Hacked Off Faces Backlash from Thousands of BloggersEffort to Exclude Small Enterprises from “Relevant Publisher”

Our Amendment to Protect Bloggers | BigBrotherWatch
Why Must the NHS Be Dragged Into Everything? | Damian Thompson
Pryce Daughters Complain to PCC | Roy Greenslade
Tell #HackedOff to Blog Off! | Samizdata
We Are Austerity Wimps | Jeremy Warner
US Nearly Shot Ahmadinejad | The Commentator
Anti-Semitism and the British Muslim Community | Mehdi Hasan
It Was George Osborne Who Leaked the Budget | Dan Hodges
Clegg Calls Time on Subsidised Booze | Telegraph
A Royal Charter For Corrupt Liars | James Delingpole
Meh to the Budget | Ben Brogan

THURSDAY, MARCH 21, 2013

Hacked Off Faces Backlash from Thousands of Bloggers
Effort to Exclude Small Enterprises from “Relevant Publisher”

Last night’s hasty launch of the Blog Off campaign for a free and unregulated blogosphere has seen over 2,400 people sign the petition telling Hugh Grant and Evan Harris where to put their regulations. Hacked Off are revising their hitherto arrogant stance and furiously back peddling this afternoon as the legislation they advocated has backfired after UK bloggers realised they would be pushed into costly and cumbersome regulatory organisations. Hugh Grant has just tweeted a link to a post on the Hacked Off website claiming that the proposals have not been endorsed by them:

“They have not been endorsed in any way by Hacked Off. On the contrary, at the weekend we urged the three parties not to approve them finally there and then, but to leave time for them to be improved. The parties agreed to this. For what it is worth, we believe the potential impact on bloggers and small publishers was unforeseen – an accident in the drafting – and we know of no reason why politicians might resist efforts to put things right.”

Frankly this is nonsense. If it were not for Hacked Off’s meddling there would be no danger of bloggers facing this vain attempt at regulation. Counter lobby Blog Off, backed by BigBrotherWatch, are urgently looking for a Peer willing to table an amendment by 3 p.m. tomorrow to protect independent bloggers. If you can help, email here.
Blog Off are looking to table an amendment that inserts into the Crime and Courts Bill a clause excluding from the definition of “revelant publisher” any enterprise that meets the definition of a small or medium sized enterprise as defined in Sections 382 and 465 Companies Act 2006.
There is, to coin a phrase, less than 24 hours to save the independent blogosphere…

Guidogram Going Out Shortly

The Guidogram round-up of the week is going out shortly.
Thousands of Westminster insiders read the Guidogram, everyone from Downing Street insiders to Fleet Street never miss it. All your budget and press regulation reaction, plus tell Evan Harris and Hacked Off Hugh to Blog Off!
Join the conspiracy and become a subscriber to the Guidogram, free, to keep in the loop. You’re either in front of Guido, or behind…

WATCH: Labour Voter Explains Party’s Benefits Stance

Labour is “on your side”.

Budget Doesn’t Unravel, Budget Spin Does

24 hours later and Osborne’s budget has yet to unravel, though both sides are having quite a set-to over the Help to Buy mortgage scheme. This morning Labour spinners got very excited by Osborne’s refusal to deny that the scheme would help wealthy homeowners to buy second homes, having the cheek to call it the“spare home subsidy”.
Both Osborne and Cable again did not deny it in the House at lunchtime. A Tory spokesman insists to Guido: “this is a very technical area. We have said that we are going to consult in order to get this right, instead of rushing into decisions or knee jerk reactions”. Yet Housing minister Mark Prisk seems to have made his mind up, telling Wato second homes would not be included.
Labour aren’t having a much better time of it: yesterday two-faced Chuka Umunna told Radio 4 he liked the policy, today he’s against it. If it turns out the spare home subsidy doesn’t exist and the policy is as he thought yesterday, that leaves him in a rather awkward position…

BBC Weather Hacked

Almost in the HMV league…
UPDATE: The BBC are working with Twitter to regain control of the account.

Tale of Two Austerities

In the Commons right now Ed Balls is giving George Osborne a kicking over his “failed austerity” programme. How does it compare with other austerity programmes?
Since the credit crisis Ireland has cut government spending by 19% in cash terms.

Over the same period Britain has increased government spending by 3% in cash terms.
What austerity?

PoliticsHome Hit By Slave Intern Complaints
Intern Aware: “Unpaid Interns Help Write WaughRoomMemo”

The law is clear: if a job demands set hours or has a specific job description you may be deemed to be a ‘worker’ and be covered by National Minimum Wage legislation. PoliticsHome’s new unpaid slave internship certainly seems to fulfil that criteria, not only must the successful candidate be a capable writer, good deadline keeper and with an eye for breaking news, he or she “also must be flexible on working hours which will include some early mornings and weekends”.Intern Aware have revealed that disgruntled interns are claiming they are required to get up in the early hours to help write the Waugh Room Memo:

“We have received complaints that PoliticsHome interns are expected to do a 4 a.m. shift from home, a weekend shift, and early shifts in the office. Ex-interns tell us that they have to get in before dawn to gather content for Paul Waugh’s daily “Waugh Room” memo. PoliticsHome appear to be building its multi-million pound business by asking young people to work for free. It should stop cheating the system and pay young journalists a wage that they can afford to live on. This will help it to attract the best talent – and may avoid a costly visit to an employment tribunal.”

It’s Waugh!
UPDATE:

New Statesman: No Now But Not Never

What a difference a week makes. Last week they were comparing Merkel to Hitler, now theStaggers could not be any more on the fence if they tried:

“The New Statesman, which has an ever-growing website and digital presence, currently does not see its interests served by regulation designed to suit politicians, nor by a revanche regime cooked up for the comfort of newspaper barons. Until a better plan is put forward we reserve our right to continue publishing “news-related material” in print and online without deference to either of those parties.”

So that’s a no, but not on principle of being  regulated. They do want to be regulated, they just want better regulation than is on offer. As ever, on their own…

Clegg Says Scrap MPs’ Booze Subsidy

Clegg initially tried to deny the existence of the Commons booze subsidy on LBC this morning, but when presented with the facts by Nick Ferrari the Deputy PM gave in: “I haven’t seen the prices, but my knee jerk reaction is why should MPs be subsidised for drinking in the House of Commons?”
The £5.8 million subsidy would be a good place to begin, but it is also worth pointing out that since parliament’s watering holes are inside a Royal Palace, many of the bars pay no rent or business rates whatsoever. Research by the ASI calculates that they are saving £1.4 million-a-year as a result. All at the taxpayer’s expense…

Here are some of the other posts on the issue Guido has put out over the years:

• Hungry for Taxes: MPs Lunch Subsidy Now £8,823 Per Annum
• Hungry For Taxes: Lunchtime Robbery
• Each MPs’ Lunch Subsidy Costs Six Hospital Meals
• Food in Parliament is Twice as Expensive for Public as MPs
• Hungry for Taxes: Compare and Contrast Today’s Menus
• Wives, Girlfriends, Predecessors
• Speaker Ignores Parliament Booze Subsidy
• Sun Backs Guido’s Subsidy Campaign
• Parliament’s I-rasher-nal Breakfast Prices

Telegraph Bungle Redundancy Day

Uproar in Victoria in the run up to today’s mass redundancy announcements. Staff have been particularly put out by the eager camera crew drifting around the newsroom filming a slick info-mericial about the new “Digital First” plans before the eighty editorial staff getting the chop to fund it are even out of the door.
If these emails obtained by Media Guido are anything to go by, the sackings have been handled with all the tact of David Brent:

“Following the Townhall meetings on 12^th March and our letter of 11^th March, you will know that the Company is required to make a number of redundancies and it has been necessary to apply the selection criteria referred to in my letter of 12^th March. We would like to arrange an individual meeting with you to discuss the provisional selection for redundancy exercise. You may, if you wish, bring a colleague or trade union representative along with you to the meeting.”

Followed by:

“Please note that my previous email was sent to all those who last week received a letter saying that they were at risk of redundancy. It did not mean that you have been selected for redundancy. Only those who are provisionally selected for redundancy will be communicated with later this week and will receive an appointment within the timeslots advised on the previous email. Apologies for any confusion or distress caused by the last email.”

The cheery tone adopted last night has not helped:

Hi everyone,
Ahead of a couple of very difficult days I want to let you know that Laurie in Services has very kindly offered to help staff with removing their personal belongings from the building. If you are made redundant you can go to the post room and get a cardboard box which you can then fill with your belongings and leave at your desk. Services will then contact you to arrange delivery of your belongings to your home address. Please label all boxes with your name, address and phone number.

It’s going to be a long day. Staff at the soon to be merged Sunday Telegraph seem most worried.