Reform Media Summary

9 May 2008

Health

Scores of hospital departments such as maternity units and cancer clinics will be closed or merged across the country under plans to be released over the next four weeks by the nine Strategic Health Authorities in England. As part of the shake-up, care services will be moved from hospitals to health centres, GP clinics and cottage hospitals closer to the patient’s home. Lord Darzai, who is leading the review, said: “We have to be much more ambitious … and we have to challenge ourselves in raising the clinical bar” (Telegraph, p.1; FT, p.2; Guardian, p.10).

Research by scientists at the University of Leicester has found that the survival rates of babies born before the 24-week abortion limit have not improved significantly over the past decade. The news comes in the midst of the debate surrounding the 24-week abortion limit that is due to be discussed in the House of Commons today (Telegraph, p.10; Mail, p.37; Express, p.11).

Pharmaceutical companies must do more to encourage identification of side-effects of medicines, under a new industry code of practice published yesterday (FT, p.4).

Economy

Mixed responses to the Bank of England’s decision to hold interest rates at 5 per cent yesterday. Graeme Leach, chief economist of at the Institute of Directors, described it as “a prudent decision” while the Council of Mortgage Lenders and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors said it was disappointing (FT, p.4;Telegraph, B2 [Damian Reece], B4; Mail, p.2, p.91 [Alex Brummer]; Independent, p.37, Daily Mirror, p.46).

Iain Cornish, Chairman of the Building Society Association, yesterday warned the credit crisis had caused irreversible damage to the mortgage market. He said “there is clearly no going back” to a time when mortgage lenders competed to offer deals with the lowest rates possible (Telegraph, p.6, p.25 [leader]; Mail, p.90).

In a change of tone from its emphasis on the risks to growth, the International Monetary Fund warned yesterday that inflation has re-emerged as a threat to the world economy. Deputy managing director, John Lipsky, said “inflation concerns have resurfaced after years of quiescence” due to rising energy and food prices (FT, p.1).

Northern Rock shareholders yesterday stepped up their campaign for greater compensation from the government following the nationalisation of the bank by formally asking for a High Court investigation (FT, p.2).

The GMB, one of the Labour Party’s most influential trade unions, is to urge the party to raise taxes on the rich by increasing the national insurance ceiling at this summer’s national policy forum (FT, p.2).

Caroline Flint, Minister for Housing, is to announce a package of measures to help struggling homeonwers amid an expected surge in repossessions (FT, p.5).

In a comment piece in the FT, Evelyn de Rothschild, calls for a restoration of ethical standards in the financial services and banking sectors: “it is essential that we do not have more regulation without thinking it through clearly” (FT, p.13).

The Spectator Business describes the Government’s response to the decision by some multinational firms to re-locate to lower tax regimes as “feeble” and urges “radical corporate tax reforms to halt the exodus and boost the flagging economy” (Spectator Business, p.11 [leader]).

Education

Every Child A Reader programme to be extended to every primary school in England. This follows the publication of a new study by Dr Sue Buroughs-Lange, of the Institute of Education, which found that a year after undergoing Reading Recovery – a method at the heart of the Government’s Every Child a Reader programme – pupils are still a year ahead of those with similar difficulties who did not take part in the programme (Times, p.9; TES, p.10).

Chief executive of the independent National Governors’ Association, Phil Revell, told the Financial Times that up to one in three school governing bodies are not fully up to the job (FT, p.4).

New Policy Exchange report finds falling applications for teacher training (Times, p.9).

According to a Government report schools are struggling to recruit governors with one in ten of the 350,000 posts available in England unfilled (Telegraph, p.2).

At a conference at Brighton College in Sussex yesterday Michael Gove, the Shadow Education Secretary, said that generations of children had been let down by so-called progressive education policies which have taught skills and “empathy” instead of bodies of knowledge. Gove went on to say that a Conservative government would reinstate traditional styles of fact-based lessons (Guardian, p.10)

According to the TES, new national tests for primary and secondary pupils are to be changed after only one in ten passed one exam (TES, p.1).

Writing in the Telegraph Alice Thomson argues that private schools do not achieve better results than their maintained counterparts due to more funding but because they “don’t have to waste money on bureaucracy” and “their teachers don’t have to spend as much time pandering to government directives” (Telegraph, p.25).

Home Affairs

Home Office figures: the number of ASBOs given by councils nearly halved between 2005 and 2006 (Times, p.4; Telegraph, p.13; Mail, p.27).

Politics

According to the latest YouGov opinion poll Labour has slumped to its lowest rating in the party’s history. The Tories recorded 49 per cent of support ahead of Labour on 23 per cent and the Liberal Democrats on 17. However, the poll also indicated that Labour’s position would not improve with another leader in charge with suggested potential successors including Ed Balls, David Miliband, Jack Straw, Harriet Harman, Andy Burnham, Alan Johnson and James Purnell (Telegraph, p.1, p.4; Mail, p.8; Economist p.11 [leader]; Express, p.4, p.12 [Patrick O’Flynn]; Sun, p.2).

John Denham, Innovation, Universities and Skills Secretary and MP for Southampton, urged Gordon Brown to reconnect with voters in the South who had become “confused about what we [the Labour Party] stand for” (FT, p.2).

The Economist suggests that criticisms of the Conservative Party that they lack substance for a would-be government are “only half-right”. Although public commitments on policy are still “scarce”, there has been a high level of activity behind the scenes with the recent publication of four green papers on issues such as schools and prisons and plans for the publication of 21 further papers (Economist, p.41).

Andrew Feldman will reportedly become the Conservative Party's chief executive in July (Times, p.15).

Gordon Brown last night announced a doubling of the amount of money the Northern Ireland executive can retain from the sale of public sector assets in a an attempt to appease Unionist MPs threatening to vote against his anti-terror legislation (FT, p.3).