“The move – announced today by Health Secretary Jeremy Hunt – will allow patients and families to know where the buck stops. The idea of identifying individual doctors and nurses has all but died out after once being commonplace in the NHS. Bringing it back was a key recommendation of the Francis inquiry into the deaths of hundreds of patients in the Mid Staffs scandal. Writing in today’s Daily Mail, Mr Hunt says: ‘A name you know and a face you trust to guide you throughout your stay can transform your experience.” – Daily Mail
“The Prime Minister praises those who help out in their communities for putting ‘their faith into action’, saying: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive’. Mr Cameron once likened his Anglican faith to the reception of Magic FM in the Chilterns, admitting that ‘it comes and goes’. But he is keen to reaffirm his Christianity in his message today, showing that he is more than happy to ‘do God’.” – Daily Mail
> Today:
> Yesterday:
Danny Alexander, the Chief Treasury Secretary, said foreign companies could abandon their plans to invest in the UK if Tories mounted a crude anti-EU campaign ahead of the European Parliament elections next May in an attempt to counter the threat from Ukip. In an article on The Independent’s website, Mr Alexander said: “The fact that some senior Conservatives are arguing that Britain should vote to leave the EU is already unsettling investors and threatening jobs and growth. Further pandering to anti-Europeans would be bad for the British economy.” – The Independent
“Tory chairman Grant Shapps has slapped down Vince Cable over his immigration rant, branding him the mad old uncle at Christmas. Furious Conservative MPs also called on the renegade Business Secretary to resign over his “Enoch Powell” attack on David Cameron on Sunday. Hitting back yesterday, Mr Shapps said: “Vince Cable’s a bit like an old uncle at Christmas. Slightly rude, does not always make sense — but he is part of the extended family so you live with it.” – The Sun
“Nothing has actually changed as a result either of the speech or of Mr Cable’s response to it. Not a single European leader has signed up to the Prime Minister’s goal of restricting freedom of movement for EU citizens. And not a single Romanian or Bulgarian planning to come to Britain next year has decided not to do so (at least, to the best of my knowledge). The only difference that the Rivers of Vince row may make is to help persuade voters that the games of party politics are meaningless – but played at their expense.” – Daily Telegraph
> Yesterday: ToryDiary – Shock Cable latest: “Cameron is Hitler.”
“While Labour politicians have done little or nothing to help the working poor, there’s still a strong public perception that Conservatives are not on the side of the low-paid. Conservatives would, rightly, point out that they have lifted the poorest out of tax altogether and that their education and welfare reforms are specifically aimed at helping the poorest. But research for Lord Ashcroft found that only 9 per cent of voters thought that Conservatives best represented the low-paid in the public sector and only 14 per cent the low-paid in the private sector (the figures for Labour are 55 per cent and 44 per cent). Three quarters of voters still think that the party is the party of the rich.” – Daily Telegraph
“The benefits cap is forcing 250 people back to work every week, Iain Duncan Smith today declares. Figures from his Department for Work and Pensions reveal that half of those hit by the highly popular handouts limit are now in a job. By last month, 19,000 of the estimated 40,000 big-claiming jobless were employed again. That’s 250 a week who have got work since they were told in April 2012 that the cap was coming.” – The Sun
“‘We are beginning to lose the plot in this country,’ Ms Soubry said yesterday. ‘It started with a photograph of her being assaulted by her husband. ‘Out in public was played what should have been a very private and very distressing moment. These criminal proceeding had already begun in 2012, and now we have had this playing out of this court case where Nigella Lawson quite properly complains that she feels she is on trial.'” – Daily Mail
“The ex-MP previously pleaded guilty to false accounting by filing 19 fake receipts for “research and translation” services. MacShane, 65, used the money to fund a series of trips to Europe, including one to judge a literary competition in Paris. His guilty plea followed more than four years of scrutiny into his use of Commons allowances. During this time the former Labour MP continued to receive a parliamentary salary and expenses – and was re-elected as an MP – despite the Commons authorities and the police being aware that he had admitted the fraud.” – Daily Telegraph