UNFASHIONABLE though it may seem, it’s time someone pointed out a fact that most commentators - and certainly most of the blogosphere - have been avoiding: the government has done a good job in the last 11 years and Britain is a far better place as a result.

As Nick Raynsford said in his New Statesman article last week:

Compared with the position we inherited in 1997, today’s Britain is a better, fairer, more successful, more confident and more tolerant society.

He’s right. We’ve been kicked around so much, and so severely, recently that it’s almost easy to forget that we don’t have to take it.

Remember the sky-high inflation under the Tories? The record mass unemployment that was “a price well worth paying” for questionable economic returns? Remember the TWO Tory-built recessions? Remember the millions of workers encouraged to claim incapacity benefits by the Tories as a way of massaging the unemployment statistics? Remember the days before the minimum wage, when employers could pay their workers peanuts, and do it with the government’s blessing? Remember the legions of school-leavers put on the scrap heap instead of being offered training and further education? Remember the double-digit interest rates? Remember the scrapping of the pensions-earnings link without anything put in place to raise pensioners’ living standards?

‘Dave’ likes to gloss over the fact that he is a (whisper it) Tory, because he doesn’t want us to remember his own party’s record, nor the part he played in advising the worst Chancellor in modern history.

Every government faces difficult challenges, as do our own citizens.

But Britain is far better off with Labour than it could ever be with the Tories. Their smug complacency and arrogance - evidenced by some of their members’ comments on this and other sites - helped to shatter our society and our economy before. It would be a tragedy if they were to be allowed to do so again.

It’s been a bruising year so far for Labour. Government is difficult. Life is difficult for many people.

But Labour can win a fourth term.

We can win a fourth term if we believe we are up to the challenge, if we start making the case for Labour afresh, acknowledging where we need to make changes while avoiding sounding defensive about our record in government, which is something we can and should be proud of.

The next election has yet to be won or lost. The people, not the commentariat, will decide its outcome. The prize for Labour as a party is a fourth term in office. The prize for Britain as a nation is growth, prosperity and security, and its deliverance from a victorious Tory Party which has yet to learn from its mistakes in office, and so is doomed to repeat them if it is ever allowed back.

Visit Tom's blog. 

WHEN cyber-Tories aren’t moaning about not having a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, they like to bang on about the so-called “intrusive state”. Iain Dale yesterday carried a letter published in Der Spiegel:

Sir, At the end of August I’m leaving London because I don’t wish my child to be forced into the kind of conformity where not only are school uniforms obligatory but even haircuts are regulated. That’s to say nothing of the ever present CCTV in schools or of the fact that even primary school kids have to give fingerprints.

Hmm. Aren’t Tories the ones who are most likely to complain about lack of uniforms in schools? And since when was the government responsible for regulating haircuts (good idea, though; must mention it to the manifesto group…)?

As for CCTV, I know of no MPs whose constituents have approached them asking for fewer CCTV cameras in their constituencies. The only people in Glasgow who I’m aware are against them are drug dealers who would rather not be filmed going about their business.

That CCTV cameras are some kind of threat to civil liberties seems to have become one of these accepted “facts” that barely qualifies as an opinion, so scarce is the evidence in its favour.

The regular accusation that we are living in what is close to, or is in reality, a “police state” is not only ridiculous - it’s offensive to the millions of people across the world who do live in such states and who regard the UK, rightly, as a beacon of freedom and democracy. So there.

Visit Tom's blog. 

HAVE we really thought through this “votes at 16″ issue?

On the only recent occasion when the Commons was given a vote on this subject - on a Ten Minute Rule Motion - I voted against. As a colleague at the time observed: “I’ll support votes at 16 when half a million 15- to 17-year-olds march on parliament demanding it.”

In fact, I’ve had virtually no representations from constituents asking me to support this measure. It’s one of those issues which, when put before people, will usually ellicit a positive response. But it’s certainly not an issue that young people, unprompted, will volunteer as an issue important to them.

And the reason all this is important is this: if 16 and 17-year-olds are to be given the vote, I worry that the most significant effect will be a huge increase in the number of “voters” who don’t vote.

I can almost hear the arguments winging their way towards me even as you read this: “Why shouldn’t they be allowed to vote when they can join the army/buy alcohol/have sex/pay tax, etc?” (And I say “they” rather than “we” because this is a change which is almost invariably promoted by those who have already reached the age of majority, rather by those who might actually benefit from it.)

I think it rather unlikely that we will ever have a single age at which individuals attain all these rights. In the meantime, the argument for votes at 16 has not yet been made. If there are powerful arguments in favour, I haven’t heard them yet.

But perhaps I will soon, because Labour’s National Policy Forum has decided in favour, and it will now be put to national conference. It’s a debate I’ll be interested in listening to.

But just because something can be changed, it doesn’t necessarily mean it should be.

Visit Tom's blog. 

Received wisdom dictates that the House of Commons chamber is an anachronism; that its procedures and traditions serve only to exacerbate the gulf between the realities faced by citizens and the privileged, rarified environment in which their representatives operate.

MPs cannot refer to any other member using their name (unless quoting from an article) and instead must refer to them by their constituencies. An MP may refer to members who sit on the same side of the chamber as “honourable friends”, but to a member opposite as “the honourable gentleman”, “the honourable lady” or simply “the honourable member for… (insert name of constituency)”.

And, of course, you must never EVER accuse another member of deliberately lying.

It all appears very quaint. But those who make the effort to listen to debates (and not just the bearpit that is Prime Minister’s Questions) will, I hope, be impressed by the general standard of debate in the chamber. However esoteric or obscure the subject, the Commons will almost always produce some thoughtful consideration of it, on both sides of the House. And the debate will (almost) always be polite and courteous.

This last quality is of particular interest to me as a blogger. The constant criticism of PMQs (as the only Commons event with which most viewers are familiar) is that it’s too “Punch and Judy”, that MPs on all sides are far too rowdy and badly behaved. So the general populace would prefer political debate to be more courteous and polite, yes? Well, maybe.

Many of the comments left on this blog in the last few days have been thoughtful and polite. Many of them have not been. It’s the same with comments left on some of the better known blogs like Guido Fawkes and Iain Dale. What is it about the blogosphere that makes people believe they can address any other person in aggressive and offensive terms that they simply wouldn’t consider appropriate in almost any other circumstance (certainly not face to face)? I can understand how anonymity might offer someone a chance to express views he or she might not want associated with themselves ordinarily. But does the fact that so many of those who leave comments choose to do so offensively mean that anonymity allows the real persona of the person writing to emerge? Or does it simply allow someone to adopt an invented, false personality to be discarded after temporary use? (And if you don’t think I have a point here, check out any thread on just about any Scottish political story carried by The Herald.)

In the blogosphere, opposition has given way to hatred, argument to invective.

The age of deference is long gone, and good riddance. But have we thrown the baby out with the bath water? In abandoning deference (decades after we should have), have we also abandoned qualities like respect and politeness?

So thank goodness for the Commons. If continuing to treat with respect those with whom we disagree is seen by those watching as being out of touch, then thank goodness there’s still one place in the land that is proudly out of touch.

Visit Tom's blog. 

Dominic Grieve, the new Shadow Home Secretary, is a decent chap. He’s also extremely sharp and, as a public prosecutor in a previous life, has prosecuted an impressive range of individuals and organisations.

But his claim in 2005 that he thought the 7/7 London bombings were “totally explicable” - comments brought to light by The Spectator in the past few days - should be of concern to all of us. “Explicable”, of course, isn’t the same as “justifiable”, but it’s not a kick in the shirt off it either. Motivation can always be explained. Myra Hindley, Harold Shipman, Peter Sutcliffe - their actions were, arguably, “explicable” if one takes account of the various psychological assessments that have tried to plumb the depths of these particular individuals’ minds.

But look at what Grieve also said in his 2005 comments. The 7/7 bombings were “totally explicable” because (and these are indirect comments): “of the deep sense of anger over the Iraq war, a wider despair about the Islamic world and what Muslims saw as a ‘decadent’ western society.”

I don’t deny that among British muslims there is anger at what has happened in Iraq, the ongoing situation in Israel and the denial of basic human rights by muslim regimes in the Middle East. But such anger can hardly be used as justification of murder.

And yes, there is resentment by some muslims at what they see as the west’s decadence. In fact, it seems that this, more than foreign policy, is the motivation for feelings of violence towards British citizens. It provided the motivation of the terrorists of 9/11. But such anger at moral standards are religiously inspired and, while important to the holders of those views themselves, they can never - should never - be addressed by government.

It is this point that most concerns me about Grieve’s views. By acknowledging anger at “decadent western society”, he seems to be suggesting that such grievances can be addressed. For the minority of British muslims who believe Islamism is the answer, acknowledging such grievances is never going to be enough. And addressing them in any way is out of the question, since that would represent an unacceptable compromise of liberality and tolerance.

Visit Tom's blog.