Clegg's using pensions for property scheme, don't hold your breath

The Liberal Democrat leader boasted at the party's annual conference that, his government are announcing a plan to help first time buyers get on the housing ladder. Attracting great headlines and no doubt steadying the queasy Lib Dem membership, this plan sounds great and going by the old maxim if it sounds to be good to be true it probably is. Basically the plan is for first time buyers to use their parents pensions to afford a deposit and voilà break the high house prices versus low wages deadlock, win win, well at least superficially.

Clegg in his leafy suburb, practising his sorry face.

My initial scepticism of the plan was whether it would just be meant for richer families. I asked on twitter if the plans would include state pensions and the replies were none, not a single one. A little odd I thought, so I checked it out and indeed it does not include state pensions, only private pensions. Perhaps the millionaire Clegg in his lovely home in a fashionable neighbourhood of London is unaware, but here among us common folk, private pensions are rarer than Liberal Democrat supporters. The children of fishermen, factory workers, labourers, builders or to put it short many ordinary Cornish people do not have great pension pots to dip into. My parents for one unfortunately were relying upon paying national insurance to get a pension, believing in good faith that would be enough. What hope does this scheme offer the most needy, again and again this government appeals to the most affluent.

This was my initial critique, digging further past the flattering headlines I came across this great piece on the Guardian website Will Nick Clegg's 'pension for property' scheme work. It turns out that the pension providers are very sceptical about this scheme, presumably without their backing this scheme would fail. But that's not the worst thing about it......

Realistically though the Lib Dems are working on an assumption that only 12,500 people would take up the offer. Privately they say the industry suggests a range of 10,000 to 20,000. It's a tiny figure, and doesn't warrant the rather dramatic introduction from Nick Clegg on the Marr show, but better than nothing, they say. link

To put that figure in context there are a lot more people than that on the housing waiting list in Cornwall never mind throughout the UK! This is the problem with the Liberal Democrats and their Conservative chums they recognise problems but don't get even close to dealing with them. Which says a lot for the state of Nick's party, one of the great centre pieces of their conference, the great policy announcement is a half baked idea that will benefit a tiny percentage of people.

I want to sack my MP, forgotten promises and David Laws

It was announced today that David Laws has been let off  very lightly after acting in a way that could be argued is fraudulent. The rights and wrongs of Law's actions aside it raises an interesting point about MP's and how their conduct is governed. It seems to be up to Westminster how to deal with wayward Members of Parliament the public have no recourse to decide the fate in such cases. In effect politicians police themselves.

After the expenses scandal both Nick Clegg and David Cameron were quick to recognise that the public were justly angry at MP's dipping into taxpayers pockets for all sorts of things from biscuits to duck ponds to rocking chairs. They both came up with the same solution and that was to give the public the right to hold their representatives to account, sack your MP the Conservative manifesto boasts and the Liberal Democrat leader offered You will have the right to sack your MP if they are proved corrupt. Now we hear endlessly from both leaders that they can't enact all their policies because of the coaliton. But in this case they both agree wholeheartedly and they've had a year to enact this policy. Time to roll up those sleeves Dave!

A Minister for Cornwall and the politics of empty promises

In my previous blog post I copied the letter that I had received from the Prime Minister about whether Kernow was due to receive a dedicated  Minister for Cornwall as was promised before the election. The This is Cornwall site picked up on my blog post and rehashed it into an article and was further rehashed by the Falmouth People website. It was very nice to see that somebody had been reading my blog, but I couldn’t help thinking that the articles did not move the debate on further. So I asked myself what I would do if I was a journalist...

I came to the conclusion that I would seek more clarification from the Prime Minister about the issue, as I did not feel the issue resolved in my previous letter from David Cameron’s office. So below, is my reply to the PM asking categorically if Cornwall will receive a dedicated Minister and outlining some of the reasons why I think Cornwall deserves more political attention from the ever distant political process. I plan to publish any replies that I receive and as courtesy have sent this same message to the Deputy Prime Minister and Cornwall’s six Members of Parliament and will post any of their replys also.

Dear Prime Minister,



Firstly I would like to thank you for the reply to my question about a Minister for Cornwall, sent from your office on the 16th of August. I hope you do not mind but I copied the letter onto my blog, seeing as it was a q & a meant for a public forum (the Prime Minister Direct event in Newquay) I thought this was appropriate, and I will also publish any reply that might be sent to this letter.

It certainly was a meaningful gesture that Cornwall was chosen as one of the first places to hold the PM Direct and hopefully this was a sign that we have moved on from the Labour years when interaction between politicians of the governing party and Cornwall was a very low priority. I was however a bit puzzled by the intent of the letter sent to me, my question was really quite simple: “are we going to get a Minister for Cornwall?” and the reply was somewhat ambiguous:


“We are now part of a Coalition Government and, as such, we are considering the best way to determine non-portfolio Ministers like this with our coalition partners.”

I can only conclude that this was a diplomatic shrug off and we will not be getting a dedicated minister. I sincerely hope that this is not the case, the Conservative candidates in Cornwall at the General Election made a lot of capital from your significant move, to create Mark Prisk as Shadow Minister for Cornwall.
There is very much a feeling in Cornwall that politics has to change, we remain in a poor economic state and in comparison to the United Kingdom and Western Europe we sadly under perform. Despite the intentions of European Union Objective One funding there has been little increase in real terms wealth. It seems obvious that Cornwall deserves a lot more attention politically and economically for this situation to improve. In this regard, personally and across the Duchy, your support for a Cornwall and Scilly LEP was greatly welcomed.

However, politically too we need to be making more decision ourselves, providing Cornish solutions to Cornish problems, if the Labour years taught as anything it was that Cornwall’s voice is not represented by offices in distant Bristol or indeed by south west ministers. The widespread rejection of the Labour party at the polls in the local, Euro and General elections in Cornwall confirms that Labour never got to grasp with Cornwall nor represented our interests satisfactorily. Many in Cornwall recognised that Cornish Conservatives were speaking sense when they argued that Cornwall needs MP’s at the heart of government and that decisions should be made in Cornwall not by regional bodies. They too looked to your now coalition partners the Liberal Democrats and their promises to deliver a Cornish Assembly with great relish. Both parties performed well at the General Election on differing promises that both echoed the need to bring more power to Cornwall and to make our voice heard better. People in Cornwall were very expectant that politics had finally changed and we could look forward to no longer being the poor relation of our neighbours.

It is therefore with a mixture of puzzlement and dismay that despite these concrete promises of more political power, that we know actually face less, with plans for a cross-Tamar Devonwall constituency. This unpopular move really undermines the electoral promises of both governing parties and leaves many wondering the utility of having politicians at the heart of government.

I feel I have made my points clearly, so now I have a number of questions:



When will Cornwall receive a dedicated Minister?

When will Cornwall start to have more say in our own affairs?

When can we expect to see the benefits of having politicians at the heart of government?



Yours sincerely,



Robert Simmons
CC to:




Nick Clegg



Andrew George



George Eustice



Sarah Newton



Stephen Gilbert



Dan Rogerson



Sheryll Murray