Education Credits for alternative state schools? Up to a point, Mr Milburn – by Edward Leigh MP

The former Blairite minister Alan Milburn is the head of Labour’s Social Mobility Commission. He said the other day that he thinks parents with children in ‘badly performing’ schools should be able to choose a different school. The method he suggests is an Education Credit worth ‘perhaps 150%’ of the child’s education in their current school. So far so good. This would clearly encourage the preferred school to take the pupil.

Alan Milburn has long thought in this way. I am pleased to see him still going in the right direction, not far behind Tory policy. It is true that the Conservative party has yet to embrace the option of freeing up entry to private schools to poorer families. But I am glad to see that we are now planning to let all sorts of organisations set up new academies in poorer areas, so that a ‘free market’ in the state system will gradually improve standards. Parents will vote with their children’s feet by sending them to the best school they can find in their area. The more new schools enabled to open in an area, the more choice local parents will have.

Yet the freedom of choice both we at the moment and Mr Milburn are offering only extends as far as allowing parents to opt for ‘an alternative state school’. It is a little like Henry Ford’s statement about his early motor cars: ‘any colour you like as long as it’s black’.

I have always argued that any such scheme should enable those who want it to choose a private school for their child.

Our current Conservative policy, taking the best from tried and tested systems abroad, particularly Sweden, is encouraging, but in the long run, until we smash down the Berlin wall between private and public education, we will not have freed the people of this country from the social and academic polarisation of clapped-out socialist comprehensives on the one hand and expensive and socially upmarket private schools on the other.

I hope that we will one day find a way to enable even the poorest child in England to be educated at a private school, if his parents think it right for him. Strangely enough, that was the original purpose of Eton College, which was founded to educate 70 poor scholars – hence the term ‘public school’.

Go fourth – by Nadine Dorries MP

On the Today programme this morning, Nick Robinson said I was wrong about Bercow only having three votes, he reckons he may know of a fourth.

I bet we will never know who it was ;-)

I just hoped that for once Westminster could have stopped playing party politics and thought about what was best for the people who had elected us.

We will all have to get on and hope that Labour was right. That this is the best thing for Parliament, reform and democracy. That Labour and the Liberal Democrats knew best.

Nadine Dorries MP writes for the Mail on Sunday

I have an article in The Mail On Sunday outlining the reasons why I do not believe that John Bercow should be Speaker. When I was asked to write this, I consulted colleagues within the party, from the top to the bottom. Some who have sadly decided to walk away and others who are charging to push reform from the front. I deliberately sought opinion from those held in the highest regard, even today. Every single colleague, without exception both urged and encouraged me to meet the request, indeed, even gave me more information than I could incorporate into an article.

http://www.mailonsunday.co.uk/debate/article-1194464/NADINE-DORRIES-Bercow-oily-opportunist-lacking-loyalty-courage–I-speak-Tory.html

My conscience is clear – this is just a witch hunt – by Brian Binley MP

Happily, I have never lived in a totalitarian state. But this week I was given an insight into what it must have been like in the dark days of East European Communism to receive the infamous knock on the door from those delightful individuals who once did the dirty work of the Stasi and the KGB.

In my case, it came in the form of an email from the Daily Telegraph, informing me that I had “questions to answer” about my living arrangements in London in the three years after I was elected to Parliament in 2005.

My conscience was perfectly clear, and after reading the “accusations”, I knew there was nothing for which I had to answer and duly contacted the reporter to explain the situation.

But frankly, I might not have bothered. Sadly, such is now the Telegraph’s thirst and hunger for making mischief since obtaining the records of MPs’ expenses, that it has long since abandoned the idea of fair and honest reporting.

Of course, some MPs have deservedly been exposed for the misuse of public funds, be it claiming for non-existent mortgages, “flipping” between homes, or claiming a fiver for a wreath they bought for Remembrance Sunday.

But now the newspaper has turned it into a McCarthyite witch-hunt for the sake of a circulation increase. It is doing the reputation of British journalism a lot of damage.

Anyway, I phoned the reporter, and began to explain the situation, but it did not take me more than a few seconds to realise that she had no intention of engaging in a fair and proper conversation. She – or rather the Telegraph’s newsdesk – had already decided that they were going to run a story about me and whatever I said was not going to change that. Her attitude was aggressive and sometimes downright rude, and it left a sour taste once I put the phone down.

I then waited with baited breath for Wednesday’s Telegraph to come out, and when it finally did, I was stunned.

Stunned that my story had made its front-page lead; and stunned by the insidious implications, like referring to me as a millionaire. What on earth is the relevance of that, whether I am or not? It was a grubby way of insinuating that I was some hard-nosed capitalist out to make an easy buck at anyone’s expense, and I deeply resent that.

For the record, the Telegraph implied that I had broken the rules by renting a flat in London that was bought by a company I founded, and ran, before becoming an MP, and that, essentially, I was paying rent to myself. Bunkum.

My company did buy a property near Westminster, but it was a commercial decision agreed to by the board of directors. It was the property of BCC Marketing, and it was perfectly correct that I pay rent. And let me make two points here: if I didn’t pay rent to BCC Marketing, I would have had to pay rent to another landlord and the rent I paid was all inclusive (council tax, utility bills, and so on), and cheaper than I would have paid for similar accommodation I might have rented privately.

And the company was about £38,000 down on the deal over the three-year period. So much for implying that I had diverted taxpayers’ money for my own personal benefit.

I had cleared my living arrangements with the Fees Office at Parliament, and then the rules changed, so I had to move out, though I appealed against the changes before I did so.

All in all, it is a non-story. My Northampton South constituency executive have always been aware of the situation and were perfectly at ease as I featured in news bulletins during the day. I obliged with all interview requests, because I was angry at what the Telegraph had done, the way it had ignored my explanations, and the damage to my reputation.

Thankfully, the local media in Northampton have been extremely professional in their treatment of the story. So much so, that constituents who were initially angered after first reading, or hearing, the “allegations” about me, and said so, have since been in touch to apologise and admit that further investigation reveals nothing. Exactly.

And this is the point. The Telegraph is doing enormous damage in its hunger to exploit the expenses scandal to its own commercial profit. Of course it did some good initially, and of course the expenses system needs an overhaul. I have been saying that since I first arrived at Westminster.

But this has gone too far, and it is about time someone stood up to them. They have taken it upon themselves to become judge and jury, without any thought to seeking the truth before they publish.

It reminds me of Rudyard Kipling’s famous quote for Stanley Baldwin: “What the proprietorship of these papers is aiming at is power, and power without responsibility – the prerogative of the harlot throughout the ages.”

WE HAVE GOT TO DEAL WITH GOOD TORIES WHO VOTE UKIP! By Brain Binley

A number of my very good supporters have already told me that they voted UKIP in the Euro elections because they wanted to make a point.

I am now in a quandary.  Do we kick them out of the local party or do I keep quiet?  Well, I am obviously not keeping quiet. 

So what should the party do?  If its got any sense at all, it should recognise that occasionally good Tories, for their own good reasons, will vote in a way the party doesn’t like.

Tough!  The party better get used to it or create a policy which those good Tories can support. 

And don’t tell me the EU is a democratically based organisation.  It isn’t. 

We go through the whole farce of voting for a Parliament which has very limited powers. 

The Commission is the only institution that is empowered to initiate legislation and they are not directly elected. 

In fact, the only real power the Parliament has is to refuse to sign off the Budget.

No wonder good Tories want to change this situation. 

So I have some sympathy with those who voted UKIP for that reason and that is why I will continue to turn a blind eye.

UK could learn a lot from Sri Lanka – by Edward Leigh MP

I commend the fact that Sri Lanka has virtually wiped out one of the most vicious terrorist organisations the world has ever seen. The Tamil Tigers invented the suicide bomb attack and mercilessly and extensively use child soldiers in its terrorist and criminal activity. Britain and America – who between them spend almost as much on defence as the rest of the world put together – have so far failed to damage the leadership or operational capacity of Al-Qaeda. It is to be applauded then, that a country with a GDP per capita 25 times lower than Britain has managed to successfully destroy a terrorist movement and its leadership.

Sadly, no war has been won without casualties. All loss of life is a tragedy, and we are not alone in regretting the terrible, and sometimes unnecessary, deaths caused by the Sri Lankan government’s campaign. Of course, what contributed in no small part to these deaths was the Tamil Tigers’ policy of using civilian as human shields. However, it is important to consider the hundreds of thousands of civilians who have needlessly died in Iraq since the British and US invasion, and what has been achieved. Britain has not stopped a rogue state from posing a threat, and equally we have not damaged Al-Qaeda’s operational ability. Sri Lanka, in its short campaign, has totally destroyed a group that over the past thirty years has caused pain and misery to thousands of Sri Lankan citizens, and has the strength to assassinate foreign leaders.

This is a success story. Well done, Sri Lanka, for doing what Britain has found itself incapable of.

Crumbling historic buildings are a symptom of this lazy Government – by Edward Leigh MP

Victoria and Albert’s mausoleum at Frogmore is in a disgraceful state of repair, I have found. Worryingly, it is not alone – Buckingham Palace also has a huge repair backlog. There can be no excuse for allowing the final resting place of one of our longest serving monarchs to fall into such disrepair.

Allowing these civic building to fall into disrepair is typical of government’s lazy attitude to history and total ignorance of the concept of civic pride. What a tragedy that Frogmore is now according to English Heritage ‘at risk’ through meanness. It made me weep to see these beautiful biblical frescoes facing needless ruin. How wonderful the Victorians were in their buildings. How we have forgotten.

The Crown has the money to pay for it if it were allowed – the government has received £1.7 billion since 1999 from the crown’s hereditary assets – but it only passes on £15 million per year for maintenance, and keeps over three quarters of the total revenue. This has led to a scandalous 27% fall in maintenance spending since 2001. The most outrageous aspect of this whole affair is that the palaces themselves made almost £30 million in visitor admissions last year, but the Royal Collection Trust only passed on one pound in every twenty to pay for maintenance. Frogmore is a beautiful example of high Victorian Italianate religious art – left in trust for the nation. It could be restored and reopened for £3 million and to clear the whole occupied palace backlog would cost only £32 million. Why can’t the government allow some hereditary revenues to pay for the upkeep of these public buildings?