Tories Looking Forward to Cuts

Reading the Guardian piece about Shadow Treasury Chief Secretary Phillip Hammond yesterday left me cold and angry. Hammond seemed to be almost enjoying the prospect of the savage cuts in public spending he is planning should the Tories gain power in next year's election. Lots of macho talk about taking "early action" and "establishing credibility" with the City and global markets. All about needing to keep the financiers happy - the same ones who got us into this current mess - rather than understanding the impact of such cuts on jobs and services for the vast majority of people in this country.

I was in Grantown on Saturday, meeting folk at the Figgat Fair. The three small care homes there are prime examples of what may be under threat if Hammond and his ilk get their way.

Hammond may fully expect to be the nation's hate figure, but he will clearly have a big smile on his face as he wields the spending axe with undisguised enjoyment.

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Digital Highlands

Last month, the Government published Digital Britain, a comprehensive strategy for the development of digital communications and services across the UK to meet the needs of individuals, business and government in the information age.

Communities in the Highlands in particular will benefit from the Universal Service Commitment, which will ensure we all have access to high quality broadband by 2012. Digital Britain goes further, with ambitious plans to deliver Next Generation Broadband to all of our communities. This is not just about giving us all ever faster access to uTube. Small businesses can thrive in the rural economy when they have high-quality communication links whilst we can all benefit from access to services and information across such digital networks.

Labour's priorities between now and the General Election are threefold: cleaning up politics, taking Britain out of recession and into recovery and modernising our public services and infrastructure.

I welcome Lord Carter's report as a major contribution to third of these goals.

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