James Cleverly

Goodbye to Des Browne

2009-11-28T08:49:00.002Z

Regular readers will know that I have never had a particularly high regard for Des Browne in his capacity of Defence Secretary.

I have little doubt that he is a good man, probably filled wit the best of intentions, but hopeless at Defence.

The news that he plans to stand down at the next election triggers little emotion, I have to confess. I wish him well in the future and have written this haiku.

Browne, not a bad man

Geoff Hoon set the bar so low

Yet Browne slid under

Feel free to add your own.

Boris in Welling shops

2009-11-27T09:44:00.002Z

Earlier this week Boris came to open a new supermarket in Welling, in my constituency.

Here's the video of the even.

My City Hall podcast

2009-11-26T07:54:00.002Z

My latest podcast has gone live over at Tory Radio, you can listen to it here.

This week I talk about Mayors Question Time where night flights and the Olympic Route Network and the great news about the roll out of Oyster cards.

Oysters on the menu

2009-11-23T13:02:00.003Z

Boris has delivered on another of his pre-election promises. From the start of next year Oyster cards will be accepted on overground trains and Thames river services.

At last outer London commuters can take advantage of the lower fairs that are available to Oyster users. Livingstone's policy of picking fights with the rail operators made for good headlines but didn't deliver the Oyster improvements that Londoners needed.

Even the hyper critical Chair of the Assembly's Transport Committee (Lib Dem, Caroline Pidgeon) seems impressed. “After repeated delays it is welcome that Oyster pay-as-you-go is finally being extended to all cover all National Rail services in London.” she said.

Total Politics- Theatre Review

2009-11-21T01:08:00.003Z

A little while ago I promised you the review of Kwame Kwei-Armah new play "Seize the Day". Well here it is. It is in this month's edition of Total Politics (available online) and as the Americans would say "there is a whole bunch of other great stuff in there too".

"Would you like to see Kwame Kwei-Armah's new play Seize the Day?" asked Emily, the nice young lady from Total Politics. "It's about a middle class black guy having a crack at becoming Mayor of London," she said. How could I resist?

The premise was not all that farfetched: long-standing players in the race relations world bemoaning the relative lack of progression made by black politicians. Seeing the London mayoralty as an opportunity to shortcut the system and create an Obama moment, they look to get someone with a bit of spark and an existing public profile, surround him with political insiders, run him as an independent, throw big money at the campaign and hey presto - a black Mayor of London.

So much for the manifesto; what about the delivery? There were times when I worried that the script was being played out by a cast of caricatures. Through much of the first act all but the leads seemed a little exaggerated, not quite grotesques but not quite right either.

All the characters you would expect to see were there but, slightly disappointingly, none that generated surprise. There was Jeremy Charles, reality TV celebrity, charismatic and dynamic, thrust to the fore but torn between his ambition and his conscience. He is being pushed, polished and prepared for greatness by manipulative power players dripping flattery into his ear.

To offset this we have Lavelle, a knife-carrying gang kid, there to provide raw street wisdom; the narrative equivalent of a hooker with the heart of gold. And, ultimately, we had Jeremy's slim white wife and Lavelle's curvy, black, earth-mother to provide a metaphorical and visible spectrum against which we could measure the authenticity of Jeremy's blackness or lack thereof.

The dialogue and acting saved these characters; their words, opinions and even their gestures were well-observed and sharp. Peppered with in-jokes about the cynicism of politics in general and race politics in particular, Kwame clearly did plenty of homework before writing and directing this play and was unafraid of stepping on a few toes.

People in the Equality and Human Rights Commission and the campaigning group Operation Black Vote may see glimpses of themselves in the kingmakers and spin doctors who orbit Jeremy; there are plenty of not-so-tangential references to them. They may not like what they see. Diane Abbott came out of it well, mentioned enough times that she might feel aggrieved not to have got a credit on the cast list.

If the first act was played a little too much for laughs, the second was much more mature and thoughtprovoking, providing some lemon to cut the honeyed first half. This is where the big questions were asked. In order to win in London, would a black candidate need to black up or become colourless? Could they get in with only the ethnic vote or without it? Would the win be for the individual or for all black Londoners?

If I told you whether or not these questions are answered, I would probably spoil the ending. But this play is at least as much about what it means to be comfortable, middle class and black as it is about politics.

Seize the Day was easy to watch and well observed; I didn't leave the theatre disappointed.

And that's how the French repay them!

2009-11-19T18:37:00.004Z

Some might say that Ireland getting done over by the French in the World Cup qualifier is galactic karma for their U-turn over the Lisbon treaty referendum.

You might think that, I couldn't possibly comment.

Labour video talking rubbish

2009-11-17T21:51:00.002Z

Watch this video:

Then read this blog.

Even when cherry picking the best bits from history the Labour party can't tell the truth.

My weekly City Hall podcast

2009-11-17T12:17:00.004Z

In this week's podcast I talk about underhand goings on at People's Question Time, dangerous dogs, the Evening Standard's 1,000 most influential Londoners and the Lord Mayor of London's parade.

You can download it here or listen to it at ToryRadio.com is now live.

Youth unemployment

2009-11-16T13:47:00.003Z

To hear that 1 in 5 young people are currently out of work is horrific. These are the worst figures since records began and is a poor indictment of Blair and Brown's time in office.

I have been keeping an eye on youth employment figures and it has become clear that the government's actions in this area have been driven more by spin and PR than by any real desire to reduce youth unemployment.

The Future Jobs Fund is a classic example of policy by headlines. It allocated £1billion to buy 6 months of employment for 100,000 long term unemployed young people. Sounds great, until you look beyond the headlines.

The fund made no provision to address the underlying cause of youth unemployment. The jobs had to be "new" positions, meaning that companies created artificial and unsustainable posts just to qualify for the funding. And once the money from the government runs out the jobs disappear.

It was £1billion spent to create an artificial dip in youth unemployment figures ahead of a General Election. Cynical and ineffective, typically New Labour.

There are three broad measures which will bring down youth unemployment. Firstly ensure that there is a buoyant employment market, particularly in the small business sector. Small businesses employ the vast bulk of young people and have been some of the worst hit by this recession.

Secondly ensure that the education and skills training is up to the standard that will enable our young people to take advantage of the economic upturn, when it comes. Creating the demand for employees will be of no use if young people are not qualified to take up the posts.

Finally make it less costly and bureaucratic for companies to employ people. It is too often the case that the marginal cost of employing staff deters small businesses from growing. They prefer to stay within their comfort zones and not to take the financial risk. Employers NI contributions should be reduced (it is basically a tax on employing people) and a simple process made available to navigate the myriad of rules that relate employing people. Better still the rules should be simplified.

The current government have done nothing to address these basic issues and I have little doubt that it will take a change of government to make any real improvement.

I know you're listening!

2009-11-12T17:21:00.000Z

Evening Standard 1000 most influential Londoners

2009-11-11T21:02:00.005Z

I wasn't going to blog about this because I thought that it would appear rather narcissistic, but what the hell, I've got a blog and that's pretty narcissistic anyway!

I have been included in the Evening Standard's list of the 1,000 most influential people in London. Luckily the list isn't fully numerical because if it were I have little doubt at which end I would find myself. Still it was nice to be invited to the candle lit soirée that ES put on and mingle with a lot of people that I mingle with at work. But with champagne.

Although I didn't stay long (I was a guest at the National Business Awards later that evening) and didn't mix as widely as I would have liked, I did bump into a few new faces who turned out to be very interesting particularly Simon Fletcher, Livingstone's former Chief of Staff, and Shami Chakrabarti.

I can't pretend I'm not chuffed to be on the list and I'm more than happy with the write up that I got:

James Cleverly - Youth ambassador
Ambitious and bright, the keen triathlete manages to bridge the gap between parties, the old school Tory assembly members and those running City Hall. Tipped for a future front bench role in Parliament.

But you know what they say, "don't believe everything you read in the press".

Lee Jasper, rabble rouser?

2009-11-11T20:09:00.003Z

On Monday of this week I attended the People's Question Time in Brixton, you can read my twitter updates here.

PQTs are usually energetic and robust but Monday's event was notable by how much shouting and heckling there was from the audience. I was particularly surprised and dissapointed when someone threw something at the stage, nearly hitting Val Shawcross AM who was hosting the event.

While some people seemed happy to write this off as the natural exuberance of a Brixton crowd, I felt something wasn't right. It turns out that at the centre of the most aggressive and noisy part of the crowd was one Lee Jasper. I have no idea whether Ken Livingstone's former right hand man was instigating the rude and aggressive behaviour or just drawn towards it, but he certainly wasn't helping to calm it down.

It seems that some people just can't move on from the politics of the playground.

My weekly catch up

2009-11-10T17:47:00.002Z

I've started a weekly podcast for Tory Radio about City Hall and London politics. You can listen to it either by visiting Tory Radio or by downloading it directly here.

This week I talk about the unavailing of the Keith Park statue in Trafalgar Square, John & Edward in Barnet and the City Hall service of remembrance.

We will remember them

2009-11-08T08:30:00.002Z

This morning I will be laying wreaths at the war memorial and at Canadian Corner, a Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery in Orpington. This afternoon I will be a a service of remembrance in Welling.

Heron wing opening at Feltham YOI

2009-11-05T21:14:00.005Z

Today has been a very exciting day for me. I have spent a great deal of time over the last year working on a range of projects to reduce the drivers towards youth crime, the details of these plans can be read here.

One of the most complicated, ambitious and exciting of these plans was called Project Daedalus, this is our plan to introduce a new regime for young offenders' institutions and reduce the levels of youth re-offending.

I described this plan as complicated because its delivery involves a range of organisations, different levels of government and significant up front expenditure. I have worked closely with the Met Police, the Prison Service, Youth Justice Board, National Offender Management Service, Probation Service, local councils, London Development Agency and a number of voluntary sector organisations to put the plan in place. This morning we launched the plan.

Kit Malthouse, Pam Chesters and I joined Boris to officially open Heron Wing, the pilot for our new regime. Oh Jack Straw was there too.

Referendum on the Lisbon treaty

2009-11-03T21:10:00.003Z

Before anyone "goes off on one" over the position we now find ourselves in, there are a few points I think we should consider.

We are not the bad guys here!

While it is very flattering for the Conservatives to be talked about as if we are already in government, we're not. Gordon Brown is the Prime Minister at the moment and Labour are in government. They are the ones who made a promise of a referendum and could have delivered on that promise. They didn't.

It is no longer possible to have a referendum on the ratification of the Lisbon treaty.

The treaty has already been ratified, while I don't like that fact at all, it is the truth. If we were to have a referendum on Lisbon what would the question be? We can't ask if the UK should ratify the treaty in the future tense, and if we ask "should the UK have ratified the treaty?" what would we do with the answer?

As Conservatives we should not base our future actions on our opponents' version of history.

The left are trying to paint David Cameron as going back on a "cast iron pledge" to hold a referendum whatever happened. Only he never said that. As you can see from this contemporary report David Cameron has broken no promise at all:

He said a referendum could take place "absolutely no problem at all" while it was still being discussed in Europe. But he admitted it was more difficult if there was no general election until 2010 and if all member states had ratified it without holding a referendum.

We are, both as a country and as a party, in a crappy position, not of our making. Gordon Brown has stitched us all up and David Cameron is going to have to come up with a plan of action. I think it is worth waiting and listening to what he has got to say before helping the left damage our election chances.

Seize the day

2009-11-02T22:53:00.003Z

I've just got back from watching Kwame Kwei-Armah's new play at the Tricycle theatre. Seize The Day is about a black TV celebrity's attempts to become mayor of London.

I was there to review the play for the guys at Total Politics, I don't want to steal my own thunder so I'll say no more tonight, but I will link the review as soon as it's up.

Gordon Brown’s U-turn shows how little Labour understands the TA

2009-10-31T11:23:00.002Z

I've written a post for the Conservative party's in house blog about the TA funding announcement and subsequent U-turn.

You can read it here

Brown jinxes Blair

2009-10-30T08:46:00.003Z

Guido Fawkes has a long running series of posts about Gordon Brown's unnerving ability to jinx the things he supports. From football teams to small businesses a Gordon Brown indorsement is like the black spot from Treasure Island.

Tony Blair must have held his head in his hand when he heard Gordon lavish praise on him, and rightly so. With regard to the presidency of the European Council Tony has gone from "front runner" to "also ran" in less than 24 hours.

Then again, maybe that was Gordon's plan!

The Kelly report

2009-10-28T15:54:00.005Z

I've not seen the report in full, just the information currently doing the rounds in the media. As someone outside parliament but close enough to understand it, I'd like to put my reactions and ideas forward.

Here are the main proposals and my reactions to them:

* MPs to rent second homes only.
I think that the current system is untenable. MPs who represent constituencies outside central London can make a fortune when they sell their publicly funded second home, this has to stop. There must be provision for MPs who want to have their families with them in London during the week to rent larger properties. (I have written about MPs accommodation here)

* Ban on MPs employing family members on Commons payroll.
I think this proposal is misguided. I see nothing wrong with MPs having family working for them, MPs work funny hours and need staff that they can completely trust. Having family on the team helps in both these areas.

The abuse comes when those family members are not doing a proper job, this
could be dealt with by ensuring that all parliamentary staff are employed by
parliament rather than the MP. All the issues about remuneration, hours,
qualifications etc would be independently verified. Easy!

*Ban on MPs close to London claiming second home allowance.
This makes complete sense, the challenge will be defining who is "close to
London".

*Allowances for inner London MPs to be reduced.
I have always assumed that this allowance was to part compensate inner
London MPs for not making money on their second home, as this perk will be going
there is less (no) need for this allowance.

*Scrapping the communications allowance
I think this should go, indeed I never agreed with it coming in, as you can see here.

*Scrapping of the resettlement allowance.
I think this would be rather unfair. There should be a discussion about the size of this payment but a couple of month's salary wouldn't bee seen as a fair redundancy payment elsewhere.
There are a number of points which I have a great deal of sympathy with, there are other elements which I feel miss the mark. The problem that MPs have is that the current public mood makes it almost impossible for them to have a sensible discussion about these recommendations.

Order, counter-order, disorder

2009-10-27T20:58:00.002Z

"Order, counter-order, disorder" is an old saying in the army, you only really understand its significance when you are put into a position of command are are trying to get soldiers to the right place, at the right time, with the right kit. If you keep changing their instructions chaos will ensue.

This is a lesson the current government could do with learning. The TA have been told to train more and support the regular army. They did just that. Then they were told to stop training for six months. Then just as that order was being disseminated they were told to start training again but not as much as before.

Talking to TA soldiers and their officers there is a great deal of confusion. Are they valued? Are they needed? Will the TA continue? What should we tell the soldiers?

I was at a briefing of London's reserve forces last week. The General commanding London explained the problem, the limitations that he was working within and his plan to make the best of the situation. By the start of this week the government's U-turn made all his plans obsolete.

Labour's ineptitude is undermining soldiers, both regular and TA, at every level. It has to stop.

BNP and Question Time

2009-10-22T21:57:00.004Z

The BBC had a golden opportunity with tonight's Question Time, and they blew it.

The BNP thrive on being vilified, being picked on, being treated as a special case. I sit next to a member of the BNP on the London Assembly and I can assure you they are nothing to be scared of.

When they are given the opportunity to act like real politicians they struggle and then they fail. This can be seen in council chambers across the country and in any video of Mayor's Question Time you might want to watch. Elected BNP members quickly move from being a mild irritation to becoming a complete irrelevance.

Question Time provided the perfect vehicle to show this incompetence, but the BBC did what so many on the left do, obsess about the BNP and feed their inflated sense of self importance. It was clear that Almost the whole of tonight's programme focussed on Nick Griffin and the BNP. Where were the questions on the postal strike, the funding cuts for the TA, swine flu, recording of crime figures etc. etc. etc?

The BBC treated Nick Griffin and the BNP as a special case, they are not special they're just crap.

The end of the London Assembly

2009-10-20T20:07:00.004Z

Over the last few days there has been speculation about the London Assembly being scrapped and the £8 million of savings that it could bring. I am a low tax, smaller state Tory and as such I have given the idea some serious thought. It is right that we question the effectiveness of public expenditure not just because of Brown's recession but because it is the right thing to do.

The general thrust of what I have read advocates the scrapping of the Assembly and it's members, the retention of the Mayor and the scrutiny being done by borough leaders or a nominees drawn from the council.

As a member of the London Assembly I see the workings of London Government up close and personal so I'm not going to pretend that it is a good system or that Assembly Members are as effectively utilised as they could be. But neither am am going to accept that all we do is ask a few awkward questions once a month and wave through the Mayor's budget once a year.

London's governance and scrutiny system was devised by Labour with the intention of having an all powerful Labour Mayor, the weakness of the Assembly in holding the Mayor to account is no accident. It so happens that Boris is far more collegiate and open than Livingstone was, but that is down to his personality. The system would allow him to be just as dictatorial and extreme as Livingstone if he so desired.

I would argue that the Mayoralty needs more and better scrutiny, not less. I have no doubt that borough leaders would be just as effective as Assembly Members in asking searching questions of the Mayor but they would still need a team, however modest, to support them in that function. Either that support would be from GLA staff, which would significantly reduce the saving, or it would have to be provided by local authority staff which would just shift the financial burden down to the boroughs.

As the Mayor would no longer be responsible for the budget of the scrutiny function it would be in their interest to flood the borough representatives with work. They would either have to beef up their scrutiny support (at the borough's expense) or just accept that stuff will be missed, reducing their scrutiny of the Mayor.

There are plenty of savings to be found in London's governance, the £14million plus spent each year on the Government Office for London and the unknown millions on a London Select Committee would be a good start. There are many things that the GLA does which should be done by the boroughs and things which central government does which could and should be done at a London level.

It is good that London's governance is re-evaluated because duplication and waste were build into the system by Labour when the Mayor and Assembly were created. The change of national government would be the right time to have a complete overhaul of London government and institutions, scrapping the Assembly might look a quick and simple cost saving measure but not completing wider reform of London government and it's relationship with national and local government would be a job only half done.

I believe that the Conservatives can create a fairer and more effective model for Mayoral scrutiny and London government and if that means my post get scrapped, fair enough. But we need to ensure we take reform seriously and understand that if there is going to be a Mayor they will need to be scrutinised, and scrutinised properly.

Huge congratulations to Jenson Button

2009-10-18T19:42:00.003Z

After seeing the qualification results from yesterday I thought that this season would go to the wire but Button pulled it out of the bag. Another British F1 champion.

I have long felt that he was overlooked as a driver and I feel vindicated and the story behind the Brawn team this year is straight out of a Boys' Own book. Pats on back all round.

Sorry for the lack of posts

2009-10-17T10:06:00.002Z

I have been feeling pretty ill over the last few days so I've been coming home and getting early nights.

I'm feeling better now so I'll get more of my thoughts on-line from now on.