NByNW Diary: Osborne's Devil is in His Detail

Wednesday 25^th November

In essence, George Osborne’s Spending Review was like one of those ads on the radio. It’s trying to sell you the Orgasma-tron 4000, which promises untold realms of utopian hedonism, and then the voiceover quickly rattles through the smallprint, practically whispering the words: “Pleasure may go up or down. Terms and conditions apply. Batteries not included.”

Certainly, there will be cuts in departmental spending, but police budgets will be maintained, health budgets will be increased, housing budgets will be increased, schools are being given budget breaks, and the headline is that the dreaded Tax Credit cuts will now not happen. Everything seems to be rosier.

But, as ever with Osborne, the devil is in the detail. Those who were going to lose out on Tax Credits will still lose the same amount by the end of the decade with the introduction of Universal Credit. It’s all a question of swinging the axe slower. We wait for the bespectacled analysts to rake through the smallprint.

Nevertheless, that left Shadow Chancellor John McDonnell in an awkward position. Responding to Financial Statements is the hardest job in British politics. You have no advanced sight of the statement, and it’s made all the harder when you have a cough, and your opponent has pulled the rug from under you.

What you shouldn’t do if you are trying to gain public trust on the economy from a far-left position is quote any controversial Communists in support of your assessment. One can imagine the nightmare scenario of McDonnell standing at the despatch box, pulling out a copy of the Little Red Book and quoting Chairman Mao.

Well, there’s no need to imagine. You can watch McDonnell's Mao McNuggets now on YouTube. Again and again.

Frequent readers have often thought that some of my inventions are real, or sometimes that something I have reported is a conjuring from my imagination. After witnessing that, even I’m not sure where the line is anymore.

More NbyNW content is available, including this story on The Labour Moderates' Secret Code to Bring Down Corbyn:

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The North by North Westminster Diary: Does anyone come out well from the Junior Doctors' Strike?

Thursday 19^th November

It has become apparent that health policy is a murky and intriguing world.

After the election, the bastard Tory Government and Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt felt mandated to introduce a seven-day NHS, as mortality rates at the weekend are considerably higher than those during the week and they wanted to rectify this – the murderous villains. Furthermore, they followed up a promise to invest upwards of £8bn pounds in the health service so that Simon Stephens, Chief Executive of NHS England, could impose his plan to “save the NHS”.

Unfortunately, as a consequence of all this, a new contract for Junior Doctors was introduced, and its details were controversial. Basically, if you were a JD, you could be expected to work for up to 15 hours as your normal working time, Monday-Saturday. There were worries about the quality of service that this quantity of hours would provide, and about morale within the NHS. Furthermore, when the Government invited the British Medical Association to talks over the new contract, they were told that 22 out of the 23 points were non-negotiable. Which was Jeremy being a classic Hunt, and served to alienate the BMA.

Nevertheless, the BMA did some spinning of its own. Before any figures were announced, they posted a calculator on their website announcing that members would see their pay reduced by 30%. A claim for which they had no evidence. And when the Department of Health did issue figures, they also put out a guarantee that any individual’s pay would not go down, apart from those who are already working unsafe levels of overtime – one of the doctors’ concerns about the new contract.

No matter though, and the BMA issued a ballot on strike action. At the eleventh hour, the Health Secretary announced a new contract offer with a headline grabbing 11% increase to the basic rate of pay and invited the BMA to come to the table for talks; and offer which they refused. A phrase comes to mind involving horses, stable doors and bolting.

Now we have the results with 98% of those balloted supporting a strike which can only impact one group of people: patients. Jeremy Hunt is, at present, refusing to go to talks at the conciliatory service ACAS.

So, here we are. The Health Secretary has been stubborn and evasive. The BMA has been economic with the truth and evasive. There maybe a genuine wish to protect the sick from both sides, and both may want a better health service. But rather than meet in the middle, both appear to have dug in their heels and now patients from the 1^st December can expect a lower quality of care – and it won’t even be a weekend.

One thing does seem to be clear in this murky and intriguing world: nobody is really coming out well from this.

NByNW Diary: Don't Be Rude to Ken Livingstone - He'll Insult Entire Sections of Society

Wednesday 18^th November

Today, Labour’s National Executive Committee has decided to appoint former Mayor of London and newt-fancier (no, really – he is) Ken Livingstone to be the joint head of the party’s policy review on Defence, alongside the Shadow Defence Secretary Maria Eagle.

This seems like a definite attempt to ensure that the anti-Trident camp are given as big a voice as possible, and as such it caused a bit of stir.

Kevan Jones MP, who served as a Defence Minister in the Labour government, told PoliticsHome: “I’m not sure Ken knows anything about Defence. It will only damage our credibility amongst those that do and who care about defence.”

To which Livingstone responded: “I think he might need some psychiatric help. He’s obviously very depressed and disturbed. He should pop off and see his GP before he makes these offensive comments.”

Which was inappropriate both generally and specifically. Generally because there is a widespread effort – not least from Jeremy Corbyn – to change attitudes towards mental health, and specifically because Kevan Jones actually has been very depressed, and opened up about this in 2012.

A lot of people were naturally upset, and Mr Jones expressed his offense at the comments.

To which, Mr Livingstone refused to apologise, saying that he grew up in South London where “If someone’s rude to you, you are rude back.” Always a good idea to try and defuse a situation by citing the moral system of a teenager but, given that he grew up in the 50s, I suppose we can just be thankful that he didn’t grow up in the Bronx, where if someone was rude to you, you'd pop a cap in their ass.

With further outcry, Ken finally gave into the pressure:

1/2 I unreservedly apologise to Kevan Jones for my comments. They should not have been made at all, let alone in this context.

— Ken Livingstone (@ken4london) November 18, 2015

2/2 I also make this apology because Jeremy is right to insist on a more civil politics and as a party we should take this seriously

— Ken Livingstone (@ken4london) November 18, 2015

Given that he refused to apologise at 12.30pm, and then volte-faced at 2pm, we can assume that Jeremy did a lot of insisting over a post-PMQs lunch by peering over his glasses and waiting for Ken to stop behaving like an unthinking adolescent.

The North by North Westminster Diary: Rambo Trump Wants to Fight Fire with Oil Fires

Tuesday 17^th November

The number of people who have crowbarred the horrific events of the weekend to fit their own prejudices just grows and grows in a frankly sickening display.

Today, I would like to focus on Donald Trump. His initial reaction to the news from Paris was all too predictable: “Oh, there’s been an attack involving guns. Just goes to show that everyone should have guns.”

Well, John Rambo, let’s consider this particular case. If everyone had had firearms, the terrorists would not have been able to gun down as many people as they did, but only if ordinary people had had the calm and the aim to not shoot at the suicide vests the attackers were wearing. And if the terrorists hadn’t just detonated their bombs. Which they probably would have done because they would have known they would have been shot.

Even if that hadn’t happened, the armed police might not have been able to respond as quickly as they did because they would have been spread about town dealing with all of the firearms incidents and killings which happen when there’s no gun control. On the basis of American figures, there would be 54 firearms deaths and injuries across France every day.

All of which leaves us with one conclusion – loads of people would still have died, and more would be dying as a matter of course. So, well done Donald: another hole got out of by digging it deeper.

Rambo then moved onto military strategy to combat IS, and he suggested that, because IS makes a lot of its considerable wealth through oil, that he would “bomb the shit” out of the oil camps, and then send in the Marines and take the crude.

Well, here Donald has put his finger on an actual strategic issue. The revenue from ISIS’ oil is vast and it goes toward funding terrorism, war and human trafficking. That’s why the Coalition has been bombing the oil refineries, though no-one has suggested going in and grabbing the black gold.

Here's the problem - it didn't work. They bombed the refineries, and what did IS do? They sent the unrefined oil ahead to other refineries. To remove the problem of the oil, you have to destroy it. Which you would do if you "bombed the shit out of it" with incendiary bombs. Which, as anyone who’s studied fire safety knows, would destroy quite a lot of the oil. Try using it or selling it then, you Gordon-Gekko-jackass.

My problem is the sheer, hollow-headed idiocy of suggesting a policy that hasn't worked as if it's a new idea, and then coming up with a Machiavellian scheme to make money out of it which doesn't work because he hasn't read an elementary science textbook.

He isn't some moustache-twirling, or indeed wig-adjusting, super-villain. He's a total berk with a psychology so warped that Freud and Jung would have to get help in order to psycho-analyse him.

My problem is that he's so jaw-droppingly inept and inappropriate for the important job for which he is applying.

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Listen to our rebuttal of Katie Hopkins' response to the Paris Attacks below.

The North by North Westminster Diary: Compassion and Unity - Not Division

Monday 16th November

The diary takes the form of a short podcast today with Jack Blackburn, Ben Mepsted and Tristan Rogers discussing the terrible events in Paris, Beirut and Baghdad. In particular, they focus on an article written by Katie Hopkins the day after the Paris attack with which they took issue. You can listen to it below.

The North by North Westminster Diary: Cameron goes à la Modi

Friday 13^th November

Another week, another visit from a controversial national leader. First it was the Chinese President Xi Jinping, then it was the Egyptian President Sisi, and now it is the Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi.

Now, one thing unites all of these people. When it comes to human rights, they are notable – and by “notable”, I mean “not able”. Mr Modi, for instance, whipped up an anti-Islamist fervour whilst he was Chief Minister of Gujarat, which led to riots that caused the deaths of at least 1,000 people. When asked whether he had any regret, he said his feelings were akin to those of a passenger in a car that had just run over a puppy.

Another thing which unites all of those leaders’ countries is that we trade with them. A lot. Jobs and investment here depend on our relationships with those countries. It is somewhat tricky, but the sheer quantity of these visits is very unsettling.

At least Mr Modi is democratically elected, which makes it a little easier – largely on the grounds that he has a large chance of being booted out in the near-future.

In an attempt to distract from some recent bad election results, Mr Modi is holding a rally at Wembley Stadium – à la One Direction. The event will also be attended by that Harry-Styles-esque heartthrob, David Cameron.

It’s one thing to have a diplomatic relationship with this man. It’s one thing to trade with him. It is quite another to go along to one of the largest stadiums in the land and play the political equivalent of Guitar Hero with him. Still – at least he’ll look preposterous.

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The North by North Westminster Diary: Storm Abigail "A Desperate Attempt to Make British Weather Sound Badass"

Thursday 12^th November

It must have happened at some kind of meteorological conference.

A bunch of weather forecasters from the Met Office were sat on a table next to some flash Americans who were talking about their experiences covering Hurricane This and Hurricane That, and then mocking their British and Irish counterparts for having to talk about light drizzle the whole time.

So, they hit the whiskey and come up with an idea.

“Let’s give our storms names! You know, like they do. That’ll make our weather sound much more badass.”

And that is why, this morning, we’re hearing a lot about Storm Abigail. Which is just a regular storm, with some amber weather warnings. Except now, it all sounds very serious, and Carol Kirkwood is telling me how we’re all going to be “affected” by Storm Abigail, and the inevitable happened on The Today Programme when a climate change campaigner called it “Hurricane Abigail”.

The thing is, it won’t change anything for the meteorologists at the convention, because they’ll be talking about Storm Barry or Storm Cheryl, and then the Yankees will say “Well, this year’s hurricane caused $10bn worth of damage. How much did Storm Derek cause?”

“Errr… well the post office was shut and there were no fresh catches at the fishmongers in time for the weekend.”

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