Climate strange

Hilary Benn outlined climate change projections in Parliament today. The question remains why he made the announcement at all.

In October 2008, Gordon Brown announced the creation of a new department to tackle the issue of climate change - the aptly titles Department for Energy and Climate Change (DECC). Ed Miliband was installed as its first Secretary of State.

The department took some responsibility from BERR (mainly energy issues) and others from DEFRA (climate change).

So you would have thought that DECC would be responsible for things such as reports on the impact of climate change.

If you are on the DECC website, it appears they are. Not so say the DEFRA website: they are. (There is even a his and his video introduction from Ed Miliband and Hilary Benn, on their respective websites).

A charitable explanation might be that DECC look at climate change, whereas DEFRA manage its effects.

Even if that were true, it invites the question as to why the two departments are not even more closely integrated? For instance, their functions being part of the same department?

The UK government has been relatively more pro-active about environmental issues than most countries. But there is no reason why a separate department is required for climate change - particularly if the environment department works on the same issues.

The DECC/DEFRA split looks, in hindsight, like wasteful and inefficient duplication.

To say nothing about the abilities of the incumbent Secretaries of States, DECC and DEFRA should be merged.

Labour pains

The UK labour market has shown surprising flexibility, which should help during a recovery.

Today British Airways announced that it was asking workers to work for free, or take unpaid leave, in a bid to cut costs. Other companies are doing the same: for example, business services firm KPMG recently asked staff to consider unpaid leave and Honda shut down factories for months.

This helps businesses retain skilled employees during the downturn, but simultaneously reduces their wage bills. Not all businesses have had that luxury - many have made staff redundant, or closed completely.

The appetite amongst workers for such schemes underlines the flexibility within the UK labour market, in contrast to previous recessions and more rigid labour markets elsewhere. And retaining skilled workers mean gearing up for a recovery should be easier, quicker and less costly for business than letting staff go.

New unemployment figures are out tomorrow. They are likely to show another jump in the number of people looking for work. It'll be scant consolation for the newly unemployed that the situation could be much worse.

State of the Union

The people behind 18 Doughty Street and ConservativeHome have set up a union. No, really.

An email dropped into my inbox the other day - it had obviously been mail-merged as they had spelt the site name incorrectly - with information about a new union: a union of Voters.

The "union" has four manifesto commitments:

1. There should be no such thing as a 'safe seat for life' - voters should be able oust any MP in whom they have lost trust.
   
2. There should be referenda when all the establishment politicians agree but the people don't.
   
3. Political parties should look to voters for their funding, not big business, big unions or big government.
   
4. Politicians should not be able to hide their expenses, income and connections from voters.
   

Some of these points are difficult to argue against, and are perhaps trivial as a result. The one on funding might disadvantage Labour compared to the Conservatives given the spending power of their respective traditional constituencies.

What is really interesting is that its founders - of the right and centre-right - have appropriated the language of the left in order to establish a (rather modish) movement against the political class. A tacit admission of the value of unions?

The site aims to be like the MoveOn movement in the states, but in typically British fashion looks a little staid from the off. It'll be interesting to see if this union becomes a tour de force in British politics...