First day of the rest of my life

Passing from the dead world to the real world was painless. After a last week of last meetings and last letters in which MPdom slid quietly to a close, the patient awoke on Monday morning full of beans and eager to embark on his new life.If only he could discover what it is.

There's nothing so ex as an ex MP busy dong nothing  working every day trying to find lots of things not to so but the weight of duty has slipped away, along with the guilty feelings of not letting anyone down fulfilling that responsibility attending this meeting and best of all  no need to go to bloody London and back every week. 

It's marvellous.But less so for my brilliant staff who've got to clear up the work of 38 years tackle the problems still coming in even though there's no MP any longer, and unless my successor keeps them in and uses their knowledge and experience to serve Grimsby they're out of work in a town where good jobs are hard to come by.

TRUTHS YOU CAN'T BE TOLD

There are lots of things the parties won't tell you for fear of frightening you but the two biggest things hidden are cuts and borrowing. The Tories will have to make massive cuts in spending to achieve the goals they set in 2010 but put back to 2020 because they failed to reach the. In 2015. But they won't tell you what benefits will have to be cut though both the Office of Budget Responsibility  and the IFS say that they will have to be bigger and harsher than the painful cuts already made.Nor will they tell y ou exactly how much they'll cut  because the total must now be higher given the fact that the fall in tax revenues caused by the first lot of cuts and the increase in spending made necessary by economic misery.

As for Labour they've very sensibly said that the reduction in borrowing they aim to achieve by 2020 won't include borrowing for investment and to rebuild Britain's creeping infrastructure (something which must include public housing for rent) and the IFS estimates that as a £30 billion increase in borrowing. That's not enough in my view but it makes sense to borrow and spend in what is a prolonged recession. Labour doesn't accept this estimate. It should because it's true but more because we should take pride in it. The only way to get the economy moving is to borrow and spend.Why don't we proclaim this and  shout "Let's Grow With Labour"

AIM HIGHER ED

My successor as MP for Grimsby Melanie Onn  is campaigning  brilliantly and raising more money than even Jack Straw could.I'm delighted that at last Grimsby is getting the money and the attention from the party that it's never had since 1979

But it's overkill. Melanie going to win Grimsby and UKIP isn't going to be the threat it proclaims itself to be. No use fearing bogeymen or women. The key seats to win are the two real marginals surrounding Grimsby, Cleethorpes and Brigg and Goole both of which we held up to 2010 and must win if we're to form a majority government .

To divert money, party workers and regional and trade union support from these two crucial seats to a Grimsby which will stay loyal to Labour is,to coin a phrase, DAFT

Aim to win not to hold.

Corporate Welfare is Fuelling Austerity by Prem Sikka

Prem Sikka

Professor of Accounting, University of Essex

Austerity cuts are an ideological project pursued by the Tories as they have become obsessed with strangling people’s hard won social rights. There is no economic justification for this. HMRC admits  that each year around £34 billion of tax is evaded, avoided or not collected. A former World Bank adviser  has estimated it to be around £100 billion a year. Some critics estimate the gap to be around £120 billion a year. The absence of any effective policy on chasing big tax avoiders enables corporations to declare huge profits and leaves people facing austerity cuts.

The government is dedicated to guaranteeing corporate profits. Studies estimate that around £85 billion a year is being given away in subsidies. In addition, the National Health Service, education, prisons and other public services are being privatised by stealth. Since 2010, the Con-Lib government has outsourced £88 billion worth of public contracts. About 25% of all money is creamed-off as profits, leaving less for actual expenditure.

Here are some examples of how the huge corporate welfare programme boosts corporate profits. The railways were privatised in 1996, but have received annual subsidy of £4-£5 billion each year. In 2012, the European Union provided €83bn (£70bn) in support of agricultural producers, about 19% of the total farm receipts. Over the years Tate & Lyle, a sugar refiner, has received €830m even though it does not own any farms. Nestle has collected €93m. Others include Haribo, the sweet manufacturer; Groupe Doux, a French chicken processor, which does not raise poultry; Coca-Cola, the Duke of Westminster, the UK Royal family and the Catholic Church.In 2012, the European Union provided €83bn (£70bn) in support of agricultural producers, about 19% of the total farm receipts. Over the years Tate & Lyle, a sugar refiner, has received €830m even though it does not own any farms. Nestle has collected €93m. Others include Haribo, the sweet manufacturer; Groupe Doux, a French chicken processor, which does not raise poultry; Coca-Cola, the Duke of Westminster, the UK Royal family and the Catholic Church.

In 2012, the European Union provided €83bn (£70bn) in support of agricultural producers, about 19% of the total farm receipts. Over the years Tate & Lyle, a sugar refiner, has received €830m even though it does not own any farms. Nestle has collected €93m. Others include Haribo, the sweet manufacturer; Groupe Doux, a French chicken processor, which does not raise poultry; Coca-Cola, the Duke of Westminster, the UK Royal family and the Catholic ChurchUnder the Private Finance Initiative (PFI) companies borrow money to build the project and then lease the assets to the government at exorbitant prices.  Currently, companies have invested some £54.7 billion but will receive £247 billion over the next 25-30 years. The profit of £200 billion won’t fully get taxed in the UK, as many projects are run from offshore tax havens.

The EU has provided €83billion (£70billion) in farm subsidies. Sugar refiner Tate & Lyle has collected €830million even though it does not own any farms. Nestle have collected €93million. The Queen's Sandringham estate has collected £7million. Others include Haribo, the sweet manufacturer; Coca-Cola, the Duke of Westminster and the Roman Catholic Church.

Last year, BT received a subsidy of £1.2 billion, and more is on the way, to provide broadband for rural areas. BT will also keep the resulting assets and future income.

Energy companies make exorbitant profits, but still get subsidies. EDF and its partners are set to receive £16 billion subsidy for building a nuclear power plant to generate electricity even though this investment is projected to provide a return of up to 21%.

Lotus, the sports car manufacturer, has received £10 billion subsidy. The price of a Porsche selling at £90,000 is reduced by £5,000, thanks to a subsidy from the taxpayer.

Walt Disney is not a Mickey-Mouse company, but over the last seven years it has received subsidies of £215 million for making highly profitable films in the UK. Of course, the company keeps all the resulting revenues.

The above is the tip of a giant corporate welfare iceberg. Corporations fund political parties and get compliant laws and barrow loads of money. This giveaway leads to higher taxes and reduces resources for social investment. If government must support companies, it must be as returnable loans or equity stake in companies, rather than as giveaways.

WE'RE DIM UP NORTH

This election is going to be influenced, not decided by divergent nationalisms within the UK.Scottish nationalism is destabilising everything. South Western nationalism should still shore up the Lib Dems and Welsh nationalism will make gains but not many. Then there's the fat complacent nationalism of the comfortable SoUth East divided only by London's pools of poverty

Yet in all this babble of accents and attitudes the nationalism of the North is strangely silent. Why?The north's problems are much the same as Scotland's-the death of basic industries, the decline of manufacturing (always an out of London activity) the drain to London, yet Scotland gets far more help support and spending than the North and is doing more to improve its own lot.

Does the North get a fair deal? Hell no!! Our safe seats are used to provide a firm base for national leaders : Osborne and Hague,Miliband and Balls to pursue policies favourable to the south. Our other seats are filled by apparatchiks and chaps or loyal back benchers who vote these policies through. We're fobbed off with baubles like HS2 or the Northern Powerhouse while all the big spending goes to London.We don't even get the same benefits from the recovery as the Fat South.

The government's entire economic strategy is based on helping the rich on the grounds that the benefit will trickle down to the poor in the same way as horses trickle down on the road. It doesn't work of course because the rich use their bonus to spend more time on the golf course or buy bigger German cars and there's certainly no trickle up effect from all the benefits showered on the fat South where most of the rich live. All that trickles up (a difficult feat in itself) is ever higher house prices  to levels that on our lower wages we can't afford.

Why the hell do we put up with it? Do we have to grow our own Northern Nationalist Party to disrupt the southern dominance as the Scots have done? We should demand that all northern MPs commit to a better deal and devolution to the North  so that we can assert the same leverage and power Scotland has.The North deserves a better  deal in return for its long loyalty. Has it had a fair deal? Hell No!

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A nice supplement in the Grimsby Telegraph looking back at my 38 years representing the best constituency in the country is promptly followed, Grimsby style, by 13 comments  asking " what's he ever done for us"(WHEDFU) the question which is being asked of candidates all over the country but is asked more loudly in Grimsby partly because folk are more direct but mainly because  we've had fewer favours from government than the big cities or the south generally.

However it has to be answered and I am now preparing an 84 page supplement setting out the answers and featuring some of the "thank you" letters from some of the many thousands I've helped over the years. The angry correspondents will get a special illustrated and illuminated copy written in calligraphy on parchment  to hang on their walls. If only they'd given their names and addresses so I can send it round by Pickfords.

Day in the life of an almost XMP.

I'M THE MOUTH OF LOUTH

Just helped to launch Labour's campaign for Louth and Horncastle with the adoption of Matt Brown our candidate to succeed Sir Peter Tapsell. Excellent speech by Matt to Labour Party which is like Labour parties used to be and should be. Intelligent, serious, concerned and loyal and more interested in policy and what Labour needs to do than in apportioning blocks for canvassing and ordering people out into the streets.A really uplifting experience.

Good luck Matt. Louth needs a change because Tory towns tend to get neglect ed suffering from the run down of health and social services and a hostility to development.Difficult to win but we need to boost the vote there as everywhere and give the people of Louth hope that better times lie ahead.

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Puzzled by the hostility to Nicola Sturgeon and Alec Salmond whore being attacked as if they were BRITISH Jihadis  or aliens who have no right to say anything South of the border.

It's damn stupid on  the one hand they're accused of being wreckers and vandals determined to wreck the British constitution  but on the other if they say anything about BRITISH politics and government they're denounced.

Let's be clear.The number of SNP MPs will increase.Whether they support or oppose either of the two governing parties in government is up to them and if neither has a majority they've a perfect right to join a coalition or give it whatever form of support they want and to ask for concessions in return.

What the LibDems did in 2010 the SNP can do in 2015 and and a party leader who rejects their support in advance or says will not deal deserves to fail. Like it or not  we're in multi party politics now and it's up to the major parties to accept that smaller parties can have purer principles  but at the end of the day deals will have to be done and leaders should think about them now.

Power is more important than the implementation of the full majesty and beauty of the manifesto or the purity of our implementable principles.

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Loved the Internet joke that OPAS had examined Richard III and found that he was fit for light work or driving a fork lift.Perhaps UKIP can select him to replace on of the candidates they keep firing. In Yorkshire of course.

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Who's going to be the first smart Alec commentator to say the campaign hasn't been launched yet but I'm bored already?

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Won't put the Mitchell clocks back tonite. I don't want to lose an hour of my last day as  Member of Parliament. Totally unfair.

The faux debate. Sweep away the judges and let us decide

The older generation of Brits, having been brought up to discipline like strong leadership which the interpret as leadership which is strong in favouring them.The younger generation, products of a different schooling prefer the whatever style of leadership: cool and anything goes.

Both have to be gratified because politics has become more presidential. The leader is the party and people relate to him or her rather than to the whole range of party policies.That's too complicated where judgement on a person is easy.

So party managers strive to give their leader a good bloke (or blokes )image. Don't let them say too much, they'll only incriminate themselves but show them in kitchens, playing with kids (but not touching) beating the shit out of some pathetic tennis player or pretending to be workers in hard hats and project the image of a good bloke to chat to in a pub-though in fact being politicians they'll probably bore you to death.

The role of leadership debates on television is to cut through all that crap, lock simpering wives up in a box and show brains working.Which is exactly why CAMERON has set out to avoid them  because he's too slick and too prone to reel out his achievements in getting the economy growing slightly after four years of clobbering it. He doesn't want the long playing record interrupted or the needle jolted in its track and he knows that Miliband would be able to do that where he can just talk over a more deferential interviewer. Or walk off on another track. Brilliant at reeling off statistics and half truths he's less good at real debate where the answers have to be thought about .

So what last night's pathetic substitute  for a head to head debate showed was the slick salesman and the serious politician whose thought his policies through rather than just reading them off some research department list..CAMERON is a brilliant PR man for a clumsy prejudiced government. Miliband is a serious thinker trying to develop policies which will work and hold a fractious party together.

One is at the top of his PR tree and with the economic recovery has something to say. The other has grown and is smart enough to show that the promises and projections  don't add up -Which is why Cameron won't face him in a head to head and why last night's substitute was such a failure. Predictable pat- ball questions from an audience and Paxman playing the stern recording angel constantly interrupting to show how clever he was just didn't do enough to test the men and set brains working .

But it did enough to show that Miliband thinks about his answers Cameron is more of a long playing record,one has guts the other talks about them and one faces up to the difficulties ahead while the other makes promises about them. The one striking conclusion is that we need a head to head to decide. Sweep away the presenters let us judge the battle.

CAMERON CLANGS

Is Cameron loosing his grip? The  Big Cobber Crosby  must be bashing his bush hat as his boss the master of PR and related trades staggers from one pre-election clanger to another.First we have the big mistake of refusing to take part in leader debates unless they're crowd spectaculars featuring everyone and their dogs. Can't spend years denouncing Milliband then showing you're scared to face him in debates.

Then we have the mysterious  leak at the week end that a Tory group is organising to save Cameron for the nation and the Tory Party when he's defeated on 7 May. That goes a long way to demonstrate confidence.

Finally comes his own announcement (made in his third kitchen) that he'll only serve one more term apparently cancelling his earlier plan to go when he can't get better terms from the EU so as to fulfil his plot to keep Britain in the EU..That won't silence his Tory critics who find him too clever by half or the alternative leaders who'll face a last minute transfer of power when they'd all prefer a longer run in.

The only explanation must be that he's rattled because he's having to eat too many words and make too many concessions to UKIP to keep his unruly mob going.I don't know what's behind all this because I'm no expert in abnormal psychology but it does make  the Conservative argument that they offer strong leadership and stability look pretty daft and make Labour's strong leadership look even more attractive.

TORY PROMISES ARE FOR MAKING NOT FOR KEEPING

George Osborne is the most promising Chancellor ever. He made huge promises in 2010 to pay off Britain's debt and get rid of its fiscal deficit. He failed to keep them so he's now put them back five years to 2020.  Then he says Britain will be a land of high wages and full employment. 

It`s unbelievable. He`s living in Cloud Cuckoo Land.  George claims that the economic recovery is the result of "the Government's long term economic plan." Total balls. There never was a long term plan except roll back the state and cut benefits to allow tax cuts for the rich which would trickle down to the people.  Much as horses trickle manure onto roads. 

The Conservative Party is the trade union of the rich.  So we`ve had five years of cutting their taxes, boosting their bonuses and salaries while holding back the wages of the rest.

It hasn`t worked.  Recovery came only because the Bank of England kept interest rates flat to the floor for six years and printed £375 billion of money. The cuts and excessive austerity actually made recovery slower by slashing demand and cutting tax revenues.

George's policies have wasted four years, cut wages and reduced household incomes to turn us into a low wage, casual employment economy with millions pushed into self-employment and 1.86 million out of work.  It`s prettied up by rocketing house prices, an overvalued pound to make imports cheap and lower fuel and food prices.  But it still leaves most people worse off.

Manufacturing hasn't grown.  Investment, particularly public investment in infrastructure, is low, as is productivity.  Tax receipts are lower because wages are low.  We can`t even pay our way in the World.

We import 6% of GDP, more than we can pay for.  That means that every year we must sell firms, houses, land and assets to foreigners just to survive. The Chancellor assumes that that gap will close.  With the pound high, the euro much lower and exports beginning to suffer, it won't.  So we`ll be colonised by foreigners owning our utilities, our trains, our productive industry, our housing and our farms.

The net effect of this Tory government's failure to fulfil its promises will be massive cuts in public spending in Welfare, cuts in Defence, cuts in Social Services and more cuts in Local Government and its services.

That gloomy prospect is inevitable unless we get a Labour government which invests, which puts our people back to work and taxes the rich more and the people less.  We need Labour to regulate the private rented sector to build more social and council housing for people who can't afford to buy, to create more apprenticeships and boost the minimum wage so that demand and living standards pick up.

After five years of failure, Britain needs a government to tilt the balance of power back from wealth to the people.  Government by the rich, for the rich, doesn't work.  Time now to give power to the people and improve their lot by creating jobs, raising pay, building houses and investing in their future rather than pouring money into the over-full pockets of the rich.