The Maurice Smith Review, charged with carrying out ‘a full and detailed review of the provisions which prevent the promotion of racism in schools’  has reported back to Government and it’s findings have been accepted by Ed Balls in full.  Apparently the review was so full and detailed that the investigations  included a meeting with a National Front press officer, as reported by the Daily Mail.  The DCSF press release * about the report outlines six recommendations made by Smith including monitoring by Ofsted and annual Government review states: The current safeguards in place to protect children and young people in maintained schools from discrimination or political indoctrination include: - a requirement for schools to have equal opportunities policies -...

Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne answers Independent readers’ question in today’s paper. Here are three which caught NewsHound’s eye: Why are you sticking it to Lord Ashcroft when your own leadership campaign was part-funded by a “non-dom”? All parties take contributions from non-dom taxpayers, but the Liberal Democrats do not put them into the House of Lords where they can make law for the rest of us who pay full taxes. Nor do our Lords break solemn and binding commitments to become permanently resident and pay full taxes. Nor do our Lords fail to tell our leaders that they have renegotiated key commitments with the Revenue. As it happens, the Tory allegation that my leadership campaign was funded by a non-dom is not true. They were simply desperate...

Over at The Guardian’s Comment Is Free website, Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne argues tht locking up more people is a populist ploy that doesn’t cut crime. Instead, he says, we should focus on rigorous community sentences instead. Here’s an excerpt: It should be a given that important matters of public policy are based on evidence and research, rather than political whim. Why, then, is the field of criminal justice uniquely and scandalously divorced from this obvious rule? … Both [Labour and Tories] continue to try to frighten the public into the arms of their party. It is this politics of fear that has created the dismal bidding war between politicians and the press on crime, a loss of faith in the police and judiciary, and the systematic demonisation...

Over at The Guardian’s Comment Is Free site, Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne argues Labour has got it wrong in proposing a referendum on the Alternative Vote: only the Single Transferable Vote will remedy the unfairness of the present system. Here’s an excerpt: [The Alternative Vote] is very similar to first-past-the-post in two key respects. Because it is based on single constituencies – a virtue for its proponents, who say they prize the constituency link – the parties continue to select one candidate each, and the voters only have one choice for each party. That means that in the majority of parliamentary seats, the important decision about who should be the MP will continue to be taken in party caucuses rather than at the public ballot box. Although most MPs...

Former head of Metropolitan police says elected police commissioners will not work and calls for bipartisan inquiryPolicing is becoming unaffordably expensive due to the failure of political parties to back cheaper alternatives to full-time police officers, the former Metropolitan police commissioner Sir Ian Blair will warn today. He will also call for politicians to put aside party divisions prior to the election and set up an all-party royal commission to agree a new role for the police.Blair will renew his attack on Conservative proposals for elected police commissioners across the country, saying they raise the spectre of Sarah Palin-style figures sacking police commissioners to protect themselves and their families.His remarks will come in a Political Quarterly lecture to be given...

Welcome to this latest LDVideo instalment, highlighting three political video clips from the past week. Nick Clegg answers the top 10 questions posed by Reddit.com users as voted by users of the site. (You can see all of the questions posed to him here). (Also available on YouTube here). BBC reports Tory shadow home secretary Chris Grayling gets into trouble for using misleading crime statistics. Sara Bedford covered the story for LDV here). And, finally, Boris Johnson does the hokey-cokey … seems he always wants to go one better than his party leader, who preferred to stick to the cokey: (Also available on YouTube...

"No matter how hard shadow home secretary Chris Grayling tried to sound convincing, there was a little wobble in the back of his throat betraying the fact he wasn't even persuading himself.He was trying to refute claims the Tory party had misrepresented statistics to make it look like violent crime had gone up more than it actually had under Labour.But within seconds he began to sound like someone with a complex for being short, who stands in front of the mirror telling themselves that size doesn't matter."Read the Evening Post Parliamentary Correspondent's full column...

Shadow home secretary Chris Grayling is accused of misleading the public in his use of crime...

Yesterday I wrote about Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling’s extraordinarily twisted use of statisticsto try to justify part of the Conservatives’ ‘Broken Britain’ narrative. Today the BBC’s Mark Easton, who broke the original story, has the newsthat Chris Grayling has just been sent a sharp letter from Parliament’s statistics watchdog, informing him that his mis-use of statistics about violent crime is ‘likely to damage public trust in official statistics’. The Chairman of the UK Statistics Authority (UKSA), Sir Michael Scholar, says he does ‘not wish to become involved in political controversy’,  but ‘must take issue’ with Grayling’s comments ’yesterday about violent crime statistics’. The...

This morning’s Today programme provided another of those ‘mustn’t miss’ moments, as presenter Evan Davis  took the Conservatives’ Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling to task over the party’s misleading use of crime statistics. Last week Mark Easton, the BBC’s Home Affairs editor, had asked ‘Are the Tories being honest with their claims on violent crime’: Last week, David Cameron told me that one reason he could justify the phrase “broken society” was because of “significant” increases in violent crime, notably gun and knife crime in Britain.  When I challenged him to produce the evidence, his party press office sent the BBC a list of statistics. It emerges that the only way the Conservative leader can back up his claims is to ignore the klaxon...

A very good piece on Radio 4’s Today programme: BBC Home Editor Mark Easton looks into how the Tories are using official statistics on violent crime to apparently show that there’s been a big rise recently.The snag is that the official sources make crystal clear that the way the figures are compiled changed significantly in 2002, resulting in an artificial increase in the numbers. This “has rendered direct numerical comparisons with pre 2002/03 levels inaccurate” – according to BBC pinko former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith.The police are also objecting to the scaremongering way the Tories are using these stats:In Milton Keynes, local [Tory] MP Mark Lancaster's office put out a statement last week claiming that there were 6,015 "violent attacks" in the town last year, reflecting...

The Labour Group on Plymouth City Council has reacted angrily at Conservative plans to take Police Community Support Officers off Plymouth’s streets, and may see them scrapped altogether. The Tories’ Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling MP has said that a government led by David Cameron would no longer demand that a fixed amount of money is spent on PCSOs. Councillor Mary Aspinall, Labour Group Secretary said: “This is further proof of how out of touch David Cameron is with what really happens on our streets. I know the PCSOs in my area of Sutton and Mount Gould, and across Plymouth, are hardworking, respected figures who do a fantastic job supporting their Police Officer colleagues, who now have more time to tackle more serious incidents. To even mention ‘doing...

It’s a f***ing disgrace! Liberal Democrat shadow home secretary Chris Huhne has put Didier Drogba at the centre of immigration policy. The politician name-checked the Chelsea striker as he responded to Home Office plans that skilled migrants will have to apply an identity card when their current visa expires. That includes footballers. Huhne said: “Making Didier Drogba [...]...

Over at The Guardian’s Comment Is Free website today, Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne argues that, if they are effective and available, body scanners at airports should have been rolled out by the government years ago. Here’s an excerpt: No one wants to have full body scanners in airports. No one wants to be electronically strip-searched at the start of their holidays. It is an invasion of privacy we would all rather avoid. But the foiled bombing attempt on a Detroit-bound plane over Christmas demonstrates that terrorists still have an unhealthy addiction to air travel, and we have to move with the developing threat. Terrorists do not stand still, and neither can we. The government’s assessment is that there would have been a 60 percent chance of identifying...

ToryDiary: Only a Conservative government will save Britain from a borrowing crisis, says George Osborne (BUT HOW?) LeftWatch: Labour's criminal recordChristine Emmett on Platform: Why small businesses need the Conservatives - and what we must be offering them Seats and Candidates Diary of a PPC: Steve Baker settles in to his new home in Wycombe and makes the most of Christmas events as he prepares to step into Paul Goodman's shoes Local Government: Telford and Wrekin increases grit capacity by 25% WATCH: Eric Pickles tells Andrew Marr that the Conservative Party is ready for a general election whenever Gordon Brown calls it Chris Grayling: Homeowners using self-defence should escape prosecution "Homeowners would be handed a licence to kill burglars by a Tory government. Shadow...

Over at the Independent on Sunday, Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne rails against the UK’s asylum system for combining ’staggering bureaucratic incompetence with institutionalised cruelty’. Here’s an excerpt: … It is one thing to stamp out abuse among asylum-seekers, but quite another to devise a system that combines staggering bureaucratic incompetence with institutionalised cruelty, for every year we are locking up hundreds and probably thousands of children, who have committed no crime, in prison-like conditions. We do not know exactly how many, because the Government will not provide regular figures, but in June there were 470 such children, most of them under five. Details on living conditions are vague, because campaigners are denied access to...

Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne has an article in today’s Times noting that how much it costs the Treasury to borrow money depends on three ratings agencies … and asks the crucial question: are they fit to wield this power? Chris’s credential for writing an article outside his brief? Well, he founded the sovereign group at Fitch Ratings, and was group managing director. Here’s an excerpt: Last week Moody’s — one of the big three international ratings agencies — warned that the UK’s top bond rating would be under threat if Britain failed to sort out its public finances in the next three years. For the first time in decades, British Chancellors have to worry about the bond market. … the bond market is vast, global and powerful, as it sets the...

It was Chancellor Alistair Darling's pre-budget report statement in the Commons and I and several other hacks were eagerly paying attention to events.I don't mean the actual statement, of course – Darling can bore a man so badly that all the blood runs out of his head.In fact, I think that actually happened to one MP.The poor soul was Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling; his melon head flopped back and his eyeballs rolled up so that all you could see was white – very freaky.Read the Evening Post parliamentary correspondent's column...

Today’s Daily Telegraph reports that top Tory Zac Goldsmith did not tell his local party about his ‘non-dom’ tax status when he was selected to fight the next election against the Lib Dems’ Susan Kramer: Earlier this week announced that he [sic] planned to surrender his “non-dom” status from the current tax year to defuse the row. However yesterday it was disclosed that Mr Goldsmith had failed to tell his local Conservative party about his tax status when he was selected as prospective parliamentary candidate for Richmond Park in March 2007. Pamela Fleming, the association’s chairman, said the matter was not discussed because “we did not ask the question. He was not asked about it. It did not come up”. You can read the full story here....

Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne today tackled Alan Johnson on his decision not to block the extradition of computer hacker Gary McKinnon, who has Asperger’s, to the USA. (LDV has previously covered the story here). Their exchange in the Commons today is recorded below, and you can read the whole Hansard debate here: Chris Huhne (Eastleigh) (LD): The Home Secretary is, in my view, a very brave man to hold out his judgment of the medical condition—and of the worsening of the medical condition—of Gary McKinnon against such overwhelming evidence as we have heard from the hon. Member for Enfield, Southgate (Mr. Burrowes). Gary McKinnon is a vulnerable British citizen who has become more vulnerable and whose interests are being ignored in favour of an unequal treaty with the...

Labour’s policing spokesperson on the London Assembly, Joanne McCartney, has spoken out against shadow home secretary Chris Grayling’s proposals for elected police commissioners. Labour’s policing spokesperson on the London Assembly, Joanne McCartney, said: “Of course the police need to be held to account, but this would lead to less accountability, not more. Senior officers are rightly resisting this and I don’t think there is much public appetite to see Boris Johnsons up and down the country running the police. The idea that we go down the American route of commissioners, mayors and politicians all trying to out tough each other with one eye on their next election is deeply worrying.” Shadow home secretary Chris Grayling proposed that that London...

Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne has slammed the decision of Labour’s Alan Johnson to refuse to block the extradition of Gary McKinnon – the self-confessed computer hacker with Asperger’s – to the US on medical grounds. It is appalling that this Government places a higher value on a deeply unfair extradition agreement than it does on the welfare of a British citizen. Alan Johnson has shamefully turned down the opportunity to demonstrate his faith in British justice and save a vulnerable man from a lifetime in prison or worse. “The Home Secretary must now step in and ensure that this sorry saga is ended once and for all by trying Gary McKinnon in this country. The Home Secretary should stop being an American poodle and start being a British bulldog.”...

The bets are on. Apparently, a hung parliament is a highly likely outcome of the next general election, following decades of gerrymandering and Labour-favouring boundary reviews. And in such a scenario, the Liberal Democrats have indicated that they would support the Conservative Party: Yes, Nick Clegg would be prepared to climb into bed with David Cameron, if the Conservative leader would entertain such a coupling.Can you imagine the chimera Cabinet this would spawn?Prime Minister – David CameronDeputy Prime Minister – Nick CleggChancellor of the Exchequer – Vince CableHome Secretary – George Osborne Foreign Secretary – William Hague Education Secretary – Chris Huhne Health Secretary – Chris GraylingTransport Secretary – Michael Gove Environment Secretary – Simon...

Whilst Labour have the police targeting the public for bin crimes, stepping on the cracks in the pavement or "looking at me in a funny way" and hauling up otherwise law abiding citizens before the justices for petty offences, if offences they are in any real meaning of the word; real crime is rising and rather than tackle that this worthless shower of shit keeps on pumping out more shit regulations on stuff like bins. This is a government has created a new crime/regulation for every day it has been in power near enough. Yet real crime, thanks to Labour is soaring ever upwards. Gun crime has almost doubled since Labour came to power as a culture of extreme gang violence has taken hold. Mind I wonder how many of these gangs and criminals that are quite happy to shoot...

Over in the Independent, Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne writes about his experiences on last night’s BBC Question Time as a fellow panellist alongside BNP leader Nick Griffin. Here’s an excerpt: The key method of Griffin was on display: pretend to be moderate and reasonable in order to garner support which would be revolted if it knew his real agenda. He was confronted with quotes from YouTube, in which he told David Duke of the Ku Klux Klan that the BNP had to move softly because the British people were not yet ready for talk of racial purity, so you talk about identity, freedom and security. Underneath the media-trained veneer, the old racial politics was there. It is the same politics we have seen time and again through the decades: find a scapegoat and blame a...

Following Guido’s revelations this morning that the UK Border Agency was paying arresting officers to play mixed-sex rugby rather than chase after illegal immigrants, a spokesperson, Tony Smith, told the Mail that: ‘This sporting event was inadvertently arranged outside the strict civil service rules. Contrary to reports it will now be taking place outside of office hours.  Any suggestion that staff could claim paid leave is absolutely wrong and staff have been notified accordingly.’ Matthew Elliott, chief executive of the Taxpayers’ Alliance told the Press Association: “The fact that the Home Office thinks taxpayers should pay for their staff to scrum down in work hours is an absolute disgrace, and the fact we’re paying extra for their fun just adds...

It’s Thursday, it’s 10.35 pm … it’s BBC1’s Question Time. It is, of course, the most highly anticipated Question Time ever with a colossal media storm surrounding the invitation of BNP leader Nick Griffin. The evening news says that there are massive protests outside BBC TV Centre, with twitter reports that staff are under siege. Across the country, protests are happening at regional BBC offices. For the Liberal Democrats, it’s leadership contender and Shadow Foreign Secretary Chris Huhne taking up cudgels for the yellow corner. Baroness Sayeeda Warsi will be in the blue corner, and Lord Chancellor Jack Straw in the red. The celebrity non-political punter will be Bonnie Greer. Stephen reported earlier on with Griffin’s response to his co-panellists – and handy...

Over at the Guardian’s Comment is Free blog, Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne – who will be appearing alonsgide BNP leader Nick Griffin on Thursday night’s BBC1 Question Time – argues that it is time for liberals to challenge the fascists head-on. Here’s an excerpt: The BBC has judged that two MEPs in a nation-wide election entitles the BNP to a voice on Question Time, just as previously a similar threshold elevated Ukip and the Greens. The BBC’s duty of impartiality is too important to have broadcasting executives decide that some opinions are acceptable and others are not, providing of course that those opinions are within the law (notably in avoiding incitement to racial hatred or violence). Therefore I do not myself criticise the BBC for...

The UK Border Agency is looking at thousands of case files Up to 40,000 immigrants who should have left Britain more than sx years ago could still be in Britain, the Home Office has said. In a letter to MPs, it revealed there was “no formal record” of the people, who were refused permission to stay or whose visas had run out. The UK Border Agency has begun looking at case files to see if the migrants are still in the UK and can be removed. These will be checked against police records to see if any are “harmful”. It follows previous rows about the failure to remove foreign prisoners and the backlog of asylum cases. ‘Harmful’ cases Agency chief executive Lin Homer said most of the files were from before 2003. In a letter to the...

Over at the Independent, Lib Dem shadow home secretary Chris Huhne argues that the real bias at broadcasters is not against the Conservatives, but the Liberal Democrats. Here’s an excerpt: The evidence of such bias is compelling and persistent. Broadcasters repeatedly ignore a third view on matters of the day. Even where Labour and Conservative views are nearly identical – such as on crime, Afghanistan or Iraq – news organisations evidently feel they can eliminate the Liberal Democrat viewpoint in the interests of simple, adversarial debate. The idea that there might be more than two points of view in an argument is normal in other European democracies, but not here. Reporters even refer to “both parties” or “both main parties” as if we were still in...