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Health
With “Devo-Manc” well underway, health secretary Jeremy Hunt was in the prime location to speak about devolved healthcare at the Conservative conference held in Greater Manchester. In his opening speech, he spoke about the importance of patient safety in the wake of Mid-Staffs, the Government’s spending commitment to the Five Year Forward View, the new wave of vanguard sites and publishing more patient data on the website My NHS.
However, it seemed the issue of junior doctors contracts overshadowed the health secretary’s announcements, with questions as to why junior doctors were choosing to emigrate to Australia rather than remain in the UK, and whether there had been consultations with the British Medical Association (BMA) to achieve a consensus with health professionals.
With Hunt fielding questions on the seven day NHS, he told the conference: “We are not asking junior doctors to work longer hours - that wouldn't be safe. Nor is it our intention to cut doctors’ pay - and it is utterly irresponsible to try and scare people into believing we are.” Dr Mark Porter, council chair of the BMA, pointed out that the seven day service arrangement hadn’t been costed into the Five Year Forward View spending commitments originally, so there needed to be a honest discussion about how this would be funded in the future.
Meanwhile, at the Labour Party conference, newly appointed shadow health secretary Heidi Alexander was looking to make her mark on the sector, by telling conference she would deliver “straight talking, honest politics” and would fight for the NHS with every bone in her body. In her opening speech, she highlighted the severe delays to cancer treatment, increasing numbers of cancelled operations and A&E admissions. She zeroed in on the junior doctor contracts issue, saying the Government was trying to make life even harder for NHS staff, and worse for patients.
Shadow mental health minister Luciana Berger indicated the Labour Party was putting mental health at centre stage, with the first shadow ministerial position dedicated solely to the policy issue. For the Liberal Democrats, health spokesperson Norman Lamb called for a “new Beveridge Report for the 21st Century” and said he would lobby for a non-partisan commission to decide on a new settlement for health and social care. He agreed the NHS should focus on prevention and the management of existing conditions, as well as utilise new technology to co-ordinate health and social care services.
Local government and housing
Labour’s new shadow Communities and Local Government team took the opportunity to lay the foundation under a Jeremy Corbyn administration with shadow cabinet member for housing and planning John Healey unveiling an independent review into home ownership led by chief executive of Taylor Wimpey, Peter Redfern. New shadow communities secretary Jon Trickett spoke of his twinned role as shadow minister of constitutional convention to set the scene for the constitutional arrangement to be “a major plank of our activity in the coming years”, just in time for the second reading of the Cities Bill in the Commons.
The Conservative’s managed to secure an agreed devolution deal with the Labour led Sheffield City Region ahead of their conference, with George Osborne using his speech to announce a further addition to the “devolution revolution”. The announcement abolished the uniform business rate, giving local authorities the power to retain business rate income—whilst the power to raise business rates is also set to be devolved to some local authorities. Meanwhile, Cameron used his tenth conference speech as leader of the Conservatives to boost ‘Generation Buy’ by announcing plans to make planning rules more flexible to allow Starter Homes to be classed as affordable housing in order to meet the demands for low cost local housing.
Tim Farron used his first conference as leader of the Liberal Democrats to argue against the Government’s proposed Right to Buy extension, whilst threatening to use his army of Peers to hinder any progress of the policy.
Education and skills
The big announcement for Conservatives was left to Prime Minister David Cameron, who promised “500 new free schools, every school an academy and local authorities running schools a thing of the past”. Education secretary Nicky Morgan announced parents would soon have the right to request a full day of childcare from schools during the holidays. Morgan later admitted to “losing her temper” in a fringe event that discussed teacher workload with several union groups.
Newly appointed shadow education secretary, Lucy Powell, pledged to shift the debate towards standards and the attainment gap, rather than focus on the structures that delivered education. Powell said she would focus her work on the growing teacher recruitment crisis, the inadequate level of funding for post-16 education and the attainment gap between disadvantaged children and their peers. She did announce Labour would end the free schools programme and instead focus on more traditional state funded schools and institutions.
The Liberal Democrats discussed the need to make education institutions more accountable at their conference, during which academies and the lack of accountability was consistently attacked. Introducing quality careers advice would be a focus for the Liberal Democrats in opposition, their education spokespeople explained to delegates.
Other key themes that emerged during the conference season were the importance of the forthcoming Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF) and how it will be implemented, the importance of character education, soft skills in the face of changing technology, ensuring a consistently high standard of apprenticeships, closing the chasm between businesses and schools and, ever present at conference over the last few years, how to ensure more women take up STEM subjects.
Business, financial services and retail
Business rates was a key announcements from the Conservatives with the Chancellor announcing dramatic plans to give local councils power over £26bn worth of business rates. The plans include the power to cut and raise taxes, though the latter can only be done with agreement of the Local Enterprise Partnership and by elected city mayors.
Business Secretary Sajid Javid had no similar rabbits to pull out the bag but focused his speech on being pro-business and the renegotiations in Europe whilst Environment Secretary Liz Truss stated her “ambition is for food and farming to be a top destination for high-flying graduates, as prestigious as medicine and as cutting-edge as Tech City.” To some controversy, Home Secretary Theresa May used her conference speech to suggest mass migration made it “impossible” to build a cohesive society whilst Conservative MP Maggie Throup announced in a fringe event that she will be chairing an APPG on Obesity.
All eyes were on Brighton to see how the election of new leader Jeremy Corbyn would shift the focus of debate. He used his speech to suggested that self-employed workers should have statutory maternity and paternity pay. However, much reporting focused on policy differences between the leader and his MPs particularly in relation to defence policy. Labour's new environment spokeswoman Kerry McCarthy said she wholeheartedly backed British farmers, acknowledging that some people were "worried" about her appointment because she was a vegan whilst Andrew Gwynne MP, the new shadow public health minister used a fringe event to suggest that devolving of public health to local councils presented an opportunity but councils needed to embed this into everything they did. He also felt self-regulation by the food industry did not work.
On the fringe, there was a lot of time devoted to business in the UK and the growth of the economy, touching on the role of banks in supporting growth. That it was potentially the last opportunity to debate EU membership amongst party members was also reflected in fringe schedules. One event on the Capital Markets Union saw panel members including Kay Swinburne MEP, discuss the merits of EU membership—they were keen to stress that the benefits outweighed the negatives for the financial services sector, an opposite stance to some audience members.
The Financial Conduct Authority fringes were packed with interested audience members who heard the regulator and others speak about the future of regulation, the changes within financial services and the protection of the consumer. In Manchester the event covered a broad range of subject matter including financial advice, pension reforms and consumer credit.
You can read the full overviews on the above as well as reports covering transport, environment, energy, home affairs, culture and media, education, foreign affairs and welfare
here
.