The Guardian is reporting:
A significant email from a senior official warning Martin Reynolds not to hold the summer party on 20 May has now been obtained by Gray, first reported by ITV.
Cabinet Office sources said she had already been given the authority to search email records – which are retained even from departing officials. A Whitehall source said Gray is nearing the end of her inquiry and publication next week was very likely.
Now Operation “Thumb Screw” – Owl
It is a remarkable feature of the present political landscape that the future governance of Britain rests on the varying, not to say wavering, bravery of Conservative backbenchers. Who, in other words, are they more frightened of? Like unwilling participants in a Westminster version of Squid Game, they are subject to pressures that are as diverse as they are intense, and appear to be in stalemate.
Is it the threats and alleged blackmail coming from special advisers and the party whips? These enforcers stand accused by William Wragg, himself a Tory MP and select committee chair, of bullying Tory MPs into supporting Boris Johnson. Or, depending on their majorities, are these hapless tribunes of their people more anxious about the anger of their electors? Do they stay awake at night worrying about whether their local associations, usually more loyal to the party’s leadership, will back them if they rebel against the prime minister?
Weighing such factors must leave little time for them to consider the wider national interest, or navigate the moral maze of Partygate. Sad to say, when politicians wrestle with their conscience, their conscience usually loses.
“Operation Save Big Dog” might sound cuddly – comical even – but, just like Big Dog himself, it could have a nasty side. As our reporting has revealed, insiders claim they were told to delete their texts and emails and effectively dispose of evidence relating to lockdown parties – advice that may have been unlawful. Downing Street has, however, denied these claims.
No one should be under the illusion that the Commons is some sort of kindergarten and the whips kindly nursery school teachers. Threats and malice are their trade. They maintain black books, and files, and spreadsheets on the private lives of elected members (from which information is occasionally leaked). The Johnson file is probably more extensive than most, ironically. They know where the bodies are buried, because they buried them. In some cases, TV shows such as The Thick of It and House of Cards look more like documentary than fiction.
What is perhaps new in the Johnson operation is the blatant leverage of public expenditure in certain parliamentary constituencies to force MPs to do what they are told. The allocation of regeneration funding, along with the relocation of government offices, to places chosen on the basis of their political significance rather than their merit has been well remarked on. The suspicion is that if some red wall community was wise enough to elect a Conservative MP, or another prosperous area is lucky enough to have a cabinet minister representing them, they have a better chance of the high street being done up, courtesy of the Treasury and the taxpayer.
The threat to withdraw such schemes from recalcitrant Tory backbenchers in marginal seats is another manifestation of the “spoils” system of politics. The intimidation is nothing new, but the novelty is that constituents will suffer because their MP wants to do the right thing. It represents another debasement of public life under this prime minister.
In the end, though, public opinion still matters the most. Defeat in a general election is the ultimate sanction on any MP – the most potent of threats. With hostile, disillusioned, defrauded voters, no MP will remain an MP for long. The signs are that many of the 2019 intake, who admittedly owe their seats to Mr Johnson, will have painfully short careers once the prime minister, having won his election, has no further use for them or the people who live in their constituencies. That may well have been one of the factors in the defection to Labour of the former Tory MP for Bury South, Christian Wakeford.
Even if they stay in the Tory party, Mr Wakeford’s former colleagues must wonder if they might be better off with someone less tainted leading them into the next election.
Staff at England’s Environment Agency say it has been cut back to such an extent that they cannot do their jobs and the regulator is no longer a deterrent to polluters.
Rachel Salvidge www.theguardian.com
Three officers at the EA have described to the Guardian and Ends Report how they are increasingly unable to hold polluters to account or improve the environment as a result of the body’s policies.
The officers wish to remain anonymous because the EA’s chief executive, Sir James Bevan, has “been very clear that he will sack anybody that is seen to be openly criticising the agency”, one officer said.
The Environment Agency has a large budget but the officers say it is not being directed towards protecting or improving the environment. Government grants to the agency rose from £880m to £1.05bn over the past two years, and money for flood operations has steadily increased. But government funding for the agency’s environmental protection work has slumped from about £170m in 2009-10 to a low of £76m in 2019-20, and £94m last year.
As a result, work that does not generate any income for the agency, such as attending pollution incidents, has been deprioritised, say the officers. Last week the Guardian revealed that the agency would no longer respond to lower-impact pollution incidents.
One EA officer said there had been a “drive to make the agency almost entirely self-sufficient, so if you can’t charge for something it gets a lower priority, which is why a lot of the officer roles have been cut – those that go out to pollution events and inspect works … it’s been cut and cut and cut and left us where we are at the moment, which is with a very limited resource on that side.”
In a speech on Tuesday, Bevan signalled that he would like industry to eventually pay the full cost of its regulation, alongside tougher punishments for polluters that could lead to custodial sentences for the worst offenders.
A second officer said increases in charges and other agency income filled the gap left by dwindling government grants but the money did not find its way to frontline work. Instead it was directed to middle management, they said.
“Part of the theory of paying for a permit is that a certain percentage is used to tackle illegal activity that operates without one,” they said. “Yet frontline officers have to watch this money go elsewhere, usually to fill newly created management roles that have no impact on frontline duties. The only sectors to benefit are the operators who want to avoid meaningful regulation. The Environment Agency appears to be making a choice to direct current funding away from frontline water quality.”
Other moves by the agency that are said to stifle fieldwork include “new incident teams that don’t leave the office” and the “removal of lease cars to attend incidents”.
Issuing permits for a potentially polluting activity, such as discharging effluent into a river, brings money into the agency, but one officer said that when making a decision on the activity, “we’re told, largely through the permitting process, to give business the benefit of the doubt, rather than the environment.
“Unless you can find a 100% solid reason not to grant something, you will grant it. The precautionary principle, which is what a lot of these decisions should be based on, is not prevalent … we don’t really get to use it.”
Permitting decisions are further undermined by the patchy nature of the agency’s data, according to the insiders. “It’s all tied up with the fact that our monitoring now is a lot poorer,” one officer said. “When you try to make a decision on an impact of something, it’s so much more difficult to prove because the data isn’t there any more. Priority is given to the applicant rather than the environment unless it’s absolutely clearcut.”
The upshot is that the agency’s funding and operational decisions have “resulted in a regulator that is toothless,” said one officer. “Should a polluter be caught, any tools that were at [its] disposal to take action have been systematically removed … Officers are actively encouraged not to take enforcement action, and asked to find another solution. We are no longer a deterrent to polluters.”
There is considerable anger among staff that “those who adhere to the legislation are paying significant sums, whilst those that chose to ignore the legislation escape any charge or meaningful punishment,” according to one officer.
Another officer said the reduction in enforcement activity would “embolden people to break the law because they know that there’s not really a strong police force out there watching over them and able to take any form of significant action against them”.
The overall feeling is that areas such as water quality are “no longer a priority and the environment in most cases is expendable. There appears to be a direction aimed at working alongside water companies, industry and agriculture, rather than regulating them.
“The Environment Agency is as far removed from the ‘polluter pays’ principle as it has ever been, and what is most concerning is that this appears to be by design,” said one.
Being unable to get out into the field to do the jobs they were hired to do has also taken its toll on staff morale, according to the officers. “Morale is so low, and the main reason for that is our poor performance on water quality and enforcement – it upsets people when they see the stuff they’re passionate about being red-carded and ignored,” said one officer.
Another said: “The majority of staff joined the Environment Agency because of a vocation for environmental protection, and their morale is at rock bottom because they are being asked to ignore this vocation with no visible justification.”
Another officer said: “You’ve got a lot of very passionate, very well meaning people, very often forbidden from doing their jobs to the full. They join the agency because they care, they really want to make a difference, [but then] their ambitions are invariably stifled and slowly blunted by an organisation that just grinds them down and gives them very few opportunities to make a difference.”
An Environment Agency spokesperson said: “Our staff are vital to our work to protect the environment, people and wildlife from harm, and we are committed to providing a healthy and high-quality working environment.
“Our most recent employee people survey highlights many positive aspects of working at the Environment Agency – with staff engagement at 68% and the majority reporting they like their job, feel supported in their health, safety and wellbeing, and want to stay within the organisation. However, we are not complacent and understand the last few years have been particularly challenging for all public servants. We continue to listen to and act upon feedback from our staff as a key priority.”
(And get ready for the nuanced report from Sue Gray, who did for Damian Green with the single word “plausible”. According to Politico London Playbook “It’s not going to be as good as what people think. She’s genuinely struggling to reconcile the prime minister’s claim that this was a work event with what she’s been hearing from other people. It’s very difficult for her.”– Owl)
Graeme Demianyk www.huffingtonpost.co.uk
Westminster is a jargon-filled place at the best of times (hello to “laying a statutory instrument”). But in recent days, British political watchers could be forgiven for being utterly confused by the salad of words being casually served up. Here’s our best attempt to explain what they mean.
Last Friday, the Independent reported Boris Johnson was drawing up a list of officials to offer resignations in a bid to save his prime ministership. What’s more, the PM reportedly called the plan “Operation Save Big Dog”.
The idea is to limit the damage caused by the much-anticipated Sue Gray report in the numerous alleged rule-breaking Westminster and Whitehall parties during lockdowns. The boozy gatherings were variously said to be fuelled by “a suitcase of wine” and “wine time Friday”.
Dan Rosenfield, Johnson’s chief of staff, and his private secretary Martin Reynolds, the man behind the infamous ‘BYOB’ party email, were being considered as possible falls guys.
The Independent reported: “The ‘save big dog’ plan includes a communications ‘grid’ in the lead up to the investigation’s conclusion and beyond.”
Operation Red Meat
If saving “Big Dog” is the over-arching aim, then “Operation Red Meat” is the suite of policies (punched in to the aforementioned “grid”) being set out by ministers underpinning the mission. By offering “red meat” to Tory MPs, the thinking is they can be distracted from the Downing Street party allegations and dissuaded from attempting a coup.
Among the initiatives designed to please riled Conservative voters, as well as the backbenchers, is putting the BBC on notice that the licence fee could be replaced after the current deal ends in 2027 (although that already appears to be in retreat). Culture secretary Nadine Dorries has confirmed that the annual payment will be frozen at £159 until 2024, however.
On Wednesday, Johnson confirmed the end England’s Plan B measures, including mask-wearing and work-from-home guidance, on their current expiry date of January 26. They were warmly welcomed by the lockdown-sceptic MPs on the Conservative benches, and the move avoided another massive rebellion if he tried to renew them.
Newspapers have been reporting Tory kite-flying on tougher action against Channel crossings, tasking the military with reducing the number of small boats risking the journey. The Times reported plans are being drawn up to send migrants, including asylum seekers, to countries such as Rwanda and Ghana for processing.
Senior Cabinet minister Michael Gove was reported to be preparing to publish his “levelling up” plans to improve lives in neglected areas across the country.
New plans are also expected to alleviate the impending cost-of-living crisis and further tackle the backlog of operations in the health service caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Operation Dog’s Dinner and Operation Dead Meat
But not everyone has read the script.
Some Tory MPs were not that impressed with the MoD taking over command of the Channel, warning the Royal Navy will be operating a “taxi service” for migrants. Conservative MP Philip Hollobone said in the Commons: “This isn’t Operation Red Meat, it’s Operation Dog’s Dinner.”
Meanwhile, the government of Ghana dismissed any suggestion it is involved in the migrant crackdown. In a tweet, the country’s ministry of foreign affairs has denied talks are ongoing with the UK about hosting a migrant processing facility.
The Ghanaian government not only slapped down the notion it was involved – it even referred to the flurry of ideas as “Operation Dead Meat”.
It said: “The ministry of foreign affairs and regional integration wishes to state categorically that Ghana has not engaged with the UK on any such plan and does not intend to consider any such operation in the future.”
Albania has also dismissed the claim the country is involved in offshoring asylum seekers, with the country’s ambassador telling The Independent it would be “against international law” and “totally contrary to the position of (his) country”.
“2019-ers”, “Grey Wolves”, and “The Pork Pie Plot”
Despite the attempts to rally MPs behind their leader, Tory wounds appeared to have widened rather than healed. Eight Tory MPs have publicly called for Johnson to go (including one that on Wednesday defected to Labour), and the feeling was the plot to oust Johnson was widening.
On Tuesday, around 20 MPs from the 2019 election intake – called “2019-ers” by many blue-tickers on Twitter – were said to have met to discuss Johnson’s future. The summit was nicknamed the “pork pie plot” (see also: “pork pie putsch”) because it was allegedly hosted in the office of MP Alicia Kearns, whose Melton Mowbray constituency is the home of the traditional meat pie.
It’s unclear where the pastry-themed rebellion fits in with Operation Rinka, a Tory counter-attack on Operation Save Big Dig that’s named after the dog killed in the Jeremy Thorpe affair in the 1970s, according to the Guardian.
Sky News’s deputy political editor Sam Coates reported an “ally” of Johnson dismissing the MPs elected three years ago as “grey wolves … because they were not socialised in parliament during the pandemic”.
Another senior MP said told Politico: “Some of these pork pie-rs are getting high on the adrenaline of change rather than thinking through the implications for party and government.”
The Mirror and the i reported one MP joking that the unrest would not be quelled. “It’s not Operation Big Dog, it’s Operation Massive Cock,” they mused.
Consultation period: 17 January 2022 to 28 February 2022 closing at 5pm
In conjunction with the independent Planning Inspector, Janet Wilson BA (Hons) BTP MRTPI DMS, who is examining the Plan, and following a direction from her, a Schedule of Proposed Main Modifications (PMMs) to the submitted Cranbrook Plan has now been prepared.
In accordance with Regulation 20 of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 (as amended) these changes are now subject to a formal 6 week consultation. Any comments that you wish to make should be submitted on the forms set out at the bottom of this page and should address whether the proposed Main Modifications comply with legal requirements and are considered necessary to make the plan sound.
The schedule of proposed main modifications (PMMs) can be accessed here.
The Council has also prepared the following documents which form part of the consultation. The documents can be accessed by clicking on the relevant titles:
Updated/additional documents which support the plan making process have also been prepared. These can be accessed by clicking on the relevant titles:
(Minor Council proposed modifications are not required to make the plan sound but they either make the plan clearer and easier to understand or they correct factual errors. They are presented within this document for information purposes only. As they do not form a Main modification, they are not endorsed by the Inspector capable of being changed by her or form part of the consultation).
Copies of the consultation documents can be viewed at the District Council Office in Honiton or the Town Council Office in Cranbrook by prior arrangement. Please allow at least 2 clear working days’ notice between your request and your preferred time to view the documents.
To arrange to view the document please email either:
plancranbrook@eastdevon.gov.uk (to view in Honiton) or
clerk@cranbrooktowncouncil.gov.uk (to view in Cranbrook).
How to make a representation?
Comments can be made on the consultation documents by completing the forms below.
Where comments relate to the Proposed Main Modifications they will be considered by the Inspector. Comments made should not introduce new concerns or repeat comments made at earlier stages of the examination. Comments made in respect of each of the PMMs, Policies map and schedule or other documents, should all be separately referenced and clearly distinguished from one another. Please note that comments are only permitted in relation to the Main Modifications.
Comments received on the proposed Main Modifications, will be collated and submitted to the Secretary of State for consideration as part of the examination by the Planning Inspector.
Please note that copies of all comments will be made available for the public to view (including your name, but will not include any personal contact details or signatures), and therefore cannot be treated as confidential. Data will be processed and held in accordance with the General Data Protection Regulations 2018 and Data Protection Act 2018.
The consultation period will run from Monday 17 January 2022 to Monday 28 February 2022 closing at 5pm. Representations made must be received by this time.
Consultation response forms
To submit comments on this consultation please complete one part A and B form for your personal details and first PMM that you wish to comment on, and separate part B forms for each subsequent PMM that you wish to comment on.
Please email the completed form to: plancranbrook@eastdevon.gov.uk
Alternatively, you can post your completed form to: The Cranbrook Plan, Planning Policy, East Devon District Council, Blackdown House, Border Road, Heathpark Industrial Estate, Honiton, EX14 1EJ.
Letters www.theguardian.com
“Please, someone, explain,” pleads Adrian Chiles at the end of his article on how local democracy works (I believe in local democracy – I just don’t understand it, 13 January). On the basis of two years’ experience as a local parish councillor, I can tell him that in the case of parish councils, “it doesn’t”.
In those two years, at the end of which I resigned in utter frustration, I learned that our parish council has virtually no powers or decision-making authority with respect to anything of significant importance.
Almost all matters of significance are the responsibility, and within the jurisdiction, of someone else: planning and housing (borough council and central government); roads and road safety, including local speed limits (county council and central government); education/schools (education authority and central government); health and social care (health trust, county council and central government); crime, policing and public safety (police and crime commissioner, and the home secretary); bus service (county council, bus service providers and central government); flooding (county council).
In its election manifesto in 2019, the Conservative party wrote: “Our new Towns Fund will help communities make sure their towns are safe to walk in and a pleasure to be in … Above all, we want the town’s future to be in the hands of the people who live there.”
The reality, however, is that during its first two years in office, the central government has sought to increase its control over decision-making, at the expense of the authority of local government, in almost all of the areas of governance that I have listed above.
Philip C Stenning
Eccleshall, Staffordshire
“The speed of the plans, even with confirmed daily UK cases above 108,000 on Wednesday, and nearly 19,000 Covid patients in hospital, has brought speculation that a main motivation has been to provide a politically embattled Johnson with some good news for his mutinous MPs.”
Peter Walker www.theguardian.com
The government has pledged to abolish almost every existing Covid restriction over the coming weeks in England and “get life completely back to normal”, a course popular with Conservative MPs but which immediately prompted stark warnings from health groups.
The NHS Confederation said the move would inevitably place renewed pressure on hospitals, while the British Medical Association said the changes planned were “not guided by the data”.
After Boris Johnson announced the end of all plan B rules, imposed to cope with the Omicron variant, by next week, Sajid Javid set out the government’s wider vision to go further, with rules on self-isolation expected to be replaced by voluntary guidance in March.
“I will come back in the spring and set out how we will live with Covid,” the health secretary told a No 10 press conference. “But the way we are going to do this is that we are going to have to find a way to remove almost all of these restrictions, and get life completely back to normal.”
The speed of the plans, even with confirmed daily UK cases above 108,000 on Wednesday, and nearly 19,000 Covid patients in hospital, has brought speculation that a main motivation has been to provide a politically embattled Johnson with some good news for his mutinous MPs.
In a hastily arranged Commons statement on Wednesday, Johnson announced the cabinet had agreed an end to all plan B measures. Advice on working from home would change immediately, while compulsory mask-wearing on public transport and in shops and vaccine certificates would cease next week.
To cheers from some on the Conservative benches, Johnson announced an immediate end to the need for pupils to wear masks at secondary schools.
While Javid has been seen as one of the more cautious cabinet voices on Covid rules in recent months, he expanded on Johnson’s theme, telling the press conference he expected vaccination and testing would be the only measures to remain.
“This plan has worked and the data shows that Omicron is in retreat,” he said. While warning of “bumps in the road”, perhaps including new variants, Javid said the UK “must learn to live with Covid in the same way we have to live with flu”.
Addressing the press conference alongside Javid, Susan Hopkins, the chief medical adviser to the UK Health Security Agency, did not take up invitations to openly disagree with the strategy, but was less bullish, stressing that any end to self-isolation would have to be based on evidence.
While rules on masks would go, Hopkins urged the public to “take our personal behaviour seriously” and use face coverings when in crowded places among strangers.
However, medical and NHS groups expressed alarm, while teaching unions warned that the changes were taking place at a time when many English schools were still seeing widespread disruption because Covid.
Dr Chaand Nagpaul, chair of the British Medical Association, said ending plan B measures rapidly could create a rebound in still-high infections and “risks creating a false sense of security” with the NHS still under crippling pressure.
“This decision clearly is not guided by the data,” Nagpaul said. “When plan B was introduced in December, there were 7,373 patients in hospital in the UK. The latest data this week shows there are 18,9791.
Chaand said ditching mask-wearing mandates “will inevitably increase transmission and place the public at greater risk, especially for those who are vulnerable”. He also said the announcement of plans to end self-isolation rules was “premature”.
Matthew Taylor, chief executive of the NHS Confederation, which represents the healthcare system in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, accused ministers of not being honest with the public that the decision to lift restrictions was “a trade-off”.
He said: “We will have greater freedoms but the cost – at least in the short term – will be that more people are likely to get sick with Covid, and that the health service will continue to have to deal with the extra burdens that this creates.”
Mary Bousted, the joint general secretary of the National Education Union, said that while the trend of secondary school infections was down, it could change: “Such uncertainty could lead to a pronounced risk of increased disruption with children and staff having to isolate.”
A director of public health in a city in the north of England said they were also concerned at the move. “This feels like more of a political decision than a decision based on the evidence and the science, and it could be quite London-centric,” they said.
“We’re seeing a reduction in cases, but they’re still incredibly high. Taking out all these measures does feel risky.”
The changes apply only to England. Covid restrictions, as part of health policy, are a devolved matter.
Though it seems to remain beyond the grasp of a surprising number of Tory MPs – Owl
Dear Owl
I have fished our rivers for more than 60 years. Where we now are was predicted when the National Rivers Authority was subsumed into the EA in 1996.
The EA do not publicly accept that they are short of money and people and still employ people whose job is to promulgate platitudinous drivel.
I recently subscribed to a petition and have posted the government’s response below. It did not fill me with confidence.
Roland Craven, Ottery St. Mary
“Dear Roland Craven,
The Government has responded to the petition you signed – “Give the Environment Agency the funds and freedom to protect English rivers”.
Government responded:
The Government recognises the importance of protecting the natural environment and are investing accordingly to progress our 25 Year Environment Plan and its commitment to clean and plentiful water.
We are determined to build back greener following the pandemic and progress our 25 Year environment Plan and its commitment to clean and plentiful water.
The Government recognises the importance of protecting the nation’s natural environment and we are investing accordingly.
The Department for Environment, Food & Rural Affairs Spending Review settlement provides a £4.3 billion cash increase over the rest of this Parliament to £7 billion in 2024-25.
The settlement will allow us to deliver on the Government’s ambitious environmental agenda to halt the decline in species abundance by 2030, achieve Net Zero by 2050, increase resilience to flooding and coastal erosion, support innovation and progress the levelling up agenda.
The settlement delivers against the goals of the 25 Year Environment Plan for nature’s recovery and includes more than £250 million in public investment over three years to include, among other things, tackling nutrient pollution in rivers and streams.
The Spending Review 2021 also sets a stretching new target to raise at least £500 million in private finance for nature’s recovery every year by 2027 and more than £1 billion a year by 2030.
The Government has taken powers in the Environment Act 2021 to create new, legally-binding targets in four priority areas including water. These new targets will be an important mechanism to drive
environmental improvement and meet our ambitious objectives for the water environment in the 25 Year Environment Plan.
The Act places clear duties on water and sewerage companies to progressively reduce the adverse impacts of discharges from storm overflows and improve transparency of reporting when discharges occur.
The Environment Agency is driving transparency with 80% of storm overflows now having Event Duration Monitors and all overflows will be monitored by the end of 2023, allowing water companies to report the frequency and duration of spills to the Environment Agency (EA) each year so they can assess compliance. The Environment Agency is acting on new information, suggesting that some water companies in England may indeed not be complying with their permits and a major Environment
Agency/Ofwat investigation has been launched.
We are committed to funding the EA to improve the water environment. For example, we are providing additional funding to the EA to increase their farm inspection regime nationwide over the next 18 months. In 2021/2 this includes an expectation of a fourfold increase in farm inspections undertaken nationally with plans to scale up further in 2022/3.
Whilst necessary to uphold basic standards, enforcement of the regulations alone are not sufficient because farmers need advice to understand the risks posed to water by agriculture and funding support
where actions beyond regulatory requirements are needed to reduce pollution further.
We are expanding the Catchment Sensitive Farming Programme, almost doubling its funding by providing an additional £17 million over the next three years to enable it to cover 100% of farms in England. Over the last 15 years this programme has been one of the main ways to help farmers tackle pollution which results from manure, fertiliser and soil running off into rivers when it rains. It provides free 1-2-1 advice to farmers to help them reduce water and air pollution through management
of nutrients, soils, animals and infrastructure among other things.
Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
Click this link to view the response online:
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/586378?reveal_response=yes
The Petitions Committee will take a look at this petition and its response. They can press the government for action and gather evidence. If this petition reaches 100,000 signatures, the Committee will consider it for a debate.
The Committee is made up of 11 MPs, from political parties in government and in opposition. It is entirely independent of the Government. Find out more about the Committee:
https://petition.parliament.uk/help#petitions-committee
Thanks,
The Petitions team
UK Government and Parliament
From today’s Western Morning News:
DESPERATE measures to get elderly patients out of hospital and into social care are to be undertaken in the Westcountry in response to a health care crisis.
Cornwall Council yesterday declared a critical incident in adult social care, echoing a similar warning from the National Health Service.
The council pledged to work with its 70 homecare providers and 222 care homes to find accommodation for 180 patients, who have finished their hospital treatment but are currently blocking beds needed for new cases.
It has also called on residents to help out neighbours or friends recently discharged from hospital to ease the pressure on the system.
Cllr Andy Virr, Cabinet Member for Care and Wellbeing said: “These extraordinary circumstances require a different level of response in our care system, which is currently unable to meet demand – particularly for hospital discharges. This approach will see us work as one system, sharing risk in order to meet these increased demands, and I’d like to say a big thank you to those families and service users who are helping support us in this.
“If you have a friend or neighbour who was recently discharged from hospital please consider how you might be able to help in their recovery. It can be something as simple as running an errand or making a phone call to check they’re OK.”
The council is also asking the voluntary sector to mobilise resources to support efforts to free up 100 beds within two weeks.
Hospitals across the South West have reported huge pressure during the coronavirus crisis, made worse by the problem of finding care for patients ready to go home.
Line of Duty creator Jed Mercurio has produced a bonus episode for fans following the show’s nail-biting finale.
Ted Hastings, Steph Corbett and Steve Arnott face one of their most difficult challenges to date after they came face-to-face with a serial liar in the latest episode.
Questioning the prime minister of Great Britain, Boris Johnson, they delve into his deception around a BYOB party hosted in Downing Street during the height of lockdown.
Hastings concluded that the PM “knowingly and intentionally flouted the rules” because he believes he’s “above the law”. – The London Economic
Watch the clip on twitter in full here.
Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak will not be hit by the expected sharp rise in energy bills in April because of a cap on the contributions they have to make towards their Downing Street flats.
Oliver Wright www.thetimes.co.uk
Under the rules, the prime minister and chancellor are allowed their “grace and favour” accommodation rent-free, with utility bills and council tax also covered by the government.
As part of an agreement with HM Revenue & Customs, unlike other “benefits in kind” paid to employees, their total taxable liability is limited to 10 per cent of their ministerial salary. This means they will not be expected to pay more when energy bills rise.
Ofgem, the energy regulator, is due next month to announce a rise in the maximum amount that energy companies can charge customers.
Analysts believe that, unless the government steps in to reduce taxes on bills, the cap could increase by about 50 per cent, pushing up the average cost of bills to almost £2,000 a year.
Johnson and Sunak will not have to pay the bill because of a longstanding agreement with the tax authorities that because they are expected to live in Downing Street for security reasons, it would not be fair to charge them the full cost of the benefit. The story, first reported by MailOnline, is likely to increase pressure on the government to take action to limit the effect on bills before Ofgem’s announcement.
A government spokeswoman said: “As has always been the case, the prime minister and chancellor are provided with residential accommodation in Downing Street.
“It is not possible to disaggregate the energy costs of 10-12 Downing Street, as it is one combined building.”
Asked what action was being taken on bills, the prime minister’s official spokesman said: “Discussions are still ongoing.”
“When did Tobias Ellwood become a ‘senior Tory MP’ to anyone other than anti-Conservative commentators?” sneered Sir Hugo Swire on Twitter after his former colleague had a pop at the PM. As chairman of the defence select committee, Ellwood is perhaps a touch more senior than Swire, once a minister in the Foreign Office (he outranked Swire in the army too), but there may be a personal reason for this envy. In 2017, Ellwood gave first aid to a dying police officer after a terrorist attack on the parliamentary estate. Swire’s wife, Sasha, noted in her diaries that her husband wished it had been him. “He has longed for the headline ‘Hugo the have-a-go hero’,” she wrote, “but it will never happen.”
Extract from Times Diary,Patrick Kidd www.thetimes.co.uk
The community will be at the heart of Honiton Town Council’s new beginning.
Councillor Jake Bonetta honiton.nub.news
At last week’s Honiton Town Council meeting, following a vote on the council budget for the new year, six serving councillors stood up and abruptly left the meeting. It was then made apparent, following the meeting, that these councillors had tendered their immediate resignation from the town council. The council is now left with 11 members, of whom 10 joined the council within the last eight months.
This marks an important junction in the history of the council – [with new leadership] in important roles such as the chair and vice chair of the council […]. Now is also the time for councillors to focus on the wants of the town, and all projects – old and new – that need completing.
As the chair of the strategy committee, and one of the councillors looking into a new community strategy for the council, I was excited to see an article last week on Nub News which outlined some suggestions for the town. The community strategy will form the outline for future work of the council over the coming few years, and will mark a significant new step towards a transparent, open and revived town council.
It is clear from the responses to the article that the town is moving in the right direction, and that there are some brilliant ideas that can be worked on, or are already in progress. One example of this is the fantastic CUB building, next to the community college, which now houses a new and revitalised youth club for the town.
There are also new and exciting projects at East Devon District Council which will see a revival of the town’s green spaces, and I will personally work hard in conjunction with the “Wild Honiton” project which is set to transform our open space for the better.
This, I hope, will include the corner of New Street and the High Street, bringing much-needed regeneration to our town centre.
I am also pleased to say that I have been taking part in consultations with schoolchildren across Honiton, talking about planned upgrades for three parks across the town equaling an investment of over £150,000 just this year on Honiton’s play areas.
There is a lot of work to do, and a lot of brilliant plans for the year ahead. The Queen’s Jubilee weekend in June will see the town council bringing together groups from across the town, organising celebrations throughout the town on the 4-day bank holiday. I will also be working closely with my colleagues at East Devon District Council to see what can be done to make sure more recycling and litter bins can be installed across Honiton.
Obviously, these are just the plans and projects that I am involved in, and the change in leadership at the town council will allow many other projects like these from other people to also happen across Honiton. I would encourage anyone with any ideas for projects to get involved in the community strategy process once this goes public later this year, to help us help you.
In the meantime, let us look forward from this marker in the town’s history with hope and unity, for this is indeed the beginning of a new era on the town council.
Last year the Environment Agency received more than 100,000 reports of water, air and land pollution in England. The public told of rivers flowing with human faeces, chemicals dumped, fish killed, factories emitting dangerous fumes, nature reserves and the countryside trashed, as well as unbearable noise and dirty air.
John Vidal www.theguardian.com
Nearly all these reports were ignored and now we know why. According to shocking leaked documents, the agency, which is the statutory protector of England’s natural environment and therefore of much of its health and safety, had ordered its staff to ignore all but the most obvious, high-profile incidents. Its staff were sent to observe only 8,000 of the 116,000 potential pollution incidents and only a handful of companies were taken to court.
In effect, there is now no one in authority even questioning the pollution that blights much of Britain, causes disease, destroys the natural world and costs billions of pounds every year to clean up. That toxic waste dumped at the bottom of your street? Forget it. Your local nature reserve or park despoiled? Don’t worry. That factory illegally belching formaldehyde? Look the other way.
Fighting pollution is no government’s strong point, but protection against the destruction of nature has been bitterly fought for. Now it is being wilfully trashed. At least in the 1980s, when environment secretary Nicholas Ridley was dubbed the “minister against the environment” and Britain was the “dirty man of Europe”, the EA was more or less independent of government, science-based, and quick to jump on polluters and to prosecute. Anyone fouling a river was likely to be investigated and at least admonished. The problem then was that the fines imposed by the courts were so minimal that the law was flouted at will.
To understand what is happening now, go back to 2011, shortly after David Cameron was elected. In his autumn statement the chancellor, George Osborne, said that he wanted to remove the “ridiculous” social and environmental costs of business. A list emerged of 174 regulations he wanted scrapped, watered down, merged, liberalised or simplified, and the prevailing governing coalition – shame on you, Nick Clegg – knowingly set about trying to abolish controls on asbestos, invasive species and industrial air pollution, as well as protections for wildlife and restrictions on noise pollution.
It was war on the environment and public safety. The forests were to be sold off, badgers exterminated and the land fracked. The climate crisis was not to be addressed at the expense of business, and profit was not to be subservient to nature. Even as the crisis was building, and nature everywhere was known to be in steep decline, government was ideologically obsessed with deregulation and actively making a grim situation even worse.
Thanks to fierce opposition, not least from some of his own backbenchers and EA staff, not all of Osborne’s anti-red tape measures could be shovelled through. But faced with opposition, the government simply strangled, muzzled or frightened the major regulatory bodies that together have been charged with protecting people.
The leaked document shows the extent of the damage done. Over the past 10 years, the EA has had its budget slashed, its staff massively reduced and its powers weakened. Polluting businesses are now expected to self-regulate and report their own transgressions, prosecutions are rare, and the agency admits that it has neither the staff nor the money to do anything other than scratch the surface of control. In words destined to become as notorious as when disgraced environment minister Owen Paterson said “the badgers have moved the goalposts”, the agency now warns, “you get the environment you pay for”.
Last week, too, the environmental audit committee reported that a “chemical cocktail” of raw sewage and slurry was polluting many of England’s rivers. According to watchdog group Unchecked UK, between 2011 and 2016, the agency’s protection budget fell by 62% and staff numbers were cut by nearly a quarter. Prosecutions fell by 80%, the number of pollution incidents logged dropped 29% and water samples taken by the EA fell by 28%. Meanwhile, nearly half of England’s sites of special scientific interest – the jewels in the crown of nature – haven’t been checked for many years.
Nor is it only the EA, or England. Taking cues from Donald Trump in the US, all other protection agencies have been neutered, including Natural England, the Forestry Commission, Natural Resources Wales and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency. Funding for the Food Standards Agency was slashed by half between 2009 and 2019, , and that of the Health and Safety Executive, which oversees workplace safety, by 53%. Proactive inspections by local authorities have been almost abandoned and prosecutions have plummeted.
The obsession with cutting “red tape” has been ruinous. Deregulation of the construction industry contributed to Grenfell and the cladding scandal, and allowing water companies to use rivers as sewage dumps – even as they were allowed to cut investment and reward shareholders – will cost tens of billions. Public outrage and the courts may have forced small improvements in air pollution, but tens of thousands of people still die needlessly every year because ministers refuse to bring standards up to the minimum World Health Organization levels.
It is now just a matter of time before another major chemical incident like that at Camelford, in Cornwall, in 1988 – when water was contaminated and up to 20,000 people poisoned – takes place. Proposed new rules buried on a government website suggest that the new post-Brexit British chemicals regulator will have only limited powers and that Britain may become a dumping ground and a laboratory for toxic chemicals. The proposals will not be subject to public consultation and will not require a vote in parliament.
Supposedly overseeing the almighty regulatory failure of the past decade will be the new Office for Environmental Protection. This new public body is to report to parliament and be theoretically independent from government. But the secretary of state will appoint the chair and other board members, there is no guarantee it will be adequately funded, and it will not take on all functions of the EU institutions that previously protected the public.
Britain is already one of the least safe places to live in Europe. From now on, the government can introduce damaging policies with little fear of official comeback and companies are more or less free to abuse the environment. With cash-strapped, politically cowed regulators muzzled, few inspections likely and little danger of prosecution, we can look forward to a pandemic of pollution.
Hosted by Exeter Labour for a Green New Deal, Monday 24th January at 19:30 on Zoom.
Speakers include transport activists and policy makers.
Road transport accounts for 31% of Devon’s greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, the largest emitter in the county.
Following on from our successful event in October at Exeter University, Exeter Labour for a Green New Deal are hosting an online Zoom event to discuss how to tackle the climate crisis through transport policies and campaigning and
The panel event will feature short presentations a question and answer session.
Panel members
Join us at this free panel event on January 24th by registering for a ticket here: https://transportinexeteranddevon.eventbrite.co.uk
Questions for the panel can be sent to exeterlgnd@gmail.com
“It’s our form of self-therapy. Motivated by rage. And parenting. So many people re-traumatised by the hypocrisy of #DowningStreetParties. So little integrity.”
The singing Marsh family present (it even has a reference to Jackie Weaver):
While we wait for Sue Gray’s internal inquiry to establish the “facts”, which seems to have new cases added daily, there is plenty of time to get creative. – Owl
That was at the beginning of last week, by Wednesday the figure was 6 per cent, which is about the same number who believe in the Loch Ness monster according to reports in both the Mirror and the Times.
www.indy100.com and www.thetimes.co.uk
People are more likely to believe the moon landings were faked than believe Boris Johnson is telling the truth about the alleged Christmas parties, according to a political pollster.
Opinium Research’s Head of Political Polling Chris Curtis this morning told BBC News that the string of party allegations have rocked the government’s popularity and ratings.
Curtis’s appearance on BBC News follows yet another allegation facing the government. This time, it’s been alleged that Downing Street staff were invited to a bring-your-own-booze (BYOB) event in May 2020.
Speaking on Tuesday morning, Curtis spoke of a poll published on December 8th, just after ITV published a leaked mock press conference from Downing Street.
Curtis said: “One question we asked, which really sums up how bad this is for the government, was ‘do you think Boris Johnson is telling the truth about what’s happening?’.
“And just 12 per cent of people thought he was telling the truth.
“That’s fewer than the number of people who believe that the moon landings were fake, so there isn’t much trust in the prime minister when it comes to this issue among the British public at the moment.”
A 2019 poll from Opinium Research found that 21 per cent of UK adults believe that Apollo 11 mission was a hoax (which broke down into 8 per cent who believed it was definitely faked, and 13 per cent who said it was probably faked).
When it comes to the Christmas party allegations, just 12 per cent believed the Covid rules were followed at the supposed shindig, whereas 65 per cent believe they were not.
Commenting on Twitter, Curtis wrote that although these statistics relate to the Christmas allegations, “I would imagine you would get a similar (or worse) result if we asked about May.”
Just one in ten believe Boris Johnson told the truth when asked about the allegations, compared to 63 per cent who believed he was fibbing.
More Conservative voters were likely to believe him (20 per cent) in comparison to Labour voters (5 per cent).
Labour voters were significantly more likely to believe the prime minister was telling porkies (85 per cent) in comparison to just under half (46 per cent) of Conservative voters.
Curtis also noted that the prime minister’s approval ratings were at a low at the end of December, before making a slight recovery in the new year.
Either way, it looks like Sue Gray has her work cut out for her…
Dominic Cummings says evidence will show Boris Johnson “lied to parliament” by denying he knew about the No 10 garden party, plunging his position deeper into jeopardy.
An email sent by “a very senior official” warned the “bring your own booze” event broke Covid rules, the exiled former chief aide claims – blowing apart the prime minister’s defence that he thought it was “a work event”.
In an explosive blog post, Mr Cummings wrote: “Not only me but other eyewitnesses who discussed this at the time would swear under oath this is what happened.”
The warning came after No 10 denied Mr Johnson was “warned about” a party, or that he told aides objecting to garden gathering that they were “overreacting”.
Many MPs believe Mr Johnson cannot survive in office if it is shown that he misled parliament with his repeated denials that parties took place with his knowledge.
But, in his post, Mr Cummings said that, after Mr Johnson’s private secretary Martin Reynolds sent the invitation “a very senior official replied by email saying the invite broke the rules”.
“This email will be seen by Sue Gray (unless there is a foolish coverup which would also probably be a criminal offence),” he has written – of the senior civil servant leading the investigation.
Mr Cummings claims Mr Reynolds told him he would “check with the PM if he’s happy for it to go ahead”, on 20 May 2020.
“I am sure he did check with the PM. (I think it very likely another senior official spoke to the PM about it but I am not sure),” the post states.
And it adds: “The idea that the PPS [principal private secretary] would be challenged by two of the most senior people in the building, say he’d check with the PM then not – is not credible.”
Many MPs believe Mr Johnson cannot survive in office if it is shown that he misled parliament with his repeated denials that parties took place with his knowledge.
Mr Cummings has written: “The events of 20 May alone, never mind the string of other events, mean the PM lied to Parliament about parties.
“Not only me but other eyewitnesses who discussed this at the time would swear under oath this is what happened.”
The fresh allegations came as one senior Tory backbencher warned people are now “too angry to forgive” Mr Johnson for the rash of lockdown-busting parties.
“Right now, listening to the public who remember very well all the sacrifices they made, I think people may well be too angry to forgive,” former minister Steve Baker said.
Asked for the scale of the anger in his Wycombe constituency, Mr Baker replied: “Absolutely furious.”
Conservative MPs are contemplating the growing evidence that voters want Mr Johnson to quit, even before Ms Gray concludes her inquiry later this week or next week.
No 10 refused to say whether the prime minister has been interviewed by her, but said the “full” report will be published when it is ready – not just its key findings.
The allegation that Mr Johnson was warned that he should scrap the garden party was made first by his close friend Dominic Lawson, in a column for The Sunday Times.
Mr Lawson said an official also him that “at least two people” had alerted the prime minister that “this was “a party” and should be immediately cancelled”
“I was told that Johnson’s dismissive response was to say they were “overreacting” and to praise Reynolds as “my loyal Labrador”,” the columnist wrote.
But, on Sunday, a No 10 spokesman said: “It is untrue that the prime minister was warned about the event in advance. As he said earlier this week, he believed implicitly that this was a work event.”
In his blog, Mr Cummings also said he expected the Gray inquiry would get to the bottom of his earlier allegation that he stopped Mr Johnson visiting the Queen “when he might have been infectious”.
“This episode was also witnessed by others who will tell the official inquiry that what I have said is true and the official denials are false,” he has written.
And he warned: “There are many other photos of parties after I left yet to appear. I’ll say more when SG’s [Sue Gray’s] report is published.”
The former aide also attacked Downing Street briefings about a “drinking culture” in No 10, arguing it was false and “intended to shift blame”.
East Devon Watch 