Ed Vaizey

I read in the Sunday Telegraph today that Prince Charles is planning to raise £1 billion to fund sustainable property developments.  The poor quality of so much development in this country is a minor obsession of mine.  I am constantly harassing the two major developers planning to build in my constituency on their plans.  I have toured Dartford with Wayne Hemingway’s wife to see how they have curbed some Wimpey’s excesses, and met other enlightened developers as well.  And of course I have visited Poundbury, the Prince’s model estate.  It gets a huge amount of criticism, because so many of the houses are pastiche of eighteenth or nineteenth century buildings.  That is a matter of taste, and I will keep my counsel on that.  But the real key to understanding  Pounbury is the lay out.  It works on a human scale, is carefully laid out to slow traffic naturally without hideous road signs or chicanes, they have refused to kow tow to the highways agency (they stuck in a fountain instead of a roundabout for example) and it works, as a place to live and work.  If he does other projects like this, I am all for it.

A village in my constituency, East Hanney, started to get to grips with its flooding problem this week end.  It was badly hit last summer, and since then has been regularly flooded when it rains heavily.  The local flood group, which convened itself shortly after last summer,got permission from the Environment Agency to weed the local brook.  About 30 volunteers showed up, and by the end of Saturday the level of the brook had fallen by about a foot.  It may well have fallen further today, as the volunteers were planning a second go.  Rural villages are going to have to look after themselves, because the EA is essentially broke and has to concentrate on urban areas.  What they need is the EA to allow them to balance the need for flood protection against environmental concerns, so that they can clear brooks of weeds.  And also what the Pitt Review has recommended, namely a detailed map showing who owns, and is responsible for, what - drainage ditches, water courses, brooks and so on.

The Observer has a long article about Iain Duncan Smith’s work with the charity/think tank he founded, called the Centre for Social Justice.  It highlights the very valuable work he is doing, and the commitment he shows to it.  I was going to blog on IDS any way, because I saw him speak last week.  It was to a small audience of about 30 people, a powerpoint presentation in a small room, but it was mesmerising.  He really knows his stuff, and cares even more about it, and it shone through.  He highlighted how the care system is failing children, and the crucial need to help children most in their early years, up to the age of three.  IDS could certainly be the Tories’ Frank Field.

Naturally, the news media is concentrating on Labour’s woeful fifth place showing in the Henley by-election, because that has the most impact on the national picture.  But the real story for me is the Lib Dems’ failure to show their usual by-election success.  Two years ago, in Bromley and Chiselhurst, they came within an ace of taking the seat from us.  On the same swing, they would have taken Henley.  But they barely increased their share of the vote, and I would argue that, as this was a by-election, that “barely” translates as a disaster for them and their candidate Stephen Kearney.

The Lib Dems showed their usual hypocrisy and penchant for dirty tricks throughout the by-election.  When it was pointed out their candidate came from Plymouth (where he had contested the City elections on 1 May and declared “I am settled in Plymouth and I love it”) the Lib Dems hit back - this must be a positiove campaign!  They then proceeded to smear the Conservative candidate with a number of completely untrue or misleading stories.  Breathtaking!

Their campaign was entirely negative, but it ended up biting them in the ankles.  They accused John of voting through council tax increases, without pointing out that they voted for bigger rises themselves.  They said local schools were doing badly and underfunded, until the schools themselves hit back.  And they constantly referred to their candidate as local when everyone knew he wasn’t, and that really annoyed people.

Finally, the Tories ran an exemplary, positive campaign.  We responded to the Lib Dem smears, but then quickly moved back to the positive. It worked.  John Howell more than deserves his victory and he will be an excellent MP.

From the guy who brought you the Romney vs Clinton prediction for the US Presidential election, comes my prediction for the next general election.  According to gallery news, the opening of Parliament is on 3rd December.  The last time this happened was in 2000, when we had a summer election in 2001.  So the next election will be the summer of 2009.

I just received this from a constituent, which made interesting (if depressing) reading, and rings true:

“I recently had cause to speak with the support office at Companies House as my company is being struck off their register. When I enquired what date the company would cease to exist I was told that they could give no firm dates as they had a back log of ‘thousands’. Over a month has gone by since the last date I was given so they are at least one month behind on their schedule. As I thought about this afterwards it occurred to me that there must be a large number of companies going to the wall under Mr Brown’s prudent stewardship and yet the media have hardly mentioned this. Alternatively the Government is hiding the number of companies failing by slowly releasing the names to the London Gazette.”

Brown is wrong on 42 days, any way you look at it.  Let’s start with the basics.  It is an exceptional act for the state to deprive someone of their liberty.  That is why there has always been a limit on how long the state can hold someone before telling them what they are charged with.  In the US it is just a day.  We are now on 28 days, the country nearest to us, Australia, is 12 days.  In this context 42 days loks well out of step.

The second point - the Government used up all its credibility on the 90 days vote.  Labour MPs were told to tell Tory MPs they would have “blood on their hands” if they voted against.  Disgracefully, Kitty Ussher said this to me on Radio 4.  Well, it has not happened, and now 42 days looks like an arbitrary new figure simply so the Government can show it has extended the limit, come what may.  There is no evidence the extension is needed.

The third point - the safeguards proposed by the Government are barmy.  Why one earth should PArliament approve each case where 42 days is asked for?  Whatever happened to separating the legislature from the judiciary?  What kind of logisitical operation is required to get parliamentary approval?  Would it be all MPs, or just a small committee?  What would Parliament bring to the process that a High Court Judge would not?  Parliamentary approval is simply an unworkable gimmick that makes me oppose the proposals even more.  

I had the privilege of chairing the selection meeting in henley on Friday night.  Almost 300 local party members turned up, and the whole evening was conducted with the right combination of good humour and seriousness.  Three very good local candidates competed - Anne Ducker, the leader of the local district council, John Cotton, a member of her cabinet, and county councillor John Howell.  In the end John Howell came through.  He has lived in the area for twenty years and represents a County seat in the constituency, one of the safest in Oxfordshire thanks to his efforts and hard work on behalf of the community.  John is a great choice, with huge business and local government experience, plus three teenage children to keep his feet on the ground.  He will be a worthy successor to Boris, and a fine MP.  I am looking forward to campaigning for him for the next few weeks.