Denzil Coulson

I was shocked - yet again - to hear that the Royal Bank of Scotland will pay out approximately £1.3billion in bonuses when the bank made losses of £3.6 billion during 2009 (read the BBC online report here)! The taxpayer owns 84% of RBS and I am very sure that most people like me are horrified that taxpayers are rewarding banks for failure!

Commenting on this RBS report, Liberal Democrat Shadow Scotland Secretary, Alistair Carmichael said:

“The idea of a bank which is still propped up by taxpayers paying out over a billion in bonuses is offensive. There should be no rewards for failure.

“With people across the country having to tighten their belts, bankers are living on another planet if they think they deserve millions in bonuses.

“RBS is effectively owned by the public. If Gordon Brown really believed in fairness, he would intervene to stop these bonuses going ahead.”

 From my own political experience, if there is one thing that Tories are good at, it is the political smear.

I could not help but wonder why the alleged bullying by Gordon Brown was a front page news story yesterday. Is it because key Tory political operators were ”guiding” journalists in the direction of National Bullying Helpline chief executive, Caroline Pratt, a willing accomplice, as Lord Mandelson claims? And why would a chief executive betray confidentiality and speak openly about bullying at No.10 Downing Street? The fact, at the time of writing this article, that four patrons of the National Bullying Helpline have resigned because of Mrs Pratt’s breaking confidentiality does suggest that this whole episode does have the odious smell of a political smear campaign. 

Even if there is no evidence of an orchestrated smear, it is very interesting that this story broke as the Tory lead in the polls was in freefall. If there is one thing I learnt in politics, it is better to “play the ball - not the man”. Attack Brown on his policies, not his character and it does appear that there is no real foundation to these “bullying” allegations as revealed in this report here.

It appears to me that the Tories “planted a political smear” as they have nothing really to say about how they would take the country in a clear political direction, which explains why Brown’s poll numbers are rising. People generally don’t like how Brown has managed the economy but they seem to trust Cameron even less with safeguarding economic recovery. 

I may be wrong about a Tory political smear. But am I really - considering all of the concerns I have expressed above?

As Tory Council Leader, Cllr John Kingsbury, gloated about Tory “achievements” in his budget speech in the Full Council meeting on Monday night, he played down how our Lib Dem group effectively rescued his Tory administration from serious financial trouble that would have had serious consequences for council services and the council tax burden for our residents.

Had our Lib Dem group not supported the Tories in acquiring ownership of the Wolsey Place Shopping Centre, they would have had a £1.5 million hole in their budget this year. By owning Wolsey Place outright, we voted to buy an asset that guarantees rental income of at least £1.5 million per year. This meant that the council tax rise burden on residents is not as high as it could have been. I seriously don’t think residents would have forgiven any political opposition if it allowed a council to cut services dramatically thereby inreasing the burden on council taxpayers as well to pay more.

I agree with Cllr John Kingsbury on one point only - “our investments have enabled us to keep Council Tax low at an affordable level” but I do not agree that services have been entirely protected as he claims. In my experience as ward councillor as I have mentioned a number of times on this blog, too many of our housing repairs and green maintenance services take too long to complete. This is a direct consequence of staff being overstretched because there are not enough council staff to do the jobs that need to be done.

Tory raiding of reserves in the “good times” to accelerate redundancies in 2007/08 left the council with no reserves to help the council finances in the bad times now. The Tories did not save reserves for a “rainy day” as John Kingsbury claimed in his speech. With the sharp fall in car parking income at the start of the recession, the Tory council was in serious trouble as there were no reserves to “cushion the fall”. Lib Dem support for the Wolsey Place acquisition rescued the Tory administration from serious financial trouble. John Kingsbury should certainly give more credit to the Lib Dems where it is sorely due.

At full council tonight, Woking Tories voted against our Lib Dem council motion to sign up to the national 10:10 campaign to reduce carbon emissions “as close as possible to 10%” in 2010.

Their reason? They stated that Woking was doing enough to reduce carbon emissions. “How arrogant” cried Bryan Cross, one of our Lib Dem councillors lambasting the Tories for their failure to engage on this issue. As I stated in the Council chamber tonight, “if Woking is doing such a good job already on green issues, why not sign up to the campaign to go further?” I stated further that Woking loses its leadership on green issues by not signing up. If Eastleigh, who have even less carbon emissions than Woking can sign up, why can’t we?

It was when I heard Tory councillor, Tony Branigan, stating that Al Gore’s 2006 film, An Inconvenient Truth was “a pack of lies” and another Tory councillor expessing scepticism about global warming, that I realised that Woking Tories are complacent at best on the urgency of tackling climate change and filled with climate change denialism at worst.

Unless we tackle climate change seriously, the economic and social costs locally, nationally and internationally will be greater under this Tory complacency on green policy.

It also shows that David Cameron’s 2007 election slogan of Vote Blue, Go Green was merely a gimmick as the Tory commitment lacks real substance.

On Tuesday, I and my fellow councillors took part in the annual Woking Shopmobility Pancake Race. What surprised me and my team is how well we did!

Not only did we win our heat against the Business Link team but we also won our semi-final race against Cycle Woking! It all came down to the final against Wolsey Place and St John the Baptist school team. Unfortunately youth in the SJB team counted against our best efforts!

Still managing to achieve the “Silver Medal” I think is quite an achievement!  See our winning aproned team in the photo above.

 Figures released today by the Liberal Democrats have revealed that the NHS is facing a £63bn bill for PFI hospitals which are only worth £11bn. The figures also reveal that:

• The first payments for hospitals PFIs began in 1999 and the NHS still owes £58bn on 106 PFI contracts over the next three decades.
• The NHS will have to pay back £7.3bn in PFI payments over the next Parliament alone (2010 - 2015)
• The most expensive PFI contract was for Wythenshawe Hospital where the NHS will pay back 16 times the original capital value.

 Commenting, Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary, Norman Lamb MP, said:

“These figures reveal the disastrous reality of Labour’s stewardship of the NHS.

“We’re entering into one of the most difficult financial periods in the NHS’s history and this “Government’s legacy will be a mountain of debt. Despite the enormous amounts of money we owe for these hospitals, many of them will never end up in public ownership. Hospitals all over the country are mortgaged to the hilt and there are serious concerns that these repayments will lead to cuts in vital services.

“We need a new approach to public services in this country. By setting up an infrastructure bank the Liberal Democrats will ensure that key projects get access to the funding they need to revitalise our economy.

“The Liberal Democrats will change the way the NHS works so that money goes further and patients come first.”

I couldn’t agree more.

This morning our Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Huhne MP, commented that “the biggest hole in the student visa system is caused by the Tory and Labour abolition of exit checks”, which means we do not know if someone has left once their visa runs out.

So - if you are looking for someone to blame for the mismanagement of immigration, look no further than the Labour Government and the Tory Government before them. We need to restore immediate control of our borders.

People are often telling me how they feel unsafe.  

Expensive ID cards aren’t going to change that, but an extra officer walking down our streets or more police on a Friday night will. 

At this time of enormous budget deficit, much spending will need to be cut. But in key areas of public policy where more investment is needed, the money must be found.

That is why we have decided to prioritise a limited commitment to increasing police numbers by 3,000 over the course of a Parliament. We believe this is vital if we are to build a strong, fair and secure society as we emerge from recession. 

Under Labour, we have seen police numbers drop in 26 out of 43 police authorities nationwide since 2005.

Unlike Labour, the Liberal Democrats are committed to more police, and this is the only way to create safer streets.

 Gordon’s Brown announcement that he is in favour of the Alternative Vote system for electing MPs will not break the logjam of two-party domination by Labour and the Conservatives. The system is used in London to elect the Mayor. Who exactly benefitted from this? Boris Johnson (Conservative) and Ken Livingstone (Labour). It does not help the smaller parties to increase their representation.

This is how Alternative voting works. Under Gordon Brown’s proposals, you select your MP by having two votes - one for your first choice and one for your second choice for MP. It still means that only a single MP can represent you in a constituency. If after all the first choice votes are counted and no-one is elected with at least 50% of the vote, then the top two candidates go forward to a second round of counting. All the second choice votes of all candidates who came third and below in the first round are added to the top two candidates until one of them passes the 50% threshold. Inevitably, it will mean that mostly Labour and Tory candidates will prevail in the second round in most seats thus perpetuating the two-party logjam.

Neither am I in favour of pure proportional representation as it exists in South Africa where I stood as a parliamentary candidate at No.61 on the Democratic Party’s National List in 1994. Here MPs are at the mercy of the party bosses who select them and there is no constituency link to speak of with voters. Many good MPs have lost their jobs in South Africa for defying the party line including ex-ANC MP, Andrew Feinstein for first exposing the arms scandal in 2001. 

Our party’s policy of having a single-transferable vote system in multi-member constituencies is by far the better choice. Under this system, you could have as many as 3 MPs from different parties representing you in a single constituency. Not only is the constituency link maintained but there is a much better representation of voter choice in Westminster.

 The Pupil Premium policy is one of the most innovative parts of our Lib Dem education policy. I am proud to have voted for it at our Spring Conference in Harrogate last year. As a primary school teacher myself, who has taught in both the state and private sector, I cannot overemphasise the importance of smaller class sizes in helping to boost individual pupil performance.

Our party plans to spend an extra £2.5 billion on schools to achieve our goal of smaller class sizes. The money will be targetted at schools taking on children who need more help, but will benefit every child in every school. The cash can be used to cut class sizes and provide one-to-one tuition or catch-up classes, ensuring every child gets the individual attention they need. An average primary school could cut class sizes to 20. An average secondary school could see classes of just 16.

Take an average primary school of just over 200 pupils. With an average number of children eligible for free school meals, this school could see an extra £90 000 in its budget. That would be enough to cut class sizes from 27 to 20. Just imagine what a difference that would make - ensuring that every child gets the individual attention they need to thrive.

Take an average secondary school with a roll of 1,000 pupils. It could expect around £400,000 more every year than it gets now, which would have an enormous impact. They could recruit a dozen extra teachers and cut classes to 16. Or they could pay for catch-up classes for 160 pupils, making sure no-one who struggles gets left behind.

This policy costs £2.5 billion, and will be introduced in the second year of the Parliament after our jobs stimulus package, paid for from savings in government such as our proposed reforms to tax credits (which will save £1.5 billion) and administrative savings in the Department for Education and quangos (which save an additional £1 billion).

Unlike the Tories who promise everyone an “elitist” education with qualified teachers without the detailed financial plans to pay for it, the Lib Dems have the proposed savings highlighted to pay for smaller class sizes.