This week’s column is fairly heavy going I’m afraid but I hope you will stick with it. With the country’s financial position as precarious as it is I hope that this will illustrate that considerable savings in public expenditure are possible without reducing our vital public services.
In my capacity as Chairman of the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee I have written to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, Alistair Darling, pointing out that recommendations from the Committee have led to savings of in excess of £4 billion over the course of the last two parliaments and that wider take up of the recommendations could reap far greater rewards.
The National Audit Office that is responsible to the Committee could and should work with relevant Government departments to identify even more savings attributable to the recommendations in specific reports. At the moment there is little evidence of the Committee recommendations being used as a spur to action across government despite the fact that they could be repeated in a number of areas.
My letter contains an appendix that goes into great detail; the savings can be broken down into five areas:
1. better financial management; 2. better information management; 3. reducing complexity and improving processes; 4. exploiting the scale of spend; and 5. improved outcomes.
In addition to setting out the financial impact that has been realised, I have included some examples of projected savings amounting to over £9 billion that could be realised.
I point out to the Chancellor how slow progress is in realising the savings we set out shows that the biggest challenge is translating aspiration into action. Our work has consistently shown over a number of years how efficiencies can be achieved in practice. The Public Accounts Committee are convinced that much more can be done and hope this summary provides a constructive contribution and inspiration for further action.
After all of our reports we get a formal government response. These do not pick up on the wider implications. I invited Mr Darling and his colleagues to drive the greatest possible savings from the Committee’s work by ensuring future responses explain what is being done to drive wider take-up of relevant recommendations, and to provide firm commitments of action where recommendations are agreed.
If ministers with responsibility for spending departments were encouraged to take forward the specific opportunities set out in the annex to my letter much greater progress could be made.
The full text of my letter can be viewed at the following link. http://edward-leigh.net/LettertoChancellor.aspx
Thursday 26 November 2009
Thursday 19 November 2009
Two Victories
I went along to the Chamber and found out that the Government had run up the white flag over Lord Waddington’s free speech amendment on the Coroner’s and Justice Bill.
This is a great victory for free speech which in a democracy should be paramount.
In the evening I debated at the Oxford Union alongside the Bishop of Winchester and Jonathon Aitken. At a well attended debate we won by ten votes, 145 to 135, proposing the motion:
“This House believes that Britain needs a return of Christian Values”
Everything conceivable was thrown at us, even the slave trade. It was interesting that we didn’t talk about homosexuality, but our opponents were adamant that Christians are obsessed by it.
I just concentrated on the teachings of Christ; a better guide then the life of a most Christians since!
The following day I took the train on the long journey up to Durham to debate at the University’s Union. This time I was opposing the motion:
“This House would ban the Bomb”
Many of the arguments have changed little in the past forty years, except that we now live in an even more hostile world. Given the setting of the debate, it was perhaps a little surprising to once again emerge victorious.
Last summer I joined Peter Lilley and John Redwood in successfully proposing a motion at the Cambridge Union, praising the record of Lady Thatcher. This was possibly an even more unlikely result at a university debating society than at Durham.
Maybe this is a straw in the wind, that Conservatives can once again win debates amongst students.
This is a great victory for free speech which in a democracy should be paramount.
In the evening I debated at the Oxford Union alongside the Bishop of Winchester and Jonathon Aitken. At a well attended debate we won by ten votes, 145 to 135, proposing the motion:
“This House believes that Britain needs a return of Christian Values”
Everything conceivable was thrown at us, even the slave trade. It was interesting that we didn’t talk about homosexuality, but our opponents were adamant that Christians are obsessed by it.
I just concentrated on the teachings of Christ; a better guide then the life of a most Christians since!
The following day I took the train on the long journey up to Durham to debate at the University’s Union. This time I was opposing the motion:
“This House would ban the Bomb”
Many of the arguments have changed little in the past forty years, except that we now live in an even more hostile world. Given the setting of the debate, it was perhaps a little surprising to once again emerge victorious.
Last summer I joined Peter Lilley and John Redwood in successfully proposing a motion at the Cambridge Union, praising the record of Lady Thatcher. This was possibly an even more unlikely result at a university debating society than at Durham.
Maybe this is a straw in the wind, that Conservatives can once again win debates amongst students.
Wednesday 11 November 2009
From Leigh to You
Clearing through some old papers last weekend I came across two old copies of The Times, one for Saturday 20th January 1996 and another for Friday 4th February 2000. I must have saved them for some particular reason though looking through them now I can't now imagine why.
Thirteen years is not a long time but it does make you realise how issues that seemed so vitally important at the time were not with the benefit of hindsight. I'm not saying that the ones I've highlighted were important, clearly they were to those involved, but here are a few that caught my eye.
The front-page headline from 1996 read "Maxwell brothers are cleared." Many of you will remember Robert Maxwell who was, for a time, a Labour MP, owner of the Daily Mirror and Chairman of Oxford United Football Club. I've no doubt that in those capacities he had some influence in the country's affairs but he is now but a footnote in our history. The headline referred to the trial of his two younger sons who were cleared following a long investigation by the Serious Fraud Office into the pension funds of his companies.
On the political pages one of the headlines states "Lilley orders clampdown to cut £730m housing benefit fraud." Peter Lilley was, in 1996, the Government minister for Social Security. Had that headline appeared in the paper's of today it would have surprised none of us.
In the 2000 edition I note that Manchester United were top of the Premier League followed by Leeds, Arsenal and Liverpool. United and Arsenal are still in the top four and Liverpool could still finish there despite a run of poor results, but Leeds fell on hard times a year or two later. But looking through the league as a whole things are still pretty much as you will find them today.
Elsewhere the paper incudes stories about the minimum wage, worries about mis-use of databases and a Government minister claiming that there was a whispering campaign against her.
The minimum wage story was an announcement by the then shadow chancellor Michael Portillo that a future Conservative Government would not reverse the minimum wage legislation. That remains our policy by the way, and the minister concerned about the whispering campaign was the late Mo Mowlam. Interestingly enough the letters column contained one from one Alistair Campbell - Tony Blair's press secretary - denying that such a campaign existed!
Change the name of the worried minister to whoever Gordon Brown and Peter Mandelson have in their sights and the story could be running this week
As regards databases - there are now thousands more of them open to mis-use. This Government alone has created scores of them, all containing the most personal information about us and, over the years, managed to lose laptops, disks and memory sticks containing far too much of it.
If you have any thoughts on today's political issues I can be contacted at the House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA or in these postal strike days email me at leighe@parliament.uk
Thirteen years is not a long time but it does make you realise how issues that seemed so vitally important at the time were not with the benefit of hindsight. I'm not saying that the ones I've highlighted were important, clearly they were to those involved, but here are a few that caught my eye.
The front-page headline from 1996 read "Maxwell brothers are cleared." Many of you will remember Robert Maxwell who was, for a time, a Labour MP, owner of the Daily Mirror and Chairman of Oxford United Football Club. I've no doubt that in those capacities he had some influence in the country's affairs but he is now but a footnote in our history. The headline referred to the trial of his two younger sons who were cleared following a long investigation by the Serious Fraud Office into the pension funds of his companies.
On the political pages one of the headlines states "Lilley orders clampdown to cut £730m housing benefit fraud." Peter Lilley was, in 1996, the Government minister for Social Security. Had that headline appeared in the paper's of today it would have surprised none of us.
In the 2000 edition I note that Manchester United were top of the Premier League followed by Leeds, Arsenal and Liverpool. United and Arsenal are still in the top four and Liverpool could still finish there despite a run of poor results, but Leeds fell on hard times a year or two later. But looking through the league as a whole things are still pretty much as you will find them today.
Elsewhere the paper incudes stories about the minimum wage, worries about mis-use of databases and a Government minister claiming that there was a whispering campaign against her.
The minimum wage story was an announcement by the then shadow chancellor Michael Portillo that a future Conservative Government would not reverse the minimum wage legislation. That remains our policy by the way, and the minister concerned about the whispering campaign was the late Mo Mowlam. Interestingly enough the letters column contained one from one Alistair Campbell - Tony Blair's press secretary - denying that such a campaign existed!
Change the name of the worried minister to whoever Gordon Brown and Peter Mandelson have in their sights and the story could be running this week
As regards databases - there are now thousands more of them open to mis-use. This Government alone has created scores of them, all containing the most personal information about us and, over the years, managed to lose laptops, disks and memory sticks containing far too much of it.
If you have any thoughts on today's political issues I can be contacted at the House of Commons, London SW1A 0AA or in these postal strike days email me at leighe@parliament.uk
Thursday 5 November 2009
The Right must continue to make the case for real reform
In all the furore over Nick Griffin’s appearance on Question Time, the voice of the moderate right has had little chance to express itself.
The first truth is that the Labour government itself has given a tremendous boost to the BNP with its immigration policies. The careful controls such as the Primary Purpose Rule which had controlled immigration under successive Conservative Governments were torn up. There has in the last twelve years been an unprecedented wave in immigration of over 2 million people. One report I read this week suggests that in the not too distant future our population will reach 77 million.
A cap is needed now on immigration.
In case anyone thinks there is something racist in this I would argue that the uncontrolled eastern European has long been a problem, much as I love Poles and their work ethos.
Even the Conservative asylum policies, designed to admit small numbers of political refugees, were a problem. Within the last twelve years these rules have been abused.
The second boost to far-right parties has been a general sense of hopelessness engendered by our increasingly rule based, regulation driven, politically correct society. We should remember that Britishness is primarily about freedom from the state. We are the only country in Europe never to have been a police state or had one imposed on us. Again a new Conservative government must have the sort of bonfire of controls that the Conservative government of 1951 initiated.
The third boost to the extremist policies has been the moral relativism of mainstream liberal thinking. Politicians are frightened of proclaiming an ideal because it may not be attainable by everybody or because they themselves fall short of it. An obvious example is marriage. It may be difficult for people to commit themselves to each other for life, to bring up children, but that does not mean it is wrong or that in acknowledging the fact we are attacking alternative lifestyles.
The fourth boost for the far-right, and most difficult to talk about, has been the squeamishness of mainstream politicians in dealing with Muslim extremism, not just the terrorist but the cultural variety. I make no secret of my admiration for Britain’s Jewish community. Muslims should learn from their example. Jewish people here have kept their religion, (if they want, of the liberal or orthodox variety) they have kept their identity, but they have chosen to integrate. They have become more British than the British; they have contributed enormously to Britain’s cultural, intellectual and business strength.
I admire Islam, its spirituality and its values. But Muslims who choose to settle here, and they are most welcome, must see themselves primarily as loyal Britons, not just in the sense of citizenship but cultural sense as well.
The last boost for extremist parties has been the lack of radical intellectual vigour in the mainstream ones. There are too few back-benchers on the opposition party and too little encouragement given to radical ideas which appeal to the party loyalist. I recently attended a Conservative county wide dinner. I was the only Conservative MP there. This doesn’t matter much, but what the party should be worried about is that there were only 40 people there. There were 2,000 journalists at the party conference but only 1,500 delegates. To break through you need ideas coming up from below. You must inspire your activists.
Back-bench MPs and MEPs who come up with new ideas should be encouraged. I am not saying that the leadership should adopt all there policies, just that we need a debate about them.
Let me give a few examples. First, localism. If we really believe in this should local authorities not be given the tax licensing powers, for instance through local sales tax being set free from central government.
In the education world we must trust the professionals. Schools really should be set free. Heads should be entirely free to set the curriculum, hire and fire staff and select and expel pupils as they wish, as happens so successfully in the private sector. Parents should be able to able to buy into the private education sector with a discount equivalent to the cost of state education. I say this by the way as a parent of a child in a comprehensive school.
The NHS is not a religion. People who have contributed all their lives as tax-payers should be able to top-up NHS care with private care or private medicines if the NHS can’t provide them with what they need. Pensioners should be allowed to claim tax relief for private health insurance (the policy of previous Conservative governments) and this should be extended as circumstances permit. I say all this as someone who has to rely exclusively for himself and his family on the NHS. At present I can afford nothing else.
We must continue to be explicit about the state of the public finances, acknowledge the need for cuts in the public sector and unveil efficiency programmes. Much progress has been made in this respect. For a long time people like me, who argued for breaking free of Labours spending plans, were called dangerous extremists who would cost us the next election; who says that now?
And of course when we take power we need a referendum on our relationship with Europe and ensuring our national sovereignty.
And so the list goes on. We need radical ideas from the grass roots. We need of course to capture the middle ground but politics needs to be fun as well!
The first truth is that the Labour government itself has given a tremendous boost to the BNP with its immigration policies. The careful controls such as the Primary Purpose Rule which had controlled immigration under successive Conservative Governments were torn up. There has in the last twelve years been an unprecedented wave in immigration of over 2 million people. One report I read this week suggests that in the not too distant future our population will reach 77 million.
A cap is needed now on immigration.
In case anyone thinks there is something racist in this I would argue that the uncontrolled eastern European has long been a problem, much as I love Poles and their work ethos.
Even the Conservative asylum policies, designed to admit small numbers of political refugees, were a problem. Within the last twelve years these rules have been abused.
The second boost to far-right parties has been a general sense of hopelessness engendered by our increasingly rule based, regulation driven, politically correct society. We should remember that Britishness is primarily about freedom from the state. We are the only country in Europe never to have been a police state or had one imposed on us. Again a new Conservative government must have the sort of bonfire of controls that the Conservative government of 1951 initiated.
The third boost to the extremist policies has been the moral relativism of mainstream liberal thinking. Politicians are frightened of proclaiming an ideal because it may not be attainable by everybody or because they themselves fall short of it. An obvious example is marriage. It may be difficult for people to commit themselves to each other for life, to bring up children, but that does not mean it is wrong or that in acknowledging the fact we are attacking alternative lifestyles.
The fourth boost for the far-right, and most difficult to talk about, has been the squeamishness of mainstream politicians in dealing with Muslim extremism, not just the terrorist but the cultural variety. I make no secret of my admiration for Britain’s Jewish community. Muslims should learn from their example. Jewish people here have kept their religion, (if they want, of the liberal or orthodox variety) they have kept their identity, but they have chosen to integrate. They have become more British than the British; they have contributed enormously to Britain’s cultural, intellectual and business strength.
I admire Islam, its spirituality and its values. But Muslims who choose to settle here, and they are most welcome, must see themselves primarily as loyal Britons, not just in the sense of citizenship but cultural sense as well.
The last boost for extremist parties has been the lack of radical intellectual vigour in the mainstream ones. There are too few back-benchers on the opposition party and too little encouragement given to radical ideas which appeal to the party loyalist. I recently attended a Conservative county wide dinner. I was the only Conservative MP there. This doesn’t matter much, but what the party should be worried about is that there were only 40 people there. There were 2,000 journalists at the party conference but only 1,500 delegates. To break through you need ideas coming up from below. You must inspire your activists.
Back-bench MPs and MEPs who come up with new ideas should be encouraged. I am not saying that the leadership should adopt all there policies, just that we need a debate about them.
Let me give a few examples. First, localism. If we really believe in this should local authorities not be given the tax licensing powers, for instance through local sales tax being set free from central government.
In the education world we must trust the professionals. Schools really should be set free. Heads should be entirely free to set the curriculum, hire and fire staff and select and expel pupils as they wish, as happens so successfully in the private sector. Parents should be able to able to buy into the private education sector with a discount equivalent to the cost of state education. I say this by the way as a parent of a child in a comprehensive school.
The NHS is not a religion. People who have contributed all their lives as tax-payers should be able to top-up NHS care with private care or private medicines if the NHS can’t provide them with what they need. Pensioners should be allowed to claim tax relief for private health insurance (the policy of previous Conservative governments) and this should be extended as circumstances permit. I say all this as someone who has to rely exclusively for himself and his family on the NHS. At present I can afford nothing else.
We must continue to be explicit about the state of the public finances, acknowledge the need for cuts in the public sector and unveil efficiency programmes. Much progress has been made in this respect. For a long time people like me, who argued for breaking free of Labours spending plans, were called dangerous extremists who would cost us the next election; who says that now?
And of course when we take power we need a referendum on our relationship with Europe and ensuring our national sovereignty.
And so the list goes on. We need radical ideas from the grass roots. We need of course to capture the middle ground but politics needs to be fun as well!
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