Government staff are misplacing their security passes at a rate of 23 a day, it has emerged. Almost 17,000 civil service passes have been lost or stolen over the past two years. Around two thirds of the misplaced cards have been misplaced by staff at the Ministry of Defence (MoD).
The figures follow a series of other security lapses by civil servants, including an incident where highly sensitive intelligence files on al-Qaeda were left on a train by a senior Whitehall official. In January last year, a laptop with the details of 600,000 people on it was taken from a Royal Navy officer’s car in Birmingham, and in November 2007, two CDs with details of 25 million Britons were lost after being posted from a Revenue and Customs office in Tyne and Wear.
This government cannot and should not be trusted with our personnel information. All this latest incident does is demonstrate the serious issues around data security should National ID cards be introduced.
Showing posts with label gordon brown. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gordon brown. Show all posts
Sunday, 8 March 2009
Wednesday, 4 February 2009
NEW GOVERNMENT BAILOUT IS BLANK CHEQUE
Without a thorough review of all the assets that are being underwritten, the latest government bank bail-out means ministers are effectively writing a blank cheque to the banks that have arguably been largely responsible for the financial crisis.
The Government is now proposing to underwrite billions of pounds worth of debt which could leave taxpayers open to vast losses.
Ministers are offering hardly any details about the terms of this underwriting. Taxpayers are being signed up to yet another bank bailout, when it is clear the Government hasn't done its homework. The £100bn insurance of bad debts owned by the banks could result in enormous losses for taxpayers, since these assets are being insured in a falling market and there are still further big losses to come in the property market.
The Prime Minister says he is putting in place proper controls to monitor the use of taxpayers' money. They should already be there! Why weren't the banks required to make a full declaration of their bad loans when the £37bn was invested?
With RBS now 70% publicly owned, there can be no more excuses for it not to start lending at reasonable levels to viable businesses and individuals.
The Government is now proposing to underwrite billions of pounds worth of debt which could leave taxpayers open to vast losses.
Ministers are offering hardly any details about the terms of this underwriting. Taxpayers are being signed up to yet another bank bailout, when it is clear the Government hasn't done its homework. The £100bn insurance of bad debts owned by the banks could result in enormous losses for taxpayers, since these assets are being insured in a falling market and there are still further big losses to come in the property market.
The Prime Minister says he is putting in place proper controls to monitor the use of taxpayers' money. They should already be there! Why weren't the banks required to make a full declaration of their bad loans when the £37bn was invested?
With RBS now 70% publicly owned, there can be no more excuses for it not to start lending at reasonable levels to viable businesses and individuals.
Northern Rock Bonuses
Nationalised bank Northern Rock is to award staff a 10% bonus.
Northern Rock, you will recall, was nationalised in February 2008 after a run on the bank in 2007. Once Britain's fifth-biggest home loan provider, it was taken into public ownership after it failed to find a suitable buyer from the private sector.
A Northern Rock spokesman refused to be drawn on how much money was being paid out, but pointed out that the staff-wide bonus scheme had been announced in October. He also stressed that no executives or senior management would benefit. The reward comes after staff met targets on repaying the bank's £26bn loan from the government.
Asked whether Mr Brown approved of the bonuses, the prime minister's spokesman said: "Northern Rock, as I think is well known, has repaid its debts to the government at a rate faster than originally planned for. Operational decisions such as this are a matter for Northern Rock."
Northern Rock still owes billions to taxpayers. At a time when millions of people are facing pay cuts or even unemployment, this bonus is hard to understand. And harder to accept.
Northern Rock, you will recall, was nationalised in February 2008 after a run on the bank in 2007. Once Britain's fifth-biggest home loan provider, it was taken into public ownership after it failed to find a suitable buyer from the private sector.
A Northern Rock spokesman refused to be drawn on how much money was being paid out, but pointed out that the staff-wide bonus scheme had been announced in October. He also stressed that no executives or senior management would benefit. The reward comes after staff met targets on repaying the bank's £26bn loan from the government.
Asked whether Mr Brown approved of the bonuses, the prime minister's spokesman said: "Northern Rock, as I think is well known, has repaid its debts to the government at a rate faster than originally planned for. Operational decisions such as this are a matter for Northern Rock."
Northern Rock still owes billions to taxpayers. At a time when millions of people are facing pay cuts or even unemployment, this bonus is hard to understand. And harder to accept.
Tories No Better Than Labour On Managing the Economy
Last week, the respected independent research organisation, the Institute for Fiscal Studies released their forecast for UK's public finances. Interestingly, they showed that Labour and the Conservatives are just as bad as each other at managing the UK economy.
Charting the UK's progress, they demonstrated the structural budget balance had risen from minus 5% of national income under the Tories to 1% after three years in government from 1979, but then fell back to minus 3% after eleven years. It then fell to minus 5% after 14 years, closing at minus 3% again after 18 years. Everyone remembers the Conservatives' humiliating failure with Sterling and the Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM).
And guess what. Under Labour the structural budget balance started at minus 3% in 1997, rose to 1% again after three years, but then fell back to minus 3% after eleven years. The Institute for Fiscal Studies now forecast that the balance will fall again to minus 7% after thirteen years before closing at minus 3% again. And so no better than where they started.
So neither party left the public finances in a healthy position after many years in government.
After seeing so much crisis and failure, its now time to give Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg and the very well respected Lib Dem Shadow Chancellor Vince Cable and colleagues a chance.
Charting the UK's progress, they demonstrated the structural budget balance had risen from minus 5% of national income under the Tories to 1% after three years in government from 1979, but then fell back to minus 3% after eleven years. It then fell to minus 5% after 14 years, closing at minus 3% again after 18 years. Everyone remembers the Conservatives' humiliating failure with Sterling and the Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM).
And guess what. Under Labour the structural budget balance started at minus 3% in 1997, rose to 1% again after three years, but then fell back to minus 3% after eleven years. The Institute for Fiscal Studies now forecast that the balance will fall again to minus 7% after thirteen years before closing at minus 3% again. And so no better than where they started.
So neither party left the public finances in a healthy position after many years in government.
After seeing so much crisis and failure, its now time to give Lib Dem leader Nick Clegg and the very well respected Lib Dem Shadow Chancellor Vince Cable and colleagues a chance.
Wednesday, 28 January 2009
Quote of the week
"This is a humiliating climbdown for Gordon Brown after he was forced to accept that people will not tolerate MPs continuing to act like members of a secret society. It is also a victory for everyone who think that politicians should be open and accountable to the people who pay their wages."
Nick Clegg, Leader of the Liberal Democrats, commenting on news that Gordon Brown has retreated from plans to exempt MPs' expenses from the Freedom of Information Act - 21 January
Nick Clegg, Leader of the Liberal Democrats, commenting on news that Gordon Brown has retreated from plans to exempt MPs' expenses from the Freedom of Information Act - 21 January
DEMOCRACY SPECIAL: PM dodges MPs questions
Lib Dem MP Norman Baker has a formidable reputation as a parliamentary inquisitor. After being elected to Parliament in 1997 he asked more questions in his first three months than his Conservative predecessor had asked in 23 years. His notable achievements since include triggering Peter Mandelson's second Cabinet resignation with his questions over the passport application of billionaire Dome sponsor Srichand Hinduja, and winning a freedom of information battle with the Commons authorities over the publication of MPs' expenses.
But according to Norman the job of the inquisitor is getting harder. In an adjournment debate on January 22nd he claimed that, while Labour ministers had initially improved the fullness and frankness of answers to parliamentary questions when they took over in 1997, the years since had seen a big increase in the use of classic answer avoidance techniques. These include the partial answer, use of the ‘disproportionate cost' excuse, and referring the questioner to an often lengthy statistical digest or website rather than providing an answer directly.
Norman said the number of questions being denied an answer on the basis of commercial confidentiality was also on the up. "An analysis of the number of times that that reason was used under the Conservatives before 1997 can be demonstrated by a steadily rising graph, but that graph drops dramatically after 1997 when the Minister's Government came to power. I have to say, however, that the graph has subsequently risen to the level that it had reached under the Conservatives. It is difficult to imagine that there were fewer matters of commercial confidentiality in 1998 than at any other point, and there is rightly a suspicion that the number of times when that excuse, or reason, for not giving a full answer has been given is related not simply to the existence of commercial confidentiality but to the difficulty or expediency involved in not giving an answer for political reasons."
Norman said that questions that would previously have been answered were now being rebuffed. "In about 1998, I asked the former Department of Transport... about the carriage of radioactive material by air. I asked how many flights carried radioactive material, and I was given a specific figure. When I asked that question again recently, I was told that those figures were not collected. I cannot believe that in the past 10 years, the Government have decided not to collect those figures, but that is what I was told." On another occasion, he said, a minister had given a misleading answer to another MP because a question asked how much nuclear waste was carried by air, rather than how much spent nuclear fuel. The intention of the question was clear, said Norman, but while the answer was technically correct, it was totally misleading.
Norman identified Gordon Brown as one of the biggest offenders at failing to answer questions. Of the 23 written parliamentary questions he had tabled to the PM over the last 12 months, only four had been answered in any way satisfactorily. "Sometimes the Prime Minister will provide irrelevant information: he is asked one thing, but his reply bears no relation to the question he was asked. Sometimes he provides information that is so vague that it cannot be used in any shape or form. Sometimes he answers the bit of the question he likes, and leaves unanswered the bits that are more difficult to answer."
He gave the example of a question he had tabled to 22 ministers, including the Prime Minister, about when they had last travelled by train. 18 ministers had responded with a precise date. Two had given holding answers. But the Prime Minister and the Chancellor refused to give the information. Mr Brown had just provided a bland statement of his general criteria for deciding how to travel. Another example was the Prime Minister's refusal to answer a question about when he had last met Tony Blair.
While there may be circumstances in which it is legitimate to not answer a parliamentary question, the sheer number of occasions on which this is happening suggests that increasingly, the test was whether an answer would cause political embarrassment. This is a misuse of power, the government must change its ways.
But according to Norman the job of the inquisitor is getting harder. In an adjournment debate on January 22nd he claimed that, while Labour ministers had initially improved the fullness and frankness of answers to parliamentary questions when they took over in 1997, the years since had seen a big increase in the use of classic answer avoidance techniques. These include the partial answer, use of the ‘disproportionate cost' excuse, and referring the questioner to an often lengthy statistical digest or website rather than providing an answer directly.
Norman said the number of questions being denied an answer on the basis of commercial confidentiality was also on the up. "An analysis of the number of times that that reason was used under the Conservatives before 1997 can be demonstrated by a steadily rising graph, but that graph drops dramatically after 1997 when the Minister's Government came to power. I have to say, however, that the graph has subsequently risen to the level that it had reached under the Conservatives. It is difficult to imagine that there were fewer matters of commercial confidentiality in 1998 than at any other point, and there is rightly a suspicion that the number of times when that excuse, or reason, for not giving a full answer has been given is related not simply to the existence of commercial confidentiality but to the difficulty or expediency involved in not giving an answer for political reasons."
Norman said that questions that would previously have been answered were now being rebuffed. "In about 1998, I asked the former Department of Transport... about the carriage of radioactive material by air. I asked how many flights carried radioactive material, and I was given a specific figure. When I asked that question again recently, I was told that those figures were not collected. I cannot believe that in the past 10 years, the Government have decided not to collect those figures, but that is what I was told." On another occasion, he said, a minister had given a misleading answer to another MP because a question asked how much nuclear waste was carried by air, rather than how much spent nuclear fuel. The intention of the question was clear, said Norman, but while the answer was technically correct, it was totally misleading.
Norman identified Gordon Brown as one of the biggest offenders at failing to answer questions. Of the 23 written parliamentary questions he had tabled to the PM over the last 12 months, only four had been answered in any way satisfactorily. "Sometimes the Prime Minister will provide irrelevant information: he is asked one thing, but his reply bears no relation to the question he was asked. Sometimes he provides information that is so vague that it cannot be used in any shape or form. Sometimes he answers the bit of the question he likes, and leaves unanswered the bits that are more difficult to answer."
He gave the example of a question he had tabled to 22 ministers, including the Prime Minister, about when they had last travelled by train. 18 ministers had responded with a precise date. Two had given holding answers. But the Prime Minister and the Chancellor refused to give the information. Mr Brown had just provided a bland statement of his general criteria for deciding how to travel. Another example was the Prime Minister's refusal to answer a question about when he had last met Tony Blair.
While there may be circumstances in which it is legitimate to not answer a parliamentary question, the sheer number of occasions on which this is happening suggests that increasingly, the test was whether an answer would cause political embarrassment. This is a misuse of power, the government must change its ways.
Friday, 23 January 2009
Heads must roll over Home Office data loss fiasco
The Information Commissioner’s Office has ruled that the Home Office breached data protection laws when a memory stick containing the personal information of thousands of prisoners was lost.
This latest judgement is another nail in the coffin for public trust in the Government. Institutionalised disregard for our personal data continues to worsen. It only serves to demonstrate that going ahead with the ID card scheme will pose a real threat to the security of our personal data.
Heads must roll if the slapdash culture is to end.
Anti-knife campaign fails as crime soars
We are facing a crimewave which is being fuelled by the recession. Latest figures show a big rise in knife-point robberies, burglaries, and fraud.
Robberies at knife-point are up 18 per cent, domestic burglaries are up four per cent and fraud or forgery is up 16 per cent.
More people died last year as a result of stabbings than at any time since records began. The Home Office figures show that robberies involving “knives or sharp instruments” were up 18 per cent between July and September last year, compared with the same period in 2007.
Fatal stabbings increased by 10 per cent to 270 in 2007-8, the highest since records began in 1977.
Domestic burglaries were up for the first time since 2002, by four per cent from 66,900 between July and September 2007 to 69,700 in the same period last year.
Other types of burglary were also up, by three per cent.
Drugs offences were nine per cent higher in July to September 2008 than in the same quarter the previous year and fraud and forgery increased by 16 per cent.
There is now clear evidence of rising crime as the recession bites.
The effectiveness of the anti-knife crime campaign launched by the government last June is questionable. The Government has failed to effectively roll out the measures that we know work against knife crime.
Posturing about penalties is no substitute for the hard graft of visible and intensive policing.
Labour's housing failure as repossessions soar
Yesterday, it was announced that repossessions were rising at an alarming rate; today we hear that the number of households on local authority housing waiting lists has hit 1.77 million - official statistics show this is up 100,000 on last year.
With the banks overstretching their credit facilities it could well mean that in the coming months that councils will have to help pick up the pieces as people end up on social housing waiting lists.
Since Labour took power 12 years ago the council house waiting list has risen from one million to almost 1.8 million, showing this Government has failed to build anywhere near the number of social homes Britain desperately needs.
The Government’s response to the social housing crisis is not only inadequate but scandalous. It is essential that the Government uses the current economic crisis to allow councils and housing associations to buy up land to build new social houses for the increasing number of families left waiting for social housing.
By allowing social housing to wither, the Government has let down hundreds of thousands of families.
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