Nik Darlington2013-05-25T11:08:44-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/author/index.php?author=nik-darlingtonCopyright 2008, HuffingtonPost.com, Inc.HuffingtonPost Blogger Feed for Nik DarlingtonGood old fashioned elbow grease.Ken Clarke has Been "Found Wanting", Says Lord Howard, in Astonishing Rebuke to Coalition Prison Policytag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.10686222011-10-31T20:02:02-04:002011-12-31T05:12:01-05:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/
At the Carlton Club's Carlton Lecture, which in the past has been delivered by sitting Prime Ministers, including Margaret Thatcher, the former Conservative party leader, now in the House of Lords as Lord Howard of Lympne, openly criticised the current Justice Secretary, Ken Clarke, by repeating his 1993 mantra, "prison works".
In June 2010, Ken Clarke attacked the "Victorian bang 'em up" prison culture in what the Guardian described as a "major assault" on Lord Howard's "prison works orthodoxy".
Mr Clarke had said that the prison population was rising out of control and needed to be checked. When he was Home Secretary for two years (1992-93) prior to Michael Howard, the number of prisoners in England and Wales was 44,628. He described the current figure of 85,000 as "an astonishing number which I would have dismissed as an impossible and ridiculous prediction if it had been put to me in a forecast in 1992."
Lord Howard gave his own insight into Whitehall predictions, saying that when he took over the Home Office in 1993 he was told that the job of a Home Secretary is "to manage public expectations about crime, which will always continue to rise" - usually by 5% every year. Adopting a triumphalist tone, Lord Howard said that he had reversed this defeatist trend - and he arrived armed with the statistics to show it.
Lord Howard said that during his tenure as Home Secretary, crime fell on a sustained basis for the first time since the First World War. A consensus was reached between the Conservative party and New Labour that prison worked: as the prison population increased, crime fell by an unprecedented 18%.
"Alas," said Lord Howard, "That consensus was broken when Ken Clarke was astonished to discover how much the prison population had risen."
"I believe in evidence based policy", claimed Lord Howard, "and there is no objective evidence for [Ken Clarke's] alternative theories." One that he mentioned was Mr Clarke's claim that crime rates have fallen as a result of an economic boom - instigated, perhaps ironically, during Clarke's tenure as Chancellor of the Exchequer during the 1990s. As evidence, Lord Howard claimed that despite unemployment rising sharply following the onset of the financial crisis in 2008/09, crime continue to fall.
Mr Clarke was attacked again for his claim that falling crime rates are a global phenomenon, again presumably linked to global prosperity. However, Lord Howard cited evidence from Canada, the Netherlands, the United States and Scotland to contradict him, then said that in Northern Ireland the prison population had fallen but crime simultaneously had increased.
Italy, said Lord Howard, is "particularly interesting". In 2006, the Italian Parliament passed a 'Collective Clemency Bill', which set free all prisoners with less than three years left on their sentences. One-third of the prison population was released. Recorded crime then rose from 2.4 million to 2.9 million.
The reasons Lord Howard gave for the fall in crime during his time as Home Secretary included greater encouragement to use CCTV and the first DNA database in the world - both policies that the current coalition government is regulating more tightly as part of a wider emphasis on greater civil liberties.
Lord Howard's is the latest in a long line of attacks on the Justice Secretary's bold attempts to cut costs in the justice budget and reform Britain's broken penal system. Mr Clarke has incurred the ire of everyone from the Tory right-wing to red-top tabloids to legal aid campaigners - some would say unfairly so too.
At the recent Conservative party conference, the Justice Secretary had a public falling out with Home Secretary Theresa May over the Human Rights Act, a gay Bolivian immigrant and his cat. Despite Ken appearing to be largely justified in his criticisms - if not the public way that he expressed them - the Prime Minister gave Mrs May his full support. Mr Clarke is also currently under fire for sentencing reforms that are being portrayed in parts of the media as weak and likely to send less people to prison - a specific example of the general criticism levelled at him last night by Lord Howard.
In a rare conciliatory moment, Lord Howard said that he agreed with and supported Ken Clarke's "rehabilitation revolution", stating in something of a departure from his previous tone, "no one wants people to be sent to prison for the sake of it", "prison is not an antidote to recidivism" and "too many people re-offend".
Yet it was only a momentary departure, for he went on to criticise Mr Clarke's very objectives: "We should no longer judge the success of our justice system by a fall in prison population." Lord Howard believes that the correlation between lower crime and a higher prison population is clear.
"It is beyond reasonable doubt," concluded Lord Howard, "and on the evidence, the coalition has been found wanting".
"I strongly support the Government's re-offending revolution and I hope that it succeeds but given the statistical evidence it has little prospect of doing so".]]>Tory Grassroots in Manchester Show Little Appetite for Fighting Murdo Fraser's Separationtag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9956042011-10-05T06:51:19-04:002011-12-05T05:12:01-05:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/
In an unscientific exit poll conducted by bloggers Tory Hoose, Mitchell languishes at the bottom with single figure support. She may have come with the biggest banner but left with the biggest mountain to climb. A late entrant to the contest, this is unsurprising. If the 'traditionalists' want to stop Murdo Fraser's radical plan to change the party's name, one (or both) of Mitchell and Carlaw (who polled a healthier 26 per cent) need to withdraw so not to split the vote.
For whilst each candidate tried to stress their unique qualities, in reality Davidson, Mitchell and Carlaw did little beyond define themselves against Fraser. There were smidgens, smudges and fudges of policy but only the provocative Fraser brings decisive change to the table, however misguided it might be to many.
It was Fraser who came out of the hustings with the slenderest of leads - 1 percentage point - over Ruth Davidson, although his younger challenger is a slim bookies' favourite in a tight race.
Davidson is an attractive choice in many ways. She would become, I think, the first gay leader of a political party in the UK, and as Craig Barrett wrote last week, she has an interesting CV - "a Sunday School teacher and a former TA officer". She also managed to get elected earlier this year in Glasgow, of all places. Unlike the other candidates, therefore, she is already a proven winner at the young age of thirty-two.
Yet whilst Davidson has attracted some high profile support, such as the respected John Lamont MSP and Leader of the House of Lords, Lord Strathclyde, it is Murdo Fraser who can count on more Tory MSPs. Were Davidson to win, she could struggle to lead a parliamentary party that wanted someone else. Nevertheless, the recent Sanderson Report envisaged a national leader who would appeal beyond the narrow political base.
Around the conference, however, the Tory grassroots are strangely uninterested. Ask people who they would choose and they struggle to name all of the candidates, proving that it isn't only busy party leaders who forget names. Most have heard of Murdo Fraser's proposal to create a new centre right party and many recoil from the idea, but scarcely care enough to express any preference.
Perhaps that is more remarkable, and for the traditionalists more concerning. The Conservative members here are overwhelmingly English and overwhelmingly uninterested in the Scottish leadership. When pushed, most members disagree with Murdo Fraser, and almost all members support the Union; but the lack of appetite for the contest gives the impression that their Scottish kin are very much already on their own.]]>Conservative Conference Diary: conspiring MPs and naughty ministerstag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9955492011-10-05T05:49:16-04:002011-12-05T05:12:01-05:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/
Q: What is the collective noun for a grouping of three or more MPs?
A: A conspiracy.
So spooky it could have been choreographed, up sidled one of the Whips. Any conspiring was quickly averted. The juniors nearly swiped away their cigarettes, like naughty schoolchildren confronted by the deputy headmaster.
But then again, the petty purring of yesterday suggest that it is Cabinet ministers who need more supervision than MPs.]]>Nation Running on Empty, but Optimist David Cameron Wants Britain to Summon Appetite for the Fighttag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9955362011-10-05T05:30:16-04:002011-12-05T05:12:01-05:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/Birmingham clouds, and the Labour party bore its authentic soul on the Mersey, the Tories have kept their feet firmly on Mancunian ground.
It has been variously described as the "flattest Tory conference" in memory (by Bruce Anderson) and by a sketchwriter in the bars last night as a "charisma free zone". The Tory MPs (what few of them there are here) that I have spoken to will happily take heads-down mundanity over too much excitement this week. One backbencher said, "if Catgate is our gaffe, what a result".
Flat is the party leadership's preferred tempo. David Cameron's speech later today is being trailed partly as a return to the 'sunlit uplands' of opposition but the optimistic tone is to be tempered with brutal honesty that the economy is worse than expected and there is a long way to go.
Invoking the household economics of Margaret Thatcher, Mr Cameron will tell households to deal with their debts: "that means all of us paying off the credit card and store card bills". On a day that Guardian columnist Sir Simon Jenkins implores the Prime Minister to learn from Mrs Thatcher's attention to detail, and a ComRes poll showed 40 per cent think Dave worse than Maggie, perhaps paying homage to the Lady isn't a bad ploy.
But David Cameron needs to spell out a vision beyond the deficit. He will say that there is a light at the end of the tunnel - "Britain is not on a path of certain decline" - but he needs to tell people what will arrest the perceived decline and turn it into an incline. This is particularly important if the coalition gets to 2015 and the economy has not recovered as is wished, something that concerned Tory MPs are contemplating.
There is some confusion over the "credit cards" line, as spinners gave conflicting accounts last night. But discreet word out of Number 10 is that the build-up to this conference speech has been more relaxed than usual.
David Cameron is one of life's natural optimists. He wants the British people to "summon the appetite to fight for a better future". If material economic gains will only slowly fill the nation's bellies, Mr Cameron will need to offer something alternatively holistic to feed the nation's soul.]]>"Words, Words, Mere words", but Ken Clarke is Correct About Reforming Britain's Prisonstag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9498432011-09-06T03:28:25-04:002011-11-05T05:12:03-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/an important article in the Guardian today, in which he blames the riots that swept English cities this summer on this country's "social deficit" between mainstream society and a "feral underclass".
Some people are dismayed by the language used. Be that as it may, dismay all you wish but I would wager that more people are horrified by the criminal acts in Tottenham, Croydon and elsewhere than some choice words of a popular old hand known for plain speaking. Actions speak louder than words.
For what it is worth, "feral" derives from the Latin ferus meaning "wild". In turn, "wild" means "uncontrolled or unrestrained, especially in pursuit of pleasure". And Mr Clarke is not playing to any 'nasty party' gallery because he is writing in the Guardian, whose readers have not voted Tory since the 1950s; if it had passed you by, the Tory press and the Justice Secretary do not see eye to eye in many things beyond a penchant for beer and cricket.
More importantly, Ken Clarke writes that the underlying nature of the riots and the rioters must be a prompt for "radical reform". Our prisons are places for punishment, of course, but there must be a heightened emphasis on rehabilitation.
Punishment alone is not enough... Locking people up without reducing the risk of them committing new crimes against new victims the minute they get out does not make for intelligent sentencing.
It's not yet been widely recognised, but the hardcore of the rioters were, in fact, known criminals. Close to three-quarters of those aged 18 or over charged with riot offences already had a prior conviction. That is the legacy of a broken penal system - one whose record in preventing reoffending has been straightforwardly dreadful. In my view, the riots can be seen in part as an outburst of outrageous behaviour by the criminal classes - individuals and families familiar with the justice system who haven't been changed by their past punishments.
I am introducing radical changes to focus our penal system relentlessly on proper, robust punishment and the reduction of reoffending. This means making our jails places of productive hard work, addressing the scandal of drugs being readily available in many of our prisons and toughening community sentences so that they command public respect. And underpinning it all, the most radical step of all: paying those who rehabilitate offenders, including the private and voluntary sectors, by the results they achieve, not (as too often in the past) for processes and box-ticking.
I have noticed some people lazily describing the Justice Secretary's words as lacking depth and an understanding of underlying problems. Evidently, they read the sexy headline (probably chosen by the Guardian) about "feral rioters" and bypassed the article itself.
However, reform can't stop at our penal system alone. The general recipe for a productive member of society is not secret. It has not changed since I was inner cities minister 25 years ago. It's about having a job, a strong family, a decent education and, beneath it all, an attitude that shares in the values of mainstream society.
Just in case the casual reader thought this was mere rhetoric, replete with the ethos of long-held experience, are coalition government policies such as deficit reduction, welfare reform, work programmes and liberalising our schools.
Rehabilitation must be the watchword of this Government's penal reforms. After this summer's riots that fact is staring us in the face more than ever.]]>Polly Toynbee is Wrong About Tories and the Poor, but it is Equally Wrong to Call her a Hypocritetag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9452582011-09-01T13:17:58-04:002011-11-01T05:12:01-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/Guardian columnist Polly Toynbee has made a career out of loathing the Conservative party, so it should come as little surprise when she claims that Tories simply can't understand the poor. This is the woman who described the coalition government's housing benefit reforms as a "final solution" for the poor.
Ms Toynbee is, by her own definition, "highly privileged". She owns three properties at a time when just owning one property is becoming more difficult than ever. The Guardian allegedly pays her a salary of £130,000 a year, when pay for many people is being frozen or cut and millions are unemployed. She sends her children to private school, when the gap between the maintained and independent sectors is significantly greater now than it was before what she calls the "good old days of Blair and Brown".
Ms Toynbee said recently at the Edinburgh Book Festival that Labour wasn't very good at blowing its own trumpet in power. On this evidence, we shouldn't be playing many violins when she talks about understanding the poor. Should we?
Naturally, Conservatives are using these details about Ms Toynbee to label her a hypocrite. Now Ms Toynbee is most certainly wrong about Tories not being able to understand the poor (try telling that to the likes of David Davis, who grew up on a council estate). And she has in the past been hypocritical to criticise people for sending their children to private schools when she is amongst the 7 per cent of parents who do too.
But calling Ms Toynbee a hypocrite is as wrong as her saying that Tories cannot understand the poor. Why? It feeds the invidious narrative that the wealthy, by default, cannot understand the plight of the poor, which is precisely the ignorant point that Ms Toynbee was making in the first place.
Some of the most compassionate campaigners on behalf of the poor have come from wealthy, privileged backgrounds. Polly Toynbee's own great-great-uncle, Arnold Toynbee, founded Toynbee Hall, a centre for social reform, and helped to establish public libraries for the working class populations of the East End, amongst many other achievements. Arnold Toynbee was the public school educated son of a pioneering physician.
Another great champion of social reform was chocolate maker Joseph Rowntree, privately educated at Bootham School. Octavia Hill came from a wealthy merchant banking family. William Beveridge was a lawyer and Old Carthusian.
British history is full of well-meaning middle and upper-class social reformers with honest and paternalistic instincts. Did Arnold Toynbee not understand the poor because he was comfortably well-off?
Of course not. Ms Toynbee is really saying that there is something in the political DNA of people who vote Conservative that precludes them from any understanding of the poor. Which is quite obviously daft.
The Liberal-Labour MP Alexander MacDonald said of Benjamin Disraeli's great reforming second ministry, that the Conservative party had done more for the working classes in five years than the Liberals had in fifty.
So Ms Toynbee is wrong to say that Tories cannot, as a rule, understand the poor. But it is equally unhelpful to use Ms Toynbee's privileged condition in life as a stick with which to beat her.
After all, it ought to be easy enough picking holes in Ms Toynbee's journalism without bringing her holiday homes into it.]]>Politicians are Ignoring the Plight of the Great British Pubtag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9375352011-08-28T19:00:00-04:002011-10-28T05:12:01-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/Press Association.
The British Beer & Pub Association (BBPA) says this is partially due to "huge" tax rises, which make drinkers in Britain amongst the highest taxed in Europe. UK alcohol duties are eight times higher than in France and eleven times higher than in Germany. The increase in VAT to 20 per cent has also contributed to beer price inflation.
The Government says that they are encouraging responsible drinking. Indeed, the Treasury has conducted a review of alcohol taxation. Included in this is minimum alcohol pricing, banning outlets from selling drinks for less than their tax. It is hoped that this will stop the use of alcohol as a loss-leader, a tactic that supermarkets and other retailers employ to drive footfall and which encourages cheaper drinking in the home, instead of the pub.
Additionally, prior to this year's Budget, George Osborne pledged to introduce an additional duty on high strength beers over 7.5% ABV and a reduced rate on beers of 2.8% ABV or lower. As a headline, it looked impressive: tackle excessive consumption of highly alcoholic drinks while protecting responsible drinkers of the sensible British pint.
Think again. Visit your standard local and scan the handpumps: how many of them are over 7.5% and under 2.8%? The answer, in all liklehood, is none.
In my home town, Richmond, we have a number of excellent pubs, the majority of which are divvied up between Young's and Fuller's. Young's beers range in strength from their Ordinary Bitter (3.7%), through London Gold (4.0%) and Special London Ale (a strong 6.4%). Even their bottled Old Nick, a barley wine at 7.2%, doesn't make George Osborne's high strength grade. Similarly, Fuller's regular range comprises one of my favourites, Chiswick (3.5%), London Pride (4.1%), ESB (5.5%) and Bengal Lancer (5.3%). Some, such as the barley wine Golden Pride (8.3%), go over the limit but it is an extreme rarity.
Your typical premium lagers like Stella Artois (5.0%), Heineken (5.0%), Carling (4.0%), Fosters (4.0%) and Kronenbourg 1664 (5.5%) also sit within the range. I cannot think of any drink - beer, lager or cider - at less than 2.8% apart from a non-alcoholic beer like Beck's Blue.
So in order to find a drink that is covered by the Treasury's new duty scale, you have to go to the specialist saloons that serve bottles of knock-your-socks off Trappiste beers from Belgian. They are marvellous watering holes but your 'Great British Pub' they certainly are not.
What this all amounts to is a policy that on the surface looks tough on irresponsible heavy drinking whilst being encouraging to the downtrodden traditional British boozer, but is actually a typically disingenuous sleight of Treasury arithmetic. Almost all beer sold in pubs will be unaffected by the new duty scales.
The worst part of it is the weaker rating, which is set far too low to be anything helpful to drinkers and publicans. A better measure would be that of an 'ordinary' pint of beer, such as something around 4% ABV. Of course, the Treasury doesn't want to count 'ordinary' pints in a lower duty rating because it would cost a lot more in foregone tax revenue.
Even a focus on 4% ABV is misleading because it still does nothing about excessive drinking and anti-social behaviour. Go into any medium-sized town centre on a Saturday night and round up the rowdiest revellers. Ask them what they have been drinking. It doesn't take a genius to guess that they are more likely to have been drinking Fosters or Carling (both 4%) than Fuller's Special London Ale (6.4%) or Golden Pride (8.3%).
Minimum alcohol pricing is the right step towards reversing the increasing trend of drinking at home, although some doctors claim that the base price is too low.
On beer duty, however, it appears pubs will have to dig into their own pockets again for the next round. The Treasury is certainly not buying it.]]>Might a Mansion tax Allow Politicians to Create a Domesday Book for the 21st Century?tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9364052011-08-25T12:39:16-04:002011-10-25T05:12:01-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/"While spending the Christmas of 1085 in Gloucester, William had deep speech with his counsellors and sent men all over England to each shire to find out what or how much each landholder had in land and livestock, and what it was worth."
So, according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, began the most impressive cataloguing of the nation's wealth this country has ever seen.
The Domesday Book was completed in 1086. Twenty years previously, William of Normandy had conquered England's lands; now he wanted their tax returns, and he wanted there to be "not one single hide, nor a yard of land, nay, moreover, not even an ox, nor a cow, nor a swine that was not set down in his writ."
The compilation of the Domesday Book was an excuse for King William's tax collectors to pry into nearly every household in England and Wales. People referred to it as 'Domesday' because it meant the 'Day of Judgement', after which there was no turning back. The Crown's fiscal supremacy was total.
Data was as crucial to tax collection in the eleventh century as it is today. For wealth taxes it is doubly crucial - if you aren't aware of possessions, you can't tax them. This is especially important for things like death duties, introduced by the Liberals in 1894 - or in modern terminology, Inheritance Tax (IHT).
For years, politicians on the Left have yearned for the sort of snooping powers enjoyed by King William - the opportunity to send inspectors into every home in the land, noting down every Edwardian corner cupboard and set of family silver. The types of items subject to IHT but which often slip through the grasp of the probate registry.
And now that opportunity might have arrived, thanks to the doggedness of Dr Cable, the Lib Dem business secretary.
Revitalised and emboldened by their relative lack of exposure during the phone hacking scandal, the Liberal Democrats are pushing for a mansion tax in a quid pro quo exchange for the Conservatives' desire to scrap the 50p income tax rate. Nick Clegg is thought to be open to the idea. David Laws, the darling of the Tories, disagrees, but party insiders describe him as "isolated", according to the FT (£).
Following Vince Cable's comments, communities secretary Eric Pickles told the Daily Telegraph that a mansion tax would be a "big mistake" because people are already paying enough tax. Furthermore, politicians would conveniently fail to review it regularly enough, meaning that thousands of homeowners would have to pay it because of the iniquity of fiscal drag. According to the Daily Mail's 'This Is Money' website, during the second quarter (Q2) of 2011, the number of properties for sale for at least £1m was 8 per cent higher than Q1 and 10 per cent higher than Q2 in 2010.
There are any number of things wrong with a mansion tax, not least the fact that £1m hardly buys one a mansion in most parts of the country these days. Also the potential complexity of it is staggering. For instance, King William didn't waste his time trying to value every property in London.
At the end of the eleventh century, England's capital was a convoluted urban warren of 18,000 souls. What would he have thought of it today, its metropolitan expanse home to 12-14 million, with nearly 13,000 per square mile? A chore not worth conquering.
It is the potential for data gathering that most excites politicians of certain shades. This could even have a benefit, in that a centralised valuation of estates throughout the country could contribute to updating bandings for council tax - a long overdue task.
But King William's subjects objected to Domesday for a reason: an Englishman's home is his castle, so it is said, and he does not want the state snooping around in it. A mansion tax could permit the creation of Domesday Book for the twenty-first century, on a scale King William could only have dreamt of.
If you would like to learn more about the original Domesday Book, visit the PASE project, a joint venture between King's College London and the University of Cambridge.
This article originally appeared on the Total Politics website on 25th August 2011.]]>Will We Blow the Final Whistle on Irresponsible Financing of Sport?tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9310672011-08-25T12:00:00-04:002011-10-25T05:12:01-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/I got a shelf life of ten years, tops. My next contract's gotta bring me the dollars that'll last me and mine a long time. Shit, I'm out of this sport in five years. What's my family gonna live on? Huh?
- Rod Tidwell, Jerry Maguire (1996)
We can ignore it, remain locked in romantic nostalgia for a more Corinthian age and be disappointed; or we can accept it for what it is and love it for what it gives.
Sport is not just a game. It can inspire hope from despair, as we have seen attempts at in Sri Lanka in recent years. It can make a lucky cadre of talented individuals very, very wealthy indeed (though even that is as old as sport itself -- do you think W.G. Grace made his lucre as a physician?). It offers a comfortable, if short-lived, career for a much larger number of talented individuals. Rod Tidwell is right. What are you going to live on when your shelf life is up? You need to make money, fast.
It was the offer of £175,000 per week from big-spenders Manchester City that prompted Samir Nasri to leave a club, Arsenal, where he was successful and popular, and to turn down a club as big and successful as Manchester United.
And what feeds high wages, high transfers and high expectations? High finance. At the top, sport, and football especially, is becoming an offshoot of the financial markets.
Manchester United's mooted stock market listing in Singapore is the latest such development. The plan is to raise $1 billion in a flotation, in order to stabilise the notoriously over-leveraged club. There were thoughts that the English champions would try an IPO in Hong Kong, but the canny Cantonese don't allow listings from companies making a loss.
Football must sort out its debt problem. That is the view of a recent report into football governance by a committee of MPs. It is also the view of UEFA, whose Financial Fair Play regulations stipulate that European clubs must break even by 2012-13. There are signs that some clubs are tightening their belts, although few are confident that UEFA's regulations can be met, let alone enforced.
Further mimicking the slippery world of finance, Manchester City are being investigated by UEFA for allegedly circumventing the Fair Play rules by over-valuing a £400 million sponsorship deal with Etihad, the state airline of Abu Dhabi, whose ruler is related to Sheikh Mansour, City's owner.
One would have thought that responsible restraint in this age of austerity would be praised, but no, in football, emotions rule reason. The Times ran a leading article (£) earlier this week about Arsene Wenger, the under-fire manager of Arsenal. It is worth quoting at length:
Arsene Wenger, entering his sixteenth season as manager, has won more trophies for Arsenal than any previous boss... The flair of his footballers is admired around the world. By discovering young talent he has managed to keep Arsenal in the top four of the Premier League without running up a transfer bill the size of Greece's sovereign debt. And all this while shepherding the club into a new stadium.
And Wenger's reward? To be booed and pilloried by Arsenal supporters for not opening his wallet more profligately...and to find himself the target of media nutters suggesting that his future at Arsenal may be precarious.
...Wenger's would be an odd strategy to mock at any time, let alone when his brand of living-within-your-means book-keeping is an example to all governments striving to cut spending without undermining the competitiveness of their economies.
David Dein, former vice-chairman of Arsenal and the man who brought Wenger to the club in 1996, has said today that fans must back him or risk losing him. And so they should. Wenger's departure under these circumstances, having just had to sell two star players (Nasri and the club captain, Cesc Fabregas), would be a ridiculous message that sustainable management is unappreciated.
It is encouraging that Tony Fernandes, owner of AirAsia and the majority shareholder at newly promoted Queen's Park Rangers, has said that he will not try to imitate the lavish injections of cash seen at the likes of Manchester City and Chelsea.
"I don't believe you can run any venture -- be it sport or a business -- that isn't profitable. I'm not saying it's going to be profitable tomorrow, but that would be the ambition."
"I think football is a fantastic business if it's run well. QPR is in a fantastic location and has huge potential to develop into something special."
It is a lofty ambition, but three cheers to that, and let's hope it lasts.]]>Muslim Students cry Usury to Avoid Interest on Student Loans. Is This Fair?tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9337522011-08-23T03:16:04-04:002011-10-22T05:12:02-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/Independent reports that an organisation representing Muslim students in Britain is protesting against the coalition government's reforms to university finance.
The Federation of Student Islamic Societies (FOSI) warns that young Muslims could be forced to sacrifice higher education as a result of the higher rates of interest under a new university loans system. The Indy's Poppy McPherson writes:
Under some interpretations of Islamic law, the acquisition of loans - particularly those which accrue interest - is forbidden. The new system requires graduates who earn above £21,000 to pay interest levels of up to 3 per cent above inflation. The National Union of Students (NUS) has warned it could be two years before a suitable system is arranged [to accommodate Muslim students].
A FOSI spokesman said:
Under Islamic law interest is seen as something that is prohibited. Previously, the interest rate was at the market rate of inflation. The problem now is that the interest is above the market rate. Because the rate of interest is above the rate of inflation, it is quite blatant usury.
The first point here is also blatant: in Britain, we do not operate under Islamic law. The student finance system has to be devised according to British laws, not those of a religion observed by 3 per cent of the UK population.
Second - and less comforting, but historically apt - thoughout the ages, the spiritual has had to adapt to the temporal (and of course vice-versa). Usury, or the charging of interest of any kind (not necessarily excessive) on a loan, was outlawed by Christian churches for hundreds of years. The first instance of secular law overriding the church was when Henry VIII's parliament passed 'An Acte Agaynst Usurie' in 1545. Islamic banks have already devised a number of methods of rewarding savers, such as entrance into Premium Bonds-style lotteries; or direct investment is encouraged instead of loans.
The third point is most pressing to the present situation of universtiy finances. The Government takes a sizeable hit on the currently interest-free student loan book. The Browne Review identified student loans as a straightforward and fair way of reforming university financing and shifting the burden from the taxpayer to graduates. Removing what was effectively a middle-class subsidy was the right thing to do. The state should not be handing out cash that in some cases will be invested in ISAs or unit trusts, so providing an easy return for students who don't truly need their loans.
The money to finance universities needs to come from somewhere. The nervous fees and funding fudge contrived by coalition ministers means that not enough is going to come from students. HE institutions will still rely for some years to come on direct grants from the state. For the state to afford this, there has to be more of a contribution from those who can afford it most - the graduates earning enough money to pay off their loans, with interest.
One could just charge Muslim students more for their higher education in the first place, and allow them to forego the payment of interest at a later date. The tuition fees policy of the Scottish Government is an example of how the authorities can get away with discriminating against students within the same state without blinking an eyelid.
If Muslim students do not want to pay interest on their student loans because doing so would contravene their faith, then I have some sympathy for them. However, we cannot have a situation in which some graduates end up paying less because they happen to observe a different religion to their peers.
Solutions? The floor is open for comments.]]>Clearing up the Mess: What Students Really Need to Know About Fees and Universitiestag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9300872011-08-18T03:08:09-04:002011-10-17T05:12:01-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/
But fees? Students (sorry, graduates) don't have an inkling of them until the small monthly payments start disappearing from their £21,000+ wage packets. After a few years, your student loan deductions begin to look just like another irksome bill, except it isn't as annoying as the electricity bill because it comes straight out of your salary without you doing anything, and you are aware (or at least you should be) that without it you probably wouldn't have as good a salary in the first place.
What about higher costs being a deterrent? The only empirical evidence we have is that the introduction of higher fees in 2006 has not reduced overall demand for university, nor has it curtailed the continuous rise in participation of young people from less affluent backgrounds. So much, so positive.
What can, and miserably does, hold people back is a lack of awareness about the financial support available, much of which goes unclaimed. Get sound provisions in place to deal with this and it will go some way to making an increase in tuition fees fairer and more palatable its detractors. A Sutton Trust report in autumn 2010 highlighted that most teenagers are not aware of the financial aid available. This is something that has been consistently apparent in my own research. Universities know that they need to do a better job in advertising state aid and their own scholarships. Many are making good progress here but it is still rare for institutions to get aid to more than three-quarters of students eligible for it.
In the past few years, a number of organisations have released misleading research about the impact of fees on students, variously claiming that demand for university would fall off a cliff at higher price points. Not only is it embarrassingly bad research, it is politically dangerous. It is misleading to the public and to policymakers. Here is a quick summary of the basic flaws.
First, most surveys have been asking current or former students. This will not give you a realistic market opinion - these respondents are biased having already paid less than half of that amount for their current or former studies. You have to be putting the question to future students. This makes the research criteria and modelling a bit more complicated but, trust me, it is achievable (I can do it with no further mathematical training than a GCSE).
Secondly, surveys have been far too simplistic. When gauging reaction to price you must give survey respondents a range of competitive options to replicate a more realistic purchase decision. Just slapping a series of price tags in front of someone and asking whether they think it is expensive or not, without providing any appropriate context, tells you nothing about decision-making. You
Thirdly, the headline fee for university tuition is only half the story. Behind that are student loans and financial aid. With nearly every institution currently charging the full rate of tuition, bursaries and scholarships are the only way for them to differentiate their offer from competitors. This produces a 'net fee' and must always be considered when modelling such pricing functions. The students who are most likely to be put off by a big headline are those students that would be eligible for financial aid.
This is where smarter pricing and price communication comes in. All the universities want to charge as much as they can but they understand their markets and they do plenty of research, so they have some understanding of what their target students can afford. The catch-22 is that if they pitch their headline fee too low, they send out a message that their 'product' - i.e. the education they offer - is poorer quality than a competitor charging more; however, charging too much will scare off precisely the students they are pitching for.
So that is where discounting - or, in HE terminology, financial support / scholarships / bursaries - comes in and this is where the 'net fee' is produced. The Government has introduced policies to improve communication of the support and discounts available to students, including a £150 million National Scholarship Scheme, and universities are being pushed to improve their own information, advice and guidance (IAG in the jargon).
Today is A-level results day, which means the start of the annual clearing stampede. In May, the universities minister, David Willetts was criticised for suggesting that universities could offer these discounts during clearing, in order to fill up spare capacity. Could that have worked? In a word: 'no'.
Firstly, Offa rules say universities would then also have to give the same discounts to students already on affected courses, resulting in a massive loss of income. Secondly, we considered this situation when I was a management consultant advising universities about tuition fees. We were trying to apply a simpler version of the yield management used by hotels and airlines, who adapt prices to reflect consumer demand.
We concluded that yield management could not work in universities principally because of institutional aversion. Like shadow universities minister, Gareth Thomas, I agree that "you can't treat university like a lastminute.com holiday". We received a lot of push-back from university executives for this exact reason (though then the comparison most often made was with easyJet and Ryanair). It would be unfair for two students to sit next to each other in the same lecture hall, one having paid £9,000 and the other £6,000, for example. And it would mean that students focused too much on the price tag of a course, instead of a myriad of more important factors such as university reputation, employability, facilities, satisfaction, teaching hours etc.
It is those factors that I recommend students concentrate on during the next few weeks. The 'best' options available will disappear in the initial hours and days (perhaps before this even goes to print), but ask yourself - are they really the best? Or are they just the most fashionable? A young person deciding on universities is facing as much a lifestyle choice as an educational or career choice. It is emotional as well as functional.
However, under the new regime of higher costs for university education, students need to consider value a lot more, and that means asking questions about employability and teaching hours. If you're paying much higher fees, you are going to start looking for much higher returns on that investment, which will be paid off further down the line.
But then again, remember that the Government has abolished tuition fees. It would have been better if they had kept them but accepted Lord Browne's central recommendation to remove the fee cap entirely. It ought to be realised that the higher the headline fees the better the situation for poorer students. In such a scenario, universities have more money to spend on financial aid and to improve facilities and teaching for everyone. It would end the absurd middle-class subsidy for university education, paid for by ordinary taxpayers. The current arrangement - described by Simon Jenkins as "a new departure in fiscal socialism" - is undoubtedly a better deal for the poorer students than what we had before, but uncapped fees would have been better.
But don't worry, don't spend too much time reading the newspapers (you can read the Huffington Post, of course), because what you see this October, or next October, or the October after that, will not be too dissimilar to the sorts of things I saw in October 2005.
Above all, don't miss out. It is still probably one of the best things you'll ever do.]]>To These Young People, There Really is no Such Thing as Societytag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9229872011-08-10T19:00:00-04:002011-10-10T05:12:02-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/
As shock fades, the recriminations begin. Conservative MPs accuse the previous Labour government of fostering welfare dependency, failing to improve education and forcing fiscal austerity upon the nation. Labour MPs allege that coalition government spending cuts have created a context of weaker policing, youth unemployment and destroyed opportunities.
Both sides are wrong to blame each other without admitting to their own part. The deficit reduction objectives of Conservative and Liberal Democrat politicians are correct but indubitably they are creating difficult and perilous readjustments. This should be acknowledged. Labour politicians should face up to the fact of the economic mire they bequeathed, and the fact that youth unemployment stood at 2.5 million when they left office. Furthermore, a youth in Manchester interviewed on this morning's Today programme said, "I'll keep doing it until I get caught - the prisons are full so what are they going to do, give me an Asbo?" The Labour government filled our prisons to record numbers and introduced the utterly ineffectual Asbo.
As Robert Halfon writes this morning on ConservativeHome, "the causes go deep." Deeper than the last government, and the government before that, and so on. Every government makes mistakes.
Blaming these riots on policies announced in the past 12 months is ignorant and intellectually lazy. Last night, the deputy leader of the Labour party, Harriet Harman, said the Government was not on the side of young people and alluded to tuition fees, the EMA and youth unemployment as causes for the discontent (see Newsnight clip below).
Showing the brazen obstinacy that has become her hallmark, Ms Harman ignored the fact that a re-elected Labour Government, which first introduced tuition fees (breaking a manifesto pledge) and commissioned the Browne Report, would have had to increase tuition fees. She ignored the fact that her government had plans to reform the inefficient EMA. New Statesmen blogger Dan Hodges tweets that if Labour continues to focus on it, the party will be out of power for a generation.
But most significantly, Ms Harman made the curious assumption that the young people rioting and looting in the streets of London and other cities have anything more than the remotest of ambitions for staying on at school or going to university.
Herein lies the root cause of the recent violence. It is found in the anger of an economic and social underclass in Britain's cities; a collective rage borne out of disillusionment and exclusion. No single party, no single politician, no single government can be blamed for this miserable phenomenon. To ignore this demonstrates a collective dereliction of responsibility not dissimilar to that shown by the perpetrators of the past few days.
These are communities bereft of identity, responsibility and hope. A politician once said that there is no such thing as society; another more recently said that there is such a thing, it just isn't the same thing as the state. But what the indiscriminate vandalism and cruelty demonstrates is that society is irrelevant to you, if you don't even know of any such thing as community.
]]>We Know Nothing yet, Except That we are all to Blame for These Riotstag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9218942011-08-09T08:13:18-04:002011-10-09T05:12:01-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/
The rioting and looting was indiscriminate, random and terrifying. Shops, cars, police stations, even fire engines and private homes - old women asleep in their beds - came under attack.
It was into the early hours before I could feel confident that the rioting raging as nearby as Ealing and Wandsworth would not reach Richmond. With police cars speeding past at regular intervals, away from us and towards London, there would not have been much left to stop them if they had happened. But then the closest Richmond has got to a riot was when Waitrose nearly ran out of pappardelle.
What do we know? Well, we know more about what we don't know, than what we do know.
The attacks have departed any rhyme or reason. What began as an apparently peaceful protest (how much of an oxymoron is that becoming?) in Tottenham after an alleged criminal was shot by police, has since developed into a melee of motivations. We can begin to speculate why people are taking part in variegated mayhem, but you would be foolhardy to assert.
Police cuts? True, police morale is at rock bottom, but the gutting of police forces that certain people are blaming for the riots spreading out of control is not a plausible explanation. This gutting hasn't happened. The Prime Minister confirmed this morning that 16,000 troops will be on London's streets tonight and all police leave is cancelled. The Met is calling up all Special Constables. Riot teams are being drawn in from across the country.
Lack of force dealt out to the rioters? No water cannons? No rubber bullets? No armed forces? A bizarre irony of last night was listening to the sort of people who spend their lives berating the EU saying our law enforcement should be more like Europe. I'm not convinced. Cars, businesses and property would have been vandalised even if the entire cavalry had charged in, and possibly inflamed tempers further. The pictures in your newspapers and on your TV screens this morning would have been worse.
Social media's role? Allegedly, much of the co-ordination (however inappropriate that word is in this context) of the riots was conducted via BlackBerry Messenger service, which is popular with young teenagers. The people tweeting last night were shocked onlookers and intrepid, tireless hacks. We don't know (or at least I don't know) whether Twitter was used to spread the destruction because I don't follow any rioters. As Hugo Rifkind wrote in the Times last week, Twitter is not as open as we think and we mostly speak to ourselves.
However much the riots displayed Twitter at its best - a rapid gatherer of information, faster and more effectively than any traditional news source - the cold light of this morning is displaying Twitter at its worst - a rapid disseminator of vapid tommyrot by people with little useful to add.
This is not about a clash between 'right' and 'left', 'authoritarian' and 'liberal', or any nomenclature you care to mention. Some Conservative MPs are blaming this on "13 years of Labour". As tempting as that seems judging by the age of some of the rioters, it is wrong, ignorant and unhelpful. Equally, for Ken Livingstone and other Labour party politicians to blame this on "Tory cuts" is pitifully opportunist. Indeed, it is times like this that party politics can be most damaging and counter-productive. It is the lazy outlet for those who would rather not search for honest answers.
Variously, so it is said, the Government, the police, the Tories, the Labour party, the Deputy Prime Minister, the Prime Minister, the Mayor of London the BBC, the public, are 'out of touch'.
If you believe this, I have news for you. The only conclusion we can safely draw is that we are all out of touch. I am out of touch. You are out of touch. We are out of touch with ourselves and with each other; with our neighbours, with our authorities and, by the sight of so many children taking part in the riots and looting, within our own families.
So point your fingers. Whoever you choose to impute, you will, sadly, be right. Because we are all to blame.]]>NHS takes on another class of junior doctors: "It's guaranteed to be a shambles but it's not the end of the world"tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9117372011-07-28T07:09:48-04:002011-09-27T05:12:01-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/Next Wednesday, the NHS welcomes another intake of junior doctors on to hospital wards. If clinical standards slide, they'll be blamed, but will it really be their fault?
For thousands of young people in Britain, next Wednesday is the biggest day of their life so far. They have waited at least five, perhaps six, years for this moment. On 3 August a new intake of junior doctors take their first cautious steps on to hospital wards. Should you be concerned?
This annual changeover hit the headlines in September 2009 - the usually muted Guardian described it as the NHS's "very own black Wednesday" - when researchers at Imperial College published a study showing mortality rates amongst patients admitted to emergency units rising by 6% compared to the previous Wednesday (i.e. yesterday). The research was based on data from nearly 300,000 patients between 2000 and 2008. Apart from top line indicators, the study actually tells us very little. Further research, for instance analysing the nature of individual deaths, would be needed to draw firm conclusions. Dr Paul Aylin, who led the study, said they had unearthed "an interesting pattern" but emphasised that it is "a relatively small difference" (a discrepancy of forty-five extra deaths over the nine years). Even so, it is apparently sizeable and consistent enough to be more than mere chance at play.
Might it be a case of new employees learning the ropes and mixing their bowsprit with their bowline, as suggested? Actual practice suggests it shouldn't be. All hospitals run thorough inductions for their new intakes - whether this week and/or this coming Monday and Tuesday. The training sessions range from clinical functions such as intermediate life support, common emergency calls, and infection control, to the more everyday concerns in any new workplace, like your weekly rota or where the coffee machine is. Familiarity ought not to be an issue.
Furthermore, in order to get this far, medics have had to pass as many as three dozen exams. The suggestion that junior doctors might not be properly prepared demonstrates ignorance of the highest order. The vast majority of them now have to undergo at least one week of work experience (often salaried) prior to starting on wards for real. In the Severn Deanery, which includes Bristol, Gloucester and Swindon, a week's 'shadowing' is mandatory for newly qualified doctors. Shrewsbury makes them do it for a fortnight. Some research suggests that higher rates of shadowing have lessened morbidity.
On top of having to absorb thousands of new doctors, there is a logistical challenge in reallocating those junior doctors finishing their first year and progressing to F2 (foundation year two), typically in a totally different hospital. So to blame mishaps and confusion on wet behind the ears trainees alone is narrow minded, when hospitals face this bigger administrative challenge. One doctor in the south-east, about to start their second year in a new hospital, bemoans the lack of support that F2's receive in comparison to F1's. "There's usually no handover so the first few days are guaranteed to be a shambles as you work out how things are done in the new hospital and new specialty." Saying that, there is an "excitement" at learning new things and meeting new people. And patients should be unaffected: "the nurses and more senior doctors remain the same so it's not the end of the world."
Two years ago, the Daily Mail suggested that the slight rise in hospital deaths could be blamed on novices fending for themselves because senior doctors are likely to be on holiday. "Nonsense", says another junior doctor. Seniors were "less likely" to head to the beach at this critical time, not more.
Surely these youngsters are nervous though? "Something that scares me most is the sound of a cardiac arrest bleep going off. If you're the first person to the scene, you've got to act. It's unlikely and the seniors will be there in seconds but you never know how you'll react until you're put into that position."
And there is the nub of it - if there is a slide in clinical standards next Wednesday, it can be blamed as much on poor supervision as inexperience. When the Imperial College study was released two years ago Patricia Hamilton, the Department of Health's director of medical education, said, "junior doctors are closely supervised by a senior doctor and this ratio is often 1:1." One doctor coming to the end of his first year told me that they were "so supervised nothing could possibly go wrong". Of course, things can, do and always will go wrong, even at the hands of the most experienced doctors; but if you go to hospital next week, don't think your life teeters on the brink in the hands of young bundles of nerves.
So God speed and good luck. Just don't break a leg, that sort of thing really isn't good for you on any day of the year.
This article first appeared in Total Politics on 28th July 2011.]]>David Cameron Pleads for Cesc Fabregas to Stay at Arsenaltag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.9093512011-07-26T03:26:27-04:002011-09-24T05:12:01-04:00Nik Darlingtonhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/nik-darlington/
Also high on the agenda would have been the ongoing crisis affecting the eurozone. Mr Cameron said Britain and Spain wanted to see "quick, bold and practical action" to ensure recovery and growth in Europe. David Cowan wrote here last week about the very real possibility that Spain, along with Portugal, Italy and Greece, will have to default outside the eurozone and revert to old currencies like the peso.
The subject of trade was also on the table and both leaders expressed their desire for bilateral trade to increase. According to Downing Street, it currently stands at more than £30 billion per year and there will be a trade summit this autumn between business leaders and policymakers.
However, there was one item of trade which as far as David Cameron was concerned was not up for negotiation.
Cesc Fabregas is one Spaniard that I hope will not be returning to Spain!
Fabregas (pictured above with Mr Zapatero and Mr Cameron) was attending Downing Street yesterday to celebrate the graduation of youngsters from the Street Leagues Football academy, of which he is a patron. The Arsenal captain is the subject of acrimonious negotiations between Spanish giants Barcelona, his home town, and London's premier club, where he has played since he was 16.
David Cameron professes to be an Aston Villa fan but clearly for him in football as in politics, the national interest trumps tribal loyalties.
Moreover, considering the dire state of the Spanish economy, the 40 million or so euros that Fabregas might cost Barcelona could probably best be put to use at home rather than being exported to Britain. Throw the mischievous separatist sentiments of the Catalans into the mix, and the Castilian Zapatero might well have been gunning for Fabregas to stay in London too.]]>