Friday, November 13, 2009 

The real story from Glasgow North East.

The story of the Glasgow North East by-election is categorically not that Labour won an overwhelming victory, especially considering the constituency is effectively a rotten borough for the party. A loss certainly would have been, though (a story, that is). It also isn't that the Conservatives received only 1,075 votes, or indeed that the British National Party was only 62 votes behind, although it might be if Chris Dillow's observation that heroin is probably more popular than the Tories was more widely disseminated. Nor is it that unsurprisingly, being a "celebrity", isn't an automatic vote winner: John Smeaton got 258 ballots while Mikey Hughes, a former Big Brother contestant, got 54. It also isn't, although it's again interesting, that the Socialist Labour vote completely collapsed on the 2005 result, when they got an astounding 4,036 votes, down this time to an appalling 47, most likely because Labour was on the ballot when it wasn't previously as a result of Michael Martin standing as the "Speaker".

The real story ought to be the catastrophically low turnout, a derisory 32.9% (Wikipedia has it as 33.2%). This can't be blamed on the lack of choice: all the main parties stood, as well as three various socialist sects, the BNP, three independents, and the Greens. While turnouts at by-elections are usually lower than at a general election, you might have thought it would have been the opposite in this instance, as there was far more choice on the ballot than previously due to the main opposition parties traditionally not standing against the Speaker, with their voters coming out this time when they might not have bothered previously. Instead it dropped from 45.8% in 2005, which was already well below the average of 61%. Did the expenses scandal have any impact? Unlikely. Instead it seems that the people of Glasgow North East, who were already poor before the recession, have lost all faith in politicians of every colour and creed. The only reassuring thing is that the British National Party didn't do better than their 1,013 votes. The current consensus is that the turnout is likely to go up next year when there is an actual, genuine alternative to the current government: Glasgow North East might yet prove to be the rule, not the exception.

Update: Slightly edited after some on Liberal Conspiracy responded with "Eh?" to the first paragraph, which is what happens when I'm trying to write something reasonably snappy and quickly to boot.

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11/13/2009 08:45:00 PM | | | links to this post

Friday, July 24, 2009 

Norwich North thoughts.

The best that Labour can say about the result in the Norwich North by-election is that it could have been a whole lot worse. There were suggestions at the beginning of the campaign that they could slip into third, fourth or even fifth place, such was the disenchantment with the party, mainly because of the way that Ian Gibson was defenestrated, not just the government's performance as a whole. To be sure, to go from a majority of over 5,000 to a Tory majority of over 7,000, a swing of 16.5%, is ghastly, but not so terrible when you consider that all three main parties lost votes on the 2005 result.

The Liberal Democrats especially must be bitterly disappointed and wonder what they did wrong. There were no real scandals among their expenses, they could claim to be the true heirs to Gibson's politics and punish Labour for getting rid of their popular incumbent, and yet they lost close to 3,000 votes, mainly to the Greens and possibly Craig Murray, but also probably to the Tories.

As for the Greens, the claims that they could win the seat turned out be hot air, although ordinarily a vote of 3,350 would be a cause for celebration. In truth their main target is Norwich South, which they hope to win next year along with Brighton and Hove. If they do, they'll be overthrowing Charles Clarke, which will be an extra cause for breaking out the (organic) champagne. Similarly, UKIP must be ecstatic with their performance, which must surely be one of their best parliamentary results in terms of votes, if not the best, getting an impressive 4,068. Likewise, although Craig Murray is disappointed with his result, 953 votes is a spectacular result for an independent, especially one who was completely ignored by the media, and to beat the BNP into 7th place is no mean feat. Most amusing though is the Libertarians, who received a grand total of 36 votes, behind the Monster Raving Loonies. Who knew that turning the country into an Ayn Rand style fantasy isn't popular?

It seems fairly pointless to try extrapolating anything from this result, as the chances of it being repeated next year seem doubtful. Voters that won't have bothered turning out for a by-election most likely will make the effort come the general election, and the parties outside the main three will almost certainly be squeezed except in their strongholds, especially as the fury over the MPs expenses is slowly forgotten. The question remains just how badly Labour is going to do, rather than how well the Conservatives will - whether it becomes a 97 style wipeout, or a result which the party can recover quicker from. Frankly, it both deserves and needs a 97 style wipeout for it to come to its senses, but the pain that will cause is still difficult to imagine.

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7/24/2009 07:11:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, June 26, 2008 

Davis and the other Haltemprice and Howden candidates.

Keeping with the despairing theme, it's hard not to now that we can see who's standing against David Davis, the full list of which is here.

There seems to be a lot of people quite content with throwing £500 away, doesn't there? Anyone having second thoughts is more than welcome to send the cash straight to me, where I can guarantee it will be put to a better use.

With the list now known, it does seem apparent that the chance of a genuine debate over civil liberties has precipitately declined. While it's impossible to know just how many of the independents are serious candidates, the inclusion of David Icke means instantly that the whole thing is just bound to descend into instant farce: great fun for the tabloids, who'll doubtless be following him around the whole time, not so good for anything approaching a defining moment, but I suppose it's possible we could be surprised.

David Davis's decision was always going to be a risk, a noble idea that rested on Labour having the guts to put up a candidate to challenge him. There may be sound political reasons for not doing so, but the cowardice it also displays, regardless of whether the candidate would have had any chance of winning or not is of a piece with Labour's current predicament, unprepared to test the electorate's actual support for almost any of the recent policies to have emerged from No.10. After all, according to the polls the public overwhelming support 42 days, so where's the harm in taking the debate back to the constituencies themselves rather than relying upon the bribery and bullshit of Westminster? The problem is that Labour is absolutely terrified of losing anything, and the partisanship of some Labour-supporting bloggers, mocking the initiative from the beginning even if they opposed 42 days showed the contempt that has arisen over the last few years for the views of the public when not asked specific questions and giving specific answers.

Still, of the other candidates that are standing, it's good to see that the Greens have put up a candidate, which would genuinely make me think twice about voting Davis if I lived in Haltemprice and Howden. It's also good to see that Davis has made clear that he considers them the only serious opposition, which means that some good, however small, still might emerge from the contest itself rather than from the simple principle of giving up your job for something you believe in. Also serious though I would imagine are the Socialist Equality Party, who despite being a tiny far-left ultra-Trotskyist sect punch way above their weight online through their World Socialist Website. They're slightly over-the-top in already claiming that Labour's anti-terror legislation has "established the apparatus of a police state in Britain," and are as hard left as you might imagine, but judging by the apparent dearth of other serious candidates, and the failure of the SWP/Respect/Left List to stand a candidate, are most likely to pick up the few left of Labour votes there are.

After being so enthusiastic to begin with over Davis's decision, it was always likely that reality was going to bite back if Labour abrogated from defending itself. It still does mark a watershed in British politics, and one which still might yet not fall flat on its face.

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6/26/2008 11:52:00 PM | | | links to this post

Monday, June 16, 2008 

Cowardy custard.

Can you say reverse ferret? On Friday Kelvin MacKenzie told the Today programme that he was 90% certain that he was going to run against David Davis in the Haltemprice and Howden by-election; by Monday it appears apparent that neither he nor the Sun have the stomach for such a battle over the policy which they have done the most to support and defend of any newspaper.

Some are ascribing this to the overwhelmingly positive response outside of Westminster to Davis's decision to resign and re-fight his seat on a civil liberties platform. I think that's certainly a factor, and the Sun doesn't want to be seen to be on the wrong side of public opinion, but I also think that it was a daft idea from the start. We know that this was mooted at Rebekah Wade's birthday party, attended by both MacKenzie and Murdoch himself, where doubtless all were well lubricated and tired and possibly emotional, and that MacKenzie then first let slip about it on the This Week sofa which he'd gone straight to from the party, without necessarily being given the go-ahead by Murdoch in anything beyond platitudes.

Firstly it was a strange idea because as we know, Murdoch always wants to back the winner, and one thing's for sure, MacKenzie was not going to win, and going by his completely feeble arguments on This Week on why we shouldn't be afraid of either the state or the police, no one outside of the Monster Raving Loony party circle was going to be convinced. Secondly, how MacKenzie was going to be funded was always going to be difficult: Murdoch himself can't because he's a foreigner, the Sun can't be seen to be funding any candidate, and it was always going to be something questioned as to where his money was coming from. Thirdly, even if Davis has told the Cameron tendency to sit and spin and royally annoyed them by his stand, running a candidate directly against Davis on the measure which they've opposed is not going to make them more amenable when the Sun is likely to be shortly sucking up to Dave and co as the election looms into view. Fourthly, part of the reason as to why Andy Coulson, former editor of the News of the Screws was appointed as Cameron's chief spin doctor was to attempt to woo the Murdoch press which had previously been incredibly sniffy about him. It still is, but it's hard not to believe that Coulson will have been dispatched to attempt to reach some sort of agreement with his old friends so as not for both sides to fully fall out.

More importantly, Murdoch and others at the Sun, when not thinking through alcoholic stupor, would have realised that it set a rather silly precedent. If the Sun is so certain that it is on the side of the public in all its fiercely expressed views rather than the politicians it so lambasts, why doesn't it put its money where its mouth is and formerly stand candidates at general elections? The fact is that it isn't that certain, that its campaigns which it starts and often so frighten politicians are often over-egged and given figures of support from its readers which are unrealistic, and above all, it's lazy. Running a campaign would take effort which certainly doesn't show itself in the pages of its newspaper, and what's more, there's no more certain way to annoy your readers than to keep permanently talking about how you're right and great and that you must pledge complete allegiance to the brand.

Probably most importantly, someone reminded both MacKenzie and the newspaper of that toxic word: Hillsborough. All that was needed was for any of the groups associated with that disaster to turn up at a canvassing, or a debate which would undoubtedly have been held, and all the unpleasantness of MacKenzie's refusal to apologise and the Sun's constant flagellating that will never appease the rightly aggrieved would have been brought back to the surface.

Hence there wasn't a single word published in the paper itself of MacKenzie's apparent fledgling candidacy. After the mauling which Davis received in the paper in Friday's leader, the mood completely changed over the weekend. Today the real ideological power behind the paper, Trevor Kavanagh, called him an "ego-driven maverick" but admitted he had a stuck a cord. Even more amazingly, and signalling the paper has done a full reverse ferret, there's probably one of the biggest attacks on the paper's own repeated leader line that has ever appeared within its own confines tomorrow courtesy of Fergus Shanahan, which will be incredibly handy whenever the paper reminds us again if we have nothing to hide we've got nothing to fear:

Three myths are peddled by Davis’s opponents.

The first is that if you are against 42 days, you are soft on terror.

Rubbish. I have backed capital punishment for terrorist murderers while many of those kicking Davis are against it. How am I soft on terror?

The second myth is that weary old chestnut: “If you’ve nothing to hide, why worry?” That’s what German civilians told each other as they looked the other way while the concentration camps were being built.

The third myth is that there is massive public support for 42 days.

Of course, there's the usual Sun idiocy we've come to expect about executing "terrorist murderers" when most of them will either be dead or want to be martyred anyway, but this is pretty incisive stuff for a paper which usually has no truck with any of these woolly ideals. Even more astonishing is this bit earlier on:

 Davis has hit the nail on the head. We HAVE allowed ourselves to be browbeaten by fears of Islamic terror attacks into abandoning too many of our freedoms — something I have said for months. Many Sun readers agree with me.

But Shanahan's own leader line doesn't; it wants to give away even more freedoms. Although as the leader line is directly decided upon by Murdoch himself, Shanahan isn't likely to have done anything to alter it.

All these reasons for MacKenzie rolling his tanks back however though don't hide that most of all, the decision not to stand for something the Sun and he so believe in is cowardice. Davis stands up to be counted, and the Sun sits down. If this really is a victory for the overwhelming opinion being expressed online, then it's something worth celebrating and cherishing. New Labour and the Sun: united in their weakness.

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6/16/2008 10:14:00 PM | | | links to this post

Friday, June 13, 2008 

On the media's response to Davis and the Sun's entering of the fray.

The overwhelming response of the media to David Davis's decision to resign and fight a by-election on 42 days and civil liberties seems only confirm the increasing disconnect, not just between politicians and the public, but also between the media and the country outside the Westminster village. Almost universally, Davis has been insulted, slurred, accused in some cases of succumbing to mental illness, and disparaged. The Guardian, while being sympathetic to his decision, variously throughout its pages calls him an "oddball", "egotistical" and a "loner", suggests his campaign may turn "quixotic" and has "Sir" Michael White saying that "such unpredictability unsettles the trade". At the other end of the spectrum, the Sun is even more vitriolic, headlining its leader "Crazy Davis", asking rhetorically whether he's "gone stark raving mad", and then goes on to declare that his stepping down was an act of "treachery", that he's a second-rate politician, serially disloyal which "provides further evidence of a deranged mind", that this is "petulant grandstanding" and finally, that he's "loopy". And this is before it's even launched its likely campaign for Kelvin MacKenzie.

All of this would be very well if the fourth estate was only catering for the Westminster village; this is almost undoubtedly exactly what they think of Davis and his very different to Ron Davies' moment of madness. The bloody man's resigned over a principle! We can't have that sort of thing going on here! The Conservative front-benchers have been completely flummoxed because they can't get their heads round how someone could do something that so endangers his actual career prospects. When you're as focused and ambitious as some of the filth that passes for the next generation, like Michael Gove and George Osborne, to potentially ruin your chances of getting your hands on the power to run the country seems akin to stripping naked, smothering yourself in butter and running around the houses of parliament with a gag in your mouth and a hedgehog up your backside. They're agog and aghast at the embarrassment and most of all, the difference to what is routinely expected of them. Forget 42 days and terrorists, to them this seems a far more dangerous outbreak of independent thinking and action.

Outside of that prism, even if they don't necessarily agree with Davis over 42 days, most ordinary people seem to respect him just because his decision was both so unexpected and outside of the norm. The online response to it seems to have been mostly positive, apart from those who have voiced their more than valid concerns that Davis is a social conservative rather than a true libertarian, which dulls his stance to an extent. This though seems to me to miss the point. For all those who have suggested that it'll turn into farce, today's coverage does generally seemed to have towards the issues itself rather than the personalities involved, and Davis, pledging to make the case and attempt to turn public opinion over 42 days in a way in which the wider political class has failed to do so is more than admirable, it's essential. At the moment we're stuck in the rut of this being framed as a vital measure that is needed by the police just in case; what it actually is just the most vivid example of the slow dilution of essential liberties which have in some cases, but not in all, been taken away without the slightest of comment and consultation, or where there has been, under the pretence that it's needed because our security demands it and not to do so is to be either irresponsible or "soft" on either crime or terror.

This view could be not more crystallised by the quite brilliant decision by Rupert Murdoch, Rebekah Wade and Kelvin MacKenzie to involve themselves. Never before has there been such a great opportunity to puncture the Sun's claimed stranglehold on the public mood and to make clear that rather than speaking for the people, it tells them what to think in coalition with whichever current politician has made a pact with the Prince of Darkness himself. The Sun doesn't represent the traditionally small-c conservative view on liberty, or the liberal-statist view on liberty as espoused by the Guardian, it represents the chuckleheaded, moronic, complacent and acquiescent view of it. Witness the great oaf of a man, who still can't bring himself to apologise to the people of Liverpool for publishing the most vicious of lies about how they behaved in the aftermath of the worst football tragedy this country has ever seen, telling everyone that he doesn't care whether terrorist suspects are locked up for 420 days, about CCTV cameras or ID cards, not because he actually believes they will make things any better, but because he simply is Kelvin MacKenzie. It doesn't affect him because no one's going to accuse him of terrorism, or follow his movements and spy on him, or attempt to steal his identity, because he's a middle-class opinion-former that's more than comfortably off and has the ear of one of the richest and most powerful men in the world. He doesn't have anything to hide because he couldn't really do anything lower than he's already managed in his tabloid career.

Here's the paradox of the Sun's position on civil liberties and the state. Murdoch and his papers believe in the smallest state achievable, the lowest taxes and the most business friendly environment for himself. When it comes to the actual power of the state over the citizen rather than faceless corporations, then he and his papers are all in favour of it. Give the police what they want! Constant CCTV surveillance! A DNA database containing everyone's fingerprints and blood samples! As tough on crime and thugs and yobs, regardless of the consequences as feasible! You only have to read the shopping list of demands that the Sun drew up in co-operation with the "mothers in arms" to get an inkling of what the paper in its wildest dreams would like the state of civil liberties in this country to look like: everyone a suspect, everyone assumed guilty until proved innocent, and you being strung up in public by the knackers for looking at a kid the wrong way. I exaggerate slightly, but only slightly, as it doesn't support capital punishment; castration of paedophiles, well, that's another matter.

The Sun's arrogance was exposed on Question Time last night. The paper's political editor, George Pascoe-Watson, was going through the usual routine of rather than giving his personal opinion instead using every opportunity to give the paper's view, and to plug it at the same time. Hence he made much of the Sun's "help for heroes" campaign, but came unstuck on one of the later questions when he began with something along the lines of "Well, as you know we on the Sun..." to which David Dimbleby interrupted with "Not everyone reads the Sun, you know", to which the audience heartily applauded. The Question Time audience is hardly representative, but what it did show was that the Sun's positioning is nowhere near as popular as it imagines, even among its readers which devour the sport and the celebrity but couldn't care less about its atrocious politics. This is exactly what Davis's campaign should pick up upon if Kelvin MacKenzie does stand, which will be incredibly interesting purely because of where his funding will come from, considering Murdoch is barred from donating as he's not a British citizen. No doubt some convoluted structure will be found that will be allowed. Instead of listening to people, what the Sun does is decide upon a line and then dictate it, regardless of what anyone else says, and if anyone suitably outspoken comes along and challenges it, then the smearing commences. Its cynical use of those that don't support it, such as the head of the British Muslim Forum, who said the opposite of what the Sun said he had on 42 days, and the completely misleading interpretation of MI5's statement are prime examples.

For if Davis's decision to contest a by-election on 42 days is vanity, then the Murdoch decision to oppose him is a potential disaster for both them and the Labour party. If Labour doesn't stand a candidate, and despite all the nonsense, if the Liberal Democrats aren't standing then Labour's chances will be greatly improved, MacKenzie will be in effect their candidate, making their arguments in an even more inarticulate way than they've managed in parliament, and by God, that's saying something. Gordon Brown can call it a stunt turned into a farce all he likes, but if his party refuses to stand, then it only shows them up as doing what the Sun does: taking the public completely for granted and not seeking their opinion at all, instead telling them what their opinion should be. Even if MacKenzie decides against standing and Davis is up only against a Monster Raving Loony, he's still made his point, and what's more, it just shows the contempt that those who are above the law for the civil liberties of the majority. The more I think about it, the more Davis's stand gives us an opportunity and a chance that we previously didn't have: to make the case for the rolling back of the state's authoritarian but completely ineffective incursion on the daily life of the citizen. When our opponents are either this pipsqueak or the worst the Sun has to offer, it really will be impossible not to force at the least a pause in the slow but consistent momentum towards something resembling a police state.

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6/13/2008 09:45:00 PM | | | links to this post

Thursday, June 12, 2008 

Davis deserves and needs support.

Apart from "Aha!", the other catchphrase that Alan Partridge bequeathed us was "and on that bombshell...". I'm sure that Steve Coogan won't begrudge us somewhat stealing it to describe David Davis's completely unexpected resignation from the post of shadow home secretary and as an MP to contest a by-election entirely on the Labour government's bonfire of civil liberties.

Let's get the sniping and conspiracy theories out of the way first. Numerous sources are alleging that this was Davis going nuclear: either because Cameron wouldn't commit to repealing 42 days if it reaches the statute book should the Conservatives win the next election, or because he was fed up with the Cameron clique muttering behind his back over his stranglehold on home affairs policy, doing things that were not going down with the all so important Murdoch press, despite the Sun being almost in a minority of one in Fleet Street in supporting 42 days. Others still are suggesting that this is to carve out a niche for the old-school hard right, or even the first step towards Davis launching a bid for the leadership.

It would be naive to dismiss the possibility that it could be all or any of the above, and certainly foolish to not realise that they must have played some role in his decision to step down. What is also clear however is that Davis has been for a while now completely aghast at the casual, crude and populist way in which our ancient liberties have been abused, diminished and now finally, with 42 days, almost taken away entirely. As others have written, Davis doesn't care much for liberties which have been won partially thanks to Europe, such as the Human Rights Act, which despite its shortcomings still offers some protection, but rather out of a patriotic sense of disgust at ancient, uniquely British liberties being sold on the open market and for short-term party political gain. For him, 42 days has been the final straw.

Reading the dismay, in some places verging on despair posts that have been written across the whole spectrum of blogs in this country, many of those online, although hardly being representative, feel exactly the same way. 42 days has been a wake-up call beyond what 90 days was for many because we all knew that not even Blair could possibly get away with such a constitutional outrage. 42 days however is meant to be more reasonable; just look at the safeguards, look at the judicial supervision, looking at us bending over backwards so far that the powers are almost worthless! None of this alters the fact that being held in a police cell for six weeks, only to then be possibly released without charge is quite simply unacceptable in any democracy worth the name. The bottom line is that we don't trust the police, we don't trust the security services and we don't trust the government to use such a power responsibly, only when it is needed and only against those that they say it will be targeted against. All three have lied to us time and time again, all have exaggerated the threat and all are motivated, not out of this benevolent desire to protect the public but out of their own self-interest.

This isn't to suggest that David Davis isn't at least being partially motivated by his own self-interest. If he wasn't, he wouldn't be human. Unlike those in the government however that are pretending to be just that, he is at the very least standing for what he believes in. While legion after legion of Labour MPs yesterday passed through the lobby, not because they believed in the legislation but because they had either been bought off or to support the Supreme Leader, the principled few stood up and said that abandoning civil liberties to those who would remove all our liberties were they to have their way is not just wrong, it is bordering on the actionable.

If this is then a stunt, then it's a stunt that deserves not just applause and praise, but that deserves the most ardent of support. Yes, David Davis is a Thatcherite. Yes, he's a social conservative rather than a genuine social libertarian. Yes, he supports capital punishment. All of that however pales into inconsideration when he makes his case so clearly and so singularly against this shabby Labour government:

But in truth perhaps 42 days is the one most salient example of the insidious, surreptitious and relentless erosion of fundamental British freedom.

And we will have shortly the most intrusive identity card system in the world. A CCTV camera for every 14 citizens, a DNA database bigger than any dictatorship has, with thousands of innocent children and millions of innocent citizens on it.

We have witnessed an assault on jury trials, a bolt against bad law and its arbitrary use by the state.

And shortcuts with our justice system, which will make our system neither firm nor fair and a creation of a database state opening up our private lives to the prying eyes of official snoopers and exposing our personal data to careless civil servants and criminal hackers.

The state has security powers to clamp down on peaceful protest and so-called hate laws to stifle legitimate debate, whilst those who incite violence get off scot-free.

This cannot go on, it must be stopped, and for that reason today I feel it is incumbent on me to take a stand.


The partisan Labour hacks think they've got the most wicked wheeze to respond to Davis's stand: don't stand a candidate at all, and let him stew in his own embarrassment. It is indeed a good position to take; that it is politically bankrupt and therefore typical of New Labour is almost superfluous to mention. If Labour decides not to stand a candidate against Davis, then all it will show is that it is simply not prepared to go to the public and have a one-on-one debate about where it has taken us, with in most cases the slightest of public consultation but with the full support of the most authoritarian parts of the "popular" press. If it declines to defend the obscenity of the cost of £93 for an worthless piece of plastic, to support the notion that innocent members of the public should permanently have their DNA and fingerprints stored on a database simply because they were once arrested, and a system by which individuals can be followed around the country that has been completely built by stealth, and instead presents Davis's stand as a lone individual barking at the moon, then it truly deserves to be absolutely trounced at the next general election. If I lived in Davis's constituency, I would be voting Conservative for the first and probably last time.

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6/12/2008 09:23:00 PM | | | links to this post

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