Serious problems with student loans system

Shadow Universities and Skills Secretary, David Willetts, has today written to Lord Mandelson to seek assurances about reports that the student loans system is experiencing serious problems with processing applications.

Just weeks before the first payments are due to be made, many potential students have written to express their concern about inaccurate information, loss of documents and an unresponsive helpline.

These problems are reminiscent of recent Government fiascos over Educational Maintenance Allowance (EMA) payments and national curriculum tests.

The text of the letter is below:

"Dear Peter

I am concerned about the serious problems prospective students are facing in sorting out their financial support before starting university this month. I am receiving letters and emails on a daily basis from students and their parents who are finding it hard to obtain accurate information about their student support applications. The Government set up new arrangements for this year, including replacing Student Finance Direct with Student Finance England, and these do not appear to be working properly. There is a clear and substantial risk that new students will face serious financial problems at the start of the new university term.

Among the problems that people are experiencing are:

• a lack of useful information on basic facts like whether an application has started to be processed;
• insufficient information about the receipt and location of original personal documents;
• repeated website failures and no response from the helpline; and
• an absence of accurate information on their financial entitlement.

Because students need a financial settlement letter in order to start university, the problems look set to affect their ability to enrol at university as well as their financial situation. And those from less well-off households are affected worst of all, as they are entitled to income-related grants alongside the student loans.

Are you aware of these problems? What steps are you taking to tackle them? And are you able to reassure all young people starting university this autumn who applied before the deadline that they will receive their full loan and grant entitlement at the start of the new term?"

Ministers do not emerge with any credit from MG Rover report

Shadow Business Secretary Ken Clarke says that questions need to be asked about the Government's role in the MG Rover deal.

Responding to the publication of the report into the collapse of MG Rover, he said that the inspectors "quite rightly" criticise the Phoenix Four and their Chief Executive, "who seem to have enriched themselves at a time when MG Rover workers were losing their jobs".

But, he said, "it is a pity" that the inspectors did not think that the scope of the inquiry enabled them to go more precisely into the Government’s role in the selection of the Phoenix bid.

It is also "regrettable", Clarke said, that they didn't investigate the possible misuse of taxpayers' money seeing as "Ministers put in £6.5m in the middle of an election campaign, to keep the company going beyond polling day".

"Unfortunately this report does not shed enough light on the Government’s undoubted involvement in brokering the deal in the first place and failing to realise that the project was heading for disaster", he added.

"I can understand why Peter Mandelson was so reluctant for this report to come out because it reminds us of this whole sorry episode from which Government ministers do not emerge with any credit."

Learning from local government

Speaking to the Local Government Association today, Shadow Chancellor George Obsorne has spoken about how much Whitehall can learn from local government.

Osborne said that the Conservative Party was "100 per cent committed" to devolving power to local government and local towns and cities.

"Localism brings people closer to political power and gives them control over their own communities. By giving people more power and control over the services that are delivered in their areas, we can inspire a new spirit of civic pride in our communities".

He went on to say that local councils are often the best sources of new ideas and new policies, which is why he wanted to give them "more power and more responsibility to unleash their innovative potential".

"Most councils in England are controlled by Conservatives", he said. "So I want the Conservative Party to learn from what local Conservative councils are doing right now, as they are dealing with many of the constraints that we may face very soon".

Osborne added, however, that localism is about more than having the right policies, but that it's also about understanding that "not all good ideas are dreamt up in a policy unit in Whitehall".

A re-run of the Afghan election should not be ruled out

Shadow Foreign Secretary William Hague has expressed concern about widespread reports of irregularities and fraud in the elections in Afghanistan.

"It is very important for the success of what our troops are doing in Afghanistan that the Afghan people accept the legitimacy of the Government", he said.

"It is vital that the Electoral Complaints Commission completes its work and that President Karzai does not declare victory before that work is done, even if it means delaying the provisional result of the election".

Hague added that if the Electoral Complaints Commission required some elections to be re-run then "that should happen", and said that a full second round of the election shouldn't be ruled out "if that proves necessary".

Pickles backs campaign to save election night

Conservative Party Chairman Eric Pickles has given his support to an online campaign to save the traditional election night ballot count.

As news spread that a number of councils are considering postponing the counting of ballots until the day after the General Election, an online campaign was set up yesterday to lobby for the traditional election night.

Led by Jonathan Isaby of ConservativeHome.com, and backed by activists from other parties, the campaign group on Facebook has been gathering momentum today.

Pickles has given the campaign his full support. In a letter to the Secretary of State for Justice, Jack Straw, he has called for guidance to be issued to local authorities encouraging them to maintain the traditional practice of counting on election night:

"At a time when interest and trust in politics is at such a low ebb, it would be a retrograde step to suck all the interest out of the most important and vibrant part of our democratic process. One only has to look to June’s European Parliamentary Count to see how the whole process had all the impact of a soggy sparkler on Bonfire Night."

In an attempt to build a cross-party consensuse he has also written to his counterparts in the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats, urging them to back the campaign.

Click here to join the "Save General Election Night" Facebook group

Cutting the cost of politics

David Cameron has given a major speech today, setting out how a Conservative Government will cut the cost of politics.

"If we’re going to take our country through these difficult times", he said, "those who lead must lead by powerful example. That means getting our own house in order and cutting the cost of politics".

He outlined several ways of doing this, including cutting the number of MPs, cutting their perks and subsidies, and cutting ministerial salaries and their cars.

In total the proposals he announced today will save taxpayers as much as £120 million a year, but Cameron emphasised that this was about more than the money.

"It’s about the message. This country is in a debt crisis. We must all now come together, play our part, carry our burden and pay our fair share. And that starts at the very top – with politicians cutting the cost of politics".

Radical reform needed at the MoD

In a major speech this morning, Shadow Defence Secretary Liam Fox set out how a Conservative Government will reform the Ministry of Defence.

He also spoke about the importance of our mission in Afghanistan. "Failure in Afghanistan would have profound geopolitical implications", he said.

"The damage to the cohesion, confidence and credibility of NATO would be immense and it would provide a shot in the arm for jihadists worldwide".

Fox outlined three key priorities for the next Conservative Government:

"First, launch a wide ranging and detailed strategic defence review.

Secondly, we will simultaneously conduct a capabilities review. There are questions for all three services as to whether they have an over abundance of senior posts. How do we stop the trend where the military seems consistently to shrink while the civil service keeps growing?

And finally, we will perform a root and branch reform of the procurement process. Reforming the procurement process will be no easy task. In fact, it will probably prove to be the greatest challenge in terms of increasing the efficiency of the MoD. All options for reform, no matter how radical, are on the table. "

He added that the MoD needed "new vision, fresh thinking, and new leadership" that only a new Government can provide. "Increasingly the public are wakening up to the sorry state of defence under Labour. It is likely to be an election issue for the first time since the end of the Cold War."

Defence resignation highlights Labour's failings

Liam Fox has reacted to the resignation of Eric Joyce – a key aide to the Defence Minister, saying that his assessment of Labour defence policy is "one that both service personnel and the public will recognise".

He said it is "extraordinary" that Labour ministers still don’t know what is going on at the Ministry of Defence, adding that they have had 12 years of "serial incompetence" in running the MoD.

Former Gurkha wins by-election for the ConservativesFriday

Eric Pickles has said he is "delighted" at news of an ex-Gurkha's victory in a Medway by-election.

Tashi Tamang Bhutia, the Conservative candidate in the previously Labour-held ward of Luton and Mayfield, finished first with 1042 votes.

Eric said Tashi's victory was "further proof of the invaluable contribution the Gurkha community makes to British society" and he added:

"It is a shame that the government had to be dragged kicking and screaming before they woke up and realised the Gurkhas should be treated as honoured veterans of our armed forces."

International economic watchdog warns UK is falling behind

Philip Hammond, Shadow Chief Secretary to the Treasury, has responded to today’s OECD growth forecasts predicting that the UK will be the only G7 country not to see any growth this year.

"We will be the only major economy without any growth this year, and the only one for which prospects have got worse not better", he said.

He added that we were ill-prepared to face the recession because of economic and fiscal mismanagement on the part of Gordon Brown. "Far from being well placed to weather the storm as Gordon Brown claimed", Hammond said, "these figures show yet again that Britain is worse placed than our neighbours".

The OECD expects the UK economy to contract by 4.7 per cent in 2009 - even more than its last forecast of 4.3 per cent.

Brown has to be straight with people about al-Megrahi

David Cameron has criticised Gordon Brown’s belated response to the release of Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi

Cameron criticised the Prime Minister's claim that there was no "double dealing".

"We learnt this morning from the Foreign Secretary that a Government minister told the Libyans that the Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary did not want Mr. Megrahi to die in a Scottish jail. But at the same time we know the Government was giving assurances to the United States that Mr. Megrahi would spend his full sentence in a Scottish prison".

He added that almost as serious as this was the double dealing with the British public, where "on the one hand Gordon Brown has completely refused to give his opinion on the release of this mass murderer but on the other hand was content for the Libyans to be told that he shouldn’t die in prison".

Cameron concluded by calling on the Prime Minister to "answer the questions that need to be answered" and to "set up an inquiry so we can sort out this mess once and for all".

Government admits prospect of blackouts

Information uncovered by Conservatives today reveals that the Government is expecting power cuts across Britain by 2017.

For the first time since the 1970s consumers will be told to prepare for blackouts because the supply of electricity will fail to meet demand at peak times, according to new government figures.

Shadow Energy and Climate Change Secretary, Greg Clark today blamed the Government for putting “its head in the sand about Britain’s energy policy for a decade”.

Over the next few years many power stations will come to the end of their lives or will be required to close by EU law, but the Government has failed to ensure that replacements are available in time.

As a result, by 2017 the Government has pencilled in power cuts expected to be around 3000 megawatt hours per year - this is the equivalent of the whole Nottingham urban area being without electricity for a day.

Clark added that the next government “has an urgent task to accelerate the deployment of a new generating capacity, and to take steps to ensure, that as a matter of national security, there is enough capacity to provide a robust margin of safety.”

Teachers need the power to keep order

Shadow Schools Minister Nick Gibb has added to warnings about the Government's plans to give teenagers a direct right of appeal against exclusion.

"This Labour Government has weakened teachers’ powers to keep order in the classroom", he said.

"Nothing undermines the authority of a headteacher more than an appeals panel returning an excluded pupil back to the same school – even in cases where knives have been involved".

Gibb pledged to give head teachers more freedom to discipline violent and disruptive pupils, and to "make sure teachers have the powers they need to nip problems with behaviour in the bud before they spiral out of control."

Preventing further suffering in Sri Lanka

100 days on from the conflict which blighted Sri Lanka for decades, William Hague has expressed serious concerns about the fate of the innocent civilians who are now residing in internment camps.

"Whilst we are glad that Sri Lanka is now free from the scourge of terrorism", he said, "we have repeatedly urged the Sri Lankan government to take all possible measures to prevent further suffering".

He called for UN and relief organisations to be given "full and unrestricted access to provide shelter, food, water, and medicine, and to oversee the screening process" – a call made all the more urgent by the onset of the monsoon season.

Hague also stressed the importance of the Sri Lankan government living up to its commitment to allow the people to return to their homes by the end of the year. "Their continued confinement in camps will simply sow the seeds of discontent and may lead to renewed conflict in years to come. This would be a disastrous setback for the country when peace has been so hard won."

Five million people have never worked under Labour

Latest figures show that three million people have not had a job since before 1996, and a further two million people in England and Wales have never had a job at all.

The figures will be highlighted by Shadow Secretary of State for Work and Pensions Theresa May in a speech on Thursday.

May will argue that far from being a product of the recent recession, the clear majority of the people without work were already on benefits before the recession began. “These are people that have been hidden away by Labour for the past ten years”, she will say.

Describing the “steady growth in welfare ghettos”, she will say that unemployment didn’t somehow disappear during the ‘boom years’, but that “it was merely disguised, renamed, and hidden away in ever growing pockets of poverty”.

“Labour’s failure to reform our welfare state in the good times has lead to a huge social and economic cost. They have slowly built a wall between the working and the workless, hoping to keep their failures out of sight.”

Women being denied labour beds to give birth

Last year, almost 4,000 women in England gave birth in a location other than a designated labour bed in a hospital.

Hospitals also gave examples of babies being born in midwife offices, lifts, toilets and a caravan. Some of these births will have been genuine emergencies and unavoidable, but many are because services are overstretched.

"New mothers should not be being put through the trauma of having to give birth in such inappropriate places", Shadow Health Secretary Andrew Lansley said. "It is extremely distressing for them and their families to be denied a labour bed because their maternity unit is full".

Lansley added that the fact that mothers are getting this sort of sub-standard treatment despite Gordon Brown’s tripling of spending on the NHS reflects the incredible waste of resources in recent years.

He also pledged that under a Conservative Government would make sure every woman who wants a single hospital room will get one, and also that it would make sure the money follows the patient "so that if more women are giving birth then more money is available".

Theresa Villiers welcomes high speed rail report

Network Rail has today published research that shows the massive potential benefits that high speed rail could deliver.

"As the Party that has championed high speed rail", Theresa Villiers, Shadow Secretary of State for Transport, said, "we welcome Network Rail's report".

She added that it "provides further evidence that we need to take high speed rail to the north. Unlike Labour, our high speed rail ambitions go north of Birmingham and we call on the Government to match our commitment".

Villiers said the report also highlighted the potential high speed rail has for picking up some of the journeys that would otherwise be taken by air. She stressed the "importance of linking up Heathrow to the new network, if we are to encourage people to make greener transport choices".

The drug and crime culture portrayed in 'The Wire' is in British cities too

In a keynote speech on crime and broken communities today, Chris Grayling has highlighted the “decade of neglect” under Labour – a decade in which “violence in our society has become a norm and not an exception”.

“Since Labour came to power, the level of violent crime in Britain has risen dramatically, by 70 per cent. Gun crime is up by more than half and there are more than 100 serious knife crimes each day. Under Labour, fatal stabbings reached the highest level on record.”

These figures, he said, showed that the drug and crime culture of the award winning US series ‘The Wire’ is increasingly becoming a feature of British cities as well:

“The culture of violence that was a feature of US cities a generation ago is now a feature of British cities. The Wire used to be just a work of fiction for British viewers. But under this Government, in many parts of British cities, The Wire has become a part of real life in this country too”.

TORIES URGED TO BACK REFERENDUM BILL

DEMOCRATIC SUPPORT SHOULD REPLACE TORY PLOTS AND PLANS

Scotland’s Conservative MSPs were today urged to back the Scottish Government’s referendum bill after media reports in the Daily Mail that senior UK Tories wish to hold a referendum on Scottish Independence if they form the next UK Government.

This follows reports in the Sunday Times that former Scottish Secretary Lord Forsyth has urged David Cameron to back a referendum.

SNP MSP Dr Alasdair Allan said;

“It is clear Tories in England and Lord Forsyth are in favour of a referendum on Independence. Scotland’s Conservatives should follow their lead.

“Instead of waiting for an election they have not won, the Tories could get the referendum ball rolling by backing the SNP Government’s proposals.

"The Scottish Government has made clear it will introduce a referendum bill this year for a vote in 2010. The easiest way for the Tories to get their independence vote is to back the SNP Government's bill - not to hatch secret plots and plans in London.

“Regardless of who is in Government in London all MSPs should value the right of the Scottish people to determine their own constitutional future and support the Scottish Government’s referendum bill when it comes to Parliament later this year.”

Figures show crime is hitting the poor hardest

New figures show that crime is now at its worst in Britain's poorest communities. All of the top twenty deprived areas in Britain are in the top 10% for crime, and within individual local authority areas the poorer parts are experiencing much worse crime than the prosperous parts.

The Conservatives have also uncovered data showing that the unemployed are twice as likely to experience violent crime and burglary as those in work.

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling said that this research “completely undermines Labour’s claim to be the party of progressive politics”. Commenting on the increasing levels of violent crime and burglary, he added:

“The people who are at the sharp end of this are the people who face the biggest challenges in their lives in some of our most deprived communities. Billions of pounds, endless initiatives and a decade of rhetoric later, and the reality is that the Government has let those people down comprehensively."