Week of July 9 – July 15 – US Daily Review

Read Time:4 Minute, 34 Second

Looking at the news and opinion out of London each day.

7-15-13

New Tory group ‘Renewal’ calls for union members to be allowed to donate their affiliation fee to any party

The Conservative party hasn’t won a parliamentary majority for more than twenty years. If it is to start doing so again, then it will have to need to expand its pool of potential voters.

7-14-13

Doomed to die by the NHS: Devastating report to reveal thousands dying needlessly as 21 hospitals probed in scandal that eclipses Mid Staffs horror

Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt will condemn up to ten NHS hospital trusts as ‘failed regimes’ this week as a damning report reveals thousands of patients are still dying needlessly. A major review of patient safety will find that as many as 21 hospitals are still failing the most critically ill people – especially the elderly and emergency cases – four years after the Mid Staffs scandal claimed hundreds of lives.

The roots of the NHS scandal are in a culture that grants human life no absolute value

Here are the figures. 14 hospital trusts were investigated by the hospital review commissioned by Jeremy Hunt. Ten require “urgent action”. 21 are still failing critically ill patients. The best part of 3500 people may have died needlessly.

Another good private school wants to join the state system. Why is Labour trying to stop it?

The battle over the King’s School in Tynemouth shows just how deeply confused Labour has become about education reform

7-13-13

Osborne has set off another round of differentiation – who will gain from it?

The recent Spending Review was meant to be a united front: a hypothetical overview of how the Tories and Lib the Dems would together manage the public finances in the year after the election. But since it was delivered it’s been differentiation-a-go-go.

7-12-13

David Cameron and Nick Clegg move like sharks to keep the coalition going

If a shark stops moving it dies. In the Prime Minister and deputy Prime Minister’s office, they believe that the same applies to the coalition. Their view is that if it is going to make it to 2015, it needs to be doing things right up until parliament is dissolved and the election called.

Taking tax to task

CentreForum’s Adam Corlett calls for a reform of our complicated tax code

Boris Johnson wasn’t joking – work is becoming a woman’s world

Sexual inequality has reversed in Britain: fewer boys go to university, get a good job or earn as much money

7-11-13

At long last, Cameron is considering an appeal to aggrieved English voters

The West Lothian question continues to bedevil British politics. While various powers have been devolved to Scotland and Wales, England has no devolution.

Jeremy Hunt turns on Labour over union policy influence

One of David Cameron’s better lines at Prime Minister’s Questions was that the trade unions ‘buy the candidates, they buy the policies and they buy the leader’.

We, the voters, have chosen taxpayer-subsidised parties and politicians. So we must make the most of it.

At first glance, there only a loose connection between an inflation-busting 12 per cent pay rise for MPs, which apparently will be announced today, and Ed Miliband’s wish to bar Labour candidates at the next election from outside earnings of more than £10,000 above their MP’s salary.

7-10-13

I’ll tell you what really devalues marriage: patronising, preachy little tax breaks

The Conservative party is trying to redefine marriage. I can’t believe they think they’re going to get away with this. Throughout human history it has been one thing, which is a loving commitment between two people who want to share a life.

Ed Miliband is no weakling but this union battle could destroy him

The Labour leader has picked a fight that has very little relevance to voters

Now Ed needs to show the value of membership

Now that Ed Miliband is looking to build a mass membership party, he has to assess what it means to be a Labour Party member

Summer of Tory love soured by European Arrest Warrant stance

James Wharton’s EU referendum bill and Theresa May’s Abu Qatada deportation have sweetened the mood on the Conservative backbenches, particularly as far as the Home Secretary is concerned. However, I’m picking up signals that her stance on EU criminal justice measures is seriously souring the spirits of some (which are ever mercurial).

7-9-13

Who owns Labour? Unite turns on the Right

Ed Miliband’s speech today isn’t an attempt to close down the row over Falkirk, but to get back on top of the issue, rather than appearing to be bounced along by events. What it will do is open a huge row with the union bosses: one the Labour leader needs to be seen to have won at the end of it all.

At root, Miliband’s Party problem is our problem too

Ed Miliband displays what child psychiatrists call a “pattern of behavior”. Confronted with a problem he can no longer avoid, he moves late and does little, a response that voters have seen again and again.