6.45pm Iain Anderson on Comment: This is the week to unlock private sector infrastructure investment
6.15pm Columnist Andrew Lilico: How the end of the Roman Empire led to the rise of political liberalism
5.15pm WATCH: The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge are expecting a baby. Congratulations to the royal couple from ConservativeHome.
5.15pm LeftWatch: Labour MPs queue up on Twitter to congratulate the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge
3pm WATCH: Margaret Hodge: "Name and shame aggressive tax avoiders." Jesse Norman: "That won't work"
1.30pm ThinkTankCentral: Autumn statement run-up: Reform looks at fiscal rules. The CPS recommends wage and aid freezes – and no carbon price floor
1.15pm Local Government: College of Social Work – another taxpayer funded group lobbying against the Government
10.45am ToryDiary: As Jeremy Hunt waits on a bench, The Birds fly in. First one…then four…then seven…then –
ToryDiary: Jeremy Hunt aims to be angrier than any voter at NHS failures
Also on ToryDiary: Rodney Leach helped to stop the Euro and defeat AV. Today, he sets out a platform for "moderate Euro-sceptics"
Columnist Bruce Anderson: Bold Boles and shy Gove
Damian Hinds on Comment: Capping payday loans is less than half the battle
Also on Comment: Lord Ashcroft – A simple proposal to help the Treasury
Local Government:
Two warnings about the Conservative brand problem:
May to Clegg: don't block data communications bill (or, as the Sun puts
it: "warning to Nick Clegg on terrorists, crooks and paedos)
"Theresa
May today warns MPs who oppose new powers to probe the internet: “Do
not put politics before people’s lives.” In an exclusive interview with
The Sun, the Home Secretary insists “we could see people dying” if a
new law to authorise online probing is blocked. Her thinly-veiled attack
on Deputy PM NIck Clegg’s stand on civil liberties grounds is the most
explosive public exchange yet between senior Coalition ministers." – The
Sun
All knife thugs will be sent to prison, says Grayling…
"The
Cabinet minister said anyone who uses a knife to threaten others in a
public place will be jailed. Of the 4,207 people arrested for carrying
knives this spring, only 951 – 22 per cent – were sent to prison. One in
five was let off with a caution. Today, Mr Grayling will announce
mandatory jail for ‘aggravated knife crime’ committed by those aged over
16." – Daily Mail
(…But he may not vote against them voting)
"This
is because as Lord Chancellor and the head of the judiciary in England
and Wales he cannot defy the European court, which provides rulings for
courts in this country to follow. This will mean he will not be able to
back his fellow MPs in trying to continue the ban in the House of
Commons. He said he would have to take legal advice before opposing any
move in the House of Commons to give prisoners the vote." – Daily
Telegraph
> Yesterday: ToryDiary: Chris Grayling confirms that he may not be able to vote against prisoner voting
Egypt judges refuse to oversee Morsi referendum – BBC
Autumn statement: Two Days out
"David Cameron has refused to sanction the new property taxes that Nick Clegg has pushed for, including any new council tax bands for properties over £1 million. In turn, Mr Clegg rejected a Tory proposal to take housing benefit away from under-25s. Liberal Democrats also appear to have fought off Tory pressure for a freeze on work-related benefits. Non-pensioner benefits are likely to be increased next year by about 1 per cent, below September’s benchmark 2.2 per cent inflation figure." – The Times (£)
> Today: Lord Ashcroft on Comment: A simple proposal to help the Treasury
> Yesterday:
More green news 1) Davey aims to push EU on emissions cuts as he arrives in Doha for climate change conference – The Times (£)
More green news 2) Yeo considering target to slash energy emissions – Financial Times (£)
Tim Montgomerie: Hunt's plan to learn from Gove, reform the NHS – and stave off crisis
"Mr Gove’s priority is to focus his attention on the small minority of failing schools and to bring them up to standard. Mr Hunt wants to embrace a similar model for healthcare. He aims to introduce a range of indicators and Ofsted-style measures that will allow all of us to compare the performances of different parts of the NHS. One of his key indicators will be a new friends and families test that was the brainchild of the Prime Minister." – The Times (£)
Hunt: Transparency, rather than targets, will help to improve our healthcare system, and people's trust in the NHS will soar
"The first thing we need to do is understand how we are performing at the moment, recognising that some areas, some hospitals and some staff are doing things better than others, so all clinicians can learn from the high-fliers. Likewise, patients should be able to access much more useful data about their local services, so that if there is better care on offer somewhere else they can seek it out or demand it from their local NHS." – Jeremy Hunt, The Guardian
> Today: ToryDiary – Jeremy Hunt aims to be angrier than any voter at NHS failures
> Yesterday: John Baron MP on Comment: The Government risks missing an opportunity to implement an earlier cancer diagnosis regime
HS2 opponents drive attempts to sink plan – Financial Times (£)
Bob Stewart, Skidmore, Doyle-Price, Freeman – and others – "back down over Leveson press law" as Cameron prepares to meet editors…
"Chris Skidmore, the MP for Kingswood and one of the signatories, said he believed current criminal and libel laws were sufficient to guard against press impropriety and added: “I’m not in favour of any statutory regulation.”…Bob Stewart, the Tory MP for Beckenham and another signatory of the letter, told The Times: “I would prefer the regulator not to be supported by statute.” The Sunday Telegraph named two others, Jackie Doyle-Price and George Freeman, who took a similar view." – The Times (£)
…And Beckenham MP claims Nick Boles is becoming "a hate figure"
"Mr
Stewart, the Tory MP for Beckenham, said his local association members
were close to revolt over Mr Boles’s outspoken approach to planning. The
minister said last week that “another 2 to 3 per cent of [Britain’s]
land” — equivalent to more than 1,500 square miles, more than the area
of Essex — should be built on to relieve the country’s housing shortage.
Boles is rapidly becoming a hate figure,” Mr Stewart said. “They would
much prefer building on brownfield sites.” – The Times (£)
> Today: Columnist Bruce Anderson – Bold Boles and shy Gove
Adonis counter-attacks Ebdon university 'snobbery' attack – Daily Mail
Boris Johnson: Leveson – the politically correct judge
"He endorses just about every politically correct criticism of the mainstream press, to the point where he seems to want to sterilise it of fun and flavour. He complains, for instance, that the Mail was wrong to say that an asylum seeker was given leave to remain because of the attachment he had formed to his cat. I read the judgment, and the cat was certainly mentioned. It struck me as an entirely legitimate headline. He seems to want to make the British press as earnest as the Neue Zürcher Zeitung, whose front-page splash was once about “100 years of Electric Light in Switzerland” – Daily Telegraph
> Yesterday:
Ofsted call to scrap nursery school subsidies for middle-income parents – The Times (£)
Not integration. Not withdrawal. But customs union membership – and little else
"The shape of a new Europe therefore writes its own script — a neighbourly alliance, partly federal, partly by treaty between independent states, in which those who want to share a currency and economic sovereignty and those who just want co-operation would be equally welcome. Only trade, the bedrock of the original Common Market, would be universal. In truth, it is not the eurozone that is the “core” of Europe — it is the single market." – The Times (£)
Today: ToryDiary – Rodney Leach helped to stop the Euro and defeat AV. Today, he sets out a platform for "moderate Euro-sceptics"
Cameron banned ministers from speaking to Dalai Lama – Daily Telegraph
We’re already halfway to a split with the UK, says Nicola Sturgeon – Scotsman
Robinson: DUP can entice more Catholics – Belfast Telegraph
Binge-drink 'shame' filming shelved over Welsh Government concerns – Wales Online
Prescott threatens to gag Channel 4 probe into his business links with China – Daily Mail
How we lost 43 of our family in the Holocaust: the Miliband family story – David Miliband, Daily Mail
Nadine: I will get the whip back 'very shortly' ('Sources': she will not get the whip back very shortly) – Daily Telegraph
Home cover soars due to floods – Daily Express
Christmas bargain hunters are expected to splash out £465million today – the biggest online shopping spree in history – Daily Mail
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