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Thursday, July 29, 2004

Guardian libels FAMOUS MP!! Read all about it!

The Guardian has launched a truly libellous, totally unprovoked and wicked, wicked attack on me! (The Guardian. Life section, page 24. Falling through the net).

After 26 years service in the House of Commons and one of the first blogging MP’s and proud owner of a blog entitled “Labour MP for Ealing, Acton and Shepherds Bush” they have called ME a Liberal Democrat MP!

OH MY GOD! THE SHAME! Can I live with it?

Rather more perceptively they have called Richard Allan the Liberal Democrat MP for Sheffield Hallam a Labour MP. Now I always thought Richard was too thoughtful to be a Liberal so I welcome his symbolic crossing of the floor of the House. Is this the first ever blog crosser? Not to be confused with cross blogger(that’s me!) or cross dresser (I don’t think Richard is – good taste in ties though!).

So will all good bloggers everywhere descend on the Guardian site and inundate it with requests for apologies and MASSIVE damages – enough to get me to that tropical beach where I ought to be right now!

PS: I note they haven’t published it on their web site – presumably because they are so ashamed.

Tuesday, July 27, 2004

General

My last post was not explicit enough but I was trying not to be too specific. I know the type of refugee situation Dan is describing but this is fundamentally different with the letters insisting that she wrote them but containing information that she doesn’t in fact know. While her spoken English is poor the letters are written in very sophisticated English – whoever has been writing them didn’t need spell checker or a dictionary!

I suspect the rape allegations are true but I’m doubtful that they were in the context of a failed or collapsing state. In fact it is odd that she was given asylum, as the country concerned is now largely safe.

I often do refer to specialist agencies but part of the problem here is that the letters are written about a NGO. So it becomes a balance of trying to protect her but not allowing serious abuse.

This is a very unusual case – thank heavens!

Monday, July 26, 2004

General

Dan. I did inhale! Apple flavoured if I remember rightly. I think a beach at Sharm el Sheikh is a better place to try a hookah then a pavement on the Uxbridge Road!

Ingrid. Things are moving on Darfur. The pressure on the Sudanese government is paying off and although the African troop deployments are small they are sending the right message. It all highlights this incredibly difficult problem of how to deal with failing states. The Red Cross is reporting that the flow of refugees has slowed dramatically but no one is going to return until the militias are under control.

Now the recess is here I am catching up with all those constituency visits and paper work that I should have done ages ago.

One visit I did a few days ago shows the problems MP’s have to confront and where individual rights get mixed up with policy decisions. I visited a woman asylum seeker who had been writing letters to me which I knew were written by some one else.

At first she denied it but then agreed they weren’t written by her. In one sense they were harmless but who was writing the letters and why? If the background story she tells is true she is particularly vulnerable and may have been the victim of persistent rape.

She didn’t want to tell me who had written the letters so I still don’t know if it was just an attempt to use her or whether it does hide something more sinister concerning people smuggling or attempts to get additional housing in Britain.

Medical reports suggest rape and possible mental breakdown. I don’t want to put more pressure on her but I do want to know more. If I fail to get the full story I may be allowing very serious abuse to continue.

I am not asking for answers I just thought you might like to have a glimpse of some of the things we get involved in!

Thursday, July 22, 2004

Mary Seacole Memorial Statue Appeal

The Mary Seacole Memorial statue appeal goes from strength to strength. We got a mention on the BBC 1 programme 55 Degrees North. Sadly I missed it but I gather it was good. The Coldstream Guards have also sent a very supportive letter as Mary did so much for them in the Crimea.

More information is available on www.maryseacole.com/

Human Fertilisationand Embryology Authority

I understand the dangers of the misuse of genetics but surely it must be right for the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority to allow parents to have a baby that can donate to a sick brother or sister.

Responses

Dan. There were Hookah pipes in Acton Park for the carnival recently and the owners (a Lebanese Restaurant) confirmed they were against a smoking ban – no surprises there! I suspect a smoking ban might have to have exceptions. I can confirm that the beach at Sharm el Sheikh is good for hookah pipes. It is where I took my first puff after diving!

Jeremy. You could be wrong. I have been on the receiving end of innumerable and horrifying tales from refugees in my constituency since I was elected in 1979. I don’t think we should go on ignoring the problem.

Anthony C. I think the armed forces review is on the right lines but I accept the infantry cuts are worrying. We need to consider the alternative of creating a peace keeping force to compliment the army. It could also be an EU one. The problem of failing states will not be resolved quickly. Ingrid might agree that it could be deployed in the Sudan.

Andrew Regan. Don’t despair Andrew! I stand by my arguments in the Fabian paper. I don’t believe people have lied on this but I do think Tony Blair got himself trapped on the WMD argument and that the wider arguments were more important. I think the general public will eventually judge our actions not on some of the finer points of detail but on whether it makes the Middle East a more stable and less violent region. The jury is still out on that but as long as we don’t walk away from the Israel Palestine issue I remain more optimistic then pessimistic.

It is important to note that Tony Blair is seen as an effective leader not least because he does take difficult decisions. See the Guardian poll the other day.

Paul Jefferies. Allowing everything that doesn’t do harm to others is a good starting point but alas alcohol abuse does harm others because people behave badly after taking excess. The same applies to some other drugs.

Friday, July 09, 2004

Responses

This is a great debate!

Smacking.

I’m against smacking but worried about enforcement. Am I really going to call the police if I see a parent slap a child? I’m told this is not a problem in countries that have a complete ban but I would want to see if it really does work. A total ban would have an educational effect as did the race relations legislation.

Children can never have the same power as adults but they do have more rights then before and in my experience teenagers are much better at making their views known then they did when I was one.

At the moment I’m inclined to vote for the amendment as the best available option but I’m open to persuasion on a total ban.
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Abortion.

Abortion is a highly emotive issue and pictures of a foetus have the power to sway opinion.

I think harryj is wrong to call it murder – would he really want woman who had an abortion to be charged and sentenced as murderers? The history of all societies shows that abortion does take place regardless of legislation. It is not that long since we all recognised the problem of back street abortions and dead foetuses were found on public rubbish dumps.

That is one of the reasons that a woman’s right to choose is important. It is also important to remember that men do have a lot of responsibility in this.

The reason I put the challenge of the hospital fire in my original post was to emphasise that we do make decisions on the quality of life. I would like harryj to answer that question.

The other big question is if we are going to be able to create life outside the womb and sustain it, then we can’t argue against abortion on the sustainability point. But if we legislate against all abortion we will reintroduce back street abortions.

No easy answers on this one!
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Smoking.

Dan reminds me that I’ve got a Hookah bar in my patch – I was thinking of making a sneaky visit! I suspect we need a public place definition and I’m also worried about a universal ban although many doctors writing to me say I shouldn’t duck the issue. They want a total ban on the basis of harm to others.

Ingrid makes a good point about traffic fumes (and Durfar – but we are doing better on that since I last wrote!) and I sympathise with feather boa and his worry about dealing with a drunken customer in my patch. I have some experience of this!

We banned smoking at Party Conference. All those smoke filled rooms are a thing of the past – that’s when we lost our way in the smoke!
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National Offender Management Service.

It was nice to hear from Judy Mcknight again. Alas Judy, I do not follow the probation/prison debate as I use to and I have heard conflicting views on the new system. I will have another look.
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Iraq.

Yes Peter, I am thinking of going to see Michael Moore. I enjoy satire but I don’t make policy on it – nor should you! Did you read Tony Blair’s speech on March 18th 2003?

Monday, July 05, 2004

Smacking

Interesting comments so far on smoking. Before I respond what about the smacking ban?

Any views?

Sunday, July 04, 2004

Abortion

Did the photographs of the embryo in the womb move you enough to call for a review of the abortion law that limits abortion to 24 weeks?

I have always voted for a fairly liberal regime because I think it is almost impossible to impose a restrictive regime on the mother not least because history strongly suggest women will opt for abortion when, for whatever reason, they don’t want to have a baby.

Abortion is a tough choice for a woman and is not entered into lightly.

It is not an easy question and these choices will get more difficult as technology develops. We are almost at the stage where we can fertilise the egg and bring it to full term outside the womb. What value judgement do we make then?

Some people will adopt a strict religious view and say that any fertilised egg is a human being and should therefore not be interfered with in any way. Some religious views go further and say we should not even intervene to prevent death because that is also Gods will.

As I am not religious I don’t adopt any of those views but it doesn’t make the choices any easier. As I have Hammersmith Hospital (where some of this work is carried out) in my constituency I have often had to think about the ever more complicated moral dilemmas we face as a result of fast moving technology.

How long do we keep someone alive who is in a persistent vegetative state? That choice will also get tougher as technology creates the possibility of keeping someone technically alive for ever but with no quality of life.

I once posed myself this dilemma. If I was in a laboratory that was on fire and there was a fertilised egg in a test tube awaiting insertion into the mothers womb and there was also an elderly and terminally ill person present would I carry the fertilised egg out or the elderly terminally ill person? I answered my own question by saying I would carry the elderly person out.

At the end of the day we do make value judgements about the quality of life and the question of pain and distress.

Am I wrong?