I was curious…
It would never have happened under Charlie Kennedy
Category Archives: Politics
Conference ’09 – pitchside reports – Sunday
First things first. I’m not staying in Brighton this year. I booked my conference tickets late and affordable accommodation was hard to come by. I’d also set my heart on camping after a number of excellent camping holidays since we went to Glastonbury.
However… it turns out that one doesn’t camp in Brighton – obviously not the done thing – and the one camp site close to the town has it’s tent field closed during conference week.
So, I had to look around and found a place down the coast in Seaford – quite a distance from Brighton, but on a train line and (crucially) with a relatively late service during the week. So you find me sat outside the tent at 11pm; above me a clear night sky with the stars nearly as bright as when we were in the Lake District, and the sound of the sea (I’m about 100 yds from the beach). Lily and Joel would be so jealous.
I wouldn’t call it ideal, but it’s probably saved me in the region of £600-ish. Plus I’ve done the ‘staying-in-the-bar-till-5am’ thing, and I don’t really fancy it this year. Too many things to do.
There isn’t too much to report today. The approach to Brighton was weird. I’d driven down so that I could bring the tent and I was interested to see that there were no signs on the A23 referring to conference. The last time I drove down to Brighton was when we lived in Twickenham, and there were banners on every bridge by the Countryside Alliance and other not-terribly-supportive groups. This
year there was nothing, just a poster by the Green party slagging off Labour between the train station and the conference centre. Ironically mostly hidden by a tree until you get close to it.
I assume that means that the likes of the Countryside Alliance have decided to stop campaigning because they assume that Cameron will give them back their hunts, slave wages, trespass laws and gun-totin-freedoms should he win the next General Election.
After quickly pitching the tent, I arrived in Brighton just in time for the North West reception and to catch up with some comrades who I’ve known for some years now.
One of the sad things about the Constituency Party not being active any more is that you miss the occasions to meet up with activists from neighbouring constituencies.
About half way through Gordon and Sarah Brown came in and gave a speech. I can’t help but feel for them (and to a lesser extent Harriet Harman). The whole conference week seems to be a rush from one gathering to another, saying basically the same thing in each meeting to rally the troops. Despite that, Brown’s speech was fine.
Better fun was meeting up with @msgracefm, @LaurenceDurnan and others from the Blackburn contingency (I’m told it’s the largest constituency group from the NW). We went for fish and chips, discussed blogging (local vs national) and android vs windows vs blackberry phone platforms – at which point Grace adopted a look similar to our Jude when I start talking about android vs windows vs iphone
platforms.
Yvette Cooper gave a lovely speech at the Young Labour reception which I was generously allowed into. It’s hard to believe that most of the people in that
room were in juniors or just starting secondary school when Labour won in 1997. Yvette managed to remind everyone of the grim days under Major without sounding patronising – a work of brilliance if you ask me – but then I wasn’t the target audience.
And so back to the tent. I didn’t do the things that I had planned (Compass rally in the evening followed by Welsh night or something like that), but much more fun and gossip-ey.
Tomorrow looks like it’ll be interesting. So I’m going to call it a day and climb into the sleeping bag. I might just stare at the stars for five more minutes though. You don’t get a view like that from a B&B room.
Euro-vote-match, erm, I’m almost a LibDem it seems
I tried out the questions at votematch – which helpfully tells me who I should vote for in the European elections on Thursday.
Putting aside the fact that I returned my postal vote yesterday, my results were:
Labour Party 49/74 Liberal Democrats 49/74 Green Party 44/74 Conservative Party 38/74 Krishnamurty Tayya (Jury Team) 26/74
Not too surprisingly, on European issues it seems that both the Lib Dems and Labour reflect how I feel. Looking at the analysis, it seems that the result is partly influenced by the fact that I think ISP’s shouldn’t be allowed to package up the internet into “channels” – going against the whole _point_ of the internet, and mainly a result of lobbying from BT, et.al.
I’d recommend giving it a go, if only because it forces one to think about the issues at a European level. Shame there isn’t one for County Council elections.
Ian McCartney standing down
I just read that Ian McCartney is standing down at the next election. A sad day, indeed. I’ll always have a soft-spot for him – he was the first MP that I voted for when I was young and about to head off to Uni (I think it was the first time he stood for Makerfield) Indeed the Makerfield constituency takes in Abram, where I went to nursery, Platt Bridge, where I went to primary school; Ashton where I went to secondary school and Orrell where I went to sixth form!
He has been a brilliant advocate for my mum’s basic skills organisation (Working Wonders) and I’m sure for other groups working in his constituency.
I wish him the very best.
Lies, damned lies and expenses
There is nothing good so far from the expenses scandal that has overwhelmed politics over the past week. I’ve avoided blogging anything since there have been many many articles and blog posts about it. However, the reaction on the doorstep can’t be ignored.
I’ve been out canvassing most days since I was selected in February. Mostly people have been concerned about what is happening in Ormskirk: the decline of the market town, the local road system, pensioners travel passes, lack of free swimming, the university – and overwhelmingly, I must stress, a majority of people who enjoy living in the town and who are generally happy with the status-quo.
That changed last Friday. People _rightly_ are furious about what has been happening in Parliament. Knocking on the door and introducing myself as Labour’s county candidate for Ormskirk opens the floodgates for people to express clearly what they think of politicians (and believe me, I’ve heard the whole spectrum).
First, to set out what I’ve done in the past… when I was a district councillor, I didn’t claim any expenses. I attended two or three courses over the four years – about taking minutes and dealing with the media. Practical stuff that I hoped would make me a better representative, but not a penny in expenses.
The reaction on the doorstep is very clear: those MP’s who abused the system stole from you and me. I agree with this. When I canvass areas that are what we might call natural labour areas, the anger and hurt is much more intense. Those MP’s, from all parties, who effectively defrauded us deserve no better than common criminals. Regardless of the initial good intentions they might have had when going into politics; to succumb to the corrpution in parliament, is wrong and they ought to pay the price.
Waving cheques on the TV is not good enough. Indeed, paying back tens of thousands of pounds with the stroke of a pen adds insult to injury. At the very least there are MP’s who should lose the whip and others who should resign. It isn’t in the gift of party leaders to sack MP’s from parliament, but if it were, then they should.
I joined the Labour party in the early nineties. After growing up in Abram, close to the Bickershaw Colliery and having known friends who lost their mining jobs and later watching the excesses of Thatchers and Major’s governments. I believed – and still do – that our common endeavour to make our society better can only be achieved through Labour policies. But I’m ashamed by what has been published this week.
We have MP’s who previously claimed that they published all their expenses on their websites, now saying that they’ll publish their receipts – after they’ve gone through them. It’s not good enough. The imminent publication of this information has been known about for the last year. For someone to publish details a few days before parliament, and then try to claim a moral high ground is to assume that the public are morons.
Only total and absolute transparency will work in the future. Every last line of expenses should be published and made available in the easiest possible format. Personally, I think it should be published as an XML feed (I’ll write more about this when it’s not the middle of the night). But regardless of the mechanics, anything less than absolute transparency – on absolutely everything that an MP recieves – would be an insult to all those people so very angry about what has been published.
Shortest NHS waits since records began
I don’t normally post things that I get in my email, but I think this is a really important piece of news. There is a lot of bad news at the moment, but it’s things like this that show what politics and concerted effort can achieve.
Oh, and only my mother and labour party emails call me “Stephen”
Stephen,
Now and again, something comes along to make us all feel especially proud to be Labour supporters. I’m writing to let you know about one that’s happening right now.
This week, the NHS is celebrating the shortest waits since its records began – something that would have been unimaginable when our Party came to power 12 years ago.
Make no mistake, you are part of this achievement. None of this would have happened without the hard work of Labour Party supporters like yourself campaigning to make three general election victories possible.
Now, for the first time, in every part of the country, nobody has to wait more than 18 weeks for treatment after being referred by their GP, unless they choose to wait longer or there is a good medical reason. Most people wait less than 8 weeks.
But, as is always true in politics, we must fight to keep our achievements safe. The Tories are committed to scrapping the waiting time guarantees that have made such a difference to people’s lives.
We can never allow this to happen and I’m asking you to watch the video above and consider donating to help us campaign to make sure that people across the country never again have to suffer the consequences of Tory cuts.
Click here to watch the video or donate.
Best Wishes
Alan
PS – Please also pass this email on to at least 5 of your friends to make sure they know what we’ve achieved and the risk posed by the Tories
To unsubscribe, please click here. Privacy: we won’t pass on your email address to anyone else. See http://www.labour.org.uk/privacy Reproduced from an email sent by the Labour Party, promoted by Ray Collins, General Secretary, the Labour Party, on behalf of the Labour Party, all at 39 Victoria Street, London, SW1H 0HA
National speed limit to be reduced from 60 to 50mph
It is reported today in The Sunday Times that the national speed limit is to be reduced from 60 to 50mph. Specifically aimed at reducing the death toll on rural roads, this will improve the lives of all those in West Lancashire who live on one of the many national speed limit roads.
Dave Sudworth has already pointed out that this will be good news in Skelmersdale, and it’s true that there are a couple of roads in the town which have the national speed limit. There are other roads in the town that have 40 and 50mph limits but still have terrible accidents – mainly because of the planning and layout of the road.
A couple of years ago, Rosie Cooper organised a transport related “Let’s Talk” session, and I was taken aback by the tales of those who lived on rural roads. Young families with children trying to get to a school just 500 yards away, but petrified of the speeding traffic outside their house and elderly people who are left isolated because of irresponsible driving.
We live on the A59 close to a stretch between Burscough and Ormskirk. The traffic heading up to Burscough starts accelerating well before the speed limit changes, and southbound traffic regularly exceeds 50mph well into the 40mph zone. I know that braking technology on cars has improved, but the regular sight of cars being dug out of hedges and front garden walls suggests that the brain to foot and foot to pedal technology is still somewhere in the stone-ages.
Well done to the government for standing up to the driving lobby and implementing something that will make a real improvement to people’s lives.
Gratuitous hat tip to Dave for spotting this.
Israel ‘to announce Gaza truce’
The two top stories on the BBC news RSS feed at the moment are:
- Israel ‘to announce Gaza truce’, and
- Obama begins historic rail trip (to inaugaration)
Coincidence? Of course not.
Born under the Tories
Spotted here at labourlist
From mySociety: Top 5 Internet Priorities for the Next Government (any next Government)
Came across this article at the mysociety blog this evening (when reading up about the history of the data retention laws). I’ve mentioned before about the “free our bills” campaign that mysociety are running and this extends that vision to the next step of using the internet as an enabling tool for citizens interacting with Government.
Great stuff. Briefly, they suggest the following:
Hire yourself some staff who know what the Internet really means for government, and fund a university to start training more who really understand both worlds: you’re going to need them. There just aren’t enough employed in any government anywhere yet to save you from being hopelessly outstripped by external progress. (note to self I must write to our MP about it)
Free your data, especially maps and other geographic information, plus the non-personal data that drives the police, health and social services, for starters. Introduce a ‘presumption of innovation’ – if someone has asked for something costly to free up, give them what they want: it’s probably a sign that they understand the value of your data when you don’t.
Give external parties the right to interface electronically with any government or mainly public system unless it can be shown to create substantial, irrevocable harm. Champion the right fiercely and punish unjustified refusals with fines.
Commission the world’s first system capable of large scale deliberation, and hold a couple of nation wide sessions on policy areas that you genuinely haven’t made your minds up on yet.
When people use your electronic systems to do anything, renew a fishing license, register a pregnancy, apply for planning permission, given them the option to collaborate with other people going through or affected by the same process. They will feel less alone, and will help your services to reform from the bottom up.