Telegraph changes tune...

Just as I was getting bored with Westminster politics – what with it being a while now since the hung Parliament, first coalition in decades, Miliband brothers’ psychodrama, biggest ever cuts thing – Alan Johnson livens things up.

Everyone will have noticed the various lines around in the papers this morning, the difference in what is alleged in the Mail and what was alleged in the Telegraph, along the lines of the Guido bit from last night, is stark.

The thing is, the Mail story seems to be stood up by the fact that Scotland Yard has launched disciplinary proceedings against Paul Rice, Johnson’s bodyguard when he was Home Secretary.

And yet the Telegraph’s print piece doesn’t seem to name any other sources for its story except Guido. It does say Labour insiders told the paper Johnson’s marriage was on the rocks, but that does not stand up the overall line.

Now we see on the Telegraph website that they have changed their story to one more along the lines of the Mail’s piece.

Interesting to see if the Telegraph is challenged over its original print story and is forced to rely on Guido to come to the rescue with its sources – dead tree and digital stand together.

Labour squeaks on tuition fees...

Students should take note of the nuance in the motion Labour has tabled on tuition fees for the Opposition Day Debate today.

Far from showing the kind of brick-wall resistance to Government proposals student leaders want, Miliband’s mealy worded motion indicates nervousness over the issue.

It doesn’t call for tuition fees to be scrapped or lowered, but calls for the Government to “publish a White Paper…before asking the House to vote”.

It makes no mention of students from poor backgrounds being able to afford university, but instead “is concerned that major questions about how the Government’s market in higher education is intended to work remain unanswered”. Powerful stuff.

Compare that to the far more stirring motion tabled by Plaid’s Jonathan Edwards, supported by the Green Party’s Caroline Lucas, which talks about education “being a right, not a privilege” and you see just how carefully Miliband is stepping on tuition fees.

Firstly this highlights the problem that students face on this issue – they don’t, and have not had for a long time, any solid support from any major political party over fees.

Labour instigated the Browne Review and even the Lib Dems had resigned themselves to reversing their pledge on fees because it’s simply unaffordable.

If students want to make any headway they need to address affordability, not simply complain about who has ‘betrayed’ them politically.

But Labour’s motion also reflects the difficulty the shadow cabinet is having on agreeing its approach to tuition fees. Until they do the Coalition will continue to get an easier ride than it should on the issue.

Labour needs to land more punches

There seemed to be little bile towards the Government over defence cuts yesterday considering it committed to slashing 25,000 civilian and 17,000 military personnel.

In part it might be because people don’t have enough time to think about it before they are being bombarded with another round of broader cuts today. It may even be simply because everyone accepts the cuts need to happen.

But it’s also because Labour failed to land any punches on the Coalition in the House of Commons during the statement and debate yesterday.

Miliband’s speech hardly registered in the post debate/statement commentary neither he nor any MP really made the case for slower cuts – where was the “credible alternative” that was promised.

I spoke to Labour MPs who said there hadn’t been any organisation of the party through the whips for either yesterday or today’s much more demanding event. There just hadn’t been enough time since the shadow government was put in place, they said.

The opposition’s befuddlement seemed to be symbolised when Eurosceptic Tory MP Edward Leigh stood up and encouraged the Government to work more closely with the French.

If Labour can’t attack the Tories on their Euroscepticism, then on what can they?

The failure to really score yesterday means Johnson must punch chunks out of Osborne today if the opposition wants to have any sort of impact on the debate. Do we think he’s ready?

Anti-climax at Treasury questions...

What a bore Johnson and Osborne were in the House today – not a patch on the scrap between Michael Gove and Andy Burnham yesterday, (see below).

I suppose Johnson didn’t want to get too involved in a ruckus which showed up his lack of detailed knowledge.

And it would have been rather base of Osborne to pound a weaker opponent for it on his first day, may as well stick to policy and seem the bigger man.

Either way, I hope Johnson finds his fight soon because a good face off between the two has an awful lot of potential.

Johnson put down

Notts MP Anna Soubry was lashed down by Alan Johnson in the Commons last night.

After she’d made an intervention which the former Home Secretary thought had gone on too long, Johnson said: “That went on a bit.”

Then when she tried to intervene again he simply said: “I will not give way again. It was tedious last time, and it would be tedious again.”

Ouch. Johnson always seemed like such a gentleman in Government, but he seems to have grown some thorns in opposition.

DNA drivel...

It took me a while to work out what this Guardian piece about Government plans for the DNA database was getting at.

That usually means the hack has approached the story from an obscure angle – one that wouldn’t naturally occur.

In a typically engaging Guardian intro it reads…

The Home Secretary Alan Johnson may sacrifice his controversial proposal for the police to store innocent people’s DNA for up to six years in order to get his crime and security bill on to the statute book before the general election.

Use of the word ‘sacrifice’ suggests Johnson is giving up something he really wanted in order to pass the rest of the bill.

Of course that is not the case. In fact currently the police can hold innocent people’s DNA forever and that is the way they, and the Government like it.

Johnson was forced to introduce plans to limit the period police can hold innocent people’s DNA to six years because the European Court said the current situation breached human rights.

So from Johnson’s point of view he is not sacrificing anything. He wants to delay bringing in a limit, because he believes innocent people’s DNA should be kept on the database. The top line should be…

Alan Johnson is planning to defy European law by allowing police to continue indefinitely holding innocent people’s DNA on the UK’s national database.

Or if the Guardian hack wanted something more wordy and cerebral sounding (you know how they are)…

Alan Johnson will delay plans to limit the time that the police can hold innocent people’s DNA on the UK’s national database – leaving it in contravention of European law.

People that disagree with the DNA database are crims...

This new campaign video shown at Home Secretary Alan Johnson’s press conference on crime yesterday left me livid.

It actually seems to suggest that only criminals would disagree with the DNA database – the one that holds data on 850,000 innocent people.

“Do we honestly need a whole database just so the police can see if someone’s dandruff matches their cigarette butt,” says the thief in the video, as if it were the best argument that opponents of the database have come up with.

It certainly was not the argument that convinced the European Court of Human Rights to rule that the kind of DNA database the Government was creating was "a disproportionate interference" in people's lives and that it couldn't be "regarded as necessary in a democratic society”.

Civil liberties drip away

Alan Johnson will finally announce the Government’s proposals for keeping details of innocent people on the DNA database today in a written statement.

Given the contentious nature of the database you’d think they’d give people a chance to debate it in the House.

But on this issue they’ve not been shy about squeezing things through on the quiet where possible.

As expected Johnson will say that the Government wants to retain the details of innocent people on the database for up to six years.

It’s a course of action that goes against the spirit, if not the word, of a European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruling last year.

At the time when the Home Office was formulating its response to the ECHR Home Office Minister Vernon Coaker said the ruling did not strictly forbid the retention of those who had not been convicted of crimes.

Possibly not, it did however say:

“…the retention at issue constitutes a disproportionate interference with the applicants' right to respect for private life and cannot be regarded as necessary in a democratic society.”

The row rolls on

John Spellar MP has "weighed in" to the row over the scientists that have quit as Government advisers.

He says on his website:

“Alan Johnson is right and there is an important democratic principle at stake. Advisers and officials can give their views and ignore public opinion, but Ministers and MPs are answerable to the voters. Outside advice is useful, but ultimately we have to answer to the public and I think the public are clear in their opposition to a free for all on drugs. If someone has a different view they should put themselves up for election.”

If it is Spellar’s view that people with opinions varying from Government line should “put themselves up for election” then why bother having advisers at all?

What people are taking away from this, and what the Government is doing little to disprove, is that ministers only appoint advisers so they can appear to make decisions based on expert advice, when actually they are making them based on something else.

What is that something else? Spellar tells us when he makes the rather clumsy admission that “ministers are answerable to the voters”. In other words, it is not wise in an electoral sense to go against the public mood on an issue as volatile as this.

I’m not an advocate of some of the things these advisors have said about drugs, but you can’t simply ignore the fact that they are saying them.

Even worse, Spellar seeks to discredit them by misrepresenting their views. He implies these former Government expert advisers are calling for a "free for all on drugs". Childish hyperbole.

The Government has to face up to these people’s views if they have been appointed to give them.

They would be much wiser to tackle them in an open debate rather than throwing toys out of the pram like Alan Johnson did on Sky yesterday.

More backwards decision making at the Home Office

Just a few days ago this blog highlighted the backwards decision making at the Home Office relating to the national DNA database.

Ministers have decided they want to keep innocent people’s DNA on the database and are searching for evidence to back their stance.

It’s a dangerous approach to governance, rather than the more sensible process of conducting an investigation and basing policy ideas on the evidence that comes out.

One reader, Gareth, aptly named what the Government is doing as “policy based evidence making”.

Now the Home Office is guilty of doing the same again on the issue of drugs.

Two scientists have quit as Government advisers because they claim ministers are disregarding advice and asking them simply to rubber stamp drug enforcement policy.

“You can’t have a chief advisor …campaigning against Government decisions,” said Home Secretary Alan Johnson after axing Prof David Nutt, who said that LSD and ecstasy were less harmful than tobacco and alcohol.

Unfortunately, you can have a bloody-minded Government who doesn’t take any notice of the advice given to it.

Parcel Force

Imagine your postie walking up the garden path and instead of popping letters through the slot, booting the door down, stomping in and walking off with your flat screen TV.

“Sorry mate, but the records show you handed in a package for delivery without the right postage on.”

David Blunket brought in the Proceeds of Crime Act to claw back the luxuries of high ranking crime barons. It gives police the right to search peoples homes, seize their cash, freeze their bank accounts and confiscate their stuff.

But now The Times is reporting Alan Johnson wants to extend the act to a whole range of public organisations.

Councils might use it to get unpaid tax, Transport for London to get fare dodgers and Royal Mail – yes the same Royal Mail that can’t decide why it’s own workforce is on strike - will be able to use it for god knows what.

The Government lost support when people found out they had put thousands of innocent people’s DNA on the national database.

They lost support when they tried to push through laws that would let them lock people up for weeks without trial.

They lost support when we found out anti terrorism powers had been given to councils so they could make sure we put the bins out on the right day.

So what do they think is going to happen over this?

The five hundred to one-ers

Forget about the Miliband brothers, or the tussle between Johnson and Harman – I want to see Esther Rantzen and Joanna Lumley slog it out for the Labour leadership.

The pair of fifty-somethings’ pin-up girls (I bet you like Lumley don’t you OldRightie) are among an elite group of outsiders who are at 500/1 to be the next leader.

They are joined by spin-Dr Alastair Campbell, tax dodger Kitty Ussher, Broxtowe MP Nick Palmer and Blair, that’s Cherie not Tony.

Just on a side note – imagine one Blair as Prime Minister and the other as President of Europe.

Johnson prepares for leadership bid

Lobbydog has spoken to a Labour back-bencher who said Alan Johnson is definitely, seriously considering standing for the Labour leadership.

He'll finalise his decision this weekend at home and we may find out one way or another on Monday.

The signal that the leadership challenge is on will be a rejection of a promotion in the reshuffle.

None of the whispers going round say a leadership move is dependent on whether Labour performs better than expected in the elections.

Even within Labour circles the vote is considered a forgone conclusion.

Keep calm and carry on, keep calm and carry on, keep calm and carry on, keep calm...

Mrs Lobbydog had been promised Gordon Brown would play no part in our bank-holiday weekend.

She gave way after I explained my fingers might burst had I not the chance to post something on his difficulties – it’ll have to be quick though, so I’ll sum it up.

The PM apparently has this iconic World War II poster – designed to prevent panic in the event of Nazi invasion – somewhere in Number 10.

I've a mental image of him standing in front of it every morning and reciting its message, always saying it one more time than he did yesterday.

Cruddas on the up

Mike Smithson over at Political Betting is looking at how emailgate might alter a Labour leadership contest.

Lobbydog put his money on Alan Johnson a while back, but Smithson says he and Ed Balls may be the losers. Meanwhile Jon Cruddas is the one to watch.

Johnson: We won't do a Myners

Was Alan Johnson having a dig at Lord Myners earlier?

He was being questioned about whether the Chief Exec of Stafford Hospital would be given a "golden pay-off".

The hospital was recently found to have "appalling" standards by the Healthcare Commission, after which the Chief Exec Martin Yeates was suspended on full pay.

Johnson said: "We do not want to see – on these benches and on the benches opposite – any reward for failure creeping into the health service which has been so apparent in other sections of the economy."

Meeoow. It'll be an interesting debriefing after a good day for the DoH team in the Commons.

Mad Hattie

Having met her once and seen her perform in the Commons it boggles my mind that Harriet Harman could have a hope of leading Labour.

The papers today are stuffed with stories about her positioning herself to take over from Brown after an election defeat.

But as we saw with the Tories after they imploded in the 90s political parties do funny things in the wake of a beating.

Alan Johnson would be a sounder, certainly less irritating candidate.

George is important, honestly

The Conservatives must get over this need to emphasise George Osborne’s importance at every turn.

It sounds forced and has done since before Ken Clarke came back – plus it’s not doing the shadow chancellor any favours.

The most recent example was one of William Hague’s answers on Marr this morning.

The skeletal presenter had just asked Hague whether he was now deputy leader of the Conservative Party.

“I’m David Cameron’s deputy,” he said.

“We don’t use the title deputy leader. Technically they call me the senior member of the shadow cabinet.”

While Marr, myself and the rest of the country were wondering what the need for all this trifle was, Hague answered without anyone asking.

“And there is George Osborne – indispensible to everything David Cameron has done.”

The other political interview on Marr was Health Secretary Alan Johnson.

Downing Street officials were, earlier this week, encouraging other members of the cabinet to talk about the economy to take the strain off Brown.

They singled out Johnson and accused him of keeping a low profile. I’d say he probably has – not wanting to tie himself, and his ambitions, to the deck of a sinking ship.

Rebuffing accusations Johnson seemed to query how he could be keeping a low profile if he was on the Andrew Marr show.

The question is obviously whether he would have been on the Andrew Marr show had he not been accused of keeping a low profile.