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01/05/2010

The Labour MP campaigning in a life jacket

The Labour MP for Bristol East, Kerry McCarthy, is her party's so-called "Twitter Tsar" and is the subject of a web-based campaign to unseat her, KerryOut, organised by Tory Bear and others.

She is facing a strong challenge in the seat from Conservative candidate Adeela Shafi, and she now appears to be reinforcing her electoral vulnerability: Ms McCarthy chose to don a life jacket for the posed photograph posted on her Facebook re-election page...

Picture 9 

1.45pm update: Someone finally spotted the gaffe...

Picture 13
Jonathan Isaby

Posted at 12:15 PM in Light relief | | Comments (19)

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Nick Clegg is Gordon Brown's only hope

CleggBrownOne of the biggest themes of the new year has been Labour overtures to the Liberal Democrats. While the Tories hope to govern on their own the only realistic hope of Labour staying in power is a coalition with the Liberal Democrats.

As Paul Goodman has already written, every wavering Tory voter needs to know that a vote for the Liberal Democrats may let Labour in by the backdoor.

On this morning's Today programme Nick Clegg was quick to attack the Conservatives (unfairly parroting the Labour line that Tory policy favours the wealthy).

Screen shot 2010-01-05 at 07.42.16It is the natural instinct of Liberal Democrats to favour Labour.  Surveys reported in this morning's Independent confirms that:

"Mr Clegg would have to win approval for his tactics from senior colleagues and a special conference of rank-and-file party members. Their centre-left sympathies were made clear in a poll last week which asked activists to choose between Mr Brown and Mr Cameron for Prime Minister after the election. Their verdict was definitive: 58 per cent named the Tory leader as the worst option, with 42 per cent for Mr Brown. The result mirrored a poll of Liberal Democrat councillors in the autumn, when nearly twice as many said they would like their party to support Labour (31 per cent) in a hung Parliament against just 16 per cent for the Tories."

Tim Montgomerie

Posted at 08:12 AM in Labour tactics and strategy, Liberal Democrats | | Comments (51)

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01/04/2010

Meet the Left-wing blogger who says "we have no alternative" but to support the right of Islam4UK to march through Wootton Bassett

Picture 7 Here's an extract from a post from Dave Osler which was also cross-posted at Liberal Conspiracy this afternoon:

"...This move is an obvious provocation from what is effectively a front organisation for banned Islamist faction Al Muhajiroun, who are manifestly not peaceniks of any description.

"It has been suggested that the announcement is simply a stunt on the part of the publicity-savvy Mr Choudary, and I very much hope that is the case. If it goes ahead, it will inevitably generate a huge counter-mobilisation likely to boost the fortunes of the fascist British National Party ahead of an impending general election. Choudary either does not care about this, or positively relishes the prospect.

"All of this leaves the principled humanist secular left with a huge headache. After all, if we do not uphold the elementary argument for freedom of speech, who will? So here we are, forced to extend our efforts in support of a manifestation of execrable religious bigotry. It is an obvious sucker punch, and we can even see it coming, but we have no alternative but to walk straight into it."

Shadow Home Secretary Chris Grayling made clear his opposition to the march earlier today.

Posted at 04:38 PM in The Left on the Web | | Comments (52)

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Exposing the lies in Labour's claims about Conservative spending pledges

Scroll down for the update with the official Conservative rebuttal of Labour's claims

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DARLING ALISTAIR 2

Alistair Darling today published a Labour Party document suggesting that there was a £34 billion "black hole" in Conservative spending plans, claiming to have assessed the cost of all Conservative policies.

I'm not sure who would want to take lessons in Maths from this Government given the parlous state of the country's finances, and needless to say, the claims are already being disputed - and not just by Conservative politicians.

The Spectator's James Forysth says that the Tories have branded it "a 'dodgy dossier' full of lies" and highlights several untruths on which it is based:

"The document says the Tories would let married couples transfer their tax allowances, when they haven’t committed to that.

"It also claims that the Tories are pledged to abolishing the 50p rate before the end of the parliament which the Tories are not." 

The Times's Sam Coates also picks up on the supposed 50p rate abolition, which Labour claimed accounts for £2.4 billion of the "black hole", and adds:

"The document also suggests that the Tories have committed themselves to avoiding the 1p increase in National Insurance, which would cost £7.17 billion in 2014/15 - which they have not. George Osborne has made it clear he really wants to promise this - but he will not do so until specific savings have been identified to pay for it.

"Secondly, you cannot necessarily trust the Treasury costings - not because the Treasury get it wrong, but because the assumptions they are directed to use may not mirror the same assumptions as the Tories."

I'll add more details as and when they emerge.

2pm update:

 Andrew Lilico, Chief Economist at Policy Exchange, offers these thoughts:

Continue reading "Exposing the lies in Labour's claims about Conservative spending pledges " »

Posted at 01:12 PM in Labour lies | | Comments (16)

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Disgraced Labour MPs seek to use 1689 Bill of Rights to avoid prosecution over expense claims

This is according to the Telegraph:

"MPs who are being investigated for expenses fraud are trying to argue a case that they are protected by the 300-year-old Bill of Rights that gives MPs Parliamentary privilege. Lawyers for the MPs are looking at whether the 1689 act could protect them from prosecution.

"If the Commons rule book, which has for years governed the expenses claims of MPs, is found to be covered by privilege then it could severely hamper attempts by prosecutors to bring MPs to court. MPs rely on privilege to remain immune from prosecution when they raise contentious matters in the Commons.

"Elliot Morley, the former Labour minister, and David Chaytor, a Labour backbencher, are being investigated by Scotland Yard for claiming expenses for mortgages that no longer existed. Jim Devine, another Labour backbencher, is also being investigated by detectives. He is alleged to have claimed £2,157 for rewiring his taxpayer-funded London flat using a receipt bearing an invalid VAT number and incorrect details of a firm.

"The three MPs are using the Labour Party’s lawyers, Steel & Shamash, although they are footing the bill themselves. The firm has confirmed that it has instructed QCs to look at whether Mr Morley, Mr Chaytor and Mr Devine are protected by Parliamentary privilege."

The trio have already been forced to announce their retirements from the Commons at the general election, but it would surely be a travesty of justice if they were able to hide behind the Bill of Rights to escape prosecution in this way.

The paper also reports that of the 400 MPs been asked to pay back money by Sir Thomas Legg, about a quarter are currently appealing against the demand. 

Jonathan Isaby

Posted at 11:47 AM in Dirty Tricks Labour | | Comments (10)

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Lib Dem candidate condemned for "sexually gratuitous" and "outrageously rude" attacks on political opponents

Picture 12 The Lib Dems' claim to be all sweetness and light when it comes to electioneering have long been in doubt. The party's own campaign manual states that positive campaigning is not enough to win elections and that candidates should "be wicked, act shamelessly, stir endlessly."

And over the Christmas period, the antics of Greg Stone, the Lib Dem candidate for Newcastle East, have been brought to national prominence.

As reported in the Telegraph, Stone has been using a pseudonym to post disparaging comments of an extremely personal nature about a series of Conservative and Labour MPs on the Guido Fawkes blog.

The Conservative candidate for Newcastle East, Dominic Llewellyn, condemned Stone in an open letter on his blog:

"I am standing for Parliament because I care deeply about the city and the nation we both live in. Far from engaging people in a positive vision of how you want to change this country for the better, your comments were sexually gratuitous at times and outrageously rude at others. They are precisely the type of comments which turn people off politics and they do not represent the values which I stand for: personal freedom, a commitment to the environment and a desire to protect the most vulnerable at home and abroad."

Stone has since been forced to apologise for his remarks and his comments have also been condemned by the Lib Dem leader of Newcastle Council as "entirely inappropriate".

Jonathan Isaby

Posted at 07:05 AM in Liberal Democrats | | Comments (15)

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01/03/2010

'Five ways Gordon Brown can still win'

Only 1% of Tory members think Brown can win a majority at the next General Election but The Sunday Mirror gave a spread to five Labour sympathisers today for them to recommend a rescue strategy for the party:

  1. Former Blair adviser Lance Price suggests that Brown emphasises full employment. The Conservatives "have always used high unemployment as an economic weapon," he writes and Labour should say that you might not fly as high with us but you'll be safe from the insecurity and risk of a Tory world.
  2. Progress' Jessica Asato suggests that Brown hires John Major's 1992 soapbox: "Politics went badly astray in 2009. We need some old-fashioned stump speeches and a sense that Gordon is prepared to take the public's anger on the chin."
  3. Peter Kellner says that unless people think Labour has been successful they won't believe they can deliver for the future: "Labour has introduced Sure Start, the minimum wage, tax credits, Freedom of Information, devolution, free museum entry and NHS Direct - but the party has gained little credit for such achievements... If and when Labour regains its reputation as the caring party, your plans for the next five years will stand some chance of being heard - and believed."
  4. The New Statesman's Jason Cowley urges attacks on the people behind David Cameron: "With the exception of David Cameron, the Tory front bench is unimpressive - and geeky. Cameron, Osborne, Gove, Grayling: these guys have run nothing and have little experience of the world beyond Westminster, as revealed by their poor judgement calls throughout the economic crisis." This morning's Independent on Sunday suggested that Labour strategists had identified George Osborne as the weak link in the Conservative team.
  5. Wolverhampton NE Labour candidate Emma Reynolds came closest to arguing for the class war strategy favoured by Ed Balls: "Gordon is rightly focusing on the threat that savage Tory cuts would have on families, jobs and businesses. He should continue to emphasise the class bias of the proposed Tory tax policies. This is not "class war", but an identification of who wins and who loses."

Read the full ideas in The Sunday Mirror.

Tim Montgomerie

Posted at 04:06 PM in Labour tactics and strategy | | Comments (33)

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01/02/2010

Polly Toynbee's warning to Labour: Get rid of Brown or you are toast

The year isn't 48 hours old and two Labour MPs - Barry Sheerman and Greg Pope - have called on Brown to go.

Polly Toynbee uses her first Guardian column of the year to slam Gordon Brown's record and to predict defeat if he stays as Labour leader:

"There is nothing to celebrate in the dismal year ahead. The Labour party is sledging down a black run, eyes tight shut, the only certainty the electoral wall at the bottom of the hill....

The delusional tone of Gordon Brown's new year message says it all: "I believe we can create a new decade of prosperity with opportunities fairly shared amongst those who work hard and play by the rules." Just about every word of this raises questions about his record that he can never answer: GDP has fallen by 5% in the last year, taking us back to 2005; growth in his time was profoundly unfairly shared – over half the population saw virtually no growth at all; GDP per capita is a fraudulent measure that disguises how almost all growth went to the top 10%, and most to the top 1% – while he and Tony Blair did no more than see that the back half didn't fall too far behind...

The cabinet is frozen by individual self-interest – shame on all of them. They want Brown gone, but none dares wield the knife without the others... The country doesn't much like the Conservatives, but voters will throw Gordon Brown out – unless Labour does first."

Posted at 07:51 AM in Gordon Brown, PollyWatch | | Comments (17)

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12/31/2009

Sunny Hundal celebrates Rush Limbaugh's hospitalisation

Screen shot 2009-12-31 at 07.28.24The above Tweet from Sunny Hundal is typical of the ugliness of his Liberal Conspiracy website. It's not the first time it has celebrated something bad happening to a centre right personality.

Responding to the recent very brutal attack on the Silvio Berlusconi their blogger Unity posted a YouTube clip of the attack. The full text of the post was: "Obviously one should never condone the use of violence against anyone, least of all man in his seventies... But – be honest – given a clear shot, you would… wouldn’t you?"

'Sunny H' himself commented:

Screen shot 2009-12-31 at 08.53.38 There follows a long discussion about whether it is appropriate and tasteful to respond in this way, of whether celebrating Thatcher's death is a good idea and the like. We are going to see the very worst of the Left when (and I hope it's some time away) Lady Thatcher dies.

Blogs cannot always be responsible for their comments but they can be responsible for their approved authors like Unity.

Here's another of Unity's posts:

"In 1983, 62% said that they thought that sexual relations between adults of the same sex were wrong. Today that figure has fallen to 34% and if, as the evidence for religious belief suggests, difference in attitudes between generations account for most of the change then, even though its not as good as it might be, there ís probably nothing much that couldn't be quickly sorted out with a decent flu pandemic."

Such hymns of hate speak for themselves.

Tim Montgomerie

Posted at 09:02 AM in The Left on the Web | | Comments (27)

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Brown spends more on spin than Blair

Screen shot 2009-12-31 at 07.35.45The Telegraph reports that "the Government’s annual PR bill is now approaching a quarter of a billion pounds a year, despite the pledge by Gordon Brown when he came to power in June 2007 to deliver the “end of spin” and a “new type of politics"." This spin bill comes on the top of the return of spinmeister general, Alastair Campbell.

Conservative frontbencher Nick Hurd MP told The Telegraph:

“Gordon Brown’s promise of the end of spin has been exposed as a sham. He now spends more taxpayers’ money on spin than Tony Blair. Labour has bankrolled a vast spin machine, politicised the civil service and created a corrosive culture of deception at the heart of Whitehall. Instead of spending the public’s money on front line services, a quarter of a billion pounds a year is now spent on the wages of spin under Brown.”

Tim Montgomerie

Posted at 07:40 AM in Gordon Brown, Waste, waste and waste | | Comments (0)

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