lord of the blog

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Sunday, May 30, 2004

Mary Seacole Memorial Statue Appeal

Mary Seacole

Good news. We now have charity status for the Mary Seacole Memorial Statue Appeal (Registration number 1103862).

The Royal College of Nursing made sure the appeal was announced at their recent conference and there have already been a number of successful events. We have a long way to go to raise the funds and erect that statue but I am just so impressed by the Committee member’s determination that I know we will succeed.

Elections

I have been absent for a while. I took a few days off on the North West coast of Scotland – a great favourite of mine. I had good walking and good weather and the long days are just incredible with sunsets after 10pm and no real night time.

I am now energised and ready for the Euro and GLA elections. I’d love to think they will be won by bloggers engaged in mortal word to word combat! Alas it is unlikely and therefore I have to hit the streets armed with leaflets and arguments.

There is a lot for Labour to be proud of and only yesterday I was talking to the mother of a baby who was pleased with the baby bond (see an earlier entry on baby bonds). In my area both schools and hospitals have improved and you don’t hear of winter bed crises any more.

It is not enough however to talk of what has been done. We also have to talk about what else is to be done. In the election for the Mayor of London and for the GLA that is fairly easy. Transport is improving and there are dramatic improvements on crime and street safety to name but two.

Europe is a more difficult issue to campaign on because people tend to be hostile to any further extension of powers so the issue centres on whether Europe is already doing too much. There is a very positive side to the European agenda especially on things like the environment. I hope we can get people to see these advantages but I am not wildly optimistic at this stage.

Monday, May 24, 2004

Responses

Thanks for the comments on spam. I don't want to close the comments or make them passport accessable but I may have to if it continues.

Peter, the last thing I would want to do is stop you commenting. Try reading your own entry as though you were a person with an open mind on the issue. I find people are willing to look at the arguments and you assume they are not. That puts people off though it might make you feel better!

Meanwhile talk to Iraqi refugees and you will quickly find out that all of us including you were closing your eyes to what was happening before. In a dictatorship things like that don't get publicised - that is why you were able to sleep soundly thinking it wasn't happening in your name. Unfortunately it was because the UN told Saddam Hussein to stop the genocide and torture and a host of other things as a condition of the 1991 ceasefire.

Just because you don't see things in pictures it doesn't mean it isn't happening!

Wednesday, May 19, 2004

Spam

I have been receiving a large amount of spam/porn so apologies to those who have found the blog somewhat corrupted.

I hope I will sort it soon. What sort of people do this and why? You can see why free speech and democracy gets undermined by the thoughtless as well as those who just don’t believe in these ideas.

Thursday, May 13, 2004

Responses

Life is getting tough! Please accept my apologies for a slow response to some of the posts.

I also had an invasion of spam/porn – just as my local paper ran an article which advises my constituents to visit the site. This could cause some serious embarrassment! I don’t think the horse xxxxing spam will win over the animal rights lobby in my patch!

Some of the posts concerning Iraq need to look at or re-visit the Fabian document. Peter Higgins (is this the same Peter Higgins who was a member of one of the revolutionary socialist groups many years ago?) can rest assured that I am not conniving with Jack Straw to undermine the PM but I have said on radio and TV that the present situation is very serious and much depends on the next few weeks/months.

Rob asked me about the Press Complaints Commission and I have to tell you that it won’t be in the next Labour manifesto. It is difficult to legislate on this and we should only do it as a last resort. All of us should keep up the pressure on the PCC to take effective action.

It must be over ten years since I started calling for a corrections column in newspapers. They said it couldn’t be done; now some of them do it. How about getting editors to put their name on their newspaper? How many people could name the editor of the Evening Standard for example? She hides away from publicity but is not slow to invade other people’s privacy and is remarkably good at spinning stories to suit her own agenda. Try guessing her name!

Dan clearly has very strong views about Pakistan. I differ from him because I believe they are trying to change and India seems to agree with me. The Fabian document implies that where a country is trying to change we should help.

Uzbekistan is in danger of becoming another Iraq but it is not true that we are not putting pressure on for change. I agree however that there is a strong case for much tougher action. I have raised it but not formally in the House – so you read it here first!

Many thanks for all your comments on both the Blogging paper and the Fabian paper.

Finally, you have to hand it to India. The world’s biggest democracy really is a success story.

Sunday, May 09, 2004

1979 and all that

In 1979 Margaret Thatcher became Prime Minister and I became an MP. The former event attracted more publicity then the latter!

My local Party held an anniversary dinner for me, which was really nice of them – especially as they had to pay! It made me think over the past 25 years and about the changes that have taken place. They have been pretty dramatic.

I have some painful memories of those 18 years in opposition. One stands out in my mind particularly strongly. It was during the miners strike and I had gone to talk to some miners on the picket line at, I think, the Cortonwood colliery. It was about 6am on a January morning and the snow was coming across horizontally. I was asked whether I thought they could win. I muttered something about the difficulties as the Nottinghamshire miners were working as were the drivers, Dockers and many others who Scargill had tried to persuade to join them. The union leader present replied saying, “ I think we’ve had it and I think you know it”

At about the same time Dennis Skinner MP who usually didn’t get too troubled by Tory responses to his questions got flattened by Peter Walker the Energy Minister who in his reply about the miners working class loyalty said the workers were so united that Russian ships were bringing in Polish coal which was being unloaded by British Dockers and taken by rail and road to the power stations to keep Britain working.

I think that put paid to any remaining doubts about the unity of the working class.

You don’t hear arguments like that any more.

Saturday, May 08, 2004

Prisoners in Iraq

I went away for a long weekend break and I return to the horror of the photos of prisoner abuse in Iraq. A clear example of how to win a war and loose the peace. Donald Rumsfeld is a disaster – see my Fabian document on the sidebar for earlier comments on this.

A clear and very visible trial of the accused is essential. Most Iraqis know that actions even worse then this were common under Saddam but no trials of the torturers took place. That is the difference and most people know it.

People like myself who supported military intervention have to accept that restoring stability to Iraq is going to take longer then hoped. 30 years of brutal dictatorship has long lasting effects. I remeber reading some years ago that after France was liberated in 1945 the French Partisans fought each other killing more then were killed by the Nazi’s. That was in a country that only had four years of dictatorship.