The Poliblogs 14th August 2007

John Redwood Hits Back

John Redwood recounts his experience of dealing with the media yesterday HERE and says that 'idiotic name calling, Labour spin and missing the point' is what is putting people off politics. He robustly defends his proposals...

Iain Dale

Heathrow needs more runways

The case for Heathrow getting a third runway is overwhelming. It is mad that the world’s third busiest airport in terms of passenger numbers only has two runways while Amsterdam’s Schipol airport, 12th on the list, has five and Charles De Gaulle in Paris, seventh, and Barajas in Madrid, 13th, have four each.

Coffee House

Britain has no hope of meeting renewable targets Blair signed up to in the spring.

"Government officials have secretly briefed ministers that Britain has no hope of getting remotely near the new European Union renewable energy target that Tony Blair signed up to in the spring - and have suggested that they find ways of wriggling out of it"

Alan Beddow

Senior Tory says "You may not like Cameron, but don't tell everyone"

A senior Tory, Lord Marland, has called for Tories to keep criticism of David Cameron behind closed doors.

"It is very unfortunate when people jump on the criticism bandwagon when you hit turbulent times because you are playing straight into the hands of our opposition.

Norfolk Blogger

Micro Managing Conman Moves Next Door

The Guardian is trumpeting an extra £39bn spending Gordo has apparently pledged since he moved next door.

Needless to say, looking at the detail reveals the usual mix of apples and pears, multi-year figures aggregated to sound much bigger than they are, and re-announcements of figures already included in existing budgets. For example, the first item is:

"An extra £7.7bn for defence to 2011, a 1.5% average real terms increase, excluding the cost of operations met from the reserve."

Burning Our Money

Andrew Lilico: What form should Britain's nuclear deterrent take?

What form should Britain's nuclear deterrent take?

Earlier this year there was a short and seemingly decisive debate over nuclear weapons, focussed on two main positions — namely (A) that we should commit to replacing Trident with a new generation of submarine-based city-killing nuclear weapons (a sort of Trident II); or (B) that we should abandon Britain's independent nuclear deterrent. Slightly less discussed positions were that we should put the decision off for a few years, or that we should aim to extent Trident's life.

Conservative Home

Let them all in ...

All Iraqis who fear for their lives, not just the translators, should be given the right to come and live in the US or UK.

Inayat Bunglawala

The Pointlessness of Number Ten Petitions

As you may know, I refuse to link to any of the Downing Street petitions because they're a waste of time. The PM hasn't a clue how many people have signed them and isn;t even given a Top Ten in his red box eaxh week. The European Referendum petition is a good case in point. It reads...

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to refrain from signing any agreement to create a new European Union treaty without first holding a referendum to ascertain the opinion of the British public.

Iain Dale

We're not playing with you

A thought occurs: if Labour, the Tories and the LibDems really are serious about supporting the Union and stressing its benefits, why are they refusing to take part in the 'national conversation' discussing Scotland's constitutional future? Why not engage, and emphasise the positive rather that sit and carp from the sidelines?

J. Arthur MacNumpty

Cameron is wrong about the European referendum – and by making it an issue he’s hauling up the white flag for the next General Election

As regular readers of this blog know, I am passionately committed, almost to the point of obsession, about accountability and democracy, for example in local health services.

So why do I find myself opposed to a referendum on the European Reform Treaty? It seems rather a counter-intuitive, anti-democratic and an unpopular view to take so I think it needs a bit of explanation.

Jeremy Hargreaves

Five reasons to be serious during the silly season

At the moment the papers are full of "silly season" stories (and blogs seem to be full of stories about how the media are full of silly season stories - we just need the TV to start covering how the blogs are covering ... !), but just because J Prescott and G Brown go off on their summer holidays, it doesn't mean the world stops turning.

So here are five serious (but I hope interesting!) stories that have just caught my eye in between the piece of Lego retrieved from the sea / remember to shake the sand out of your shoes before leaving the beach / etc stories:

Lynne Featherstone

Good and bad news for Dave from the ICM detail

The full detail from yesterday’s ICM poll for the Sunday Mirror is now on the ICM website and, as I usually do, have clipped the voting intention the above voting intention data categories by what respondents said they did last time.

Political Betting

The great William Hague fairy story

As far as most fashionable people are concerned, it is a serious sin to be 'rightwing', two words they like to run together into one. And it is also very easy. All you need to do is to disagree with any small part of what they regard as the 'progressive' agenda - though they use the word 'progressive' as if it were an entirely neutral description of what they desire.

Peter Hitchens