There is a story in the FT today, which unfortunately I can’t link to as the FT requires payment for viewing its stories once you reach a certain number of views. It was however taken up in the Telegraph and details what the government think a future of reduced government waste looks like in a yet-to-be-published review.

 There is clear blue water between the parties on this, even if Labour are trying to steal our ideas, U-turning on what they previously parroted about Tory cuts. Compare this with the pamphlet put forward by John Redwood and Woking’s very own Carl Thomson and you very soon begin to understand how we are serious about cutting government waste; and Labour is a serious waste about to be cut out of government.

Carl Thomson, co-author of the Bow Group pamphlet

There is a very good pamphlet that has just been published by the Bow Group on cutting government spending without impacting on public service delivery. The author is John Redwood, MP for Wokingham who spoke at the Conservative Annual Dinner the other evening along similar lines to some of the themes in the pamphlet. Carl Thomson, our candidate in Mount Hermon East in the Woking Borough Council elections next year (Twitter @carlthomson), has co-authored the report with John Redwood and his clarity of thought is evident in there too.

Mr Redwood has written an article on ConservativeHome about his work and it is definitely worth a read – it is comfortably digested in 20 minutes. The two authors go through each government department and suggest areas where savings could be made. Some of them are themes we are already familiar with such as quangos and staffing and there are one of two others thrown in that you may not have considered.

Particularly interesting are the comments of the introducion and conclusion, which talk about the politics of cutting expenditure, how Labour has tried first to say that all spending is untouchable and automatically equates to sacking doctors and nurses and then changed its mind. Spending cuts are not about cutting services, the pamphlet says, that is a very public sector way of looking at things. They are about delivering everything that you want to deliver – which might be everything you deliver now, or even more – more efficiently, with less waste and providing the taxpayer with better value.

A lot of ConservativeHomers are calling for John Redwood to be installed as Shadow Chancellor on the back of this but personally I think they are living in a dreamworld. Mr Redwood’s problem is not ability – he is among the most able of all MPs – it’s his public image, associated as he is with the cost-cutting, economy-is-everything right wing of the party. This pamphlet has shown another side to him – that he a considerate MP looking to create a better, more financially sustainable future but I had to laugh in the conclusion when he suggested that PR, spin and marketing costs should be cut.

Apart from the fact that everyone says that in opposition but seem to be much keener on PR when it comes to telling the world what they’ve achieved, perhaps if John Redwood had had the benefit of some proper PR and marketing to the general public during the first 10 years of his political career, there’s a chance he might be Shadow Chancellor by now!

Anyway, being Shadow Chancellor is no good if you can’t contribute anything useful and this is a superb contribution to the debate. Particularly congratulations to Carl, whose first pamphlet for the Bow Group this is – it’s a very careful and measured look at an emotive subject and will I’m sure find its way to the Shadow Chancellor before long.

John Redwood addresses the Woking Conservative dinner

I have just got back from a superb Annual Grand Dinner for Woking Conservatives that was not only fantastically well-attended by councillors and party members alike but where there were some star turns too. Obviously none of them were on the record so it would be most remiss of me to report their words on here but it wouldn’t be much of post to talk about nothing so I’ll make some observations to which I’m sure none would object.

I’ll be honest, John Redwood (now added to blogroll) is a very able man but quite a bit to the right of me generally. His views on Europe are very well-documented and it’s no surprise that he kicked off his remarks on this subject. What I was pleasantly surprised at though was the time he took to speak about social issues; perhaps not something he is generally noted for. He spoke about the work Iain Duncan Smith (who spent this evening addressing Harlow Conservatives according to @halfon4harlow) has done and I think has a genuine committment towards opportunity and advancement for people. He’s not quite ready to join the Tory Reform Group yet, but I’ve seen another dimension to his hard-nosed image.

I sat on a table with Nirj Deva MEP and spoke to him and his political assistant at some length about Europe and European issues. I was pleased to discover that he is a big fan of Woking but also to understand a little more about the Conservative stance on the EU within the European group, which often gets overshadowed by Westminster debate. It would be unfair of me to recall the conversation in detail but needless to say the question of committing ourselves to a given position within or outside the current European “bloc” is a good deal more nuanced and sophisticated than perhaps I imagined.

And last of all, there was a very confident and concise speech from Jonathan Lord, who I saw address a large group for the first time since his selection. A few months ago, I said I would never work for a parliamentary candidate who was not local because I couldn’t see how they would know the area well enough to know its people. Apart from the fact that Jonathan is hardly an outsider anyway coming from Guildford, he has totally convinced me that not only is he working hard but enjoying it.

Apart from an engagement last night at Winston Churchill School, the Conservative Dinner tonight, he is at the Horsell and Woodham Branch coffee morning tomorrow morning followed by campaigning in the afternoon. He is getting every bit as stuck in as I hoped our candidate would – and I had pretty high expectations. Keep going Jonathan, you have really spurred on our enthusiasm with your infectious commitment, diligence and clear enjoyment of getting to know Woking and its people. As someone who went through that process myself abeit in a difference capacity seven years ago, I promise that both repay such an approach with interest.