Archive: 1 February – 7 February 2010
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Friday 5 February 2010
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MP Jim Devine at his home in Blackburn, Scotland as he gave interviews to express his disbelief at the expenses charges. Photograph: Danny Lawson/PA
Elliot Morley, David Chaytor and Jim Devine issued a joint statement today within minutes of hearing that they were being charged in relation to their expenses. At the end of the text that was emailed to journalists, there was a note saying "Mr Morley, Mr Chaytor and Mr Devine will not be available for media interviews".
But Devine has been giving interviews. He was at his home in Blackburn, West Lothian, when he heard the news and afterwards he gave interviews to BBC News and Sky. He insisted that he was innocent and he said that when there were allegations last summer that he had submitted suspect claims for shelving and for electrical work, he himself had referred the matter to the Continue reading...
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Good news this morning. No, nothing to do with those pitiful MPs who milked their expenses. I'm talking about the real masters of the universe.
Several papers (it's the lead story in the FT) report that Andrew Cuomo, the New York attorney general, is suing Bank of America and two of its top executives – Ken Lewis and Joe Price – for duping shareholders about mounting losses at Merrill Lynch before the great crash of 2008.
In the process they seem to have manipulated the federal US government into handing over $20bn (£12.7bn) of American taxpayers' money to finance the merger of the two banks, BofA's takeover of stricken Merrill. Cuomo wants the money the bank and the bankers made back – for shareholders and taxpayers.
Good. The US regulatory regime has always been tougher than ours, ever since they started seriously tackling the golden age plutocracy 100 years ago. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) announced a $150m settlement this week. Cuomo is after scalps. Continue reading...
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Thursday 4 February 2010
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Ever since the dam broke on MPs' expenses last spring I have been eager to know precisely how extensive the abuse of the system would prove to be.
Today's report from Sir Thomas Legg's review takes up closer to the answer. Fragile maths student that I am, it looks about half, though I am still checking details.
More than 50% or just under 50%? Legg's report on the 752 MPs and ex-MPs whose exes he vetted over the period 2004-09 gives a headline figure of 390 who have been told to pay up – though some have already done so. He calculates that as 52% against 48% with whom he has "no issues".
Symbolically that's more than half. Symbolically, I wish it wasn't, because further undermining the already weakened public confidence in the political system won't do anyone much good in the long run. Continue reading...
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Tucked away in today's Guardian is a handy little counterfactual. David Freud, the businessman turned Labour-advising policy wonk turned Tory peer, has been praising Labour's handling of the labour market during the recession.
It's implicitly a free market compliment because, as Patrick Wintour reports, Lord Freud is contrasting Britain's reaction to the job-subsidising policies enacted in Germany and elsewhere. It may be storing up long-term problems.
Freud explains to startled fellow peers that, yes, he is "congratulating the government on not subsidising a process of adjustment but allowing the market and the contract between employers and employees to hold sway – albeit the employees took a hit."
They certainly did. A survey this week predicted that unemployment may eventually nudge 3 million. But currently it's nearly half a million below what the experts predicted when the recession became serious. Continue reading...
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Coverage throughout the day with Andrew Sparrow as expenses reports are published and new figures on allowances released
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Wednesday 3 February 2010
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In his article in the Guardian today Gordon Brown says he wants to "build a progressive consensus" in favour of constitutional change. This afternoon I can report that the prime minister has succeeded in achieving a consensus more quickly than anyone might ever have expected. Seven organisations that campaign on constitutional matters have signed a joint letter – condemning Brown for blocking reform.
The seven groups have issued a statement criticising the government for its failure to allow MPs to have a vote on the reform proposals produced by a committee chaired by the Labour MP Tony Wright.
The Wright committee recommended various measures that would give more power to backbenchers, such as the election of select committee chairmen. In theory the government is in favour of many of the measures. But it is going to put them to the Commons in a manner that it is likely to ensure that they g Continue reading...
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Anthony Wells has highlighted some fascinating data on his UK Polling Report blog, which he has found in a document published by the polling firm Ipsos Mori.
It suggests that most opinion polls are failing to register a phenomenon that could result in the Tories winning around 30 more seats on election day than anyone just looking at the headline figures would expect.
Ipsos Mori has published its aggregated polling data for 2009, ie the results of every poll it conducted last year lumped together. That means it has responses from more than 12,000 individuals. Continue reading...
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Gordon Brown at prime ministers questions today. Photograph: BBC
It doesn't take a genius to know that Labour's greatest problem in the forthcoming general election campaign will be how to sell the prime minister to the public for another whole term. Four or five more years of Gordon Brown is not a great soundbite. In fact it, could hardly be worse.
The truth is that Labour is stuck with a product that is not easy to sell. But somehow it has to try.
Today at prime minister's questions came another clue as to how it intends to do that.
Up until recently, the main way Labour had tried to sell Gordon was as the man who made the right calls on the big issues, the man who called it right on the economy when it mattered while the Tories got it wrong. Continue reading...
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This may be an eccentric view, but I am increasingly fascinated by the parallels I detect between two controversies currently dominating the news pages of the Guardian: Sir John Chilcot's Iraq war inquiry and "Glaciergate".
In the one case you have Tony Blair, George Bush and others accused of rigging the intelligence on WMD to justify a costly invasion of Iraq that has resulted in many deaths, injuries and damage – and cost a great deal of money that could have been put to better purposes.
Their case has been dissected and will be found wanting by the inquiry's eventual verdict, though not sufficiently to justify the bloodlust of their principal detractors – whose own case is full of holes too. I have yet to read a wholly persuasive article on the subject, including my own.
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Gordon Brown at PMQs today. Photograph: BBC
Minute-by-minute coverage of Gordon Brown's weekly parliamentary grilling
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John Rentoul's campaign to defend Tony Blair's reputation doesn't seem to be going to well. According to a ComRes poll out today, 37% of voters think he should be put on trial for going to war with Iraq.
At first glance this suggests that Blair's evidence to the Chilcot inquiry did not make a particularly good impression. ComRes conducted most of their fieldwork over the weekend, after Blair's appearance at the inquiry. Last month, when a polling organisation last asked a question about Blair being put on trial, only 23% of respondents said that Blair should be tried as a war criminal. But the questions were framed differently and a direct comparison isn't fair. In January YouGov offered the "war crimes" option as one of five alternative answers to a question. ComRes just asked respondents to agree or disagree with the proposition that Blair should be "put on trial for going to war with Iraq". Some 57% disagreed, 37% agreed and 5% did not know.
As the Independent points out in its write-up of the poll today, the ComRes findings also suggest that Gordon Brown is not going to have much luck blaming it all on Blair. The poll also says that 60% of voters think Brown should share responsibility with Blair for the decision to go to war.
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Tuesday 2 February 2010
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Gordon Brown giving evidence to the Commons liaison committee last year. Photograph: PA Wire/PA
Minute-by-minute coverage as Gordon Brown appears before the Commons liaison committee
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So Gordon Brown has finally made his mind up after weeks of dithering and decided to back those cabinet colleagues seeking a pre-election commitment to a referendum on electoral reform. Will it do him any good? I doubt it.
Peter Hain, John Denham and Jack Straw are among those supporting a post-election referendum on the alternative vote (AV) option. Ed Balls favours AV now too – it's a Brownite policy switch – but thinks it would be a distraction at this stage in the parliament. He's right.
Nick Clegg and his Lib Dem allies, whom it's supposed to impress, jeer at Brown's "deathbed conversion". The Tories oppose AV and say they would reverse any legal obligation if Brown manages to insert one into the ragbag constitutional reform bill. Continue reading...
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Clare Short, who is giving evidence for three hours today. Photograph: Murdo Macleod
Follow the action as the former international development secretary gives evidence to the Chilcot panel
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Monday 1 February 2010
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At the end of last year the Electoral Commission produced figures suggesting that at least 100 constituencies are likely to abandon the traditional Thursday night election count and instead start totting up the votes on Friday morning.
Today Jonathan Isaby's campaign to save Thursday night counting has hit a fresh setback. Jenny Watson, chair of the Electoral Commission, has told returning officers that counting on Friday would be "entirely appropriate".
Watson was speaking at the annual conference of the Association of Electoral Administrators at Blackpool. I wasn't there, but the Press Association are reporting her comments. Continue reading...
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A woman wearing a niqab walks near the Eiffel Tower in Paris. Photograph: Gonzalo Fuentes/Reuters
Have you been following that favourite British pastime, enthusiastically reciprocated beyond Calais, of watching the French making idiots of themselves again? It would be fun if it wasn't serious and didn't affect us too.
I do not refer to the controversy over a bit of British academic research which suggested the G-spot may be a myth, the condescending French repudiation of which Lizzy Davies wittily reported in last week's Guardian. Crowdsourcing research continues.
Nor even the acquittal of Dominque de Villepin in the conspiracy to stitch up Nicolas Sarkozy, his rival (past, present and future) for the French presidency by way of a very French funny-money smear campaign. (Busy Lizzy wrote up that Inspector Clouseau tale too.)
No, the serious one is that vote by French MPs last week which would lead to a ban on the wearing of full Islamic covering – the niqab (face veil) as well as the burka (full body) – in official public spaces such as hospitals, post offices and buses. Continue reading...
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Peter Mandelson, who will today 'challenge' the Tories over their economic policies . Photograph: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images
Follow the action as the business secretary holds a press conference focusing on the Tories' economic policies
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