June 17th 2010 Day 37

Slash and Burn #2

I cried when I watched Channel 4 News tonight. 

Jobs to go. Futures will be ruined. Lives wrecked.

And for what? Cuts driven by ideology not economics.

Broken Promises

Apparently in the election campaign the LibDems and the Tories promised not to cut the funding for the new hospital in North Tees and Hartlepool. Today they cut it. 

Transparent Government

Channel 4 News invited the government to have a minister interviewed tonight. 

They refused.

Liam Byrne, Shadow First Secretary to the Treasury steps up to the mark

"Both the country and the Liberal Democrat party beyond will be aghast this afternoon at your attack on jobs, your attack on construction workers, your attack on the industries of the future and the cancellation of a hospital. 
 

Let me ask you: what could be more front line than this? In five minutes this afternoon you have reversed three years of Liberal Democratic policy of which you were the principal author. What a moment of abject humiliation." 

He also said the spending projects being axed amounted to just 0.05% of government spending, "nailing the myth" that Labour had operated a "scorched earth" policy in the run-up to the general election.

Kyrgyzstan

When we teach about the genocides of the Holocaust, Bosnia and Rwanda, one of the students will always ask 'Why didn't anyone do anything, Miss?'

What will we answer this time? 'Oh, we were too busy watching the World Cup'....

The British Red Cross have donated £100 000 from their Disaster Fund to help in Kyrgyzstan. Unicef are monitoring the situation with seven representatives on the ground.

We cannot afford to ignore this.

June 9 2010 Day 29

Cut, Slash, Burn...

My, how the days fly! Since my last post, we've seen David Laws resign, lots of changes to Education, Maggie back in Number 10, the government's first bill voted down by the Lords and the announcement of the pain that's to come. Not to mention the endless obsessive slandering of the previous government! I particularly enjoyed hearing on the Today programme this morning that all these 'shock horror we never knew things were this bad' figures have been known about for AGES! Such clean, truthful politicians these coalition boys.

They did, of course, also promise in their election campaigns that they would not 'take us back to the 80s'. How soon they break their words. I am preparing to dig deep and protest in every possible way. I for one won't stand by and watch mutely from the sidelines while the society and social contract that this country has fought and struggled for since the days of Lloyd George is wilfully dismantled by a bunch of overgrown and overprivileged public schoolboys. 

Labour til I die!

Ledbury Labour!

On June 23rd at 7.30pm in a top-secret location, Ledbury Labour will be born again! I have had a busy couple of weeks, beginning with meeting the lovely men and women of the North Herefordshire CLP up in Leominster. It was a great feeling to be amongst people who share your basic values - though of course we are all of varying shades of red! 

With their help and support, Melissa Morris and I have set up the first Ledbury meeting. We're on Facebook (Ledbury Labour) and Twitter (@ledburylabour) now and we even have an email address (ledburylabour@gmail.com)! Today I took delivery of 6000 Summer Campaign leaflets from the Labour Party (now down to 5998 as I've given out two already; oh those lucky recipients!) and I even had my question posted and answered on David Miliband's live webchat this afternoon - luckily he couldn't hear my chorus of squeals! Sorry to Huw my colleague who did have to hear it, in a fairly confined space... though as Huw appears to be a Tory, perhaps I shouldn't be apologising?!

Leadership Campaign

What a great day for the Party! Five top quality candidates and no sign of us disintegrating into infighting and disarray. I am once again very proud to be a member of this great organisation which has pulled together to enable the country's first black female candidate for the leadership of a political party to stand for election.

Melissa and I have seen and heard Ed Miliband at Hay, and we'll be at a Leadership Husting in London on Saturday. Although I've now made up my mind (clue is in the previous section!), it will be a very interesting debate. Watch this space!

May 26th 2010 Day 15

The Queen's Speech

David Cameron was, in my opinion, a little more aggressive and combative than was either necessary or suited the occasion yesterday, in what he said after the Queen's Speech. Actually he was downright rude. The Labour government were not responsible for the credit crunch and the ensuing world recession. I think he'll find the money people bear the burden of that. The previous government chose to apply the fiscal stimulus rather than abandon people and businesses to their fate in the way that the Thatcher government did in the early 80s. It's hard to see that the outcome of that decision so far was wrong in human terms. Maybe we do owe money - aren't we as a people worth a little debt?

To call the Labour government wasteful, irresponsible etc is to make cheap shots which I can only hope show Mr Cameron up as the callous, privileged old Etonian he really is. Where was he in the early 80s when Toxteth and Brixton and Handsworth exploded? Did he think or care about the children of miners who were striking to try to hold on to a future for their communities in the face of Mrs Thatcher's determination to 'break them'? Or did he just cheer her on? No doubt he was far too busy playing rugger at prep school and being de-bagged in the Sixth form at Eton... He simply doesn't know what it is like to be an ordinary person in this country, and jeering at those who have tried to help, enable and empower them only reveals the depth of this ignorance.

If we really are going to have 'grown-up' politics, Mr Cameron will need to stop behaving like a braying Hooray and grow up himself.

May 25th 2010 Day 14

Grown-up politics...

Call me childish if you like, tell me this is a new time of grown-up politics, but I will still disagree with this particular coalition's policies and approach. Yes, they've 'compromised' and yes, I'd like to think they genuinely believe in this Brave New World, but I for one am immensely disappointed with the Lib Dems in particular - a party I always respected for their integrity and principle.

I just can't believe that this sudden about-turn over policy is the result of some strangely accelerated 'maturing' process that affected Mr Cameron, Mr Clegg and their respective parties during the period between the results coming in and the forming of the coalition. Doesn't expediency and the desire to gain and hold on to secure power sound more credible?

Opinionated...

If holding strong beliefs and principles, and being proud to stand up for them makes me opinionated, then I'm guilty as charged. In the words of Tony Benn, I'd far rather be a signpost than a weather-vane.

May 24th 2010 Day 13

Wake up at 5.55am to another beautiful day. Don't even mind that it's Monday...

Day 13 in the ConDem Nation and I wonder what it will bring? Apparently news of cuts and job losses. As someone said on 'Today' earlier, all jobs in education are 'front line'. I'm hoping none of my colleagues have inadvertently voted themselves out of a job.

On R4 last night a LibDem MP was explaining why their party had changed its mind about starting cuts now instead of next year as in their manifesto - apparently it's because of Greece. Well, that's alright then!

The question of which Miliband continues to amble round my mind... David? Ed? David? Ed? Oooh choices, choices!