and really they ought to be on an opt-in basis.
They've collected the numbers from all the companies we've bought stuff from
over the years and gave our mobiles as contact numbers without ticking a box
about "I do not wish you to pass this number to reliable third parties".

I expect to be criticising this in Parliament. In the meantime, if you start
getting spam calls or texts, check the website and it should allow you to opt
out. If not, please tell me.

4. Rights, responsibilities and help for (ex-)council tenants

A good many issues that arise in my surgeries relate to the large former council
estates around the borough, most of which are now owner-occupied but which still
put a good many people close together. Many current and former tenants aren't
clear what help they can get when problems arise.

If you are a Broxtowe Borough council housing tenant or leaseholder who has
exercised their right to buy, then you're invited to a conference that the
council has organised to discuss your needs, on Tuesday 21st July 2009 between
10.00am and 3.30pm at the Town Hall in Foster Avenue. There is a free goody bag
for the first 20 residents that arrive as well as a free prize draw for everyone
who attends with three prizes of £25, £15 & £10 in Argos vouchers.

The theme is `tenancy sustainability', which means helping residents to solve
problems and issues to ensure they enjoy a long and happy tenancy in their
homes. The conference will include a range of speakers from housing services
covering supported housing, repairs, anti-social behaviour and allocations.
Framework Housing Association will also be speaking about the floating support
they provide to help residents maintain their tenancies. There will be various
information stalls from across the Council and other agencies, such as Citizens'
Advice Broxtowe, Castle College, Job Centre Plus and the Fire Service. This
annual conference brings residents and employees together to provide the
opportunity for them to increase their knowledge of the service, learn how the
service may be of help to them as well as offer the chance to talk directly with
employees. The conference is free to attend and transport can be arranged and
light refreshments will be provided. For further details contact Claire Newton
on 0115 917 3616.

5. Local events

Beeston North FunDay

Barbara Carr asks me to mention this: it's at Carwood Rd, Beeston North on 18th
July. 11am to 3pm. Various bouncy castles, barbecue etc. Aim is raise funds for
Lowes Estate Residents Association, whose aim is to fund a day out for local
elderly residents and families on low incomes etc.

Jill Burn asks me to report more Big Lumch events on Sunday July 19 (see
previous email for discussion of the Big Lunch – basically the idea is that we
go all continental and have a party in the street with our neighbours):

Chilwell Eat Well are organising a community picnic on Inham Nook Recreation
Ground from 12-3pm. The invitation is for everyone to bring their own picnic and
something to sit on plus games to play (optional). Broxtowe Borough Council are
providing access to the toilets and extra rubbish collection.

Also three street parties:
Long Lane Attenborough
Denison Street Beeston

The Community Garden in Beeston Fields are also hosting a Big Lunch.

Best wishes

Nick

Hi all –

This one is going to be less non-partisan than usual, though it won't be
negative either. I want to look ahead to the coming General Election, and
announce the launch of two support groups of a type that I believe are entirely
new to British politics and perhaps are an early sign of a less party-based age:
"Independents for Palmer" and "Conservatives for Palmer".

If that doesn't interest you, though, skip down for news of my private member's
Bill for pets in sheltered accommodation, the week's events, with a carnival and
a sponsored swim next Saturday, and then a reminder of the important
consultation on housing development – if you care about our Green Belt, please
read that.

1. The coming General Election

There's a good deal of demoralisation in Parliament at the moment, with over 100
MPs over all parties standing down – some in disgrace, some because they were
going to retire anyway, some because the poisonous media climate has made them
tire of the job.

I'm not one of them. I think working as an MP, if you do it right, is one of the
best things you can do with your life. Every small improvement you bring about
in Parliament affects tens of thousands, perhaps millions, of people. Meanwhile,
locally, you can make a huge difference to individual lives and small
businesses.

I like to think I do a decent job both in Broxtowe and in Westminster, and if
you allow me to, I'd be honoured to carry on doing it. But it depends very much
on the `Rainbow Coalition' of support that I've built up over the years – people
who usually vote Labour, Conservative, LibDem, Green, UKIP or not at all, but
who at General elections vote to keep me as the local MP. The result last time
was this:

For me: 20,457 votes (42 %)
Conservatives 18,161 (37 %)

LibDems 7,837 (16 %)
Far-right parties (Veritas, UKIP) 1,245 (2.6%)
Greens 896 (2 %)
Independent 170 (0%)

On the same day, there were local elections, where the combined Labour vote was
over 6,500 lower – in other words, nearly a third of my support came from people
who actually voted for another party in the local elections. This was actively
encouraged in some cases, with a LibDem leaflet in Beeston North noting that you
could vote for Steve Carr there and for me at the General Election.

More recently, Tom Ruffin, who was a LibDem councillor in Stapleford, wrote last
week,

"As a former Liberal Democrat councillor I normally vote LibDem, but in this
close election Nick needs our support to stop the Tory candidate from winning."

Quite a few people tell me they feel a dilemma about the coming election. They
aren't, for various reasons, satisfied with the current Labour government, but
they feel I do a good job as their MP.
This is where the new groups come in.

They are (I think) the first time this idea has been seen anywhere in Britain,
though common in other countries where people are traditionally more open to
voting for individuals than parties (e.g. nobody thought it odd in the US that
there was a `Republicans for Obama' group). They're for people who recognise
that there may well be a change of government nationally, but who still would
like me to represent them. Whether the next Prime Minister is Labour or
Conservative, the Government is still going to need to be held to account in a
positive, intelligent way, and Broxtowe is still going to need good local
leadership.

Professor Paul Roberts, who is heading the Independents for Palmer group,
explains why:

"Nick Palmer is an accessible MP who works tirelessly for his constituents. He
takes a keen interest in local issues, and is equally well-informed on current
national debates and world events. His judgement is sound, and rooted in
broadly-based experience of life. I have never been a member of any political
party, but at the next election I will be voting for Nick to continue working
for Broxtowe residents of all political persuasions and none."

Russell Whiting, who set up Conservatives for Palmer, puts it like this:

"I joined the Conservative Party on my 15th birthday and have campaigned for
them ever since. When I moved to Nottingham I had correspondence with both Nick
and his opponent Anna Soubry, and I have found Nick to be the more positive,
open, honest, and responsive of the two. I will continue to support the
Conservative Party on a national basis, but will support, and vote for Nick
Palmer in Browtowe."

Another supporter, former Conservative councillor Michael Ridge wrote in the
Beeston Express after the abortion debate, "In an age where so many are
suspicious of politicians, we should give credit when it is due. Dr Palmer's
positive approach to this deeply controversial legislation and his
indefatigabile work should renew our confidence in the people we elect to serve
us at Westminster." – like Russell, he's supporting the Conservatives nationally
but encouraging people here to support me.

Bill Davis MBE and his wife Dorothy just say crisply: "We would normally vote
Conservative, but quite frankly as Nick Palmer seems to be one of the very few
honest MPs with regard to the appalling expenses scandal, we are going to vote
for him."

What about you? Over the coming months, I hope to build up both my Labour
support base and to continue to reach out to supporters of other parties. I will
be vastly out-spent by my Conservative opponent (who has £125,000 dedicated to
Broxtowe from Baron Ashcroft and another wealthy businessman in addition to
local resources): you can expect them to deluge you with glossy leaflets and
pseudo-personalised letters. They are, however, short of local helpers on the
ground. Conversely, I rely on help to deliver newsletters and leaflets by hand,
and on the network of friendships and support that I've built up over the years.
It'll be an interesting match!

What do I stand for? I've been a member of the Labour Party for 40 years, and I
stand by my ideals: it is, in my view, a noble cause which sometimes goes
astray. But beyond that I stand for a positive and constructive approach to
politics that seems to me sadly in short supply in Parliament these days.
Whether the Government is Labour or Conservative, if you re-elect me I will try
to stick to that spirit.

I've written many things to this email group over the years, but the clearest
statement of my philosophy and background was this one a couple of years ago:

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/BroxtoweInfo/message/362

Why write about the election now? Because elections aren't won or lost in a few
weeks, but over months of hard preparation. Whatever your normal party
preference, I hope that you may want to give me your support. Feedback welcome –
and if you'd like to help with leaflet delivery or in other ways, please let me
know.

2. A right to pets in sheltered housing

As you may have seen on TV, I'll be introducing a Bill this week to propose that
residents in sheltered housing and, where possible, care homes, should be given
the option to have a pet, subject to practical considerations.

Moving home is always stressful, but moving out of your family into sheltered
accommodation or care can be one of the most traumatic moments in life. You're
giving up your independence – probably for good – and you're leaving behind the
home that may have most associations with your life.

In Britain, unlike many other countries, we often add an extra element to the
agony. We put a ban on bringing in any kind of pet. An elderly cat who sleeps
all day? No. A budgerigar? No. In some cases, not even a goldfish. So not only
are you leaving your former life behind, but you're having to give up a
companion who may mean a great deal to you – and you may have to choose between
having them put down or put into a rescue shelter.

Why? Well, there are practical issues to consider. It's argued that someone
might trip over the animal. But then, they might trip over a chair too – should
we ban chairs? In any case, it might be that pets will be kept out of the shared
areas, in case some residents have allergies. More seriously, there's a question
of who pays any vets' bills, and what happens if the owner becomes too ill to
look after the pet. It's reasonable that these issues are discussed and
arrangements made in advance. Especially in sheltered housing complexes, where
residents normally have self-contained flats, though, it's hard to see there
being any insuperable difficulties.

The most telling point is that practice varies enormously. The Cinnamon Trust,
who specialise in this area, have a list of 500 homes who do let residents have
animals, including Elm House in Beeston, which I visited this week. Many who do
not seem to be just suiting their own convenience – it's one less thing to think
about. What my Bill is about is requiring sheltered complex and home managers to
accept animals unless there is a specific reason why a particular animal would
be unsuitable.  It has wide all-party support, including David Blunkett, Ann
Widdecombe and Evan Harris, and I hope to see it adopted by the parties in
manifestos for the coming election.

3. Event news

Beeston Carnival: Saturday 11th July. Bands in Beeston Square from 103 (in aid
of Macmillan Cancer Care), plus clog dancer, plus carnival princess crowning.
Broadgate Park festival from 12. Parade sdtarts at Foster Avenue at 1. Call
Lynda and pat Llaly on 0115-9223823 if you'd like details, or just come and
enjoy it.

Splash 2009, The Annual Hemlockstone Lions Club Open Fund Raising Evening,
Bramcote Baths - Saturday 11th July 2009, 06.30 p.m. to 08.00 p.m. This is a
large sponsored swim for charity – the idea is that you swim as many lengths as
you can, in front of a cheering audience, and get friends to sponsor you for
charity. Contact grahamharvey3@... for details.

4. Development consultation – less than a month to go

Last but not least, don't forget that the consultation on future home building
plans is still running, and although the current economic conditions make early
development unlikely, the decisions taken now will determine where development
happens up to 2026. To take an analogy, the recent Tesco approval has its roots
in the planning zones designated some eight years ago, but people didn't spot
the implications back then. In particular, if you don't want the green Field
Farm site, extending north up to Bilborough College, concreted over during the
coming years, now is the time to say so, and even if you don't want to bother
with every bit of the discussion I do encourage you to submit a comment on this.
See

http://www.broxtowe.gov.uk/index.aspx?articleid=5730

for the consultation – the deadline for replies is July 31.

Best wishes,

Nick

June 27 2009

Hi all –

Time to catch up with things beyond the expenses issue that's dominated the
news. First a quick warning. We're all used to hoax emails saying there's a
horrible virus around that will destroy our hard disks and eat our children if
we open the next email. It's always worth checking such lurid warning in Google
with the word "hoax". But there are genuine viruses out there, of course, and a
current one is an apparently spontaneous offer from Microsoft to upgrade
Outlook. This is a fake: it inserts phishing software to pick up your banking
details. Pass it on!

1. The tram

There's been a good deal of uncertainty since the Conservatives won the County
election on a platform which included stopping the tram, but immediately
afterwards indicated that they might be having second thoughts. An expected
application to redevelop Beeston Square was put on hold, and it appeared that we
might be back in limboland for some time while the situation was clarified.

Consequently, I asked to see the new County leader, Kay Cutts, for a
non-partisan discussion, and we had a friendly conversation yesterday. As I
understand it, there are really two issues:

a) Will the County be official co-promoters partners in the tram project and
withhold the financial contribution?
b) Will they prevent the project from going ahead by refusing to go ahead with
the previously-agreed land exchanges?

Part a) is not actually that significant: the County's share of the cost if
they're official co-promoters is just 5%, and much of that is recovered by
Section 106 agreements with developers along the projected routes (if the tram
goes ahead there is likely to be a major housing development on the Rushcliffe
route, and the developer contributes to infrastructure such as the tram). If the
County pulls out, the Section 106 money goes to the city instead and they can
use it to fill the gap.

Part b) is crucial, though – the County owns part of the projected route and if
they refused to allow it to be used, that would put the project in jeopardy.

Kay Cutts told me that the position was that the County majority were still
against the tram, but they believed that they could not properly obstruct it
going ahead without legal challenge, so it was likely to happen (unless the
Workplace Parking Levy was rejected, which I think is unlikely). I said that,
whatever the decision, local people would really appreciate clarity soon, so
that we all know where we stand and other investment was not held in limbo. I
also suggested that, even if the County decided not to be official co-sponsors,
they might like to participate in the package to help Chilwell shops along the
route with the transition.

Coincidentally, there is a statement today in the Evening Post from a list of
major local employers (the two universities, the two hospitals, Castle College
and several more) urging that the project be allowed to go ahead. I think it
will, and we should know finally within the next 3 months at the latest.

Meanwhile, there has been further progress on the tentative idea of an extension
of the tram from Phoenix Park to Kimberley and perhaps Eastwood. In the very
long run, one could imagine the loop being completed with an extension through
Ilkeston and Trowell back to Bardills. I discussed this with Kimberley Cllr
Richard Robinson and council transport planners in March, and had positive
feedback from members of Kimberley Town Council as well as Glenis Wilmott MEP,
who may be able to support an application for European funding..

Now a number of Kimberley residents are signalling their support for this
project and have identified a possible route which has been walked by a number
of experts who see it as a possibility.

The residents have now arranged a walk on Monday July 6 along the route,
followed by a public meeting to launch a group to support this proposal and hope
for support from all political parties. The arrangements are:

Meet 5pm Phoenix Park tram stop. Walk to the Nelson and Railway at Kimberley
along a suggested route (stout shoes recommended since it's obviously off-road).
Public meeting at the Nelson and Railway 7.30pm (food available beforehand). T1
Phoenix flyer bus back to Phoenix Park. Any local resident is more than welcome
to join in the walk and/or the meeting. For more details contact Richard on
Richard.Robinson@... .

I should stress that this is really early days – if it happens, I'd be surprised
to see it actually running before 2020, and there would countless discussions
about the most suitable route and the availability of funding. But a
precondition for it being seriously considered at all would be feasibility and
local interest, so this exploratory exercise is significant.

2. Constitutional reform

There's a consensus in Parliament that we shouldn't just clean up the current
expenses mess and put in safeguards for the future, but ought to take the
opportunity to reform the way Parliament works. The objective is partly to make
decision-making clearer so that the public can see decisions coming and how to
influence them, and partly to strengthen the role of backbench MPs, especially
through the Select Committee system.

The Government has set up an all-party Constitutional Reform Commission to
report by the autumn. Normally the membership of these commissions is selected
by the party leaders, but in the spirit of the idea we decided on the Labour
side to have an unwhipped election by backbenchers. I put my name forward,
partly because I've experience of politics in three other countries so can
introduce ideas that work elsewhere, and was elected with the support of 75 MPs
as one of our participants.

We've started off with a revolt, as the terms of reference were quite narrow
(select committees and private members' bills), and we want to tackle the
process for Government legislation as well: the Leader of the House has agreed
to look at extending the remit to that. If you have ideas for how you'd like to
see Parliament working better, let me know and I'll keep them in mind as we
work.

3. Home repair help

I'm grateful to Beating-Drum, a friend in Beeston, for pointing out this
little-known council scheme, which may be of interest to many of you who have
elderly or disabled relatives on limited incomes:

http://www.broxtowe.gov.uk/CHttpHandler.ashx?id=13964&p=0

4. Local events

JULY 4 10am-4pm Garden party for Cancer Research UK, David and Kath Jenkins, 21A
Grasmere Rd, Beeston, 0115-9257356. £1 gets you coffee/tea and biscuits, and
there will be plants, bric-a-brac, cakes, tombola and a raffle.

JULY 4 also, 11am-4pm, Beeston Community Celebration Event at Roundhill School,
Foster Avenue – this has everything from face-painting to African drumming to
Chinese lion-dancing (what? Dunno – but we'll find out!) to Derbyshire well
dressing (? likewise!) to Kwik Cricket to brush painting to origami. There's
also a youth event in Beeston Square with activities and performances for the
young.

JULY 4 also, 2.30-4.30pm Christchurch Hall Pre-school are holding an
American-themed (it's Independence Day when they decided to see us off) Fun Day 
with lots of games, face painting, tombola, raffle, bouncy castle, BBQ and
stocks with a teacher in to pelt with sponges!  Venue: Christchurch Hall, Lime
Grove Avenue, Chilwell NG9
4AR.  Entrance 50p for adults, free for children.  All proceeds are going
towards raising funds to create a garden and improve the outside play area for
the Pre-school, which is a registered charity.

All in all it's quite a day for Beeston and Chilwell - why not start with the
garden party and then check out the other events from 11?

JULY 19: THE BIG LUNCH. This is actually a national project launched by The Eden
Project (thank to local green activist Jeff Buck for pointing it out) and
supported by too many organisations to name – it's an invitation for us to go
all continental and un-British and have lots of street parties and enjoy the
community spirit, and there are all kinds of spin-offs such as youth events and
film-making projects. See http://www.thebiglunch.com/ for more and contact
nottsbiglunch@... for local events, or see Facebook's Big Lunch
Nottinghamshire.  You'd be wise to anticipate some street closures that day.

Finally, for idle amusement at my expense, a nearly-egg-on–face anecdote. You
remember the scene in The 39 Steps where Richard Hannay dashes into a hall,
pursued by villains, and is taken to be the guest speaker, so has to make an
instant speech on free trade? Well, I had an obscure note in my diary the other
day: "citizens' rights discussion, committee room 16″, but couldn't
remember what it was. Hmm, I thought, may as well go along and see. I got there
to find anxious-looking people outside.

"There he is! You're just on!"

"Er, what?"

"You've got 20 minutes for your introductory speech - Shami will speak after
you."

Yes - a 2-hour discussion with Shami Chakrabati on ID cards, DNA, and other
IT-liberty-related issues, in front of a packed audience of IT and liberty
campaign specialists. It was arranged months ago and I'd completely forgotten.
Eeek. Fortunately I'd given a similar talk at the Sorbonne two weeks earlier so
I wasn't tongue-tied, and Shami and I found more common ground than I'd have
expected, so it turned out fine.

Best regards

Nick

Hi -

Very briefly as I've written lots this week and this was going to be a light
weekend for me, but some of you may be interested:

Broxtowe had the highest turnout in the East Midlands (possibly the highest in
Britain, but we'll have to see) at 47%, and one of the lowest drops in Labour
support (just -3%). As in other places in the East Midlands, UKIP dropped behind
Labour and LibDems into fourth, most of their Euro-vote shifting back to the
Tories as the Kilroy factor disappeared: the BNP and Greens also picked up a
bit.

Totals (rounded to nearest whole number):

Con 32% (+6), Lab 19% (-3), LD 17% (+2), UKIP 15% (-9), BNP 9% (+2), Green 7%
(+1).

While I'm here, a plug for...

Garden Party on Saturday 13th June, at 7 North Drive Chilwell, Nottingham (in
between Park Road and Grove Avenue). 10am - 5pm it is in aid of Hayward House
Hospice . We will be having Live music, Local artists work for sale. Plant sale,
Tombola Homemade cakes and refreshments, Children's workshops.. Admission £1.50
( children under 10 free).

Next time, I hope to have updates on Tesco and Beeston centre issues and on the
open-cast threat.

Good night!

Nick

Just a quick note to let you know. Bad weather has led to the cancellation, on
advice due to safety issues.

Nick

Hi all -

Just a quick and slightly sleepy update with the Broxtowe results. I'll be
discussing the wider national issues on the Today programme on Radio 4 tomorrow
at 830ish.

Broadly, the picture was a huge slump in turnout almost everywhere, especially
affecting Labour here as elsewhere. The Labour vote in every electoral division
fell; so, interestingly, did the Conservative vote, with a single exception
(Beeston South and Attenborough, where it rose by 5 votes). Only one seat in the
constituency changed hands and it was that one: Labour's vote fell just 2% here,
but it was enough for a Tory majority of 189, so Eric Kerry took the seat from
Pat Lally.

The other nail-biter was Nuthall, where the absence of Labour and LibDem
candidates enabled Independent Sue Wildey to put on over 600 votes, but
Conservative councillor Philip Owen dropped just 143 votes, enabling him to
squeeze home by 1752 to 1741 after threee recounts.

Everyone else was confirmed in the previous seats that their parties held, with
the LibDems gaining Eastwood in neighbouring Ashfield constituency. Contrary to
expectations, the smaller parties failed to make significant headway, the best
result being UKIP's 786 in Toton and Chilwell (a quarter of the winning Tory
score).

You can see the full results for your area here:

http://www.nottinghamshire.gov.uk/home/your_council/councilelections/electionres\
ults.htm

Congratulations to the winners (and to Notts Conservatives who look poised to
take control of the County), commiserations to the losers,
and at a personal level I'd say that in particular to Pat Lally, a
hard-working councillor who lost his seat due (in my view) to
annoyance with events in Westminster over which he had no control:
some of his voters abstained or voted Green in protest, and it
was just enough to lose.

I've also been asked to pass on these snippets:

COSSALL OPEN GARDENS SUN JUNE 14 1-5pm. in your next email letter. An annual
event to raise essential funds to help maintain our ancient church and  old
school hall.

CHILWELL COLLEGE HOUSE CARNIVAL 20th June 1.30pm-5pm
College House Junior School, Cator Lane
Adults £1, Under 12's 50p
Sorry, no dogs

Birds of Prey, Climbing Tower, Car Boot Sale, BBQ, Strawberries &
Cream, Refreshments, Toys, Bric-Brac, Games, Tombola, Children's Rides.

Apart from the radio interview, a surgery and the Hemlock Happening tomorrow, I
plan to put my feet up for a non-political weekend after quite a lively
fortnight, so please forgive any slightly delayed responses!

Best regards

Nick

Hi all –

Brief updates, mainly because I forgot to plug the first of these and it's
imminent, but also to update you on early election trends (see below):

1. Hemlock Happening
This is the big event of the Bramcote and Stapleford year and worth coming from
further afield. It's this Saturday June 6 from 1pm when I'll be opening it. If
you're new to the area or haven't tried it yet, you should consider it: it's a
festival of gentle local talent and humour and there's a firework display at the
end. See
http://www.hemlockhappening.org/

Like something a bit less restrained? Well, there's...

2. Bands and bikes event

Former LibDem councillor Tom Ruffin asks me to plug this different sort of
event, at the Draycott House showground July 17-19 – lots of bands including
local ones, motorbikes galore, etc.
                www.rockandbikefest.co.uk

Not into rock and bikes? At the other end of spectrum here's a garden trail
event:

3. Garden peace
Beeston and Chilwell Garden Trail will be taking place on Saturday and Sunday 20
and 21 June from 2.00 – 5.00 p.m. Tickets are £3.00 to cover both days and there
are 12 gardens open, many of them for the first time!. See
www.beestonandchilwellgardentrail.org.uk

4.  Election update
Meanwhile, early postal voting suggests a lowish poll in our area, which is
worrying if you reckon (as I do)  that it increases the chance of an extreme
party taking Labour's seat in the Euros (unless, of course, you think that'd be
cool). Please vote if you can. Note:

- If you asked for a postal vote you must vote with it, but can drop it in on
the day in any Broxtowe polling station if you've not posted it by tomorrow
Wednesday.

- If you've mislaid your polling card it matters not – just go to the usual
polling station and say who you are.
County results will be known on Friday, Euro-results on Sunday. If you would
actually like to help us get the vote out on Thursday, let me know.

Best wishes

Nick

Hi all –

First, thanks to all those (over 200 of you) who came to the meeting on MPs'
expenses on Thursday. The atmosphere was friendly, serious and constructive –
all things missing from some of the national debate. After some modifications to
the proposals that I want to put to the Commission of Standards, the elements of
the package gained broad approval: rented properties only, reformed salary and
pensions, shared Communications Allowance (though we didn't take a specific vote
on that) and a modified "recall" option (requiring specific allegations of
wrongdoing which the MP could challenge in court). There was also a lot of
interest in electoral reform as one of the ways forward. If anyone who couldn't
attend would like a copy of the detailed briefing distributed at the meeting,
let me know.

Particular thanks to LibDem councillor Steve Carr, who got the most applause of
the evening for saying "We should be proud of our MP for his honesty" – it's
nice when goodwill crosses party lines, especially in times like these. There
was also warm applause for the secretary of Beeston Amnesty when he said, "Of
course the issue of expenses needs to be sorted out. But we mustn't forget that
compared with some of the things happening in the world it's not actually as
important." It's an unfashionable view, but a point to consider, and partly with
that in mind I'm commenting on the largely-overlooked Sri Lankan situation
below.

First, though, several of you have asked for this, to match the quick guide to
the County elections last time:

1. Quick guide to the European election

The system is that we elect 5 MEPs for the whole East Midlands. Each party puts
forward up to 5 candidates, and get seats for the top people on their lists
based on proportional representation according to the number of votes for each
party. So, if party X gets twice as many votes as party Y, probably X will get
its first two candidates elected while Y will only get its top one.

At the last election in the East Mids, the Conservatives and UKIP shared top
place with 26% each, followed by Labour with 21%, the LibDems with 13%, the BNP
with 6.5% and the Greens 5.5%. As an example of the pitfalls of celebrity
politics, UKIP did especially well because of the prominence of TV showmaster
Robert Kilroy-Silk: I'll leave to you to judge whether he's been in frequent
touch with you since he was elected (I understand he lives much of the time in
Spain).

Recent polling is hard to read, but there has been a shift from Labour to Green
and LibDems, enough to put the LibDems ahead of Labour but probably not enough
to give the Greens a seat. The likely outcome is in my view two Conservatives,
one UKIP, and any two of LibDem, Labour and the BNP (in that order of
probability). The polls suggest the BNP will fall short (they need to get about
13% to have a chance), though there is a tendency for polls to understate them,
since some BNP voters don't like to admit it. It's also possible that further
UKIP momentum will give them the second seat instead of the Conservatives, but I
think the missing Kilroy factor may hurt them in our region.

There are also lots of small parties on the ballot paper, such as a Christian
party and a `coalition of independents' called the Jury Team – none of those not
mentioned above have (in my opinion) any chance of a seat, though of course you
might want to show support for them anyway. As you would expect, I hope that you
will vote Labour, not least to help us to hold off any late BNP surge.

2. Strange leaflets

A curiosity about the BNP campaign is that their main leaflet features `ordinary
people' speaking up for Britain, but it turns out that all but one of them are
actually foreigners who have never said any of the things attributed to them.
The one exception is a Scots Guardsman, pictured in uniform: he is a real Scots
Guardsman but is outraged, and says he regards the party as "scumbags". The full
story is here:

http://timesonline.typepad.com/comment/2009/05/bnp-voters-dont-exist.html

Another odd leaflet, though not nearly as outrageous, comes from the
Conservatives in Beeston South and Attenborough. This says indignantly that I've
made `false allegations' about local Conservatives over the approval of the food
defence scheme along the Strand. My `allegation' was that they were against
approving this route, describing it as a `Berlin Wall', until the survey of the
area which I conducted showed an 8-1 majority in favour, whereupon they were
suddenly in favour of it too.

Well, it's important to have truthful representatives, so it's worth checking
who is telling the truth here. Please judge who is right for yourself. Here is a
quote from the Conservative candidate Ms Soubry's blog on September 16, in which
she wrote critically and at length against the Environment Agency's proposal,
concluding:

"I can see no merit in the proposed route".

If you're unsure whether I might be making this up, you can see her discussing
it with me on TV (skip 4 minutes in):

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/politics_show/7877528.stm

Don't get me wrong. If parties make a mistake they're right to correct it – I've
been wrong in the past too and have changed my mind. As (I think) the late
Cardinal Heenan once said "If my knowledge of the facts changes, I change my
mind. What do you do?" But I've not then had the nerve to accuse anyone of
making `false allegations' for pointing out that I used to think differently.
It's silly, since it gives the impression that they think Attenborough residents
have the memory span of elderly gnats.

Moving to a grimmer subject:

3. Should we support UN action over Sri Lanka?

As you'll have seen on TV, the civil war in Sri Lanka is over, with the
separatist Tamil Tigers defeated and the area that they controlled overrun.
There has been a long-running (impressively peaceful) demonstration in
Parliament Square by Tamils, drawing attention to alleged massacres of
civilians. It now appears from UN and other independent sources that a great
many civilians, perhaps 20,000, were killed in the final stages, and that a very
large number of Tamils are now in detention camps in unpleasant conditions,
while the authorities vet them for possible Tiger sympathies. The Tigers in turn
were noted for their ruthlessness and readiness to use terrorist methods. What
should our attitude be?

First, I think we need to be careful in judging the evidence: it's still quite
fragmented and partial, and it is horribly likely that civilians will be caught
in the crossfire in the final stages of a civil war with both sides partly at
fault. Nor should we taking sides in the conflict – it is not up to us to
decide, and the fact that the war seems to be over is potentially a good thing
in itself. However, it does seem to me that we need to encourage the UN to take
the most active possible stance in urging that the detention camps be
administered humanely, and that civilians are released from them as quickly as
possible, so that the long road back to normality can be started. It must be in
the Sri Lankan government's interest to show some magnanimity in their moment of
victory, and amid all our other preoccupations we shouldn't fail to exert
pressure over this,. Otherwise, six months from now we may be asking ourselves
why Parliament turned a blind eye while a humanitarian disaster unfolded, and
"we were busy talking about our expenses" will not seem a sufficient answer.

4. Local events and opportunities

I've been asked to pass these on:

The 'Spotlight on Youth' Marching Band Competition, on Sunday 7th June 2009,
10.00am to 6.00pm at the Harvey Hadden Stadium, Wigman Road, Bilborough.  With
15 bands, hot food, refreshments and stalls, there is lots to see, taste and
hear! To find out more, please visit the competition website at
www.spotlightonyouth@....  Tickets start from just £3.  "Come along
and support young people making a positive difference!", say the organisers.


Sunday 7th June
9am – 1pm
Chilwell School Partnership presents:
Outdoor Car Boot Sale
Chilwell School, Queen's Road West
Sellers – cars £5, vans £7.50
Set up from 7.30am - no need to book

Sunday 14th June
7.30pm
Paradiso Cinema presents:
The Fall
Chilwell Arts Theatre, Chilwell School
Tickets £4.50, £3 (conc) on the door
Refreshments from 7pm
www.chilwellartstheatre.co.uk

Study theology part time at St John's Nottingham
This one-day-a-week course is a great way to gain experience of theological
study, especially for those who have other commitments in their lives. It is
particularly appropriate for those with leadership responsibility who need to be
theologically equipped for their ministry.
To find out more, call Louise Williams on 0115 968 3203 or email:
admissions@... www.stjohns-nottm.ac.uk
St John's College, Chilwell Lane, Bramcote, Nottingham NG9 3DS

Best wishes

Nick

Hi all –

As the expenses issue rolls into its third week, blotting out public discussion
of anything else, I’d like to discuss some implications for democracy on a wider
scale and suggest ways in which a stand needs to be taken.

I’d be grateful if you’d read this one even if you usually just skim my stuff:
I’m going to suggest some things that I want to do, but also some things that
I’d like to ask you to do. It seems to me that the entire political class is
‘behind the curve’ at the moment, and we need leadership and a certain amount of
courage at local as well as national level: too many people are cowering behind
their desks, hoping the issue will go away.

1. Public meeting in Beeston

First, although I’m grateful that lots of you have written to say you think I’m
honest, I’m conscious that there will be people out there who barely know who I
am and have no idea whether I’ve got a moat and a Ferrari and have been ripping
off the taxpayer for years. So I’m calling a public meeting next Thursday with a
triple agenda:

a) Describing the system up to now, the types of use, abuses, evasion and
outright fraud that have come to light, and the exact scale of the problem. See 
analysis of this below.

b) Presenting details of the expenses related to my rented flat in London in
detail, and inviting any questions that anyone wants to ask about it.

c) Putting forward my provisional proposals for Kelly’s Committee on Standards
in Public Life, which is soliciting input for their recommendations (which all
parties have in principle agreed in advance to accept, whatever they are), and
asking people in the meeting to vote on the proposition: “If the proposals on
housing are adopted, we will feel that the issue of future second home expense
claims has been properly addressed”. More below, again.

It’s on Thursday May 28, at Roundhill School, Foster Avenue, Beeston (by the
Town Hall), from 7 to 9. There is no charge, thought we’ll have a whip-round to
cover costs. There is no connection with the election campaign and taking part
has no implication of support for any party. The meeting will be chaired by
Charlie Walker of the Evening Post. Come if you can – there is a lynch mob
atmosphere towards politicians in general at the moment, and it’s important for
a sensible discussion that the audience is not solely composed of people who
want to string us *all* up.

    Which takes us to…

2. Voting for individuals at the County elections

Some of you have told me that they’re so disgusted that they plan not to vote at
all on June 4. With respect, this is bonkers. What we’ve seen quite clearly is
that each party has a mixture of decent people and people on the make. If you
don’t vote, you explicitly waive your annual opportunity to influence this in
favour of the decent ones. It’s as though you’d had a disappointment in love,
and decided to let the patrons of the pub down the road decide whom you should
marry next. Moreover, if abstention is widespread, there’s a real possibility
that you will shortly be represented at both County and European level for the
next 4 years by folk who think the main problem about Broxtowe is that it has
too many black people in it. Moreover, it’s a huge disincentive to people who go
into politics for the right reasons – if you’ll treat them on exactly the same
level as someone sleazy, why should they bother?

To help the choice, I’ll try to give a brief truthful assessment of the outlook,
to help you decide if you want to vote tactically for a good local person:

Beauvale: Nail-biting finale last time saw veteran Conservative David Taylor
take the seat by just 16 votes from Labour, with a big BNP incursion. Everyone
is trying again and it makes sense to vote either for David or Labour’s Jen
Cole, who is fighting hard to get the seat back.

Beeston North: Sitting councillor is the LibDem Steve Carr, who won the seat
originally from Labour but has built a large personal following through hard
work. If the national polls are correct, the Conservatives could be close to
gaining this one and it’s possible that some Labour and Green voters will go
tactically for Steve. There's a separate borough by-election in the northern
part of the ward, with Steve's wife Barbara up against former councillor Wayne
Kirkham for Labour.

Beeston South and Attenborough: I’ll declare an interest as the sitting
councillor, Labour’s Pat Lally, works two days a week for me. This is almost the
mirror image of North; the Conservatives are on national polls close to gaining
this, but there is also a strong BNP effort (their candidate is the likely GE
candidate against me) and Pat, who with his wife Lynda has been working for
Beeston for many years, may get support from LibDems (who are not really
campaigning much here) and Greens.

Bramcote and Stapleford: LibDems Stan Heptinstall and Brian Wombwell seem likely
to see off all-comers, though Labour’s Geoff Ward and Stapleford champion John
McGrath are working hard. A UKIP candidate, but no BNP.

Chilwell and Toton: similarly, Tories Richard Jackson and Tom Pettengell, two of
the most respected local Tories, look safe, but both BNP and UKIP are standing,
as well as my Labour colleagues Ed Jacobs and Atul Joshi, plus LibDems and
Greens.

Kimberley and Trowell: Particularly interesting multi-party battle – don’t vote
tactically here as almost anyone could win. The friendly LibDem councillor, Ken
Rigby, who has a huge personal vote in Trowell, is being challenged by the
famously indefatigable Richard Robinson, who has held the seat before for Labour
and has an equally huge personal vote in Kimberley. There’s also a strong effort
from Shane Easom for the Tories, and there are BNP and Green candidates too in
an area near BNP strongholds – it’s likely to be a real nail-biter.

Nuthall: Almost uniquely in Britain, this is a duel, with sitting Conservative
Philip Owen facing the current Broxtowe mayor, Independent Sue Wildey. Labour
and the LibDems have not put up candidates here so Sue has a clear shot:
although Philip is possibly the most formidable Conservative councillor, Sue has
a strong following wind as ‘the lady in the white dress’ pledged to bring a
fresh non-party flavour to the county council: she’s likely to get lots of
tactical votes.

Last but not least there's the European election. Last time lots of people tried
the 'vote for a wild protest candidate' idea, and we've had 4 years represented
by Mr Kilroy-Silk, who I understand lives in Spain, though he attends Strasbourg
often enough to collect his pay. He's not standing again...

Apart from voting, would you like to help in the final stages of these elections
to help ward off the lunatic fringe? If so, let me know!

3. The Westminster scene

There’s pretty general demoralisation on both side of the House, frankly – MPs
on all sides discovering that old friends have apparently been milking the
system, and waiting to see who gets the next bullet. I regretfully stuck my neck
out to call for the Speaker to step down (see
http://www.thisisnottingham.co.uk/news/Notts-MP-wants-Speaker-s-head/article-100\
2269-detail/article.html) but that’s not because I think he was the core of the
problem – he’s a nice man for normal times but just didn’t rise to the occasion.
It is absolutely essential that we don’t regard his removal as ‘solving’ the
problem, which goes back to much broader questions of attitude.

The Telegraph is continuing to recoup the reported £150,000 they paid for the
disk by spinning the story out with a few revelations each day. I’m sure it’s
doing wonders for their sales, but it would be in the public interest if they
got on with it and published the full list quickly, rather than drag it out for
months. The cases they’re reporting fall into separate categories that in my
opinion need to be treated differently, but there’s a common factor to many of
them: the belief that anything legal is OK. It’s that underlying attitude (and
I’m sure MPs are not unique in it) that in my opinion needs to change.
Categories:

a) People who deliberately lied

Any MP who appears to have deliberately deceived the Fees Office by claiming
non-existent mortgages or the like should be deselected by their parties and
face a full police investigation. This is, if proved, the equivalent of tax
evasion and should be treated in the same way. This category appears to be small
– around three cases so far.

b) People who bent the rules for profit

Several dozen MPs have found ways to make money out of the system, typically by
‘flipping’ – first declaring one house to be the ‘second home’, doing it up,
then changing the designation and selling it. This wasn’t illegal but it was a
blatant abuse (equivalent to tax avoidance – e.g. having your salary paid in the
Virgin Islands). Some apparent cases do have good reasons for a change in second
home – they were appointed as Ministers (which used to *require* you to
designate London as your main home), a family member died, etc. But a full
explanation is required.

c) People who bought luxury items

The rules say that all purchases should be necessary to do the job and live in
London and unnecessary extravagance should be avoided. The last bit has
evidently been almost ignored – the general Fees Office culture has apparently
been that anything that makes life comfortable in the second home is OK, so some
MPs have got everything from wall-hangings to moat-cleaning to huge TV sets to
luxury fittings to the latest, the duck island. Wealthier MPs in this category
have generally declared London as their main home, so the extravagant expenses
have gone on improving their country homes.

I can’t see any justification for any of this, except that the vagueness and lax
enforcement of the ‘no unnecessary extravagance’ rule has led people to think
that the allowance was an entitlement to give themselves a great environment. As
it happens, I’ve always simply rented furnished flats, but I did buy a sofa and
mattress from IKEA to replace the weather-beaten ones from the landlord. I paid
for them myself – I don’t think the idea that I could, let alone should, have
claimed for them ever crossed my mind. Similarly, a couple of months back I
decided to buy a set-top box so I could get more channels on the London TV – why
not? But again I paid for it myself.

d) People who have messy records

Many MPs seem to have made honest mistakes. The Tory whip who was highlighted
yesterday as ‘claiming a non-existent mortgage’ turns out to have had that
precise mortgage on his second home, but he absent-mindedly kept entering his
main home as the address instead. As he’s made no money out of it at all, this
seems credible.

The system is complicated enough to make genuine errors easy, and the
understaffed Fees Office doesn’t have the time to analyse every claim. I
discovered I’d overclaimed for council tax after moving to a new flat, and if
I’d not reported it and offered a refund I doubt if it would have come to light.
Similarly, I’ve just had a British Gas refund (because I used less electricity
than expected) which I need to report. I saw an obscure negative direct debit
“Brgas -£38” on my online bank statement, and went to my online British Gas
statement and found they’d paid the refund, but again if I’d not noticed it
nobody would have known. I’m not the most orderly of people and under constant
time pressure, so I’d much prefer it if the rent, council tax and utilities were
simply paid directly by Parliament – no fiddles, no mistakes, total
transparency.

e) People who use the system as designed

Some of the criticism is simply that people claim allowances at all, even when
they’re for the intended purpose. There’s an Evening Standard story this week
contrasting a Devon LibDem MP with someone from Devon who lives in a tent – the
implication is that the MP is being greedy for expecting a roof over his bed at
all. Similarly, the Mail praises a Labour MP for sleeping on the floor in her
office.

This goes further than I think is reasonable, but I’d be interested in your
views. As I’ve reported before, I use the allowance to rent a one-bedroom
flatlet very near Parliament, with a rent of £1750/month that’s typical for the
area: it’s the smallest place I’ve ever lived in. It’s certainly true that if I
moved to, say, Brixton, I’d pay less rent. The trade-off would be that I’d spend
more time commuting, often late at night when I currently try to keep on top of
the email flow. I’d argue that most people would make the same choice.

To take a local comparison: if you were assigned to do a job at Boots for a
government agency that kept you working late most nights, and were told you
could have enough rent allowance to stay nearby in Beeston, would you insist on
commuting from The Meadows or even sleeping on the floor in the office, in order
to save the taxpayer money? If so, I’m impressed, but I wonder if it’s really a
reasonable requirement.

That said, the arrangement is about to bite me on the bottom, since the
agreement that the party leaders reached last week caps rent claims at £1250. As
I have a long break clause in the rental agreement, unless there’s some
transitional arrangement this means I’ll be around £4000 out of pocket before I
can move.  It’s a fairly common problem – we’ll see if the Kelly recommendations
solve it, otherwise it’s Brixton ho!

4. A reform package

One of Obama’s advisers likes to say “Never miss the chance to use a crisis as
an opportunity”. We can use this to rethink how we do politics, and try to
re-establish the idea of politicians leading and setting an example. That’s not
as impossible as you might think – bear in mind that there are 646 MPs, and
probably fewer than 10% have had any serious allegations against them. But we
need to get ahead of the curve. What I plan to propose is this:

a) Basic accommodation rent-free, but owned by Parliament.

MPs from outside Greater London should be offered somewhere in a nearby block of
flats (such as County Hall), to include a bedroom, a living room, basic fittings
and kitchenware, a good computer with broadband connection, a TV,  and utilities
and council tax paid. These costs would be paid directly by Parliament. MPs
would get no other living costs – that’s what the salary is for. (On the other
hand, they’d be free to use the flat as they think fit – add personal items,
have their daughter to visit, whatever.)

If MPs don’t like the flats, they are of course free to live wherever else they
like, at their expense.

b) Fair salary

The salary should be set by an independent body, comparing with medium civil
service pay, and its recommendations implemented towards the end of each
Parliament without either Government or MPs having a chance to change them. New
candidates would know what to expect for the next Parliament. There would be
incentives for non-Ministerial roles which involve additional responsibility,
such as taking part in Select Committees, so that MPs would no longer need to go
the ministerial route to earn a better salary. With many of the allowances
abolished, I think a higher salary might be justifiable, to be phased in after
the current economic crisis.

c) Defined contribution pension

In accordance with current normal practice, future pension contributions would
go into a defined contribution scheme, and final salary benefits frozen at the
current level.

d) Shared Communication Allowance

At present, MPs can spend £10,000 a year on non-partisan communications – e.g.
I’ve used some of mine to survey Attenborough residents about flood protection,
consult Nuthall residents about a pharmacy, and alert people to proposal for
Green Belt development. They’re commonly also used for ostensibly non-political
Annual Reports, showing lots of photos of MPs doing community things.  The
information function is important (with 70,000 constituents, I simply can’t
afford to print and post regular letters to everyone), but it does give an
incumbency bonus. I propose that it be reduced to £8000, but the runner-up in
each constituency should be given a £5000 allowance on the same basis (must be
non-partisan), enabling residents to see two views of what’s going on. If the
runner-up loses interest (i.e. doesn’t plan to stand again), (s)he would be free
to designate another person from the party that they stood for to inherit the
allowance.

e) Recall

As in the US, if a large proportion of the constituents of an MP decide they
wish to force an election, it ought to be possible – say a petition signed by
30% (about 21000 people). This would enable constituents of MPs whose behaviour
fell seriously short of what was expected to avoid having them hanging around
until the end of the Parliament, but it’d be difficult enough to avoid mass
eviction whenever a party was temporarily unpopular.

The basic idea of the package would be to offer reasonable, stable terms and
conditions for MPs, with useful information flow from both sides in every
constituency and an emergency mechanism in case of serious disgrace. If
something like this happens, won’t we all feel a bit better about our system?

Feedback welcome, as always, and I hope to see many of you at the meeting. Next
email I'd like to get back to other topics, including a detailed assessment of
the risk of the return of an open-cast mine project in our area.

As always, please add No Need To Reply if you don’t need an answer. I had a
record last week with an angry constituent emailing me 33 times in a couple of
days, including pictures he’d done of photoshopped MPs’ corpses – I’ve done
something I’ve never done before, putting him on the spam list so I don’t see
his stuff at all. I’m always willing to listen, but it’s a bit of a balancing
act: if the line isn’t drawn *somewhere* it’s literally impossible to do the
job!

Best regards

Nick

Hi all –

A report back on the last polls of your views below, but first comments on the
Gurkha and expenses controversies. Before I get into those, a passing plug for
this thought-provoking little video on human evolution:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cL9Wu2kWwSY

Startling stuff!

1. The Gurhka controversy

As many of you know, I was one of the MPs who voted against the Government on
this, but I'll try to summarise the arguments as I understand them fairly
anyway.

Gurkhas have traditionally been recruited from Nepal on a contract as foreign
soldiers, paid what is a good rate for Nepal but much less than British
soldiers. They can retire at age 33 on a pension, which again is very small by
British standards but not bad in Nepal.

   	 Traditionally, serving Gurkhas did not acquire the right to live in Britain,
and in fact up to 1997 apparently only six Gurkhas did so, all of whom happened
to be wealthy and entitled to settle on the basis of being self-supporting.  The
current government introduced the right of settlement for all Gurkhas who served
since Labour took over in 1997, which coincided with the date when Gurkhas
started to be based in Britain, and it's also increased the Gurkha pension so
the ycould afford to live here.

	 The current campaign is for Gurkhas who served before that to be allowed to
settle as well, with their families (around 30,000 people). The argument in
favour is quite simple, and was expressed by the LibDem leader, Nick Clegg: `if
people are willing to die for Britain, they should acquire the right to live in
Britain'. Moreover, many people like what they see and hear of the Gurkhas, and
feel that they would be a valuable addition for the country. Finally, many of
the people we are talking about are now quite elderly, so if we're going to do
anything, we need to get on with it.

	 The argument against is partly cost: 30,000 additional mostly retired people
will need both the higher pensions and health care: the possible extra cost is
estimated at around £1.4 billion a year. Moreover, it wasn't part of the
original recruitment deal, which quite clearly didn't include any right of
settlement. Finally, it may be that establishing the precedent in the terms
expressed by Mr Clegg will lead the courts to rule that all former combatants
who fought with British troops are entitled to settle here. If so, we are
potentially talking about several hundred thousand new pensioners from
Australia, India, Pakistan, Canada and many other countries, at a cost of many
billions.

	 That does seem to me to be something we shouldn't rush into, and the
legislation needs careful drafting to focus on the Gurkhas. The government
proposed to extend the right of residence to pre-1997 soldiers, but only if they
were long-serving, had been stationed in Britain, had received medals for
gallantry, or had fallen ill as a result of service.

	 I don't think the Government has a poor record on this, and Opposition critics
of `unfeeling' Ministers have something of a nerve, seeing that previous
Governments refused to allow virtually any Gurkhas to settle at all. But I felt
it had now got to the point where we were quibbling, at the expense of some very
vulnerable old people who have been good friends to Britain. So I voted
accordingly, for the Opposition motion, and look forward to an improved deal.

         A general comment: it's easier for me to vote against the Government
when I disagree with something now that I'm no longer a PPS so no longer so much
bound by collective responsibility. The downside of that is that I am consulted
less about Bills before they're proposed - essentially I've switched from an
'insider' to an 'outsider' role. There's something to be said for both, but I'm
finding the independence of the backbench role useful; this is my second revolt
in a couple of months and I'm also signed up to the opposition to the Royal Mail
part-privatisation.

2. Expenses

More horrors are unfolding as I write, and I don't have anything to say in
defence of anyone who perverts the system, especially as they drag us all into
the mud with them. I am formally proposing to the independent Committee of
Standards in Punlic Life my suggestion in a previous email: that we should buy
the former County Hall on the Thames and assign the furnished flats rent-free to
MPs, getting rid of any allowance to rent or buy anywhere else.

At a personal level, I went through my four years of invoices and I've found one
error: a few years ago, I seem to have claimed £61.10 twice in successive months
for the same anti-virus software. I've pointed it out to the office who examine
claims, and asked them to check that it's actually the same payment (and not the
same software for two different computers); while they're checking, I've
refunded the money.  I can't find anything else odd in my invoices; they'll all
be published in July (or sooner if the Telegraph puts them all online) and you
can review them for yourself.  My second home has always been a small rented
London flat, and I've never bought any furniture or fittings for it from
expenses.

3. Survey results

Many thanks to all of you who took part in my survey on potential cost-saving
measures. A summary of the results:

Trident: 43% agree with my suggestion that we should put the system into the
disarmament talks. 37% would like to simply scrap it without further ado. 20%
would like to press ahead.

Aircraft carriers: 55% agree with my suggestion that we should cancel the
project and scale back our commitments to middle-sized power level. 37%
disagree, and would like to continue the project. 18% would cancel the carriers,
but seek to retain a global role in other ways.

ID cards: 59% of you would now scrap the project; 26% would like to continue but
delay implementation; 15% would like to press ahead at once.

Schools and hospitals: 65% of you agree to slowing capital projects to free
resources for other medical treatment. 27% disagree and want to press ahead with
the current rate of building. 8% favour cuts in health and education.

Motorways: 46% are against further motorway construction in principle, 44%
favour a slowdown to save money, but 10% want to press ahead with more motorways
to give drivers a better deal.

Taxes on high incomes: 62% of you agree with me that it would be reasonable to
raise tax by 2p above £50,000. 29% think this goes too far, but would be up for
it over £100,000. 9% think the Government's existing increases over £100,000 are
unfair.

Thanks again for taking part! I'll bear the results in mind and quote them to
colleagues in Westminster when the opportunity arises as we tackle the later
stages of the economic crisis.

Best wishes

Nick

Hi all –

In this update, I'd like to brief you on recent meetings with NET about what
happens next and to initiate a constructive (I hope!) discussion on savings in
public expenditure (if you're only interested in local issues, just skip point
2). Before doing that, though, I'd like to correct a previous email.

1. David Watts

In my last e-mail I said that David Watts had said that we should have sent aid
to the Taleban. I accept that he did not say this and what he actually said was
that we should have sent aid to Afghanistan. I accept entirely that David was
referring to the people of Afghanistan, and not to the murderous and misogynist
Taleban, and I withdraw unreservedly my previous comment and apologise to David
for the distress caused.

2. Public spending savings – what should we protect and what should we reduce?

It's generally agreed that the recession has opened a huge gap in public
finances (all forms of tax revenue have declined, with e.g. stamp duty
collapsing as few houses have been bought or sold) while the cost of support for
people made unemployed is rising) which needs to be plugged.

The post-Budget debate divides neatly into two aspects. The first is the
short-term one that I've discussed here before: should we initiate cuts in
public expenditure immediately, or support the economy at the expense of a
continuing deficit until it starts to recover? The Conservatives are arguing for
immediate cuts on the grounds that it would make a start on reducing the
deficit. The general view of governments throughout the Western world, which I
share, is that the 30s Depression showed the dangers of `cutting your way out of
a recession' – if you cut in mid-recession, you put more people out of work,
further worsening the position, and get a vicious downward spiral.

There isn't much point in lingering over this aspect, since we won't be making
the instant cuts but agree that serious restraint (to be precise, increasing
spending by just 0.7% while the economy grows at the trend rate of 3.5%) is
going to be needed as the economy emerges from recession (depending on whom you
believe, either in 2010 or 2011). So I'd like to start a discussion on what
happens then, a subject on which all parties are being annoyingly elusive.

The Government's position is that one quarter of the burden should be met by tax
and NI increases on people earning over £100,000 (this should raise £70 billion
over a 10-period), and the remaining three quarters by a near-freeze on new
expenditure in the future. All the major Departments except education and health
would be asked to make major efficiency savings every year for the foreseeable
future, gradually reducing their share of national income, with savings through
better use of IT and back-office operations, while front-line services are
protected. This seems to me frankly vague. The Opposition's position is even
vaguer: they say they would `stop government waste' and give examples like
reducing the number of MPs. I suspect that might be popular, but it's not a
serious contribution to the economic debate: if *all* MPs were dismissed
tomorrow and Parliament were abolished, the total saving would be less than 0.1%
of the deficit.

    The problem, of course, is that all parties are scared of you: they think
that if they identify specific major changes, you'll react in horror. The
Government has at least bitten a quarter of the bullet with the announced tax
rises for the wealthy, which as you know from my last email I recommended and
support. Briefly on that point, I don't agree with the belief that many wealthy
people move their homes because the marginal tax rate changes. I was close to
that tax bracket with my previous job (which paid £90,000 a year in 1997,
equivalent to £125,000 at 2009 prices), and frankly if you're doing that well
you live where you'd most like to live, without basing it on whether the
marginal tax rate is 40% or 50%. It's not a question of vindictively `soaking
the rich' – I believe that people on £150,000 accept that it's fair that in a
difficult period they can be asked to help more than people on £30,000 or less.

But I'd like to have a go at further detail: I think people react well to being
treated like adults and I'd like to encourage an open discussion about the
options, and to set up a consultation poll in my next email on what changes
you'd accept. Here are some initial thoughts for your consideration, excluding
ideas which save less than £1 billion (however desirable they might be on other
grounds), since we are addressing a £175 billion gap. I don't favour them all
(in particular I oppose cuts to the NHS and education), and there are plenty of
other possibilities to debate, but I hope they'll give food for constructive
thought:

• The current cost estimate of the Trident nuclear weapons system is around £20
billion. The initial order for the submarines is this September, so there would
not at this stage be heavy cancellation fees. The current plan is for the system
to be ready by 2024.

Now, the reason I supported the renewal of Trident is that we had a manifesto
commitment against unilateral disarmament, and more broadly I felt it was part
of the post-1997 deal with the electorate that we wouldn't do it. What I'd
propose here is not instant cancellation, but an offer to President Obama to put
the system into the arms reduction talks which he agrees with President Medvedev
of Russia at the G20 summit. If we can get a further reduction in Russian
nuclear missiles in exchange, and save £20 billion, that seems a reasonable
option.
    The counter-argument to consider is that we really don't know anything about
the world in 2024. Perhaps by then there will be many nuclear-armed states and
we would regret having given ours up (though we would be in no worse position
than Germany, Italy or many other medium-sized states)? Keeping the current
system is, by the way, *not* a viable long-term option – it's going to wear out
and become unsafe to maintain eventually.

• The aircraft carriers will cost around £4 billion. A problem about these is
that the initial orders have been placed, so I suspect the cancellation fees
would be very substantial, and perhaps the saving would be only £2 billion, plus
operational savings. There is a good discussion of the project here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_Elizabeth_class_aircraft_carrier

The argument for a swift rethink, apart from the savings, is that perhaps we
should be scaling back our ambition to be able to intervene around the world
(even in the best of causes), and settle for the status of a medium-sized
European power. The counter-argument, again, is that it's hard to tell what the
future world may be like, and perhaps we would regret it – for example, it would
make it harder to defend the Falklands against any renewed Argentinian assault.
I think the cancellation would make sense in that context of a general rethink
of our global role (which would produce further large savings, at the expense of
less influence), but probably not in isolation.

• I've long supported identity cards as a sensible way of confirming identity in
case of legitimate doubt. However, the project is actually in two parts. There's
the enhancement of the passport data base, to include fingerprints, and we need
to do this anyway or we'll be progressively unable to travel internationally
since it's increasingly going to be a requirement. Then there's the voluntary ID
card for everyday use, which would make life easier for banking and other areas
where secure identity is important – e.g. it's been suggested that veterans
could get additional benefits on production of an ID card confirming their
status.

These things would in my opinion be useful, but there are concerns about
possible misuse for surveillance purposes, and it's hard to say that they're
something that's really essential right now. So perhaps the ID card part of the
scheme should be put on ice for the time being? This wouldn't save the £20
billion that you sometimes see people claim (that figure comes from totalling
all costs of passports and ID cards over a decade), but it would save £1.1
billion up front plus operating costs.

A counter-argument to consider is that it's a missed opportunity, since if we're
supplying fingerprints for passports anyway, it's a pity not to offer the
voluntary card as a side-benefit for consumer use.

• Major new buildings. Although the Government has committed not to reduce the
health or education budgets overall, I think there's a case for looking at the
division of how it's spent between annual capital investment (i.e. rebuilding
projects) and treatment. The NHS and schools estates were in a ramshackle state
in 1997 (one school, for instance, used to have to close for days each winter
when the boiler broke down, and another school was in `temporary' huts built in
1915), but the massive refurbishment over recent years has radically changed
that. At the same time, we're still pushing against the limits of the treatments
that we can afford, with NICE still ruling out some drugs as simply not
sufficient value for money. Perhaps it's time to slow the rebuilding drive, and
use the money to meet the expanding medical and educational needs that won't be
met by rising budgets. In the last resort, I'd rather get the best treatment in
a 20-year-old building than a less good treatment in a shiny new one. There are,
of course, some MPs who favour actual overall cuts.

• Motorway construction. £9 billion has been set aside for motorway building
over the next 6 years. The quiet scaling back of he M1 widening (south of
Nottingham it's turned into a hard-shoulder use with no extra lanes) probably
heralds a rethink of this, and I think that makes sense. First there are the
environmental issues associated with ever-wider motorways, and second the
network is now reasonably good most of the time in most of the country, and
again I think it's hard to say it's absolutely essential that we press ahead in
the next few years.

• Other tax rises. Finally, should we completely exclude any tax rise for anyone
under £100,000/year? There have been cuts in income tax in recent years which
were absorbed without much excitement, and I wonder if an extra penny or two on
rate tax in the £50,000-£100,000 range would not be a reasonable thing to ask.

Few of these ideas are going to be welcome in themselves - but if the next
election is fought on evasive slogans ("Labour will see you through" vs "time
for a change with the Conservatives"), then neither party will really have a
mandate for a proper rethink, and I reckon we're all mature enough to be able to
have a sensible discussion of them. Please give your views in my survey here:

http://tinyurl.com/cpkjcr

or (if you don't like using tinyurl)
  http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=MWlDA3vL_2fk9L_2fxLu_2fsa2PA_3d_3d

As always, feedback and other suggestions welcome – preferably with an NNTR if
you don't need a reply, but I'll look at every idea seriously.

3. NET: what happens now?

Following meetings with residents in Chilwell and at Neville Sadler Court (with
more to come – e.g. I've asked to visit Sandby Court), I went to see NET to pose
a range of detailed questions from the meetings, and to ask more generally about
the outlook and how local people will be consulted at each stage. I'll be
sending the meeting participants the detailed answers to their questions (mostly
too specialised to list here, but I can email a copy if you're interested).
a) Program from now

July 2009:

- Expected completion of the financial details (this assumes the probably
approval of the city's workplace parking levy, possibly with modifications).
- NET invite large and small firms to express interest in all or part of the
project.
- This is the period when we should lobby for major strategic elements in the
tender process (e.g. specification of involvement of local subcontractors, but
not the siting of a particular replanted tree)

November 2009:

- NET formally invites bids for the contract and starts discussions with major
interested companies on how they'd tackle the work. The next 6 months are a
highly-regulated process governed by fair competition rules, designed to get the
best value for taxpayers to the required quality: the downside is that it takes
6 months!

May 2010:

- Companies submit final bids for the work

Autumn 2010:

- The winning contractor is announced, and detailed consultation start on each
section of the route (at this stage, it does go down to individual tress)

Summer 2011:

- Construction begins, with each section likely to be dealt with for relatively
short periods before the construction moves on to another section.

Once construction starts I am pressing NET to ensure that we do not have a
repeat of how things were in Hyson Green where it is agreed the contractors left
works idle for too long. There are three phases to the works: The first is more
disruptive to pedestrians as drains, gas, electricity water and telecom services
are moved away from the tramlines and repositioned mainly under the pavements.
The second phase involves tracklaying: this will be done in 100m sections at a
time and each section should be completed in a relatively short time (a question
to be discussed in each  consultation group – see below - is whether we want
more disruption for a shorter time. The third phase is putting up the wires and
commissioning. This is relatively non-intrusive but takes almost a year. The
total time to construct the tramway is approximately 3 years but work outside
any individual house or business should be for periods of 6 weeks or so. It is
expected to open in 2014.

Meanwhile, other aspects to the redevelopment of Beeston will be going on: the
Tesco negotiations will conclude at some point (they are currently still
deadlocked, as the council is not willing to approve a megastore that would
cause traffic gridlock), and the developers of Beeston Square has said that the
indecision over the last few years has been a hindrance to their plans so we
should be able to look forward to investment in that area – but again there will
be consultation needed.

b) Consultation
I am pushing hard for more consultation. NET were reluctant to attend my public
meeting and haven't so far attended CAT meetings. During our discussion, they
agreed to come to CAT meetings along the route in future, regardless of the
political colour of the Councillors. I also asked them to come to an event that
I'll organise in September when they will present their plans on a large display
and invite individual discussions so that everyone can raise the issues that
concern them most – I'll let you know details when I've arranged it. Community
forums are to be set up which will represent small sections along the route such
as Sandby Court. I have pressed for these to be set up at the earliest
opportunity and it is envisaged that they will be an early requirement of the
successful contractor.

Best wishes

Nick