Monday 20 July 2009

Trainspotting at Westminster



Choose something else.

Sunday 19 July 2009

Labour Halfwit


Now, I'm probably not the one to hark on about media skills. My strong accent counts against me in interviews. Comments on my media appearances from reasonably independent sources did though include "passionate" and "knowledgeable". Neither of which could be applied to the hapless Naz Sarkar who is the Labour candidate for Reading West.

Oh dear. It really is a throwaway election for Labour and they've resorted to on the job training for the Labour "yoof". Give him another 12 years and perhaps he'll make a decent fist of a local radio interview, but can we really bear another three term monopoly by any party in Westminster?

I'm actually pretty disgusted by Labour for putting this rookie up as a seemingly serious candidate. Compare his performances with the young Libertarian candidate in Norwich, Thomas Burridge
It's nothing to do with age, it's to do with ability. Surely Labour could have found a better candidate than Naz? Or is this what happens when a party abandons roots, raison d'etre and principles, choosing to pursue power for its' own sake?

Where are the real Socialists? They've abandoned Labour and all I see in the rag-tag splinters such as No2EU, the Scottish Socialists and others are extremists and fantasists. Is Socialism dead? Is Naz Sarkar the pall-bearer?

Hat Tip - Cllr Dave Luckett

Sing A Song Of Parliament


Sing a song of Parliament,
Pockets full of cash.
Fraudulently claiming
then adding to their stash.
With their ploy discovered
They said they'll give it back,
If you or I had done the same
We'd promptly get the sack.


Sing a song of freebies
Snouts all in the trough,
Giving back their ill-got gains
Is just not good enough.
Sponging off our earnings
With a likely tale,
If working folk had done the same
They'd soon end up in jail.


Sing a song of fraudsters
Counting out their money.
They smile and look quite unashamed
As though they think it's funny.
Sitting in a secret place
Counting our their dosh,
Spent on baths and cleaning moats -
Or crisps and orange squash.


Sing a song of MPs
Who took us for a ride,
It's up to us election time
Their futures to decide.
It's gone too far to bring back trust
Of anyone in power,
To most of us they'll always be
A shifty, crooked shower.

Now, where can I find a choir to record this?

Hat Tip - Subrosa

Friday 17 July 2009

This Guy is a Candidate?

Meet the Labour candidate for Reading West



Oh well, Labour have obviously given up. What an utter insult to the voters of Reading that this is the standard of candidate on offer. How the hell must Labour supporters feel; people who believe in Labour values, that have supported the party through thick and thin, that feel only Labour come close to representing their views, when this shambolic excuse is supposedly going to fight their corner in Westminster. Third-rate lobby fodder.

There is an alternative. If you feel you could do a better job than Naz, stand with Jury Team. No whips, no party orders. If you want to stand on a platform of traditional Labour values, you can. If you're more Labour than New Labour, take the opportunity that Jury Team offers and stand up to be counted.

Thursday 16 July 2009

Vote For Your Favourite Blogs




It's that time of year again, when Total Politics asks you to vote for your Top 10 favourite blogs. The votes will be compiled and included in the forthcoming book, the Total Politics Guide to Blogging 2009-10, which will be published in September. This year the poll is being promoted/sponsored by LabourList and LibDemVoice as well as our publisher Iain Dale's blog.

The rules are simple.

1. You must vote for your ten favourite blogs and ranks them from 1 (your favourite) to 10 (your tenth favourite).
2. Your votes must be ranked from 1 to 10. Any votes which do not have rankings will not be counted.
3. You MUST include ten blogs. If you include fewer than ten your vote will not count.
2. Email your vote to toptenblogs@totalpolitics.com
3. Only vote once.
4. Only blogs based in the UK, run by UK residents are eligible or based on UK politics are eligible.
5. Anonymous votes left in the comments will not count. You must give a name
6. All votes must be received by midnight on 31 July 2009. Any votes received after that date will not count.

If you have your own blog, please do encourage your readers to take part. Last year, more than 80 blogs did so. We hope this year it will be far more than that. BUT, DO NOT list ten blogs you think your readers should vote for. Any duplicate voting of this nature will be disallowed. If you do not wish for your blog to be voted for please email katy.scholes@totalpolitics.com. You will see a list of the blogs who have chosen not to be included in the comments shortly.

There are many ways of measuring a blog's popularity. Wikio and Technorati have complicated logarithms which measure the importance of incoming links and traffic. Google Analytics does it by measuring how many people visit. But our poll gives blog readers the opportunity to vote for the ones they like and visit most often. It's not scientific. It's impossible to achieve 100% balance and we don't pretend it's perfect.

The results of the poll will be published in the forthcoming book the TOTAL POLITICS GUIDE TO POLITICAL BLOGGING IN THE UK which will be published in mid September in association with APCO Worldwide.

So, go to it. Email us your Top Ten Favourite Blogs

Don't Let Jacqui Smith Get Away With It

Let's nail Jacqui Smith

Copied from Old Holborn's place...

£100,000 needed to nail Jacqui Smith


I am a member of the Sunlight Centre for Open Politics and we have decided to nail Jacqui Smith for being a little free and easy with the truth.


Any contribution you might be able to make would be greatly appreciated. Sorry to bother you if you have already donated to the campaign. You can donate via PayPal through the link above (click on the picture). If we can successfully prosecute the former Home Secretary this would be a major step toward cleaning up Westminster and proving to our law makers that they are not above the law.


So put YOUR hands in your pocket for a change, instead of Darling and let's teach them a lesson. Do it. Do something. Put the fear of 60,000,000 of us into the 646 who run every minutae of our lives for their own benefit.

All it would take is one high profile politician being dragged through the courts by the public for the rest of them to get the message. We're not allowed to hang crooked politicians any more, but we can hang them out to dry in the courts.


Hat Tip - half the blogosphere

Party First & To Hell With You All

Once again we see party politics stand in the way of good governance and justice.

Gary McKinnon is facing extradition to the US on charges of computer hacking. This has brought what many see as a deeply unfair extradition treaty back into the public eye. According to the Daily Mail dozens of Labour MPs expressed their support for Mr McKinnon in letters to campaigners and 74 Labour MPs signed Commons motions backing Mr McKinnon or demanding a review of extradition agreements with the U.S.

However, yesterday a Tory call for an urgent review of the controversial Extradition Act 2003 was voted down by 290 votes to 236. If only 28 more Labour MPs had stuck to their principles, the Government would have faced defeat. 59 of the Labour MPs who had earlier supported Mr McKinnon voted against the motion. 15 abstained.

Why the change of heart? Has the extradition treaty suddenly became ok? Have they decided that Mr McKinnon (who has been diagnosed with Aspergers) has turned into a heinous criminal unworthy of support by our elected representatives? Or is it more to do with the fact that this was a Tory motion and the knee-jerk reaction of MPs is to oppose anything and everything other parties put forward?

This is not good governance. MPs of all parties are supposed to hold the government of the day to account. They are meant to scrutinise legislation and represent the views of the electorate. It shouldn't matter which party an MP belongs to, bad legislation is bad legislation and brings the entire House of Commons into disrepute. Once again we see MPs putting the Party first.

Listed below are the names of those whose promises mean nothing. Take note of them and remember their actions come the forthcoming election. They'll each be spending tens of thousands painting themselves whiter than white and hoping that you'll have forgotten what deceitful creatures they are.

Diane Abbott (Hackney North and Stoke Newington), David Anderson (Blaydon), John Austin (Erith and Thamesmead), Joe Benton (Bootle), Clive Betts (Sheffield Attercliffe), Lyn Brown (West Ham), Russell Brown (Dumfries and Galloway), Richard Burden (Birmingham Northfield), Dawn Butler (Brent South), Martin Caton (Gower), Ann Cryer (Keighley), Jim Cunningham (Coventry South)

Quentin Davies (Grantham and Stamford), Janet Dean (Burton), Jim Dowd (Lewisham West), Jeff Ennis (Barnsley East and Mexborough), Hywel Francis (Aberavon), Neil Gerrard (Walthamstow), Roger Godsiff (Birmingham Sparkbrook and Small Heath), Helen Goodman (Bishop Auckland), John Grogan (Selby), Patrick Hall (Bedford), David Heyes (Ashton under Lyne), Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North), Joan Humble (Blackpool North and Fleetwood), Brian Iddon (Bolton South East), Eric Illsley (Barnsley East)

Glenda Jackson (Hampstead and Highgate), Brian Jenkins (Tamworth), Martyn Jones (Clwyd South), Sadiq Khan ( Tooting), Mark Lazarowicz (Edinburgh North and Leith), Tony Lloyd ( Manchester Central), Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East), Jim McGovern (Dundee West), Anne McGuire ( Stirling), Shahid Malik (Dewsbury), Gordon Marsden (Blackpool South), Anne Moffat (East Lothian), Madeleine Moon (Bridgend), Julie Morgan (Cardiff North), George Mudie (Leeds East)

Nick Palmer (Broxtowe), Gordon Prentice (Pendle), Joan Ruddock (Lewisham Deptford), Joan Ryan (Enfield North), Martin Salter (Reading West), Andy Slaughter (Ealing, Acton and Shepherd's Bush), John Smith ( Glamorgan), Sir Peter Soulsby (Leicester South), Gavin Strang (Edinburgh East)

David Taylor (North West Leicestershire), Desmond Turner (Brighton Kemptown), Rudi Vis (Finchley and Golders Green), Lynda Waltho (Stourbridge), Bob Wareing (Liverpool West Derby), Betty Williams (Conway), Anthony Wright (Great Yarmouth), Iain Wright (Hartlepool).

Those who abstained were:

Roger Berry (Kingswood), Roberta Blackman-Woods (City of Durham), Harry Cohen (Leyton and Wanstead), Andrew Dismore (Hendon), Bill Etherington (Sunderland North), Frank Field (Birkenhead), Fabian Hamilton (Leeds North East), John Heppell (Nottingham East), Peter Kilfoyle (Liverpool Walton), Christine McCafferty (Calder Valley), Bob Marshall-Andrews ( Medway), Chris Mullin (Sunderland South), Edward O'Hara (Knowsley South), Marsha Singh (Bradford West), Mike Wood (Batley and Spen).

Thursday 2 July 2009

Like Ferrets In A Sack

Shadow chancellor George Osborne is being investigated by the sleaze watchdog over his expenses.


"In essence, your complaint is that between 2001 and 2003 Mr Osborne wrongly identified his main home for the purposes of his claims against the Additional Costs Allowance, and that from 2003 Mr Osborne claimed for mortgage payments that were not necessarily incurred contrary to the rules of the house."


Well another one faces a grilling. They really are all at it aren't they.

I wonder who shopped him?

The complaint to the Parliamentary Standards Commissioner came from the chairman of the Labour Party in Mr Osborne's Tatton constituency, Laurie Burton

Ah right. This is going to be a fun election. They're all going to be jumping up and down, pointing at each other and shouting "Please Sir, Please Sir".

What really stuck in my throat was -

Mr Burton told Sky News he had not made the complaint on a party political basis.

"I'm doing it because I'm an ordinary man of the public who shares the outrage and disgust that people have throughout the country.

Ach, away and bile yer heid ya balloon.Do you expect us to believe that you would be putting on the outraged face if it was a Labour MP? In fact, seeing as how it's upset you so much, what did you have to say about the dozens of Labour MPs caught with their hands in the till?


Speak up.


Can't hear you.


That's right, because you said SFA about it. Get stuffed you sanctimonious prat.

My Blog List

Referendum Poll

Donations Welcome

NO2ID - Stop ID cards and the database state

Twitter Updates

    follow me on Twitter