A second hydrogen explosion rocked Japan’s Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant today. The explosion occurred in a separate unit of the reactor from the one hit by an earlier explosion Saturday. Nuclear agency officials said radiation was leaked, but that levels were low and that the reactor’s containment was not damaged….
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Taliban claims responsibility for the third attack in a month in the formerly peaceful Kunduz province A suicide attack on an army recruitment centre in northern Afghanistan has killed 37 people. It was the third major assault in the area in less than a month, the deputy governor said. A Taliban spokesman, Zabihullah Mujahid, claimed responsibility for the attack on behalf of the militant Islamist group. Dozens more were wounded, officials said. A Reuters witness heard gunfire in the area after the attack but Hamdullah Danishi, the deputy governor of Kunduz province, said the casualties were all caused by a single suicide bomber. “The death toll includes new recruits, army soldiers and civilians,” Danishi told Reuters. A doctor in the Kunduz provincial hospital said 33 bodies had been brought in. Violence is spreading fast in the once relatively peaceful north, with Kunduz a particular focus for insurgents. The Kunduz police chief was killed by a suicide bomber while out on patrol in the city last week. In late February, another suicide bomber killed at least 30 people in a government office while people were queueing to collect identity cards in the Emam Saheb district of Kunduz. The previous governor of Kunduz was killed in an attack on a mosque where he was worshipping last October. The province has become established as an insurgent base over the past two years, with attacks radiating out into surrounding provinces, while Nato-led International Security Assistance Force (Isaf) offensives have been concentrated in Taliban strongholds in the south and east. Isaf said it was investigating reports of the latest attack in Kunduz. In 2010, violence across Afghanistan hit its worst levels since the Taliban were ousted by US-backed Afghan forces in late 2001, despite the presence of about 150,000 foreign troops. It has been rising this year even before an expected spring offensive against insurgents. Afghanistan Global terrorism guardian.co.uk
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Rolling coverage of all the day’s political developments as they happen 11.48am: Q: Is Prince Andrew a liability? Miliband says when he was energy secretary he worked with the prince in the prince’s role as trade envoy. The prince did a good job, Miliband says. Q: Will David be your best man? (That’s a reference to this story in the Mail on Sunday yesterday.) Miliband says that Gordon Brown won’t be organising his stag do. And when he has something to say about his best man, “I can promise you you’ll be the last to know”, he tells Graeme Wilson from the Sun. 11.45am: Q: If borrowing is £20bn less than envisaged originally by Alistair Darling, how would you spend that money? Balls says governments make tax and spending decisions on a year by year basis. He does not have access to the government’s figures, he says. Q: If you did not spend every penny wisely, can you tell us where the money was wasted? Balls says no government spends every penny wisely. It is always possible to make efficiencies. That’s why the Labour government commissioned the Gershon review. 11.43am: Q: What do you say to the Tory charge that you have already spend the bank bonus tax money many times over? Balls says this is “total utter garbage and claptrap”. Q: How many of these construction jobs would actually go to British people? Balls says there are many British contractors who are not working at the moment because jobs have gone in the construction industry. And immigration from the EU has fallen. So, Balls says, he does not accept the proposition. 11.42am: Q: How many members of the shadow cabinet support AV? Miliband says he supports AV, although others in the party don’t. Balls says he supports AV, but he does not think it is the most important issue facing the party. 11.40am: Q: What would you say to people outraged by your decision not to vote against the welfare bill at second reading? Miliband says Labour tabled a reasoned amendment to the bill setting out the party’s objections. But Labour MPs did not vote against the bill at second reading because they are some principles in the bill that the party supports. 11.37am: Q: Which of the Conservative cuts would you support, if any? Balls says you make decisions budget by budget. Borrowing was coming down faster than expected. The idea that there were pre-ordained cuts envisaged is not true. Balls says he set out cuts as children’s secretary. And as shadow home secretary he supported some cuts. But if unemployment is rising, that makes it harder to get the defict down. There are three factors involved in defict reduction: tax, spending and growth. Of these, growth is most important, Balls suggests. 11.36am: Q: What happened about the AV event planned for tomorrow? Miliband says Clegg was worried about the event going ahead without his involvement. 11.35am: Q: Are you in favour a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU? Miliband says Britain made a decision on Europe in 1975. It was the right decision. The bonds that have been created by the EU “have helped to create peace in Europe”. Someone like his father would have been surprised by how this has happened, he says. 11.31am: Q: Would you share a platform with Nick Clegg on AV? Miliband says he would share a platform with anyone who would help him win the AV campaign. But he won’t share a platform with Clegg, “because I don’t think he will help us win the referendum”. The best thing Clegg could do would be to “lie low for a bit”. Q: What mistakes did you make in power? Balls says he did not regulate the banks enough. He regrets not slapping down people like George Osborne even more than he did, because they were arguing for less regulation. The Tories are saying Labour was “feckless with public spending”. That is “complete nonsense”, Balls says. Labour tried to control spending. As evidence of this, he cites the Gershon review. 11.30am: Q: Do you support the recommendations of the Hutton report on public sector pensions? Miliband says he is going to study the report in detail. But the government has pre-empted it, because it has already decided to increase employee contributions from public sector workers. That shows the government is not taking Hutton seriously, he says. 11.28am: Q: Why not make the bank bonus tax permanent? Balls said a year ago the banks said the bonus tax would not work. It ended up raising £3.5bn. In the long term, it is important to wait for the Vickers report on the future of banking, Balls says. If you can make progress on reforming the bank bonus rules, then there may be no need for a permanent bank bonus tax. 11.26am: Q: Are you now in favour of the VAT increase generally? Miliband says Labour would not have put up VAT. But he cannot say now what Labour’s budget plans will be for 2015. Balls says he has made no commitments on VAT generally. But it is clear that the VAT rise was the wrong tax at the wrong time, Balls says. 11.22am: Q: If the bank bonus tax was such a good idea, why was it a one-off? Miliband says Alistair Darling thought there would be more global action on bank bonuses when he said his tax would be a one-off. Darling also envisaged more restraint from banks. Balls says filling up his car cost him £74.50 at the weekend. Other families are paying the same. They look at those bills and think that cutting taxes for banks should not be a priority. Q: Would the EU let you cut VAT on fuel? Balls says Kenneth Clarke cut VAT on fuel in 1995. That was perfectly legal. The government does have to go through the proper EU procedures, and the Treasury has already done this in relation to VAT on fuel in rural areas. 11.17am: They are taking questions now. Q: Are you still committed to halving the deficit over four years, as Alistair Darling proposed? Or is there a new Balls plan to replace the Darling plan? Miliband says Labour is still sticking to the proposal to halve the deficit over four years. Balls says Osborne wants to go further than Alistair Darling. Darling’s plan was clear. “That is what we thing the government should be doing today,” he says. The idea that Labour’s deficit reduction plans and the government’s are similar is “complete nonsense”. Darling was over-achieving his plan by £20bn a year, Balls says, because the deficit was falling more quickly than expected. Q: Would you support military action in Libya? Miliband says he supported what David Cameron said about investigating the possibility of a no-fly zone. But Cameron needs to convert “a phrase into a plan”. Britain cannot just stand by. But any plan has to be feasible. 11.10am: Ed Balls is speaking now. He says George Osborne should rethink his extreme plans to cut the deficit more quickly than any other major economy. He cites various experts who agree, including “the last three winner of the Nobel prize for economics”. Even withing the “fiscal straightjacket” Osborne has chosen, there are things he could do to stimulate growth. Balls says Osborne should cancel the VAT increase on fuel. He can do this now. It would cost £800m, using the extra money from the bank levy to fund this. Labour are going to have a debate on this on Wednesday. MPs will vote on the plan. Balls will be urging Tory MPs to vote for the cut. Balls says a “cautious estimate” suggests that repeating the bank bonus tax could raise £2bn. The money should be used to do three things. (See 10.59am.) First, it should be used to pay for new homes. Second, it should be used to pay for a youth jobs fund. If this is as successful as the future jobs fund was, it could get almost 90,000 people into work. Third, there should be an extra £200m for the regional growth fund. 11.05am: Ed Miliband says David Cameron’s claim about Britain being “out of the danger zone” now sounds very hollow. The economy should be growing strongly by now. Unemployment should be coming down. If the growth forecasts are revised down in next week’s budget, we’ll know that government policies are to blame, Miliband says. Some families are facing the equivalent of a 5p tax rise, he says. The Tories says there is no alternative – “words we’ve heard before from another Tory government” [Margaret Thatcher's]. They were wrong then and they are wrong now, Miliband says. Labour would have made cuts – “but at a sensible and balanced pace”. Miliband says he does not expect the government to abandon its deficit reduction plan. But they should be taking steps to deal with the problem of faltering growth. Continuing the tax on bank bonuses could create 110,000 jobs, Miliband says. 11.04am: Ed Miliband and Ed Balls are here. Milband starts by expressing support for what the government is doing to help the Japanese. 10.59am: According to the press release Labour have just handed out to journalists at the news conference, raising £2bn by repeating the one-off bank bonus tax introduced by Alistair Darling would pay for: • Spending £1.2bn on building more than 25,000 homes. This would generate 20,000 jobs in the construction industry and “several times more in the supply chain”, Labour says. • A £600m fund for youth jobs. • An extra £200m for the regional growth fund. 10.58am: Today Ed Miliband and Ed Balls are claiming that a bank bonus tax of £2bn could be used to create 110,000 new jobs. 10.50am: I’m at Church House waiting for the Ed Miliband/Ed Balls press conference to start. The Tories have invited us to a counter-briefing designed to highlight “Labour’s unfunded spending commitments”, although rather foolishly they’re holding it at 11.45am, when many of us will probably still be at Labour’s event. Never mind. I think we’ve got the gist of it already. The Tories put out a press notice yesterday claiming that Labour had already committed themselves to using the the £2.7bn bank levy to fund spending commitments worth £27bn. 10.24am: You can read all today’s Guardian politics stories here. And all the politics stories filed yesterday, including some in today’s paper, are here. As for the rest of the papers, I’ve already mentioned Sir Malcolm Rifkind’s artice in the Times saying the west should arm the Libyan rebels. (See 8.57am.) Here are some articles worth noting. • Lord Ashdown in the Financial Times (subscription) says Europe should impose a no-fly zone over Libya. Of the other options available to us, only one makes sense and that is a no-fly zone. Could it lead to us being drawn in further? Possibly. Is that a risk? Certainly. But, as with Bosnia, we must calculate not just the risks of action, but also the risks of inaction. Here too, the risks of standing by and doing nothing are greater than those that would be incurred by a careful, graduated and proportionate response designed to assert the primacy of international law and enable the people of Libya to make their own choice about their government. Thanks to the lead given by London and Paris, we may assume that the military preparations for a no-fly zone are broadly in place. We await only the right conditions to impose one. First, and most important, there has to be a clear call from Libyans. This action must be at their initiation, not ours. They have already made this call. The second is Arab regional support – perhaps even a regional face. The Arab League’s support for a no-fly zone is remarkable and important. There now needs to be a diplomatic campaign to bring in other Arab nations. • Louis Susman, the US ambassador, tells Con Coughlin in an interview in the Daily Telegraph that he has some concerns about the speed with which the government is cutting the deficit. While Mr Susman says that he now believes Mr Cameron “is growing into the job”, he still entertains some concerns about the speed with which the Prime Minister and the Chancellor, George Osborne, are tackling Britain’s massive budget deficit, which he fears might still result in a double-dip recession. “It is very admirable and we are rooting for you,” Mr Susman says of the Government’s recovery programme. “But the question is, is it too much, too fast? We worry about double-dip recession and the lack of growth.” He points out that in the States, Mr Obama is hoping to achieve economic growth in the region of 3.5 per cent while at the same time halving the budget deficit by 2013. • Jim Pickard in the Financial Times (subscription) says George Osborne will unveil a plan for “land auctions” in the budget. George Osborne is set to announce pilots for new “land auctions” in the Budget in an attempt to drive down the price of land for development, stimulating economic growth. The chancellor will invite a small number of councils to volunteer for the radical trials, designed to give an incentive to offer more planning approvals for new homes, business parks and other developments. Vince Cable, business secretary, proposed the idea but failed to win the wholehearted backing of Eric Pickles, communities secretary, who is understood to have misgivings about it … Under the system, a council would ask any local landowners to submit sealed-bid letters stating the price at which they would be willing to sell their land. This price would be binding and councils would be given the right to buy that land for a set period. The council would then choose which land offered they would like to be developed, would grant that land planning permission, and auction it to developers. This would allow local authorities to capture almost all of the increase in land value created by allowing development. • Claire Ellicott in the Daily Mail says an official report found that more than 100 state schools failed to enter a single candidate for GCSE history last year. The schools inspectorate Ofsted also found that England is the only country in Europe where children may stop studying history at the age of 13. Its conclusions will add weight to calls for reform to the national curriculum, which is being reviewed by Education Secretary Michael Gove and historian Simon Schama. 10.11am: A campaign called People’s Pledge has been launched today demanding a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU. A YouGov poll for the campaign found that 61% of voters would support a referendum, against 25% opposing it. 9.48am: Andrew Lansley, the health secretary, has come up with some new figures designed to strengthen the case for NHS reform. His department has put out a news release saying there will be a 252% increase in the number of people with two or more long-term conditions by 2050. Here’s an extract. Almost one in three of the population have a long term condition – such as asthma, heart and lung disease, arthritis, hypertension and diabetes – and half of people over the age of 60 have one. They are the biggest users of the NHS accounting for around 50 percent of GP appointments and 70 per cent of inpatient hospital beds meaning 30 per cent of the population accounts for 70 per cent of the spend. The NHS will not be able to meet this increase in demand unless it changes. Add to that the fragmented and inefficient way the NHS currently looks after people with long term conditions and the health service just won’t be able to cope a few years from now. 9.24am: Alan Milburn, the former Labour health secretary, turned down an invitation from the government to apply to become chair of the new NHS commissioning board, the Northern Echo reports. 9.21am: We’re going to be hearing a lot from Ed Miliband today. As well as doing his press conference, he’s going to be on Sky’s Boulton & Co programme at 1pm. 8.57am: Here are the main points from William Hague’s interview on the Today programme. I’ve taken the quotes from PoliticsHome. • Hague said the world was reaching “a point of decision” over Libya. We are now reaching a point of decision, very clearly, on what happens next. I’ve been discussing that with Hillary Clinton, last night, and the French foreign minister. We will meet, along with the other five foreign ministers of the G8, tonight in Paris and there’ll be a meeting at the UN security council of its members today to see what further we can do. • He said there was a case for arming the rebels. Sir Malcolm Rifkind has written an article in the Times (paywall) proposing this and Hague said that Rifkind made “a very good case”. But he said there was currently an arms embargo on the whole of Libya and that there would be disadvantages to lifting it. I wouldn’t exclude various possibilities on this score but I do stress for the moment that there is an international arms embargo and that lifting it can affect the ability of the Gaddafi side. • He said establishing a no-fly zone was still a possibility. Clearly a no-fly zone is one of the leading propositions. It isn’t the answer to everything, but it has been called for by the Arab League and it is something which the international community now must consider. • He said military action could be legal even without a UN security council resolution. There has to be regional support – which there clearly is – there has to be clear legality for it and a demonstrable need, and now of course one of the ways in which to make anything in these situations legal is to have a resolution of the United Nations security council. In cases of great, overwhelming humanitarian need then nations are able to act under international law even without a resolution of the security council. But it’s clearly the cleanest and simplest support for legality to have a security council resolution. • He said that the Foreign Office was not aware of any confirmed reports of Britons dying in the Japanese disaster. But he did not rule out the possibility of Britons having died. “Clearly at any one time there are a lot of British people travelling around in Japan,” he said. 8.43am: There are two main events in the diary today. Ed Miliband and Ed Balls are holding a joint press conference this morning which will be about next week’s budget. And David Cameron will be making a statement in the Commons this afternoon about Libya. Libya has been overshadowed by the events in Japan, but the crisis there has not gone away. William Hague has just told the Today programme that the “point of decision” over Libya is arriving. I’ll post more from his Today programme interview in a moment. Here’s a full list of what’s coming up. 11am: Ed Miliband and Ed Balls hold a press conference. They will urge the government to cut VAT on petrol and impose a new tax on bank bonuses . 11am: The Fair Fuel Campaign stages a protest at Westminster about fuel tax. 11.30am: Save the Children lobbies the Treasury, urging George Osborne to help families in severe poverty in the budget. 3.30pm: David Cameron gives a statement to the Commons about the EU summit called to discuss Libya . As usual, I’ll be covering all the breaking political news, as well as looking at the papers and bringing you the best politics from the web. I’ll post a lunchtime summary at around 1pm, and an afternoon one after Cameron’s statement. Andrew Sparrow guardian.co.uk
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• Hydrogen explosion at Unit 3 of Fukushima Daiichi plant • Reports of 2,000 bodies found in Miyagi prefecture • Tsunami warning appears to have been false alarm • Read the Guardian’s latest news story on the explosion Click here for a summary of events so far 10.37am: Below the line Hoxtoner, who is in Japan, writes : Just went to the local supermarket here in Sendai. NOTHING !! You have to see it to believe it. The only things I saw that were in bulk was alcohol, fags, coffee and tea and there wasn’t much of that. Other nationalities have been instructed to leave the Tohoku area. I have checked the British FCO and I don’t see any such statement. The Electric came on here in the early hours on Sat. We have water,but no gas. It’s also a bad hayfever day to add on to all the tragedies and anxieties. I don’t usually drink during the day yet I’ve decided to pour myself out a beer. Slight aftershocks and helicopters flying around as I type. 10.27am: Water levels have fallen far enough to partly expose fuel rods at the No 2 reactor at Fukushima Daiichi, according to the Jiji news agency. 10.18am: The Australian broadcaster ABC has posted a series of before and after satellite images from around north east Japan which give a clear sense of how much devastation the tsunami caused. The viewer can slide back and forth between the before and after shots, seeing how entire towns have been swept away. See the gallery here . 10.02am: The No 2 reactor at the Fukushima Dai-Ichi plant has lost all its cooling capacity, according to Japan’s Nuclear and Industrial Safety Agency . NHK World is reporting that Tokyo Electric Power Company, which owns the plant, has notified the agency of an emergency at the No 2 reactor. This is the second emergency notice for the reactor. The utility firm told the agency shortly after the quake on Friday that the reactor’s emergency cooling power system had failed. Since then, the company tried to cool the reactor by circulating water by steam power, instead of electricity. But an attempt to lower the temperature inside the vessel that houses the reactor did not work well. Fears of a hydrogen explosion at the vessel housing building are growing as the water level of the reactor is falling. A reaction with the steam and exposed fuel rods generates a large amount of hydrogen. 9.36am: A quick note from my colleague James Randerson on the “Richter Scale” – the logarithmic magnitude scale that was defined in 1935 to measure earthquakes in California. It was developed by Charles Richter (who also happened to be a nudist) and Beno Gutenberg of the California Institute of Technology (CIT) and was originally referred to as “Local Magnitude” or ML, James writes: Even though it was superseded in 1979 by the more uniformly applicable moment magnitude (Mw) scale the Richter scale has an amazing staying power in the public, and it has to be said journalistic, mind. In the barrage of information about the Japan earthquake numerous articles have used to the old scale incorrectly (
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Foreign secretary says international community must consider rebels’ call for help after Arab League backs no-fly zone The international community is approaching the “point of decision” on military intervention in Libya to protect the population from Colonel Muammar Gaddafi’s warplanes, the foreign secretary, William Hague, has said. After the Arab League backed calls for a military no-fly zone, he said the international community must now consider the rebels’ request for help. Hague, who is meeting fellow G8 foreign ministers in Paris on Monday night, also indicated that the government could consider arming the rebels to help them combat the superior firepower of Gaddafi’s security forces. “We are now reaching a point of decision, very clearly, on what happens next,” Hague told BBC Radio 4′s Today programme. “Clearly a no-fly zone is one of the leading propositions. It isn’t the answer to everything but it has been called for by the Arab League and is something which the international community must now consider.” He indicated that while the “cleanest and simplest” way of securing a legal basis for a no-fly zone would be a resolution of the United Nations security council, it was not necessarily essential. “In cases of great, overwhelming humanitarian need, then nations are able to act under international law, even without a resolution of the security council,” he said. Hague also expressed sympathy for a call by the former foreign secretary Sir Malcolm Rifkind for an “open and urgent” supply of weapons to the rebels, to avoid repeating the “mistake” of the Bosnian war in the 1990s. Writing in the Times, Rifkind said: “Having been defence secretary at the time I have, in retrospect, felt that (the arms embargo) was the most serious mistake made by the UN.” Hague said all arms exports to Libya – including to the rebels – were subject to a UN embargo, although he suggested that this could change. “I wouldn’t exclude various possibilities on this score,” he said. “I think Malcolm Rifkind makes a very good case. Again, this is the kind of subject which has to be discussed with our international partners.” He said that if Gaddafi was able to push back the rebels and re-establish control, the future for the country would be bleak. “If Gaddafi went on to be able to dominate much of the country, this would be a long nightmare for the Libyan people and this would be a pariah state for some time to come,” he said. Libya William Hague Middle East guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …The state never backed cultural difference at the expense of cohesion. What is emerging is people’s lived experience On 12 March 1983 A
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Labour leader and shadow chancellor to call for windfall tax on bankers’ bonuses to be repeated and for VAT rise on petrol to be reversed in order to help boost growth Ed Miliband, the Labour leader, will today urge the government to repeat last year’s bank bonus tax to fund help for the young unemployed and support for the faltering construction industry. Ahead of next week’s budget, he and Ed Balls, the shadow chancellor, will appeal to George Osborne to do more to bolster growth. At a press conference in Westminster, they will say that a repeat of the £3.5bn windfall tax on bankers’ bonuses would raise cash to promote growth and help hard-pressed families. They will detail specific proposals for tackling the “crisis” of youth unemployment and boost the construction industry, which has lost 27,000 jobs in the past year. Labour is also calling for the VAT rise to be reversed on petrol as prices soar over 130p per litre. It intends to force a Commons vote on the issue on Wednesday. Miliband is expected to say this morning: “We are under no illusions that at this stage the government will abandon their deficit reduction plan – they are too dug in for that. “But at least they should take some steps to deal with faltering growth in our economy – to start to establish a plan to create jobs in the private sector … to deal with the crisis of youth unemployment in our country and build the skills we need for the future. “The tests for next week’s budget are clear – growth and living standards. But the signs aren’t good that they will be met. The government should think again.” Yesterday, Balls urged the chancellor to provide “immediate relief” for motorists by reversing, on petrol purchases only, January’s rise in VAT from 17.5% to 20%. Speaking to Sky News, he called on Osborne to “act now”. “I think he should act immediately on VAT. This was an own goal and he didn’t have to do it,” Balls said. “In parliament on Wednesday we will be urging Conservative and Liberal Democrat MPs to join with us in voting in parliament to urge the chancellor to cut VAT on fuel now and give immediate relief to hauliers and motorists across the country.” Ed Miliband Ed Balls Executive pay and bonuses Petrol prices Motoring George Osborne Construction industry Unemployment guardian.co.uk
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At least eight people die in attack in volatile Diyala province, security sources say A car bomb attack on an Iraqi army unit in the volatile Diyala province has killed at least eight soldiers, security sources said, as the Iraqi government continues to battle a stubborn insurgency. The blast took place near an army headquarters in Kanaan, 45 miles north-east of Baghdad, killing eight soldiers and wounding 12, according to a source in Diyala’s operations command. Another source said 10 soldiers had been killed and 13 wounded, while Muthana al-Timimi, head of the security committee of the Diyala provincial council, gave the casualty figures as five dead and 10 wounded. He said the blast was caused by a large quantity of explosives placed near government buildings, including the army HQ. Rescue workers were searching for survivors in the rubble, a witness at the scene told Reuters. The explosion damaged the army headquarters and nearby buildings, he said. “I can see a big hole in the ground and three damaged buildings.” Samira al-Shibli, a spokeswoman for the Diyala provincial governor, said three soldiers had been killed and six wounded. “It was a parked car bomb attack on an Iraqi army intelligence unit … The sound of the blast was heard in all of the city of Baquba,” she said, adding that another car bomb was discovered at the scene but was defused. Iraqi security sources and officials sometimes give conflicting figures of casualties. Al-Qaida and other Sunni insurgents are still battling Iraqi security forces in Diyala. A volatile mix of minority Kurds, majority Shias and Sunnis has made it difficult to bring peace there. Suspected Sunni insurgents and Shia militias have stepped up assaults in recent months on Iraqi police officers and soldiers, seeking to undermine faith in the security forces before a full US military withdrawal by the end of this year. Iraq Global terrorism Middle East guardian.co.uk
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Andrew Lansley stands by strategy to beat alcohol misuse despite being told responsibility deal will not work Six health organisations have walked away from the government’s “responsibility deal” on alcohol, saying that health secretary Andrew Lansley has allowed the industry to drive through a series of insignificant pledges that will do nothing to reduce drink-related illness and deaths. The deal, due to be announced on Tuesday, will see supermarkets, pubs and drinks manufacturers pledge to do their bit to reduce harmful drinking, such as labelling bottles and cans with the number of alcohol units. Other pledges will be made by the food and fitness industries. Health representatives on the alcohol panel, which has been meeting for several months, say the government listened to industry and refused to allow issues that could make a difference, such as price and promotion to children, to be discussed. The Royal College of Physicians, the British Liver Trust, the British Association for the Study of the Liver, the Institute of Alcohol Studies, the British Medical Association and Alcohol Concern have written to Lansley rejecting a deal that they say: • Prioritises the views of industry. Health groups’ proposals for bans on price-based advertising and cinema advertising during under-18 films, and health warnings on bottles and cans, were all turned down. • Aims to “foster a culture of responsible drinking” – not tackle illness and death. • Does not provide any way of measuring the success of the pledges. Professor Sir Ian Gilmore, special adviser on alcohol to the royal college, said it was perfectly appropriate for government to take the economic impact of any policy into account, but “it is not acceptable for the drinks industry to drive the pace and direction that such public health policy takes.” The pledges would not give doctors, “who see the rising tide of health harm from drink in their daily practice, any confidence that they will get to the core of how we reverse this entirely preventable cause of illness and death”. Lansley has said there will be a government alcohol strategy later in the year. But the six organisations say they have seen no evidence that the government is working towards “a comprehensive, cross-departmental strategy to reduce alcohol harm, based on evidence of what works, with rigorous evaluation”. They also complain that government has not committed to any alternative actions – such as legislation – if the pledges fail to cut alcohol-related harm. Lansley said: “We have made clear from the start that the responsibility deal is just one strand of the government’s wide public health policy. It explicitly excludes cost and price competition to avoid conflicts of interest. “The Treasury have already announced a new tax on super-strength beers; the Home Office have made their announcement on a ban in sales of alcohol below cost and plans to tighten licensing laws; and our public health strategy sets out how local areas will be given a ring-fenced public health budget to ensure alcohol misuse gets the priority it deserves. In tandem to this action, the responsibility deal is working with the industry on voluntary agreements to get speedier results. For example, to improve unit labelling. The Responsibility Deal has achieved more in the last six months than the previous Government’s Coalition for Better Health did in a year and a half. What is more, this is only the first step” Alison Rogers, chief executive of the British Liver Trust, said there was “a fundamental conflict of interest” for industry, whose objective is to sell more alcohol, sitting on a panel with the aim of reducing alcohol harm. “We know that the most effective measure we could be taking is to cut total population consumption and the drinks industry are never going to do that. Our fundamental concern is that they are sitting at a policy-making table here.” In her letter to Lansley: she points to 20 years’ experience of industry’s voluntary measures, “which by the DH’s [Department of Health's] own evaluation (of labelling, for instance) have been independently assessed as ineffective.” Among the pledges, industry will undertake to continue to fund the Drinkaware Trust. The letter goes on: “We have witnessed a long history of procrastination by the alcohol industry as successive governments have been seduced by the siren calls of voluntary self-regulation We continue to regard this initiative with great scepticism and understand that the DH’s own initial evaluation of the campaign has not been favourable.” Don Shenker, chief executive of Alcohol Concern said it was “the worst possible deal for everyone who wants to see alcohol harm reduced. There are no firm targets or any sanctions if the drinks industry fails to fulfil its pledges. It’s all carrot and no stick for the drinks industry and supermarkets. “The deal on alcohol is clearly the result of determined drinks industry lobbying coupled with a coalition government in thrall to business.”Vivienne Nathanson, director of professional activities at the BMA, said the pledges would do nothing to tackle the crucial issues – affordability, availability and promotion. They were particularly concerned about the low cost of really powerful drinks and promotion to under-18s. “Young people don’t know alcohol is a poison – that people die of acute toxicity,” she said. Young people were targeted by the sponsorship by industry of pop festivals, for instance. “You can’t buy alcohol under-18 yet young people have favourite alcopops – they have tried them all.” Alcohol Health policy Health Andrew Lansley Food & drink industry Sarah Boseley guardian.co.uk
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Nick Clegg will meet David Cameron this week to discuss unpopular bill after Lib Dems demand changes The government’s plans for a health service shakeup face a radical overhaul after the Liberal Democrat leadership was forced to bow to the strength of a grassroots rebellion fuelled by fear of privatisation and an undue emphasis on competition. The Lib Dems voted almost unanimously at the party’s spring conference in Sheffield to give councillors a central role in GP commissioning and in scrutinising foundation trusts. They called for a ban on all cherry-picking by private companies offering treatment services. David Cameron will hold talks this week with his deputy, Nick Clegg, to decide whether the rebellion provides an opportunity to make changes to a health and social care bill that has become increasingly unpopular. Cameron acknowledges the government has not got his message across on health. The bill hands £80bn to new GP commissioning boards and will allow any willing provider to compete to provide services. The health secretary, Andrew Lansley told BBC1′s Politics Show: “We’ve already made changes. We are not sitting there thinking we must know the answers and nothing can change. If we can clarify and amend in order to reassure people, then we will do so.” He claimed the bill already prevented cherry-picking by the private sector and extended accountability. Coalition ministers are expected to avoid a rebellion at the bill’s report stage in the Commons or in the Lords, where the medical profession is a strong lobby and could rip the bill apart. The vote in Sheffield will free previously loyal Lib Dem MPs to voice opposition inside the parliamentary party. Key party members stressed they had no master plan in response to the vote, but said it could not be ignored and argued many Conservatives were uneasy about the reforms. Faced with certain defeat in Saturday’s vote, the leadership accepted two amendments, supported by Baroness Shirley Williams and the former MP Evan Harris, and promised to take the critical messages back to government. Clegg agreed to the amendments after a breakfast meeting with Williams. Some Lib Dem cabinet members want to use the revolt to rework the bill, which they admit is unpopular, little understood and seen as the sort of top-down reorganisation the coalition had vowed not to enforce. One said: “I thought we had committed ourselves to give the NHS more money and to leave it alone. I like Lansley, but I do not know why we are doing this.” Clegg told his party: “All of us in government are listening and we take these concerns seriously.” He said he wanted reform and he was totally opposed to the privatisation of health. He said the amendments went with the grain of the bill. Harris responded to Clegg, saying: “The conference voted overwhelmingly for more accountability and openness in commissioning, for a rejection of the marketisation of the health service and for safeguards against cherry-picking by private sector providers… and against the undermining of local NHS services. Nick’s rejection of privatisation, while welcome, does not yet address all these issues.” The amended motion said: • No decision about spending of NHS funds should be made in private, which could have happened under the proposed GP consortiums. • NHS commissioning must be retained as a public function, rather than sub-contracted to private companies. • No new private providers should be allowed where there is risk of cherry-picking. • GP commissioning boards must construct annual plans in conjunction with new health and wellbeing boards. • There must be a continued separation of commissioning and provision of services to prevent conflicts of interest. • Half of the members of the new commissioning consortiums must be local councillors appointed as non-executive directors. Downing Street said: “This is not about significant changes to the policy but about reassuring people with minor changes to the language of the bill as it goes through the House.” Health policy Health Liberal Democrats Nick Clegg Andrew Lansley Shirley Williams David Cameron NHS Patrick Wintour Allegra Stratton guardian.co.uk
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