Nick Clegg 'told Brown to quit as PM' - Lord Mandelson

news.bbc.co.uk comments:

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg told Gordon Brown he had to leave office as the price of any coalition deal with Labour, it has emerged.

The revelation, from former Business Secretary Lord Mandelson, comes in the Times' serialisation of his memoirs.

He says Mr Clegg told Mr Brown it was "not possible to secure the legitimacy of a coalition" unless he stood down as prime minister in "a dignified way".

The story has been confirmed by Mr Clegg's spokeswoman.

Lord Mandelson was with Mr Brown in the negotiations that took place in the days after the general election in May.

He describes a secret meeting at which the now deputy prime minister told the PM to his face he would have to go, if there was to be any hope of a Lib Dem-Labour coalition deal.

r Clegg is quoted as saying: "Please understand I have no personal animosity whatsoever... but it is not possible to secure the legitimacy of a coalition and win a referendum unless you move on in a dignified way."

Lord Mandelson says Mr Brown did not give a clear answer at the time, but soon afterwards left Downing Street to inform the Queen he was quitting.

A spokeswoman for the deputy PM told the BBC: "Nick Clegg did feel that given the general election result, it would be incomprehensible to the British people if Gordon Brown remained as prime minister and he did make that clear to him."

Lord Mandelson claims Mr Brown went as far as drawing up a proposed Lib-Lab cabinet featuring Mr Clegg, Vince Cable and Lord Ashdown.

But he says former prime minister Tony Blair also told his successor he could not be part of any coalition.

"Tony told him and me that the public would simply not accept Gordon remaining," he writes.

He adds that Mr Brown eventually accepted he would have to quit, but did not want it to look like he had been forced out.

Lord Mandelson quotes him as saying: "I have been humiliated enough."

'Egotistical factionalism'
Lord Mandelson's memoirs have already proved controversial.

Ahead of the publication of his book, The Third Man, the peer told the Times Mr Brown believed that the two of them, and Tony Blair, had "killed each other" with their internal feuding.

Lord Mandelson also claimed that allies of Mr Brown showed "unbridled contempt" for Mr Blair which was "very destructive".

Mr Brown's former aide, Charlie Whelan, hit back at the allegations, but Labour leadership hopeful Andy Burnham told the BBC on Sunday that infighting and plotting had damaged the party.

The former health secretary said he wanted to offer a "complete break" from "egotistical factionalism" at the top of Labour.

Elsewhere on Monday, Mr Clegg and Prime Minister David Cameron have given a show of unity by writing a joint newspaper article proclaiming their coalition is about shared principles of giving more power to people.

Posted by Joe Martin providing business services for small businesses and the self employed. Find me at joemartin.co.uk

Usain Bolt snubs London meeting over tax laws

Triple Olympic champion Usain Bolt has announced he will not compete at August's Aviva London Grand Prix because of Britain's tax laws.
The 100m and 200m world record holder may not now compete in the UK again until the 2012 Olympics.
New regulations mean the 23-year-old Jamaican could lose more money than he would earn from competing at the Crystal Palace Diamond League event.
"I am definitely not going to run [in London]," Bolt told a news conference.
Crystal Palace organisers had hoped to stage a three-way showdown between Bolt and his sprint rivals Asafa Powell and Tyson Gay.
Athletes competing in the UK are liable for a 50% tax rate on their appearance fee as well as a proportion of their total worldwide earnings - which for Bolt, who earns millions from endorsements, could be hugely costly.
HM Revenue & Customs won a case in 2006 brought by tennis star Andre Agassi. It successfully argued that as well as the prize money he accrued, a proportion of Agassi's worldwide sponsorship income was also earned during his time in the UK and was therefore taxable.
HMRC bases its tax charge on the number of UK events athletes compete in. For example, if Bolt were to take part in 10 meetings worldwide, with one in the UK, the HMRC could tax him on one-10th of his worldwide earnings.
The UK's tax laws have proved a handicap to the country's chances of hosting events. Uefa admitted in 2008 that Wembley missed out on the 2010 Champions League final for that very reason.
The Government has since agreed to waive the rule so London can host the 2011 final, and competitors in the 2012 Olympics are also exempt.
Golfer Sergio Garcia has admitted in the past that he limits his appearances in the UK because of tax laws.

This does seem crazy given the lost potential revenue not just from the athletes but from all the other revenue stream from those that could benefit!

What's your view?

Posted by Joe Martin providing business services for small businesses and the self employed. Find me at joemartin.co.uk

David Miliband says public lost trust in Brown's Labour

vid Miliband has criticised Gordon Brown's record in office, saying Labour's failings worsened under him.
Mr Miliband said the former Prime Minister had failed to demonstrate the "moral seriousness" he had promised.
The shadow Foreign Secretary said that by the time of the election in May Labour had lost the people's trust.
Mr Miliband, who is running to succeed Mr Brown as party leader, was giving a lecture in memory of Labour founder Keir Hardie in south Wales.
Mr Miliband told the audience in Mountain Ash, Cynon Valley, that he had completely agreed with Mr Brown when he took over from Tony Blair.
Pledges failed to materialise
He said: "I supported and voted for him. I agreed that we needed greater moral seriousness and less indifference to the excesses of a celebrity-drenched culture.
"I agreed with him when he said that we needed greater coherence as a government, particularly in relation to child poverty and equality.
"I agreed with him on the importance of party reform and a meaningful internationalism that would be part of a unified government strategy.
"I agreed that we needed a civic morality to champion civility when confronting a widespread indifference to others.
"But it didn't happen."

en he was foreign secretary to the then prime minister, although many observers suspected he harboured leadership ambitions.
In his speech he said Labour's problems had got worse after Mr Brown became leader.
By the time of May's general election Labour had "lost the trust of the people - and in a democracy that's a very big problem," Mr Miliband said.
"It was not just more of the same. Far from correcting them, failings - tactics, spin, high-handedness - intensified, and we lost many of our strengths - optimism born of clear strategy, bold plans for change and reform, a compelling articulation of aspiration and hope.
"We did not succeed in renewing ourselves in office - and the roots of that failure were deep not recent, about procedure and openness, or lack of it, as much as policy," he added.

Eh tu Brute?

Posted by Joe Martin providing business services for small businesses and the self employed. Find me at joemartin.co.uk

Nick Clegg outlines plans for electoral reform

Deputy PM Nick Clegg has unveiled plans to have fewer MPs and hold a referendum on the voting system before the next election.

In a statement which included plans for fixed-term parliaments, he said UK democracy was "fractured", with some votes counting more than others.

He also changed the number of MPs required to vote to dissolve Parliament from 55% to 66%, after heavy criticism.

Labour attacked boundary changes as "gerrymandering".

'Uniquely placed'
In a wide-ranging statement, Mr Clegg confirmed the government planned to introduce legislation for five-year fixed term parliaments and to hold a referendum next May on changing the Westminster voting system from first-past-the-post to the Alternative Vote (AV), where candidates are ranked in order of preference.

If plans get through Parliament, it would mean the next general election would be held on 7 May 2015 and the number of MPs would be reduced by 50 to 600.

The Boundary Commission would be asked to redraw the constituency map, so each has roughly the same number of voters, by the end of 2013 - allowing new constituencies to be used in the 2015 general election.

New constituencies would be set within 5% of a target quota of registered voters - apart from in Orkney and Shetland and the Western Isles which were "uniquely placed given their locations" - something welcomed by the Scottish National Party.

Mr Clegg told MPs: "Together, these proposals help correct the deep unfairness in the way we hold elections in this country.

"Under the current set-up, votes count more in some parts of the country than others, and millions feel that their votes don't count at all. Elections are won and lost in a small minority of seats.

"We have a fractured democracy, where some people's votes count and other people's votes don't count."

Boundary changes
The proposal to "equalise" constituencies was in the Conservative manifesto - while the Lib Dems are committed to changing the voting system.

The coalition deal between the two parties saw an agreement for a referendum on changing the voting system to AV, but Tory MPs will be able to campaign against a change.

But Labour, which had also planned a referendum on switching to AV, attacked plans to link the referendum with proposed boundary changes and reducing the number of MPs, something Mr Clegg said would save £12m a year.

hadow justice secretary Jack Straw said he backed a referendum on AV but added: "What we are not going to allow is for that support to be used as some kind of cover for outrageously partisan proposals in the same Bill to gerrymander the boundaries of this House of Commons by arbitrarily changing the rules for settling boundaries and by an equally arbitrary cut in the number of MPs."

He argued there was a "huge problem" of 3.5 million people who were eligible to vote but not on the electoral register - to which Mr Clegg hit back that Labour had done nothing about it for 13 years.

Other Labour MPs also stood up to complain that plans to change the constituency boundaries amounted to "gerrymandering".

'Synthetic fury'
But Mr Clegg accused them of "synthetic fury" on the issue, adding: "Members on all sides will see the proposal to cap the number of MPs at 600 is a sensible one."

Tory MPs were also annoyed at the prospect of a referendum on AV being held on the same day as elections in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, which they argued would "skew" the result because turnout would differ across the UK. Plaid Cymru, the DUP and SNP have also complained about the date.

Campaign group Unlock Democracy welcomed the plans for a referendum on AV and for fixed-term parliaments. Spokeswoman Alexandra Runswick said: "These new proposals are stronger than those initially announced and far more likely to stand the test of time."

Mr Clegg also announced he was changing plans on giving MPs the power to dissolve Parliament before the fixed term is expired, following heavy criticism by Labour and some Tory MPs.

The power is linked to the coalition government's plans to introduce five-year fixed term parliaments, under which the prime minister would lose the power to dissolve parliament at a time of his or her choosing.

The government had said the threshold for dissolving Parliament would be 55% - high enough to stop either of the governing parties triggering an election without the other.

But both parties together have just over 56% of MPs and would still have been able to whip their MPs to trigger a dissolution.

Mr Clegg said they had "listened carefully" to MPs' concerns and had raised the threshold to two thirds, or 66% - the threshold used in the Scottish Parliament - which he said would make it impossible for any government to "force a dissolution for its own purposes".

And he stressed that the existing threshold for a no-confidence vote would remain as a simple majority of 50% plus one.

If a government lost a confidence vote, and no new government could be formed within 14 days, Parliament would automatically dissolve and a general election would be called, he said - insisting the changes would "strengthen parliament's power over the executive".

For Labour, Mr Straw said it was "the first major U-turn of this government and in less than two months".

Posted by Joe Martin providing business services for small businesses and the self employed. Find me at joemartin.co.uk

Government spends thousands on iPhone apps

Posted on news.bbc.co.uk

I didn't realise the government had so many websites; 820! I thought this report was so funny I had to post it.

BBC News has learnt that the Government has spent tens of thousands of pounds developing iPhone applications.

A Freedom of Information (FOI) request revealed that development costs ranged from £10,000 - £40,000.

These included a travel advice app from the Foreign Office and a jobseekers' tool.

But the Home Office declined the FOI request for information on its iPhone apps, saying security concerns "prevent us from supplying information".

The information comes just a few weeks after the government announced it was to conduct a review of all 820 of its websites.

A report by the Central Office of Information has revealed that the government spent £94m on website development and running costs and £32m on web staff in 2009 - 2010.

The most expensive application was a proposed Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) app that provides "a masterclass for changing your wheel".

Documents seen by the BBC reveal that the DVLA Motoring Masterclass app would cost £40,000 and would also work out fuel mileage, act as a hazard light and track RAC patrols.

A spokesman for the DVLA told BBC News:

"We want to make it as easy as possible for motorists to renew their car tax, tell us about a change of address or update their driving licence, meaning they stay safe and legal to drive.

"This would also bring benefits for DVLA, for example by reducing the number of reminders that need to be sent out.

"We considered how an application could help with this but no final decisions have been taken and the app, for now, is still in development," he added.

It is not known how much of the total £40,000 budget has been spent or how far the app is from completion. At present, the spokesman said, further development is "on hold".

Underemployed
By the end of May there were over 53,000 downloads of the Jobcentre Plus app, although critics have asked why someone who can afford both an iPhone and the expensive running costs would need a Jobcentre Plus app.

There are also reports that it will not work with Apple's new iOS4, which Mark Wallace, campaign director for the Tax Payers' Alliance, found a little ironic.

"It seems many Government bodies have given in to the temptation to spend money on fashionable gimmicks at a time when they are meant to be cutting back on self-indulgent wastes of money", he told BBC News.

"It is ridiculous not only that they are commissioning these apps but that some of them are supposedly secret on grounds of national security.

"Someone who is faced with losing their home because of high tax bills, or whose life is being ruined by crime isn't going to get any reassurance from knowing there's an app for that," he added

However, a number of government departments said they had no plans to develop iPhone applications, including the Department for Culture. Media and Sport, HM Treasury, Northern Ireland Office, Scotland Office, Government Equalities Office, Ministry of Justice, the Cabinet Office and the Department for International Development.

A statement by the Cabinet Office to BBC News said: " The government recently announced a freeze on all marketing and advertising spend for this year and this includes iPhone applications.

"Future spend on iPhone development will be subject to strict controls: only essential activity, approved by the Efficiency and Reform Group, which is chaired by the Minister for the Cabinet Office and the Chief Secretary to the Treasury, will be allowed".
Posted by Joe Martin providing business services for small businesses and the self employed. Find me at joemartin.co.uk

Ministers Are Told to Plan for 40% Spending Cuts

Reported on Bloomburg Businessweek By Eddie Buckle.

July 5 (Bloomberg) -- U.K. government departments have been told to plan for spending cuts of as much as 40 percent as Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne seeks to narrow a record budget deficit.

The Treasury has ordered most ministers to draw up scenarios for spending reductions of both 25 percent, the average figure specified by Osborne in last month’s budget, and 40 percent over four years, Transport Secretary Philip Hammond said on BBC 1 television’s “Andrew Marr Show” yesterday.

Prime Minister David Cameron’s coalition of Conservatives and Liberal Democrats is proposing expenditure cuts and tax increases totaling 113 billion pounds ($172 billion) to slash a deficit of 11 percent of economic output. Osborne is due to set budgets for each department in a spending review in October once ministers have made their own proposals.

“What we’re not going to do is slice 25 percent off every department,” Hammond said. While no department will have to reduce spending by the full 40 percent, “some departments may see cuts a bit higher than 25 percent,” he said.

Education Secretary Michael Gove will today announce a reduction of as much as 3.5 million pounds in the schools budget, the Guardian newspaper reported. That will mean freezing plans to rebuild about 700 schools, the newspaper said.

Education, Defense

Under the Treasury plans, Gove and Defense Secretary Liam Fox have both been asked to prepare proposals for budget cuts of 10 percent and 20 percent. The only departments exempted are health and international development.

“We are determined to tackle the record budget deficit in order to keep rates lower for longer, protect jobs, and maintain the quality of essential public services,” the Treasury said in an e-mailed statement. “These planning assumptions are not final settlements.”

The opposition Labour Party’s home-affairs spokesman, Alan Johnson, told the BBC that the idea such large-scale spending cuts could be made without harming services such as policing was “fantasy land.”

Ministers agreed to draw up the plans when the Cabinet met in Bradford, northern England, last week, the Treasury said.

Business Secretary Vince Cable’s department will have to set out how it can reduce its spending to as little as 11.5 billion pounds by 2015 from 19.2 billion pounds in the current fiscal year. Gove’s officials will need to draw up a blueprint to cut the education budget to 40.7 billion pounds from 50.9 billion pounds.

Job Losses

The Institute for Fiscal Studies, a London-based independent research group, said the cuts to public spending would be the deepest since World War II and some departments would face reductions of a third. There will be 610,000 jobs cut in the public sector over the next five years as the spending squeeze is implemented, the government’s new Office for Budget Responsibility said last week.

Ministers will meet civil-service union officials today to discuss possible changes to the compensation terms for those who lose their jobs, the BBC reported.

“They want to bring redundancy arrangements into line with the private sector but not do anything about pay,” Mark Serwotka, the general secretary of the Public and Commercial Services union, told BBC Radio 4 this morning. “There’s no argument for any cuts in public services at all at the moment.”

Hammond said that as far as his own department was concerned, “we will not have so much money to spend” on road and rail projects. “We will have to look at our priorities,” he said.

“It is crystal clear that modernization and upgrade works will be axed,” Bob Crow, the general secretary of the Rail, Maritime and Transport union, said in an e-mailed statement. “With cuts of up to 40 percent in the transport budget we are looking at thousands of job losses amongst the staff who operate and maintain services with dire consequences for passenger safety as corners are cut.”


Posted by Joe Martin providing business services for small businesses and the self employed. Find me at joemartin.co.uk

PM and goal-line technology firms dispute Fifa claims

By Daniel Emery
Technology reporter, BBC News

The prime minister has backed calls for video and goal-line technology (GLT) to be used in football matches.

David Cameron's call echoes that made by makers of ball-tracking systems, along with a number of managers.

"I'm a keen follower of cricket and tennis and I think the third umpire has been a great thing... that's something football could now have a look at," said Mr Cameron.

Fifa has consistently refused to entertain the idea of using GLT.

Manufacturers of ball-tracking systems say England's disallowed World Cup goal just emphasised an ongoing problem with the sport.

Hawk-Eye and Cairos, which make rival GLT systems, say Fifa needs to rethink its current position.

"We are using technology that is 100% accurate and adds fairness to the game," Christian Holzer of Cairos told BBC News.

"Technology should not enter into the game. It was a clear statement made by the majority of the IFAB (International Football Association Board)," said Fifa general secretary Jerome Valcke in March.

But not everyone agrees. There have been calls from players, managers and coaches for a number of years, prompted by a series of controversial refereeing decisions.

British based Hawk-Eye, which uses a camera detection system, and German firm Cairos, which utilises chip technology inside the ball, both say that new technology would assist referees and make their job easier.

"The decision was unfair to the English team. Had it gone 2-2 at half-time, it would have been a very different match," said Mr Holzer.

The issue of GLT has dogged Fifa for more than a decade.

The rules of football are determined by IFAB, which consists of eight voting members. England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland each have one vote, with "the rest of the world" (ie the Fifa executive) holding the remaining four.

Posted by Joe Martin providing business services for small businesses and the self employed. Find me at joemartin.co.uk