The Rt Hon Malcolm Bruce MP

July (2) Column

****************************************************************************************************

Making Afghanistan famous for pomegranates

****************************************************************************************************

The casualty rate in Afghanistan has led to an increasingly intense debate about the UK's role, whether it's a 'winnable war' and whether our forces are well enough equipped.

The brutal truth is that the situation in Afghanistan has dragged on and become more difficult because we became embroiled in an unnecessary and unjustified war in Iraq.

Tony Blair's folly was that he wanted the UK to be America's closest ally and committed us to military engagements over and above our more domestic commitments regardless of whether our troops were sufficiently prepared and supported.

There has long been a call for more helicopters and there is no doubt that helicopters can help get troops and casualties quickly in and out of tight situations.

Helicopters alone would not avoid casualties but it is true that deploying them in a hostile environment means more sophisticated equipment and training is required.

However, if NATO were to pull out now it would leave a vacuum into which nothing positive could move - destabilising a whole region.

We are not at war with the people of Afghanistan - but trying to create security to enable them to rebuild their lives for mutual benefit.

Most of our aid and development budget is being spent to build public services across the whole country not just in Helmand and that has delivered some success especially for educating girls.

Afghanistan is a deeply conservative, tribal society in which women's rights are limited but nevertheless much better than under the Taleban.

It may not be western style democracy but if it can aspire to stable government and improving services then NATO's engagement will have served the alliance strategic interests to the benefit of better living conditions for the region.

Afghanistan is notorious for opium poppies where it was once famous for pomegranates. May the pomegranates flourish again.

****************************************************************************************************

Public interest priority for East Coast mainline

****************************************************************************************************

Yet another debacle with the franchise on the East Coast mainline has left the Government with no option but to take the franchise back into public management.

This is small comfort to passengers to and from the North East who have suffered an increasingly unreliable service in terms of excess charges and uncompetitive fares.

Even if there has been an improvement in journey times without major investment it will never be competitive with the airlines. In any case for passengers booking ahead the fares have more often than not been uncompetitive with air fares.

The North East has a good quality of life and contributes enormously to the national wealth but we are a long way from everywhere else and deserve decent communications with the rest of the UK.

There is, I believe, a good case for keeping the east coast franchise in public ownership and even allowing a publicly owned company to bid for it in due course.

The nonsense of British privatisation has been that no publicly owned company has been allowed to bid but foreign ones have.

Railways do not make money. They require public investment and subsidy. That doesn't mean there is no room for private sector involvement but it is always going to be a tricky balance. The east coat route is testimony to that.

****************************************************************************************************

Kevin Mcleod's positive signal for our hard to heat homes

****************************************************************************************************

I was happy to take part in a photo opportunity with Kevin McLeod promoting new means of insulating hard to heat homes.

Aberdeen and the North East has a disproportionate share of such homes and not enough research has been carried out into how they can be made warmer and more efficient nor is enough done in the way of grants.

In the sixties and seventies a lot of houses were built that do not have cavity walls or fireplaces and which, thermal imaging shows, put more emissions into the neighbourhood than into the house.

The result is high energy bills and cold houses.

It does now appear that new insulation materials offer more viable solution that do not take too much off the internal dimensions of what are often small houses.

The next step is to bring the cost down so that people can afford to install it and gain the benefit as well as reducing the climate change impact.

****************************************************************************************************

How Scottish is Scotch?

****************************************************************************************************

Diageo have clearly raised a storm over their decision to sever its connections with Kilmarnock and invest in Fife instead.

The proud boast of the brand has been 'born 1820 and still going strong' and the connection has continued for nigh on 200 years.

The company may argue that it is simply facing economic fact and is still committed to Scotland, but whisky's cache or unique selling point is its connections to Scottish communities.

As Johnny Walker is a blend there is nothing peculiar to Kilmarnock that characterises the whisky. Nevertheless the associations of a blend can still be a potent part of its appeal and Diageo disregards that at its peril.

Diageo has not covered itself with glory having had to invent the neutral name after the disaster of the Guinness takeover.

Investment and disinvestment of whisky brands and distilleries has been a merry-go-round in recent years.

This may be the moment the industry has to decide just how Scottish is Scotch!

****************************************************************************************************

Chilcott inquiry will put Blair and Brown in the spotlight

****************************************************************************************************

Sir John Chilcott is setting about his enquiry into the Iraq war having to recover from the government's nonsense that it should be conducted in secret - clearly an absurd and untenable position.

Most of the enquiry will now be in public but it will clearly continue beyond the next election.

Gordon Brown and Tony Blair among others may yet have an uncomfortable time being cross-examined on their conduct in the run up to the war.

The enquiry will be the poorer for not being able to call Robin Cook but Clare Short will no doubt make an interesting witness.

What is accepted by almost everyone today is that there was no connection between Iraq and Al Q'aeda and there were no weapons of mass destruction.

The war took massive resources that might have been better deployed elsewhere and radicalised young muslims throughout the world - hardly a great contribution to defeating terrorism.

****************************************************************************************************

PM fails to answer question on Scottish banks' future

****************************************************************************************************

The Prime Minister made his twice yearly appearance before the House of Commons liaison committee last week. He maintained his usual bludgeoning style - avoiding the questions and just presenting what he wants to say.

I would have liked to have pressed him harder on the future of British banks. Having denied he had any such intention before the 1997 election Gordon Brown as Chancellor made the Bank of England independent and set up the Financial Services Authority.

This did not stop the worst banking crisis since the 1930s. The Prime Minister was unable to explain what he has done to stop such a collapse happening again.

On our Scottish Banks he argued that the fact that HBOS would have failed was sufficient justification for setting aside the competition rules and allowing Lloyds/TSB to take it over.

He ignored the fact that HBOS was in such a mess it forced Lloyds into the arms of Government which it might otherwise have avoided.

He also ignored the European Competition Commissioners which warned that HBOS may have to be sold off separately again and that RBS needed to be broken up to fit the European single market.

He didn't even begin to address why the British taxpayer should continue to underwrite the global debts of RBS or how the bank might be restructured to reduce exposure, get some return and offer consumers better choice.

Soon enough Mr Brown will have to answer to the British electorate.

ENDS