On the verge of ...

John Prescott today warns the Labour party that it is £20m in debt, "on the verge of bankruptcy"

John Prescott is, by the way, hoping to become Labour party Treasurer. The introductory piece in the Guardian is here, the main article here.

Mr Prescott seems to blame Gordon Brown for the Labour Party's problems, although he doesn't seem to condemn him for the state of the country's economy. He says,... the so-called "election that never was", in 2007, cost the party £1.5m in preparation costs ...

Prescott also thanks the various backers who are, currently, keeping the party afloat, namely,

... party staff and volunteers, trade union contributions, high value donations and the goodwill of the Co-op bank ...

Iain Dale highlights Unite's cost-cutting efforts, which somehow managed to increase the Union's 'surplus' by more than £9million in a mere twelve months - a truly astonishing sum of money in these cash-strapped times. And Bob Crow's salary has been increased by 12%. So it would seem that, at the moment at least, the Unions are flush with funds.

When an organisation is deep in debt it's easy for it to be pressurised by those with a bit of cash to push their way and because of this Mrs R thinks the next few months in the life of the Labour Party will be more than a little interesting. She thinks it's not only on the verge of bankruptcy, time will tell.

Mrs R hasn't the time to write more, so suggests you read what other bloggers have to say about this - John Ward in Medway "Labour almost Bankrupt" and Raedwald "Thieves operate in this area".

Edit : And Iain Dale has an idea that might help save Labour from bankruptcy.

....

Unpleasant people.

Sometimes, when looking at other blogs, you learn about people whose behaviour make you wonder how they managed to end up being paid out of the public purse. More often than not, if you're anything like Mrs Rigby, you just shake your head and 'move on' - because that's what you're meant to do these days isn't it? And because, well, we've seen it, or something similar, all too many times before.

Some people somehow manage to 'get away with an awful lot' of unpleasantness, both online and in the real world. They seem to be able to 'get away with' a lot more than ... than most people. It's hard to work out why, maybe sometimes it's really because of 'who they are' and sometimes it's because of 'who they know' and who's looking after their interests. At other times it could be because they're so belligerent, so caustic, so full of themselves and so, errm, horrible, it'd be hard to choose which particular bit of behaviour or verbiage to target and condemn - so we leave them be.

One such person came to Mrs R's notice in this post at GrumpyOldTwat's blog. In amongst the comments is one from Subrosa, who says

Do you now believe if a red rosette was stuck on a monkey they'd vote for it? (Apology to monkeys).

It makes Mrs Rigby ask herself that if that particular person was the best choice of candidate for Local Government, then what were the worst like?

Anyhow, if you'd like to learn more about this individual perhaps you'd like to follow Mrs R's footsteps by first going to GrumpyOldTwat's place then stroll over for quite a surprising read at Harry's Place. Once you've picked your jaw up off the keyboard maybe you could take a look at a couple of posts at Corrugated Soundbite here and also here. (Don't forget to read the comments).

When you've digested all that, with the help of a cup of coffee or something a little stronger, perhaps you'd like to pop back to GOT's blog and follow some of the highlighted links - there are quite a few.

Oh, and a P.S. - you did remember to read all the comments belonging to all those blog posts, didn't you? If not, it's worth backtracking and doing so.

And to think, this man was elected to a position in local government. He helps shape local policies, he is a so-called public servant ... and, because of the way the last government 'sorted out' local funding, we all contribute towards the financial pot from which he draws his wages, even though he may not work, or live, anywhere near us.

....

Ed Balls R4 interview

Reading this on Coffee House it would be easy to believe that Mr Ed Balls is a reincarnation of Mr Brown. Thing is, Brown's apparently alive and well, well, alive, and is mostly somewhere in Kirkcaldy where he's writing his memoirs and being paid to be an MP - except when he goes to the zoo.

Here's the beginning of the John Humphrys/Ed Balls radio 4 interview. You can read the whole thing over at the Coffee House

John Humphrys: There are two big questions in British politics, the 1st is whether the coalition can hold together; the second is whether the Labour party can hold together. It’s not quite that simple for the obvious reason that the coalition is two parties, and the Labour party isn’t, not officially anyway. But for years it was divided between those who supported Blair, and those who supported Brown. And the question now as the party struggles to decide who to choose for its new leader is whether it can heal that division. It hasn’t been helped by Peter Mandelson, Lord Mandelson’s, book about to be published, and he’s got a lot to say about it. Ed Balls is one of the leadership contenders and he was about as close to Gordon Brown as it’s possible to be and he’s with me. Good morning to you.

Ed Balls: Good morning John.

JH: Do you regret those years of division?

EB: I don’t regret at all the national minimum wage, three-and-a-half thousand Sure Start children’s centres…

JH: No, that’s not what I asked you, I asked you about the division.

EB: But, John, what we had in the last 13 years is a Labour government which achieved more for jobs and social justice, did more redistribution than any government since 1945. I think put our health service on a sound footing, transformed education, so we had the best generation of teachers ever. I think it was a profoundly successful government. And the fact is there were times when Gordon Brown and Tony Blair had disagreements and arguments, but out of that creative tension came some huge achievements and I think the Labour party is very proud of what was achieved in the last 30 years, 13 years and .....

Ever had that feeling of Déjà vu?

Read the rest, you know you want to!

(P.S. Edited to quote more of the transcript)

....

EPU - gone.

The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Mr Osborne, said during his Budget speech,

"I can confirm that, as set out in the coalition agreement, this government will not be joining the euro in this parliament," ...

"Therefore ... I have abolished the Treasury's euro preparations unit -- yes, one does exist -- ..."

Mrs Rigby hadn't a clue there was such a thing, so she went off to look for it, and found all sorts of documents in the National Archives - where all the 'out of date' stuff was shoved when the coalition took over.

Here it is :- "Euro Preparation Unit"

Preparations committees in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland
On 9 June 2003, the Chancellor invited the Secretaries of State for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland to establish new preparations committees. The role of each committee is to:

* Oversee the work on euro preparations;
* Raise awareness of preparations issues;
* Ensure co-ordination and co-operation between key sectors;
* Consult on the third outline National Changeover Plan; and
* Feed back particular views and issues to the Chancellor's Standing Committee on Euro Preparations (the Secretaries of State for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are members of the Standing Committee).

The committees have a similar structure to the Standing Committee, with representatives from the public, private and voluntary sectors. Each committee is headed by the relevant Secretary of State.

As usual, England wasn't to get its' own voice - but would no doubt be footing the bill.

Not only that but

Local authorities Euro preparation
HM Treasury and the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in conjunction with the Local Government Association have issued guidance for local authorities on euro preparations. The guidance offers advice on high-level business and communications issues that local authorities need to consider in their preparations for the euro.

and

Managed Transition Plan
A working draft of the UK’s preferred phased approach or “Managed Transition” to any possible future UK changeover to the euro has been published to provide a basis for informal discussion and further development with stakeholders.

It looks as if ordinary folk like Mrs R weren't considered 'stakeholders' either. And anyway, what is a 'stakeholder' when it's at home? Sounds like the sort of thing vampire hunters might use.

Then there's

The Government has a “prepare and decide” policy towards euro entry and euro preparations. Under the policy of “prepare and decide” the objective of HM Treasury Euro Preparations has been to make sure that the UK maintains a genuine option of being able to make a smooth and effective euro changeover - if that is what the Government, Parliament and the British people, in a referendum, decide.

Referendum? Yes, of course there would have been, just like the one for the Lisbon Treaty.

Maybe ordinary taxpayers didn't need to know - but 'companies' did because "Companies House will accept accounts in the new currency for accounting periods ending on or after 1 January 1999." and

More detail on the practical issues that companies might need to consider are contained in the Government’s Euro Preparation Unit (EPU) fact sheets.

It's at times like this that Mrs R feels incredibly dim, and rather left out of things because all she ever seems to do is pay tax. Nobody ever seems to ask her opinion, she's never been picked for a 'focus group' - although she did read about once, but because she isn't an approved 'minority' she couldn't join in.

For the last thirteen years Mrs R has only ever told what was going on in Westminster if they thought she might be vaguely sort of pleased and, as she's said, she had absolutely no idea this EPU existed, had no idea that local councils had been ordered to make preparations for joining the Euro and still has absolutely no idea how much all these 'preparations' might have cost in wasted council tax, income tax and VAT receipts - money that's been taken out of her pocket.

It's very easy to have a bit of a conspiracies-R-us moment and wonder how many other 'preparation units' Labour set up when we weren't looking.

....

Ainsworth interview

Coventry North East MP Ainsworth, who spent the 11 months up to the General Election in the cabinet, was rarely able to secure one-to-one meetings with Mr Brown and when the two did get together Ainsworth says his views on defence policy were generally ignored, he has revealed.

“It’s no secret that Gordon and I are not each other’s greatest fans,” he explained. “I found him very difficult to work with. Impossible really.”

Makes Mrs R think, "Aww, poor Bob.

Then she read this :-

In his first major interview since resigning as Secretary of State, Ainsworth admits he is struggling to get used to “normality”. He’s gone from a cossetted life, whisked around the world with first class travel accompanied by a retinue of support staff and armed security guards, to the role of a backbench constituency MP.

Why on earth did he, or indeed any government minister, need all that? It does, though, help explain this profligacy. Since 2008 (Fausty)

£178 million [spent] on MPs' pay and perks

....

Labour leadership #6

Andy Burnham
Born 7 January, 1970

Researcher to Tessa Jowell 1994-1997 election.
Parliamentary Officer for the NHS Confederation from August to December 1997, before taking up the post as an administrator with the Football Task Force for a year. (wikipedia)
Special Adviser to the then-Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport 1998-2001.
Elected MP for Leigh 2001.
Health Select Committee from 2001 - 2003
Parliamentary Private Secretary to then-Home Secretary David Blunkett 2003 - 2004. PPS to then-Education Secretary Ruth Kelly 2004-2005.
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State 2005 - 2006 (with responsibility for implementing the Identity Cards Act 2006.)
Minister of State at the Department of Health 2006-2007.
Chief Secretary to the Treasury, a position he held until 2007 - 2008.

Working Class Tory quotes Mary Riddell:-

In some respects, Mr Burnham is the most Right-wing of the four candidates. A Roman Catholic, he is the most enthusiastic about promoting marriage and likely to be firm on law and order. On the Iraq War, he is neither regretful – like the two Eds – or as reflective as David Miliband. To him, regime change and weapons of mass destruction were inter-connected reasons for the invasion.

Working Class Tory goes on to and suggest that ...

Burnham would appear to be the least worst option if Labour were to win the next election. However, a Labour win would be the worst possible future outcome, and if Burnham is more likely to achieve it, I hope he does not become leader.

Mrs Rigby would tend to agree.

....

Labour leadership #5

Diane Julie Abbott

Born 27 September 1953
Married Richard Thompson, divorced
Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington since 1987.

Attended Harrow County Grammar School
Studied History at Newnham, Cambridge.
Admin trainee @ Home Office 1976-1978.
Race Relations Officer @ NCCL 1978-1980
Researcher/reporter Thames TV 1980 -1983.
Researcher/reporter TV-am 1983-1985.
Press Officer GLC (Livingstone) 1985-1986.
Head of Press and PR Lambeth Council 1986-1987.

Elected to Westminster City Council 1982-1986.
Elected MP 1987

She is well known, possibly because of her TV show "This Week", where she and Michael Portillo discuss, errm, the Political events of the week.

She has been called a hypocrite because she chose to send her son to a private school, whilst condemning others for doing so. She is, as far as Mrs Rigby is aware, against Grammar Schools - although she attended one herself.

She decided to enter the Labour leadership race because she thought the "white, male candidates 'all look the same'."

She likes the idea of positive discrimination.

Of all the Labour Leadership candidates mentioned so far she has the longest political experience, although she has never been a government minister. At 56 (57 in Sept) she is the oldest leadership candidate - almost 17 years older than Andy Burnham.

She managed to gain the necessary 33+ nominations only after John McDonnell had stood aside and asked those who had nominated him to switch their allegiance.

The Mail reports that Mr David Miliband has nominated her rather than himself.

To be honest Mrs R thinks it's highly likely she will be elected Deputy Leader of the Party - they 'have to' have a woman to satisfy the quota hunters and to claim some legitimacy and stamp their feet on the moral high ground when demanding parliament and employers follow their equality-hunting rules - doesn't matter too much whether the individual is any good, it's their genetic inheritance that's most important.

....

Labour Leadership #4 - Buffoons!

Most generous of you, Mr Parris, to offer such cogent advice to a bunch of dangerous buffoons.

so 'Someone Once wrote' in the Telegraph, commenting on Matthew Parris's column concerning the "hustings statements" of the four men at the top of the Labour Party's leadership list.

Here's a taster or five from the article:-

David Miliband looked for a moment as if he was going to.

Come to think of it, that sentence bids fair to be chiselled on to his gravestone: “David Miliband looked for a moment as if he was going to.”

and

This — from Ed Miliband, but for all the difference it makes, it could have been from the chief executive of Pepsi-Cola, the Chief Rabbi, or the chief lyricist of Abba —

and

Mr Balls’s submission is simply clunking and charmless.

and

Mr Burnham’s is kind of sweet.

but

All four men are anyway inextricably tangled in the failure of the last Labour Government. Yet all are Privy Counsellors and three at at least are of considerable stature. You can actually imagine them as prime ministers. You just don’t want them to be.

Yes, these are out of context extracts, so you need to read the whole thing for yourself and, as usual, don't forget to also read the comments .... where you'll be reminded, again, that

this... is the collection of GOATs* that was 'running' this country until recently?????
Much is explained, if not excused.

..........

* Edited and amended because NotASheep left a comment saying, "Leave us goats alone!"

GOAT = Mr Brown's "Government of All Talents"

Not this sort

Picture from here where you can discover How to tell a Goat Goat from a Man Goat.

....

Labour leadership #3

Mr Edward Balls

born 25 February 1967
Married to Yvette Cooper
"Labour Co-op" MP for Morley and Outwood.

Studied PPE at Keble, Oxford (where he was a member of both the Labour Club and the Conservative Association) then at Harvard (-1990).
Journalist on Financial Times 1990-1994.
Adviser to Gordon Brown 1994-2004.
First stood for election in 2004.
Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families in June 2007.
Re-elected with a reduced majority as Labour Co-op party MP for Morley and Outwood, beating local Conservative Antony Calvert by 1,101 votes.

Mrs Rigby will leave it to the Guardian to explain why he might not be the best person to 'lead' a party, any party, especially a political that is meant to represent the ordinary working folk of Britain. An article that also, uncannily*, indicates some of the social problems that are Labour's legacy

I have arranged to go to Swindon with Ed Balls on the first excursion in his four-month Labour leadership campaign. There is just one problem. He has gone to Euston instead of Paddington. When he arrives, half an hour late, he apologises, explaining that he's having some difficulty adjusting to life without a ministerial car and half-a-dozen staff explaining where he needs to be.

and

The day proves to be pleasingly accident prone. We are met at the station by Anne Snelgrove, who lost her Swindon South seat to the Conservatives in the election but remains close to Balls and is one of his campaign managers in the leadership race. She has arranged a visit to a local pre-school playgroup, but *the playgroup's roof has been vandalised, causing a flood in their usual play area and confining the children to a small room next door.

and

On the train back – we upgrade to the almost empty first class to avoid annoying other passengers with talk of "post neoclassical endogenous growth theory" ...

and

From Paddington, we take a taxi to the Commons

Mrs Rigby just thinks it's rather odd that they had to go all the way to Swindon for the interview, instead of staying in London. Why the need for the journey - it certainly isn't very 'green'.

And to then visit a playgroup - why? Why involve little children in some stunt? These are pre-school children, they know nothing about politicians, and politicians should know that we're meant to be very careful around small children these days.

And the means of travel? Train/taxi? The reality is that ordinary people would, if they didn't have their own car, probably try to use either National Express or Megabus for longish journey, because rail fares are too expensive! A return journey from London to Swindon costs £109, or £179 First class.

But, Mrs R supposes it was all on expenses and probably all paid for by the newspaper, so stuff like that doesn't matter.

There's no indication that Mr Balls has anything other than a political awareness of the real world that the rest of us inhabit.

Is he really the best person to lead the Labour Party?

..........

See Mrs R's thoughts about Mr David Miliband and Mr Edward Miliband.
..........

P.S.
(added 21:11 02/06/2010)

There's this interesting piece too, dated 28 April 2010. Where Matthew Norman discusses the leadership potential of Mr Balls.
Read it - and you'll probably both smile and weep.

....

Weedy Ed's sour grapes (Labour leadership #2)

This is aimed at Mr Edward Miliband who, according to the Guardian, thinks the Liberal Democrats have

... been "betrayed" by their party's coalition with the Conservatives

He thinks ...

The coalition ... had not happened "by accident"

No. We know it didn't happen 'by accident', and there are a lot of reasons why.

The existing coalition was forced/precipitated by Mr Brown. He was the one who'd told us all that he had the right to form a government, because he was Prime Minister and because it said so in the constitution - the same constitution Mr Straw had been telling us we didn't have. Mr Brown had eighteen days, an unusual length of time to try to make a deal, but it didn't seem to be working out and he made what appeared to be a sudden, late in the day, decision to tell the Queen he could not form a government.

We've seen the pictures, we've seen who he was with at the time, and we've read the reports telling us what he/your party/Campbell/Mandelson wanted us to know and it seems he made his decision because talks about forming a 'rainbow coalition' with the Liberal Democrats, SNP, Plaid etc weren't working out the way he/you/your negotiators wanted.

By scurrying off to the Palace he left the other parties with no choice. Mr Cameron, as the leader of the political party that won the most seats, HAD TO go to the Queen and say he would try to form a government. He had no choice, those were/are the rules – it's in the constitution, because the country is not allowed to not have a government for more than an hour or so.

Just think, Mr Edward Miliband, your party could have done a deal with the Conservatives and had a massive combined parliamentary majority. All it needed was a bit of wheeling and dealing. A bit of give and take and, who knows, you could have been in control of this country almost for ever. Imagine all those lovely new laws you could have made!

But no, you didn't think of that because people in the Labour Party hate the Tories, you hate people who might be Tories, and also hate making deals where you might have to make concessions. You want the upper hand, all the time – so you would never have approached those who had more votes and try to form a government with them. Frankly, it wouldn't have even crossed the mind of anybody in your party.

So, for the next few years your job is to be active in OPPOSITION. It is your party's job to, if necessary, try to rein in the coalition government if they try to take things too far and it's your job to try to negotiate, to fine tune bits of legislation so you get a little bit of your own way – and then you can tell the media how wonderful you are.

Trouble is, you haven't a clue how that works, have you?

You see, during the thirteen long years your party was in government you could do whatever you wanted, because Labour had a large enough majority to push through almost any legislation it chose - and you did. And you called the other parties names, said what bad things they might have done, but you didn't know for sure because although they were in opposition they didn't have enough parliamentary seats to be able to actively oppose anything and couldn't negotiate deals because you wouldn't let them – because your lot knew what was the best for the country and did exactly what you wanted. It was like letting a bunch of five year olds loose in a sweet shop.

The Tories, in the meantime, got themselves ready for being in government, because they knew that with the two-party system their turn would come. But it didn't work out that way, because we voters are fickle and unpredictable creatures, and we didn't want any party to have absolute power. So they had to make compromises, and so did the Lib Dems whose policies, to be honest, had almost as many holes as a sieve - but they meant well, and didn't imagine they'd ever have to see their ideas through to completion. But that's what's happening - with compromises and with concessions on both sides.

And you don't like it do you? You don't think it's fair. You don't think it's fair because you didn't win, and you're bad losers.

Ask yourself a question. Ask yourself why this happened and see if you draw the same conclusions as we Rigbys.

We think it happened because the election campaign, for Labour at least, started months ago. Public money was used to tour the country and 'electioneer' by telling everybody how wonderful you all were. Trouble was, you didn't bother speaking to ordinary folk, you only spoke to party activists and unionists who patted you on the head and smiled at you, said you were lovely - and they lapped up all the anti-Tory and, to some extent, anti-Liberal guff you were spewing out. There were no proper policy proposals, all we pleb voters heard was name-calling. It carried on too, and affected the ethos of the 'proper' electioneering and influenced those televised 'debates' which weren't debates at all.

And your real electioneering showed us all just how impoverished your party really is, how little money you have in the coffers and why you hate people such as that Tory donor - because you were jealous, because couldn't have his money and thought it should be yours. The moment Labour had to pay its own bills all the fancy jets, all the chauffeurs and limousines and police outriders vanished - to be replaced by minibuses and coaches and, sometimes, the front half of a regular train that you commandeered all to yourselves. And even then you didn't care about all the other people who'd bought tickets to travel. You were all much too important to even notice them.

The election campaigns left us ordinary people with difficult choices. Those who were 'floating voters' had a tough time making up our minds, because we didn't know what we were voting for. The one thing we did know was that we didn't want your lot to stay in government any longer, and the result showed just that – it showed that the country couldn't decide which party to put in government, although it most certainly put Labour out of office. We'd had enough.

We knew that your party's manifesto promises might as well have been written on rice paper - they were worthless, and tasteless too. We knew that your party was happy to break manifesto commitments if it suited you. We knew that members of your party were willing to lie to both enquiries and parliament, and we knew that your party would happily ignore ECHR rulings it didn't like and you did it, as one minister said, “To protect us from ourselves.” (and from all those horrible terrorists)

No amount of spinning and weaving stories will change the election result. Labour came second, and a poor second too. The party did not get enough seats to be able to form a viable coalition with the party that came third - maybe all the boundary changes were a bit of a mistake after all, because sometimes, just sometimes, you need friends.

And now? You're still bleating, and blaming the other guys for not being in your gang, and you're trying to split their party down the middle – because maybe you think it'll help you win. Win what? Mrs R isn't quite sure.

Frankly, their political party is nothing to do with you! How your political opponents organise themselves is none of your business - and it isn't good form to blatantly try to steal people from another party by telling them they're unhappy. Anyhow, it's pointless because ... let's say it again ... Labour is in OPPOSITION.

It's time to stop posturing, time to stop whining, time to stop moaning about the other chaps and time to start looking at your own party, your own policies and your own mistakes.

Once you can truly and honestly admit your party's mistakes, admit that the electorate doesn't really like you, then you can move forward and start to try winning the hearts and minds of those you alienated – the Mrs Duffys of Britain. All the ordinary folk who you brushed aside, along with the factory closures and jobs that were outsourced to India when you were looking, and who you called racist or xenophobic when they complained.

Mr Edward Miliband, you said in your interview that you and your brother never fought as children because

"I think we were too weedy for that. It wasn't really our style,"

Maybe that was when you learned to blame somebody else for your own mistakes, instead of learning to fight either physical or mental battles that you would either win or lose. Maybe that was when you, and those like you, failed to learn to be good losers, when you failed to learn that acknowledging a victor and being humble in defeat can be as powerful a thing as winning, because it shows the true character of the individual.

Mr Miliband, if you truly want to lead the Labour Party, then admitting to being 'weedy' might not have been the smartest thing to do, because the Labour Party needs a person with courage and integrity. It needs it because the party is in tatters, it's lost the plot and it's lost its' way. All you have are 'the faithful' and the Unions. The same Unions who are currently ruining people's long-planned holidays, because they want their travel perks - and it's alienating the electorate. Your media friends will help you all they can, but it's the ordinary people of the country you need to convince - and we will take a lot of convincing.

Our memories seem to be much longer, and more accurate, than yours.

....

Gordon's Gift to the House of Lords

The previous Prime Minister (the Rt Hon Gordon Brown MP) undertook a process to recommend to the Queen new party-political life peerages. This consisted of working peers from each party and, as is customary at the end of a Parliament, a dissolution list for former MPs.

source number10.gov.uk'

Mrs Rigby has chosen to show pictures of three of our soon-to-be Peers, chosen for three very different reasons.

Mr John Leslie Prescott. (picture Telegraph) Reported to have said that he would reject the offer of a peerage, but his wife Pauline changed his mind.

Mrs Rigby found this picture of soon-to-be-a-Peer Ian Paisley in the Guardian. Depending on your point of view he either rightly stood his ground or blocked progress, but in the end negotiated with long term enemy, Sinn Fein's Martin McGuinness. His son, also Ian, is now MP for North Antrim.

Sir Ian Blair. Ex-Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police. The BBC says His attempt to cling to office was ultimately futile; confidence drained away, friends beyond government were hard to find. Picture BBC




The Labour Party claimed it would modernise the House of Lords.

Each of the people named in Mr Brown's list of new Peers will have their say in how Britain is governed, and will be paid a daily allowance to attend the House of Lords. They will have this right for the rest of their lives.

For ease, here is a quick view of the full list of new peerages. (Mail)

Oh, and Michael Howard, who is listed as "former Home Secretary, and held other senior posts in government and opposition" was also leader of the Conservative Party between 2003 and 2005 and was, therefore, Leader of the Opposition. Maybe that's what whoever drew up the list means by 'other senior posts'.

....

Labour leadership #1

Mr David Miliband

Born 15th July 1965, brother to Edward Miliband.
Studied PPE at Corpus Christi, Oxford, with further studies in Political Science at MIT.
Worked at the Institute of Policy Studies Institute for Public Policy Research*.
Became Mr Blair's Head of Policy in 1994.
First elected to Parliament in 2001.
Promoted to Schools Minister in 2002, swiftly followed by posts as Cabinet Office Minister, then Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.
In 2007 he was appointed Foreign Secretary and took his charms overseas.

He managed to annoy :-

Russia - in September 2008, when he was

subjected to 'F-word' tirade from Russian foreign minister Mr Lavrov [who] objected to being lectured by the British.

It would seem that Mr Lavrov also

asked Mr Miliband in equally blunt terms whether he knew anything of Russia's history

and

It is not the first time Mr Miliband and his Russian counterpart have clashed. Last year, Mr Lavrov retaliated to the expulsion of Russian diplomats from London by closing British Council offices in Russia.

You'd think, maybe, Mr Miliband would have been a bit more careful after that, but no.

India, January 2009

the Foreign Secretary's visit to India last week was labelled a "disaster" by the country's leading politicians.

He was accused of being "aggressive in tone and manner" in a meeting with the Indian Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, and dismissed as a "young man" by senior officials.

So Mandelson tried the rescue the situation. But ...

It left the impression of the Cabinet veteran being forced to clean up after the mess left by his "novice" younger colleague in India, a country which places huge emphasis on respect for elders.

The shadow Foreign Secretary, William Hague, said yesterday: "It is becoming clear that David Miliband's India tour was a serious diplomatic disaster. To have to be rescued by Lord Mandelson adds political humiliation on top of that."

Not satisfied with having irritated both Russia and India, Mr Miliband managed to get Sri Lankans to burn his effigy. This was in May 2009.

We learn (from NotaSheep) that Mr David Miliband has sufficient sponsors for his bid to become leader of the Labour Party to go ahead. It would seem that 54 of his fellow MPs believe he is the best person to lead the Labour Party and, if they were to win a general election, would be pleased to see him become Prime Minister.

It's quite a chilling thought really, but surely by then he would be older, and wiser and may have gained a little more life experience and humility.
..........

*
See comments

....

Thirsk and Malton

Voters at Thirsk and Malton (in Yorkshire) elected Conservative Anne McIntosh to take the final seat in the new parliament.

Votes cast were as follows:

* Conservative - 20,167 (52.87%)
* Liberal Democrat - 8,886 (23.30%)
* Labour - 5,169 (13.55%)
* UKIP - 2,502 (6.56%)
* Liberal - 1,418 (3.72%)

Turnout was 50.3%, with 38,142 votes cast.

According to the BBC the 'notional results' of the 2005 election would have been

Conservative - 51.9%
Labour - 23.4%
Liberal Democrat - 18.8%
Others - 5.9%

Based on those figures, and according to BBC, Labour should have pulled in 11,585 votes, so didn't do at all well. The Conservatives increased their percentage vote, the Lib Dems must be delighted with the result and the 'other parties' polled more than anticipated - so it looks as if previously Labour voters have switched their allegiance and been brave enough to support what were minotiry parties.

Whichever member of which Labour family ends up leading the party, they need to take a careful look at this result, and work out what went so badly wrong. Perhaps they will also need to understand that a 'coalition' may have, at long last, freed the country from the rotating two party system.

....

Messrs. Ed have something to say.

So both Messrs Ed have tried to enhance their chances of being elected as the new leader of the Labour Party by saying they "condemn Iraq invasion"

At least that's what it says in the Mail. It says the same in other newspapers too, so it must be right.

If the invasion of Iraq was so wrong Mr Edward Miliband should explain why he voted "strongly against an inquiry". He voted so strongly that each time the matter was raised in Parliament - he said, "No!"

And Mr Edward Balls? Well, he wasn't an MP at the time but according to John Rentoul he still managed to play a part.

Though not yet elected as an MP, Mr Balls – as Mr Brown’s adviser – was party to top level discussions after attempts to get a second UN Security Council resolution failed.

“I was in the room when a decision was taken that we would say it was that dastardly Frenchman, Jacques Chirac, who had scuppered it. It wasn’t really true, you know. I said to Gordon: 'I know why you’re doing this, but you’ll regret it’. France is a very important relationship for us.”

Oh!

Good job M. Chirac didn't ever get to hear about it, could have soured relationships between Britain and France.

Ah! Oops!

Even though he is no longer President of France, M. Chirac is still very important, and probably keeps an eye out for what people in other countries are saying about him and his country. Clever of Mr Ed Balls to put something like that in the newspapers.

But, we've heard this buck-passing somewhere before, because the ahem, "Credit Crunch" was America's fault. What's the betting it was a useful thing to do, handy get-out clause sort of thing.

But okay chaps. You've had your little joke. It's time to be serious. We know from Mr Blair that there were no 'weapons of mass desctruction' and we know Mr Brown told at least one lot of lies to both Chilcot and to Parliament. It doesn't stretch the imagination to think there might have been others that haven't yet come to light.

So, what do we know?

In Britain we're never really told the whole story about military casualties, so let's see what CNN has to say about Iraq

There have been 4,718 coalition deaths --
4,402 Americans,
2 Australians,
1 Azerbaijani,
179 Britons,
13 Bulgarians,
1 Czech,
7 Danes,
2 Dutch,
2 Estonians,
1 Fijian,
5 Georgians,
1 Hungarian,
33 Italians,
1 Kazakh,
3 Latvians,
22 Poles,
3 Romanians,
5 Salvadoran,
4 Slovaks,
1 South Korean,
11 Spaniards,
2 Thai
18 Ukrainians
-- in the Iraq war as of May 14, 2010, according to a CNN count.

The list below is the names of the soldiers, Marines, airmen, sailors and Coast Guardsmen whose deaths have been reported by their country's governments. The list also includes 14 U.S. Defense Department civilian employees.

At least 31,810 U.S. troops have been wounded in action, according to the Pentagon.

The BBC only tells us that there were 179 British military fatalities. Guessing, by using similar proportions to the US military death:casualties then perhaps 1,293 British troops were seriously injured.

The Iraq Body Count Project (IBC) estimates there have been 95,888 – 104,595 violent civilian deaths as a result of the conflict. Other sources tell a different story, with ORB estimating over a million violent deaths as a result of the conflict.

There were many demonstrations against the Iraq War, with millions of people taking to the streets all round the world

All those people involved in a war. All those lives lost, all those injuries.

And Messrs Balls and Miliband reckon it was all a bit of a mistake.

Could they say the same in front of David Kelly's family?

So, maybe it'll be post-meritocratic and not a 'white [man] in their 40s' Diane Abbot for leader.

That'll be fun.

....

For Ellie

A picture, especially for BevaniteEllie, who you may recall hopes Mr Balls' will win the competition and become leader of the Labour Party.

Here he is, in all his glory - courtesy of the Daily Mail

The picture is, incidentally, captioned "Ed Balls shows off more than a six-pack in skimpy sportswear". The newspaper article correctly refers to him as "Labour heavyweight"

And to think that this man has had the audacity to lecture people about their 'unhealthy' lifestyles.

....

Ellie has a short memory.

Ellie Gerrard that is, yes, this one. Mrs R found her thanks to reading about her on various blogs including Uncle Marvo's place, but she's writing because of this piece by CF which prompted a little stroll through some online archives.

As CF points out, Bevanite Ellie seems to change her mind quite a bit. First there's this piece about that Labour Leadership Contest that never was and the fallout from the Glasgow East by-election in 27 July 2008 ...

Here's my ideal scenario for the coming months. Brown accepts that too much damage has been done and while I feel sorry for someone who has waited so long for a job which he has done averagely and been slaughtered for, I care more for our party and supporters. Alan Johnson takes the reigns. If we rely on another Blairite, wet behind the ears and a propagator of policies and a Labour party that has failed then we will die, and will deserve to. Johnson is politicallly astute, personable and above all passionate. He is committed to socialism and a staunch trade unionist thus would hopefully unite our party which needs to be stronger than ever today. A general election would come sooner rather than later with change of leadership and we would fight in on tough policies, left wing ideas and real issues. not pandering to any conservative measure or media giant. The Labour party in it's purest form, for when our party is distilled it is deadly. Win or lose such an election we will know where we stand and will be in a stronger, and prouder position to reignite the flame of which mere embers remain today.

In short, Brown (although I had high hopes and don't burden you with total responsibility) get your coat, time's up. Our party is worth fighting for, and I know as long as there's breath in my body I will fight for us.

Only a year later on 27th July 2009, and on her old blog, Ellie was discussing MPs favourite viewing. She noted that

Alastair Darling - Yes Minister never fails to make me laugh. Although it's less comedy, more documentary. oh, and black humour - it's kept us going over the last two years at the treasury (bless)

Margaret Beckett - The Last of the Summer Wine (Jesus wept) makes me laugh a lot. Have I Got News for You is also quite funny. But I don't like it when it gets too cruel. (Paul, Ian, I do hope you're listening, Margaret would like you to tone it down)

Alan Johnson - Blackadder, Fawlty Towers ... make the Johnson's laugh. (AJ, I expected a few more 'hip' choices considering your cutting edge taste in all things musical).

Ellie wasn't impressed and said so

I do hope you're thinking the same as me. Did these people stop watching TV in 1975? A little mention for 'In the Loop' would have gone far in this selection. People say MPs are out of touch, for God sake peeps, don't fuel it.

So, maybe that made Ellie think Alan Johnson was too old fashioned and too out of touch with her generation to lead her Labour Party?

Oh, and Ellie doesn't like Shami Chakrabarti either. Ellie thinks she's a

... blusherless faced, crop haired, Tory sympathiser

Hmmm.

Well, with that we'll move forward another year to when lucky Ellie found herself launching Labour's election campaign (18 April 2010) and, naturally, she changed her mind - again ...

I don’t have to make the case for Gordon Brown on here, he’s done that himself. All I’d say is that this is a man of substance that we not only want, but need, leading us into the challenging, but potentially exciting, future which awaits us.

Oh!

Less than a month later, on 17th May, Ellie got herself all in a tizz about the impact of Dear Gordon resigning stepping down as leader. Here's why ...

one thing worries me, the calls for a snap leadership election. I think those calling for a quick transition are, perhaps inadvertently, suggesting Gordon was the reason we lost, that the electorate’s issues with the Labour Government didn’t go deeper. He wasn’t and they do. It was not an awkward smile, or stiffness on camera which made the semi-skilled workers of this country desert our party, as potential leadership candidates are now writing daily, it was that they felt ignored. That we were no longer on their side. That hard reality is crucifying to those of us who joined this party to protect the exact voters who abandoned us

And now, today, 20th May 2010, Mr Balls has got the lovely Ellie has got a spot on CiF, where she writes:

I am well aware that Ed Balls is not the most popular candidate for Labour leader. Vilification by the rightwing press has led to an image of Balls which many who know him personally, many of whom I've spoken to, do not recognise. This will be an opportunity for the public to see the real Ed. Quite simply, it will be a cold day in hell when Labour party members choose our leader based on his popularity in the sections of the media we rightly loathe. Ed has the hunger, the drive and the fire in the belly to lead our party back into Downing Street. It is perhaps just that which the rightwing media fear.

So, it looks as if Ellie loves Alan, Gordon, Ed - and she knows he's a nice person because she's spoken to 'many' of his friends!!

Mrs R will say one thing for Ellie - she really doesn't mind changing her mind, and she'll back anythingbody she thinks will win.

Trouble is that people who keep doing it, and maintain their own record as proof, tend to come a cropper - especially if they're in the Labour Party. McBride and co make a living from eating people like Ellie for breakfast, Mrs R thinks she'll go a very long way in the Labour Party - but maybe not as far as she hopes. Labour likes loyalty to the Party, and Ellie has that in spades, but she's shown she changes her mind and leaves online records of changing her mind, and that's something they don't like.

So, Ellie, wearing your heart on your sleeve whilst you're strolling round Paris bemoaning the lack of a French 'welfare state' (- maybe Ellie hasn't heard of the time when France got rid of its nobility and became a truly egalitarian country) might be fun but, errm, the party you adore and give your wholehearted support for likes you now - but they'll discard you if you haven't backed the winner, so don't start counting on your MP's expenses just yet.

....

"They still don't get it. Maybe they never will."

Prodicus

Thus James Purnell:

The coalition will want to say that this new politics shows that it is a progressive Government. [...]

What does “progressive” mean?

It means whatever the speaker says it means. To a Socialist, it means socialism and everything its equality-obsessed totalitarian world-view brings with it. It means taking power and then meddling in everything because only your divine insight can improve people's lives and anyone who disputes that is actually evil and must be fought by all possible means. Killed, preferably. No wonder Labour couldn't make a coalition.

To a Conservative, 'progressive' means helping people to make progress - towards something better, without destroying the good they and others have already achieved. It means building on what is, rather than tearing it all down in the name of a Brave New World of your own making. It means going with the grain of human nature, not fantasising that Men can be transformed into Supermen. It means learning from experience rather than from a textbook. ...

Read the rest of this excellent piece here

....

Brown and ‘fairness’. Again. (from Chicken Yoghurt)

This is quoted in full - a piece written by Justin McKeating at Chicken Yoghurt.

Seen first on CF's place.

Mrs Rigby hopes the author doesn't mind too much that his excellent article is reproduced in full, but she thinks it's worth it.

The trouble is, you can spend so much of your time worrying about the theoretical horrors of a Tory government that you forget the practical horrors of a New Labour one.

Complicity in torture. Chemical weapons in Iraq. The children of refugees developing post-traumatic stress disorder in internment camps. Women who clean the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s office living on lentils to pay for a school uniform. Should I go on?

You listen to Brown make his ‘barnstorming‘ speech to Citizens UK with its ‘compassion’, ‘goodwill’, ‘fairness’, ‘duty’, ‘friendship’, ‘justice’, ‘dignity’ and ‘good society’, and you wonder how we reconcile those with the above list of grotesques. I’ve said it before and I’ll damn well say it again, Brown invokes the decency with which he says he was brought up and you wonder what the hell happened to it. The rhetoric is a long way behind the reality.

I don’t think he’s that good an actor which rules him out as a pathological liar. Look at this letter from Brown to Open Kingdom on the subject of the detention of child refugees. As someone with a horrified fascination with what our so-called civilized society does to these children, I could spend all day pointing out what I’ll charitably call errors in his letter, much of it contradicted by many an unread and unreported study.

Brown clearly believes what he’s saying and writing (or written for him), so is he deluded, in denial or so insulated from the real world by his handlers that he has no idea of the terrible things his government does in his name? His letter to Open Kingdom makes me think he either has the facts but doesn’t wish to admit them or someone is keeping the facts from him. Does he close his eyes and ears or does someone blindfold him and cover his lugs for him?

Whatever the reasons it’s no way to run a country while laying claim to the virtues of compassion and decency. Brown’s running a government that’s yet to find a minimum standard of human decency let alone the lofty peaks of sainthood he tries to scale with his cheap talk.

‘If you fight for fairness, you will always find in me a friend, a partner and a brother,’ said Brown in his speech yesterday. Reading that next to an account of a child refugee screaming in the night at Yarl’s Wood makes my lunch rise. (Brown was non-commital at best when question about child detention. He ‘wanted no child to suffer’. Which is nice.) It reminds me of what Jamie Kenny said about George Best when the old bastard died:

I’m a football fan, but fuck the football too. It meant nothing from the moment he first raised his hand to his wife. If he could have avoided living like a swine by staying in Belfast and working at Tesco’s, then he should have done that.

I’m a fairness fan, but fuck the minimum wage too (wave it at the family living on lentils)**. Brown’s ‘achievements’ meant nothing from the moment that child first started to scream.

(I hear a lot about how the Tories would have done the same or worse had they been in power for the last 13 years. I don’t find it very comforting or persuasive when feeling pressure to vote for New Labour. And anyway, I don’t have the same knack of peering into alternate universes as some people. Maybe what we need is another theory like Schrödinger’s cat or McKeating’s Niqab. Let us call it McKeating’s Cameron. We shove David Cameron in a box. The Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics implies that until the votes are counted on Thursday night, he is simultaneously the benign change we need and a complete bastard.)

Now you've read this, you should hop over there and cast your eye over some of the other pieces on the site. They're worth reading.

..........
**
More about the family living on lentils here

Before Brown’s speech (on 3rd May 2010) came Martha, 62, and her daughter Sandra, cleaners who – deliciously neatly – clean the chancellor’s office. They earn £6.95 an hour, explained Martha, and have to get up at 3.30am to take a tortuous bus journey because the tube is too expensive. In order to buy her granddaughter’s school uniform, the whole family had to eat lentils for a week.

It was then the turn of the granddaughter, who broke down at the lectern. “If they were paid a living wage,” she sobbed, “we wouldn’t have to eat lentils for a week. If they were paid a living wage, my mum could afford the tube and I would see her for three hours more a day …”

....

Balls to vote Lib Dem?***

A couple of days to Mrs R made a very small donation to Antony Calvert's campaign to 'get Balls out". She did this because she would dearly like to see Mr Balls in the political wasteland - although she knows very well that if he doesn't win he's likely to end up in ermine. It might be too late for the 'Dissolution Honours', but there'll be plenty of other opportunities. But, maybe not, because he might just have committed political treason, silly chap.

Mr Balls is reported as saying that he wants Labour voters in so-called 'marginal seats'* to vote Lib Dem "to keep the Tories out".

Mr Balls is a professional politician who probably spends a lot of time with the party's 'faithful'. Mr Balls wants to be leader of the Labour Party, at least that's what the papers tell us, yet he's asking people who support the Labour Party to vote for the Lib Dems - to keep the nasty, baby-eating, Policeman-sacking, murderous, Tories out of government.

There are a few things Mr Balls might not have realised, the main one is that not many people are really 'politically aware'. They see headlines, scan the rest and make their own opinion.

There might have been 'millions' watching those debates, but educational theorists say few people these days can sustain concentration for more than ten or fifteen minutes, yet broadcasters expected the electorate to watch three men talking for 90 minutes - without a tea/coffee/meal/snack/toilet break. Not many will have done so.

People like Mr Balls aren't likely to realise that ordinary folk won't have a clue if they live in a marginal seat, and not many people know if their constituency boundary has been redrawn.

Not many people will even think about finding out if the Labour candidate might be in a fairly dodgy position - financially.

When somebody stands for election they have to pay a deposit - it's £500 per person. It says so here. It also says that

A deposit ... is forfeited if they fail to gain at least 5% of the votes cast in their constituency

And, Mrs R will say it again - Mr Balls is asking Labour voters to vote Lib Dem.

No, it might not be exactly what he said, and it isn't likely to be what he means - but it's what a lot of people will think he means when they skim the headlines or hear it on the television or radio.

So, there are all those Labour voters who've been a bit irritated by Mr Brown's behaviour and have decided to do a Mrs Duffy and not vote, they won't even stroll to the postbox with their envelope.

There are some Labour voters who've become so disenchanted with what's been going on that they're going to vote BNP and there are the rest, who are a bit unsure.

Is it likely those unsure people will vote Conservative? Not a chance, not if they've 'always voted Labour', they'd sooner cut off their hands.

Is it likely those people will vote Lib Dem? Actually, Mrs R thinks not, not when it comes to putting an X in a box. She thinks they're more likely to stay at home, especially if it's cold, and more especially if it's raining.

If that happens it's going to make an awful mess of the polling figures - and might even mean quite a few Labour candidates lose their deposits.

During their time in office Labour has cost the Rigby family considerably more than £500 and, because of their appalling mismanagement of the economy, will go on costing them more than £500 for quite a few years to come.

Poetic justice, don't you think?

Did Mr Balls really think his little scheme through?

And to think he wanted to be Chancellor of the Exchequer!


..........

*
Mrs Rigby went to find out a bit more about these 'marginals'. The BBC has a handy sort of gizmo that lists each party's 'battlegrounds', which it describes thusly

The list is based on "notional" results, which provide an estimate of the 2005 election outcome, had recent constituency boundary changes been in force then.

According to the list there are 44 target marginals identified by Labour, with majorities ranging from 0.1% to 9.9%. 33 are Conservative, 9 are Liberal Democrats, 1 is Scottish National Party and 1 is Respect-Unity Coalition.

There are 30 seats identified as Liberal Democrat marginals, with majorities ranging from 0.2% to 9.2%. 17 of these are Conservative, the other 13 are Labour.

There are 116 Conservatives target seats, ranging from a 'nominal' 0% difference (the new constituency of Gillingham & Rainham) and 12% difference. The list contains 89 Labour seats, 23 Lib Dem, 2 SNP, 1 Independent Community Health Concern (and Mrs R clearly can't count, but she's gone boggle eyed trying to go through the list, and gives up!)

Plaid Cymru is targetting 12 seats - 11 Labour and 1 Lib Dem.

Scottish Nationalists are targetting 14 seats - 13 Labour and 1 Lib Dem.

There's another bit of the site (dropdown) that lists 'Defence seats', but you'll have to look for yourself. Here they are Lib Dems (28), Labour (24), Conservative (50), Plaid (2), SNP (6).

It says that

Losing 24 seats would mean Gordon Brown's Labour party losing its overall majority in the House of Commons.

The seats highlighted in the map and in the list below are the 24 most likely to fall, based on Labour-held seats where they have the smallest majority over the next party.

Bored yet? No? Good!

Using Mrs Rigby's own brand of statistical analysis** she worked out that the other parties combined are targetting a grand total of 127 Labour marginals. Some of them might well be the same seats, if so she hasn't a clue which they might be.

Mrs Rigby then looked at this BBC site. It's fairly straightforward, all you do is choose your constituency and see who's standing, then scroll down a bit to see the numbers and percentages next to the names. If your seat is a 'marginal' or 'target' it says so.

Mrs R looked at all the constituencies she's ever voted in since she was 18. Every one of them has this 'nominal' number, so she reckons loads and loads of constituency boundaries have been redrawn. She notes that some of those seats are now called 'marginals'.

..........
**
Adding all the red numbers together

..........
***
Well, he should if he follows his own advice and wants to keep the Conservatives out of his own seat of Morley and Outwood

....

Trying to "smear" Mrs Duffy

...it was claimed that Mr Brown had misheard the 66-year-old and had though she had asked 'where are they f***ing from?'

If this is true it shows, yet again, how completely and utterly out of touch they are with the ordinary people who have always voted Labour.

Ordinary people don't swear. Ordinary people don't use foul language, especially not people like Mrs Duffy, and especially not in front of television cameras or when speaking to leaders of political parties - who they respect because of what they are (or were), not because of who they are.

How dare they try to 'smear' her in a feeble attempt to paper over the yawning chasms cracks. It is not reasonable, or acceptable, to try to destroy the character of an ordinary woman in an attempt to make political gain.

Mrs Rigby is so angry, so incredibly angry.

This is, perhaps the first time in many years that Mrs Rigby would support a claim for attempted character assassination, libel, alongside a demand for significant compensation for hurt and emotional distress.

Why on earth should a 66 year old widow have to put up with this, just because she went out for a loaf of bread and happened to see Mr Brown - leader of the Labour Party and one-time Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Mrs Rigby hopes this is the final nail in the coffin of the disgusting "New Labour" project. The party needs cleaning out, it needs to be destroyed and rebuilt from the bottom up.

As much as Mrs Rigby dislikes Alan Johnson, at least he seems to acknowledge his real working class roots - unlike the privileged and socially advantaged, sneering, social-climbing, arrogant Milibands, and male and female Balls and that despicable misandrist Harman woman.

If Mrs Rigby lived in Rochdale, which she doesn't, she would probably vote BNP - out of spite, just to show them her contempt.

....