Downing Street Says » 2004

» Monday, February 16, 2004

Chief Secretary of the Treasury

Asked what the Chief Secretary of the Treasury actually did, the PMOS said that the Chief Secretary of the Treasury performed the traditional role of Chief Secretary of the Treasury and although that may not be visible to journalists a lot of work took place behind the scenes.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (2)

Public Inquiries

Asked if the Government was concerned about the lack of enthusiasm for public inquiries, specifically the Cory Inquiry, given the cost of the Bloody Sunday Inquiry, the PMOS said that there were assumptions built into that question which he was not going to follow down. The simple fact was that there were genuine legal difficulties which arose out of the Cory report which we had to address before we could publish and before we could announce what we were going to do. It was better to let that process unfold.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

» Thursday, February 12, 2004

Education

Asked to explain what was new about the Government's Building Schools for the Future initiative, the Prime Minister's Official Spokesman (PMOS) said that what was new was the fifteen-year programme to address the problem of dilapidated school buildings. In 1997, the level of capital spending for schools had been £700m. By 2005, it would be £5.1bn. Of that, £2bn was being allocated to fourteen LEAs which would carry out a systematic programme of either rebuilding of refurbishing secondary schools in their areas. This meant that in fifteen years' time, every secondary school would be either new or as new. Asked if it was the capital spending that was new, the PMOS said no. The money had already been allocated. Today's announcement was outlining details about how the money was going to be spent. We wanted LEAs to move away from the mend-and-repair mentality of 1997 when £700m was all that had been possible to spend, to a systematic programme of rebuilding or rehabilitation.

Briefing took place at 15:45 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

PM Speech/Education

The Prime Minister's Official Spokesman (PMOS) advised journalists that the Prime Minister would be making a speech this afternoon at the new Capital City Academy in Willesden. The key theme was the launch of the Building Schools for the Future initiative through which the Government planned to rebuild or refurbish every secondary school in England over the next fifteen years, as part of a capital spending programme which due to reach £5.1bn 2005. The first wave of the programme would involve fourteen LEAs sharing over £2bn (from the £5.1bn). Each one would be asked to come up with a systematic 'renewal plan' to overhaul their school buildings, moving away from the 'sticking plaster' approach of the past - fixing of a roof here or a broken window there - to a thorough going review of the size, character and number of schools locality by locality. In the plans, the LEAs would be asked to consider the scope for City Academies above the fifty three we wanted to see by 2007.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Pay

The PMOS advised journalists that the Senior Salaries Review Body (SSRB) had submitted its recommendations on pay, to which the Prime Minister had published his response this morning. Simultaneous Written Ministerial Statement were also being made today by Geoff Hoon (Armed Forces), David Blunkett (Prison Service) and Paul Murphy (Prison Service, Northern Ireland). The main recommendations, which the Government accepted, were: an increase, from April 1 2004, of 2% to the pay ranges for each of the SCS pay bands; a range of performance related base pay awards from 0 to 9% - a minimum bonus payment of 3% of salary or £2,500, whichever was the higher, for those who qualified; an uplift to the Permanent Secretaries pay ranges resulting in a new range of £121,100 to £256,550; low performance would also be recognised with the bottom 5-10% of performers receiving awards of between 0% and 2% - i.e. a real terms pay cut.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Berlin Meeting

The PMOS informed journalists that the Prime Minister would be having a dinner/meeting with Chancellor Schroeder in Berlin later today. They would take the opportunity to discuss the IGC and foreign policy issues such as Iraq, Afghanistan and the Middle East. They would also look ahead to next week's Trilateral summit in Berlin on 18 February, which would focus on EU economic reform in preparation for the EU Spring Summit in Brussels next month. The PMOS reminded journalists that the UK, France and Germany had also produced a joint paper ahead of the Spring Summit last year. Asked if the Prime Minister was also intending to hold a bilateral with President Chirac in Paris, the PMOS said that he was not aware of any plans for him to do so at this stage.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Immigration/Morecambe Bay

Questioned about the warning the Home Office had received last year about the cockle-pickers at Morecambe Bay, the PMOS said that as the Immigration Service had made clear, it had referred only to one operation. Both the Immigration Service and the police had been involved in other operations in the Morecambe Bay area, including one in August 2003. Consequently, the assumption that they had been ignoring the problem was false.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

» Wednesday, February 11, 2004

Trade Unions

Asked the Government's justification for giving money to Trade Unions, the Prime Minister's Official Spokesman (PMOS) told journalists that the Government had given a significant sum of money to businesses to help them adapt and change. This was a modest sum amounting to about £5-10 million spread over several years. Obviously, as the Prime Minister had said, the Government was for good employment relations and this was a way of enabling that to happen. The Government was committed to ensuring that we had good labour relations in the UK and had done a huge amount in terms of the minimum wage, paternity leave and union recognition, to address this area. Put to him that the funding to business helped create wealth, which helped to create jobs, but that was not the case with Unions, the PMOS said that in the context of ensuring good employment relations, it was a benefit to the economy as a whole. Asked if the money was being given to Trade Unions because they couldn't afford to modernize, the PMOS said that Unions had different sources of funding but as had been explained in Parliament, this was money specifically designed to help Unions modernize employer-employee relations and that was obviously a good thing. The measures however would be subject to a vote in the House as part of the Employment Relations Bill. Asked if the money would be specifically 'ring-fenced', the PMOS said that there were, for example, funds to allow Unions to embrace new technology more easily to the benefit of the workforce and to business as a whole. Asked who would audit the money, the PMOS said he presumed it would be done by the DTI.

Briefing took place at 15:45 | Read whole briefing | Comment (1)

EU Accession Immigration

Asked to clarify the Government's position on arrangements for the accession countries, the PMOS said it was important to give context to this. The Prime Minister had said in the House that from the 1st May there would be freedom of movement across the 25 EU countries. The question was not therefore, 'how do you prevent people from travelling to any country?' The Government would not want to in any event, since it believed in the principle of freedom of movement. The question was, 'what are the entitlements that people have if they go to another country?' The Government had not yet laid the regulations for this and obviously there was still ongoing discussion within Government. The Government's desire was to ensure that people did not, for example, come here for "benefit tourism" or "benefit shopping" etc. There was clearly an issue in respect of the right to work because obviously different countries had taken a different view, some had a derogation. However it should be clear that if a country derogated in terms of employment it didn't mean that people could not still go to that country and perhaps work illegally. In the UK, where we had almost full employment and labour shortages in the South-East, there was an issue in terms of ensuring that if people came here and worked then they were economically active in a way that benefited the Exchequer. The position on that hadn't changed.

Briefing took place at 15:45 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

Unemployment Statistics

The Prime Minister's Official Spokesman (PMOS) drew journalists' attention to the latest unemployment figures which had been published this morning. They showed that unemployment was at its lowest level since 1975. No doubt the good news would be competing with 'I'm a Celebrity...Get me Out of Here' in the column inches stakes tomorrow morning if past form was anything to go by.

Briefing took place at 11:00 | Read whole briefing | Comments (0)

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» Monday, February 16, 2004

Chief Secretary of the Treasury

Public Inquiries

» Thursday, February 12, 2004

Education

PM Speech/Education

Pay

Berlin Meeting

Immigration/Morecambe Bay

» Wednesday, February 11, 2004

Trade Unions

EU Accession Immigration

Unemployment Statistics

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