Ian Allsop previews another year of debates based on personal conviction rather than facts.

2013 is the new 2012. Without the shiny expensive bits, but with the same old arguments.

There is already too much I want to comment on for me to be writing space-consuming introductions about there being too much I want to comment on.

There have been reports of the death of Big Society (though whether something that was never alive in the first place can cease to exist is debateable). Acevo supremo, Sir Stephen Bubb, said it was dead in one of those letters he delights in writing to the Prime Minister, so it must be so. But then sector minister Nick Hurd responded, saying it wasn’t so – who knows what to believe?

Brave

The game was up when Cameron said in the Commons that the growth of food banks was a positive example of BS in action. To claim something that only exists because of the failure of government policies as a success of government policy is brave if nothing else.

Please don’t tell him but I have not always been Sir Stephen’s biggest fan (his lauding of those food banks in a blog post that also contained details of his own lavish dining could inspire a column all on its own). However, one response to his well-argued case actually made me feel sorry for him.

The ConservativeHome website piece was a textbook example of when debate is influenced more by tribal, political grandstanding than by the facts.

The website post smeared Bubb and dismissed his critique, mainly on the basis of his socialist past, a long-forgotten Lambeth Council scandal, his alleged pay, and the fact that Acevo was a governmentfunded agency of New Labour or something.

In this way it could brush aside Bubb’s letter with an irrelevant attack based on his supposed political convictions, rather than concentrating on anything as trivial as information.

'I quite like foxes, even though one once destroyed my gardening shoes'

Political motivation was also used by the Spectator as a criticism of RSPCA’s action against illegal fox-hunts, without any political motivation of its own of course.

It’s only political motivation when an opponent does something you disagree with, not when you then respond.

I quite like foxes, even though one once destroyed my gardening shoes, and I certainly wouldn’t dress up and hunt them, but I also recognise why they are regarded as pests.

Fox-hunting is an obvious symbol of the class-war debate and stirs emotions because of that. But an organisation set up to prevent cruelty to animals spending money given to prevent cruelty to animals on preventing cruelty to animals doesn’t seem that shocking.

Another example of an issue being fought along lines of personal view rather than fact is a case that has stirred the Christian community into some less-than-Christian posturing.

I am no expert on it – previously I assumed the Plymouth Brethren sailed off with the Mayflower – so I am not getting into any profound legal analysis based on half-truths. That’s the job of sections of the press and MPs, over-simplifying a complex case and using it for their own ends.

The Brethren case has been taken up by Tory MPs, including Robert Halfon, who called the Charity Commission “anti-Christian” in the Commons.

The Commission has declined to comment, especially while the case is due at the Charity Tribunal in March, other than to say that as the Plymouth Brethren avoid contact with those who do not follow their teachings, including other Christians, and do not allow non-members to attend religious services – a doctrine of separation – it is unable to conclude that it is established for the advancement of religion for public benefit.

One comment I read on civilsociety.co.uk saying it was another case of some religious people “failing to understand the very obvious difference between being discriminated against and simply being subject to the same rules as everyone else” spoke more sense to me than any of the faith-based panic.

One to watch

The Brethren and RSPCA arguments will continue, but I would like to nominate another name as my ‘one to watch’ for 2013.

Last October I defended the appointment of William Shawcross as Charity Commission chair after his outspokenness was queried; but I may have to review.

That loud noise you heard in November was the collective dropping of jaws when Shawcross called chuggers a “blight on the charitable sector”, thus fuelling another debate based on personal conviction rather than facts.

Stick around for much more of the same in 2013.