It was only a few hours ago that I listened to justice secretary Kenneth Clarke tell Radio 4's Today programme of the need for "more intelligent sentencing" in the law courts.
So the party of the family wants to shift jobless people from unemployment blackspots to areas of high vacancy rates. Not so much a brutal "get on yer bike" but a polite "let me help you on yer bike (with an almighty shove)". It's bike-lite.
Amid the brouhaha in the wake of George Osborne's emergency Budget and the sense of national tragedy then hyperbole that tracked the varying fortunes of England's football team, it would have been easy to miss the latest developments in the Baby P case.
Carers Week ended just a few days ago and, with supreme timing, Hammersmith and Fulham Council in west London - reputed to be David Cameron's favourite borough - has decided to end funding its carers' centre. Its only carers' centre.
Sometimes a campaign just feels wrong. That can be said about Project Prevention's attempt to sterilise drug misusers in the UK, using a £200 bribe.
Let's have a bit of context. We discovered yesterday that the government's director of social care earns about £30,000 less in a year than the former England football captain earns in a week.
| Outside Left questions the thinking behind today’s social policy, with a sometimes wry, occasionally cynical, always straight-talking look at the political elite that shapes it, written by sub editor, Mike McNabb. |
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