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Morning Report: Cameron sets about proving Steve Hilton right

January 14, 2013 9:34 am

Author:

Mark Ferguson

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Yesterday Steve Hilton’s Stanford lecture revealed the omnishambolic nature of the Downing Street operation. This morning, David Cameron was on the Today Programme and Daybreak doing his to prove his barefoot guru right.

Seemingly Downing Street sent the PM out to do the morning media rounds to talk about pensions. However Cameron’s crack squad of advisers evidently forgot that Cameron hasn’t made his much trailed Europe speech yet – so obviously that was all Cameron was asked about. So Cameron ended up on the Today Programme getting monstered over a speech that he hasn’t given yet and that he can’t talk about. Another failure of the government’s media grid, one suspects.

Cameron did however commit to leaders debates in 2015 though – although he’s rather cagey about having them dominate the weeks before the election. I can’t for the life of me understand why…

Elsewhere this morning, Michael Gove is pushing ahead with plans for performance-related pay in schools, as his war on teachers continues, and the Mirror have reported approvingly on Ed Miliband’s plans for a crackdown on company tax avoidance. Meanwhile most of the papers have reported Ed Miliband’s comments on Ed Balls remaining as Shadow Chancellor – but as I noted earlier this morning, that’s unsurprising and sensible.

Bit of a quiet start to the week – don’t expect it to stay that way…

http://www.facebook.com/jim.crowder2 Jim Crowder

Almost too partisan to comment, but it’s worth a shot.

Are you suggesting that this was different under Labour? Or that the Tories are so much more competent than Labour that you would have expected it to be different now?

I wasn’t at the lecture (I live in Devon and transport is not as good here as in London), but read the article in The Sunday Times. It certainly did not suggest any government incompetence by either party. It did suggest that the EU and Civil Service control more policy that a government does. Some will believe this to be wrong, others see it as a way of limiting the political power of an elected government they disagree with.

I hope the answer is not to have political appointments in the Civil Service.
Brumanuensis

“the Mirror have reported approvingly on Ed Miliband’s plans for a crackdown on company tax avoidance”

That’s not exactly a surprise is it?
http://twitter.com/lavarae Rachel Walker

Is Labour happy about the leaders debates if it ends up being two members of the coalition against one shadow? The Greens have a member of parliment, so should be invited. And while I’m no fan, UKIP would appear to have much right to appear as LibDems based on polling.

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