Sunday, 21 April 2013

Today's Top ConservativeHome Features
Today's ConservativeHome newslinks
Miliband poised to reject Government spending plans - opening up a 1992-type "Labour's Double Whammy" election in 2015...
Miliband Red Ed“Miliband…wants to run a big Election campaign, making the case for radical economic change. He won’t be able to do that if he spends months refusing to say whether he will accept Osborne’s spending numbers.  If Miliband does go down this route, he’ll be in for a fight. Both Coalition parties believe, with some justification, that the public still doesn’t trust Labour not to spend too much. One senior Downing Street figure declares that ‘the screw is going to come down on them hard’. They will attack Labour for w anting to repeat Brown’s mistakes.” James Forsyth, Mail on Sunday
  • Labour lead over Tories cut to six points, but UKIP surges -Observer
  • Labour's mid-term wobble - Observer
  • Labour MPs thump Miliband over "naive" secret meeting with Galloway - Mail on Sunday
  • Labour plans student-style 'salary loans' for the unemployed -Observer
  • One nation under Ed – but what would he actually do? - Rafael Behr, Observer
  • Dave and Ed, the scaredy-cats avoiding a real fight - Adam Boulton,Sunday Times (£)
...But, meanwhile, "Threat of triple-dip recession puts more strain on Osborne"
“Economists say growth in the first quarter will have been 0.1% at best. There are fears, however, that last month’s cold weather and falling construction output might actually have caused the economy to contract. Gross domestic product shrank by 0.3% in the final three months of last year. Britain first went into recession in early 2008, coming out in 2009. There was a second recession from late 2011 until mid-2012. A third recession — defined as another two quarters of falling GDP — would put more strain on the chancellor” – Sunday Times (£)
Cameron rages at Zac Goldsmith
Goldsmith & Cameron
"The Prime Minister vented his fury after being given no choice but to climb down over proposals aiming to make it easier to build home extensions without planning permission. ‘Who does that man think he’s accountable to?’ Mr Cameron raged when Mr Goldsmith went back on a pledge to Ministers and led a Tory revolt in the Commons." - Mail on Sunday
Euro-sceptic "Business for Britain" campaign to launch tomorrow - in anticipation of an In/Out referendum during the next Parliament
"Scores of companies are throwing their weight behind Business for Britain, a campaign group that is demanding a better deal on jobs, growth and other policy areas from Brussels. The list of individuals backing the campaign will be published tomorrow and will range from FTSE 100 directors to the owners of smaller businesses."- Sunday Times (£)
Matthew Elliott: Why we're launching Business for Britain
Screen shot 2013-04-21 at 08.52.46"Today we face a similar situation, with a small group of self-appointed business spokesmen making radically pro-EU statements, skewing the national debate. That’s why tomorrow a campaign will be launched called Business for Britain. The successor to Business for Sterling, it will bring together more than 500 people, from FTSE 100 directors to family-owned businesses that are the backbone of our economy, to articulate the demand that this government, or a future one, gets a better deal from the EU: for jobs, for growth, for Britai n." - Matthew Elliot, Sunday Times (£)
  • The debt-ridden EU stares bankruptcy in the face - Christopher Booker, Sunday Telegraph
Coalition set to lose a quarter of its seats in council elections as UKIP soar
"Analysis carried out by Colin Rallings and Michael Thrasher, both professors at Plymouth University, suggests that Labour will gain 350 council seats, while the Tories will lose 310 and the Liberal Democrats 130. The election experts predict the “most unpredictable local contests for years” due to the impact of UKIP, which is fielding almost as many candidates as the Lib Dems." - Sunday Times (£)
  • Main political parties baffled by the rise of UKIP - Andrew Rawnsley,Observer
Now badger-killing monster Owen Paterson is photographed brandishing two squirrel traps
Screen shot 2013-04-21 at 08.53.44"The dead animals’ heads are inside the devices, while their bodies and bushy tails hang limply below. ‘I’m not sure what was more shocking – the dead squirrels or the smile on Owen’s face,’ said one Conservative who has seen the picture. ‘If the animal rights mob saw it they would have a fit. Owen insisted that we look at the photo and then he said, “Look at this – these traps are the real deal. No squirrel is going to get out of that.” -Mail on Sunday
"But please, Mr Gove, Sir, children are dead beat by 3.30pm"
“I was just learning to come to terms with my disturbing love of many of Michael Gove’s education reforms — learning by rote, knowing times tables and so on — but now he’s gone and blown it by suggesting that school days should be longer and school holidays shorter. No, they shouldn’t. It would be a disaster. Children are knackered by 3.30pm, as any parent will attest” – India Knight, Sunday Times (£)
  • Anthony Seldon agrees with India Knight - Mail on Sunday
  • Villagers attack super-head over Gove plan to bring inner-city pupils to plush village - Mail on Sunday
Lord Ashcroft will give half his fortune to charity
Screen shot 2013-04-21 at 08.54.40“The billionaire and Tory peer Lord Ashcroft is to pledge at least half of his £1.2bn fortune to charity as he joins a philanthropic movement led by Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, America’s two richest men. The former Tory treasurer, who has given the party £10m but will not help to fund its general election campaign, will next month sign up to the Giving Pledge, a public commitment by billionaires to give away the majority of their wealth” – Sunday Times (£)
Boris calls for “Thatcherite zeal” to cut down on strikes
“London Mayor Boris Johnson has joined calls for the PM to ban strikes unless they are backed by 50 per cent of those entitled to vote. He told The Sun: ‘The idea that a strike can be called by a majority of those that vote, rather than a majority of all those balloted, is farcical. It often results in a strike backed by just one in 10 members, antagonising commuters and costing billions. I’d urge the Government to act with Thatcherite zeal and legislate against strikes supported by less than half of all union members.’” – Sun on Sunday
Paul Goodman: Thatcher's Legacy - Why Tories must win hearts and minds in Bolton
Screen shot 2013-04-21 at 09.00.57“There is a sense within the Tory tribe that their leader is at last trying to be the heir not to a Labour prime minister, but to the Conservative one whose funeral rites he helped to lead. Hence the claims that No 10 is examining schemes for wider share ownership – an echo of the popular capitalism of Lady Thatcher’s day…the swing seats which the Conservatives must win to gain David Cameron the majority that eluded him three years ago… are concentrated in urban and suburban areas in the Midlands and Nor th, where the public sector is comparatively large and social attitudes relatively conservative” -Sunday Telegraph
In the second set of extracts from his authorised biography of Margaret Thatcher, Charles Moore describes how Margaret Thatcher took on the men and won the Tory leadership
“It is possible that Mrs Thatcher was also ambitious enough to be dropping a hint, at a time when such things were considered a source of shame, that Heath was homosexual. Many at the time believed that he was. WF Deedes [former Tory minister, then editor of The Daily Telegraph] noted a private conversation with Mrs Thatcher in 1976: “M. seems convinced TH is a homosexual. (Women have more accurate instincts than we.) I said charitably: "an instinct sublimated in boats!’” -  Sunday Telegraph
  • Liam Fox will call for the Tories to follow Thatcher on eve of local elections - Sunday Telegraph
  • The Chancellor's grief at Lady Thatcher's funeral won't sway his critics, but many found it both genuine and moving - Jane Merrick,Independent on Sunday
  • Thatcher V BBC struggle finally laid to rest - Sunday Telegraph
  • Leaders need convictions and courage - Janet Daley, Sunday Telegraph
Charles Clover: our debt to Thatcher the scientist
Screen shot 2013-04-21 at 09.09.58“The left and the greens don’t like to admit that Thatcher did more than any other world leader to legitimise environmental concerns. The right now finds her espousal of the science of global warming embarrassing. The climate change deniers say she recanted that belief, while not being quite able to nail the evidence for it. Thatcher’s scientific training convinced her that the hole in the ozone layer was a serious man-made problem." – Sunday Times (£)
Stephen Hammond wants MPs to have a £40,000 pay rise
"Mr Hammond’s proposal would take a regular MP’s salary from around £65,000 to £105,000 — a 38 per cent hike — while his own salary would rocket to more than £130,000. The Transport Minister also insists their pay should rise by at least 2.5 per cent every year — while their gold-plated pensions are protected" - The Sun on Sunday
News in Brief

Posted by Britannia Radio at 15:09