Chris Whiteside's Blog

These are the lyrics to the 18th century song "The Glorious First of June" commemorating a naval battle on 1st June 1794  which both the British and French claim as a victory. And here's the unusual thing - they were both right, because both sides succeeded in the objects for which they fought. The Royal Navy's primary objective was to confirm their naval superiority in the Western Approaches and enhance Britain's security by damaging the French fleet, and the Channel Fleet under Admiral Lord Howe (left of centre in the painting below) achieved exactly that, inflicting a severe tactical defeat on the French Atlantic fleet. In fierce fighting the British captured seven French ships of the line, one of which later sank, without losing any. However, the French navy's objective had been to ensure that a grain convoy got through to France where people were starving due to a poor harvest, and they achieved it. Howe went for the French fleet, which was the main threa...

“If Keir Starmer can’t deal with Dianne Abbott, how on earth is he going to deal with Vladimir Putin?” (Chancellor Jeremy Hunt )

Next week is the 80th anniversary of the D-Day assault, Operation Overlord, which began the liberation of Europe. There will be a series of national events and also local events all over the country.   More details of events which the royal family are taking part in can be found on the internet at The 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings | The Royal Family I will be posting details of local events in Leeds and Egremont in the coming days.

This morning,    writing in The Daily Telegraph , the Chancellor confirmed under the Conservatives,  we will not increase the rates of income tax, National Insurance, or VAT, and we will focus on cutting the unfair double tax on work.  We are the only party with clear plan to cut taxes for working people, by taking bold action to secure your family finances.  The Conservatives will take bold action to cut taxes. We will cut National Insurance until it is gone whenever it is economically responsible to do so, making work pay, and our Triple Lock Plus will keep the State Pension free from income tax, supporting those who rely on it in retirement. Labour cannot say the same. There are big choices facing the country at this election, not least on the economy. After the turbulent years of Covid and the energy crisis caused by Putin, Rishi Sunak has restored stability to the economy, meaning we have been able to cut taxes. When it’s affordable, we will continue to cut...

 

 

On 29 May 2024, the Conservatives announced we will deliver 100,000 more apprenticeships by the end of the next parliament and we will pay for this by cutting low-value degrees which make people poorer.   We want young people to secure the best opportunities with a good well-paid job which means we need to crack down on university degrees which make people poorer at the expense of the taxpayer. That is why we have set out a clear plan to deliver 100,000 more apprenticeships per year by the end of the next parliament, funded by changing the law to close the poorest performing university courses. This will make sure we continue with the rollout of our successful apprenticeship program which since 2010 has seen over 5.8 million people get the skills and opportunities they deserve.  This bold action will ensure young people have the skills they need to get good, secure jobs. Labour would halve the number of apprenticeships and take young people back to square one. We are doin...

 

The Labour candidate for Stroud is in hot water this morning, after posting a video on X, formerly Twitter, in which a woman called Milly described herself as having been a 'centrist Conservative all my life' but said she was now voting for Labour and for him. There is one slight problem. The Guido Fawkes website swiftly pointed out that "Milly" is in fact Labour councillor Milly Hill, who represents the Cam East ward on Stroud District council. You can find Guido's article at Labour's "Hero Conservative" is Labour Councillor – Guido Fawkes (order-order.com) and more details on the Daily Mail site at   'Lifelong Tory voter' now backing Starmer exposed as Labour councillor (msn.com) When challenged about this, Councillor Hill admitted she last voted Conservative when David Cameron was leader - so at least three elections ago - and voted for Jeremy Corbyn in 2019. Sadly, there are people in all parties who play this kind of trick but this is a ...

 Uncertain times call for a clear plan and bold action to chart a course to a secure future. Today the Prime Minister will continue campaigning in the South West of England, setting out a clear plan to deliver 100,000 more high skilled apprenticeships a year – taking bold action to secure opportunities for our young people alongside our National Service plan.  Improving education is the closest thing we have to a silver bullet to secure a better future for young people, which is why we have massively driven up standards since Labour left office and delivered 5.8 million apprenticeships.  The Conservatives will go further by scrapping "rip off" degrees that are not giving young people the skills they need and for which taxpayers are footing the bill, and instead will fund 100,000 new apprenticeships a year.  We are taking bold action and setting out a clear plan to secure young people’s futures.

Tackling tax avoidance and evasion A Conservative government will raise at least £6 billion a year by the end of the Parliament by cracking down on aggressive tax avoidance and evasion, improving tax compliance and closing the tax gap. Sticking to the plan:  In the last year, inflation has fallen from 11.1 per cent to 2.3 per cent, the economy is growing and we are cutting taxes for 29 million working people. If we want to continue with our clear plan and bold action to cut taxes, it is vital that people and businesses pay the taxes they owe. Under the last Labour government, the tax gap (the difference between taxes owed and taxes actually collected) was far too high. Since 2010, we have introduced 200 measures to tackle the tax gap which has already achieved significant progress, and we are taking further bold action to raise at least £6 billion a year more by the end of the next Parliament from continuing to crack down on tax avoidance and evasion. Only Rishi Sunak and the Conse...

A thread on X, formerly Twitter, from Conservative Home's Paul Goodman (who was MP for Wycombe 2001-2020)  MP retirements. A thread.  1) It’s claimed that Conservative MPs are quitting the Commons rather than lose their seats on July 4.  In some cases, this is true.  But it’s not the whole truth. Or even the most important part of it.  After all … 2) …At least 27 Labour MPs are also quitting. Five of these retirements were announced yesterday -  @KevinBrennanMP @KeeleyMP @spellar @ViendraSharma and @JohnCryerMP …. 3) … Which must be borne in mind.  27 is small scale compared to the 80 or so on the Conservative side.  And, certainly, there have been recent big-scale turnover before what are widely seem as fin de siecle elections.  Consider the figures ... 4) 117 MPs stood down in 2020 and 149 in 2010 (boosted in the latter case by “expenses”).  Otherwise, the highest recent total was 2015, in which 90 MPs quit.  (2017 and 2019 were ...

Today the Prime Minister announced a new, enhanced Triple Lock Plus plan to protect pensioners - particularly the poorest pensioners who depend on the Basic State Pension. The new Triple Lock Plus will cut income tax for pensioners from next year and make sure the state pension is always below their tax free threshold. This will ensure dignity and financial security in retirement.  We have cut tax for working people by reducing National Insurance from 12 per cent to 8 per cent. Now we will cut tax for pensioners too. That is why, from next April we will increase the personal allowance for pensioners in line with the Triple Lock by introducing a new age-related allowance – a tax cut of around £100 for 8 million pensioners. And we will guarantee in legislation that the pensioners’ personal allowance will rise in line with the highest of earnings, prices or 2.5 per cent so that it is higher than the State Pension in each year of the next Parliament: the new Triple Lock Plus. We are do...

 

 

Writing in the Daily Express, Defence Secretary Grant Shapps sets out in an article called " Britain’s going to toughen up because our adversaries certainly are. " how our bold new model of national service for 18-year-olds will up-skill the next generation, with real-world skills, values and experience they could never learn in a classroom, giving them what they need to succeed, make our nation more secure and strengthen our national security. In uncertain times we need to honest about the long-term challenges we face, including generations of young people who don’t have the opportunities they deserve. That is why a future Conservative Government will introduce mandatory National Service for every 18-year-old to be spent in a competitive, full-time military commission or spending one weekend a month volunteering in their community. Uncertain times call for a clear plan and bold action to chart a course to a secure future. Our plan will ensure the youngest generations, and ou...

The Labour party has been making a real effort to sell itself as friendly to business. There is no doubt that both "New Labour" under Blair and Starmer's current Labour leadership are less hostile to business than "old Labour" or the Corbyn left were. That does not necessarily mean that they understand the realities of business economics as well as they think they do. As Bim Afolami, Economic Secretary to the Treasury, and MP for Hitchin and Harpenden in the last parliament (now standing for the redrawn constituency of Hitchin after his old constituency was split up by the  boundary commission) writes in this article, with very very few exceptions Labour candidates in this election are public sector or pressure group workers, trade union activists, or lawyers. Well worth a read.

 

"As Putin's three-day war enters it's third year ..." ( Start of an MoD press release yesterday about the enormous cost of the war to Russia. It is estimated that the financial cost of the war to Russia so far exceed $211 billion - not to mention that they hae also lsot tens of thousands of human lives.)

People who have worked hard their lives deserve to enjoy their retirement with security and dignity, which is why the Conservatives have committed to the Triple Lock in our manifesto .• The Conservatives have increased the State Pension by over £ 900 this year, are providing additional cost of living payments to pensioners to help with high energy bills, and we are delivering pension reforms to boost pension pots for hardworking people.  • The choice at this election is clear: the Conservatives who have increased the State Pension by £3,700 since coming to power and will protect the Triple Lock, or Labour who raided pensions when last in Government and want to increase taxes on pensioners. The Conservatives will protect pensioners by:  • Protecting the Triple Lock and uprating the State Pension by £900 this year, protecting pensioners’ incomes. We have protected the Triple Lock we introduced in 2011 and will uprate the State Pension by 8.5 per cent in April 2024 in line with ...

 A lovely afternoon to be out campaigning in the Hillcrest area of Whitehaven.

I jumped the gun by posting a version of Sir John Stainer's anthem "I saw the Lord" last Sunday, because it's more appropriate to Trinity Sunday, which is today. That is both because the lyrics of the anthem reference the Trinity, and because most of them are taken from the prophet Isiah's account of his vision of The Lord in the year that King Uzziah died, which forms the Old Testament lesson appointed for today.   So as a second music spot for Trinity Sunday, here is a different recording of Stainer's masterpiece, this time sung by The Sixteen.

Today  the Prime Minister has set out that a future Conservative government will introduce mandatory National Service  for every 18-year-old, to be spent in a competitive, full-time military commission or spending one weekend a month volunteering in civil resilience.  We have so much to be proud of as a country, but we also need to be open and honest about the long-ter m challenges that our country and our society faces. One of the challenges we want to tackle is that we have generations of young people who don’t have the opportunities they deserve.  That is why we will introduce a bold new model of National Service for 18-year-olds to be spent either in a competitive, full-time military commission over 12 months or with one weekend per month volunteering roles in the community, like as a special constable, RNLI volunteer, or NHS responder. This will give young people real world skills, while contributing to their country and community. We have so much to be proud of...