CPS Headlines
CPS leads Conservative Party Public Services policy development
Double up on Heathrow from Jock Lowe and Mark Bostock
UK should follow Australia's lead and scrap Carbon Price Floor - Tony Lodge
CPS leads Conservative Party Public Services policy development
The Centre for Policy Studies is working with the Conservative Party's 1922 Committee to
bring the best think-tank ideas to the heart of government. The CPS is acting as the secretariat alongside
Steve Baker MP – the Conservative member responsible for health, education and transport policy on the backbench committee - in bringing forward innovative new ideas to be pitched to both backbench Tories and members of the Number 10 Policy Board, headed by
Jo Johnson MP. The aim is to feed through new ideas for both immediate implementation and the next Conservative manifesto in 2015.
The first meeting took place on Tuesday 9 July on the subject of rail competition, with further meetings this week on improving NHS productivity and enabling free schools to expand rapidly.
Double up on Heathrow
Jock Lowe, Concorde’s longest serving pilot, and
Mark Bostock, the promoter of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link alignment (delivered on time and on budget, now HS1), put forward a brilliantly simple solution to the problem of capacity and congestion at Heathrow Airport in
Double up on Heathrow: a simple, privately funded, affordable and achievable solution, published on Monday 8 July by the Centre for Policy Studies.
They calculate that, under their scheme, the average airport user charge would be only £24 per passenger (compared to Heathrow's current £18), whilst Lord Foster’s Thames Hub proposal would require a charge of at least £62 (a figure which would be even higher for Boris Island).
This proposal is being submitted to the independent Airports Commission (the Davies Review) which is scheduled to make an interim report by the end of this year.
Last week’s
Growth Bulletin from Ryan Bourne and Tim Knox set out the argument for the plan.
Media Impact:
‘Our proposals could give London the airport capacity it needs at a reasonable cost. Heathrow is arguably as important to UK economic competitiveness as the English language, our timezone and our legal system – why would we even consider dispensing with such an asset?’
‘‘The ‘quick, quiet and cost-effective’ solution – including the creation of a sixth terminal called ‘T6’ – would retain the West London airport’s status as the UK’s major air hub while reducing noise and sidestepping opposition to a new third runway.’
Liam Fox on immigration: An open-and-shut case
The Centre for Policy Studies hosted Dr. Liam Fox MP on Monday 8 July for a key speech on immigration.
Dr. Fox set out his vision for an “Open-and-Shut” case for immigration – rather than concentrating on numbers coming in, being more intelligent about who is let in.
Pointing to the immigration systems of Australia, Canada and the United States as examples, he outlined why the UK needs to make it easier for immigrants in vital sectors to come to these shores while cutting down the number who, for whatever reason, would end up placing a burden on our welfare system and national infrastructure.
You can watch the full video of Dr. Fox’s
speech here.
Media Impact:
UK should follow Australia's lead and scrap Carbon Price Floor - Tony Lodge
Writing for
Conservative Home, Tony Lodge has highlighted how once-again Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has moved to scrap the unpopular Carbon Tax that Prime Minister Julia Gillard implemented having assured the electorate she would not.
In light of this, Lodge considers whether the UK may now follow suit and ditch the Carbon Price Floor – the tax on fossil fuels used in the generation of electricity.
Lodge writes: “
the UK is about to significantly further increase the minimum floor its electricity generators pay for carbon emissions. Having started in April at £16/tonne, this price will then rise to £30/tonne in 2020 and £70/tonne in 2030. The money raised will go the Exchequer, which expects revenues to increase from £740 million in 2013/14 to £1.4 billion in 2015/16.
Many observers had previously believed that the EU ETS price would start to increase as the Eurozone emerged from recession, but the reality is the reverse. In recent weeks the EU ETS prices has weakened further as Europe remains mired in recession; consequently the disparity between EU and UK carbon prices has widened even further.”
Read more on the
Centre for Policy Studies website, and read Tony Lodge’s CPS pamphlet “
The Atomic Clock”.
