Conservative Future force YouTube to pull video (updated)
What does Conservative Future have to hide? A new video by the free online magazine Don’t Panic, on CF, was forcibly pulled by the latter off YouTube “due to a copyright claim”.
(video now below)
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Today programme gives Dorries free ride over plot
The Today programme was accused of giving Tory MP Nadine Dorries a free ride on Tuesday regarding the new speaker John Bercow.
A reader wrote in to Liberal Conspiracy to say she had sent a complaint to the programme after John Humphrys interviewed Dorries on Tuesday. In his preamble to Vernon Bogdanor interview, just after his Nadine Dorries interview at the 8.10am slot, he said that there was talk of MPs wanting to unseat the new Speaker, but Nadine Dorries was “not part of that”.
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Bercow is new Speaker
John Bercow has been elected to the office of Speaker of the House of Commons after defeating Sir George Young in the final round of voting by 322 votes to 271.
Sunny adds: I’m pleased for two reasons. First – Bercow was the rare sane voice on the Tory side on the HFE bill last year. Second, because it looks like all that frantic briefing against Bercow by Nadine Dorries MP, Iain Dale and Guido Fawkes had no impact and perhaps even strengthened him. Brilliant result.
It’s not just the message, Gordon.
Michael Ellam, the current spokesman to Gordon Brown, declared the news on Tuesday that he is being replaced by Simon Lewis – the former spokesperson to the Queen. Good communications with the public is the sine qua non for an incumbent whose party’s latest ICM polls show that they are 15% behind the main opposition on the question of cleaning up the political system.
But communications is not the sum total of Brown’s problems.
On Sunday morning I thought everything would be OK. I had started to read the Observer and on the inlay page saw that Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman had told Will Hutton in an interview that the UK economy was the best in Europe, and that not only are we seeing off the last dregs of the financial crisis, but Brown and Darling may well have beaten the city analysts predictions of long turmoil.
Well, I thought, aren’t we glad that the rebels bailed out last minute, that Blears apologised for leaving the way she did, that Miliband had a change of heart 9 days previous, and that despite all its talk, Compass effectively did nothing to start a ruckus with the right wing of the Labour Party.
Are UKIP and the BNP Blair’s ideological legacy?
Tony Blair built his success on neutralising ideological debate. The New Labour project, which is now in collapse, had two aspects and one purpose: to steal the Conservatives’ clothes, to strip Labour of its ideological commitments, and to do it all in the pursuit of power.
As Blair put it himself: “I have taken from my party everything they thought they believed in, I have stripped them of their core beliefs. What keeps them together is success and power”. (Andrew Rawnsely, Servants of the People pg 195).
But the New Labour project didn’t just strip Labour of its ideology and wrong-foot the Tories to generate electoral success. It re-defined the nature of political success as occupation of the centre ground via a deliberately non-ideologically appeal to vague notions of a “Third Way”, or “community” or “progressivism”. In the process, New Labour stripped the other main parties of their ideology too.
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Euroelections: 1994 and now
Remember the factional disarray that beset Conservative governments in the early 1990s, as Labour supporters gleefully watched the Major administrations unravel before our very eyes?
I can’t help being struck by the parallels between the political climate then and now. Except that this time round, Labour is the butt of the joke and it is the Tories that require a continuous supply of dry underwear.
One obvious comparison is the state of the UK economy, which had undergone serious turbulence in the preceding two years, as a result of the unconstrained financial markets that Thatcherism deified and the Labourism of the period still half-heartedly contemplated reining in.
Their shameless hunger for power
post by Elle Dodd
Caroline Spellman was speaking on radio 4 this morning. I can’t find the exact quote but she said something like, it’s great that Tories are winning in the Midlands and the North because they are the battlegrounds.
We all know what she meant: the lower classes in the industrial towns have not been known to vote Tory, and now they are, that makes a Tory victory at a General Election more likely. An analysis that is hard not to agree with. But something about it really struck home how power hungry and goal driven politicians have become.
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Will Cameron’s words come back to bite him?
Bob Piper says:
It is not good enough for Members of Parliament to say, “What I did was within the rules”… David Cameron to Adam Boulton… presumably recorded before this story hit the news stands.The Conservative Party response was entirely predictable. Apparently, what Cameron did was “entirely within the rules.”
What’s unsurprising about the revelations around David Cameron’s tax-payer funded mortgage is that all the right-wing bloggers, including Guido Fawkes, are either playing silent or excusing it. What’s more surprising is that the Guardian, which has desperately been trying to charm Cameron, is completely downplaying the story; it’s not even on the front page.
Cameron now says he’s ready to repay it back. But why would you do that if you were within the rules? Let’s wait and see if all those calling for the heads of Labour cabinet ministers (incl myself) will also apply the same standards to Cameron. Somehow I doubt it.
(PS – Alastair Darling should go to, for removal of any doubt)
The other kind of Tory housing…
A bit more about the realities of evil Tories on the ground, as we prepare to be governed by them:
Parked high outside Hendon Town Hall is one of those wretchedly dated revolving billboards that councils use to spam the masses with unsubstantiated PR bilge: at various turns of the loop, this one proclaims that the Tory Barnet council is ‘working for a healthy community,’ and ’supporting the vulnerable to live independent and active lives,’ and screeds of other modernisation tripe.
All is not lost, though. There is this evening a nice, large protest group under the billboard – a protest group that is made up of exactly the vulnerable Barnet residents that the council purports to so fervidly support.
These protestors are very pissed off. They are Barnet sheltered housing residents, and they’re picketing this evening’s Barnet council annual meeting to protest at a council proposal to remove permanent on-site wardens (people who help in emergencies, organise GP visits and appointments, and check in with each resident at least once a day) from their sheltered housing blocks and replace the wardens with a ‘floating’ support service, whatever the hell that is. They’re mostly very elderly (in their 80s and even 90s) and at that unlovely point in life where people become too frail to stand. They’re huddled in wheelchairs, or clutching walking-frames, or leaning on carers and chairs.
They’re not too sure what a ‘floating’ support service is, either. The cynics among them have a few ideas – they imagine a system where residents telepathically trip some alarm when dropping dead from heart attack, thus alerting a random officer somewhere in the borough to stop by later on with a shovel.
I understand – kind of – the term ‘floating service’ to mean a support officer of some stripe will stop a various housing blocks across the borough, to meet briefly with anyone who needs – well, supporting.
Bill Campbell, Barnet council’s unnaturally oily senior press creature, refused point-blank to say what a floating service was when I told him that I didn’t quite grasp the idea – Campbell said he couldn’t say what a floating service was until the cabinet voted for or against the concept at its 8 June meeting. I said that someone must know what a floating service was, if only to be in a position to put the concept of it before the cabinet. Campbell said again that he couldn’t say what the concept would be. I thought probably somebody could. This went on for longer than was strictly fascinating. Suffice to say a floating service is not one the council wants to brag about. Let’s return on 8 June. continue reading… »
Cameron giving power to the people? Yeah right
Few revolutionary slogans are ever successfully transformed into singalong top twenty singles. But that’s the trick John Lennon pulled off with his 1971 hit ‘Power to the People’. Let’s face it, ‘Communism is Soviet Power Plus Electrification’ just doesn’t scan in quite the same way.
The title of Lennon’s ditty subsequently become the catchphrase of Wolfie Smith, leader of a small microsect in BBC comedy series that effectively satirised the far left, at a time when it did not send itself up quite as comprehensively as it manages today.
How and why the flame thence passed from Wolfie to David Cameron is beyond me. But when the leader of the Conservative Party starts promising to implement the principle demand of a seventies sitcom revolutionary, laughter is still the only tenable immediate reaction.
List of MPs who’ve stepped down (so far, updated)
Last Update: 1st July 2009
I’ve compiled a list of MPs who have announced their intention to resign, so far. A union leader today said around 50 Labour MPs should stand down by the end, so this list will no doubt continue to be updated as and when.
Most of the scalps so far have been Conservative, thanks to their headline-grabbing gaffes.
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How many houses does Cameron own?
According to Johann Hari:
A few days ago, the Lader of the Opposition was asked how many homes he owns. “I own a house in North Kensington and… in the constituency in Oxfordshire and that is, as far as I know, all I have,” he said.
He then started to get confused, said he might own four homes after all, and pleaded: “Do not make me sound like a prat for not knowing how many houses I’ve got.”
Are there any other sources for this?
Who is the government really listening to?
Wow. Strong words from David Cameron yesterday. Only six years after a national poll found that over half of us felt we had “no say over what government does”, he’s today calling for “the redistribution of power from the powerful to the powerless”.
“Through decentralisation, transparency and accountability we must take power from the elite and hand it to the man and woman in the street,” he said. But why do we feel excluded from politics?
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Cameron promises sweeping parliamentary reforms
The Guardian today features an article by Cameron promising sweeing reforms of Parliament. An accompanying story states:
In a broad-ranging article in the Guardian, Cameron declares that he would trim back the powers of the prime minister and boost the role of parliament to win back public confidence.
Here are those reforms in brief:
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Can this man unseat Nadine Dorries?
Will it take one airhead wannabe celeb to unseat another? The Independent and Sky News are reporting that “former pop singer and reality TV star” David Van Day is exploring the possibility of standing against Mid-Bedfordshire MP Nadine Dorries. The Indy reminds readers:
The Tory MP is said to have claimed for a New Year’s Eve hotel room and a second home allowance while only having one home. She also got taxpayers to foot the bill for a lost £2,190 deposit on a rented flat, the Daily Telegraph reported
According to news reports he plans to visit her constituency under the ‘No Expenses Party’ banner and find out if residents are receptive. We wish him all the best. Anyone who can raise awareness of Dorries’ comments and expenses is more than welcome to do so. Last week Ms Dorries also said Trident was not a weapon of mass destruction.
Anyone else willing to join the fray? After all, they’re only responding to David Cameron’s call.
Sunny adds: Nadine Dorries’ blog is back up, and fully re-worked. It looks like her blog was down so it could be upgraded, rather than libel reasons (which have not been mentioned on her blog).
Tory Wintertons jump before being pushed
From the Telegraph:
Sir Nicholas and Ann Winterton, the Conservative MPs, are to resign from parliament at the next election. The couple will not run for re-election as the MPs for Macclesfield and Congleton.
…
Their decision comes after the Telegraph disclosed that they claimed more than £80,000 in rent for a small London flat that was owned by a trust controlled by their children. Expenses submitted by Sir Nicholas show he claimed for £41,508 in rent. His wife’s claims amounted to £41,584.
Couldn’t happen to a nicer couple.
Time for an Election
The papers today are carrying stories stating that a clear majority of the public want an early general election. This is of course completely unsurprising in light of the avalanche of scandal that there has been over recent weeks, and the pathetic reaction of MPs to it. People want to exercise the one democratic control that they have over their politicians – the right to throw them out at the ballot box.
What has been surprising though, is the reaction of the liberal political classes to the call. Yasmin Alibhai-Brown’s performance on Thursday’s Question Time was a case in point. Not only did she oppose calling an election, she did so on the grounds that such was people’s “anger”, they might “vote to spite”, and return BNP MPs to Westminster!
It is, of course, highly unlikely that the fascists could corral enough votes even in their strongest Westminster constituency to win an FPTP election. But even that isn’t really the point.
Cameron tells Dorries to shut up (updated)
Further to Unity’s post earlier, this storm gets better by the hour. David Cameron has now had to publicly rebuke ‘high-flying Tory’ Nadine Dorries for her “witch-hunt” comments.
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MPs expenses now a PR disaster for Cameron
» Tory MP Anthony Steen’s don’t be hating on my MTV cribs tirade is all over the papers today (BBC, Guardian, Telegraph, Daily Mail, Independent, Sun (twice). It’s a PR disaster for David Cameron – a day after a duck adorned the Telegraph’s front page.
This may turn into a bigger headache for Cameron than he initially expected because things like moats, duck ponds and “my big house” stick in people’s minds better than flipping of houses. Secondly, it’s class-warfare at it’s best isn’t it? You don’t have to raise the 50p tax and wait for the Tory pips to squeak. Now people can just tell how removed Tories are from ordinary life by the size of their moats, duck-ponds and houses. I suspect the best Labour election poster at this stage would be the one that says ‘quack quack’.
» One aspect of media coverage continues to trouble me, and I’m glad Toby Helm @ Guardian blog brought it up: What’s the difference between Hazel Blears and James Purnell?. If Brown can get rid of James Pernicious (thanks commenters!) then things might even start looking up for New Labour. Though Blears’ allies are fighting back. I suspect this is going to turn into a full-blown civil war.
» Meanwhile, it looks like Margaret Moran is becoming a huge liability for Labour.
» Collared by the Telegraph today: Tory MP Peter Luff and Labour MP Ian Gibson. Plus, John Bercow faces questions over his expenses claims after he “flipped” his second home from his constituency to a £540,000 flat in London and claimed the maximum possible allowances.
Tory MP Steen: People are just jealous of my large pad
Tory MP Anthony Steen today said the negative reaction to his expense claim for the felling of trees was down to “jealousy”, and added that the details of his expenses should never have been published.
He said, “I think I behaved impeccably”, and added that the reaction to his claim was down to jealousy, because, “I’ve got a very very large house. It’s not particularly attractive…it does me nicely”.
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You can read articles through the front page, via Twitter or rss feeds.
» How bad is the feline obesity crisis?
» Why don’t MPs pay back tuition fees instead of increasing ours?
» Obama is right to slam BP – and why capitalists should too
» Why does Phillip Blond see civic cohesion as a security issue?
» So what if the Labour candidates went to Oxbridge?
» Last night’s Labour hustings: will it get interesting or turn to torture?
» It’s now down to Ken to win London for Labour
» The Labour people need
» Blog Nation: what would you like to see discussed?
» The Labour leadership’s token contender.. and it’s not Diane Abbott
» In defence of these fraternal nominations
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