Cameron and the Hefferlump - Now it's serious!

There is an absolute gem in this fortnight's Private Eye, reproduced on their website:

Simon Heffer’s constant criticism of David Cameron in the Telegraph is beginning to goad poor Dave beyond endurance. During his holiday in Brittany last month, the Tory leader was lunching one day with Tory treasurer Lord Marland, who has a holiday apartment out there – and who mentioned that Hefferlump sometimes rents a particular house in Dinard for his summer hols.

‘Right!’ Dave roared, rising from the table. ‘Let’s go over there and settle this Heffer business now!’ Cameron was ready for battle. Marland had to drive him to Dinard and lead him to the front door of the house.

Alas! What terrible vengeance he planned will never be known: the villa turned out to be occupied by a blameless and wholly unHefferish family.

Cameron stomped off red-faced with rage and embarrassment – while, far away, Simon Heffer continued his sedate motoring holiday in the Bavarian Alps. Poop poop!

Conservative's green policy shambles

On balance, I agree with the Friends of the Earth verdict on the Tory "Quality of Life" proposals:

This is an enormously important report with many innovative and significant proposals that we wholeheartedly support.The challenge now is to turn this blueprint for a greener future into official party policy.

There's the rub. My head is still spinning on this. I am still not quite sure what the Tories are proposing, particularly after Zak Goldsmith "backpedalled" on some of the main proposals on Conservative Home as highlighted by Chris K. Maybe they aren't proposing anything - it's all just a way of getting on the telly. I don't know. It's a mystery.

This whole thing (I hesitate to use the word "announcement" as it has been more a series of briefings, leaks, press releases and lots of "backpedalling") has been almost impossible to follow. The Tory policy making process, if it can be called that, is an utter shambles.

But anyway, there are some contradictions which are glaring. On Newsnight, only last month, Cameron said he was in favour of airport expansion but now this report proposes to "institute a significant moratorium on new road and airport building." No doubt, Cameron will indicate that it hangs on the interpretation of the the word "significant", but he can't have it both ways.

On the one hand, David Cameron is saying that the money taken on "green taxes" will 'go into a ring-fenced fund to reduce family taxes', and on the other the report itself (1.3.3.1.2) says the proposed green taxes will be "fiscally neutral":

Our policy proposals are fiscally neutral. For example, whilst we recommend levying a high Purchase Tax for the most polluting cars in a class, we argue that all the money received should be returned to tax payers either in the form of a ‘feebate’ to the greenest cars or in other tax reductions.

So which is it to be?

With only a month to go before a possible election, this is a policy mess I would not like to have in our party!

It was entertaining to see John Gummer presenting this report on the telly. My goodness how I missed him! I always feel that he should be doing the voices at a "Punch and Judy" show. As far I am concerned the Tories can give us 24 hour rolling Gummer and Redwood. Most entertaining but unlikely to win them any votes.

Yet more problems for the Tory quality of life proposals

It seems to be one danged thing after another for the Tory quality of life proposals. They appear to have more holes than your average-sized colander.

The latest squall is to do with the proposals about shops and green taxes.

The Sun fires off at Cameron saying "he is barking mad if he thinks supermarkets should charge for parking".

Richard Littlejohn, never missing an opportunity to shoot from the hip, also goes steaming in, in the Mail:

People are aware of their responsibilities to the planet, and most try to conserve energy and recycle as much as possible. But they resent lectures about individual behaviour from Old Etonian politicians. An extra two grand on a Mondeo may not matter to a multi-millionaire like Goldsmith, but it's a huge chunk of change from the average family budget. And whatever CMD [Call Me Dave] may think, regardless of what people tell pollsters, no one will vote for higher taxes and higher prices. They also resent being expected to pay more, on top of their council tax, for less frequent rubbish collections. The Government already raises the thick end of £30 billion a year through "green" taxes - virtually none of which gets spent improving the environment.

I don't agree with the gist of these attacks, but it is great fun to observe the travails of the combustible organism which is the present day Tory "coalition".

Money and celebrity will not make us happy - thanks for the advice Dave!

With the new policy launch, David Cameron is telling us that money and celebrity will not make us happy. Well, that's very easy to say when you are rich and famous like him, Cameron, and one of the main authors of the report, Zak Goldsmith.

The Sindie reports:

The proposals, to be published by David Cameron, are expected to urge people to pursue a "slower" lifestyle that may involve a cut in salary and flexible working.

That's great advice isn't it? Especially coming from someone who is rich with at least two highly paid jobs and a wife in a highly paid job, and from a Shadow Cabinet which not only have highly paid MPs' jobs but also 115 jobs outside their parliamentary and shadow roles.

The advice is sound, but it would sound so much better coming from someone who had taken a cut in salary and had moved to flexible working and a slower life style.

Cameron chickening out of green air taxes - MIrror

The Sunday Mirror reports that "advisers to Mr Cameron believe they have now persuaded him to dump the plans for green air taxes". So his chickening out of one of the most necessary green policies, then.

Sunday Times reports enticing green tax cut proposals from the Tories:

The Conservatives are proposing to offer tax cuts worth thousands of pounds to householders who make homes more energy efficient. A policy group set up by David Cameron is recommending rebates in stamp duty, reductions in council tax and cuts in the Vat levied on materials that save energy.

Desperate Cameron contacted Eliasch 15 times to try to stop him defecting

So says the Sunday Telegraph:

David Cameron made a series of desperate bids to persuade Johan Eliasch, the Conservative Party's former deputy treasurer, from signing up as an adviser to Gordon Brown. It was claimed that Mr Eliasch, a millionaire businessman, was contacted as many as 15 times by Mr Cameron as the Tory leader made a vain effort to dissuade him from defecting to the Prime Minister.

'Voters are confused about Cameron' - new Tory Vice Chairman

I think the Tory party is bit like Cricket Clubs - they have 37 Vice Chairs or something like that. Anyway, Kulveer Ranger has just been appointed a Tory Vice-Chair and has said:

Voters do not know if David Cameron is a “toff with a conscience” or whether he can relate to wider society, according to a vice-chairman of the Conservative Party.

Well it's not surprising is it? I suppose we should give the public full marks for skills of perception.

Portillo accuses Cameron of "losing his nerve" over Conservative rebranding

Appropriately, Marketing Week reports:

Michael Portillo, the former Conservative minister-turned-TV-personality, has accused Tory leader David Cameron of "losing his nerve" over the rebranding of the party after it faltered in opinion polls.

Conservative Home criticises Cameron's sharp rebuffs to internal critics

Cameron does seem to be making a consistent mistake in attacking his internal critics with remarkable venom.

First, he shredded Kalms, Brady and Miraj on Today. Now he says a former deputy leader and Tory Chairman, Michael Ancram, is a 'blast from the past who signifies nothing'. The actual quote was: "When you make changes you’ll get blasts from the past who signify nothing."

While this "offence is the best form of defence" tactic might dig Cameron out of temporary ordure occasionally, in the long-term he is making a huge mistake. He is building up a very cheesed-off cadre of Tories who are going to be sharping their knives behind his back, waiting for the moment to pounce.

Conservative Home comments:

Mr Cameron really must stop trashing his critics. His frustration is understandable but his behaviour is not statesmanlike.

David Cameron gets the White Van Man vote

"They ought to bring back national service"

...The clarion call of white van men, cab drivers and retired colonels everywhere.

Well that's what David Cameron wants to. All 16/17 year-olds should go on a "boot camp" and wrap themselves in the Union Jack, he reckons. In fact, he initially proposed this in 2005 but he has pulled it out of his "in case of emergency lurch right" box to fit in with his "on the hoof" PR "programme".

There is no more suitable organ for Cameron to re-announce this than the Currant Bun, the home of the White Van Man.

To be fair, it's a voluntary scheme. Six weeks. It could involve helping charidees or such like. And he's getting Amir Khan to launch it with him, so that's alright then. Very glossy and shiny.

And the youngsters would be given a cash sum at the end of their "service"! But - wait for it - that will go to a charity of their choice and to the organisation who provided their service opportunity.

I can't see it, somehow.

Is this idea cobblers or am I being unfair?

Is the take-up of teenagers, who could be surfing and earning a bit of money over the summer holidays, to go on a sort of "Boot camp", for no pay, likely to be overwhelming?

It seems to be, above all, another example of policy (re-)announcement driven by a rather desperate PR agenda, aimed, above all, at getting Cameron's revolting, shiny, saintimonious face on the telly as much as possible.

Mark Oaten - what can I say?

I don't want to cause a kerfuffle.

Mark Oaten is entitled to write an article in the Times.

I just don't think he is right about 'common cause' between the LibDems and the Tories. Yes, if, a few months ago, you looked at some of the vague mood music that Cameron was emitting, he did seem like a bona fide Observer reader. But now he is showing his true colours (Hit a hoodie etc), so it is obvious that:

a) There is no common cause between the LibDems and the Tories, as we knew all along - the Cameron "sunshine" agenda was a sham masking the real Tory party.

b) The Tory party haven't really worked out what the heck they stand for, so how can you have common cause with a confused entity?

Gordon Brown - serial kleptomaniac of political ideas

Just a few days ago, David Cameron proposed a crack down on violent videos and computer games viewed by kids.

Now Gordonius Brownus has stepped in:

Gordon Brown promised yesterday to look again at banning violent computer games for teenagers.

He said he was aware of growing concern about the effect of screen violence on youngsters. And he would study whether new rules are needed on advertising and sale of violent games to them.

What a surprise.

We can expect more of this. The highly shrewd Mr Brown has coaxed Cameron into revealing all his best ideas, so that Brownus can adopt them and pull the rug from under the feet of the Camster.

Arnie recoils from the Curse of Cameron

All along the watchtower reports plasible reasons, to do with Californian affairs, as to why Arnold Schwarzenegger will not be attending the Conservative conference this year, as previously widely advertised.

It seems a fair assumption that Arnie is actually dumping Cameron because he can see he (Cameron) is not a likely election winner. Why cheese off Gordon Brown when it is obvious that Cameron is highly unlikely to win the next election?

Also, "The Governator" might also be only too aware that the last time an American politician (John McCain) addressed a Tory conference, their political career went into an irretrievable nose-dive immediately afterwards.

Brown's cunning plan?

George Jones in the Telegraph says that Cameron's summer wobble is in danger of turning into a winter of discontent. He also says that Cameron is in danger of using up all his ammo (all these commission policy announcements) too early.

The latter point was one that has occurred to me in the last few days. Gordon Brown's middle name is "devious" and one has been searching for a motive, other than the obvious, for all this October election speculation.

It could be that Brown has a cunning plan. Speculate about an October election. Get Cameron firing off all his salvoes in the form of his various policy initiatives. Then don't call an autumn election and pick and choose the best of Cameron's initiatives and implement them as government policy before the actual election next spring, or whenever.

Clever that.

It is also possible, of course, that Brown is just as confused as the rest of us. But I doubt it.

Cameron gets blasted by Tory heavyweight

Oh dear. Oh dear.

There could be a snap, crackle, pop election in thirty days time, but dear old David Cameron is under fire from Tory heavyweight Michael Ancram.

David Cameron 'is trashing Thatcher legacy' is the headline in the Telegraph.

It seems that Cameron has missed a trick in not putting Ancram in charge of one of his commissions to keep him busy. Instead, Ancram has put together a document of 30 pages describing how he thinks the Tory party has lost its "soul", publishing it on the very day that Cameron wants the spotlight to be on the latest report from his commissions.

Having said that, the things which Ancram wants Cameron to focus on - tax cuts, law and order, Europe - have indeed been key elements in the "Cameron rightward lurch" programme during the last couple of weeks.

It really is extraordinary that a heavyweight loyal Tory feels so strongly as to fire a shot at Cameron below the water line, so near to a potential election date.

Two phrases, a year apart, which give the lie to the "no Cameron lurch" pretence

I only have to read Andrew Rawnsley's weekly column in the Observer to realise why skilled journalists should command a high salary. The man put the dillema of Cameron brilliantly in this week's edition.

Tish and drat. I didn't spot this one. But Rawnsley did. The huge gulf exemplified by Cameron's emblematic "before and after rightward lurch" statements on youth crime:

Before lurch:

"We have to show a lot more love". ("Hug-a-hoodie" speech July 10th 2006)


After lurch:

"Common sense suggests that with young people you need to hit them where it hurts". (22nd August 2007)

Slam dunk!

Tory members overwhelmingly reject green taxes

David Cameron is still unable to get the support of his party for anything other than traditional core Tory policies.

Despite his best husky-hugging efforts, only 34% of Tory members would be "happy to pay green taxes if other taxes fall by the same amount".

That is according to the latest Conservative members' survey by Conservative Home.

The Cameron lurch to the right

The Independent reports that Cameron has re-ignited claims that he is lurching to the right after his comments on immigration last night.

Seumas Milne in the Guardian writes an excellent commentary on this lurching to the right business, entitled: "Now we see what the return of Tory Britain would be like":

Now, after two months of the Brown bounce, a series of public rows over policy and two humiliating byelection performances, the real Conservative party is reasserting itself - and giving us a flavour of what the return of Tory Britain would feel like. Start with the prospect of rightwing libertarian Boris Johnson, a man who thinks it's amusing to refer to Africans as "piccaninnies", regrets the end of colonialism and denounced the Lawrence inquiry into the racist killing of a black teenager as "Orwellian" - as Tory mayor of Britain's multiracial capital.

...on the crucial economic, social and class issues, Cameron's Tories stand where they always have done: if anything, they are moving on to even more extreme neoliberal territory.

Watch Cameron on Newsnight

Cameron's interview on Newsnight last night can be seen here.

Cameron on Newsnight : The farce of the Conservative part-time shadow cabinet exposed

The Newsnight interview with David Cameron last night showed the BBC at its best. Four senior journalists interrogated Cameron, with interesting results.

It was an unusual format. I suspect the deal was - "OK - make sure Paxo is two thousand miles away but we'll let four of your finest have a go instead".

The result was productive - some light produced rather than the heat radiated by a "Paxo stuffing".

David Cameron was showing his gift of the gab at its most elegant. However, each of the four journalists hit home with individual points which, although Cameron gave a smooth line of defence in each case, actually exposed serious weaknesses in his position.

On Iraq, Mark Durban clearly drove home the point that Cameron had a neo-Con stance on Iraq, but now two years later, has become a liberal dove on the matter. Although Cameron waffled his way out of this one, his hypocrisy was clearly exposed.

Stephanie Flanders beautifully exposed the uselessness of the £20 a week proposal for married couples. Cameron virtually admitted (or at least implied) that the proposal would have no impact but said that it was, more or less, a needed gesture. So, in summary, Cameron is proposing to spend millions of scarce taxpayers' resources on what he as much as admits is a "gesture". Ridiculous.

On Immigration, Cameron seemed to mix up asylum and immigration. He was saying that asylum admissions have been too high. The natural action which flows from that statement is a limit on asylum admissions, which the Tories proposed at the last election, and was quite rightly condemned as a breach of civilised behaviour. To give Cameron his due (never thought I'd write that!) he did make a genuine attempt to carefully calibrate his language on immigration.

But it was Michael Crick who, for me, scored the winning goal against the Camster. He raised the issue of the Shadow cabinets' 115 jobs outside parliament. He exposed the ridiculousness of a part-time shadow cabinet which is trying to present themselves as potential ministers in a few months time. In particular he focused on William Hague's many outside jobs which bring him hundreds of thousands of pounds every year. How can we take the Tories seriously as a potential government when they are off earning vast amounts outside their shadow cabinet and parliamentary jobs?

Our friendly neighbourhood Fluffy Elephant obviously had a spiral topped notepad under his trunk during this programme as written a brilliant and comprehensive debunking of "Mr Balloon".