Via The Blue Blog » Our welfare reforms will make work pay: At the election, the Conservatives made a promise to you to get Britain working. Now we are delivering on that promise. This Government is on the side of people who want to get ahead. The plans we have announced in the last few days will get people into work and will reform the welfare system to ensure that work always pays and no one can say they are better […]
Tags: Reform, Social Justice, Welfare
Later, I’ll set out the case against inflation, which is caused by the instutional design of the banking system. For the moment, here’s a relevant article from the Cobden Centre: Mr Smith works hard, plans carefully, and saves what he can, putting his money into a building society. He pays his credit card bills off each month, and tries to overpay his mortgage when he can. Mr Smith got a 3% pay rise last year – inflation was only 2% […]
Tags: economics, Inflation, Justice, Social Justice
You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We will preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on Earth, or we will sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness. We will keep in mind and remember that Barry Goldwater has faith in us. He has faith that you and I have the ability and the dignity and the right to make our own decisions and determine our own destiny. And […]
Tags: Democracy, humour, Liberty, Reagan, Social Justice, Socialism, Speeches
Via The TaxPayers’ Alliance – Economics 101: The IFS spreadsheet doesn’t tell us what policy choices are best for the poor: Suppose you invented a policy, some kind of economic miracle, which doubled the incomes of the poorest ten per cent of families without the Government spending a pound. That would reduce benefit spending. It would also increase tax revenues from the poorest. The same method that the IFS are using in their reports would show the effects of that policy […]
Tags: Budget, economics, Social Justice
“It is not clear how you would go about working out how much better off a household is from not having a Greek-style meltdown,” said Mr Browne. via FT.com / UK / Politics & policy – Equality fears add to Budget woes.
Tags: Budget, economics, Greece, Social Justice
Via 21st Century Welfare, the Coalition seeks views on proposals for welfare reform. Since I gave time to work for the Centre for Social Justice, these reforms are close to my heart: we must take people out of the present intergenerational cycles of broad spectrum poverty. Iain Duncan Smith’s statement in the main paper is encouraging, particularly the central section: Too often governments have tried to tackle poverty but ended up managing its symptoms. The changes outlined here are based on […]
Tags: Addictions, debt, Education, Family breakdown, Optimism, Poverty, Reform, Social Justice, Society, Welfare, Worklessness
Fascinating reading from Civitas: Politicians from all parties say they are committed to the ideal of a ‘meritocratic’ society – they all want talented and hard-working people to succeed in life, irrespective of their social background. However, a new report from the independent think tank Civitas argues that many politicians are badly informed about the facts of social mobility in modern Britain. And because they don’t know the facts, they support policies which are at best unnecessary, and at worst […]
Tags: Optimism, Social Justice, Social mobility, Society
The IEA blogger Kristian Niemitz reports Iain Duncan Smith’s speech: “The purpose of my life here is to improve the quality of life of the worst off in society.” Such ambitious rhetoric is not unusual for new incumbents at the Department for Work and Pensions. The difference with Iain Duncan Smith is that he means it, having advocated an overhaul of Britain’s rotten welfare system for years while being far away from the lure of power. If IDS is to […]
Tags: Iain Duncan Smith, IEA, Social Justice, social policy
As I sit here on the train, reading a book on ethics, I am mindful of being an engineer in politics. Engineers are quintessentially pragmatic. We get things done, in the circumstances we face, with the resources we have. We may accept falling short of perfection, but we deliver things which work and improve them. However, we don’t flounder around uninformed. Aeroplanes do not fly thanks to fairy dust and software does not write itself. Aerospace engineering requires the application of […]
Tags: Ethics, Ideas, IEA, Inequality, Labour, Mises, Pragmatism, Social Justice
NB: The author is Tim Hewish, who I am glad to welcome as a local contributor. — Steve One of my local Wycombe friends asked me: Why, as a young person, should I vote Conservative? I initially came out with the usual blurb about the positives of Conservatism, but she stopped me mid-way and she repeated ‘no, as a young person’. This made me think about the question further and I was fortunate enough to find two articles that stated […]
Tags: Big Brother, big society, Conservatives, Fairness, New Labour, Optimism, Responsibility, Social Justice
Steve Baker is the Conservative MP for Wycombe.
Steve was first elected to Parliament in 2010. He was previously an RAF engineer officer then a consulting software engineer. Find out more...
Steve holds regular surgeries in High Wycombe. If you would like an appointment, please contact me.
