Prime Minister's Questions 04/09/13

Okay I have to admit that I expected real fireworks in today's PMQ's. However I appreciated both David Cameron and Ed Miliband's statesman like approach to PMQ's.

Both Ed Milliband and David Cameron restated their desire of a peaceful intervention with David Cameron restating that Britain would not be involved in any military action. 

I think this could become a real problem for David Cameron because already German intelligence, has confirmed that President Assad did use chemical weapons on the rebels. 

If the UN ultimately does back military intervention then it could make David Cameron and Britain appear as bystanders on an international stage. 

On domestic questions Labour MP's asked David Cameron about his view on the mansion tax versus  bedroom tax and he replied asking the Labour leadership if they where going to reverse the bedroom tax.

Another Labour MP's asked about food banks and David Cameron responded that least his government informing people at the job centre about the existence of food banks. 

David Cameron main problem came from  his back benchers who posed somewhat uncomfortable questions to him about Syria and  the NHS. In particularly the NHS question  from Jesse Norman an MP that David Cameron sacked as an adviser today!

So although PMQ's was more subdued than I had anticipated, today's questions could have a future significance. 

The Syrian crisis

The current political firestorm in both the UK and the US is about the ongoing crises in Syria. 

According numerous reports President Assad has used chemical weapons on his people. Now some people demanding that Europe and the US should now use it's military firepower to oust President Assad.

In the UK Prime Minister David Cameron is seriously under fire. He was forced to recall parliament so MP's could vote on whether military action against Syria was appropriate. 

The result of the vote was an unmitigated disaster for David Cameron and he lost this important vote by about 13 votes. 

David Cameron is in a situation that no UK Prime Minister has been in for over 300 years. He could not even convince his backbenchers that military action was needed.

It has not been a good summer recess for David Cameron with photos of him on holiday in Portugal and then another holiday in the UK he comes across as out of touch with how the average British person is feeling.

The next few weeks will be pivotal for David Cameron either he reasserts his authority or he will become a lame duck Prime Minister.

President Obama has a different challenge to David Cameron as he liked and respected within the Democratic Party. 

However the American people are tired of war and the Iraq and Afghanistan

conflict has cost billions of dollars and thousands of lives. 

So President Obama needs to put forward an airtight case that will ensure that he gets the American people behind him. So that the American people do not start to view him as George W Bush mark two.

My own view is that the case for military intervention has not been made. I also believe that the UN  should be taking the lead and that would ensure that if military intervention was needed it would have global support.

Trayvon Martin

I must confess that I did not follow the whole court case. However there are some things in this case that really stand  out to me. 

Firstly, I believe that the prosecution over reached itself. As I do not believe it was murder case but more like manslaughter and if the prosecution had gone with the  manslaughter charge maybe they would have secured a conviction.

Secondly now that George Zimmerman has been found not guilty he is now apparently allowed to get his gun back. Now if this is really the case then rest assured as soon as the dust as settled on this case George Zimmerman will try his luck  again and claim self defence.

Thirdly Trayvon Martin did not come from the "perfect family" I.e. married parents and 2.3 children and he may not have been the perfect teenager. But he should be afforded the same rights as every other human being in the US.

I remember the 1990s was not good for race relations in the US it was the Rodney King case  and the UK it was the Stephen Lawrence case. 

I for one do not want to go back to those days where the legal system was seen as biased against people of colour.

I was hoping that both the UK and the US had moved on but it is cases like Trayvon Martin case that make me realise that we have not really moved on.

However I continue to be cautiously optimistic that as awful as the verdict sounds for people of colour. We have  to continue to believe that legal system works for us well. If people of colour stop believing in the legal system it would not help our cause.

Lastly George Zimmerman maybe legally free but in his mind he will never be free as ultimately it was his gun that ended Trayvon Martin's life.

PMQ review 10/07/13

Today's PMQ's was all about party funding and Ed Milliband did not hesitate ask David Cameron questions about Tory funding. David Cameron sidestepped most of Ed Milliband's questions and instead focused on how much political influence unions have on the Labour Party.

As it is questions to the Prime Minister it was evident that David Cameron had not answered any of the questions put him by Ed Milliband and therefore Ed Milliband was the clear winner. My problem with focusing the entire PMQ's on funding is that voters have real concerns about their jobs and standard of living.

Tory backbenches also asked questions about Britain's influence in the EU and the unions. Whilst Labour backbenchers asked about Tory donators like JCB allegedly  having influence over policy. I sincerely hope that  in the last PMQ of the year next week Ed will go back to fighting the rights of squeezed middle and leave David Cameron to talk about union influences.

However for this week it was imperative that Ed Millliband stood firm on this issue of union donations and even suggesting a cap of £5000 on political donations because if he hadn't then Tories would have accused him of being indecisive and weak.

 It remain to be seen whether fighting about donations moves votes either way however what Ed Milliband doesn't need is voter antipathy as this will discourage them from going to the polls and voting in 2015.

Ed Milliband Union Reform

Ed Milliband made a historic speech yesterday on the Labour Party links with the unions. I applaud Ed for taking this initiative especially as it could have some serious financial implications. It shows that Ed is not afraid to take on challenges no matter how serious they are.

If Ed wants to be the next PM he has to be seen as a man that has no fear when it comes to taking on challenges. The fact that Ed's speech was applauded by both Tony Blair and Len McCLuskey goes to show that Ed is working hard to unite the different factions of the Labour Party.

As Ed is aware that if he did not take the initiative then David Cameron would have seized on this opportunity and would have described him as weak and an ineffective leader. Now I hope that  Ed will take the real argument about party donations to David Cameron.

Prime Minister's Questions review 03/07/13

Today PMQ's started off fairly nicely with Ed Milliband asking about the UK government responses to the clashes in Egypt. David Cameron provided a nice considered response about how the government was liaising with the Egyptian government and how President Obama had spoken to President Morsi.

However when Ed Milliband asked David Cameron about primary school places that's when Cameron became defensive and started his usual "its all Labour's fault". Today Cameron went a step further and most of his responses to the Labour MPs was embedded with "they are all here because of Len McCluskey"

Cameron responses were a little interesting at first but then just got repetitive and boring and he came across to me as quite desperate as well. Cameron is clearly gearing up for the next election and he thinks that it can be fought on painting Ed Milliband as a die had trade unionist.

Cameron was asked various questions ranging from food banks to bedroom tax and his standard response was either it is all Labour's fault or the Unite union is pulling the strings of the Labour party.

I thought Ed Milliband did quite well today in raising issues that are affecting families up and down the country. Whilst David Cameron does not come across as a man who understand the daily struggles of families in the UK.

Spending Review 2013

The coalition government has two more years in power before the next general election. The economic situation in the UK is serious as unemployment stands at 2.4 million and growth is about 0.3% annually.

In 2010 David Cameron promised that he would be able to balance the budget by 2015. Now in 2013 Cameron has yet to admit that the deficit is actually going up and not down.

George Osborne’s spending reviewing included the following:

·         No more welfare cuts.

·         People currently claiming job seekers allowance would now need visit the job centre on a weekly basis.

·          Making it prerequisite for new claimants who do not speak English to learn it.

·         Automatic pay increases in the public sector would also come to an end 

·         Increase the number of free schools.

Mr Osborne has spent the last three years tackling the deficit and yet it is widely known that the UK deficit has risen. By this time next year it will be abundantly clear to all whether or not Mr Osborne economic policy has been successful. Which in turn will determine whether or not this coalition government will be re-elected in May 2015.