Free school meals

[Antlion]

Okay a few points:

Federalism is an aspiration and a process that the Liberal Democrats have always envisaged would be gradually arrived at, possibly over the course of decades, by a systematic reform of both sub-national governance and Westminster institutions like the House of Lords.

Full Fiscal Autonomy is a policy of transferring mostly fiscal powers away from the Treasury over a matter of 4-5 years max. It does not envisage, require or predicate itself upon mitigatory systemic changes to ensure stability either politically or economically.

I think it was an error on the part of the Lib Dems to pledge to retain the Barnett formula, though it is not itself incompatible with federalism. It is merely one mechanism by which fiscal transfers could be achieved. If you look at the Campbell report into devolution, he actually argued for a new formula that introduced means-tested fiscal transfers, which would be more consistent with moving towards a federalised approach and would mitigate against fiscal instability.

The party has put forward a number of policies for federalism, or concrete steps that would make it possible to move towards it, though it has been piecemeal. The most concrete recent example was the Campbell commission which proposed a new Act of Federal Union to replace the existing British constitution, which would redefine the relationship between the nations and give them the flexibility to move towards a structurally federal settlement at different speeds, drawing from the Spanish experience.

It is perfectly legitimate for Liberal Democrats to say that Full Fiscal Autonomy is a bad idea while also advocating federalism for the simple reason that they are not advocating that something be introduced quickly, comprehensively and without significant additional cross party and institutional discussion and negotiation. The SNP were demanding that FFA be put in the Scotland Bill. That's completely different from a general commitment to move the British state, very slowly but carefully, towards a federal structure.

Cheers; I had not heard of this Commission, but have looked it up and the first thing that leapt out at me was:

"The Commission has set out a route map for home rule. Its aim is to build a consensus which can be endorsed at the 2015 general election. That plan mirrors the efforts we have made, with others, to enact the great reforms of the Scotland Acts of 1998 and 2012."

The terms "home rule" and "federalism" seem to be used a great deal, with a claim that:

"Scotland will thrive with the fiscal responsibility and authority that comes with home rule, but that home rule settlement can only be stable if it forms part of the move to a truly federal United Kingdom"

I admit I haven't read the Liberal Democrat 2015 manifesto; did it propose a "route map for home rule" beyond the proposal of the Smith Commission?

I know this is all largely a moot point given the wipeout of the Liberal Democrats in the General Election, but if the party wishes to be seriously seen as proposing something approaching a fully federalised UK, I submit that they need to ease up on the criticism of parties like the SNP which endorse more than they do in terms of the "home rule" they claim to champion.

[Ad Lib]

Cheers; I had not heard of this Commission, but have looked it up and the first thing that leapt out at me was:

"The Commission has set out a route map for home rule. Its aim is to build a consensus which can be endorsed at the 2015 general election. That plan mirrors the efforts we have made, with others, to enact the great reforms of the Scotland Acts of 1998 and 2012."

The terms "home rule" and "federalism" seem to be used a great deal, with a claim that:

"Scotland will thrive with the fiscal responsibility and authority that comes with home rule, but that home rule settlement can only be stable if it forms part of the move to a truly federal United Kingdom"

I admit I haven't read the Liberal Democrat 2015 manifesto; did it propose a "route map for home rule" beyond the proposal of the Smith Commission?

I know this is all largely a moot point given the wipeout of the Liberal Democrats in the General Election, but if the party wishes to be seriously seen as proposing something approaching a fully federalised UK, I submit that they need to ease up on the criticism of parties like the SNP which endorse more than they do in terms of the "home rule" they claim to champion.

The aim was "to build a consensus which can be endorsed at the 2015 general election". Unfortunately for us, there was no consensus or willing discussion to be had on the part of the other parties, including the SNP, to look at the holding of a UK-wide constitutional convention to explore moves towards a federal settlement. The recommendations of the Campbell Commission were adopted in full by both the Scottish and UK Parties, but no further progress has been made in securing the support or further discussion by other parties which is necessary to take the idea any further forward. Jeremy Purvis had been pushing for the UK government to initiate a proper constitutional convention but his efforts have been fruitless.

The Campbell Commission itself has already sketched out the preliminary stages of a route towards home rule within a federal settlement. Without consensus beyond the Liberal Democrats' internal party democracy, however, we cannot take that idea any further than we already have.

I don't think there is any reasons to ease-up on pointing out the egregious flaws of the SNP's proposals for rushing a constitutional settlement and very deliberately not attempting to reach any sort of consensus on the necessary safeguards to make something akin to home rule work properly and sustainably. The reason the Lib Dem vision is incomplete and aspirational is because we know that the others will not yet commit to that combination of powers and safeguards. A vote for the Lib Dems is one to force the others to be more open to making concessions on those fronts.

The SNP aren't interested in a sustainable home-rule settlement. They want independence. They want a home-rule settlement that creates a level of instability that has the potential to maximise the political support for Scottish independence. That's a perfectly reasonable position to adopt and one they're completely entitled to adopt. They shouldn't pretend at the same time to be the party of home rule, though, because they're not. Their prospectus for home rule is unsustainable and a trojan horse for something else. That doesn't mean they don't have a point about certain taxes and that their criticisms of the British state aren't sometimes legitimate. But it doesn't mean accepting them as some sort of benign force either.

[Swampy]

Still traveling so I don't want to write a long post without checking my sources but my suspicions is if you offered the SNP home rule tomorrow they'd bite your hand off.

[Swampy]

Also I can kinda understand why cost per student is higher in London, because teachers have higher cost of living and there are plenty of students who need remedial help with English (through no fault of their own.)

[Ad Lib]

Still traveling so I don't want to write a long post without checking my sources but my suspicions is if you offered the SNP home rule tomorrow they'd bite your hand off.

I suspect they'd be extremely conflicted. On the one hand, they would be keen for it because it would break-up a lot of the institutional glue that the Unionists can fall back-on like a common welfare safety net, but on the other hand they would be fucking terrified at the prospect of having to find £800 of extra revenue per head just to operate at a deficit as a % of GDP level equivalent to the rest of the UK.

In the short-term, FFA is a disastrous policy for a party that maintains austerity is not necessary. They won't have even the flexibility Corbyn would with people's QE as they'd have no control over monetary policy to shield Scotland while the oil price is low. The IFS looked at this before the election. They didn't just say that Scotland had a higher deficit than the UK as a whole. They said it was forecast to grow over the next 5 years while the UK's as a whole modestly shrank. The prospect of trying efficiently to separate out the welfare and pensions systems while maintaining any pretence of keeping departmental spending levels the same as they are now isn't one I'd envy for anyone.

Just to stand still we are talking rises in all bands of income tax and a really tough debate about whether to undercut or overcut the rUK corporation tax rate. FFA doesn't even give the SNP the low-hanging fruit cuts of things like Trident.

As a serious policy for the Scottish Parliament to be in control of all its revenue-raising rather than as a trojan horse for another referendum within 5-10 yeas, I think the private view at Bute House is that FFA would be a short-term disaster for Scotland and for the SNP. The only thing I'm surprised about is that Cameron and Osborne resisted the temptation to say "f**k it" and to offer the SNP the rope with which to hang themselves.

Also I can kinda understand why cost per student is higher in London, because teachers have higher cost of living and there are plenty of students who need remedial help with English (through no fault of their own.)

This is a good point actually. LAs will be subject to London-weighting requirements for employment. The London-Glasgow comparison is particularly interesting given a number of schools on the south side have sizeable migrant communities in their catchments, though not on the same scale as London. The success of schools in London where sometimes even the majority of pupils speak English if at all as a second language in terms of academic results is really quite impressive.

[Antlion]

I suspect they'd be extremely conflicted. On the one hand, they would be keen for it because it would break-up a lot of the institutional glue that the Unionists can fall back-on like a common welfare safety net, but on the other hand they would be fucking terrified at the prospect of having to find £800 of extra revenue per head just to operate at a deficit as a % of GDP level equivalent to the rest of the UK.

In the short-term, FFA is a disastrous policy for a party that maintains austerity is not necessary. They won't have even the flexibility Corbyn would with people's QE as they'd have no control over monetary policy to shield Scotland while the oil price is low. The IFS looked at this before the election. They didn't just say that Scotland had a higher deficit than the UK as a whole. They said it was forecast to grow over the next 5 years while the UK's as a whole modestly shrank. The prospect of trying efficiently to separate out the welfare and pensions systems while maintaining any pretence of keeping departmental spending levels the same as they are now isn't one I'd envy for anyone.

Just to stand still we are talking rises in all bands of income tax and a really tough debate about whether to undercut or overcut the rUK corporation tax rate. FFA doesn't even give the SNP the low-hanging fruit cuts of things like Trident.

Hold on; are you equating "home rule" (which Swampy above mentioned, to which you replied and which your party wants) with FFA? Is the difference here purely on timescale?

This makes a bit of a mockery of the Lib Dems attempts to castigate the SNP for wanting FFA to be "phased in" over a number of years, as the suggestion seem to be that they also want to tepidly introduce home rule (which you have collapsed with FFA in your response above) over ... well ... an undisclosed number of years.

I simply cannot see the Lib Dems' alleged ambitions for Scottish "home rule" as comporting with the hysterical hostility they publicly exhibited toward FFA as "damaging to the integrity of the union".

[strichener]

*sigh*

The reason that overall public spending per capita in Scotland is higher than it is in England is because the baseline of Barnettable spending is higher. This was deliberately done to account for the fact that the provision of certain services in Scotland is more expensive because we have more rural communities. This does not mean that Barnett consequential changes are calculated based on whether England raises its spending rurally or in its urban areas. England has shifted towards spending more in its urban areas, but the Barnett consequentials are blind to this.

The reason that Scotland has higher prevailing spending figures on key public services, like education, is because its overall budget, per capita, is slightly bigger, and that most of those additional resources are spent achieving a comparable level of service provision particularly in the Highlands and Islands.

It is not evidence that, because Scotland's schools spending per capita is slightly higher than England's, that Angela Constance et al are doing as good or better a job than their counterparts at the Department for Education at allocating their budget effectively, nor is it evidence that the Scottish Government is better than HMT at allocating appropriate resources to the schools budget.

What is clear is that schools spending is rising in England, falling in Scotland, and the attainment gap conforms to the same pattern. We shouldn't be content with that.

You can piss off with your *sigh* nonesense. You have bored me into submission and I cannot even be bothered showing you the relevant extracts from the paper that I read that show you are wrong in regards to England increasing education spending. Read it yourself

[strichener]

This is a good point actually. LAs will be subject to London-weighting requirements for employment. The London-Glasgow comparison is particularly interesting given a number of schools on the south side have sizeable migrant communities in their catchments, though not on the same scale as London. The success of schools in London where sometimes even the majority of pupils speak English if at all as a second language in terms of academic results is really quite impressive.

Not when the spending can be up to twice as much per head in London.

[Ad Lib]

Hold on; are you equating "home rule" (which Swampy above mentioned, to which you replied and which your party wants) with FFA? Is the difference here purely on timescale?

This makes a bit of a mockery of the Lib Dems attempts to castigate the SNP for wanting FFA to be "phased in" over a number of years, as the suggestion seem to be that they also want to tepidly introduce home rule (which you have collapsed with FFA in your response above) over ... well ... an undisclosed number of years.

I simply cannot see the Lib Dems' alleged ambitions for Scottish "home rule" as comporting with the hysterical hostility they publicly exhibited toward FFA as "damaging to the integrity of the union".

If he's not talking about FFA then we've already got a form of home rule, so I don't understand the question. The Lib Dems merely advocate a form of home rule that is different from the current form and from FFA.

[Ad Lib]

You can piss off with your *sigh* nonesense. You have bored me into submission and I cannot even be bothered showing you the relevant extracts from the paper that I read that show you are wrong in regards to England increasing education spending. Read it yourself

It's funny you refer to that research paper, because it shows that spending in Scottish secondary education is well below the UK average and that it's primary school education and to a lesser extent tertiary education spending that keeps us above the UK average, as is so elegantly shown by the bar charts on page 8. Indeed, if we talk about "schools" which is what I referred to when talking about the increase in English spending in recent years compared with the Scottish real terms cut, we come behind England. QED on the Scottish Government's funding priorities. Of course, the education comparable service percentage for adjustments to the Barnett formula currently stands at 100%, meaning that if the Scottish schools budget has been cut, it is because the Scottish Government has decided to spend budgetary increases in the English schools budget elsewhere, and not because of any broader decision on overall spending levels in other English-spending-based departments.

Not when the spending can be up to twice as much per head in London.

Why isn't the Scottish Government concentrating resources to the worst performing schools like that? This is the question we should be asking.

[Antlion]

If he's not talking about FFA then we've already got a form of home rule, so I don't understand the question. The Lib Dems merely advocate a form of home rule that is different from the current form and from FFA.

I assumed that Swampy's comment, "if the SNP were offered home rule tomorrow, they'd take it" was in reference to the "home rule" supposedly subscribed to by the Liberal Democrats (as that is what preceding discussion of "home rule" revolved around - I first quoted it from the Campbell Commission document composed by the Liberal Democrats).

If, as a Liberal Democrat, you take this to mean "full fiscal autonomy" (as you appear to in your reply to Swampy) then the same objections raised by your party towards its phased introduction apply also to their desire for its phased introduction, and the same deficiencies raised by the IFS to the SNP's desired introduction of it apply also to the Liberal Democrats' desired introduction of it.

Otherwise, and if they are different things, it seems a strange jump from discussion of the SNP jumping at "home rule", which the Liberal Democrats' seem keen on (if reluctant to absolutely define it in detail) to a discussion of their alleged anxieties about accepting FFA.

[Ad Lib]

I assumed that Swampy's comment, "if the SNP were offered home rule tomorrow, they'd take it" was in reference to the "home rule" supposedly subscribed to by the Liberal Democrats (as that is what preceding discussion of "home rule" revolved around - I first quoted it from the Campbell Commission document composed by the Liberal Democrats).

If, as a Liberal Democrat, you take this to mean "full fiscal autonomy" (as you appear to in your reply to Swampy) then the same objections raised by your party towards its phased introduction apply also to their desire for its phased introduction, and the same deficiencies raised by the IFS to the SNP's desired introduction of it apply also to the Liberal Democrats' desired introduction of it.

Unless Swampy wants to clarify specifically what he means by home rule, and I think he means FFA, but could be wrong, then I think his question makes no sense.

We have one type of home rule. It's called the Scotland Acts 1998 an 2012. We are getting another type of home rule, the Scotland Bill 2015. The Smith proposals go, give or take a few specific details, pretty much as far as the generality of the Campbell Commission's vision of home rule.

If he means something further than that, but short of Full Fiscal Autonomy, I'd like him to define it.

I didn't "take" anything "as a Liberal Democrat". I took the context of the words Swampy was uttering to mean that by "home rule" he means FFA or something close to it. The Liberal Democrats, for the avoidance of doubt, definitely do not mean that. We mean a system which still involves fiscal transfers for the foreseeable future.

The SNP vision of home rule is very different from the Lib Dem one. It's not just a question of timescale, but timescale is important. Even if the Lib Dems were to endorse FFA, we'd be talking about it in the context of a 40-year aspiration, once Scotland's economy had become much less oil-dependent and was running a routinely balanced budget in terms of keeping down deficit and debt as a proportion of GDP to equivalent levels of the rest of the UK. The SNP wanted it within the course of a single Parliamentary session, at a time when Scotland's deficit was scheduled to rise.

One of those visions envisages responsibility being phased in alongside convergence of economic conditions and increased gradual self-sufficiency over a period of decades. One of them envisages bulk transfer of tax and spend to a population unit spending much more than it's currently taking in over a very short period of time.

One of those is responsible. The other isn't.

[Antlion]

Unless Swampy wants to clarify specifically what he means by home rule, and I think he means FFA, but could be wrong, then I think his question makes no sense.

We have one type of home rule. It's called the Scotland Acts 1998 an 2012. We are getting another type of home rule, the Scotland Bill 2015. The Smith proposals go, give or take a few specific details, pretty much as far as the generality of the Campbell Commission's vision of home rule.

If he means something further than that, but short of Full Fiscal Autonomy, I'd like him to define it.

I think the problem here stems from the Liberal Democrats' (and other figures - notable Gordon Brown's) lax and nebulous use of the term, "home rule".

As I quoted above, the Liberal Democrat document states that it intends to lay out a "route map for home rule" (implying that it is something which Scotland does not yet have) and claiming that "home rule" will be unstable without a federal system to underpin it. This isn't very helpful, as the suggestion is that "home rule" does not yet exist, and is to be worked towards in tandem with an approach to federalism.

These terms (FFA, Devo Max, home rule) appear largely fluid and undefined with enough overlap to make them contentious. Attacking particular ones whilst defending and supporting others therefore seems counterproductive and duplicitous, at least until such a time as lines of demarcation are drawn between them and the exact powers and limitations of each are spelled out in full.

It seems to me, therefore, that the Liberal Democrats were (or are) being entirely opportunistic in their gleeful lambasting of the SNP's wish for future FFA, when their own stated desire for an as-yet nonexistent and unclear "home rule" underpinned by a move towards a federal UK is so woolly.

[strichener]

It's funny you refer to that research paper, because it shows that spending in Scottish secondary education is well below the UK average and that it's primary school education and to a lesser extent tertiary education spending that keeps us above the UK average, as is so elegantly shown by the bar charts on page 8. Indeed, if we talk about "schools" which is what I referred to when talking about the increase in English spending in recent years compared with the Scottish real terms cut, we come behind England. QED on the Scottish Government's funding priorities. Of course, the education comparable service percentage for adjustments to the Barnett formula currently stands at 100%, meaning that if the Scottish schools budget has been cut, it is because the Scottish Government has decided to spend budgetary increases in the English schools budget elsewhere, and not because of any broader decision on overall spending levels in other English-spending-based departments.

Not surprised that this is what you have taken from the document. Would you like to restate your 3% real time growth figure? I can see neither the paper that I referenced or the IFS substantiate this.

[Antlion]

Just to keep things needlessly complicated, here are some of the terms applied to Scottish Full Fiscal Autonomy (wiki, but each is fully referenced).

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full_fiscal_autonomy_for_Scotland

"Full fiscal autonomy (FFA) [is] also known as devolution max, devo-max, fiscal federalism, independence lite or independence-minus.

Scottish fiscal autonomy stopping short of full political independence is usually promoted by advocates of a federal or confederal constitution for the United Kingdom."

But not the Liberal Democrats, who think federalism is something to support "home rule", whatever "home rule" might be ...

[Fotbawmad]

I suspect they'd be extremely conflicted. On the one hand, they would be keen for it because it would break-up a lot of the institutional glue that the Unionists can fall back-on like a common welfare safety net, but on the other hand they would be fucking terrified at the prospect of having to find £800 of extra revenue per head just to operate at a deficit as a % of GDP level equivalent to the rest of the UK.

In the short-term, FFA is a disastrous policy for a party that maintains austerity is not necessary. They won't have even the flexibility Corbyn would with people's QE as they'd have no control over monetary policy to shield Scotland while the oil price is low. The IFS looked at this before the election. They didn't just say that Scotland had a higher deficit than the UK as a whole. They said it was forecast to grow over the next 5 years while the UK's as a whole modestly shrank. The prospect of trying efficiently to separate out the welfare and pensions systems while maintaining any pretence of keeping departmental spending levels the same as they are now isn't one I'd envy for anyone.

If we can't borrow our own money like England can, then FFA does become a problem in the short term. It's not helpful when you have the likes of UKIP saying Scotland is being subsided by the Barnett formula. When in fact we'd be better off if we got to spend all the money we raised. Most of the myths and misconceptions about the economic case for Scotland are laid out in this video.

[Ad Lib]

Not surprised that this is what you have taken from the document. Would you like to restate your 3% real time growth figure? I can see neither the paper that I referenced or the IFS substantiate this.

http://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/7670

"Current school spending has been protected compared with other areas of domestic spending. The current schools budget has increased by 3% in real-terms between 2010-11 and 2014-15 (equating to a 0.6% rise in spending per pupil after accounting for growth in pupil numbers). In contrast, current public service spending has been cut by 8% in real-terms over the same period."

[invergowrie arab]

It's funny you refer to that research paper, because it shows that spending in Scottish secondary education is well below the UK average and that it's primary school education and to a lesser extent tertiary education spending that keeps us above the UK average, as is so elegantly shown by the bar charts on page 8. Indeed, if we talk about "schools" which is what I referred to when talking about the increase in English spending in recent years compared with the Scottish real terms cut, we come behind England. QED on the Scottish Government's funding priorities. Of course, the education comparable service percentage for adjustments to the Barnett formula currently stands at 100%, meaning that if the Scottish schools budget has been cut, it is because the Scottish Government has decided to spend budgetary increases in the English schools budget elsewhere, and not because of any broader decision on overall spending levels in other English-spending-based departments.

Why isn't the Scottish Government concentrating resources to the worst performing schools like that? This is the question we should be asking.

But they are. That's what the attainment challenge fund is for. It's a straight lift from the London attainment challenge.

[Ad Lib]

But they are. That's what the attainment challenge fund is for. It's a straight lift from the London attainment challenge.

Except it's not a straight lift. For one, they've sat on their arses for 8 years before trying it. Secondly, all they've done is say they'll put the money towards it. No look at all about how in London it interacted with change to school management structures through, among other things, the academies programme.

There's also been no import of the pupil premium allocation method, pressed for by the Lib Dems, which complemented the London challenge for schools with high free-school-meal ratios.

[invergowrie arab]

Firstly Nicola sturgeon has been leader for less than a year.

Secondly you can pick holes in the programme all you like but your claim that the Scottish government is not directing additional educational resource into the worst performing schools is simply wrong.

Why should it be a straight lift from London? It's focussing on the early and primary years, we don't have the same education system and we very rarely have schools with the same demographic make up as London.

Whilst I would acknowledge the success of the London model I would still say it was a weakness to have it so heavily school based. Scotland's attainment challenge will be far more holistic. Tinkering with school management structures will do nothing to improve the outcomes for children. You need total community solutions.

They have done far more than say they will put money towards it. They are in the process of signing off the implementation plans developed by the 7 LA test sites. I don't doubt you welcome this devolution of power to LAs away from the big bad centralist Holyrood machine.