News from Asides
Asides
MP under pressure as Kingston Lib Dems split over tuition fee hike
Liberal Democrat MPs may live to regret joining the Tories in government if this week’s Surrey Comet is anything to go by.
The first difficulty for the local Lib Dem MP and government Minister, Ed Davey, is the revelation that the government has been caught using inflated figures to justify closing Kingston Magistrates Court as part of £15m government cuts.
“The true running costs make Kingston the sixth cheapest of London’s 33 courts, and more than £200,000 a year cheaper than the three courts slated to take its workload,” the paper reports.
More worrying for Ed Davey is the split between himself and his Lib Dem council, highlighted in a [...]
‘Stealth cuts’ to tax credits will deprive working families of £6.2 billion
It is understandable if many Londoners skip the business pages of the Evening Standard, but if they do they’re missing a treat as Chris Blackhurst continues to make the pages worth reading even if you don’t wear a pinstripe suit. Take today’s article about the largely ignored ’slow burn’ cuts destined to hit working families:
“Since the Spending Review, the economists who work for Resolution Foundation have been crunching the numbers on how the cuts affect the less well-off. What they’ve discovered is that the changes to the tax credits system will deprive working families (that vast body of people so beloved of leading politicians in their party broadcasts, literature [...]
Tory MP to keep promise to vote against student tuition fees increase
We would like to congratulate the CONSERVATIVE MP for Ilford North, Lee Scott, for showing the Liberal Democrats what should be done after you’ve signed a promise not to support a rise in student tuition fees. We’ve been keeping an eye on Mr Scott after he seemed to waiver in his opposition to the fee rise in his local paper earlier this month, but the Redbridge Guardian this week reports that:
Lee Scott, Ilford North MP, said he “has never sat on the fence” and he wanted to make clear his opposition to raising tuition fees.
He said: “I’m not going to be voting for a rise in tuition fees.”
David Willetts, [...]
Lib Dem challengers crushed by Labour landslide in Kentish Town by-election
Labour crushed the Liberal Democrat challengers in the Kentish Town by-election yesterday, winning 53% of the vote in the London borough of Camden seat.
Once again voters rejected Nick Clegg’s party, swinging behind Labour in massive numbers instead.
Labour’s new Kentish Town councillor Jenny Headlam-Wells won 1,411 votes, while the Lib Dems could only muster 715. The Green Party candidate came third with 349 votes, with the Conservatives trailing with just 186.
Ken Livingstone, Labour’s candidate for the 2012 London Mayoral election, was quick to congratulate Jenny Headlam-Wells via Twitter, but a photo of a Labour leaflet distributed during the by-election which parodied Liberal Democrat Ministers Vince Cable and Danny [...]
Lib Dem vote collapses, Labour triumphs in three by-elections
In three local by-elections held yesterday Labour triumphed, with a wholesale collapse in the Liberal Democrat vote in Labour’s favour.
In Nick Clegg’s Sheffield back yard, Labour’s Terry Fox comfortably kept Manor Castle Labour with a massive 17.5% swing from the Liberal Democrats to Labour. Labour won 2,092 votes with the Liberal Democrats trailing in a poor second place with just 303 votes.
It was an even worse story for the Liberal Democrats in Oxford after local Labour campaigner Mike Rowley took the Barton and Sandhills seat from the Lib Dems. This time the swing from the Lib Dems to Labour was 10%. Again the votes tell the story, with [...]
Honoured economist warns Spending Review cuts will cause another recession
The Government’s cuts were branded the “greatest error seen in our lifetime” by a former Bank of England rate setter today who warned the country now faced another recession and a long painful recovery, the Press Association reports.
Economist David Blanchflower said a double dip into the red was inevitable following the announcement of the comprehensive spending review.
But he predicted worse was to come as any return to growth would be anaemic and not strong enough to generate enough jobs to tackle rising unemployment.
The US-based economist’s comments came on the day he was made a CBE for services to his industry and the Bank of England.
Speaking after [...]
Parents hit by £2.8bn Working Tax Credits cuts
Alan Johnson described George Osborne’s Spending Review speech as “smoke and mirrors” and as journalists and economists wade through the detail a rather less rosy picture for ordinary people is starting to emerge.
Working Tax Credits for instance are to be hit with a £2.8bn cut over the next four years, today’s Spending Review documents reveal.
Almost £1.8bn is to be cut from couples with children who work part time by changing the rules for how many hours a couple must work before they are eligible to claim Working Tax Credits. The minimum number of hours is to be raised from 16 hours to 24 hours a week, but one partner [...]
Cameron’s conference blues after Labour snatch two seats
David Cameron’s Conservatives have been dealt a double blow after Labour gained two council seats from them during their conference, reports The Independent:
Candidate Helen Jackson triumphed at Irwell, Rossendale Borough, Lancashire, and party colleague Colin Lloyd took a Tilgate seat at Crawley Borough, West Sussex.
Both these wins come in constituencies gained by the Conservatives in May’s General Election.
Labour also easily held on at Healey and Whitworth, Rossendale, in a ward where another seat had been won by the Community First group in this year’s main council polls.
However the party may have passed up the chance of a third gain by failing to field a candidate at [...]
Lord Prescott leads praise for David Miliband’s contribution to Labour
With the 5pm embargo reached, the media are able to report the official resignation of David Miliband from Labour’s frontbench.
The first to praise the unsuccessful leadership candidate for his valuable contribution to Labour at the heart of government was Lord Prescott, who writes:
“I’m sure that all party members will agree with me that David has given great service not only to Labour but also to his country.
“We all owe him an enormous debt of gratitude for the massive contribution he made making Labour electable again and changing Britain into a better and fairer place.
“He helped create a record that we can be proud of and I respect [...]
Poll: Ed Miliband’s election win results in Labour lead
None of the newspapers backed Ed Miliband, and the nationals continue to be critical of the narrow win but, if the verdict of The Sun’s YouGov poll is anything to go by, the pundits are out of touch with voters’ opinion after Labour pulled ahead of the Tories in their latest poll.
For the first time since the General Election, Labour now leads the Conservatives in the regular tracking poll of political support.
The latest YouGov/Sun poll puts Labour on 40%, with the Tories on 39% and Nick Clegg’s Liberal Democrats on just 12%.
YouGov have also been tracking support for the ConDem government and the charts they provide speak [...]
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