What's Clegg doing in Afghanistan?

Cameron is back from his hols (and looking for larger accommodation) so why is Nick Clegg in Afghanistan instead of doing all the other incredibly important things he gets to do as deputy PM?

He doesn’t have defence or foreign affairs within his portfolio; nor does he have any military experience. So what practical purpose is served by flying the flak-jacketed Lib Dem leader into a war zone – other than to give the Taliban an opportunity to improve their aim?

The answer is that it all depends on your point of view. In a strategic sense, his arrival has as much impact as spit in a sandstorm. However, the publicly financed visit undoubtedly provides the embattled Lib Dem leader with marvellous photo opportunities that will look great as a backdrop for his forthcoming conference speech. What this all cost in terms of transport and security is something that the Tax Payers Alliance should probably ask; if it ever occurs to them.

Sadly, but in keeping with the established trend of things turning to shit as soon as Thickish Nick opens his mouth, he undermined his insistence that the military campaign in Afghanistan is "turning the corner" by admitting he "had no idea exactly how and when we will succeed". The man’s status slipped further from ‘forgettable’ to ‘irrelevant’ when his worthy sentiments about the need for political engagement were politely dismissed by Afghan officials who stated it was currently "not practical in Helmand".

In politics, the usual advice given to anyone in a hole is to stop digging. In Clegg’s case, you can’t help but feel that his best move might be to jump in.

ConDems obstruct anti-human trafficking action

Whilst acknowledging Peter Black's insistence that “I write what I feel like writing and when I have something to say”, it is nonetheless remarkable how many things seem to get left off his blog while he focuses on non-events, e.g. the lacklustre Labour leadership contest.

One astonishing omission is the claim that Cameron & Clegg are sending out the "wrong signal" across the world after their ConDem government refused to endorse an EU directive designed to co-ordinate European efforts to combat the trade in sex slaves.

According to yesterday’s Guardian, new figures show that fewer traffickers are being jailed than at any time in the last five years. Campaigners are calling on ministers to adopt the directive which includes a common definition of the crime of trafficking, thus making it easier to convict offenders in the EU's 27 member states.

Back in 2008, Black wrote an uncompromising post backing Nick Clegg in his previous role as Lib Dem Home Affairs spokesman. The issue was immigration and the need for balanced & effective controls. Among the 12 points listed in Clegg’s comprehensive agenda was “full ratification of the Council of Europe convention on people trafficking”.

It seems an entirely logical step to sign up to the EU directive as well. What could be the problem and why aren’t Welsh Lib Dems taking up the issue? We should be told – as someone used to be quite fond of saying.


Update:

Sky News quotes a Home Office spokeswoman as stating that the government's decision could be reversed if it is "in Britain's interests".

"Human trafficking is a brutal form of organised crime and combating it is a key priority for the Government," she said.

"The UK already complies with most of what is required by the draft EU directive. The government will review the UK's position once the directive has been agreed, and will continue to work constructively with European partners on matters of mutual interest.

"By not opting in now but reviewing our position when the directive is agreed, we can choose to benefit from being part of a directive that is helpful, but avoid being bound by measures that are against our interests," she added.

At least 2,600 women have been trafficked into England and Wales according to the Association of Chief Police Officers.

What is it going to take?

There will probably be some profound words involved when Barack Obama announces today that US combat operations in Iraq are to come to an end. But there are just as likely to be people drawing parallels with Nixon’s address to the nation that troops were to return from Vietnam.

For all the passionate flag-waving, neither turning of events could ever be credibly portrayed as a victory or even “mission accomplished” – especially as few have ever agreed on either the purpose of the mission or the objectives entailed.

Another anticipated similarity is that Obama’s broadcast from the Oval Office will be no more overtly critical of the Bush administration than Nixon was of Johnson and Kennedy. US foreign policy will always run in conjunction with US interests and it would be naive to expect anything else. Even so, the president’s PR staffs have their hands full in presenting a failure to form a government in Baghdad and a huge new escalation in violence as an intended part of the strategy.

Things naturally look very different from this side of the pond where the recriminations and the rationalisations just keep on coming. Whitehall is full of people with decades of diplomatic experience and who were ignored by Blair & Brown in their eagerness to sign up to “regime change”; even though events subsequently unfolded to ensure it was their regime as well as Saddam’s that bit the dust. Moreover, and as several historians have pointed out, Anglo-American influence could very easily have installed democratic governments in post-War Persia.

The reason why they instead backed more despotic models is that two-thirds of the world's proven oil reserves are to be found in the Persian Gulf. Keeping it out of anti-democratic Russian soviet hands was a priority which necessitated equally undemocratic but “stable” administrations on the ground; thus protecting what was under it. Despite repeated denials at the Chilcott Enquiry, it is a key consideration that evoked contemporary echoes in 2003 when US cars could be seen sporting bumper stickers with the exhortation to “Kick his ass and grab the gas”.

The New Labour government ministers who were apparently swayed by talk of WMD launches within 45 minutes would not only have known about past illegal US interventions in sovereign states but would have quite possibly protested about them as students. If Al Qaeda were not active in Baghdad prior to invasion then the attack and subsequent occupation ensured that they have since thrived.

Whilst conspiracy theories continue to bounce around about David Kelly, the effect of winning a war but losing a peace means that what is now happening in Iraq arguably borders on a holocaust requiring co-ordinated humanitarian intervention as much as any natural disaster. Yet UK politicians seem unable to detach themselves from an American outlook which De Gaulle once described as "neurotic" and has been living up to the reputation ever since.  

In the 1980’s Britain served as a US aircraft carrier - and became a strategic target as a result. In later years, we provided the departure lounge for rendition flights. Why are we so politically interlinked when recent events show that US financial market trends are no longer the barometer which determines the weather in the UK compared to the economic bow-waves of India and China?

Every successive new PM makes the trip to Washington in the first few months of office while the UK media excitedly talks up the “special relationship”. Or in Cameron’s case, we assume the role of junior partner and the visit rates sixth spot on US network news. Each time the bitter lessons of the past are consigned into the bin in exchange for some undefined promise of a better future. It has proved time and again to be a dangerous and unproductive arrangement. What is it going to take before we learn?

Straws – and those who grasp at them

Oh dear. We didn’t think that Peter Black could get more fraught in his deflections during these awful early months of the ConDem coalition. But his latest appropriately entitled post, “All bluster and no substance”, which links us with self-serving Milord Prescott (no less) in order to portray a schism about NHS Direct, is bottom-scraping stuff indeed.

His “Labour-leaning” tag for this blog is now a rather tired allegation – and one which is based more on a lack of imagination than any supposed insight. Yet, such flailing around is only to be expected under such clearly trying times for Liberal Democrats. Perhaps we should be more sympathetic in future.

Nah.

Bullying - more extensive than reported

Wales on Sunday carries a report of how hundreds of staff in some Welsh councils could be suffering at the hands of a bullying culture. An investigation by WoS, covering 20 of 22 local authorities, revealed that nearly 200 council staff have complained of being bullied at work in the past 18 months.

It is not known if a alarming instance of verbal abuse & swearing by a Swansea Labour councillor is included in these findings. The long-serving individual with a known reputation for being erratic is said to have ‘lost it’ during exchanges with support staff. He is reported to have shouted “f.....g c..t” in front of several female employees, loudly enough to be heard in the adjoining room and an outside corridor

No disciplinary action has ever been taken against the councillor either by the council or the local government ombudsman.

Excuse me Ms Lumley, but ........

The Observer reports that the Gurkhas could be disbanded as a result of government in-fighting over defence spending.

Political insistence that the full £20bn cost of replacing Trident falls on Ministry of Defence budgets means that the Brigade of Gurkhas, which has been part of the British army for nearly  200 years, could among the ground forces scrapped unless more cash is made available.

Tory defence secretary Liam Fox is one of several ministers involved in brinkmanship games with the Treasury. According to Whitehall watchers, his game plan is to meet austerity targets by either slashing regiments or dumping, i.e. drastically reducing, Britain’s sea-borne nuclear deterrent.

The paper reports that the increasing costs of running the Gurkhas – whose rights were championed in a high-profile campaign by actress Joanna Lumley – now makes them a prime target for spending cuts.

Pundits predict that Clegg and Lib Dem ministers in the government will want to underline their role as policy moderators and opt for cutting Trident. They will also be influenced by defence chiefs making similar noises about the relevance or need for a nuclear replacement.

It would certainly be a popular announcement from the conference platform and a much needed deflection of activist dissent over what is seen as the leadership's disastrous handling of social policy.

Over and out for helpline

Although it has been de rigueur in recent weeks to question ConDem commitment to the form and spirit of devolved services, expectations are that criticism from Labour in Wales about government plans to scrap the NHS Direct helpline in England will be unusually muted.

Assembly chiefs are known to be deeply unsatisfied with their own call centre service which has consistently proved to be an expensive and irrelevant flop.

Despite several re-launches and marketing ploys, A&E departments throughout Welsh hospitals have yet to record any sort of decline in non-emergency arrivals. This is attributed in part to anecdotal reports of patients arriving at emergency rooms with minor ailments after being told by NHS Direct staff that it is the quickest way to receive treatment.

The view among officials is that ministers in Cardiff Bay will quietly close down the service before the end of the year and replace it with a national version of the 101 non-emergency number currently being piloted in Cardiff.

Mediums and messages

We see that the Beeb has caught up with our post of last Thursday about declining circulation figures in the Welsh regional press.

Understandably, the focus is mostly on the Western Mail, with ample comment from ex and current Trinity Mirror bods keen to talk the group’s future prospects. But in the commercial world, the claim that circulation was "improving slightly" sounds more like a clinical euphemism than a business projection.

Some analysts might also put a slight question mark against the comment by Alan Edmunds, publishing director at Media Wales, that the company's website was helping them reach a "large audience". Recent figures show the same downward trend, year-on-year, for web traffic at WalesOnline - although they still record the largest proportion of visits out of the three main news sites.

Meanwhile, and just a little ironically, it is Martin Shipton writing in the Western Mail who produces what is probably the best analysis so far of the on-going troubles at S4C.

Having recounted the improbable thinking behind an assumed continuity of the Welsh language channel, and focused on the tenure arrangements for interim chief exec Arwel Ellis Owen, Shipton quotes one of those ubiquitous insiders who states:

 “The new leadership of S4C needs to neutralise the perception that it’s nothing more than a self-serving clique of Welsh language bigwigs commissioning their friends to produce programmes that a decreasing number of especially younger people don’t want to watch. It’s that perception which in some quarters has led to S4C being referred to as S Pedwar Cheque”.

After metaphysical fluff from Owen about Wales’ status as the first fully digital country in the UK, the article ends nicely with him ruling out any question of the channel reverting to merely a peak hours operation, stating rather inadvisably, “people would find that unacceptable”.

Such statements not only have a way of sounding slightly pompous through repetition but also tend to become self-fulfilling. But then, something which Owen and his contemporaries in the Welsh media monopoly often overlook is that effective journalism is usually nothing more than knowing how and when to ask the right question.

A quote for Friday

“How long I take to address an issue is a matter for me. I write what I feel like writing and when I have something to say”.

Lib Dem AM Peter Black - writing on his blog in response to the query why it had taken him so long to give an opinion on the highly critical IFS report which claims that the recent ConDem budget will hit lower paid families. He does not accept the findings.

Still keeping it in the family

Although “reform” has become the watchword for ministers these days, recent revelations show that the Palace of Westminster is patently less wedded to the concept. The casual impression to be gained from putting one’s nose up against the misty windows of the Member’s Bar is that the proclaimed cleanup of parliamentary excesses has turned out to be little more than a quick wipe over with a damp cloth.

Take, for example, the promised crackdown on the abuse of MPs employing family members. When the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority (Ipsa) first came into being, it conducted a public consultation which recorded that 59 per cent of respondents wanted an end to instututionalised nepotism with just 22 per cent backing the practice.

Despite recommendations to the same effect from Sir Christopher Kelly, who conducted the wide-ranging review of the bad old system, Speaker John Bercow and all three party leaders, the new body nonetheless allowed a concession permitting the employment of wives and children who are described as "connected parties" under the new rules.

Although Ipsa’s chairman, Prof. Sir Ian Kennedy, admitted to have been ‘robustly lobbied’ by MPs, he added that his change of mind was based upon the “quality rather than the quantity" of consultation responses received. Of course, no-one has been vulgar enough to suggest that a £100K salary, plus a generous expenses package, subsequently voted through by MPs might also have been a factor.

This inexplicable u-turn means that, Ian Liddell-Grainger, member for Bridgewater and West Somerset and, as it happens 336th in line to the throne, is able to not only have has his wife working in his office but has also obtained Westminster passes for his two eldest children.

The regulations supposedly prohibit MPs from employing more than one relative, but Ipsa says it is not concerned about the arrangement as there is no record of the young Liddell-Graingers receiving any payment. They do not state if they have actually investigated.

Liddell-Grainger is one of nearly 30 MPs who have so far registered relatives as staff. Others include Hugo Swire, Margaret Beckett, Hilary Benn and Chris Grayling. Yet the full extent of the ‘approved’ practice is hidden by circumstances whereby family members who have different surnames or are not blood relatives may not have been declared.

Ipsa cost over £6 million to set up and has had to pay out a reported £1 million in interim subsistence claims since the election to tide MPs over for staff wages and office costs.

Earlier this week, details emerged of how honourable members had repeatedly swore at Ipsa staff as the expenses system was explained to them. One MP described it as a "fucking abortion", another described an Ipsa member of staff as a "monkey" and "nutty". Ipsa published accounts of nine incidents with MPs on its website in response to a freedom of information request. These were almost identical to earlier reports in the Sunday press which named a number of senior MPs, including the home secretary Theresa May and business secretary Vince Cable.

The expose comes in the same week that the Insitute of Fiscal Studies concluded that the ConDems emergency budget would penalise poorer families in the longer term.

Radio silence

No word from Welsh Lib Dem bloggers over seriously uncomfortable claims by the Institute of Financial Studies (IFS) that the coalition government’s emergency budget dumped on poorer families. No mention either of demands by equality groups requiring ministers to come clean on what social issues, if any, they took into account.

Strange that the usually erudite Welsh Lib Dem finance spokesperson has no comment on the matter and yet finds time to blog about drugs in Swansea and selection gossip.

Liberal Democrat Voice mentions that Clegg has an article in today’s Financial Times in which he attempts the esoteric by refusing to slavishly comply with “statistical tests, based often on somewhat arbitrary [Labour] measures” and talking up qualitative values instead.

Yet this was the same guy who was described by the FT back in June as ‘obsessed’ with the dynamics of a certain income distribution chart because it very much suited his purposes and his speech writers.

Even then, tax analysts were seriously questioning his claims that he was backing tough but fair fiscal medicine. As the article states very clearly, “The trouble is that this chart showing the spread of pain from the tax rises and benefit cuts is just a snapshot of 2012. It won’t look as fair after that.”

We don’t recommend reading the entire tortuous article by Clegg unless, that is, you think you would enjoy a reworked account of Lib Dem commitment to fairness masquerading as a ham-fisted attempt to redefine the meaning of “progressive".

Playing dumb

It occurs to us that one possible reason behind the falling circulation figures mentioned in the previous post could be the tendency of newspapers like the Beans on Toast to go off in the opposite direction to its readership when it comes to the more obvious priorities.

The first in a couple of examples afforded space in said publication is a bizarre report of how some anonymous non-entity posing as a 'health worker' objects to a local hospital employing additional consultants for an A&E department because it will cause an overspend(?) Somehow you can imagine an entirely different headline, not to mention reaction, if these posts were to be frozen.

And as if the spectacle of the community campaigning Post empathising with the bean-counters was not unsettling enough, the paper also thinks another newsworthy item is the local Labour angst over how the city’s social services department is £3.6 million over budget. Considering the earlier stories printed about overseas recruitments and the need for a greater focus on child protection, figuring out the eventual effect on council finances should be a no-brainer – even for the EP. Yet is anyone suggesting that the council should renege on its commitments and cut the amount? Er, no.

But credit where it's due. At least the Evening Post beat off our prediction that they would dutifully print official spin about a recent critical assessment on the council’s performance in advance of today's cabinet meeting. As it happens, they haven’t printed anything.

More circulation pain

The news on the circulation front continues to be bad for the Welsh regional press. Year-on-year figures dropped again with the Cardiff-based Western Mail and South Wales Echo between them recording the biggest percentage fall  of just over 10%.

The daily tabloid which proclaims itself the National Newspaper for Wales now has a circulation of under 30,000 and shows no sign of reversing the downward trend.

Figures published by industry body ABC are as follows:

South Wales Evening Post: 42,619 (-7.5%)

South Wales Echo: 35,389 (-10.1%)

Daily Post (Wales): 32,414 (-4.5%)

Western Mail: 29,567 (-10.2%)

South Wales Argus: 24,679 (-7.5%)

The depressing fall in sales will undoubtedly spark renewed debate in many quarters on the future of hard copy news as a medium within an industry increasingly dominated by internet publishing. One recent study reported that the daily newspaper is now the primary source of information for just 28% of the UK population. The projection is for the share to fall still further.  

Proprietors have been looking at the performance of the pay-to-read Times Online site. Results are said to be mixed since its launch six months ago with almost as many advertisers leaving as signing up. Nevertheless, the News of the World is the next Murdoch title to become a subscription site and both Trinity Mirror and DGMT are said to be considering rolling out limited versions of their flagship papers sometime next year.

A further expectation is for more and louder lamentations from the Society of Editors over how a decline in readership figures is linked to the advent of council sponsored free-sheets – despite the awkward fact that no-one has ever really managed to prove this to be the case; quantitatively speaking.

One of the few areas of agreement among the print barons is that the prospect of assistance from Westminster or Cardiff Bay is very remote indeed. What's more, with pressure growing for a much-troubled S4C to be adopted as the Assembly’s sickly child, any suggestion of a new subsidised Welsh language newspaper can be considered effectively stillborn.

Was the council grassed up?

We understand that police have been questioning whether anyone at Calamity Hall had prior knowledge of the massive cannabis factory operating out of a Swansea council-owned building.

Acting on information received, police in Swansea executed a search warrant under the misuse of drugs act at the former Four Seasons club in Llansamlet. The early indications are that it is the largest haul of its kind in the area.

Unfortunately, the only response to be elicited from a council source was “Yeah ... right ...Trallwn Road, you say .... mmm ........ sorry, what was the question again?”

Progressive regression

The lead story for most press & broadcasters today is the conclusion by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) that proposed ConDem welfare cuts in the June budget make working families on the lowest incomes, and particularly those with children, the biggest losers.

The report states: "Once all of the benefit cuts are considered, the tax and benefit changes announced in the emergency Budget are clearly regressive as, on average, they hit the poorest households more than those in the upper middle of the income distribution in cash, let alone percentage, terms."

According to the Beeb, the IFS analysis suggests that cuts to areas such as housing benefit and disability allowance would hit the poorest families to the tune of £422 between the Budget and April 2014. This means that only the richest 10% of households lost more in cash terms from the Budget, than those in the bottom 60%.

The report also questioned the government's decision to use the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) instead of the Retail Prices Index (RPI) when calculating certain benefits.

These findings come as a rebuttal of George Osborne's earlier claims that his austerity package was progressive in that it shielded poor families. There has been no comment from the chancellor although a Treasury statement last night claimed the IFS analysis was “selective” and ignored “the pro-growth and employment effects of budget measures such as helping households move from benefits into work, and reductions in corporation tax”.

Nick Clegg has previously maintained that the budget represented "progressive austerity" and that fairness was “hard-wired” into government proposals. Sound- bites aside, it is unlikely that many Lib Dem MPs will be comfortable with such a negative assessment from Britain's leading independent tax experts. But whether they actually do anything about it is probably just as doubtful.

We will also have to wait and see if the Welsh Lib Dem’s finance spokesman has any progressive thoughts about regressive budgets.

Update:
Nick Clegg has dismissed the IFS findings as "by definition, partial". The problem is that he fails to elaborate on whether he means partial (incomplete) or partial (opposite of impartial) or both - as if it matters anyway.

His response is that "If you just look at who is receiving benefits then, in a sense, you don't ask the most important question of all, which is how you can relieve poverty and make Britain fairer by getting people off benefits and into work." 

The bottom line however is that when George Osborne described his Budget measures as progressive, he was referring to changes taking effect by 2012. The IFS argues that we should look at a longer period, up to 2014, taking in a fuller range of measures including cuts to housing benefit.  Over to you, Nick.

Humbug!

We note that yesterday’s Wales on Sunday managed to find space to recount the outrage by uber-parsimonious Taxpayers Alliance that £40,000 was spent over three years between all 22 Welsh local authorities on celeb endorsements & personal appearances. This equates to about £606 a year per council.    

Matthew Elliott, TPA chief executive said: “It is obscene that ordinary taxpayers, who don’t earn much, are funding the lifestyles of the rich and the famous”. Hmm.

It’s an interesting comment from someone who heads up a rather shadowy outfit that still refuses to fully disclose details of salaries & expenses or how the organisation is financed. Speculation persists that the TPA receives significant donations from tory MPs - whose salaries and allowances are funded by the taxpayers.

Even the WoS would have to concede that this self-appointed spending watchdog is patently scraping the barrel by questioning whether the annual fireworks display or Christmas lights switch-on should include some C-list celeb who is enjoying an extended 15 minutes after their appearances on a instantly forgettable reality show. And we all know what kind of Scrooge-related headlines appear in the local press whenever a Santa's parade is curtailed.  

As it happens, Mr Elliot leaves the TPA this October to head up a campaign opposed to electoral reform. It will be fascinating to learn how this operation is funded and how many un-paid celebs are invited to share platforms with the rich & famous tory politicians.

Cameron's solution to the housing shortage

A slightly sickening story is to be found on Thisismoney.co.uk which reveals that the Camerons are cashing in on the luxury London property market by letting their £2.7million house in Notting Hill. This means that they could pocket up to £6,000 a month whilst living in No 10 or at the official country retreat of Chequers.

The finance and mortgage website maintains that the PM and family also have the use of their £ 1million constituency home in the Cotswolds, which has benefited from years of taxpayer funding through the Westminster second homes allowance.

The tory leader sought to convince the public of his frugality when he became Prime Minister by announcing that he and his ministers would take a 5% cut in salary and a pay freeze for the next five years. That means he is earning £142,500 a year, £7,500 a year less than his predecessor, Gordon Brown. But the lucrative rental arrangement –  which could bring in up to £72,000 a year – will more than make up the shortfall.

A poor performance

It is entirely understandable that the Beans on Toast would get itself excited by an admission from Lib Dem leader Chris Holley that Swansea Council is “skint” and could be selling off the Grand theatre along with other civic heirlooms belonging to local taxpayers.

So they can be excused for being distracted an item in the same agenda which is a corporate assessment report by the Auditor General for Wales who says the local authority has to pull its socks up and start making improvements.  

Findings in the 14 page report resemble a curate’s egg but with few actual good parts. It kicks off by saying, “our reviews indicated a mixed picture of both very good performance and areas for concern in major service areas" and it's a sure bet that the civic spin-corps will be highlighted the few positives to be found. You can also be reasonably sure that the local paper will happily reproduce the same one-side bullshit on Monday without serious question.

Therefore, we thought we’d introduce a bit more balance into the process by flagging up the bad bits – especially since we're spoilt for choice.

As you would expect, the AG’s audit team highlighted on-going problems in child & family services and stated an expectation that the council can "demonstrate that the necessary improvements are embedded and capable of sustaining improvement”. The impression however is that the auditors did not exactly get the evidence they were seeking.

On finance, the report mentions “governance problems” and wants to see “tough and timely decisions to secure the necessary savings”. Whilst there is as an acknowledgement that the council has a “stable” management team the auditors found flaws exist in some business arrangements.

The political dealings of the council earned little praise with a section highlighting the “further challenge of transforming services in a political environment of organised opposition”. This is a reference to the cross-party tendency for councillors to shop each other to the Ombudsman for petty and politically driven reasons (the recent referral by the council leader of 33 opposition members to the local government watchdog and consequent abortive investigation being an expensive case in point).  

There is also a serious question mark over machinations by the Lib Dem leadership that kept cronies in post through an increase in the number of sinecures Planning committees – a move which some officers already say has caused significant delays and additional costs.

The report’s authors make no bones about their view that it is a retrograde move and state,

”The increased number of Planning Committees is contrary to both officer and a previous audit recommendation 3 (Sept 2008). The Council must demonstrate that an increase in the number of these Planning Committees represents an efficient and proper use of resources. This issue is an area that we will be reviewing through the summer months.”

This is followed by further censure over internal gerrymandering by Holley which created new posts paying Special Responsibility Allowances to balance out those lost following an external independent review. The report is scathing:

“Other increases to the number of committees will need to be justified in the light of the contents of the recent Independent Remuneration Panel for Wales. This report states: ‘Councils should note we do not expect, as a consequence of our decision to remove Special Responsibility Allowances from chairs of non-regulatory and non-scrutiny committees and from all vice chairs, that there will be an increase in the number of posts attracting an SRA, other than when a well-evidenced rationale supported by the Council at large and which can be publicly justified is provided to the Panel for its consideration.’”

The auditor's dissatisfaction with arrangements unashamedly imposed to sustain a system of political patronage is compounded by their findings that councillors are otherwise excluded from important key activities and slates the fact that "the role of members is not clearly defined in terms of identifying and monitoring risk.“

But it is the council’s shortcomings in information technology which attract the most serious criticism. Despite claims in the council's propaganda rag about computerised super-systems engendering all sorts of back-office improvements, the auditor state that “the structure of decision making in ICT in the Council is confused” and that the council only has “limited in-house ICT capability and frequently uses consultants for advice and guidance".

Besides being a personal indictment of business improvement cabinet member Mary Jones, the revelation shows up the patent hypocrisy of local Lib Dems who have been regularly pointing the finger at the Welsh Assembly Government for using outside specialists.

The report carries seven key recommendations including an insistence that the council works more closely with its partners and that it takes better ownership of financial & service planning. Improvements are also needed it says in political accountability and ICT capabilities and there is a call for more attention to staff development. It finishes with a warning that “a lack of clarity on the future role of HR in the council” means it may end up without the staff resources needed to implement the changes aimed at boosting performance.

No doubt Holley & Co will mumble their way through the words written down for them at Thursday’s cabinet meeting. The report will proceed without amendment to the next council meeting in the certain knowledge that a docile (and pre-purchased) majority will vote through whatever recommendations are put in front of them. But before Labour and Tory hatchet men start sharpening their predictable rhetoric, they may wish to ask themselves to what degree they have managed to become part of the problem. While they’re at it they might try to establish just how many of the voters out there actually regard them as any sort of a solution.

The answer to that question may prove as uncomfortable to the opposition as the Auditor General’s report is for the ruling administration.

Handstands

Welsh Lib Dem meta-blog Freedom Central demonstrates a notable feat of gymnastics this morning with a post entitled, UK Government should not dismiss request for alcohol licensing powers out-of-hand.

Earlier in the week, the collaborative site came in for considerable stick here & elsewhere for its apparent loss of devolutionary zeal in pretty much dismissing an attempt by Edwina Hart to have Wales go it alone on alcohol pricing and licensing hours.

The widespread criticism prompted a comment from Lib Dem Peter Black who claimed that FC is “an independent though Lib Dem inclined blog” and that “official Lib Dem policy is to devolve justice powers to the Assembly”.  Identical phrasing appears in today’s FC post and the long-winded title suggests that the text has also been issued as a press release.

Biggest non-surprise of the week

Nick Clegg has confirmed that the lure of high office means that Lib Dems will remain in coalition with the Conservatives even if electoral reform is blocked.

Speaking on BBC Radio 4's Westminster Hour, the deputy PM was sanguine that his party’s opinion poll ratings have plummeted (down from 27% to 14%) since the general election whilst tories retain a 40% popularity mark.

Clegg told the interviewer that the Liberal Democrats "aren't a sort of glorified form of the Electoral Reform Society" and that, personally, he cared about other issues such as social mobility "probably even more than electoral reform".

The clarification marks the end of what has been a difficult week for the junior partner. He was ambushed by disgruntled former supporters on a publicity trip to the north and saw his social mobility announcements undermined by strong official hints of cuts to universal benefits.

Nevertheless, his firm position was that no one would be taking ''any notice'' of the Lib Dems if they were not in government and that forming a coalition with Labour could have made the party’s "identity crisis" even worse.

So there you have it, joining the tories has saved the Lib Dems from becoming a bunch of confused attention-seekers.

Recess

A visitor recently returned from the smoke tells us that Westminster echoes to the sound of saws & hammers as running repairs plus the odd mod are made to offices whilst MPs are away for their extended summer break.

Of course, the business of government still continues - more or less - although there is precious little of the promised clarity to be had as ministers send out contradictory signals on the extent & duration of the public sector austerity package. Few expect any difference when parliament resumes.

At least MPs are doing their bit to boost the economic outlook. Sadly the economies in question are those of France, Italy and the USA, according to a sample of contact numbers left with stay-at-home staff.

But let’s be honest, MPs away on their hols are not exactly missing much. Recent appearances by Cameron & Clegg in shirtsleeves meeting mode served to confirm that their interest in politics was undoubtedly fuelled by the fact that they were both crap in public relations jobs. Lib Dems want a veto, Tories want a new treasurer and the middle-class want to hold on to their benefits.

Meanwhile Labour holds its breath in anticipation of a leadership contest despite knowing that the outcome will have less impact on the national consciousness as the result of Big Brother. Ah well.

Recess ends on 6 September but Conference Recess then operates from 16 September to 11 October.