The 2007 AGM season is over.

Like Christmas the 'AGM season' seems to arrive sooner and last longer every year.

As PPC I have to try and attend an extraordinary number of Annual General Meetings - there are half a dozen local ward Associations, seven Conservative Clubs, a couple of non political associations I am involved with and finally, our Conservative Association AGM that occurred last night, and I try and get to as many as possible.

These AGM's always seem to remind one of a glorious past; our great civic forbears set up these pillars of due process in Victorian times to protect donors and ensure 'fair play'. I cannot help but marvel at the determination of some people to ensure every letter of due process is followed. From 'apologies for absence' right the way though to 'any other business' each and every AGM follows the same format under the hawkish eye of sternly critical committee members.

I do wonder about the need for this when in some cases the bodies concerned can consist of little more than the committee members themselves (not St Marychurch ward committee pictured, they are a successful group doing well.) This leads to the charade of having to 'elect' officers when in nearly every case there aren't any new volunteers and the same people are perenially re-elected without the need for a vote, in a process that is unnervingly reminiscent of a kind of 1950's Communist era.

Last night we racked through the official stuff in a few minutes and then spent half an hour discussing politics - much more fun.

All credit then to Chairman John Cowie for making the evening enjoyable, and relevant, and above all for thinking about his members first.

A Bad day to try and bury bad news

• £5,000,000,000 goes 'missing' on Tax Credits shambles
  
• Housing market in turmoil over HIP fiasco
• Judges refuse to back Government over Ministry of Justice plans
• UK Government will miss it's child poverty targets says Bernardo's

These are just four of the leading press stories in todays newspapers. The New Labour fiasco rolls on and on with one embarrassing cock-up after another.

If Gordon Brown does nothing else he needs to get a grip on the way this country is being run and do so quickly, but the problem is that many of the biggest cock-ups are in fact down to him.

Three out of four of todays stories are directly or indirectly related to Gordon Brown and his insistant meddling in departments across the piece.

Having read two biographies of Gordon Brown (including the excellent one by Tom Bower) I remain convinced that a Gordon Brown government will be WORSE than a Tony Blair one.

If Britain was a public company either it's board would have been sacked by now or it would have been taken over by someone else.

But I suppose we are undergoing a 'break-up' bid with Alex Salmond in Scotland aren't we?

There is much fuss in the media about wether the Grammar School issue is our equivalent to Tony Blair ditching the Labour constitutinal clause 4 commitment to nationalisation thereby proving that New Labour had broken with it's socialist past.

The idea that Cameron wants a ‘clause 4′ moment over anything is to completely misunderstand the nature of the Cameron project; and David Cameron personally.

He really, really, does not want to have a fight with parts of the Conservative party.

His style is genuinely non-confrontational - he really does want a return to consensual politics -people working together for the best- and he is completely truthful when he says ‘if the Labour party comes up with a policy we agree with we will back it’.

So entrenched have some political activists become that they see politics as a war, but the public don’t; they just want to see our country run properly.

Everybody knows that on some issues party politics - the adversarial system- has become pointless and in some cases damaging, education is one such area.

There are only 160 or so grammar schools left against over 3,000 secondary schools. The Conservatives haven't introduced new Grammar Schools in 18 years in Government and nobody has seriously imagined that we had any plans to roll out Grammar Schools across the UK.

I believe that everyone has talent somewhere. The job of a good education system is to find that talent and make the best of it. That could and should include artistic ability, sporting ability, mechanical aptitude, and any other number of abilities that thousands of children have but which is not valued or honed by the old system , and isn't happening under the comprehensive system either.

The public schools do a better job on this. Bryanston is recognised and known as a very artistic public school, for instance, against Harrow which is very academic. The idea behind both Blairs education vision and ours is to try and replicate some of that diversity in the state sector. City academies are encouraged to specialise and accordingly they can select up to 10% of their pupils by ability from outside their ‘normal’ catchment who have notable talent in their speciality.

In additon, proper subject streaming by ability and restoring effective and worthwile discipline will do far more to help most children than any amount of posturing over the return of an old system rejected by all parties and the vast majority of parents and teachers 40 years ago.

And the idea that this is a party political ploy by us is totally wrong and shows just how insulated some Labour activists have become.

This is not a political game it’s real life. It’s about our childrens education.

How much do people care about who is the ceremonial Chairman anymore?

The local newspaper letters page has been inundated recently with indignant letters from prominent Lib Dems past and present complaining about the Conservatives decision to abandon protocol and pick their own colleague Mrs McPhail for Council Chair over last years deputy (and by rotation the person who would previously have become this years Chairman) Lib Dem Cllr Stringer.

I may be guilty of being a bit biased here, and I do feel a bit sorry for Mr Stringers wife (who we are told had stocked up with new attire for her civic year at the top table) but I think that once again, the Lib Dems are in danger of being seen to make much ado about nothing.

The fact is most people in the bay want good quality local services at a reasonable cost. they want a Council who will work hard to return some much needed prosperity and industry to the bay and they want councillors who are going to concentrate on the things that matter to ordinary citizens like keeping the place clean, safe and making sure their taxes are affordable.

As to who wears the Georgian red robe.... I don't think most people, including me, give a $%^&**!

Comrade Brown is elevated to lead the party and the country unopposed!

Yes citizens on this historic day our glorious leader is elevated to lead the Party and our great country and without the need for an inconvenient and possibly unreliable election by the people.

Who needs democracy when one has such a popular and commanding leader prepared to take control?

Citizens should be grateful and any who are not will soon be hearing from the Authorities....

(With grateful thanks to eng.davno.ru/posters/collections/stalin/ for providing the original poster)

SO HARRY STAYS AWAY-
Are we admitting defeat in Iraq?

The disgraceful news that the Army high command have decided that Iraq is too dangerous for Prince Harry is surely the best indication yet that we are losing the wholly ill named 'war on terror' .

It comes as a bit of a shock to discover that the once proud and mighty British army have been reduced to such a low state. The fact that they cannot be sure of protecting one soldier in the region is all the proof we need that this 'war' is going nowhere fast.

Because to put it bluntly, the purpose of terrorism is to alter behaviour through the use of fear rather than the use of force. Persian warriors have honed the use of terror to compensate for their lack of actual firepower for centuries.

The very fact that the fear of what might happen to Prince Harry has meant that he is being pulled off the deployment means that the terrorists have -in this case- won.

This is a major setback and in my view will be a huge boost to the insurgents; make Al-Qaeda stronger and more powerful in the region; and damage the morale of our servicng soldiers even more.

'Tin Hat' at the ready over Grammar Schools announcement.

I am preparing myself for serious flak over David Willets contentious announcment this afternoon that a Conservative Government would not permit the opening of any new grammar schools.

This is a very difficult issue for me, as I am the product of a Grammar school and one of my daughters is currently benefitting from a Grammar School education.

In a survey I conducted in 2004 over 80% of local residents say that the want to retain our Grammar Schools. So I am expecting howls of protest from many quarters over this proposal to back the City Academies initiative and dump our previous long-held promise of re-introducing the 11 plus.

I agree that turning the clock back to the old days of grammar schools is , frankly, a no-no. The well documented problems of selecting pupils on a fairly narrow band of ability aged 11 is a historical debate we lost long ago and I see no point in trying to turn back after such a long time.

What David Willets says is this:

"We must break free from the belief that academic selection is any longer the way to transform the life chances of bright poor kids. This is a widespread belief but we just have to recognise that there is overwhelming evidence that such academic selection entrenches advantage, it does not spread it."

"For those children from modest backgrounds who do get to grammar schools the benefits are enormous. And we will not get rid of those grammar schools that remain. But the trouble is that the chances of a child from a poor background getting to a grammar school in those parts of the country where they do survive are shockingly low.

"A Conservative agenda for education will not be about just helping a minority of pupils escape a bad education. We want better schools for all, based on fair admission and fair funding. That is why we are outlining a series of specific measures for driving up standards and expanding the Academies programme begun by Tony Blair."

Directly funded schools is an idea I have always liked, whether they are called 'grant maintained' as they were under John Major or 'City Academies' as they are under Tony Blair.