Those of the party faithful on e-mail will have received one by now from our new leader, Ed, asking us for ‘fresh ideas’. Whilst I appreciate what he is trying to do, I have a slight problem with this because I believe that when we were in power we had plenty of good ‘not-so-fresh’ ideas but politicos, particularly the media, failed to mention them. They instead delighted – and still do – in talking about the Iraq War, Blair and Brown as if this sums up 13 years of Labour in power. And unfortunately we are still having to put up with story after story concerning our MPs either with the continuing expenses saga or more recently with former MP Phil Woollas, being found guilty of telling lies about a LibDem candidate. (That makes a change!) And of course what makes hearing these stories even more galling is not that they did wrong but that they, unlike many others I'm sure, got caught!
Looking at it from the other way, whilst in the past I have been very anti negative campaigning, I can see now that we have got to let people know what the opposition are doing wrong. And in this case it happens to be the dreadful (and quite possibly unnecessary) cuts that this coalition government is proposing. More than that, we must set the record straight in that if still in power we would not be consigning hundreds of thousands of people to the dole heap.
So my idea isn’t exactly fresh but quite simple – let’s tell everyone all the GOOD we did, at the same time as pointing out all the BAD that the ConDems are doing. After all, let’s face it, precious few others will!
Les
PS I have another ’not-so-fresh’ idea – please can we get rid of the new colours of puky pink and ghastly green – bring back RED!!!
Friday, 10 December 2010
Cuts - Fact 2
I found this item tucked away on page 14 of the Daily Mirror, 4th December.
Buried in a 120 page document it has come to light that the ConDems have withdrawn cash that Labour was giving to councils to fund items for the those disabled people trying to find a job. This money covered things like walking sticks, wheelchairs and hearing aids. This appalling decision coincided with International Day of Disabled People!
Les
Buried in a 120 page document it has come to light that the ConDems have withdrawn cash that Labour was giving to councils to fund items for the those disabled people trying to find a job. This money covered things like walking sticks, wheelchairs and hearing aids. This appalling decision coincided with International Day of Disabled People!
Les
Friday, 19 November 2010
Cuts - Fact 1
Whenever I hear one I am going to add a fact which proves what lying bastards this ConDem government really are!
Let's kick it off with this one – apparently it could save up to £1billion tackling benefit fraud but a whopping £18 billion if they went after tax evasion instead.
Les
Let's kick it off with this one – apparently it could save up to £1billion tackling benefit fraud but a whopping £18 billion if they went after tax evasion instead.
Les
How they DID get away with it!
The other week there were two very sensible calmly written letters in the Big Issue, against the cuts. I don’t know how they wrote them because I don’t feel calm or sensible when it comes to this subject. On the contrary I feel very very angry!
Leading up to the General Election in May this year, the Tories did the usual by blaming Labour for the deficit. They told everyone that it was all Gordon Brown’s fault for saving the banks whilst conveniently ‘forgetting’ to add that if the banks went under it would be OUR money that would be lost! But where I think they played a real blinder was by continually saying two other things – one half true and the other a downright lie.
The Lie – they convinced a lot of people that the deficit was very bad for the country and the only way to tackle it was through the drastic public expenditure cuts. But the truth is that there are countless gigantic holes in this argument, the most compelling of these being those put forward by economists who prove that there are other fairer ways of reducing it. But unfortunately this false message stuck.
The Half Truth – vote for change! Oh you’ll get that alright, from Labour’s, whilst not by any means faultless, at least fair approach, to the Tories ‘your pain, our gain’ style of politics. Half true because the well off would continue to be looked after whilst the poorer in society would end up being poorer still. But again they got away with this because they never made it clear exactly what ‘vote for change’ actually meant, just peddled false hope.
Has anything good come out of this? Well, in a way yes as the Tories are back behaving in the correct fashion, so at last it’s clear who we are fighting. And of course Nick Clegg has now shown his true colours – surely those who were taken in by him will not consider ever voting for the LibDems again!
Les
PS I gather one of the councillors for Cockett, LibDem Cllr Bates-Hughes has also been coming out with the ‘it’s Brown’s fault for saving the banks’ so I presume she must keep all her money under the mattress!
Leading up to the General Election in May this year, the Tories did the usual by blaming Labour for the deficit. They told everyone that it was all Gordon Brown’s fault for saving the banks whilst conveniently ‘forgetting’ to add that if the banks went under it would be OUR money that would be lost! But where I think they played a real blinder was by continually saying two other things – one half true and the other a downright lie.
The Lie – they convinced a lot of people that the deficit was very bad for the country and the only way to tackle it was through the drastic public expenditure cuts. But the truth is that there are countless gigantic holes in this argument, the most compelling of these being those put forward by economists who prove that there are other fairer ways of reducing it. But unfortunately this false message stuck.
The Half Truth – vote for change! Oh you’ll get that alright, from Labour’s, whilst not by any means faultless, at least fair approach, to the Tories ‘your pain, our gain’ style of politics. Half true because the well off would continue to be looked after whilst the poorer in society would end up being poorer still. But again they got away with this because they never made it clear exactly what ‘vote for change’ actually meant, just peddled false hope.
Has anything good come out of this? Well, in a way yes as the Tories are back behaving in the correct fashion, so at last it’s clear who we are fighting. And of course Nick Clegg has now shown his true colours – surely those who were taken in by him will not consider ever voting for the LibDems again!
Les
PS I gather one of the councillors for Cockett, LibDem Cllr Bates-Hughes has also been coming out with the ‘it’s Brown’s fault for saving the banks’ so I presume she must keep all her money under the mattress!
Sunday, 3 October 2010
Autumn Catch-up
I started this blog – my personal take on politics – a while ago so today I thought I’d try a bit of catch up …
19.6.10 CON-DEM NATION – What it really means!
What a double whammy – two lying ‘Tories’ for the price of one! In a speech given just few weeks before May 6th Nick Clegg said if the LibDems ended up sharing the power with the Tories he would make it quite clear that he didn’t agree with what they proposed. Yet a few weeks into their government and he has accepted all of David Cameron’s massive cuts.
Obviously we have to hope that the public will gradually see them both for what they are, but sadly it will be too late for many as only when they lose their jobs will some then realise the consequences of who is now in power.
On a positive note I think we have everything on our side but need to get this across. We are the party that will share our wealth with others whilst the Conservatives (and LibDems!) will continue to keep all to themselves. Capitalism is easy – you just have to look after number one. Democracy costs but then that’s because it’s worth having.
3.10.10 Policies not Personalities
None of us ‘own’ the Labour Party – we belong to it, and should believe in the ethos that is Labour, a collective trying to achieve a fairer society for all. Unfortunately over the past 13 years it would appear that some people within the party have sadly veered away from that, in particular former leader Tony Blair.
I can’t help feeling that much of this happened because of the way party leaders are portrayed and all too often get unwarranted admiration & automatic respect which they haven’t earned. Of course I realise that the media don’t help, just after a good story – true or false, and regardless of the consequences. So no wonder leaders fail when put up on such a high pedestal that the only way is down!
The way I see it leaders will come and they will go. In the meantime they are privileged to be allowed to hold the reins, and need to understand the huge responsibility they have for quiding us all when they are after all just human beings like the rest of us. So as far as I am concerned they should not be used as a reason for supporting the party or not. You either agree with the basic Labour ethos or you don’t …
Les
19.6.10 CON-DEM NATION – What it really means!
What a double whammy – two lying ‘Tories’ for the price of one! In a speech given just few weeks before May 6th Nick Clegg said if the LibDems ended up sharing the power with the Tories he would make it quite clear that he didn’t agree with what they proposed. Yet a few weeks into their government and he has accepted all of David Cameron’s massive cuts.
Obviously we have to hope that the public will gradually see them both for what they are, but sadly it will be too late for many as only when they lose their jobs will some then realise the consequences of who is now in power.
On a positive note I think we have everything on our side but need to get this across. We are the party that will share our wealth with others whilst the Conservatives (and LibDems!) will continue to keep all to themselves. Capitalism is easy – you just have to look after number one. Democracy costs but then that’s because it’s worth having.28.7.10 WAG AM Selection
After a relatively short period we have selected our candidate in Swansea West to stand for election to the Welsh Assembly next year – Julie James –a
nd I look forward to working with her.
The process began with a really strong contingent of eight women attending the initial ‘speed dating’ nomination event, then finally down to the three for the selection itself. And I for one am very pleased that we stuck to all women shortlist. Whilst some might consider it wrong to use positive discrimination in this way, the fact that all eight were good certainly bodes well for the future.
nd I look forward to working with her.The process began with a really strong contingent of eight women attending the initial ‘speed dating’ nomination event, then finally down to the three for the selection itself. And I for one am very pleased that we stuck to all women shortlist. Whilst some might consider it wrong to use positive discrimination in this way, the fact that all eight were good certainly bodes well for the future.
3.10.10 Policies not Personalities
None of us ‘own’ the Labour Party – we belong to it, and should believe in the ethos that is Labour, a collective trying to achieve a fairer society for all. Unfortunately over the past 13 years it would appear that some people within the party have sadly veered away from that, in particular former leader Tony Blair.
I can’t help feeling that much of this happened because of the way party leaders are portrayed and all too often get unwarranted admiration & automatic respect which they haven’t earned. Of course I realise that the media don’t help, just after a good story – true or false, and regardless of the consequences. So no wonder leaders fail when put up on such a high pedestal that the only way is down!
We’ve just 
had a leadership election but now, thank goodness, that distraction is over & done with and we can get on with campaigning. It wont be a piece of cake as we have very little representation in the media these days, and no doubt they will tell us everything Ed gets wrong (anything he gets right will be on page 92 in font size 6!)
had a leadership election but now, thank goodness, that distraction is over & done with and we can get on with campaigning. It wont be a piece of cake as we have very little representation in the media these days, and no doubt they will tell us everything Ed gets wrong (anything he gets right will be on page 92 in font size 6!)The way I see it leaders will come and they will go. In the meantime they are privileged to be allowed to hold the reins, and need to understand the huge responsibility they have for quiding us all when they are after all just human beings like the rest of us. So as far as I am concerned they should not be used as a reason for supporting the party or not. You either agree with the basic Labour ethos or you don’t …
Les
Saturday, 19 June 2010
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