John Hemming's Web Log

Click here to try the beta test call entre phoning service "John Hemming, who has created an internet Startup called Cirrostratus since he ceased being an MP, is launching a free online service to make life easier for people phoning call centres.   The service is provided by Cirrostratus, but the SIP backbone is provided by the multi-award winning business VoIP solution, Soho66." John said, "Many people find phoning call centres a real pain.  Our service is aiming to make things a lot easier.   One click on alink or the bookmarks list and our server will phone up the call centre and get through all the menus.  This is a lot faster than when people have to phone up and is less irritating." "Additionally the system uses WebRtc and the internet to make the call. This means that people don't find their normal phone system being blocked whilst they hang on the line waiting to speak to a human being." Marketing Manager from Soho66, David McManus, said:...

It was recently reported that the police were not investigating the allegations of Perverting the Course of Justice that I had made. This came as a surprise to me as I had been told for some time that my allegations were to be considered once the VRR had been rejected. I have now had a very constructive meeting with Staffordshire police on Friday 29th June 2018 and the misunderstandings have been resolved. At that meeting the evidence relating to the perversion of the course of justice and the harassment campaign against my family were discussed. The police have decided to investigate both the perversion of the course of justice and also the harassment campaign. I would like to thank them for changing their decision and I accept their apology for the way in which they did that. I am also in possession of written confirmation a police force would be investigating allegations that a vulnerable witness has been harassed for trying to expose the campaign against me. I hope that the auth...

I have now reviewed the case paperwork for the above case where I have been asked for further and better particulars of the situation with the final hearing and had a meeting with the grandparents. There is no judgment for the case. I have read the transcript of the hearing. This confirms that the hearing lasted of the order of 10 minutes as what was treated as a consent hearing. The grandmother was in the court building, but not in the hearing. The grandfather was in part of the court hearing, but because of hearing difficulties could not really hear what was going on. The judge was told that the grandparents consented both to a care order and to the threshold documents. The grandparents are both adamant that they did not consent to the care order or that the facts of the the threshold warranted removing their grandchild. The nub of the case was the agreed fact that the grandfather in order to keep their granddaughter safe and stop her getting up to cook during the night, loc...

Statement by John Hemming I am pleased that the Police have now made it clear that there has been a concerted effort to promote false criminal allegations against me and that the allegations had no substance whatsoever. I would like to thank Emily Cox, my children, Ayaz Iqbal (my Solicitor), my local lib dem team and many others who supported me through this dreadful experience. There are many worse things that happen to people, but this was a really bad experience. It is bad enough to have false allegations made about yourself to the police, but to have a concerted campaign involving your political opponents and many others in public creates an environment in which it is reasonable to be concerned about ill founded vigilante attacks on your family and yourself. Luckily there was a more substantial lobby to the contrary as well, which included many people who were themselves real survivors of abuse, which has helped. I am normally someone who helps other people figh...

I have always wanted to put together some figures to see what has been happening to total government expenditure. It was clear at the start of the coalition government that what started as a government which was really quite tight as to finance developed into a government with some financial flexibility. At the time I knew that was because the interest rates on government debt were coming down which freed up money to be spent. I have spent a little time getting at the statistics from the ONS to try to see what actually has happened actually since 1998. In the chart below I have taken the ONS figures for spending in the calendar year. That is because the inflation figures (RPI/CPI) are also calendar year figures. In the end a similar pattern would arise with financial year figures. What I have taken is the current spending excluding banks and calculated that in 1987 Equivalent Pounds sterling. When copying the image from my source data I have left the source figures both for cu...

Original Date 26th May 2017 One thing I used to do when I was the Member of Parliament for Yardley was to call together meetings of all of the religious organisations in Yardley as a Yardley multi-faith group.  In many ways it is the creation of informal links between people that makes communication easier even if there is no formal decision making power. Obviously this is something I would intend to do again if the people of Yardley ask me to take on the responsibility of representing them in parliament. It highlights the sort of thing that politicians can do which arises from a leadership role within communities rather than any constitutional position. I have already written in an earlier blog post about the principles of resolving conflict.  It can be summarised as "murdering innocents is wrong". A number of local mosques have issued statements following the atrocity in Manchester and I think it is worth quoting from parts of them. One said that the mosque ...

Candidates in elections tend to find themselves very busy with lots of things to do.  It is, therefore, necessary to prioritise things to ensure that the important things are dealt with. To me the issue of homelessness and rough sleeping is an important issue.  Therefore, when Birmingham's Faith Leaders group contacted me to ask me what I would propose and whether I would work with them to make things better I was pleased to respond with my views and indicate that I would work with them after the election. The Faith Leaders Group (Bishops and other religious leaders in Birmingham) have now sent out their report. Sadly, according to their report,  I was the only candidate for Yardley to respond.  The group in their report said: "Particularly disappointing was the lack of response from some of those candidates seeking re-election as MP for their respective constituencies." It is worth looking at the priorities of my opponent. Interestingly today she has dec...

Plans by Theresa May to axe free school lunches would waste the £2,267,245 invested in Birmingham to upgrade school kitchens, according to the Liberal Democrats. It comes after figures revealed 31,895 children in Birmingham are set to lose out under the Conservative proposals. When in government, the Liberal Democrats invested £160m upgrading school kitchen facilities to enable them to prepare hot lunches, including £2,267,245 in Birmingham. John Hemming, the Liberal Democrat candidate for Yardley commented: “The Liberal Democrats in government invested £160m to give schools the kitchens they needed to ensure that no infant would go hungry, including over £2,000,000 in Birmingham. "This policy was extremely successful and guaranteed that local children received at least two of their five a day in their school lunch. “But now Theresa May is threatening to throw that money down the drain. "A Conservative measure designed to save money will waste m...

Conservative manifesto plans will mean the average household in Birmingham could be forced to pay 39.5% of the value of their homes for social care after they die, it has been revealed. The manifesto plans, which would mean that people would be forced to hand over assets worth over £100,000 to pay for social care at home, would have a particularly damaging impact on sufferers of dementia, who have complicated long-term health needs. The Liberal Democrats have hit out at the plans and are calling for a cap of £72,000 to protect people from crippling care costs. John Hemming, Liberal Democrat candidate for Yardley said: “Many elderly people currently face the cruel situation of having to sell their home when they die to fund residential care home costs.  Now the frail and elderly receiving care in their own home will face a ‘Personal Death Tax’ charged against their home. And the more help you need, the more the Conservatives will take when you die. “The Liberal Democrats ...

The Liberal Democrats have slammed the Conservative proposed "dementia tax," as official figures have revealed the number of people diagnosed with dementia reached a record high of over 442,000 last month. NHS digital statistics show that in April 2017, the number of patients recorded by GPs as having dementia was 442,000, more than double the 220,000 cases recorded 10 years ago. Older people with dementia often need care in their own homes for many years, meaning they would be hit with crippling costs to pay for their own care under Conservative proposals. Over 134,000 patients with dementia were below the age of 79, while 307,000 were 80 or older. Liberal Democrat Shadow Health Secretary Norman Lamb commented: "These figures reveal the impact the Conservative dementia tax will have on thousands of vulnerable people across the country. "Frail and elderly people receiving care in their own home will now face a ‘Personal Death Tax’ charged against...

The Labour Candidate has recently claimed that John Hemming was campaigning for unilateral nuclear disarmament at the 2015 General Election. This has been done on twitter and this is what she has said: She also seems to be confused between multilateral disarmament and unilateral disarmament. The Lib Dem position in 2015 and now was one of keeping nuclear weapons, but having fewer of them. In a world with rogue nations such as North Korea we cannot throw away the nukes as Jeremy Corbyn would do. It was recently confirmed that even though many Labour MPs wish to keep the nuclear weapons, Jeremy Corbyn might still scrap them as PM. John Hemming's view has been one wishing to see multilateral nuclear disarmament (where everyone in the world gives up having nuclear weapons), but of course with North Korea doing what they are doing this is not possible now and is unlikely to be possible for many years. He has not supported unilateral nuclear disarmament (where the UK throws aw...

This is a link to a debate in 2007. At that debate I asked a question of the minister: John Hemming (Birmingham, Yardley) (LD):  As an ex-cub scout, venture scout and assistant scout leader, I welcome the recognition of the importance of scouting in its centenary year and hope that funding follows. The Minister will be aware that I am concerned that children are inappropriately put into care and that research demonstrates that 70 per cent. of children return to their parents when they escape from the control of the state at the age of 16. I am particularly concerned about deaths of children in care, particularly one that occurred in the Trafford local authority area earlier this year. We must ask why arbitrary bureaucratic rules prevent children in care from making toast for each other but do not allow people to prevent them from acting as youth prostitutes. Will she look into the treatment of children in care, including the activities they are allowed to be involved in? B...

BMA GP committee warns general practice is on the "brink of collapse"  John Hemming says: “Instead of £350m a week for the NHS, under the Conservatives we’ve seen the health service being gradually run into the ground. “Patients across the country are struggling to get appointments with their GP. “The NHS cannot take five years of a Conservative landslide that would give Theresa May free rein to cut services further at your local hospital. “The Liberal Democrats offer a brighter future with a penny on income tax to rescue the NHS and care.”

One thing about online systems is that it is possible to find out what articles are read by more people and which ones appear unimportant. My campaign is mainly positive, but I am also highlighting issues where I believe it demonstrates that my opponent was not doing her job properly as an MP. I have sorted the articles on this blog by the number of people who are interested in them. Here is the top ten list Millionaires and Politics Gender Issues Comparison of Candidates The Courts - particularly family courts Housing Benefit for 18-21 year olds Extra money for the NHS Why Marxism is Wrong The running of the parliamentary office The Labour Candidates Book Promotion tour and why it matters Labour Leaflet Analysis Bus Regulation and Bus Wars What this demonstrates is that people are generally more interested when one candidate is raising issues in respect of another candidate than purely positive articles. Housing Benefit comes interestingly high in the top ten list....

Labour supporters have asked for some of the evidence of the various comments by Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell.   Hence this page has been written to give details: Speech in which John McDonnell says he is a Marxist: This is an article about Jeremy Corbyn's views on Nato If there are any other items that people would wish to have justified from the leaflets please indicate as such in the comments.

7,181 3-4 year-olds in Birmingham would benefit from Liberal Democrat plans to triple funding for the early years pupil premium, with gives extra cash to nurseries, preschools and school receptions when they take on children from disadvantaged backgrounds. The cash would triple the funding to £1,000 per pupil per year - up from £302 in 2015-16. This will increase the allocation for Birmingham from around £2,068,440 to £6,205,320, and will pay for every disadvantaged child who benefits to receive 570 hours of state-funded early education. It forms part of a series of policies the Liberal Democrats are announcing ahead of launching their manifesto, with a focus on giving children and young people a brighter future. These include: Helping people buy their first home for the same cost as renting, with a new model of ‘Rent to Own’ homes Restoring housing benefit for young people Creating a discounted bus pass for 16-21 year olds, giving a 66% discount ...

Liberal Democrats have announced they would boost investment in police forces by £300m a year. This is in stark contrast to the Conservatives who have overseen devastating cuts to community policing. Theresa May as Home Secretary and now Prime Minister has cut policing budgets by over £2bn, eroding the very fabric of community policing. Under the Liberal Democrats the West Midlands would see a fund ing increase of £16,220,000 a year. This could be used to restore a visible policing presence in the community and ensure the police have the training and tools to deal with the changing nature of crime. Liberal Democrat John Hemming commented: “This investment in our police is absolutely vital. Under Theresa May – first as Home Secretary and now as Prime Minister, our police have had to deal with severe cuts. These are now cutting into the bone. “Our police work tirelessly to keep us safe and this Government has completely betrayed them. “Only the Liberal Democrats have a cre...

Liberal Democrats have announced they would end years of pay restraint for nurses, teachers and police by lifting the 1% cap on public sector pay and up-rating wages in line with inflation. The plans would lead to an estimated pay rise of £780 for the average public sector worker by 2021. In contrast, the Conservative's public sector pay cap combined with rising inflation since the Brexit vote will mean that by 2021 a new nurse will be £530 a year worse off, a primary school teacher £550 and an army sergeant £830. Liberal Democrat Shadow Chancellor Vince Cable commented: “Public sector workers are facing a double blow at the hands of this Conservative government, with years of pitiful increases to pay combined with a Brexit squeeze caused by soaring inflation. “Our NHS and schools are already struggling to recruit the staff they need. "Living standards are falling, prices are risin...

Speaking at the Royal College of Nursing Congress, the Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Tim Farron, has confirmed that the Party would reinstate student bursaries, which benefit nursing, midwifery and allied health students, with immediate effect. In 2015, the Conservative Government announced they would be scrapping bursaries for nursing students from August 2017. UCAS figures show that the number of applications for nursing courses due to start this year were approximately 10,000 lower – down by nearly a quarter – compared to the same point last year. The Liberal Democrats argue that this short-sighted cut will compound the existing shortage of nurses in the NHS, threatening the quality of patient care. Liberal Democrat Leader Tim Farron said: “The Government’s decision to abandon bursaries for nursing students was clearly wrong. "The evidence has shown a drastic fall in the number of people app...

The Liberal Democrats would give a “start-up allowance’ to help budding entrepreneurs with living costs in the first six months of setting up their business. The party is making a bold pitch to be the party of business with Tim Farron the only major party leader committed to Britain’s membership of the single market. Tim will launch the party’s business policy at the Liberal Democrat Entrepreneurs Network event on Tuesday night. Susan Kramer, Liberal Democrat Business spokesperson, said: “Entrepreneurs are the lifeblood of a thriving economy but I know from my own time in business, the early months can be really tough. This will really help get small businesses off the ground and let the economy grow. It takes courage to set up a business, and we are on the side of entrepreneurs." Tim Farron said: “While the Conservatives focus on giving tax cuts to giant corporations, our focus is on small bu...