Practical Thoughts

Dear Reader, Nothing has changed on the Tory front bench. At Prime Minister's Questions on Wednesday, David Cameron spoke on behalf of a very beleaguered looking Chancellor who frankly looked as though he was afraid of having to claim benefits himself (by losing his job)! But David Cameron didn't answer the question put to him ( six times ) by the Leader of the Opposition, and gave the feeling that it was Osborne's responsibility to deal with the issue, and not his. The following day there was a Parliamentary debate on "The Effect of the Tax Credit Cuts" at which a number of Tory MPs conceded that there was a case to look into for special help for those lower income workers. It took an SNP MP to point out that amounts wrongly paid out by the DWP and HMRC government departments exceeded the bill that would be saved by the proposed Tax Credit reforms (£4.5bn). The government, therefore, is failing to mop up expensive holes in its payments structure - as well ...

Dear Reader, This past week - if we would look closely - has emphasised just how calamitous Calamity Cameron is! The issues that have been greatly highlighted this week have been related to (a) the Chinese president's visit and (b) the associated UK steel industry problems. And the latter issue has - in my opinion - been dealt with appallingly badly by Cameron and his government. Okay, Cameron was quick to make the statement that the interests of the steel workers would be safeguarded. But isn't that just rhetoric designed to keep people believing - mainly his supporters - that everything is fine and that he has One Nation interests at heart? The fact is that with the Redcar steel plants completely closed, there is virtually nothing in that area for the workers to go into, so no matter what you re-train them for (if that's the idea) then nothing short of moving families to a totally new area will help them. Tibbett's "On your bike" rhetoric rears it...