PMQs

For the second week in a row, Blair was trounced at PMQs by the efforts of his own party. The support he previously fed off had drained away to leave an utterly shell shocked group of people sitting behind him as it was their duty to be there. Barely a peep came out of them. Our side, by contrast, were raucous and jovial, challenging the PM, cheering the Leader of the Opposition and jeering the other side. It certainly felt good to watch. Blair looked as if he and the Deputy PM were the only ones to be enjoying it on their side. Cameron noted that he was glad he had "put a smile on the Deputy Prime Minister's face" - no doubt, up to this point, he must've thought from the papers he was the only person in Westminster not to have done so so far...

There was a minor lib dem in one of the day's other speeches who obviously thinks of himself as being of a higher calibre than he is. He attempted, when questioning a government minister, to attack the Tory's record on referenda, going back to the Maastricht Treaty. Truly irrelevant comment from an utterly irrelevant man. He just looked silly making it.

In the Lords, a battle was being fought between transparancy and intransigence. A government minister was repeatedly asked about various parts of the DPM's duties and conduct and repeatedly stonewalled the House by trying to effectively say "We're more open than you lot ever were" whilst keeping the answer to himself. Stupidity like this emboldened the house in a party political way that really isn't the way the Lords should be. I far prefer it's more consensual and considered approach to legislation than that of the Commons, so it saddens me that poorly performing government spokesmen can drag it down so badly.

Now, its about time I added a little bit of my own life into this rather drab and reporting blog. In real life, I am a research student at UCL in the Atmospheric Physics Laboratory, working on the auroral processes of the Earth and other planets. How does this link into politics I hear you ask. If you do, then you've misunderstood politics, which isn't about the major issues of the day, but rather day to day conduct of state, community and individuals.

The Research Councils that fund the various communities are quangos on which sit people torn between funding research properly and getting the government's wishes through. The current government believes in a world where certain boxes exist to be ticked in life, and those boxes that must be ticked are the big glossy ones that everyone can see, ignore the numorous others. The recent budget saw the confirmation that the research council that runs the STP community is to be broken up, and replaced by a variety of others, the only one of which is certain is the LFC - the Large Facilities Council. Even this is uncertain as it is otherwise referred to as the LFRC - the Large Facilities Research Council, the R determining whether or not the Council controls spending on the research at the large facilities or just the management of the facilities themselves. As the various facilities were switched over from PPARC, STP facilities, which undertake long term monitoring of the atmosphere, were considered equal to astronomical facilities, which take snapshots of their targets. As the atmospheric facilities have taken their snapshot, it was decided everyone that could would be shut down. Everything. The UK is switching off its radars, ionosondes and any device that monitors trends in the atmosphere and sticking the money into things such as Venus Express, the space-probe that grabs the headlines.

This is a ridiculous, self serving and practically gormless proposal that at the very least risks putting a massive hole in the continuous monitoring of atmospheric trends and at worst cuts it off when it is most required.

The Day After the Night Before

As always, the local elections proved a mixture of local issues and national trends. In my home tow of Kendal, South Lakeland District Council slipped from our hands and went to the lib dems, mostly through a collapse of the Labour vote, but also through two losses of our own. This meant a gain of nine seats for the liberals, who were the largest party by a slim seat or two beforehand, and now the majority holders. In my adopted home of Camden, the seemingly eternal Labour council slipped into no overall control - reflecting the national trends of small movements into and out of that state, mostly in our favour.

In terms of seats, lets compare the overall picture with the stats that the Times had. It is reported that Labour's losses may breach 250 seats. This is the level that the Times had as 'making MPs jittery'. We seem to have broken over two hundred gains and a forty percent share of the vote, which the Times on Wednesday suggested would mean the Conservatives are "on their way back" and have made real progress under Dave. It should be noted that a worse than expected night in the North for us means the Southern boost was even more than the overall figures may initially suggest. As for the minor parties, the liberals made no significant gains, putting in a truly lacklustre performance. The BNP made a showing, showing an aftereffect of the tribal politics that exists in some areas of this country that insists the working classes can vote for Labour, but not the Tories, and certainly they aren't Lib Dems. This is a regressive throwback that must be rooted out.

Following the local elections, all the held back bad news that the Parties had wanted kept out of the way until voting was a thing of the past sloshed onto the front pages. Prescott loses responsibilities and Clarke is sacked in a robustly Blairite reshuffle. Backbench MPs, especially known Brownites, have been seen passing a letter calling for a timetable for the PM's departure round. This will not be impaired by the amount that their lot lost as Blair put his placemen in the best positions and shooed away Brown's. For the Lib Dems, we have antisemitism at the highest level as their leader in the European Parliament (now exleader) resigns over comments he made to a concerned Jewish correspondant over remarks he had earlier made in about Isreal. Now it is his turn to (paraphrasing his own words) "wallow in his own filth". At least that slightly offsets the very limited rise in power of fascists and antisemites over the past day or two.

...and speaking of which, Mageret Hodge appears to be facing a rebuke or two over comments she made that were seen to legitimise the BNP.

And that was the day today!

Local Elections

Headed into the community centre on this bright sunny day and added a few crosses to the Conservative candidates' boxes.

Come on everyone - add to lets see Blair having trouble getting an election. They say a sunny day adding to turnout will help increase Labour's share of the vote - don't let him get it up!

The worm turns

NHS in crisis, minister in affair shock, Home Office makes massive blunder, Kinnock acts like an idiot and gets caught, nope, not the nineties according to Blair, but the government today

It has become a bit of a tradition in recent years for a minister (even Blair himself, when it comes to the WI) to stretch the patience of their audience until it breaks. But it took Patricia Hewitt to do it twice within a week, and on the same subject of massive cuts in the Health Service whilst talking up how much money has gone into it...

Ministers dallying with their secretaries has always been a bit of a cliche, so its unsurprising to find Prescott, a man not known for resisting any of the trappings of power, revealing the reason for the size and number of rooms in his department...

And then there's Charles Clarke. Not so much that over a thousand people were released into the community that shouldn't have been. Not even that he forgot to tell parliament about it until it was too late - but he even forgot to inform the police, whose job it was to round up the escapees - nearly three hundred of which went after the Home Office knew what was happening. It doesn't help matters that the Home Office don't have all the details about those they released on them...

Not that you'd expect Government to have all the answers...

In related news (to the last slight), a group of leftwingers in a pub near to my office drafted a document called the Euston manifesto (available online to those with an afternoon to spare) which is a critique of their fellow leftwingers' views across the board, using the traditionally stated left wing values. They come out with a document more likely, as was pointed out in the Times today, to appeal to the modern Right than the modern Left.

What have I said all along?

Nearly forgot to mention the Lib Dem's record donation at the last election looking as if it may have to be paid back... serves them right for being holier than thou over the Loans for Peerages affair... and the Eurocratic nightmare of the Strasburg fiasco

...and the only Tory story in the papers today was Cameron's best performance yet against Blair!

Howdo, Hairdo. The local elections so far

It has been noted in the times today that Chere Blair charged the Labour Party £7,700 for that which she optimistically calls a do. A party spokesman responds by saying "so what" and stated that Mrs Blair worked extremely hard, visiting over fifty constituencies. Fantastic. I'm sure the dedicated and hardworking activists of the party will be over the moon. Each one of them unpaid, but as a whole presenting more of the face of the Labour party than Mrs Blair ever will. Collectively, it has been noted, Peter Khilfoyle's constituency party pootled along on half that amount for its entire expenses. But, I guess he has fewer publicity grabbing, money grubbing protocelebrities who have a definate opinion of where they should be in the world (note the occasional chairing of policy committees) and doesn't care that the electorate differs in their opinion. If she wants the privileges of parliament, she can stand for it. If she wants the priviliges of being the Prime Minister's wife, she can stop bleating on about how her work is manifestly disconnected from her husband's.

I rather liked the Labour Party election broadcast. Not because it showed an all out attack on Dave, proving his electoral affect is poweful enough to draw the party fire. Not because the personalised campaigning shows Blair for who he is. I like it because it shows a real difference between the modern Conservative party and the old Labour party. The former party sees that it can maintain traditional Conservative values whilst reaching out to campaign on issues that conform to these values, but are seen as the domain of other parties - the environment, liberal values etc. This contrasts with the tribalism of Labour, quite surprising given the Tory clothes Blair has tried to slip into. The image of a guy quite willing to cycle about happily, taking policies from various springs of intellect whilst remaining true blue is one I'm comfortable with.

Rather a Chameleaon than a Dinosaur

The current state of world politics

I sometimes wonder about the general state of things across the world, and at the moment, I get little joy from what I see. Last night, I was caught up in the enthusiasm of Italians as they went to the polls. Quite ironic given that were I in Italy, I wouldn't have voted. Choosing between a slimy politician leading the centre right block and a weasly ex-eurocrat on the centre left. Both coalitions contain undesireable elements, and it makes me wonder both how proportional representation fails to meld with a one party system of government (as opposed to a government of national unity, led by the head of the largest party, populated in consultation with the head of state say) and how voters for one part of a coalition could register distate with another part. What would the two main party leaders have done if they won through coalition votes, but their own parties disintergrated?

But proportional representation and its results in countries like Italy and Israel does not stand out as the only failing system at the moment. Indeed, it is just one of many. Look at Zimbabwe and Belarus, where one vote gets you a president at one point in history and they then change the rules to give you a dictator for the rest. Or Palestine and Iran, where religion, not politics, stands out as the abiding ideology behind the national choices. In each of these cases forces beyond democracy have a look in at national level.

Even in fully democratic countries like the US, Britain and France, the very fact that the popularity of a government can suddenly decline in a shorter period than the government's term of office leaves a country with a leader they do not want. Or the fact that a small unpopular point of policy in a larger, popular manifesto can create unrest.

I suppose the thing that really set me off on this inconclusive scan around was the current Loans for Peerages affair, in which both the main parties are mired and should have the balls to pull themselves out of. With other issues of fraud and incompetance, in the European Commision for example, begging to be sorted out, I wonder if the current parties vying for position in the houses of our parliament are up to the job in terms of their own complicity in such things and their abilities in sorting it out. If they can clear themselves, then they can turn to other institutions and lead the way forward. If not, they are hamstrung and I hope the current police investigation is a watershed in sorting out party politics from the mess it has sleepwalked into and let us all carry on as we should've done in the first place.

Well, its taken a while, but after a general site cleanup, this blog is just about ready to begin...