Err, Sunny the news isn’t actually that good for New Lab (and deservedly not, Christ on a bike,tracking everyone’s holidays now: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7877182.stm
At least Purnell’s welfare privatisation is hitting the buffers, just like most of us predicted, the private sector ain’t interested if they can’t cherry-pick: http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2009/feb/08/labour-welfare-jobs-plan )
Returning to that poll, Sample Size: 2005 electors in in 60 seas where Labour’s majority (on the new boundaries) was 6-14% over the Conservatives
These are not really marginals (Labour has over 40 more vulnerable seats…) but are all middling Labour seats with an inbuilt bias in Labour’s favour. Despite these being what should be semi-secure Lab seats (y’know, over 6% majority is q. a bit) Lab are running at only 36% to the Tories’ 43%

That the results are so bad even with that bias suggests the real results from an even selection of marginals could likely be catastrophic for Brown and Labour.

Strange quasi-symmetry here.

Gordon Brown had a very bad start to the crisis. He finally listened to those that had been warning him all summer long that a bank crisis was likely only when the fat was in the fire. He also listened to his political (as distinct from personal) instincts and brought back Mandelson as a non-Treasury economics Minister. His standing then began to recover. If he can pin the nullity of Tory economic policy on Cameron, then Cameron will be the ‘stupid’ in “Its the economy, stupid”.

Cameron and his team began to flounder on economic policy as soon as the Government began to get its act together. He finally listened to those who were telling him so, and agreed ( contrary to his personal instincts) to bring back Kenneth Clarke as a non-Treasury economics spokesman. Will his standing soon begin to recover? If he articulates informed criticism of the Government’s economic policies, maybe. If he pins blame for the crisis on Gordon Brown’s 2008 summer holiday from reality fighting fantasmal challenges to his Leadership, Cameron’s recovery would look certain. Only economic recovery showing before the election could save Labour.

The asymetrical joker is the Vince Cable, Nick Clegg and the LibDems. They have consistently been having a surprisingly good crisis. Their economic policies and record are beginning to register. When only 12% agree that there is no real alternative to the Government’s economic policy; and only 15% are confident of Osborne as a possible Chancellor; there seem to be a very sizable chunk of voters who might take a chance on Cable and co.

We we we….

So, this is now an official Labour supporting site?

<iOnly economic recovery showing before the election could save Labour.

It didn’t save the Tories in 1997 (two years after the economic recovery started) and (even if it happens) it won’t save Labour now.

So, this is now an official Labour supporting site?

No, but I’d seriously question the liberal credentials of someone who’d prefer to see a Tory majority at the next election over a Labour majority.

While Obama keeps talking up the crisis, and hence the action needed, it frustrates me that Brown keeps trying to play down what is a very serious crisis. The public clearly agree and its time he stepped up, knowing the public aren’t blaming him for the collapse of banks.

He may know that, but not from this survey. All this survey tells him is that most of the public does not blame “The British government’s policies on tax and spending” for the collapse of the banks. If the public does not think that the government was powerless to prevent the “banks lending irresponsibly”, it must think that the government was to some extent responsible.

And the public can certainly blame “The British government’s policies on tax and spending” for the British governments own debt.

Obama is talking up the crisis because he can blame it all on his predecessor. Brown is trying to play down the crisis because he can not blame any of it on his predecessor. He was Chancellor at the time.

John B

Why?

Fuck Labour and fuck the Conservatives. Who’s *actually* got the policies and credibility to pull this round, ditch what doesn’t work and get Britain moving? By the time the Tories get in it’ll be too late and they won’t do the right thing anyway, because of lack of intellectual depth (which is why we don’t trust them, as a nation and why he brought Clarke back).

Given that, it’s Labour or nothing. Either they get it right, or we go down together, no matter who wins in 2010. Therefore it’s more important that Gordon Brown doesn’t screw up.

@ BH: because the Tories are in no demonstrable way more liberal than Labour (they’ve thoroughly supported all Labour’s illiberal policies, aside from one pathetic piece of grandstanding over whether we should lock people up without trial for four weeks or eight weeks), and in several demonstrable ways less so (abortion, gay rights, women’s rights).

And that’s even before you reach the non-partisan point about whether an incoming Tory government would be competent to deal with the current economic situation…

Hmmm those questions are interesting in that they only personalise on certain things but not others. If asked is the British Gov to blame in terms of policies for the current crisis I wonder if they answers would be different than if it was ‘is Gordon Browns policies to blame’…?

When I say ‘we’, I mean the country. Politically, I don’t want the Tories to get a massive majority at the next election, which is what it seems like now. And regardless of all that, I still want to see some action on the economy – which is the main reason why I’m talking up all this.

Obama is talking up the crisis because he can blame it all on his predecessor. Brown is trying to play down the crisis because he can not blame any of it on his predecessor. He was Chancellor at the time.

He can blame American banks… which I also blame.

Do you agree or disagree with the following statements?
“Gordon Brown is refusing to acknowledge the full depth of the economic crisis”
Strongly agree 23%
Tend to agree 35%
TOTAL AGREE 58%
[..]
“David Cameron is talking the economy down for political purposes and risks making things worse by damaging confidence”
Strongly agree 17%
Tend to agree 36%
TOTAL AGREE 53%”

So they think Brown is not acknowledging enough, but Cameron is acknowledging too much? Something isn’t quite right with this poll (or perhaps it’s just confusion in the public) when the same amount of people feel that the two main leaders of the house are both doing it wrong on either end of the scale.

You either have to take things being called what they are, or live in the world of “it’s not so bad”, you can’t do both.

because the Tories are in no demonstrable way more liberal than Labour (they’ve thoroughly supported all Labour’s illiberal policies, aside from one pathetic piece of grandstanding over whether we should lock people up without trial for four weeks or eight weeks), and in several demonstrable ways less so (abortion, gay rights, women’s rights).

I don’t really disagree with you that they’re not more liberal, I’m not sure if they’re less so. While clearly they have enough funding by Christian groups to infringe on the liberties of “minority” groups, they have stood up (or are now standing up) against ID cards, against the data sharing measures in the coroners and justice bill…in fact they’re pretty much consistent now on supporting the liberties of individuals against the state.

What Tories do bad on liberties Labour do good, and vice versa…both are terrible parties for liberals, however in the current age where Labour has gone as far as it has in rights for homosexuals, etc, the current battle ground is state vs personal…and I’m sorry to say that on that subject alone I’d want a Tory majority rather than a Labour one. Start rolling in inequality and economy in to that and of course my desire wanes in to non-existance fairly rapidly, but to claim that in the modern climate that Labour are more deserving of being in majority than the Tories on liberties strikes me as a bit false.

I think the Labour party has to start standing up to Gordon Brown a bit more. Whilst I’m not one of those people who thinks that everything Barack Obama does is right simply because I hugely admire his achievement in getting elected, his main positive characteristics, for me, are:
1) Willingness to admit mistakes, e.g. botched cabinet appointments
2) Principled decisions to favour liberty over authoritarianism (over torture, Guantanamo, if not over warrantless surveillance)
3) Favouring greater transparency in government and a general belief that government isn’t in the business of ‘winning’ a battle against enemies such as the media, the banks, big business or whatever, but is actually in the business of providing objectively good government

On each of these Gordon Brown is Obama’s diametric opposite. On these measurements, he may actually be worse than Tony Blair, which is saying something. His leadership style is simply wrong, in that he centralises too much on to himself. I’d go so far as to say that that’s more of a burden than any individual should have to bear, and he’d benefit personally from delegating more. But Labour now looks too scared to think about how things could be done differently, even when there’s an obvious example in America. Sunny is right that the public are not especially enamoured of Cameron or his party; the Tory brand is not fully decontaminated, and the Tories are only gaining because Labour seems to have forgotten its purpose and the fact that there are higher values than tomorrow’s newspaper headlines.

The trouble is that people feel that Brown should have “done something” about the banks – such as imposing more counter-cyclical capital requirements as in Spain – especially when he claims to have spotted problems 10 years ago.
He was in charge.

And it is not clear that it is somehow the fault of American banks that the UK recession is forecast to be worse than anywhere else, including America, is it?

The Tories would have done just as little, I suspect, of course.
But they weren’t in charge.

If we really are in worse shape than other similar economies to deal with this situation (and that seems to be generally agreed) then the Government as a whole, and Brown in particular, do carry some of the blame.

I personally doubt that the Tories would have dealt with it any better – had they been in office during the past decade, we would probably have lower taxes, even worse public services and be in the same mess, relative to other countries.

The real problem is that we don’t have a proper economic base. I challenged the massed ranks of Tories over at Smithson’s site to say what they would do to sort things out and reply came there none (well, one platitude about “fixing broken Britain”, to be fair).

There is also a case that Labour is exhausted – parties talk about “renewing themselves” in office, but that is very hard to do and requires the sacrifice of flagship policies (ID cards?) and personalities. In its own best interests, Labour needs to go into opposition.

Willingness to admit mistakes

Brown is, I believe seriously, deluded enough to believe that he hasn’t made any.
He certainly acts that way.

So they think Brown is not acknowledging enough, but Cameron is acknowledging too much? Something isn’t quite right with this poll (or perhaps it’s just confusion in the public) when the same amount of people feel that the two main leaders of the house are both doing it wrong on either end of the scale.

Lee – the way I read it, it’s actually quite bad for the Tories. The key point in the second question is ‘for political purposes’.

So in effect, voters think Cameron is talking up the crisis not because he has an real alternative plans, but because he just wants to take a cheap shot at Labour. Which is precisely what he’s doing.

In fact, even the Tory grassroots don’t have any economic solutions other than ‘do nothing’. They’re currently trying to make fun of Sarkozy telling off Brown for the VAT cut…. but what does Sarkozy say? He says – spend more money! Use fiscal stimulus to get the economy going! And this is a right-winger saying it… the right here dare not repeat that part of the conversation.

Economically, the UK right is as useless as it’s ever been. Ken Clarke is about the only guy who vaguely talks sense on their benches.

I agree the Tories are witless but the massed ranks of Labour MPs are spineless (save some noble exceptions:one of my local MPs, Jim Cousins has been very good on civ libs, and having the guts to vote against much of the worst NewLab stuff) . They ought to collectively tell Brown to get off his pedestal, admit his horrific mistakes as Chancellor (eg PFIs are unravelling, and they’re now getting bailed out, meaning we pay enormously over the odds and shoulder the risks, while the racketeering PFI consortia still get their loot…) and show some humility. That’s what really pisses people off about Brown: he makes it so f*cking hard for anyone to empathise, sympathise or even warm to him, being so arrogantly deluded that he is and always has been right.
Still don’t see that poll holding much positive news for the labour party, though.

Hard to see which is the more tendentious – the original poll or Sunny’s highly selective interpretation.

Not sure I trust either, and not sure that sensible folk will take much notice of either…

Horrifying results in constituencies actually deep into Labour terrain. Its a pointless exercise in that there is no way of reliably knowing how important the questions are to the respondents . For example the question about Margaret Thatcher’s administration would be answered by people with no recollection of the events and whatever warped view they have vaguely digested its history Against the back ground of Labour plummeting its waiting for Gordot and we all know how that ends …

Meanwhile the Telegraphs ICM Poll shows Labour down to a chorttlesome 28% and enough rank breaking is going to tell us they know the game is up . With the Liberals up at 22% they could beat Labour and Labour and ,like Israel ,Labour can only lose once . It is commonplace that Liberal votes are tactical, but we have not noticed that the Labour Party without anti Conservative votes is a Party whose time has gone , certainly in England .
The Liberal vote by re engaging with the Gladstonian views Margaret Thatcher espoused, has moved right.In fact the Liberals are claiming at least to want to run a lower tax settlement . Naturally no-one believes them but the effort counts for a bit. As blocking the largest single Party will not be possible its is actually their only choice

For the Liberals party it is quite clear that any suggestion they might ally with Labour would be their death in their important Southern seats . I doubt a single MP would survive so they cannot be associated with New Labour . They have in the past proved shall we say , realistic when it comes to getting power…Personally I have find there is reasonable relationship between Liberals and Conservatives . They like to think they are clever but up close and personal they know we defend individual Liberty , and they only sometimes do. They know we have the cojones and defended the individual from the state when they hung on the left`s coat tails

Why not a Liberal Conservative pact ?

The extent to which the Conservative Party is socially Conservative is so attenuated as to scarcely allow a cigarette Paper between it and the average Liberal . Am I socially Conservative ? In many ways they are where the Heathite Conservatives were , and the division is on Europe. I think we can get round that , a lot of Liberals on the ground realise they cannot be the Party of faceless bureaucratic diktats and at the very least this needs rethinking .
Conservatives have taken a pragmatic view and otherwise we seem to have a lot in common. Cameron wants Europe in the long grass and such a score draw is the best the Euro-phile are going to get with the people of Europe losing all interest and any sympathy. Not all Liberals in any case wish to abolish the country and most cannot admit it to voters if they do .Furthermore if they want to get out of their middleclass white ghetto they had better stop being quite as superior about he loyalties felt by ordinary people . I think this is possible .

New Labour in ten years has been a centralising tax raising law making bossy boots of party and its mystery to me that anyone calling themselves Liberal would even consider voting for it .
This could be a time for Liberals to make a choice .Do they hang onto Labour coat-tails and stay a whiney child in the back seat of the car or do they make a bid to overtake Labour . It is quite possible this is the best chance they will ever get.

Events have tempted New labour into a retrain to safe collectivist territory , they have forgotten that this philosophy has few votes in normal times. They have an old socialist Scottish leader who is personally unattractive and gutlessly did not take his best chance . They are about to get the blame for mass unemployment and debt , and they are once again paid for by the Unions . Labour are running scared of the BNP for god’s sake. It is a chance for the Liberal Party if they have the balls Brown has not to break out of the third Party position , even if they only partially achieve this the moment the number of seats is relevant it changes everything .

Sunny Hundall does not want Liberals to notice but the senior Partner is not that senior all of a sudden and while there will always be a few oldsters who like his socialist cabbage soup it is the Liberal Party who have the credentials for the opposition of the next century . Not New Labour . Not Sunny Hundal and not thoe Liberals who are too in awe of Labour to argue their own case.

Go on then John B seriously question it . I `d be interested in your attempt

Sousbois – how am I selectively interpreting it? I’d be interested to hear that…

(John b, don’t bother).

“Lee – the way I read it, it’s actually quite bad for the Tories. The key point in the second question is ‘for political purposes’.”

And if Gordon Brown started talking it down it wouldn’t be for political purposes? It’s a quite tenuous distinction, if you don’t mind me saying.

In fact, even the Tory grassroots don’t have any economic solutions other than ‘do nothing’

You have to laugh at Sunny’s consistency in denying the obvious – that the Labour Party is stealing the policies of the so-called “do-nothing” party and has nothing to offer of its own.

Come on Sunny…surely it’s time for you to wake up. How much does Mandelson pay you to peddle his line?

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1) cannot see why it is looking that the “Tories are going to be in with a big majority next time”
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2) more importantly why does this excellent site not make an attempt at providing a (comprehensive) national narrative – one that the public would be receptive to.
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Think labour is no good with the narrative but is seen as the Big Boys as far as the economy is concerned. i.e that they are perceived as being competent in rectifying problems – even though they may have contributed to them.

.Tories are not bad when it comes to their possible focus on communities. But they do not have any strategic insights when it matters economic and finance. …their fundamental problem though is that they are perceived to be lightweight…..except clarke,Ken. but one person does not make a government.

…liberals are in with a chance of having some role in government, as to what and to what degree depends on how Labour’s narrative and insights evolve.

Diogenes: here is what Cameron said recently about the economy.

Please let me know which bit of that constitutes an original plan to do something about the economy as it stands now.

http://conservativehome.blogs.com/torydiary/2009/02/george-osbornes.html

Shadow Chancellor George Osborne has just been interviewed by Andrew Marr; there were no grand policy announcements, but here’s a run down of the points he was making:

Bonuses for senior management at government backed banks are “simply unacceptable”;
“The party is over for the banks… you can’t go on paying yourself 20 times what a heart surgeon gets”;
He raised the potential for this issue to blow up at the Tory conference last year, but the Government’s attitude is too hand to mouth. There are too many reviews and short-term initiatives. “People want leadership from this Government”;
He wouldn’t rule out printing money – quantative easing – but it is there as a last resort and the fact that it is being thought about is an indication of how the Government’s other economic measures have failed;
The VAT cut was supposed to be the big answer, yet people are lining up to say the Government’s response to the crisis has been inadequate;
The Bank of England made mistakes over the last decade – not spotting the levels of debt building up in the economy, the asset boom, housing inflation – but Gordon Brown was at the wheel of the ship for ten years as Chancellor and shouldn’t be seeking to blame others for the crisis now;
On the Bank of England, appointments to the monetary policy need to be more transparent, the Governor should be appointed for a single fixed term and the Bank should be given greater powers;
On so-called “moral capitalism”, he said that whilst markets are “far better than other systems” when it comes to distributing resources and rewards, they are “a means to and ends” and not the “be-all and end-all” as government needs to address the unfairnesses created by markets.

I’m not repeating anything Mandelson is saying. In fact, the NewLab response at the upper echelons has been equally bereft of a central message. I say that right at the beginning of this post.

Lee: Sure, but I was specifically referring to people’s opinions of Cameron’s response. My feeling is that Brown should come fully clean about the extent of the crisis rather than pretend it will be sorted out soon, because it won’t.

Ash –
1) I think there’s a big Tory majority coming… the polls will move against Labour in the coming year.
2) I plan to do that… you’re right – I need to illustrate what I’m getting at.

I agree with you on what Brown should do, Sunny, it just strikes me that something is wrong with the poll, or people are *that* confused if they think Labour will look better by doing pretty much what Cameron is doing when he states that the economy is shitty, while thinking Cameron is being opportunist by doing so. They really aren’t compatible viewpoints….so it interests me as to how people can seemingly believe both.

lee: my interpretation is that people don’t actually know how bad it’ll get (anyone who says they do is talking nonsense), but that they’re fairly sure that a) Brown will fail to admit the scale of the problem, whatever that scale is, and that b) cameron is an unscrupulous hack who’d say anything for a bost in the polls.

bit confused by newmania’s request, I thought I answered that already in response to bishop hill. anyway… a fiver says that if we have a new tory government with an absolute majority, it will drop none of labour’s database-statery (except id cards – but they are clearly already dead, even if labour wins another term, on sheer technological grounds).

Not sure for whom this is good or bad news, but backs Sunny’s point that the Tory vote is almost as much anti-Labour as pro-Tory, while those (few) who support Labour do so for positive reasons…

http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2009/02/09/is-this-the-polling-that-should-shape-party-strategies/

[28] I have a lot of sympathy with that.

Still, Cameron like Thatcher was elected to his Party’s leadership in order to make a break with the past. Thatcher wasn’t particularly liked until she got into office (or indeed, until she wrapped herself in the flag over the Falklands). She did however have an intellectual base in Hayek, Keith Joseph etc. Cameron doesn’t seem to have one, or at least not one that sets him apart from politicians in other Parties. He will need a coup de théatre (as Thatcher and Blair had) to survive. (What this says about the quality of our public life is just too depressing to go into…)

However, if a Cameron government, even one with a three-figure majority, fails to catch the public mood, it doesn’t follow that Labour, or even the Lib Dems, will be the beneficiary. Labour will be disabled by infighting, both over who did what in office, and by the quality – or lack of – of Ms Harman’s leadership of the Opposition. The Lib Dems have no clear alternative to the ineffective Clegg, other than the veteran Cable.

The political and economic circumastances are ripe for a right-wing populist Party to emerge, building on what UKIP and the BNP have done so far, probably led by a celebrity (Jeremy Clarkson anyone?) and funded by a tax-exile or perhaps a Russian kleptocrat with or without a tame newspaper.

“Ash -
1) I think there’s a big Tory majority coming… the polls will move against Labour in the coming year.
2) I plan to do that… you’re right – I need to illustrate what I’m getting at.”
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think we should more or less forget the opinion polls at the moment…as it (i.e the economic, financial and social crisis) is going to get a lot worse before it gets better. The poll that is worth looking at it is the one which is going to be taken after the true extent of the drastic plight the UK is in becomes clear.

I expect the massive regenerative and also life changing shifts in Britain to be over later this year – by say start Nov!

This gives me some real optimism. When ever I’m out campaigning I always meet other Labour activists who think we can still win; they’re not just saying it, they mean it. Maybe Cameron is only good when he’s using his undoubtedly talented media skills in civil times.The thing about an election campaign is it tends to focus on the issues and expose the candidates’ weaknesses. I’m not gonna bet the house on it, but I certainly don’t think it’s over yet.

[Gordon Brown] can blame American banks… which I also blame [for the crisis]

Sunny, he has.

I suspect, however, that most of the electorate would agree with Kenneth Clarke:

Our present problems were caused by failures on the part of both Government and the private sector. The recession was largely caused by the folly of bankers and the complete failure of the system set up by Gordon Brown to regulate banking and financial services.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/profiles/kenneth-clarke-you-ask-the-questions-1604498.html?utm_source=taomail&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=134+Communication%2C+Mon+9th+Feb+2009&tmtid=1675-134-6-1-944

The Tory party was not running any banks. The Labour party was running the Government. So Labour will inevitably get more of whatever blame is going around.

think labour is more flexible and hence can win (with the help of liberals).

Europe is a killer for the Tories.

It has not emerged as an issue as yet but given that it may be UK’s saviour…

sorry…change Labour can win to

Labour will win.

Europe is killer for the Tories? You mean the only party that actually courts the mainstream opinion that “EU is bad”? Not that I agree with them, but the EU and British opposition to it, especially during hard economic times, is a reason people will be voting with them, not against them.

Europe is killer for the Tories? You mean the only party that actually courts the mainstream opinion that “EU is bad”? Not that I agree with them, but the EU and British opposition to it, especially during hard economic times, is a reason people will be voting with them, not against them.
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well, if there is stiimulus in the UK like the US which creates loads of job which the voters would want….

the government is going to be able to sell it’s new debt – as that would be required to create all those jobs.

and who will be most receptive to buying this debt – the Eurozone?

ash, it’s very sweet but you’re both overestimating the perceptions of the public and the ability for this government to have visibly turned enough around by the time an election campaign starts. Europe is, and will be for some time, a nasty word for the electorate at large..whether we like it or not. If Labour even think of trying to win an election on the issue of Europe then we know they have lost the plot, as they have no narrative the public wishes to hear after the referendum debacle. The Tories on the other hand know that issue is their strength.

So I repeat, Europe is not a killer for the Tories, far from it.

The Tory party was not running any banks. The Labour party was running the Government. So Labour will inevitably get more of whatever blame is going around.

Not necessarily. And the polls don’t indicate people are blaming the government for what went wrong.

Just because Labour was running the govt doesn’t mean it was its duty to judge the risk of the assets that were being sold and re-sold. They didn’t regulate adequately, that they can be blamed for. but it’s not like the Tories were calling for any of that.

They’re all to blame. The question is – what can be done now?

Free banking! Non-statutory currencies! Now is the time to start pushing a radical agenda for decentralising economic power. It is not just wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists suggesting this either. Demos was talking about this sort of thing years ago: http://www.demos.co.uk/publications/opensourcedemocracy2

ash, it’s very sweet but you’re both overestimating the perceptions of the public and the ability for this government to have visibly turned enough around by the time an election campaign starts. Europe is, and will be for some time, a nasty word for the electorate at large..whether we like it or not. If Labour even think of trying to win an election on the issue of Europe then we know they have lost the plot, as they have no narrative the public wishes to hear after the referendum debacle. The Tories on the other hand know that issue is their strength.

thanks.

think the brits are a pragmatic lot. and that will be at the heart of success at the election.

The jobs in the communities as a result of a large stimulus accompanied by greater control of decentralised budgets will give ‘em more control,

the price for this being the E word. but that itself may get restructured. for instance E3. a unit compromising France Germany and us.

We are all aware the Germany has a surplus. and a healthy one too.

carrot one – jobs.
carrot two – jobs in the community
carrot 3 – control of decentralised budgets

Bitter chilli – some loss of nationhood to a bigger entity, comprising atleast one country who the Brits would rather avoid.

Ref comment 33

Absolutely correct. the press over the past week have been banging on about the role of the bankers in all this.

As Mr Clarke points out the fault must rest with the government of the day’s complete inability (or worse unwilligness) to regulate the sector.

I can remember as a young man studying for my Bar Finals at Lincoln’s Inn in the early 90′s seeing the “show trial” before a Parliamentry Select Committee of the Maxwell brothers in the wake of their father’s death.

Broadcast live on television it was a disgracesful example of MP’s justifying their existance ” by bolting the door after the horse had gone.” The exercise said more about the failure of the government of the day than it did about any supposed guilt on the part of the Maxwell brothers.

I make this statement for two reasons

1. It was a classic example of trial by media that’s prejuducial effect on any subsequent due process proceedings the Maxwells would and indeed did have to undergo far outweight its usefulness as an exercise in informing the public. The only purpose it was serving was to “reasure the public” that our Honourable and right Honourable friends were responding.
The reality of course was if they had done their job in the first place the situation may have been avoided.

2. Yesterday’s news or this weeks media circus? This week has seen key players in the banking sector, called to account for their behaviour. Because they are at fault ? They have caused the crisis?

Permit me to digress with a story.

Lets forget for a moment what the current new labour government of over 10 years has failed to do. Lets remeber some of the great summits of human acheivement they have effortlessly brought about by the skillfull use of one of the most precious comodities this nation still has and hopefully will despite their efforts to have; Parliamentry Debating Time.

I refer to that monumentous legislative acheivement that was the ban on fox hunting.

So lets take the veiw of the hounds. Here we are on a wonderful frosty but sunny morning in Cheshire or Leicestershire out doing what comes naturally to us. However today is different . We are no longer hunting hounds selectively bred over generations to control a pest with no natural preditor and provide support to a rural way of life that has existed for centuries providing employment etc. No we are now new labour hounds. Politically Correct champion’s of social justice hounds’
that of course is if your a fox. if your a member of a failing countryside economy you might take a different view of course. But hey calm down we nolonger offend the delicate sensibilities of the restaurant customers of Islington as they sip fine wine and tuck into their Tuscan Rabbit.

And lets not forget our new re-employment programme under a government initiative- New deal for hounds -drag hunting.

Oh come on it makes perfect sense. It keeps us in pedigree chum and so what if its impossible to police. Of course when we are going full tilt after the drag cent and by unhappy coincidence one of the team unearths a real fox of course we ignore it. It never occurs to us to let 1,000 years of breeding, instinct and trianing to kick in and ravage poor old Volpus in the heat of the chase.

Now lets take the view of the Bankers. Doing alright thanks Jack, excellent package and bonus on the way, provided we run the bank okay. You want to lend money? Of course you can! how much? What do you me how much will we lend you and how much do we think you can afford to pay back? Ha Ha Ha bless you sir, we dont work like that any more thats so 1980′s. You tell us what you want and don’t forget you need it now. Its not for a holidays or home imrovements any more, its to pay your inflated utility bills and buy your groceries sir, helping you survive. Sign here!

This government tried to protect the Fox under a misguided wave of popularist vote wining public relations exercise that was clearly a priority in a country that was still failing a generation of children in terms of eductation and welfare.

While necessary regulation and legislation was simplly not carried out for reasons that will remain unknow to the generation that it effects until that generation and its children are too old to care.

i will repeat that the solution is quite simple.

As a lawyer by qualification and as and Englishman by birth I am a true supporter of Parilamentry Democracy as it should opperate. goeverment should have the freedon to act as it see fit ONLY WITH THE CONSENT OF THE PEOPLE AND UNDER THE LAW.

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