Letters From A Tory Daily views on British politics and the Conservative Party from a centre-right thinker who writes letters on his blog to politicians, journalists and many others.

Dear Alan Johnson,
I’m sure you consider yesterday’s announcement regarding sex offenders to be a fantastic success, given that the press lapped it up and the Conservatives were forced to fall into line. The plan is to let families ask police if someone with access to their child has convictions or has been previously suspected of abuse, following the [...]

“Unfortunately mistakes sometimes happen”
- a statement from OFSTED in response to their failure to disclose a 70-page inspection report to the court reviewing Sharon Shoesmith’s sacking. The ex-chief of Haringey’s children’s services says she was unfairly sacked after the Baby P abuse case.  In addition to notes from an OFSTED inspector being withheld, drafts of the inspection [...]

Dear Alan Johnson,
Your desire to stay out of the limelight is clear enough, but every so often you get dragged into fiery debates.  Given Labour’s desperation with populist measures as you approach a crushing electoral defeat, I wonder what you have made of the new iPhone software in America that shows parents a map of where all the [...]

Dear Donald Tusk,
As Prime Minister of Poland you probably aren’t used to causing a stir in the British media but the recent passing of a law making it compulsory for paedophiles convicted of raping children under the age of 15 years or a close relative to undergo chemical castration on their release from prison has done [...]

From the Telegraph:
Adults who look after friends’ children on a regular basis are being forced to register with Ofsted under new legislation.  They must complete a criminal record check, learn first aid, take a childcare course and even follow Labour’s “nappy curriculum” for under-fives. …It comes just weeks after it emerged that parents giving lifts [...]

“The Criminal Records Bureau already struggles, at huge cost, to do its job and this task is more complex and larger. While taxpayers and the people forced to undergo the [Independent Safeguarding Authority's] checks will lose out, the only people to benefit will be the army of bureaucrats needed to attempt the impossible.”
- James Dawkins, [...]

“We can’t keep trying to fix families that are completely broken.”
- Martin Narey, chief executive of Barnardos, who believes that many more children need to be taken into care at birth to stop them being damaged beyond repair by inadequate parents.   In his interview with the Observer, he went on to say: “If you can [...]

From the Independent:
Until a few weeks before they were arrested, the boys lived with their mother and other siblings in a tatty semi on a quiet council estate. They lived there for eight years until they were moved into foster care about a month before they committed GBH by beating, burning and sexually abusing two [...]

(UPDATED WITH CORRECT PICTURE)
Dear Advertising Standards Agency (ASA),
You tread a thin line in most of your work as an industry-led regulator, seeing as you have to pass judgement on a notoriously subjective topic.  Today you have ruled that because a model featured partially nude in a ”provocative” fashion advert looked under the age of 16, the advert [...]

“An unsavoury character could have come in and we just can’t put the children in the event or the students at the host school at risk like that.  The ultimate fear is that a child is hurt or abuducted, and we must take all measures possible to prevent that.”
- Paul Blunt, development manager at the [...]

Dear Dr Pedro Greer,
Seeing as yesterday’s news here in the UK was dominated by the race to become the ‘Speaker’ of the House of Commons (which was eventually won by some prick called John Bercow), the shocking article on the BBC website about Miami’s treatment of their sex offenders will have escaped many people’s attention.  A Miami law [...]

Dear libertarians,
Every so often a story comes along that beautifully clarifies why I will never support libertarianism.  The death of Baby P was one such story, and a couple of days ago another of these pivotal stories reared its head, as a young mother who was judged too stupid to care for her own baby has [...]

Dear Colleen Hauser,
To say that I am disheartened to read about your behaviour would be a huge understatement.  An alert has gone out to police forces across the US to search for you after you left home with your cancer-stricken teenage son to avoid him receiving chemotherapy.  Sadly, your decision is likely to end with your son dying  [...]

Dear Ed Balls,
There appears to be a growing consensus that you represent the very worst aspects of the Labour Party – arrogance, incompetence and disdain at the heart of Gordon Brown’s inner circle.  Yesterday’s announcement on the recruitment and retention of social workers after the death of Baby P might sound like good news, but it [...]

Dear libertarians,
Regular readers of my blog will know that once in a while I stumble across a story which I think strikes at the heart of libertarian values.  Like many other Conservatives (big and small ‘c’) I want the state to play a much smaller role in our lives than it does now, but I [...]

Dear Alan Campbell,
As a Home Office minister, I’m sure Jacqui Smith takes all the high profile cases and leaves you with the issues that she isn’t particularly interested in.  I appreciate that regulating the internet is a horribly messy situation and doesn’t offer much in the way of glitz and glamour, but don’t think for [...]

“At the back of my mind was, ‘God, I hope nobody finds out about this’.”
- Tim Russo, 41, a convicted sex offender, who was paid more than £2,500 by the Labour Party to help their 2005 election campaign.  In 2002, Russo was convicted in America of trying to arrange sex with someone he thought was a 13-year-old boy.  [...]

Dear Internet Watch Foundation (IWF),
As the organisation that filters out websites for internet users in the UK, you were never likely to escape controversy for long.  Your ruling that the Scorpion’s 1976 album called ‘Virgin Killers’ may have an illegal front cover and you subsequently blocking the Wikipedia website that contains the album cover has caused [...]

“Imagine living with a neighbour from hell and then double it.  I once rolled the dirt off Shannon’s feet. The mud was like glue, really stuck on. We had beetles and mice in our home which were coming from their house. I think social services should be shot. I used to tell them time and again [...]

Dear libertarians,
As a conservative I am always intruiged by libertarian angles on some of the problems facing society.  The government having faith in its citizens, giving them the freedom to make choices and not unduly interfering in their lives are all principles that I broadly subscribe to.  What I find harder to reconcile is the [...]

Dear Nick Clegg,
In the chamber of comedy that was PMQs yesterday, it was you who took time to draw attention to the terrible plight of two sisters in Sheffield whose father was given 25 life sentences on Tuesday for raping and abusing them over a period of thirty years.  As with the case of Baby [...]

“Too many vulnerable children are still being let down by the system and we are failing to learn from the worst cases of abuse.” – Christine Gilbert, Ofsted’s chief inspector (19th November 2008)
“This is a tragic and serious loss of life that has got to be investigated properly so that all of the lessons can [...]

Dear Ed Balls,
Since becoming Secretary of State, you have demonstrated your love of centralised control in education and children’s services beyond any reasonable doubt.  Removing the freedoms that City Academies enjoyed under Tony Blair is a good example of how you detest individual responsibility and independence from government.  Like Gordon Brown, your response to the [...]