Visiting No. 10

10 Downing Street: the world's most famous front door

Last Tuesday morning, I was due to meet two of the Prime Minister's policy advisors, for a meeting about regulatory policy in relation to tourism. 

So far, so unremarkable. But that meant going through the world's most famous front door - at 10 Downing Street.

Seeing inside No. 10 was a fascinating experience - and after my meeting, I was lucky enough to have a brief "tour". 

The only other building I have been inside that gave me such a palpable sense of history was the Pantheon in Rome (which everyone must visit once in their lifetime). Downing Street is much newer and nothing special architecturally - a cluster of Georgian town houses knocked together - but it has been the epicentre of politics in Britain and our Empire for 275 years (and now a workplace for some 200 people).

It was humbling to walk up that famous staircase, lined with the portrait of every former Prime Minister from Robert Walpole to Gordon Brown - and to see a worn and modest brown leather tub chair that didn't look anything, until you heard it was the "smoking chair" used by Winston Churchill.

And I discovered a "secret" that I can reveal exclusively here: have you ever seen that door opening (inwards, uniquely for a front door) as someone approaches it, and wondered how? I asked the security man inside the door how he knows when to open it - and he showed me. To the left of the door on the inside, is a piece of mahogany furniture - but it has a glass top with a TV screen inside, showing four views of the street outside. Walk up to the door, and it opens for you - if you have got through the security on the gates...

The door, by the way, is now (since the 1991 IRA attack on No. 10) a bomb-proof metal one; the original oak door can be seen in the nearby Churchill Museum at the old Cabinet War Rooms. 

On walking through that door as the new Prime Minister on 7th May 1940, the day Germany invaded Belgium, Holland and Luxembourg, Churchill said "I felt as if I were walking with destiny, and that all my past life had been but a preparation for this hour, and this trial".

What an experience to follow in the footsteps of history.

When will Police heads roll?

"Plebgate" - the name seems to relegate the story to those amusing, "and finally..." anecdotes at the end of the news.

The Metropolitan Police and the Police Federation are certainly hoping the story will go away.

And yet, this is perhaps one of the most shocking stories about the Police in recent years - and after a run of appalling scandals showing Police corruption, criminality, lying and/or cover-ups at many levels, that is saying something.

This seems to have been a conspiracy by Police officers to topple a Cabinet Minister, followed by lying, lying and lying again to cover it up.

The Police's own enquiries have veered between stitch-up and farce, and the CPS seems frozen in indecision. Both cite the "complexity" of the case as a reason for the year (and counting) of time they have taken so far. Yet Michael Crick of Channel 4 News seems to have solved it many months ago.

So let's not mince words: Inspector Ken Mackaill of the Police Federation lied to the cameras  after his meeting with Andrew Mitchell a year ago. He lied to oust a Cabinet Minister from his job. He lied because he could - he knew he would be believed, because he is a Police Inspector.

Yet now we know - because the meeting was taped - that Inspector Mackaill was lying when he spoke about the "facts" recorded by the Police log, and we know - because the original event was recorded on CCTV - that the Police log itself contained untruths. And we know that emails were sent to the authorities, purporting to come from witnesses, that were in fact written by a Police officer who was not even present at the time. The same fateful words were inserted into that lying testimony as were in the discredited Police log.

When will the CPS decide? When will the whole truth come out officially?

When will Police heads roll?

Anti-what?

Can anyone explain to me what the tented protesters outside St Paul's are against? Or what they are for? The press tend to describe them as "anti-capitalist", but what does that mean exactly? Are they against money, or property? I am confused.

They once had a likely spokesman, who wrote to The Times saying "Sir, I wish to protest most strongly about everything. Yours, Spike Milligan".

Fastjet will never fly

So much excitement in the press - both the travel trade and the newspapers - about "Sir Stelios" and his "plans to launch a new airline". He has so far bought a domain name - but if you read some of today's papers, you could be forgiven for thinking that the red-liveried airline "Fastjet" will soon be open for bookings.

At the risk of sticking my neck out, here's a prediction: Fastjet will never fly. I may be cynical, but I think it won't get off the ground because it is a red herring - this is just a chess move in Sir Stelios's somewhat bizarre games at the expense of easyJet.

He is a bored millionaire, and relishes a fight - and the limelight. Anyone with any sense would be happy to trouser his recent £57m dividend and leave the management with the headaches of actually running an airline. But that would be too "easy". Fastjet - what am I bet that it never sees the light, let alone the skies?

The launch of "Hospitality Today" magazine - from hospital!

The last few weeks of my life seem to have passed in a blur. My company, Special Publishing, has launched a digital magazine for the hospitality industry - "Hospitality Today" - and that has taken a lot of my time. We have a foreword from the Minister of Tourism, a wine column from Jancis Robinson and much else beside - and we are reaching over 30,000 business owners (hoteliers, restaurateurs, and owners of inns, pubs and B&Bs).
The most exciting thing, though, is the innovative technology that underpins our "virtual magazine" - it can be read by anyone, anywhere on any PC, Mac, laptop, iPhone, iPad or smartphone. You can "turn the pages", but unlike printed magazines we can have video as well as still pictures on the page.

Enough of the sales pitch - my reason for this post is to say that just three days before our launch date, I saw my GP with 'stomach pains' and was rushed into hospital straight away, and went under the knife that evening for an appendectomy.

Thank god for the Blackberry - luckily I was able to OK a last minute ad from Moet & Chandon from my trolley before being put under - and that closed the magazine ready for launch. We did make the planned launch date after all.

In my couple of days of enforced inaction in hospital, however, I did refelect on the fact that NHS hospitals have some of the same faults as some hospitality businesses - mainly a lack of communication to the patient/customer. People will put up with an awful lot, if they are told what is going on quickly, clearly and honestly by someone who introduces him or herself and explains his or her role.

Whether it is a matre d' welcoming you to your table and describing today's specials, or a nurse telling you when you are due to go into the theatre, the same principles apply. On that basis, the NHS have a lot of room for improvement in my experience - though it has to be said that the operation was a complete success - luckily for me (and 'Hospitality Today'!).

The Bronx, Bad Behaviour and Bottles

Three news items on successive days: (1) recalling how the pre-80s Bronx was a derelict no-go area, virtually a "war zone" where houses could not even be given away (they are now changing hands for millions); (2) yesterday's report from the Chief Inspector of Constabulary Sir Denis O'Connor saying the Police "did not regard anti-social behaviour as real crime", and (3) today's report that Dr Alasdair Forsyth, from the Glasgow Centre for the Study of Violence, is calling for city pubs to stop serving drinks in glasses and use plastic instead.

I can't be the only person to see a link here. The O'Connor report shows how important it is that the Police act on anti-social behaviour, which they "[do] not regard... as real crime and [are] slow to act [on]". The public don't agree: 45% (3.5m) of calls to the Police relate to it.

The New York story shows the ultimate consequence of ignoring anti-social behaviour: you end up with a war zone where citizens (and even Police) can't venture. How was it reclaimed? By cracking down first on "low-level" crime and anti-social behaviour.

Today's call to ban glasses illustrates another, more insidious consequence of failing to Police properly - the suggestions that we all suffer in order to reduce the availability of 'weapons' to the tiny minority.

The O'Connor report says the Police need to 'reclaim the streets'. It is about time they did - and the Government need to back them to do so. The (many) laws against anti-social behaviour, public drunkenness etc. need to be enforced. It is a slippery slope towards the (pre-80s) Bronx - and deciding to ban beer glasses rather than crack down on drunkenness and brawling may be a step down that slope.

Spivs and Gamblers...?

Vince Cable got some easy cheers by railing against City "spivs and gamblers" - how comforting to be able to blame our ills on those nasty fat cats.

The banking bailout, on current figures, looks as if it will break even or even make the taxpayer a profit. Meanwhile banks and finance contribute a huge proportion of UK taxes - and now salaries and bonuses will be taxed at 50%.

What would you call those who run an organisation for years, borrowing £1 for every £4 they spend of shareholders' money, leaving others to pick up the tab in the future? The man in charge of the purse strings of this organisation for a decade was fond of using the word "prudence" in every speech. Some might say that they were nearer the "spivs and gamblers" end of the spectrum.

England voted Conservative...again

The 'Coalition Document' issued today by the new UK Government has an intriguing line not so far commented on: "We have agreed to establish a commission to consider the ‘West Lothian question’."

Already voices have been heard in Scotland querying being ruled from England by Tories who were not voted for in Scotland. Welcome to our world! We in England are long used to being ruled by a Labour party voted on us by Scots.

I am intrigued at how this will be tackled: will it address the justice of the English getting the Government they vote for? Interesting times...

They Deserve our Goodwill

The last few amazing days have shown that that extraordinary thing, the "unwritten" British constitution, has worked. We now have what many said they wanted - politicians working together for the greater good.

Now is not the time for sniping and criticism from the wings - it is a time for us all to give the new Government room, and goodwill, to tackle the big issues. The massive deficit left by Labour must be sorted out, starting this morning.

The Golden "Blank Cheque" Award goes to...

Controlling public expenditure - what the Government does with our hard-earned taxes - is rightly much debated. I don't see very much public discussion, though, about the last great redoubt of the "blank cheque": in the clutches of grandees of the Law, especially in their favoured retirement roles of running eponymous "Inquiries".
I mentioned Legg a while back but at under £2 million, Legg was a relative paragon of restraint; The Bristol Royal Infirmary Inquiry cost £14 million, the BSE Inquiry around £27 million. There can be only one winner, though, and as I open the (24 carat gold) envelope, I see that the Golden Blank Cheque award goes to: The Rt Hon Lord Saville.
Tony Blair first gave Lord Saville his book of blank cheques in January 1998, saying that the Saville enquiry should take a more thorough look at this matter of "urgent importance" than the first Inquiry into "Bloody Sunday" (by Lord Widgery), which reported 11 weeks after the event. Lord Saville has duly taken more than 11 weeks, more than 11 months - in fact, more than 11 years and counting.
The sheer surreal black comedy of Lord Saville's sense of "urgency" justifies our award today: on his Inquiry website, under "What's New" [sic], there is a Press Release headed "Final Report" [sic]. This explains that the final report is "in preparation" and that it is "not possible to give any firm estimate of when the report is likely to be finished". This latest news item is dated 12th August 2005. Yes, 2005. I am not making this up.
But why hurry, when the blank cheques are being filled out at £44,000 a DAY (yes, a DAY), mostly in fees to lawyers. £44,000 a day, for 12 years and 1 month (so far, until the end of last month): that makes £190,300,000. At that rate, if his Lordship can keep going another 8 months he can break the £200 million mark. That would indeed be a spectacular achievement, I am sure we all agree.
Yes, truly wonderful for the lawyers - but may I spoil their party with a question about how the budgets for these enquiries are set, or controlled? Someone is clearly counting the money as it is handed over to the various chambers, temples and inns, but has anyone thought of controlling it?
To put it another way, why are the cheques blank?

Legg is a symptom of the problem, not the solution

I am sure Sir Thomas Legg is a decent and honourable man. But nevertheless he illustrates a wider problem, and is guilty of some of what he criticises in MPs.
All my working life has been spent in small, usually family-owned private companies. The mindset I am used to is one of acute cost-consciousness, of always looking for the least expensive way of achieving the required ends. Of counting every penny.
Sir Thomas moves in the lofty world of the "great and good", where such a penny-pinching focus would be regarded with distain; in his world, his deliberations are of an importance far removed from the vulgar mundanities of mere cost. The cost is a blank cheque to be signed by others.
The Legg report declares that "Proportionate limits on [MPs'] expenditure must be taken to have been in force".

But nobody should be above any thought of value, of what bill they are giving the public.

Is it too much to expect that, as Sir Thomas spent £1.16 million clawing back £1.12 million, he should have given a moment's thought himself to proportionality and restraint in the use of taxpayers' money?

A pity Brown is miserly only with the truth

Who said "I was brought up in a family where I was taught not to attack people personally. I think it is a mistake if politics degenerate in that way"? Clue: the same person who hired and rehired Damien McBride, and repeatedly refused to sack him (until he had no other choice).

Who said, again and again, "the choice is between Labour investment and Tory cuts", and decried David Cameron as "Mr 10%"? Clue: the same person whose own Treasury was secretly planning 10% cuts.

Who kept using the word "prudence" in every sentence in his budgets? Clue: the same person who has splurged billions of taxpayers' money on public sector pay increases, non-jobs and scandalously expensive PFI schemes.

Who now is - most ludicrously of all - suddenly proclaiming himself the friend of the "squeezed middle class"? Clue: he has spent 11 years squeezing the middle classes - especially "middle England", for whom he seems to have a visceral contempt.

What word can best describe such a person? Clue: four letters, beginning with "L".

Lady Scotland must resign

Was Lady Scotland's employment of her Tongan servant knowingly illegal? No, I am sure not. Should she resign? Yes.
Why should she resign? NOT because she inadvertently broke the letter of a law whilst acting reasonably and in good faith - but because she was a key player in this Government's deliberate imposition of (perhaps unreasonably) onerous requirements on ANYONE employing an immigrant. When this legislation was going through, small business representatives said that the strict requirements to check and copy all paperwork etc. were unnecessarily burdensome, and would be difficult for small businesses or individuals to comply with in practice. Lady Scotland's - the Government's - reply was clear: the onus was on the employer, they must comply and the mere burden of compliance was not an excuse. Ignorance of the detail of the law was not, of course, an excuse. Acting reasonably in good faith was not an excuse.
So the Government can take one of two honourable courses - (a) admit that such legislation imposed an unreasonable burden on individuals and small businesses, and amend it accordingly, OR (b) maintain their stance, and take the appropriate action against Lady Scotland, who must also, of course, resign.
What they cannot in honour do is maintain the strict rules for the rest of us with no excuses allowed, but excuse Lady Scotland. That is untenable. That is dishonest. That is wrong.

Parliament is useless - and we all pay the price

It would be funny - if it wasn't so tragic, wasteful and stupid. The sight of Sir Roger Singleton, chairman of the ludicrous new "Independent Safeguarding Authority" (ISA), faced with the storm of protest about the ridiculous new "vetting and barring" of everyone having anything to do with kids, plaintively asking on Channel 4 news where the critics were when all this went through parliament three years ago.
Poor, naive Sir Roger! Did you really think that your ISA had been very carefully thought through by a wise, scrutinising Parliament, weighing carefully the pros and cons? And did you really think that you would have the full support of the man responsible in government?
I'm afraid that's Balls. Ed: he has - of course - dumped you like a hot brick now the reality of these proposals has become widely known. You are now - like David Kelly - "chaff", a fall guy. Mr Balls may have been all smiles last time you met - now you won't see him for back-pedalling.
The legislation - needless to say - was a half-baked proposal rammed through a supine Parliament by an incompetent Government. It is typical: intrusive, illiberal, expensive, bureaucratic - yet totally ineffective, passed only so the Government could be seen to be "doing something" after Soham.
The appalling crass idiocy of our Goverment, and the total uselessness of our Parliament, is almost unbelievable. I despair.

Gordon Brown's "McPoison"

People calling Damian McBride "McPoison" and "McNasty"; complaints about his bullying, unpleasant and unacceptable smear tactics; colleagues calling for him to be sacked. No, not this week - back in October last, when cabinet colleagues called on Gordon Brown to finally sack his famously odious spin-doctor. Gordon Brown resisted - yet again - as he had resisted many such calls over the years after appointing and re-appointing McBride. Even after he was exposed smearing Ruth Kelly, Gordon Brown kept him on. Many predicted it would end in tears.

Now Gordon has reaped what he sowed. Those who live by poison will die by poison - even if it is very slowly. Of course Gordon Brown knew what McBride was like - he had been told many times. He kept him on because the poisonous threats were useful to No. 10. Even after hearing about the latest scandalous emails, Downing Street's first reaction was do downplay them as "juvenile". Still Gordon Brown did not sack McBride; he eventually resigned 24 hours later.

To add insult to injury, the Prime Minister issues letters of non-apology, and makes a great fuss of asking for the special advisors' code of conduct (flagrantly and unambiguously broken by McBride) to be "tightened" - a transparent and meaningless sleight of hand, typical of Mr Brown's 'smoke and mirrors' tactics. What a shamefull mess - with Mr Brown at its centre. The stench will take some time to clear away.

Taxpayers, rise up and revolt!

Today's Sunday Times "Appointments" section features 51 adverts. Of these, 26 (51%) are pure public sector, 11 (22%) are charity, third sector or non-profit organisations. A further 7 are ads for the Sunday Times itself or generic ads from recruitment consultancies - leaving 7 - that is 14% - of all the job ads being from commercial businesses.
Think about that - only one job in seven advertsised in the Sunday Times today - at considerable expense - is a "real" job - in the sense of one that will generate wealth and ultimately fund the public and voluntary sectors.
According to data from Nielsen Media Research, our Government's media spend rose by almost 20% in 2008 to £178.1m, putting the government within spitting distance of P&G, which narrowly retained the title of the UK's biggest advertiser despite cutting spend to £178.7m. In 2009, the Government may become the UK's biggest advertiser, as taxpayers pay to watch ever more ads telling them what to do and what not to do.
Are you seeing a pattern here? It gets worse. A Spectator columnist recently reported that “if [the Chancellor] were to raise VAT to 25 per cent, double corporation tax, close the Foreign Office, cancel all international aid, disband the Army and the police, release all prisoners, close every school and abolish unemployment benefit he would still be unable to close the gulf between what the Government spends and what it raises in taxes”.
Gordon Brown's £5 billion raid on our pensions was the least of it - the outrageous scandal of "PFI" schemes mortaging our children and grandchildren, the spraying of (our) pound notes at doctors and other public-sector workers, the creation of vast numbers of non-jobs in the public sector, the unsustainable gold-plating of public sector pensions, the waste of hundreds of billions on useless and sinister IT databases, the rise in public sector pay while the few jobs in the private sector that must pay for all this are seeing incomes fall - all these are part of the same sorry story: the Government has (I'm sorry but no politer phrase will do) pissed our money away against a wall for too long, and Britain is broke.

UPDATE, 20 Sept 09: Looking at the Sunday Times today, there is not much change; 84% of the job ads are for public sector, education or charity jobs, and only 16% (around 1 in 6) are for wealth-generating jobs.

Vive les Vignerons

"I would like people in Britain to realise what is at stake here" says Mr Tremoulet, whose family has been growing grapes in the Languedoc for generations, in a report by the BBC headlined "French Wine Withers on the Vine". He describes the situation for farmers as "catastrophic", as British drinkers turn away from French wines because of the strong Euro. The UK is the biggest importer of wine in the world and we are now, it seems, turning from Chablis to Chile, lured by supermarket "3 bottles for a tenner" offers. Here as in other areas, the old world is losing out to the new.
I'd like to reassure M. Tremoulet that I for one am doing my bit. A delicious crisp Alsace Riesling last night, a silky 2002 claret last weekend and my stocks of Duval-Leroy champagne are fast diminishing. No, I am not giving up French wine, credit crunch or no credit crunch. I remember "Johnny" Hugel, in the cellar in Riquewihr in which his family had produced wine from father to son since 1639, saying that if times were tough or you were feeling low, go to a good restaurant, order a lovely bottle of wine ("preferably one of mine"), and you would feel all the better afterwards. I'm not sure how economically sound his advice was, but I've followed it ever since and it works. M. Tremoulet, I'm doing my best!

Caught by the "Court of Public Opinion"

Did any politician ever give a bigger hostage to fortune than did Harriet Harman when she decried mere "courts of law" in favour of "the court of public opinion"?
No wonder no arrest was made when a fellow cabinet member was assaulted with green custard - why resort to the law courts when it is "public opinon" that counts? In the court of public opinion, it is so much easier to pronounce judgement and pass sentence, without having to weigh up tiresome and complex arguments or balance interests.
Forget being taken into custody pending trial - just chuck the custard! Harriet Harman says the rule of law need not restrain us when we feel strongly.
I predict much more custard, as Harriet's (anti-)Law finds favour with those frustrated by those pesky and restrictive Acts of Parliament.
And who is this supporter of summary justice? Oh yes, she is a QC, an MP, a past Legal Officer for the National Council for Civil Liberties, past Solicitor General, Leader of the House of Commons, and "Secretary of State for Equalities". Not Equalities under the Law, surely?

Wanted: Leila Deen, age 29

Why was Leila Deen not arrested and charged with assaulting a cabinet minister? It seems ridiculous that she could commit an illegal and violent act, for the cameras, then spend half an hour giving interviews to the media before going on her way.
Lord Mandelson's protection unit - and the Metropolitan Police - have a lot of questions to answer.
For the first time I remember, I agree with John Prescott!