Earl of Onslow dies aged 73

Earl of Onslow in the House of Lords

I've just noticed this on the BBC website.

"The hereditary peer, the Earl of Onslow, has died, House of Lords speaker Baroness Hayman has announced. The 73-year-old peer had been a member of the House for 40 years and last spoke in the chamber on 29 March. A self-styled "disloyal" Conservative, he was known for his colourful bow ties and outspoken views on issues such as drugs, which he called to be legalised."

Nick Clegg is currently unveiling plans for a second chamber populated by 300 members, 80% of which could be elected. Who might get to choose the candidates, I wonder? Maybe they will be those who failed for the other place.

Lord Onslow saw humbug, spoke up against it, and was not afraid to speak his mind. I'd far rather have a 100 of him than one of Clegg's nominees! Let the dust settle on the House of Commons, with all its recent travails, before we get to pontificate on the House of Lords. Anyway, who is so desperate for this supposed reform? Most people are worried about their immediate futures.

Foreign affairs for Nick Clegg?

Nick Clegg meeting Dutch PM Mark Rutte - did they
speak in English or Dutch?

I've just read the link that Iain Dale put on his blog. This is about an interview he has given to So So Gay. He suggested it was read and I did. And it is a good read. Two things strike me. On civil partnerships, the current ban on a religious element to them and objections to the ban, the article says, "Dale, who is in a civil partnership himself, is open to that objection despite his own agnosticism. ‘I don’t think the law should prohibit a religious element, but I also don’t think that churches should be forced to offer services for gay people if they don’t want to.’ That's the point. Not forcing people, either way. His comments on Chris Bryant and Ben Bradshaw are also telling. But it's like all things with Labour. If they think you are stealing their political clothes they will try to say you look like a tramp.

On the Coalition and Nick Clegg's position in it after the poll slump last week for the Liberal Democrats, Dale sees Clegg in the foreign secretary role. "Dale can see Clegg as a potential future foreign secretary – subject to William Hague’s standing down at the next reshuffle". I think this would be a good idea. I've never really understood what a deputy prime minister is for or does. John Prescott spent some of his time humping his desk and carpet about his office. He also spent time knocking old buildings down in Northern England. Michael Heseltine was deputy prime minister as was Geoffrey Howe. Neither seemed fulfilled in the job.

I think, if William Hague does go in a reshuffle, that Clegg would be ideal as foreign secreatary. This is a proper job in government. He has the background from his Dutch and Russian blood and he is married to a Spanish politician's daughter. In Europe, I am told, he would come across well. Not because he is pro-European but because he would not be perceived as "arrogantly English". That's what I've been told. If the continental Europeans would be happier with that, surely that is to our advantage.

Of course, if like Peter Bone MP, you want the Coalition to collapse tomorrow, then Nick Clegg should be left to his own devices as a role-finding deputy prime minister. Mr Bone wants to "be rid of the Liberals" as if he was seeking help from a rat catcher. Personally, I want the coalition to succeed in its mission. Peter Bone may not like "liberals" but he should have helped the Conservative Party to be more electable last year. We've got what we've got. Let's do the best with it and stop infighting and move forward.

Gillian Duffy collars Nick Clegg over Coalition policies

Gillian Duffy is shocked again!

"It's all gone wrong," opines Gillian Duffy, the feisty pensioner who took on Gordon Brown at the general election last year. As she encountered the Deputy Prime Minister today she gave him her ten pence worth of Labourite thinking. The fact that it was under the fading star of New Labour that the bubble burst was something she conveniently forgot. Mrs Duffy is Old Labour to the core. Money grows on trees and the rich can get stuffed!

Here she is in action -

Oliver Letwin in Sheffield holiday row

"A holiday in Sheffield! Wow!"

Oliver Letwin occasionally pops up in the news. Then he keeps his head down. This time he apparently made comments about not wanting Sheffield families to afford cheap holidays. The comments were made in a private conversation with Boris Johnson. Not so private. It is alleged that during a conversation with Mr Johnson about new airports, Mr Letwin said, "We don't want more people from Sheffield flying away on cheap holidays." Nick Clegg who is the MP for Sheffield Hallam  told Sky News Mr Letwin had "become the most controversial politician in Sheffield". "I suggest to him that he probably wants to tread with care when he comes to visit a city that I love."

Isn't it all a bit silly? Maybe Letwin was having a jibe at Clegg going away for his skiing holiday and then having to cut it short, forgetting that he was in charge of the country? If all private tittle tattle is picked up on, then where does it end?

I find that Denis MacShane has entered the fray. In a letter to Mr Letwin, MacShane, MP for Rotherham said, "This is pure snobbery that is unworthy of someone with your wealth and privileged upbringing. Can I say these remarks are profoundly offensive to all the people of South Yorkshire who have as much right to enjoy a holiday as the millionaires in the Cabinet."

Can I say that MacShane is a pompous prat who most likely has loads of private conversations we should't or would't want to hear about?

Nick Clegg attacked as a hypocrite

Making a difference to social mobility

I can't understand why people should get so agitated about the government's desire to improve social mobility. Maybe it's because they think only they should do it. Labour in particular think the apparatus of the state belongs to them. Their client vote is mainly the bulk of Unison. I saw Jack Dromey on Labour's front bench the other day. Now here's a guy who got a leg up in society with the help of his posh wife. Posh Harriet Harperson, niece of of an earl and a daughter of a posh doctor. When Dromey was picketing in the seventies he must have realised he needed a bit more than a bovver boy's hairdo to succeed in life.

Nick Clegg has been called names just because he had a so-called privileged background. He may have had, but his mother endured a Japanese concentration camp. Do these critics have any clue? And isn't it better helping people than sitting on the sidelines doing nothing? The Good Samaritan was able to help out because he had money and the ability to help. No good asking another helpless soul for help.

I'd say Nick Clegg was in the very best situation to help the less advantaged. Those saying that they never would have voted Liberal Democrat had they known that Clegg & Co would be in government must think voting is completely devoid from the stuff of elections. It's a bit like Little Britain with people saying "I'm the only Liberal Democrat in the village". Did they think voting Liberal Democrat meant hoping they would lose?

Those carping now would, I believe carp if any party had got in. They just carp for the sake of it. Chief amongst them is Ed Balls. He must see details of the deficit and think he's looking at a list of lottery winners from the way he talks.

Nick Clegg has gone from campaign cheerleader to Downing Street deputy. Maybe there's a whiff of jealousy in the attacks?

Coalition Conferences

For the first time in living memory of any living Briton, a Liberal (of sorts) gets up at a conference and talks about being in government. As a natural conservative I would have preferred a fully-fledged Conservative government. However, the voters, ever more hurtling towards electoral pipolar disorder, plumped for a situation where no party held a majority in the Commons. So, in the face of dire financial circumstances, two parties agreed to a coalition government. But before it had started, the gainsayers tried to start to unravel the newly-knitted coat of two colours. "It won't last!", they cried, as if doom and gloom were far better bedfellows. The BBC is quite keen on seeing the coalition crash before the year is out. Questions abound on possible calamities, possible rifts. Who cares? THERE'S A CRISIS AT OUR DOOR!

Apparently 40% of the electorate are still moaning about not voting for a coalition. I sometimes wonder if some people should ever get near a ballot box. They seem to think an election is a kind of affirmation of their views and their views alone. David Miliband, celebral geek that he is, even suggested that the last general election was in some way an affront to his democratic decencies. Really?!!

Nick Clegg is right when he says that this coalition government must be judged on five years of achievement or failure. However, carping before anything has happened is just going to lead us into a self-inflicted catastrophe. With the bankers and corporate bonus baggers reaping undeserved pickings.

Clegg's curate's egg

Nick Clegg is going to announce reform today. No more conforming, but reforming the system. I have a gut sense at the moment that it will be deforming. Particularly with regard to the House of Lords.

This new august body will be elected by proportional representation. So presumably out go the bishops, in come the BNPeers. Out go the crossbenchers, in come the crossdressers. Out go the hereditary peers, in come the 21st century proletariat. A bunch of second division politicians who won't know whether they are to muse over government legislation or to stand their ground and confront the Commons.

Nick Clegg needs to know a bit more about unravelling the constitution and its consequences. Yesterday, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Lord High Chancellor were given pecking order mention on the first day back for MPs. We know what happened to the Lord Chancellor's position. It was gravely attacked by the closet republicans of New Labour. Is Rowan Williams going to turfed off the red benches with equal unceremonious ingratitude? Does Nick Clegg have any clue about the Established Church? I've not heard one word about it.

The House of Lords is a fine institution. It is the only second chamber in the entire world to examine legislation with such mental dexterity and service to the nation. The crossbenchers provide a whole host of independently minded peers. And each and every one of the noble lords is able to take up causes on behalf of the public. Being unelected does NOT mean they are divorced from the general political life.

What is to be the suggested replacement? Elected people! Well, I've got an MP for that. Do I want the second placed person in the constituency poll to go for the "Senate"? A slate of rejects hoping for some political crumbs. If the new chamber is to have limited powers who wants to be elected to such a chamber? So many questions. The answers aren't so good.

The only show in town

Gordon Brown thinks he has done a fine thing. Admit defeat of a sort but suggest that all parties are losers. Tell the nation he will quit as Labour leader but say he will stay on as prime minister until the progressive coalition has had a chance to "secure the economy". Then give some kind of rousing speech at the Labour conference, wish his successor well and depart for a cushy job like top bottlewasher at the IMF. That's the game plan. It's eagerly being taken up by the likes of Peter Hain, always the opportunist.

Thankfully such minds as David Blunkett's are coming out against it. So is John Reid. Labour could join up with the LibDems and form a minority government, with the Nats acting as whipping boys in order to secure votes in the House. Perfectly possible, but exceedingly unstable and likely to anger the electorate.

Far better for the Tories and LibDems to form a stable coalition and knuckle down to deal with the deficit. And I hope we won't all carp and criticise when they take difficult decisions. We don't want to end up like Greece or worse. So the only show in town is the Cameron and Clegg coalition. Anything else is a non-viable non-starter.

Brown telephone call to Clegg was amicable

Can't believe everything I see or hear! Apparently it was not a diatribe....."More about that phone call between Gordon Brown and Nick Clegg. A Lib Dem source has told BBC chief political correspondent Laura Kuenssberg that it was a perfectly amicable conversation, and not an angry exchange." So all's well in the stable again!

Cameron won on points and poise

David Cameron won the debate last night. Not by a mile, but he did OK. A school report would say "much improved this term!". Nick Clegg came second and Gordon Brown limped in a reasonable third. To be fair to the PM, I think he did better than some said he did.

All three seemed to get through OK. However, all clammed up on questions they didn't want to answer. Transparency has some way to go it would appear. Linked to truthfulness, of course.

Cameron was much more relaxed. Nick Clegg had moments when he looked like he was piggy in the middle. And what on earth happened to Gordon Brown's make-up. I thought Phyllis Diller may have had a hand in it.

It's still a three-horse race with several loose horses cantering along beside.

Clegg in their sights - Rag, Tag & Bobtail!

I've made my own mind up about the LibDems immigration policy. I don't think it will work. And I think I could have a very constructive debate about it. But that seems to have passed the minds of the Daily Express and Daily Mail journalists by. They are just out to dig the dirt and then dish it out like a drunken seed broadcaster fighting off the gulls and the pigeons.

Nick Clegg's opinions on immigration, Trident and the rest, won't be trounced by the mindless rantings of a pornographer's paper. This very same rag that announced on 1st September 1939 that there would be no war. The very same outfit that told the world they had found Martin Bormann alive and well. Left to the Daily Express to fight the Nazis and we would all be in some frightful empire by now. The Daily Express is a paper I advise people never to read unless they want to turn into some BNP-lite opinion former.

The Daily Mail is more subtle but still rather devoid of reasoned opinion at times. Paul Dacre, the editor, is a man who guards his own privacy in much the same way as a cornered tiger would. But give loose-worded reporting a go and he's your man.

As I mentioned before, crazed reporting aimed at whipping up people to vote against the LibDems is bound to backfire. Reasoned argument should win the day. The Express has dug up an article Clegg wrote in 2002. They must be desperate. In it he said Britons have a greater “cross to bear” than the Germans do over their Nazi past. Then an Express reporter rings up Nicholas Soames, "wadya think of Clegg and his Nazi stuff, Mr.Soames?", and getsSoames to say, “Any person who takes this view about Britain’s role in the Second World War is unfit to lead a national party, let alone the country.”

Of course it's all twisted around to suit the pornographer's paper and his views. What Nick Clegg wrote all those years ago does actually have some validity. This was not about anything DURING the second world war but about us, the British, in the 21st century. Yes, there are lot's who are Little Englanders. I'll give you an example. When BMW took over Rover, the Germans had to endure such comments as, "my grandfather always said that the best Krauts were dead Krauts" and such like. It was just as if the war was only a couple of days old.

The Daily Express may like to think there are no wrongs in this country. They may like to confuse the likes of Nicholas Soames into agreeing with their BNP-lite propaganda, but I find it all rather offensive. We keep hearing of the need for a proper and reasoned debate. I hope I hear that tonight. But I am dead certain I don't want the Daily Express pandering to the lowest common denominator in the process.

Clegg under pressure - sort of!

Nick Clegg is obviously being got at by those in the press who are not LibDem fans. The Daily Telegraph is reporting that he is "under pressure" over expense funding. That pressure is happening because the Telegraph has just adjusted the thermostat. I do love the terminology that the media uses. Yesterday the BBC said Clegg "attacked" Gordon Brown. When I saw it the scene looked like a toothless terrier that was just barking serenely. I'll tell you what a verbal attack is. George Osborne rounding on Alistair Darling. Now that was rather personal.

If we are going to have politicians attacking people, let it be like John Prescott trying to lay a punch on the public or Quintin Hogg lashing out with an umbrella. That's attacking stuff.

The media misuse words in much the same way as they allege misuse of public funds by MPs. This morning, Nick Robinson the political editor of the BBC (who seems to end his carefully scripted reports in rather the same manner as an episode of The Archers) reported that a voter who had thought of voting BNP had now switched to the LibDems on the strength of Clegg's performance last week.

Nick Clegg has got as far as he has on suggesting a plague on both your houses. The BNP suggests a plague on all three. If the Daily Telegraph pumps this up too much all that will happen is that those that are wavering will flow towards those with a strong and vulgar message. That former BNP voter could become a bit firmer by returning. Also, the Tories are not clean on the expenses issue, highlighted of course in the Telegraph exposure (on a relentless basis). The scandal still excites as witnessed by STV's Scottish leaders' debate when a couple of audience members amplified their disgust.

What is that saying? Oh yes, "Be careful what you wish for!".

Leaders' Debate - Who won it? Seems it was Nick Clegg!

Just dragged myself away from interminable political opinion making on ITV1. The last speaker being Lord Pearson who has been given a slot for his views. Much of all this has been hyped up and the people most excited about it all are the TV companies and the pollsters. I think the level of excitement offered by the three leaders was less energised.

When this was first mooted (a leaders' debate) everyone thought David Cameron had most to lose as he was the more telegenic and that Gordon Brown had most to gain. In the event both were deemed to have been outshone by Nick Clegg. I think Clegg did well and his natural approach is obviously appealing. David Cameron's political content was mostly sound but his body language seemed at times to give away his nervousness. Gordon Brown got it one fairly good strike about the Conservative posters of himself smiling and Cameron's controlled smirk seemed to suggest he was ill at ease over Brown's newfound Cheshire cat routine. But I think the most telling thing for me was at the very end when they all shook hands. Brown was keen to leave the other two and go to the audience as friendly host thanking his guests. Cameron and Clegg spent few moments in exchanging words. They seemed relaxed in each other's company. Whilst only a fleeting period and one can't read too much into it, it would tend to give a little bit of support to the suggestion that the two could work well in any coalition arrangement.

The pollsters are now crunching the numbers, but they all seem to agree that Nick Clegg was the outright winner. Which will mean that, as William Hague rightly points out, the LibDems will come under greater scrutiny. I hope it will be by proper debate than by a kind of musical chairs game.

Paul McCartney for Downing Street?

In its rolling news feature, the BBC reports at 1552 "As the Lib Dem leader arrived at a community centre in Penny Lane, one onlooker said disappointingly, "I thought the VIP was going to be Paul McCartney" ". The BBC's Fiona Trott in Liverpool for the election puts this in as vital news.

I wonder what this says about it all. Are the electorate interested in this election, long awaited as it has been? Although I'm fairly involved in political thought it still amazes me that many people don't know who their political leaders are. Nick Clegg is relatively unknown we are told, but surely at a political event during the election the person was never going to be Paul McCartney. Or am I just too much out of the loop?

Nick Clegg misses the point!

I'm getting a bit miffed with the party leaders and their approach to the expense scandal. They are, all three, excercising some kind of mammoth bolting procedure of a rickety stable door when the old nag itself is no longer chomping on the hay.

The truth is the Additional Costs Allowance was an unstainstable, unsupportable and totally mistaken idea in the first place. It rather vaguely said that second-home expenses may only be claimed for spending "necessarily incurred in staying overnight away from their main home for the purpose of performing their parliamentary duties". It seems all sorts were allowed, including gardening expenses. Nick Clegg and the other two leaders happily availed themselves of the system. They didn't squeak when they turned up at the Fees Office. "Gardening expenses, Mr.Clegg?" "Yeah, got a bigger mower and a smaller groundsman, er, I mean, gardener, er, or, handyman." "Right, OK, sign there then and the cash is yours. Not feeling a tad uncomfortable that you've got the most expensive gardener in Sheffield? I could always find a lad who'd do it for a quid? No, not interested? Oh, well!"

That conversation never took place. Neither did much else regarding the Allowance Scheme. However, it was what MPs were expected to be involved in. Now it's become a farce. It's one thing going after a person who has extorted cash or fiddled the system, but Nick Clegg is going after MPs who have "played by the rules". As with David Cameron, he is falling into a holier-than-thou position. This is not morally right. It is also totally undemocratic. It is not up to them to decide if a person who has not broken any rules should be de-selected. It is up to the voters to decide the merits of electing a candidate.

We are getting a kind of witch-hunt going on because the "authorities" feel uncomfortable. The truth is that legally and morally MPs who did not abuse the system should not pay anything back. The system was crazy, but then loads of businesses have crazy systems. Gordon Brown keeps telling us that continued bank bonuses are not illegal. However, it may be politically prudent for MPs to pay back unnecessary expenses.

Nick Clegg has paid back some of his gardening expenses but not all of them. Sir Thomas Legg thinks that a £1000 maximum for mowing your lawn and sweeping up the trash is OK. If he thinks that, then his time has been a waste. His first question should have been as to why an MP felt he needed to have his lawnmowing paid for in the first place.

The whole thing will not be sorted by Sir Thomas Legg and his pen-pushing exercise. No, it will be sorted at the Great Clearance Election next year!

Nick Clegg plays Robin Hood today

Some say the party conference season is just like a series of pantomimes. Well, if that is so, the Liberal Democrats are putting on Robin Hood with Nick Clegg in the starring role as Robin of Locksley himself. Vince Cable, as Friar Tuck, is the Treasury spokesman of the LibDems. He is all for a 0.5% annual levy on the most expensive homes in Britain, raising £1 billion in extra tax. This would apply to the extra value over the £1 million mark. Are there that many million-pound mansions in the country? The Lib Dems say about 250,000 property-owners would pay about £4,000 a year each on average mostly in the South-East of England. The tax would be based on Land Registry valuations. That includes quite a few properties worth considerably more that £1 million.

Nick Clegg says, "I think people, even at the top end, now accept we need to try and rebalance things a bit so that everyone moves together - the whole of society moves together. This is a small correction which I think will make a big difference for people who are really struggling to make ends meet." I am all for helping people out but "rebalancing a bit" is surely not going to help matters much in the struggle to pay back our National Debt.

He says the reason for the new tax was "fairness" and rebalancing "one of the most unfair tax systems around". Granted, but we need a powerful hedgecutter to trim things back, not a puny pair of secateurs!

VAT will have to go up. Bank bonuses will have to be curtailed. Corporation tax will have to go up. Public spending will have to be seriously reduced. It will hurt, but this is the time to take off the rose-tinted specs and get a pair of glasses that gives us 20/20 vision!

Watchdog warns over Lib Dems' phone poll plan

Nick Clegg is said to be facing embarrassment after the Information Commissioner expressed "concern" over plans to bombard 250,000 voters with automated phone calls featuring a recording of the Liberal Democrat leader. According to the watchdog, "The Privacy and Electronic Communication Regulations forbid the use of automated unsolicited direct marketing calls to any individual who has not previously given their consent to receive such calls."

Has anybody told those guys from the US offering holidays in Florida or some such? I get them quite frequently and I've not said yes! I bet someone tipped off the Commissioner. I wonder who it was?

LibDems no longer so passionate over Euro!

In a surprising turn of events, or turn of policy, the Lib Dems have made a significant break with their commitment to the European single currency. They no longer see it as a priority. Well, I'm blowed!

In an interview with the The Independent on Sunday, Chris Huhne said, "The truth is, within the British debate, it's completely off the radar and there is simply no point in regarding it as a runner worth investing political time in." Mr Huhne also told the IoS that Nick Clegg would not become a household name until after the next election, saying the leader needed to "go through an election to become a real figure in the front rooms of the country". But I bet he'll be talked about in the front rooms of Tory and UKIP activists!

I wonder if this is a way of getting on board soft eurosceptics? Maybe. It goes to show that the next election will be a very odd affair indeed.

Gordon and the garden gnomes!

Gordon Brown's not exactly like a cat with nine lives. He's more like a bear that's run into the last chance saloon after being shot at by blue-rinsed hunters and chased by his own kind. He's a sorry picture indeed, as the bartender tries to calm him down. He's not quite Yogi, he's not really Pooh, and he doesn't normally go to Paddington station. However, he does seem lost. He's definitely a bear with a sore head, but has the bartender got the cure for him?

John Major famously strode into the garden of No 10 and announced that he intended to have a "put-up-or-shut-up" leadership election. What followed was a bit of a damp squib. Gordon Brown only has a wet and windy garden to look at today. Hidden in the flower beds are some uppity gnomes, all ready to spout contradictory ditties. Some think he's great. One or two want him gone. Another thinks he's "absolutely convinced" that Brown is the "best person" to be Prime Minister. The last straw probably!

The truth is that Gordon Brown miscalculated his time as PM. He was outclassed and outrun by the crafty Blair. The Granita deal was his downfall. He was OK as Chancellor, but Blair was the "Leader of New Labour" and this has meant Brown's place was always to be second. History has shown that British prime ministers that "take over", rather than get "elected", always hit the buffers. The reason is clear. The precedessor has flogged the train so that the new driver gets little or no head of steam. What happened for Macmillan/Home and Wilson/Callaghan will happen for Blair/Brown. The same could be said of Thatcher/Major. Although John Major won the 1992 election, it was not really a vote of confidence for him. It was a rejection of Neil Kinnock. John Major's exit from Downing Street was postponed for five years, but thankfully that meant no Kinnock premiership.

Gordon Brown may have time to quieten the gnomes or they may just be able to topple him. My guess is that he is stuck with Harold Macmillan's truism. "Events, dear boy, events". Those events look like leading him the Callaghan way, with Cameron taking over. The only difference was in 1979 there was clear blue water between the Tories and Labour. The people knew who was what. Now it's all a blur. If Cameron doesn't quite make it on his own, he'll have to cosy up to Nick Clegg. A coalition would at least be better than a continuation of this New Labour charade!