Much ado about what in particular? Or the Guardian and lazy journalism

When I tell certain people that I enjoy reading the Guardian, they give me a quizzical look - as though they are a parent whose son has returned from his first term at university with his polo shirt done up to the top button.  He looks like the son you knew and there shouldn't, in theory, be anything wrong with doing up the top button of a polo shirt but...you just know he probably won't be the same again.

But there you go.  My name is Nik and I read the Guardian.  I've said it.

Why do I read it?  You get something different from its news coverage, for a start - the Guardian tends to cover quite different sorts of topics, or at least the same topics from a quite different angle.  So it is informative and challenges me to think differently or to reinforce my views.  Plus it has a stellar cast of columnists, from Michael White to Michael Kettle; Sir Simon Jenkins to Simon Hoggart; Julian Glover to Polly Toynbee.  Even Polly.  You might not always (you might never) agree with her but she is a media heavyweight.

Yet sometimes you do wonder why you read the Guardian; moments like when you come across Patrick Butler's blog today, 'Domestic violence: women's charities face 100% cuts'.  From the starting blocks, you know precisely where this is all heading:

"In an era of senseless cuts to vital public services, here's one that in its brutal scale and short-sightnedness almost beggars belief: Devon county council's proposals to reduce funding for domestic violence support services by 100%."

Brief summary: as part of its budget settlement, Devon County Council is, like all councils, having to make cuts to its expenditure.  As part of that, it has proposed to remove £1 million of funding from three domestic violence charities.  That represents less than one-fiftieth of the overall cuts being made.  It represents 0.0006% of local government spending; or 0.0001% of total UK spending.   Of course cuts to charities - whom I'm sure do a good job - are regrettable but Butler's way of expressing it is utterly pathetic.

First, of course these things look bad, but that's localism for you and the chief paradox at the middle of the Government's worthy decentralisation programme. The centre wants to devolve responsibility and accountability but flak still returns to the centre, even though it's not their decision.

Secondly, this is simply media trailing.  The council is putting out an interim suggestion on where cuts might fall but the actual decision isn't being taken until later.  It's part and parcel of announcements to gauge public reaction and act accordingly and governments have been doing it as long as there's been a popular press.  The decision has not been made.

Thirdly, in typical Guardian style, the author mews sanctimoniously about a single issue and won't mention any context.  At least Polly Toynbee tends to put things in context.  What other actions are Devon County Council taking as part of their budget settlement?  Who knows, not the general reader because they haven't read the settlement, perhaps the journalist hasn't bothered either.  If you go to Devon County Council's website you will see that, yes, they have to propose £54.6 million of budget cuts.  In spite of that, there will be increases for social care for older people and people with disabilities, children in care and children with special needs.  Direct grants to schools will increase and no libraries will close.  They are undergoing public consultation before announcing the full settlement next month.

Moreover, what do we know about or are told about the state of Devon?  Have quick look at the National Statistics website and you'll see that the south-west of England has the highest life expectancies and the lowest proportion of the population in social rented housing.  It has one of the highest household incomes in the country outside London; the lowest proportion of workless households; and the lowest crime rates in England.

Now have another very quick glance (its quite simple all this research) at recent British Crime Survey statistics on domestic violence:

"The risk of intimate violence varied by demographic, socio-economic and lifestyle characteristics. Characteristics that were independently associated with an increased risk of intimate violence across all the forms included marital status (in particular being unmarried), housing tenure, age (under the age of 45), and having a limiting disability or illness."

I'm not saying for a moment that there are not some serious cases of domestic violence against women that occur in Devon.  But, in short, Devon is evidently not the epicentre of the problem.

It isn't only the Guardian (the Daily Telegraph is turning into a tabloid with a bow-tie), but it does really grates me the way things like this are reported.  A narrative has been cast about these cuts and elements of the media will use any scraps they can find to flesh that narrative out - irrespective of context or relativity.

The Government is chucking (increased) billions of pounds at fighting poverty and preventable diseases in the developing world; ring-fencing the health budget against much opposition (including the Labour and Liberal parties) because, what a surprise, Tories do care about the NHS; protecting Post Offices from further closures.... And the Guardian is kicking and screaming about a million quid for a charity doing a job that local social services probably ought to be doing anyway?

Of course, these hacks aren't going to stop this sort of thing.  So, an apt consideration in present circumstances: the Government must sharpen its communications operation.  Richard Lambert's pronouncements on the economy recently may well have been "pathetic" on some levels, according to Lord Lawson, but his accusation of drift and lack of purpose in the Government's overall message holds a fair amount of truth.

In Much Ado About Nothing (Act V), Claudio says Hero has been "done to death by slanderous tongue."    The Government must sell its strategy and (already considerable) achievements, or journalists will disseminate their own versions of events.   Leave it too late, for the hoped-for freebie frenzy in 2013-14, and the chance of electoral resurrection might have already gone.  Get the message right now - and it has to be now, before the cuts really bite - and you might just be able to take the country with you.

Anglo-Dutch free trade alliance reminds us what the EU is for

Whilst his MPs are squabbling in the House of Commons about the European Union Bill, the Prime Minister is on the continent making friends.

The Guardian reports that David Cameron, "in his first major EU initiative since becoming Prime Minister", is attempting to create an internal free market area with the Dutch.  This would permit professional and service workers to work throughout the European continent.  The article is just a bit amnesic: Cameron's biggest initiative on the European stage to date has been to limit the increase of the EU budget from 6% to no more than 2.9%, in concert with the French and Germans.  The more cynical might observe that an even bigger achievement has been simply not to cause a row.

That is by the by, for the crux of the matter - an Anglo-Dutch free trade alliance - carries intriguing historical overtones.

England and the Netherlands spent a lot of the seventeenth century coming to nautical blows over the issue of who ruled the waves - and therefore international trade.  The Dutch could not find a way to defeat Cromwell (who could, but Death himself?) but generally they came out on top and in 1667 their raid of the English fleet at Medway ranks as one of this island nation's worst humiliations.

The great French Annalist Fernand Braudel wrote, "history may be divided into three movements: what moves rapidly, what moves slowly and what appears not to move at all.”

The Dutch navy may have been fleeter of foot by the broadside, but moving slowly alongside beneath the swifter current of events was the burgeoning dominance of international finance and trade by the City of London and the nascent British Empire.

The prompt for both of these phenomena - warfare and mercantile superiority - were the Navigation Acts.  These laws, first passed in 1651, were designed to protect English colonial trade with European rivals, particularly the Dutch.  Some historians say that they were a crucial part of the eventual British dominance of world trade and the City's financial preeminnce.  Also pivotal was the accession of William of Orange to the English crown in 1688, which swung the attention of Dutch financiers towards London.

It is oft proclaimed that Britain was at the vanguard of free trade and liberty.  There is some truth in this, if your history books begin with the Pax Britannica.  For much of Britain's rise to global prominence had been on the back of protectionism and naval power.  The Navigation Acts were only repealed in 1849, by which point Great Britain ruled the waves.  Liberalising trade routes did not level the playing field, so much as give British traders more markets to buy and sell in.

With the benefit of hindsight, the respective tales of Britain and Holland could have been quite different.  Both relied on a strong navy to project power and an early mastery of trade and finance.  On the latter count, the Dutch were certainly the superiors.  They even contested similar regions of influence, such as North America, the Caribbeean, the Cape of Good Hope and south-east Asia.  Eventually, Britain came out on top, but it could have been different.

Now Britain and Holland appearto be joining forces to remind their fellow Europeans what the EU is for: liberalised markets for free trade in goods, services and personnel.  Many Conservative MPs have a keen taste for history - not least Bill Cash, who I know to be writing a biography of free trade campaigner John Bright.

Although a free trade alliance between Britain and Holland may seem out of step with the historical record, it sends a message that the European project has lots its way in a search for political, as opposed to economic, union (the clue ought to have been in the title, really).

This, then, is a timely reminder to dissatisfied eurosceptic MPs - particularly those in the new intake - that their Prime Minister has the right idea about Europe.  An idea more nuanced and pragmatic than they might like, perhaps, but this really ought to be a European adventure on which leader and party can see eye to eye.

Ed Balls now has Miliband in the palm of his hand

I haven't really got time for this, but...

The Alan Johnson resignation this afternoon came as a shock.  The affable former postman might have taken to his new brief like a duck to a shooting range, and he wasn't joking about needing an economics primer, however who genuinely saw this coming?

The embarrassing gaffes have not helped.  Not only have they damaged Labour presentationally, they have wounded a good man's pride.  No one enjoys being ridiculed, especially about their maths gremlins.  And honestly, as much as I like Johnson, telling a BBC journalist that they "probably read more" of the last Labour budget is a self-deprecation too far for a Shadow Chancellor.

But strategically, Johnson was still useful for Ed Miliband.  I wrote in October that the choice of Johnson was "strikingly astute" as it tied up a critical colleague and reassured the public that Labour would pursue a credible economic policy by backing Alistair Darling's deficit reduction plans.

The alternative - Ed Balls - had long advocated a softer policy that would put further investment, growth and recovery ahead of deficit reduction and higher taxes for the rich to mitigate spending cuts.  When it came to the decision, Miliband rightly acknowledged reality and plumped for Johnson, sending Balls off to shadow Theresa May.

Since then, however, Labour's economic message, driven by Miliband and Johnson, has been a 'me-too' muddle: opposing some cuts but broadly agreeing that the deficit had to be addressed.  Miliband's leadership has never got off the ground, paternity leave or not.

Meanwhile, Ed Balls has been in combative mood, impressing as shadow home secretary, most recently in portraying the Government's hokey-cokey dance over Control Orders as playing party politics with national security.

He has also not been keeping his dissatisfaction with the Labour leadership's economic policy to himself.  As early as the CSR you could tell he was fuming inside as he watched Alan Johnson stand up to deliver a happy-go-lucky slapstick routine when Balls' well-reviewed Bloomberg speech would have been more effective, to put it lightly.

As wicked irony would have it, had Ed Miliband appointed Ed Balls as his Shadow Chancellor back in October, the new leader would probably have been able to command a certain amount of authority over his defeated challenger.

Now, however, Balls is in the ascendency and in spite of a good victory in Oldham last week, Miliband is struggling.  Personal dynamics are also important.  When Gordon Brown was Chancellor, Balls was his right-hand man (apparently unable to make decisions without consulting him) whereas Miliband was a junior adviser.   On economic policy (at the very least) it will be Balls, not his leader, who will be running the show.

The Government can use this to its advantage if it can successfully paint Ed Balls as the man who, along with Gordon Brown, got the country into its present mess.  If the spinners can manage to depict Miliband as the 'son of Brown', Balls is a much more obvious target.

Yet allow Balls to gain even an inch and he'll take not one yard but ten.  Say what you like about him - he is a consummate political operator.  His first task is likely to be to attack the Government over inflation and VAT - on both counts he can turn his involvement in the last Labour Government to his advantage.  Back then, he and Brown presided over the NICE decade - the Governor of the Bank of England wasn't writing many letters to the Chancellor in those years.  There are myriad reasons why the analogy is inadequate but that never stopped a good soundbite.

And VAT, which is contributing to rising inflation and crucially inflationary expectations, is a topic on which Ed Balls actually has some credibility.  It was Balls who, before the last General Election, insisted that Labour must pledge not to raise VAT.  He was correctly and honourably overruled by Alistair Darling.

Now that Balls is calling the shots, he can tell us all that he was right all along.  Don't increase the regressive VAT, which hurts ordinary hard-working British families - put up taxes on the rich instead.

I sometimes hear Conservative backbenchers confiding that the man pulling the strings in Government is George Osborne.  Now his opposite number will be doing the same for Labour.  And like Osborne, Balls is a scheming politician to the bones: they are always sniffing around for dividing lines.

However it all pans out, you can count on something.  The Chancellor can say goodbye to relaxing skiing trips to Klosters.  With Ed Balls conducting the Opposition's orchestra, he'll be lucky if he gets a spare weekend.