LIBDEMS' LEADERSHIP RACE

So Nick Clegg wins. Well ... whoop-de-doo!

For most (if not all) of us, isn't it just a relief that the 'Snoozeathon' (hat-tip to Iain Dale) is finally over? Actually I think Iain has it about right in that the ultimate 'loser' in this protracted 'watching-paint-dry' exercise is the LibDem party itself. No momentum or traction was generated within either the media (though the BBC did at least try to help them along) or the minds of the general public by the contest. Nick Clegg has ended up with a 'victory' of sorts but, because of the narrowness of the margin, it is decidedly hollow. And, given his lacklustre performance during the campaign, there has to be a real risk that (a la the Great Bottler) he's not really cut out for the intensity of the top job. The party itself, in not giving either Clegg or Huhne a clear mandate, has manifested its natural inclination towards degrees of tribalism and indecision - typically, their Janus-faced instinct of trying to look both ways at the same time has come to the fore.

But, as Iain says, this is not to underestimate Nick Clegg. Although I make no prognosis of potential coalition deals (above my pay grade) it is undoubtedly correct that Clegg has more potential appeal to Conservative rather than Labour waverers. For the Tories that is both a problem and a risk that needs to be addressed. But, for me, the real question has to be what sort of room for manoeuvre does Clegg actually have, given that the narrowness of the outcome shows that Huhne has a viable power-base - and therefore influence over both policy and tactics/strategy - within the party as a whole? Will he find himself somewhat hog-tied by the noises off that, in all likelihood, will emanate from the Huhne camp in the coming weeks and months?

YAWN - LIB/DEM LEADERSHIP RACE - YAWN

So Vince (Vincent Price) Cable tells us the outcome of the Huhne/Clegg love-in - like me, aren't you just gagging to know the result? (I jest!!!) - is "very close".

Translation: "It's all been such a frightful, tedious palaver. Can't we just call it an unedifying 'bore draw' so that we can all get a life and leave the politics to those big boys in the Labour and Conservative parties?"

DATA SECURITY: GOVT'S TRACK RECORD

Further to my previous post, I've been doing a little research. It would seem that (some of) the various legislative changes to the data protection/security regime that Richard Thomas is currently calling for have in fact already been before Parliament.

Back in March of this year in the House of Lords various amendments were debated in the context of the Serious Crime Bill aiming to strengthen the hand of the ICO vis a vis data protection/security. In fact, on 30th April and again on 9th May Baroness Anelay (now Opposition Chief Whip in the Lords but Home Office spokesman at the time) moved specific amendments (relevant debates available here and here) to ensure that the information commissioner would have the right to carry out assessments of data processing on his own volition. And, on 18th and 25th June respectively, Baroness Noakes (Opposition Treasury spokesman) and Earl Northesk initiated debates (here and here) on a similar provision on the face of the Statistics and Registration Service Bill.

In both cases, the Government rejected the amendments pretty much out-of-hand, although (it being the House of Lords) with some small measure of elegance. No surprise there then! Now, I'm not saying that, had they been accepted, the HMRC fiasco wouldn't have happened - though it might have made it less likely. Rather it is illustrative of the culture of complacency and indifference with which government thinking about and policy development of the needs of data security and protection is infected.

In passing I can't resist a barbed dig at the Lib Dems about this. Rationally this whole issue should be their natural territory but, in parliamentary and legislative terms, they give the impression of being completely unsighted about it. Instead - and happily - the Conservatives are making all the running on it with the 'yellow perils' being merely followers. It does beg the question as to what the Lib Dems are actually for if they can't be bothered to prosecute those matters that should be dearest to their hearts and underlying political philosophy. So, reckoning that the Conservatives in the House of Lords have a bee in their collective bonnets about this, is there a realistic prospect that they might introduce a PMB in the near future?

ID CARDS COSTS

The Government's flagship white elephant that is ID cards is never that far way from the news. So in the past week or so we've had LibDem leadership - more like hand-bags at dawn than a genuine contest albeit there are mild signs that potential tantrums between the two are getting a little bit uglier (see here) - contender, Nick Clegg, attempt to claim some sort of moral high ground over the issue. Despite this inspiring a certain amount of aeration from that stalwart, Guido (see here) (and I do not disagree with the fundamental point he is making about the responsibilities of legislators), Clegg's position is not quite as 'principled' as it may outwardly appear, as John Lettice points out in The Register (see here). It seems the perennial Janus-like habits of the LibDems aren't going to be excised any time soon.

Be that as it may, there is another reason why the whole shebang might resurface again in the dead tree press over the next week or so. You, dear reader, will recall that, in order to get the ermine-clad monkeys to let the Bill through, the Government had to concede to publication of a six-monthly financial health-check of the whole vainglorious scheme as provided for by Section 37 of the Act. The Act received Royal Assent on 30th March, 2006. So, on strict interpretation of the text, the Home Office is required to publish its Cost Report on 30th March and 30th September each year. Well,... 30th Sept has been and gone without a sniff of the relevant Report and so Basher Reid's "not-fit-for-purpose" HO is in breach of its statutory duty.

Of course, dear reader, you will also be aware that this isn't the first time the HO has failed in this particular respect. This year's previous Report (and an exceptionally skimpy, disingenuous piece of work it was too - available here), due as I say on 30th March, wasn't published until 10th May. That failure provoked this somewhat genteel exchange on the red leather benches. I suppose, if a generous frame of mind were applied, the deadline for publication could be stretched to 10th November - previous late publication of 10th May + 6 months - but, in truth, I'm not holding my breath that even this will be complied with. (As an aside one can only speculate what havoc would have been wreaked in the Home Office had The Great Bottler not bottled it and we had been in general election mode over the past month or so!) Whatever, can we expect Baroness Noakes, as the prime mover of the original amendment in the Bill, to be tabling another question in the Lords asking the Government why they seem serially incapable of complying with their own laws?

This, after all, is the real significance of the issue. An administration that expects us as citizens to comply with 1,000s upon 1,000s of new laws, regulations, imposts, edicts, &c that they have imposed upon us since it came to power in 1997 cannot even be bothered to obey this relatively trifling statutory requirement imposed upon itself. And that, my friends, really does beg the question of whether we shouldn't perhaps follow their example and be somewhat more contemptuous of what they legislate into law, supposedly in our names. And ironically, this brings us full circle to Nick Clegg's less-than-principled stand on ID cards. We could perhaps have more faith in his leadership ambitions if he took this concept to heart rather than indulging himself in essentially meaningless gestures in an unedifying attempt to establish his putative libertarian credentials.