Cassilis

Best wishes to those few diehards to read and comment regularly (likewise the regular readers who stay silent) - thanks for your support in 2007. You'll have noticed some changes in the sidebar area - more on those in the new year...

Enjoy Aretha in the video box and have an entertaining night....

Liam.

OK - I wouldn't stake the mortgage on it and better informed and connected bloggers than I may rubbish the idea but bear with me a little...

When Brown backed off an autumn election in early October the story ran that he'd ruled out a poll until at least 2009. The obsequious Andrew Marr pressed this point a little but Brown insisted that it was "very unlikely" (transcript). Under different circumstances this 'non-denial' would've attracted some attention but the story quickly became Brown's character and the remarkable reversal in fortunes over that couple of weeks - but he didn't rule it out.

Given the way his autumn eventually panned out a snap February poll would clearly be nuts. But its worth pointing out that despite the disasters of the last couple of months most polling still has the Tories short of a sufficient lead to land a workable majority. However embattled Brown is his team will take heart that Cameron has yet to poll in the 45/50% region seen by many as a tipping point in party fortunes (Cameron's team should be troubled by the same observation). Granted, the spring need only see one or two more 'Mr Bean' episodes and I suspect the dye will be cast - Brown will simply hang on until defeat in the poll whenever it comes. But if the New Year brings more Stalin than Bean and the Tories find themselves in choppy waters as they flesh out their platform don't underestimate Gordon Brown's lust for power - if he thought he could snatch another five years in office he wouldn't let a pseudo-promise to Andrew Marr stop him.

Labels: Politics

I've been tagged by Nich Starling to pick up Iain Dale's meme on 8 wishes for 2008. No great enthusiast for blog memes but since it's Christmas and in no particular order...

1. A Democratic presidency - still undecided on Clinton / Edwards / Obama but very much decided against Guilliani / Huckabee / Romney!
2. Real third party politics in the UK - C'mon Mr Clegg, give messrs Brown & Cameron a run for their money. I'm not a Lib Dem but politics is better when there are real alternatives.
3. Rediscover my guitar - may have included something like this in a list last year but, if so, I failed. Jazz guitar is still an infinitely more satisfying and challenging hobby than blogging...
4. To lose some weight - self-explanatory...
5. To launch a new website / blog - Sshhh, can't say more at the moment but should be interesting (and will have to involve some of you!)
6. Job Security - any colleagues reading will understand, may still be at the same company but lots of changes on the horizon. Coming through them unscathed would be nice...
7. Write short stories - I've started many but never finished them. Not a good omen since one day I'd like to write a novel. In '08 I'm hoping to add a few short stories here...
8. Keep falling in love with Joseph - sentimental I know but having a kid changes everything and it's genuinely the first thing that pops into your head when you think about how he'll grow next year...

Struggling to name five who've already escaped but I'll try Newmania, Chris Paul, Paul Burgin, Paul Linford and Grant Thoms

On the wind down now to Christmas so posting will be light at best but a couple of things I want to add my tuppence worth to this afternoon.

Since I'm always quick to take issue with Polly Toynbee when I think she's wrong it's only fair I point out when she's more or less on the button. I haven't actually seen as many 'PC gone mad' stories as in previous years but Polly's experience shows how keen the media are to try and concoct them anyway:

"I had at least five calls from broadcasters this year inviting me to say it would be a jolly good thing if Christmas were rebranded Winterval"

She cites a study by Theos bemoaning the lack of biblical knowledge in the UK but rightly defends secularists against the charge that they're somehow on a crusade to banish Christ from Christmas - if knowledge isn't what it was and religious Christmas cards and nativity plays are becoming less common then market forces have a greater part to play than Dawkins, Toynbee et al. She rightly points out that you can be an aetheist and still appreciate and value the Christian narrative:

"The loss of classical mythology has made much poetry, art and literature incomprehensible to most people. The loss of Christian mythology would make most European history and painting impenetrable. Secularists do not welcome ignorance as a substitute for declining faith."

On a related note there's a discussion over at Paul Linford's blog on whether or not being a 'person of faith' makes someone a better MP. I won't rehash the discussion / comments and they're well worth a read but with all due respect to Paul I have to side with those who suggest it simply shouldn't be a factor and should remain an intensley private matter. More later perhaps...

Stories about the historical or geographical ignorance of US politicians abound and in my experience they often tell you more about anti-US European prejudice than they do about anything else. This story though suggests they’re not always without substance.

White House Press Secretary Dana Perino recalls a reporter referring to the Cuban Missile Crisis during one of her early briefings. "I was panicked a bit because I really don't know about . . . the Cuban Missile Crisis. It had to do with Cuba and missiles, I'm pretty sure."

Labels: Politics

Not sure how unusual I am in this respect but my morning listening usually consists of switching between Radio 4’s Today programme and Chris Moyles on Radio 1 depending on which of them is the least annoying at that particular time (often a close run thing). But Humphries and Co. must have had the upper hand recently because until this morning I was unaware of the row over the Radio 1 censorship u-turn on the Pogues / Kirsty MacColl song ‘Fairytale of New York’. Peter Tatchell has joined the fray this morning and as far as he’s concerned this is straightforward hypocrisy since presumably the station wouldn’t tolerate openly racist or religiously bigoted language:

“…the crunch issue is double-standards. I challenge those who defend the use of the word faggot in these lyrics to state publicly that they would also defend the right of white singers to use the n-word as a term of abuse in a song. They won't and that makes them cowardly homophobic hypocrites.”

There’s much to admire in Tatchell and on most issues I agree with him but I think he’s got this wrong. Anyone familiar with the song knows that the lyrics are a ‘call & response’ type narrative between two (presumably) drunk lovers on Christmas Eve in New York – it shifts effortlessly between syrupy reminisces of Christmas’ past and bilious denunciations of each others character. Most of it is written as direct speech and the offending part is:

MacGowan:
You're a bum
You're a punk
You're an old slut on junk
Lying there almost dead on a drip in that bed

MacColl:
You scumbag, you maggot
You cheap lousy faggot
Happy Christmas your arse
I pray God it's our last

Tatchell points out the word ‘faggot’ is intended to be abusive and insulting but he’s ignoring the wider context of the song. It’s relaying a dialogue between two people, most likely drunk and between whom there’s obviously more than a little animosity. That verse serves to illustrate the hostility that can exist between people who are / were in love – and the whole song is about how transitory both good and bad feelings can be. A few lines before those quoted above the protagonists are complimenting each other and expressing undying love. What’s more I don’t believe there’s anyone who isn’t aware of this context and so the idea that ‘faggot’ could be taken as abusive or insulting in any general sense is just nonsense.

I’m quite happy to answer Tatchell’s challenge and ‘defend the right of white singers to use the n-word as a term of abuse in a song’ – Bob Dylan in ‘Hurricane’:

All of Rubin’s cards were marked in advance
The trial was a pig-circus, he never had a chance.
The judge made Rubin’s witnesses drunkards from the slums
To the white folks who watched he was a revolutionary bum
And to the black folks he was just a crazy nigger.
No one doubted that he pulled the trigger.
And though they could not produce the gun,
The DA said he was the one who did the deed
And the all-white jury agreed.

The point here is that context has to matter and blanket bans that ignore context or motive actually serve to antagonise decent, honourable people. The contrast between Shane McGowan's lyric here and some of the overt homophobia you find elsewhere (Beenie Man etc.) couldn't be starker and I only hope there isn't some proxy agenda here given McGowan's Catholic / Irish background. Final word - 'Fairytale of New York' also contains one of my favourite lyrics, less controversial than any of the above but wonderfully acerbic, particularly with the sadly missed Kirsty MacColl's delivery:

MacGowan: I could have been someone
MacColl: Well so could anyone...

...it may just be me not paying attention but where the hell is Boris Johnson? Granted, the campaign may not have formally started but given that Boris has had an enviable media profile for a few years now (presumably one of the reasons he was selected) he seems to have gone to ground.

I know he's standing in mayoral elections rather than national ones but given the difficulties the government have found themselves in over the last couple of months I can't help but think Boris has missed an opportunity here. None of those problems can be laid at Livingstone's door obviously but a well run campaign should be able to suggest parallels between Labour's national problems and the London issues Boris intends to campaign on. The parallels may not be there of course but since when has that sort of detail mattered to campaigning politicians?

He needn't have been a key player in the Conservative's attack over recent months but I just find it strange that he doesn't even appear to have been on the bench. I guess supporters will be hoping that he's cosseted away with a crack team of advisers getting ready to launch himself on London in the early spring...

Labels: Politics

On CiF today Polly Toynbee takes issue with Tory attempts to wrestle the tag ‘progressive’ from Labour, dismissing both the sincerity of Cameron’s use of the word as well as it’s original relevance to New Labour anyway. Curiously she credits Peter Mandelson with ‘devising’ the word in the early 90’s as a way to avoid saying ‘centre-left’ when in fact the term’s been reasonably common currency in US politics since Teddy Roosevelt formed the ‘Progressive Party’ in 1912. Polly’s objection to Tory use of ‘progressive’ sits in the same vein as Alex Hilton’s diatribe on Saturday about the inherent evils of Toryism – both are desperate to tether the Tories to the Thatcherite hard-right caricature because they know how electorally damaging that would be. What’s more, far too many Tories would be happy to be described as such when in truth a little history shows a different picture.

As Prime Minister Disraeli embraced social reform precisely because it relieved poverty and hardship – this was the birth of “One Nation” politics. He passed many major acts of social reform including trade union rights, factory conditions, public health, education and housing. The Tories have always been political magpies, picking and choosing between ideas to suit the moment, appropriating their opponents’ most popular themes and readily discarding hitherto fervent beliefs once their electoral value waned. Critics of course might condemn this as the subjugation of abstract principle to the goal of winning and maintaining power but it’s surely no accident that the Conservative party spent two-thirds of the 20th century in government.

From their 2006 publication Compassionate Conservatism, Jesse Norman and Janan Ganesh summed it up as follows:

A political conservative must determine the requirements of a particular situation, and reflect on which of his or her principles are to be deployed and how. This may require a shift from one principle to another over time, or the simultaneous application of different principles to different situations. Such shifts may be disdained as hypocrisy, and of course sometimes they may actually be hypocritical. But politics is not logic. Absolute consistency in the application of abstract principle to practical politics is rarely possible and never wise. The British electorate, with its preference for common sense over grand theory, usually rewards this insight at elections, even as it abuses it between them.

What ultimately distinguishes conservatism from its rival creeds, therefore, is not so much the views it holds, though some of these are unique to conservatism, as the way it holds them. Socialism and liberalism are, at root, theories and ideologies: fundamental interpretations of the nature of history and of “the good”, from which policy programmes are supposedly inferred. Conservatism is no such thing. It is instinctive, not theoretical; a disposition, not a doctrine; realistic and sceptical, not grandiose or utopian; accepting of the imperfectability of man, not restless to overcome it; and anxious to improve the lot of the many not by referring to some plan, but by working with the grain of what Kant called “the crooked timber of humanity”. It is precisely its reluctance to accord sacred status to any abstract idea that allows conservatism to incorporate so many of them. It is precisely its refusal to regard change as a good in itself thatmakes it uniquely qualified to manage change most prudently.

Quite.

Labels: Politics

I’ve never been comfortable with the term ‘career politician’. It’s usually taken to mean someone who happily suppresses principles in pursuit of hard power and carries an implied criticism about the targets sincerity and/or integrity. It’s also a charge normally levelled by those who consider themselves without compromise when it comes to their own principles and is often laden with smug contempt. What’s more, the accuser often has a label of their own – ‘maverick’ or ‘rebel’ usually, the implication this time being that their principles are not for sale and their own integrity is beyond question.

There are of course politicians who deserve these labels but more often than not I think the media get these labels and criticisms the wrong way round. There’s no surer route to political celebrity than the MP who’s always ready and willing to criticise their own party (Tebbit, Widdecombe, Benn, Skinner etc.). Likewise with the politicians who hold fast to the banalities of adolescent politics, ready to ‘damn them all’ or champion some despot somewhere just because they share an enemy (Benn again, Galloway etc). Invariably these politicians wield no actual power whatsoever which is why their certainty about the world has never been dented. Provided they have a neat turn of phrase and can raise a chuckle or two at the same time these people are assured of a lengthy career.

Those they damn as unprincipled sell-outs however usually have a far harder time of it that anyone gives them credit for. It may be a trite observation but success in politics demands compromise. Principles and values are grand, important things but achieving anything worthwhile inevitably involves reconciling competing values and making very difficult decisions. Values and principles are worthless if they remain nothing but abstracts and while there may be some who reach the top by keeping their head down and saying the right things, many who make it do so while clinging fast to their principles and reconciling them with the need to actually achieve something.

I’d written this before I stumbled across Oliver Kamm’s excellent post today on the follies of Tony Benn – well worth a read.

Labels: Politics

After 6-8 weeks in which the Conservatives have had an understandable spring in their step the Economist sounds a welcome note of caution on how much remains to done before they can take the next election for granted.

"...the Tories have not pulled away decisively: they are polling at around 40%, which is short of both the 45% mark that Mr Cameron has made his party's target and the 60% that Labour scored under Tony Blair in 1995. Labour then was more than 30 points ahead of the governing Tories; today the Tories are less than ten points ahead of Labour. Conservatives note that they face a stronger government than Sir John Major's. None of its recent mistakes has been as ruinous for voters as the recession of the early 1990s. Neither is it as exhausted of ideas: Sir John never produced anything as vaulting as the children's plan unveiled on December 11th."

That's a timely warning. Tribal Tories may struggle to accept this but no matter how many dazzling policy initiatives they can produce they will only win power when public disaffection with Brown & Labour passes that difficult to track tipping point and despite recent debacles we may not be there yet. In the decade before Labour took office we’d had race riots, poll tax riots, unparalleled hostility from the arts establishment & popular cultural figures all against a backdrop of serious in fighting and ill discipline in the governing party. That’s why the returns on Blair & Campbell’s Labour rebranding were far more immediate and substantial than those we’ve seen on Cameron’s project (the 60% polling referred to above). I don’t think any serious and objective comparison between Brown under Labour in 2007 and the Conservatives under Major in 1997 could find many significant parallels and somebody, somewhere in the party should be acknowledging this.

Labels: Politics

It's almost 6 months since Gordon Brown assumed the Premiership and of all the emotions I anticipated feeling towards him at this stage, pity was the least likely. But that's exactly how I feel. Ceding the job he'd worked towards all his life to the shallow, intellectually inferior up-start from Fettes would've been galling enough but I'm guessing electoral pragmatism allowed him to square that particular circle. That it then took 13 years for him to collect 'his reward' has to have taken its toll on the man - and if the shaky hands, continual stuttering and black dog scowls aren't evidence of that I don't know what is.

I think two things have combined to give rise to Brown's current difficulties - one is the effective free reign Brown had on domestic policy since 1997 and the other is/was his predecessor’s innate political talent. Taking that second one first, Blair's gift for deflecting criticism and seemingly rising above the political fray provided a degree of cover for his Chancellor and I'm not sure Brown's ever properly acknowledged that debt. His (Blair's) ability to charm any interviewer, leave most PMQ's without a scratch and just generally create the impression of being in control was electoral gold dust for New Labour and is too readily dismissed as superficial or just spin. It was as central to New Labour's success as their achievements were.

And while the Blair charm worked its wonders Brown busied himself in the background, believing (with some justification) that his contribution was more tangible and real than the PR man out front ever gave him credit for. That's the root of his whole 'getting on with the business of government' strategy that he spells out at every opportunity now - it's what he believes he's been doing for 10 years and he had no intention of changing. The problem though is that because of the clear split in responsibility Brown has an underdeveloped sense of how government and the media interact. I realise that's a bold claim against a man who was pivotal in the formation of New Labour but that was opposition not government. Since the 3rd of May 1997 Brown effectively left all that to the Campbells / Mandelsons & Blairs of the world, more or less subscribing to the narrative that dismisses any concern with media management as froth and spin. But that's to massively underestimate what Blair brought to the table.

Blair (or more accurately Blair's team) would just never have let the November election debacle play out like that. Even if they'd have made the same fundamental mistake of trying to go to the wire before deciding they would've found a way to play the story, a line to take, that would've minimised the damage to the party. Likewise with Northern Rock or the missing HMRC data - Blair would've contrived an opportunity to emote impressively with some fraught customers or distance himself successfully from the HMRC practices that gave rise to the mistake, all of which would have insulated him and the party from the worst electoral impact of these incidents. The latest example of Brown's naivety comes over his decision not to attend the signing ceremony for the EU treaty in Lisbon this weekend but to fly out later and sign it. On one level it’s a massive ‘so what?’ – it’s ridiculous to infer anything from it or suggest it’s anything other than the PM managing his time effectively. On another level though it’s a spectacularly stupid thing to have done and the fact that no one in Brown’s circle seems to have even anticipated the reaction should alarm anyone who wishes Gordon Brown well.

Far from being a shallow charmer Blair simply understood our national politics better and played the game with infinitely more skill than Brown can muster. He understood how things landed with opponents and supporters alike, which little things would end in a media storm they didn’t deserve and which big things could be safely ignored. He largely made his own political weather and where he didn’t he managed to endure the storm. It’s only been six months but time and again it looks like Gordon Brown is the sort of politician who simply succumbs to the weather and that’s not a good omen for New Labour.

Labels: Politics

Here's a wonderful example of the internet's ability to combine the mundane with the noble. Freerice.com is a sister site of Poverty.com with the twin aims of improving everyone's vocabulary and ending world hunger (in that order curiously enough).

It's completely free for the user and the main page basically gives you a word followed by four different meanings and you have to choose the correct one. Every time you get one right the site donates 20 grains of rice, via the UN, towards ending world hunger. It keeps track of your 'score' and the words get harder the better you do (and easier again if you start to get some wrong). The donations are funded by advertisers whose wares are touted along the bottom of the page. The next time you have 10mins to spare in front of a PC why not have a go at this rather than surfing around those irritating and self-important blog things (this one included)?

It's only been live for a couple of months but already 7.7bn grains of rice have been donated. I'm sure my modest readership won't increase that by any great order but if you all pass it on and then all your readers pass it on....

There are banner & buttons available here also...

Blogging squabbles are undignified affairs so it's with more than a little reluctance that I add my tuppence worth to the latest spat between Iain Dale and Chris Paul. I'm motivated to do so since neither man comes out of it tremendously well. Quick potted history of the dispute.

Iain's Telegraph column on Friday called for a 'Bonfire of the Bureaucrats' - fairly routine right-wing stuff (and that's not a criticism) about the size and cost of the public sector and a call for a future Tory government to be ruthless in reigning this back. In the comments thread Chris Paul took issue with Iain's reference to 'hundreds of thousands of extra bureaucrats' and suggested that Iain was including front line services in that number. Various posts / comments followed but as yet they've still to kiss and make up (for the avoidance of doubt that's not my goal here anyway, I'd have more joy with Tony in Jerusalem...) So, a quick dig around the ONS website and I find the following:

Public Sector Employment over the last decade and a half, split according to function looks like this:

So yes, the numbers employed by the state have indeed grown since Labour took office (Iain serves), but actually the numbers have yet to scale the heights they were at shortly after the sainted Mrs T left office so right-wing rage seems a little misplaced (Chris returns). So what about the charge that Iain's including front line staff to make his point? The graph above shows the different groups but if we use %'s we get a better view so:

Taken together both graphs appear to lend weight to Chris's charge - numbers in the forces and the police are roughly static (the scalings not great but in absolute terms the former's dropped c.16k and the later risen c.48k) whereas the numbers and proportions in health and education have risen strongly (356k and 266k respectively). The proportion of staff in 'Other' (which by the way includes all 'non-front line' health, social and public admin roles) has indeed been falling although in absolute terms it's risen c.13k. Final boring numbers bit - Chris suggest that the number of civil service roles has reduced by 20%. I don't think he sources it but a quick look here shows the following:

So yes, a reducing trend in civil service employment but reducing from the massive hike experienced since Labour took office.

I wouldn't be so rash (or arrogant) as to pronounce on a victor here - it's a complex subject. In truth, and with the greatest of respect to both men, it's fairly typical blogging fair - a little partisan, selective with the figures and generating more heat than light. My politics are a little closer to Iain's than Chris's and taken in the round the rash of statistics above show Labour still does prefer a state driven solution to most others. But as I've argued many, many times before this doesn't justify the ludicrous caricature of New Labour as some sort of Stalinist monolith sweeping everything into the arms of the state. Since Gordon Brown employs fewer people in the public realm than Mrs Thatcher did the right might want to temper their outrage a little. There's a case to be made here but nobody's making it well enough - as I said on Iain's original post:

"...the generalities need to be ditched and the [Tories] needs to articulate exactly which 'bureaucrats' they'd cull. Not quite named individuals obviously but specific job roles and the functions they perform. There are two reasons why the Tories need to approach this in this way. The first is simply because it's the responsible thing to do. 'Believing in smaller government' is, if we're honest, as vacuous a generality as 'fairness for all' or 'promoting excellence' etc. It actually means nothing without more detail so the Tories owe an explanation to the electorate on exactly what they will stop the state from doing. The second reason is tactical. Look at the reaction to Redwood's proposals earlier this year - can't recall exactly but it was something like 'Tories will make it easier to sack people'. That was a tremendous own goal and surely Cameron's team have the skills by now to understand how stories play with the apolitical or floating voters the Tories need to connect with to win?"

Labels: Politics

Via Andrew Brown I discover that more than half the Government Art Collection (about 7,000 works) is now online . The originals are displayed in Government buildings here in the UK and around the world and it's administered by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport. Worth a browse for anyone interested in art and, for those happy few like me who are interested in politics as well, it's a particularly intriguing collection. From Rubens & Tintoretto to Bacon & Lowry - well worth a visit.

And as for that mischievous post title? It actually refers to the Scottish painter who died in 1945, more famed for his etching than his painting in fact. The picture to the left, 'Culloden Moor', is an example of Cameron's work - he's known for his barren, dimly lit landscapes, bleak vistas suggestive of despair in the human soul and the pitiless nature of man's being. You're thinking of David Cameron, honourable member for Witney and leader of the opposition. Different David.

No jokes please...

Labels: art, Politics

Yesterday saw a relaunch for the website of 'History & Policy', a collective project between the University of Cambridge, The Institute of Historical Research and The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (no, I don't quite see that fit either). I had been aware of the site beforehand but hadn't visited much recently - the story reminds how worthwhile a resource it is so one for the bookmarks I'd suggest. A couple of brief things to flag for the moment.

Labels: Politics

Let me get this straight. In late 2002 / early 2003 western intelligence services overstated the threat from Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. One of the main justifications for the eventual invasion was shown to be false and since then the intelligence services stock has been trading at a discount to say the least. Since then the anti-war left has cited this history (with some justification I should add) at every opportunity to rubbish any US / UK intelligence on Iranian nuclear ambitions. The lesson? - don’t trust western intelligence.

Yesterday a US Intelligence survey concludes that Iran ceased its nuclear weapons programme in 2003. Cue immediate acceptance of these conclusions from the same anti-war left who spent almost five years rubbishing the same intelligence sources and gleeful mocking of the impact the findings will have on the remaining neocons in Bush’s administration. The lesson this time? – when it supports your position the intelligence must be fine.

Don’t get me wrong – lord knows I’m not going into bat for the efficacy of western intelligence! Just pointing out that if you’ve spent the last few years charging that the intelligence is partisan and politicised then you can hardly jump four square behind it just because it suddenly supports your position. As ever Oliver Kamm is on the button when it comes to international relations and the comment thread is hysterical....

A little late on this but worth flagging all the same. Pickled Politics had an interesting discussion yesterday on the news that the Muslim Council of Britain has reversed it's long standing boycott of Holocaust Memorial Day. Opinion in the comment thread seems divided as to whether the MCB deserves credit for this or whether it's too little too late.

I'd always thought the boycott was indefensible anyway so I'm not minded to be too gushing in praise for the MCB just for finally doing the right thing. Having said that, any suggestions that the MCB shouldn't be made welcome now is unhelpful at best and, at worse, tantamount to the Holocaust Memorial Day Trust being guilty of the very thing they've criticised the MCB for in the past - let's just get on with remembering what the 27th January is all about.

Despite disagreeing with them on their boycott as well as some other issues I do have some sympathy for the MCB. As the comment thread at PP illustrates they're held up as some sort of oracle of Muslim opinion and expected to be able to respond instantly and with perfect nuance to any story relating to Islam anywhere in the world. Any attempt to add context or qualify their comments tends to get labelled appeasement which, of course, it sometimes is but not always. It's worth noting the speed with which they condemned the treatment of Gillian Gibbons in the Sudan over the 'teddy bear' row and the pleasing lack of any such qualifications or excuses.

Labels: Religion

I've only been caught by a speed camera once. It was a quiet Sunday morning on a wide stretch of dual carriage way on the West coast of Scotland and I was doing 47mph - unfortunately there was a temporary 40mph speed limit in place which I ignored. So yes, the ticket was annoying and infuriating but it was also entirely justified since I had broken the law.


One wonders then how many of the 1.9m fines issued in 2005 were issued for entirely legal driving. I'd wager none so what on earth is Ms Villiers talking about? What's more, elsewhere the article points out that most of the revenue raised via speed cameras (£115m in 2005) is ploughed straight back into operating the camera system so the cash cow argument is a red herring (the words 'cow' and 'herring' in the same sentence - some sort of prize surely?) People caught speeding on camera are breaking the law - of all the supposition you can direct at the incident (risking lives or not etc.) that's the only thing that's beyond dispute. It's the primary fact and beyond dispute so there should be no moans or complaints about people being fined for breaking the law. By all means make sure that the law remains relevant - there may be something to the charge that some of our speed limits (particularly 70mph) are in need of revision following improvements in road / vehicle design but the idea that the law should be calibrated against the number of deaths it's enforcement prevents is muddled thinking.

Labels: Politics

...has been resumed. I had some hosting problems over the weekend which is why things went quiet. Thanks to Steve Green for flagging my temporary home but I'm now back here where I belong...

Update: Bob Piper also kindly flagged my temporary home so thanks Bob....

It can't be fun being a Labour supporter or blogger at the moment - no matter what your politics you'd need a heart of stone not to have some sympathy given what the last week has brought. By my reading there's a fairly standard sort of line being taken by Labour blogs at the moment:

This is bad but it's cock-up not conspiracy (here) - Tory glee is misplaced because they're just as bad if not worse, we introduced the transparency rules (here) - let's get some perspective, this isn't 15% interest rates or soaring unemployment and waiting lists (here) etc. etc.

And if I'm honest most of these objections are reasonable enough. If there's a moral high ground in party funding then it's been a helluva long time since any of the three main parties paid a visit. And given the other problems the UK faced by the mid-90's the idea that Brown's government has reached the same dizzy heights of incompetence as Major et al simply doesn't stack up. So Labour supporters are entitled to ask why the public don't buy these explanations and why polling since this row broke out has been so unkind. Here's why.

We all know the public have a ludicrously low opinion of politicians. This is moderated a little in that they'll forgive 'their lot' more than their opponents but not much - at root the 'they're all the same' attitude is incredibly prevalent, certainly among the politically inactive masses. This should mean that funding scandals or sexual misdemeanours etc. barely raise an eyebrow among the public since there's no great expectation of anything else. But here's the rub - the public I think do get very irked by blatant hypocrisy or overtly preachy politicians. They're prepared to turn a blind eye to the married politician shagging their secretary or lining their pockets with dodgy cheques provided that same bloke hasn't been lecturing me about morals or integrity when he's not getting his end away. This is what done for Major in the mid-90's - it wasn't really the sins of Mellor, Hamilton, Aitken et al. that pissed off the public, it was the fact that they took place against a backdrop of their party uging us to get 'back to basics' (that and the fact that the economy was shot). Pre-1997 Labour never missed an opportunity to set themselves up as 'above the fray' - they more or less claimed inhuman levels of probity and banged on again and again about integrity and trust etc. Remember 'whiter than white' and suggestions that 'even the appearance of wrongdoing' was unacceptable? I remember at the time being a bit uneasy about this even from a Labour point of view - understandable in terms of raising immediate political capital but talk about hastening the prospect of being hoist on your own petard!?

Well, that's exactly what's happening now. Yes this is cock-up not conspiracy and no, there's no evidence yet that Ministers knowingly engaged in illegal activity but Labour didn't ask to be judged on those broad terms. They asked to be judged very harshly on appearances not just the facts, judged by a different standard from days gone by. Crying 'well we're all at it' now may be true but the other lot didn't set themselves up as 'holier than thou'...

One final bit of pontification from me that occurred as I write this. Governments lose office because of two things acting together - the general loss of public trust & affection and one (or more) major screw-up or policy disaster. Arguably the Iraq war should've counted as the latter but because Blair's administration retained the former they still won in 2005. Brown will recover a little from his current woes but I think even loyal Labour supporters would have to concede that the general public trust / affection thing is gone for good. That means Brown's government is probably one major policy screw-up away from certain defeat come the next election. Iraq was effectively neutralised by the 2005 poll and I don't think the HRMC disk thing was it (although I could be wrong). I'm guessing ID cards will be scrapped for fear of being just that mistake - like the poll tax they'll impact almost everyone and that's dangerous territory for a government whose store of public affection is already spent.

Labels: Politics