My Conference Speech, Posted for Breast Cancer Awareness Month

At Labour Conference 2010, I was all set to speak in the Health Debate. Unfortunately I wasn't called, but as October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, I am going to share what I would have said with you, here.

Three years ago this week, I had the last in what had been seven months of chemotherapy treatment for breast cancer. I was 35 when diagnosed and my children were 8, 5 and 3. It was a devastating blow to us all.

Thanks to the Cancer Guarantee, introduced by our Labour Government, I am standing here today; because of Labour's NHS, my husband still has his wife and my children still have their mother. 

I was referred by my GP and seen by a cancer specialist in just 8 days and it was just two weeks from that initial consultation that I was wheeled in to theatre for surgery.

Early detection is our greatest weapon in the fight against cancer and Andrew Lansley has assured us that he will keep the fourteen-day cancer guarantee - we were going to reduce it to seven days.

For patients like me, detection is only the beginning. I was fortunate enough to be treated at my local hospital in Barnsley and I pay tribute to the staff in the Breast Unit who cared for me. Barnsley hospital has a satellite centre for cancer treatment, meaning that I could have chemotherapy there, rather than have the additional cost and difficulty of traveling almost 20 miles to Sheffield. It is provision such as this that is at risk under Coalition Health cuts. 

The White paper says they will pay hospitals based on outcomes, but it is impossible to calculate a cost for prevention. This then puts at risk early screening programmes that women such as my own daughter will need when she is old enough, due to her family history. Something that is not their fault.

I do not want women like me to be the "waste" that is cut out of the NHS by the Coalition.

• We have the right to not worry about whether we can afford our treatment.
• We have the right to local care.
• We have the right to survive.

I owe a huge debt to the NHS - one I could never repay. Thanks to Labour, I will never have to.

What Price is Clegg Prepared to Pay for Higher Education?

In March 2006, Stephen Williams, MP for Bristol West said:

"I believe passionately that education should be free at all levels and the fact that the Lib Dems have abolished tuition fees in Scotland shows that it can be done."

I wonder if he still holds this belief as passionately as he did back then?

 

Along with EVERY elected Liberal Democrat MP, Nick Clegg also signed the pledge while on the election trail and told students that the Lib Dems would "oppose any raising of the cap". Very definite and decisive words that would have convinced many in higher education to back the Liberal Democrats.

In fact, this was one of the Lib Dem's flagship policies - and one of their most popular. It lead to a surge in support from students, with one poll ahead of the general election, showing that 50% of those likely to vote, would vote Liberal Democrat.

So, now it is crunch time. How many of those Liberal Democrat MPs will do the decent thing and stick by their promise? According to the coalition agreement, Lib Dem MPs will be allowed to abstain on any votes on Higher Education Funding - but that is just not good enough.

Clegg and his Lib Dem MPs did not quietly say they would sit on their hands; they said they would oppose, they promised to oppose and they signed a pledge to oppose. Now let us see how they repay the people who did as Nick Clegg asked when he told them:

"Use your vote to block those unfair tuition fees and get them scrapped once and for all."

Osborne Admits Cuts Target the Poor

In his Evening Standard Blog today, Paul Waugh has published a leaked email sent by George Osborne to Conservative MPs.  It seems that Osborne has finally accepted the opinion of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, who said in August that contrary to Osborne's claim of a "progressive budget", it was in fact "clearly very regressive". 

Again, Osborne demonstrates that despite his claims that we are "all in this together", we are very clearly not. Unless of course he is only speaking to his rich chums or cabinet colleagues. The budget cuts were proven by IFS calculations to hit the poorest in society much harder than the rich. On 25th August, James Browne, senior research economist at the IFS told BBC Radio 4's Today programme that, as a result of the budget cuts:

"[the] poorest tenth of the population are losing more as a percentage of their income than the richest tenth".

But George put his fingers in his ears, went "la la la" and pushed ahead anyway.  

Yesterday the ill-conceived idea to cut child benefit was another example of Osborne's fag-packet calculations. On the face of it, it probably seemed a good idea; George may even have thought the left would welcome it.

The desperate attempt to appear 'More Red than Ed' was laughable, as he attempted to explain the cut during his speech to the Conservative Party Conference in Birmingham.  Earnestly, George posed the question: How can we justify taxing the poor to pay benefits to the rich?

Of course, on face value this is a justified question and George would have been delighted when Kitty Ussher, Director of centre-left think tank Demos said:

“It seems totally insane that people who are not scrabbling around to make ends meet should be getting the same as those who are finding it hard. If you are not living from hand to mouth, you shouldn't have it."

Yet the logistics of the scheme to cut child benefit from higher-rate taxpayers are a joke. How can Osborne explain cutting child benefit from a single-income household bringing in £44k, yet maintain the payment to a joint income household where each partner brings in £43k? Absolute proof of the minuscule amount of thought that actually went into the scheme.

In his email today, George at least shows some of the message has finally got through, as he confesses to his Parliamentary Party:

"I made £11 billion of savings from other parts of the welfare system, many of which affected people on lower incomes"

Unfortunately by the time the full impact of his actions is apparent, it will be way too late. Not for George of course, he will be comfortable with his multi-million pound trust fund, while the rest of us mourn our public services, weep for what is left of our NHS and many will rue the day they ever voted for either half of this ConDem coalition.

Osborne Cuts Child Benefit: We're all in this together kids...

Today, on Twitter, I made the comment that changing Child Benefit was something I believe Labour should have done a long time ago. Not in the way that George Osborne plans to do it, but in terms of preventing the super-rich from being able to claim it. The responses I received were broadly in agreement - I asked the question: Why should the Beckhams be able to claim it? Why should £20 of taxes paid by working people be given to David and Victoria towards the upkeep of Brooklyn? 

This is the issue: the very wealthy do not need it and by giving them this universal benefit, it prevents the money being targeted more effectively. The issue is not about single-parents, I would question whether a single-parent earning £250k per annum should claim it too; neither is it about multiple-income households, it is a hugely complex issue and it appears that George ran out of room on the back of the postage stamp he is writing his ideas on.

George Osborne is making a huge mistake in trying to pretend he is making the rich pay more. As ever, he has tried to over-simplify a very complicated issue and come out with completely the wrong result. Yes, there should be a review of how Child Benefit is paid, but doing so with no consideration to overall household income, is not the way to do it.