Britannia Radio

Today's ConservativeHome top features ToryDiary: "Voters support using public money to provide vaccines that will protect children and adults from polio or pneumonia or malaria: they are not Godfrey Blooms. But they are not convinced by all the claims of the aid charities, and are doubtless suspicious that the charities, like other organisations, have a vested interest to defend." Justine Greening is right about aid transparency Also on ToryDiary, for the fifth day running, we ask: Why can't we be told how many members the Conservative Party has? Henry Hill's Red White and Blue column: Tearing the veil from the 'YeSNP' Andrew Rosindell on Comment: "The time has come for Spain and it government to act like a twenty-first Century democracy and move on from this stupidity. If they refuse to do so, the Spanish Ambassador in London should be ordered to return home, and the Royal Navy must be dispatched to the waters around Gibraltar to protect British interests." Gibraltar - Cameron must be ready to send the navy in and Spain's ambassador packing Jeremy Hunt on Comment: Patient safety - nothing should matter more in our NHS Local Government: Whatever you might read in The Independent, in Cornwall the spare room subsidy cut is working The Deep End: "Ex-politicians are as entitled as anyone else to make a living – especially those quitting politics before retirement age. Some – like our own esteemed editor – go on to higher and better things. But, the American situation, in which getting on for half of all legislators turn into lobbyists, is deeply problematic." Washington has fallen to the political undead – Westminster must not be next Today's ConservativeHome newslinks Greening: Charities must embrace transparency "It is important that those charities show their volunteers, their subscribers and their staff that they are paying fair rewards and are good value for money. Smaller charities, who are often doing great work on a shoestring, can find it hard to compete for staff and donations with the bigger players." - Daily Telegraph  Donors and volunteers betrayed - Daily Telegraph Leader Charity boss claims right wingers hate those who help the poor - Daily Telegraph >Today: ToryDiary - Justine Greening is right about aid transparency Jail negligent doctors and nurses, says NHS report "Prof Berwick said changing the culture of the NHS would ‘trump’ any new rules and strategies, and he stressed that accidental errors by staff would not be subject to criminal prosecution under the new system. But organisations that mislead regulators or hide evidence would face criminal sanctions along with staff who wilfully mistreat or neglect patients causing serious harm or death. He said: ‘Where there is wilful or reckless neglect of patients there needs to be consequences.’ But it would affect ‘a very small number of cases’." - Daily Mail  NHS phone line cost more than seeing a doctor - The Times (£)  >Today: Jeremy Hunt on Comment - Patient safety - nothing should matter more in our NHS Good news on top of good news for the Chancellor "A stream of good news for the economy yesterday gave hope that Britain is finally emerging from the downturn. Figures showing that house prices had risen by almost £10,000 in a year were just one part of a wider economic recovery alongside improved orders for manufacturers and a revival on the high street. It also emerged that new car sales surged by 12.7 per cent in July compared to a year ago, with a total of 162,228 registrations. And the National Institute of Economic and Social Research said the economy grew by 0.7 per cent between May and July as the recovery picked up p ace." - Daily Mail  It's a big day for Mark Carney - FT  New two for one regulation cuts to become law - The Times (£)  Labour should stop banking on a downturn - Daily Mail Leader  Miliband's strategy is in pieces - FT  Wanted: Labour answer to Crosby - The Times (£)  Welsh Tories to bring back grammar schools "The Welsh Conservatives’ shift – revealed in the Daily Telegraph – will reopen the debate about allowing academic selection in the state school system elsewhere in the UK. Mr Cameron has antagonised many traditional Tories by opposing schools that select by academic ability, saying that the party’s education policy should focus on creating academies and free schools." - Daily Telegraph  We must have confidence to found new grammar schools - Angela Burns, Daily Telegraph  A boot in the backside for Scottish Conservatives - Alan Cochrane, Daily Telegraph  Gibraltar requests Royal Navy ships to see off Spain's "sabre-rattling" "Gibraltar's chief minister has asked Britain to send Royal Navy warships to the area in a bid to stop Spanish boat police making unauthorised incursions into the Rock's territorial waters. Fabian Picardo an Oxford-educated lawyer and leader of the Gibraltar Labour Party, has now asked David Cameron to send vessels 'larger than the small craft it has now.' He accused Madrid of 'sabre-rattling' and behaving like North Korea after Spanish foreign minister Jose Garcia-Margallo's suggested introducing a levy on people crossing the border between Gibraltar and Spain." - Daily Mail  No, replies Hague - The Sun (£)  Ambassador makes formal complaint to Madrid - FT >Today: Andrew Rosindell on Comment - Gibraltar - Cameron must be ready to send the navy in and Spain's ambassador packing >Yesterday: WATCH - Spain ramps up the pressure on Gibraltar A nation reels as Chuka Umunna says one thing and does another "Labour rising star Chuka Umunna was accused of hypocrisy last night for accepting a £20,000 donation from a gambling tycoon after publicly demanding cuts in the number of betting shops. Tories said the shadow  business secretary was guilty of double standards for accepting the money from Neil Goulden. Mr Goulden is chairman of the Association of British Bookmakers, the UK trade body and lobbying organisation for the industry." - Daily Mail Lib Dems want to ban petrol and diesel cars - The Times (£)  >Sunday: LeftWatch - Chuka Umunna, "the unions' representative in Parliament", hits choppy waters Fracking could take place in 13 cabinet ministers' seats "Companies involved in shale gas drilling have exploration licences in areas represented by Chancellor George Osborne, a vocal supporter of the technology, and Liberal Democrat Energy Secretary Ed Davey.  Education Secretary Michael Gove, Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt and Cabinet Office minister Francis Maude are among those whose constituencies are in a shale belt that stretches across southern England from Dorset to Kent." - Daily Mail   Stop insulting stay at home mums, George "This week’s news that Mr Osborne intends to reward families in which both parents work with handouts of up to £1,200 for each child — even if the parents bring home as much as £300,000 between them — is further evidence that the Government regards motherhood as a second-rate occupation. A cop-out. Not a job at all. So scant is the Coalition’s regard for stay-at-home mums that they have assaulted us on every front.  This week’s announcement is just one of a series of initiatives designed, it seems, to devalue the role of mothers who decide that their children will fare better if they are raised at home." -Laura Perrins, Daily Mail  >Yesterday: ToryDiary - Osborne's pro-marriage move is part of the Cameron charm offensive Michael Howard spearheads Somalia's new oil industry "Lord Howard, who joined newly formed company Soma Oil and Gas as non-executive chairman only three months ago, signed the deal in Mogadishu, the shelled-out capital of Somalia where al-Qaeda-linked jihadists mount regular suicide bomb attacks, during his first visit there on Tuesday. Interest in oil and gas exploration along the east African coast has surged after commercial quantities of oil were discovered in Kenya and Uganda along with gas in Tanzania and Mozambique further south sending many wildcat explorers into high-risk nearby prospective areas including Somalia." - FT  Specialist judges for child abuse trials "Child victims of sexual abuse will receive greater protection in criminal trials, with the introduction of a hand-picked panel of specialist judges to try their cases. The move, to be announced today by the Lord Chief Justice, is a response to growing concerns about the treatment of young witnesses under cross-examination, particularly during lengthy trials featuring multiple defendants." - The Times (£)  We still don't understand the riots "It is possible to develop a theory — that the riots weren’t meaningless criminality, but that they nevertheless represented a moral breakdown and that the despicable behaviour may be explained by a desire to assert power but that this didn’t begin to justify it. Yet this is only a theory and leaves much that we don’t know. Was this, for instance, a moral breakdown just in certain communities and groups, or something broader? Is Britain broken or just a part of Britain? I want to know, we need to know, we do not know." - Daniel Finkelstein, The Times (£)  >Monday: ToryDiary - Two years after the riots: The Government, not David Lammy, are learning the lessons UKIP MEP in "bongo bongo land" outburst "A senior UKIP politician was recorded telling activists that Britain should not be sending aid to ‘bongo bongo land’. Godfrey Bloom, a UKIP member of the European Parliament, made the comments at a meeting of supporters last month. He suggested foreigners used aid to ‘buy Ray-Ban sunglasses’ and ‘apartments in Paris’." -Daily Mail   >Monday: ToryDiary - UKIP's people are less flawed than its policies News in brief Andrew Alexander attacks Crosby and Lord Finkelstein -Daily Mail  Apologise to Peter Cruddas, Mr Cameron - Ann Widdecombe, Daily Express  Backbenchers unhappy with PM's Euro envoy choice - The Independent  Yesterday on ConservativeHome ToryDiary: Who on earth are British Influence trying to influence? Nick de Bois MP on Comment: "That our childcare plans have seemingly angered the stay at home parent, is regrettable but inevitable if policies do not support a clear, robustly-argued vision, namely that Conservatives believe in family and will support family."Without a strong family policy and message, even the best policy initiatives will flounder Brian Monteith on Comment: "Who would have expected a Conservative-led government to take Labour’s public health regulations that restricted the availability or consumption of tobacco and the campaigns that demonised smokers – and seek to make them even more punitive?" Will the persecution of smokers ever stop under Conservatives? Local Government: Doncaster Council tops the league for zero hours contracts Local Government: DEFRA spends £85,000 pushing for Council Tax rises WATCH: Hunt - Punish NHS staff neglect , don't punish mistakes WATCH: Spain ramps up the pressure on Gibraltar WATCH: Foreign Office Minister Alistair Burt - why it's crucial to help Syria WATCH: The Australian Liberals' attack ad: "Kevin Rudd is all talk"