http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/en-UKhttp://backend.userland.com/rss092http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/http://data5.blog.de/design/preview/0f/0ce0f9b743e9f86366b6065740b96d_160x200.jpg <p>A’FIDDLING WE WILL GO<br> We should baptise this period for History as ‘The Fiddlers’ Parliament’ and memorialise it for its exceptionality. The scale and detail of the rank dishonesty is truly startling and will neither be forgotten nor forgiven. These must have been halcyon days for those ever so honourable members of the House: an expenses system which allowed you, if you were without principle or any notion of morality, to abuse it so readily that it might as well not have existed at all. How lovely it must have been to go shopping for houses, furniture, food and virtually anything under the sun and not have to pay for it, whilst all the time claiming legitimacy of intent within the rules. Some MPs certainly appear to have an outstanding talent for creative cheating and this should be recognised in a ‘Dishonour Awards System’ such as Cardinal of Corruption or Baroness of Roguery. It took a Hercules of old to clean up the Augean Stables but no such figure of comparable stature is around today in any of the political parties. I was hoping that a reasonably clean figure would emerge from all this and I note that Geoffrey Robinson of Coventry made no claims at all. Presumably, this is because he is wealthy enough not to bother with the system (and not all wealthy MPs do this) but I do not see him as a Hercules, far from it. This should tell us to look for the MPs with legitimate and honest claims, and to avoid thinking that we are governed only by liars.<br> GOLDMAN SACHS WITH SACKS OF GOLD<br> The £2.1 billion profits recorded by the investment bank Goldman Sachs, in the second quarter, are certainly good news for the bankers as they will benefit from the obscene but perdurable bonus culture which has cost so many people their jobs, their houses and their security. Just ten months ago this very same bank took a bevy of mendicants to the US government asking it to rescue them from possible collapse. Now they are back to the pathways which took them to the edge of the precipice in the first place and we must surely once again be asking questions about regulation and accountability. Whenever things like this happen, I go to Cabletalk to find out what he thinks. He is the man who declared that the banks, during the crunch, should be coerced into operating for the benefit of the public and taken into temporary public ownership until the crisis was over and then they should be allowed to pursue their own agenda (snouts in the trough for fat bonuses for themselves and tant pis pour les autres and the rest of the world). I thought Vince would think that, now GS is up and running and making super profits, he would accept its recovery. It seems, however, that Cabletalk disapproves of the bank despite its ‘success’ and is spinning round in a kayak on this issue but doesn’t know how to paddle. Here we have an economic liberal at heart who wants regulation to secure financial security but only in times of trouble. Why not have it all the time and end the casino economy that puts profits before people?</p> <p> LRC LOSING ITS WAY IN PR FICTIONS?<br> Ray Davison reviews: The Left Case for Proportional Representation. A Discussion Paper for the LRC by Michael Calderbank, Political Campaigns Officer, Electoral Reform Society Writing in a Personal Capacity.<br> This eight page article aims to present the case for the LRC to adopt as policy support for the introduction of proportional representation for elections to the Commons and for local councils in England and Wales. It is a most curious piece of writing for several reasons, although I personally would not undervalue it for its soporific qualities. First, incredibly, it does not argue for any particular system of PR, among the numerous on offer, but just for the principle. For the carnivorous tippler like myself, this is the electoral equivalent of a pub with no beer or Sunday lunch with quorn and no beef. Everything about PR is in the detail of the system and a left case without this is inadequately made. Second, Calderbank pays hardly any attention to what he means politically by a left case. Surely if there is a cogent case to be made, he must demonstrate how a particular proportional voting system can advance left-wing objectives such as promoting equal opportunites, opening blocked horizons, ending discrimination and exploitation and so forth. He may not see such notions as progressive or even left but his paper sets out no political programme of his own and he does not relate his PR arguments to any substantial political agenda. Instead, we are once again exposed to the tired and tedious preoccupation with fair voting of the Make Votes Count campaigners who do not seem at all concerned about whether what they call ‘fair votin’ would actually foster reactionary policies and immobilize political advance.<br> Although Calderbank refuses to back any particular PR horse, it is easy to see where his preferences are. He clearly does not like single member Constituencies as they, in his view, restrict voter choice. In another curious moment of this asymptotic article, he argues that a Blairite in Islington would have no choice but to vote for Corbyn, whilst the Labour left in Stalybridge and Hyde would be restricted to Purnell. Thus, the reader is able to see that the writer favours multi- member constituencies. Calderbank also accepts that restrictions on voter choice and concentrations of Party power come from closed list systems of PR, providing us with a further indication of his preferences-an open list system. We are by now not far from identifying where his true persuasion lies: STV with open lists and the possible refinement and complication of cross voting. This is the system which will challenge the brains of a sizeable proportion of the electorate, produce results like gasometer readings and take an eternity to finalize but for the boffinesque members of the Electoral Society, it is the stuff and nectar of their PR dreams of fairness.<br> Elsewhere, there are sections in this paper dismissing as myths of FPTP advocates the claim that PR helps the far right and gives too much power to party machines. In both sections the arguments advanced are terminally weak, amounting to little more than a statement to this effect. No supporter of FPTP would argue that that system does not produce BNP successes and mavericks and white suiters or that it can produce coalitions, but there is objective evidence that PR makes this much more likely and almost inevitable. ERS itself stresses that FPTP is ‘unfair’ to small Parties. As for Party machines, Calderbank concedes that closed lists and parachutings are undesirable but largely what he claims are myths of FPTP resist his assaults and survive as reasonable criticisms of PR.<br> Another big assumption of this article and of Make Votes Count in general is the claim that FPTP produces ‘wasted’ votes. Thus, we are told that, in the general election of 2005, over 19 million votes cast made no difference whatsoever to the outcome-70% of all votes cast. Well we all know about statistical fiddles but this one is off the radar. Of course, it will be the case that in single member constituencies with simple majority voting, there will be losing votes but these votes have been counted. It is clearly just a strategy to call them wasted. More importantly, there will be a winner who commanded more votes than any other candidate and that person is a dog wagging its tail! There are points in this section about targets and swing-voter concentration which are well made and it is clear that the way Parties focus their efforts on marginal seats can be very alienating for second and third parties in safe seats but FPTP supporters often make the same points.<br> At a certain moment, Calderbank makes a crucial point: ‘It is understandable’, he says, ‘ that some Labour Party members are reluctant to give up a system that has rewarded their party with three consecutive majorities… .’Well never was there a greater expression of the obvious and we accept that these victories were ‘disproportionate’ but Labour Party socialists are in the business of securing Labour governments, preferably left-leaning ones, because that ways lies progress and ‘fairness’. Electoral systems are part of political struggle and not some academic abstract exercise. If there is a left case for PR, it has got to demonstrate a cogent political argument that there is a link between ‘fair’ voting (properly conceptualized and defined) and political progress. This paper does not produce such a case and seems very close to the right-wing case most of the time. The LRC should send it back for amplification.</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2009/09/09/some-thoughts-miscellaneous-6932565/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2009/09/09/some-thoughts-miscellaneous-6932565/Wed, 09 Sep 2009 19:54:10 +0200<p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2009/09/09/some-thoughts-miscellaneous-6932474/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2009/09/09/some-thoughts-miscellaneous-6932474/Wed, 09 Sep 2009 19:45:43 +0200 <p>There was a time when the political economy was very much an issue for discussion but it was ever such a long time ago. We have lived for three decades in an era of deregulation, light-touched and even lighter-fingered, so much so that the basic questions of socialist thinking (what is money, what is wealth, who owns it and how do we change and egalicise these structures of power so that everybody benefits?) were a peripheral matter for the intellectual left. Now such matters return to haunt us and even Tribune is conducting a tombstone interview with Marx himself! New Labour antipathy to public ownership is holed spectacularly below the waterline and they will surely sink further unless it ends its residual quantum of pro-capitalist solace and gives the banks a fundamental lesson about economic power. As they take our handouts, they must accept and be forced to accept that the economy should serve the people and not their bonuses and profits. Their days as highwaymen and casino buccaneers must end and we must show our contempt for their self-serving greed and indifference to their victims (December 08). </p> <p>'High Noon for the Boys of Chicago'<br> Ray Davison reviews Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism, Penguin Books, 2007. </p> <p>Those who want the name of Milton Friedman permanently glorified as a building in the Department of Economics at the University of Chicago, should be the first to read this book. Here they would find five hundred pages packed with reasons why this high priest of free-market capitalism, author of the seminal Capitalism and Freedom (1962), progenitor, with Hayek, of the 'Chicago Boys' School of Economics and their intellectual and political heirs the neo-cons, should not be celebrated in bricks and mortar but excised as an anti-democratic malignancy of the modern world economy. If the old wild west was tamed by sheriffs, rangers and marshals, then Klein can legitimately lay claim to be fulfilling a similar function for these equally wild and dangerous apologists of deregulated capital and market adulation. Klein does not fire blanks or miss her targets: her aim, in twenty one hard-hitting, bullet-raining chapters, is to show how over a period of thirty years or so, the core tenets of Chicago School economic theory (privatisation, deregulation and cuts to government services) exploited as an experiment a number of global crises, some natural but others, more ominously, created for the purpose. Klein baptises these experiments as the 'disaster capitalism complex'. Let us be very clear about this: her charge is that, by deliberate and fully conscious intent, the 'Chicago Boys' and their ilk used situations of shock and instability (coups, regime changes, wars and floods) to test and apply their theory that unconditional, deregulated capitalism was the pathway to individual freedom, prosperity and democracy. The theory naturally challenged any form of collectivist culture and practice (Marxist or otherwise) but also Keynesian developmentalism and protectionism. The theory was hatched in the fifties and sixties but first tested and applied in Chile after Pinochet's coup against Allende in 1973. However, thirty years later, Klein finds the same fundamentalist economic theory and practice underpinning the invasion of Iraq. In between Chile and Iraq, she tracks relentlessly and repeatedly the ever-present influence of the School in Brazil and Uruguay and Argentina in the seventies, South Africa under apartheid, Asia, the Russia of Yeltsin, Thatcherite Britain and the USA. In each and every chapter, she cogently exposes the disastrous impact of the theory and practice on the public sphere, its damage to the institutions of social solidarity. Far from being the begetter of wealth, democracy and freedom, cut-throat capital again and again generates a terrible 'ideological blowback' where immense inequalities thrive in ruthless greed-pickled cultures without proper democratic accountability or adequate public control, a breeding-ground for other forms of fundamentalism. Worst still, the Chicago Boys repeatedly boasted of their successes as they buried their disasters in mountains of lies and duplicity and one of their advocates, Fukuyama, even had the audacity to claim their tenets as the final form of History. Here is a book that comprehensively refutes the drip-down theory of wealth, unmasks self-serving greed and demonstrates beyond doubt that an agreement with capital is an agreement for it. A female Chomsky? Certainly, at the very least, a powerful addendum to his work. (This review was written for the 2008 Labour Party Conference edition of Campaign Group News which published it minus the last two sentences. This was the last issue of the paper as it became financially unviable. I had been invited to review regularly other books of my choice. I do not know if the events were connected!).</p> <p>DON’T BANK ON THE BANKS<br> It is almost unbearably painful to see New Labour racking itself to persuade the banks of Britain to act to defend the public interest, rather than their own, as this financial crisis bites ever deeper. Almost unbearable, yes, but as total public ownership, and therefore accountability and control, edges closer, so the defining economic flagship of the Blair /Brown years, that special partnership with capital, will capsize and wreckage aplenty will follow. There will be many people who will be amazed that the gods of deregulation have been exposed with feet of clay, as the dethroned tyrants and tycoons of the market bring out the begging bowls and clamour for protection from the very forces they unleashed to satisfy their greed. However, what follows is the really important issue. Partnerships require trust and cooperation but the banks have displayed considerable indifference to anything but their own financial interests and bonuses. This should not surprise us as an agreement with capital is invariably an agreement for it. How far the banks will go in their resistance to Darling’s imprecations is not clear but their capacity to absorb public money so readily is a sponge of some proportions. In such times, real public ownership is required.</p> <p>ITS TIME FOR A CHANGE<br> I am told that some irresistible electoral law determines that there shall be in Britain a change of government every so often and that nothing can stop the feeling that it is time for 'the other lot' to have their turn. I am not wedded to determinism of this kind, so if it has been like this in the past, I do not see that it has to be like this in the future. Even so, I have to ask: has it been like this in the past? Obviously not if you know anything about history! Did Labour and the Tories alternate power under Victoria and William the Conqueror? The sensibility that makes Labour possible as a government and a force in politics generally is a cultural construction born in struggle and conflict, some of it quite violent. If it is a time for a change and it always is if you are progressive and socialist, then it is not a change for a return of the Tories. Their raison d'être is to protect an interest and that interest is necessarily a privilege of the few paid for by the exploitation of the masses. When the Tories talk of the public interest or benefit, you know they are Greeks bearing gifts and you should fear them (pace Greeks). However, a country and a people that can spend so much time on and pay so much attention to the general garbage pumped into its cerebellum by the 'entertainment industry' (and I see most of the media as part of that) is probably not ready for the harsh, demanding and higher lessons of political life. There are people who say they are not interested in politics as they lose their jobs and houses and who demonise unions as instruments of oppression. Well, I suppose the jobless and the homeless can get together somewhere to watch Strictly Come Dancing and Celebrity Millionaire etc and get sucked into that dumb-downed world which then makes them think it 's time for a change to the Tories so that they can be rescued. But I think it would be better if they used their limbs and loins, eyes and synapses to engage politically and fight for a decent and fair society, a change that really matters and which is in their power to achieve but not with a remote in an armchair.And yes it is time for a change , a change to the politics of money, a change that will bring accountability to the deregulated casino economy so that it serves the public and not its own greed. New Labour needs to think this through and cease being the prisoner of capital and start being its jailer.<br> QUANTITATIVE EASEMENTS<br> This super laxative injection, which promises to unblock the constipated back passages of our Great British Banks and release capital flow aplenty, has a certain allure to it. I am sure that most of us could do with a few shots of it to get our own economies moving but it’s the banks and lamentably the bankers who are getting all the doses of this financial syrup of figs. The many face the insecurities of lost jobs and homes and the anxieties of making ends meet. Will the strategy work? Sisyphus pushed a stone up a hill only to see it roll down again and I know people who see this as a myth about constipation (pushing hard things to no avail). I hope it does not finish like that but things do not appear to be moving that easily. I must say that I endorse for once Rowan of Canterbury’s view that it is not enough to blame the bankers and the bonus culture for our troubles: we must address the system which gives rise to it, that is to say deregulated liberalism (or some would say capitalism and yes it must be abolished but that is not the agenda for our government. Nor is it on the agenda of the much- praised, dancing Cabletalk (the voice of Vince) who wants the banks to be taken into public ownership now and forced to operate for public benefit not private gain. He then thinks, inexplicably in my view, when all this is over, that they should return to the private sector. Where is the logic in that and why has he not been asked this simple question by media pundits?</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2009/01/22/the-politics-of-money-5422654/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2009/01/22/the-politics-of-money-5422654/Thu, 22 Jan 2009 10:55:42 +0100 <p> BANK ON THE ROCKS</p> <p>Mark Anthony took a long time to die, as did Bottom the weaver mechanical playing Pyramus, but neither can equal the death throes of Northern Rock as it finally slid into the arms of public ownership for the kiss of life. O my Darling, O my Darling, O my Darling Alastair, art thou lost and gone forever? Will those dark brows now whiten to match that snowy head? Here is a nationalisation too far for the architects of New Labour ideology and an arrow in the quiver of those who believe that the private sector, especially, but evidently not exclusively, those avaricious banks, are there for themselves and do not serve the public benefit. Where were they when the Rock faltered, where the insurance and protection financed from the obscenity of their profits? They are there when the sun shines on their greed, but nowhere to be seen when asked to feed the cow they milk. They pocket and privatise the profit but socialise their losses with the taxpayers. It is not an isolated phenomenon for we have the scandal of the Railways, the Water Authorities, the Post Office not to mention the abomination of PFI and the creeping privatisation and marketisation of the NHS. Northern Rock clearly places public ownership back on the agenda but you would not know this from the press. Now you see Paxman and Humphreys for what they are: slaves to the ideology of market freedom. Here was an opportunity for them and the rest of the media to stress the public benefit and castigate the private sector. Only Vince Cable could penetrate the smoke screens of reaction, whilst Gordon and Alastair uttered the tosh of the year: Northern Rock has been taken into temporary public ownership which means its future profits will belong to the taxpayers. When it regains full profitability, it will be returned to the private sector. There’s logic for you. It used to be said that we should nationalise the top 200 companies. Well one is a start. Only 199 to go. On this rock, we should build the people’s church.</p> <p>BANKING ON THE BISHOP: ROWAN RORY ON THE ROCKS<br> I cannot be the only person who thought that Rory had kidnapped Rowan of Canterbury, gagged and cuffed him and placed him in a barrel of marmalade, when that deep speech was muttered. The venerable scholar, like a person in slippers about to prepare their late night Horlicks with the strike of a match in a room full of leaking gas, produced a mighty, off the scale, richter explosion and then looked surprised. It takes a special kind of 'academic' skill to launch in innocence a nuclear warhead into the heart of the multicultural debate and unite virtually the whole world against you, including allies in your own church. The Sun shone with typical warmth: 'What a Burkah' as it contemplated the 'inevitability' of sharia law on the shores of England. At last Labour was off the front page for multitudinous cock-ups incarnadine and the sea rolled over Moby Rowan as he sank under a downpour of harpoons. Thanks be to God of whatever variety. </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2008/03/04/banking-on-it-3814504/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2008/03/04/banking-on-it-3814504/Tue, 04 Mar 2008 10:17:13 +0100 <p>TWO PRESCRIPTIONS FOR LABOUR’S ILLS<br> Ray Davison reviews Jon Cruddas’ and John Harris’ Fit for Purpose – a programme for Labour Party renewal. Compass, 2006 pp. 1-34 and Renewal – a two-way process for the 21st century, an Interim Report 2007 from LabOUR, an independent commission on Accountability, Party and Parliamentary Democracy, LabOUR Commission, 2007, pp. (ii)-59.</p> <p>Those who metaphorically donate their organs and life-blood in the service of the Party, its historic vision and values, will find significant interest in these two pamphlets seeking the prescriptions of renewal and revival for a Labour Party not in the best of health. The symptoms are there for all to see: dramatic haemorrhaging of its membership, down by over 50% since 1997, widespread inertia and atrophy of its vital limbs - its branches and GMCs - chronic abulia, disaffection and alienation of its once active and engaged body of members and supporters. Both documents examine the ailing organs with acuity, pointing out the areas of degeneration and failure like Rembrandt’s Anatomist. Fit for Purpose ranges freely over the Party’s history as an organisation born to fight for the industrial working class and uses a compelling blend of sociology, philosophy and general cultural perspectives to identify the challenges facing Labour policy makers in a post-industrial social order with a much more fluid class base and where politics is centred on a terrain much wider than the workplace.<br> LabOUR’s Renewal constructs its not dissimilar arguments in a more down to earth language, making really good use of what it calls ‘an evidenced based approach’ information gleaned from focus groups supervised by Professor Stuart Weir of the Democratic Audit, University of Essex and commissioned LabOUR /You Gov polls of members and lapsed members. Both pamphlets emphasise the negative and morale- breaking effects of New Labour’s top-down authoritarian model of policy–making and control freakery; both dwell on the imperfection and sometimes inanities of Partnership in Power; both, of course, have a lot to say about the Party’s financial management and our government’s relationship with money.<br> Finding the antidotes to our Party’s multitude of afflictions is the pivotal aim of these contributions but there is not going to be an easy answer and certainly no systemic viagra to revitalise, re-engage, renew and even resuscitate. Both works want to retain the federal structure of the Party and keep Conference as its sovereign body; both want to reform the NPF and have its CLP delegates elected by OMOV regionally; both want to empower members and end the era of imposed, monological policy formulation ( LabOUR even advances the idea of a Charter of Members Right to enhance and give a quasi statutory authority to the voice of members); both, crucially, recognise the determining role of egalitarianism, redistribution and democratic procedure in the motivation and political aspirations of members of the Party.<br> It is to be noted that both these documents pre-date the Brown Coronation and the launch of the new Leader’s own initiative, the so-called consultation Extending and Renewing Party Democracy. The words of the Brown invitation make one wish for an additional section to each contribution, although LabOUR’s report is only interim, so a supplement will come. Timeo Gordonum ac dona ferentum! Like a cunning Dr Finlay with a casebook, Gordon sends us a welcome chance to get better but like that other equine structure, we must beware the swollen underbelly, potentially full of bowmen with their arrows pointed at Labour’s primary organ, its heart. *</p> <p>*This review was written for Campaign Briefing70, which is the Newsletter of the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy. The Newsletter is prepared annually for distribution at the Labour Party’s National Conference, which was in Bournemouth this year (go to CLPD.org.uk for current edition). Brown’s proposals were heavily endorsed at the Conference, thus what was left of the sovereign voice of Conference has now been abolished and the annual event has become a rally and fan-club for the Labour government. Attendance levels and payment of exorbitant attendance fees are likely to shrink. Why pay for no say? Also, if the Latin bothers you, think of Trojan horses and suspicious Greeks bearing gifts.</p> <p>MING TO THE KNACKER<br> Cursed are the merciless for they shall receive no mercy. He that profiteth from alcohol abuse shall be soberly dispatched. Like poor, exhausted Boxer in Animal Farm, the tired old cadaver to be of the sweet and dignified Ming was unceremoniously sent to the knacker. What a sorry sight was this. This frail and venerable gentleman, with failing teeth and pipe-cleaner limbs, a pitiful shadow of those doric Olympian legs of yore which scorched the very earth they barely touched, was untimely plucked from his dotage. Where there should have been affection, warmth and respect, a celebration of wisdom and experience, there was only a cold steel arrow pointing to a cold coffin. Will Ming now join Gordon’s big tentism to end his days away from the Kafkaesque jackals and ghouls of Liberal Democracy? Proposal for a Sun headline: It's the socks what did it.</p> <p>A BODY FULL OF THREE CHEESE PIZZAS<br> This latest and possibly last issue of Tony Benn’s unfailingly readable diaries (More Time For Politics, 2001-2007) tells us many personal things about this unusual man, now in his eighties: his love of Caroline, his pride in his extensive family and in the achievements of Hilary whose politics he in no way shares, the curiously chaotic domestic infrastructure that accompanies a life political so relentlessly busy and engaged that it could be that of six pathological activists of the left. He complains of tiredness and aching limbs on occasions but that doesn’t stop him. And all this is fuelled by a thrice –daily intake of three cheese pizzas, an addiction to which he cannot overcome despite the occasional attempt to do so. Look at this entry for Saturday December 27 2003:<br> ‘In 2003 I delivered 142 speeches in forty-six towns and cities, including Baghdad and Cairo. I did thirty-three press interviews, 385 broadcasts (235 radio and 150 television), to thirty foreign countries. I published a hardback, Free Radical, a paperback, Free at Last!, and I must have written sixty, seventy, eighty articles. So that’s not a bad record for a man of seventy-eight.’ I hope Ming will read these diaries and get to the nearest Pizza House for that is certainly my next stop.</p> <p>A MAJOR BODY SHOCK FOR ALASTAIR<br> Alastair Campbell knows a thing or two about the libidinal impulses of the body politic and his diaries (The Blair Years) shows how quick on the uptake he is about the Robin Cook dalliance. Yet even this formidable press secretary is thrown into a moment of high lyricism on Saturday September 28, 2002: ‘Woke up to one of those rare and totally gobsmacking revelations that newspapers very occasionally produce, namely that John Major had a four-year affair with Edwina Currie. It was one of those ‘cor fuck me’ jaw-dropping moments. How on earth did he get away with it?’</p> <p>AN UNWANTED BODY<br> ‘Fair, kind and true: a simply wonderful socialist and an inspiration to all who love peace and progress.’</p> <p>Ray Davison, Secretary of East Devon Constituency Labour Party, salutes the memory of Norman Stevens, life-long socialist and Labour Party member who died on Tuesday October 30th at the age of 93. His funeral will take place on Friday November 16 at 2.30pm at Exeter Crematorium and after at Buckerell Lodge.</p> <p>Norman Stevens invites superlatives: he was the kindest and most considerate of people, always ultra polite and courteous, always full of cheer and positive. He was a real gentleman with a playful and enduringly youthful humour, a sparkling wit and a life-enhancing warmth and generosity of spirit which extended to everybody, whatever their politics.<br> These qualities were evident in all that he did in a very long and full life: as a Labour Councillor for Withycombe Urban Ward and Chair of the Council; as a member of the Cooperative Party and Movement and as an employee of the Cooperative Union; as a passionate supporter of the German Democratic Republic: as a pacifist, conscientious objector and member of the Society of Friends. He embodied in his social and political life values and principles which represented, particularly for us in the Labour Party, but also no doubt for the many who knew him outside the Party, the very essence of the human, the benevolent and the civilised.<br> These values and principles underpinned too his private life: Norman was a devoted husband to Margaret to whom he was married for sixty years. Margaret predeceased him in 2006, spending the last part of her life in a nursing home, where Norman visited her daily<br> We were proud in the Labour Party to have Norman as our Constituency President until March this year. He was a fine public speaker who could readily draw on his deep knowledge of the history of our Party, including even the odd ribald story with delicious bits of gossip and hints of scandal .<br> You might have thought that after 76 years of unbroken membership of our Party, Norman would want a bit of a rest from politics, but there was no sign of that when I visited him in his nursing home shortly before he died. Despite his evident frailty, there was a robustness and resolution in his conversation, and indeed a moving stoical acceptance in the way he lived his own declining health. Politically, Norman was a Bennite (it was Tony Benn who presented Norman with a Party Merit Award in 1987) and Bennites stay the course. At the same time Norman was a Bennite who knew you had to carry the people with you to secure a mandate and that took time and patience.<br> Such qualities of strength and endurance in a person of so open and friendly disposition made for a powerful and persuasive commitment. He was a person fair, kind and true: a simply wonderful socialist and an inspiration to all who love peace and progress. And it was a privilege and a pleasure for those who met him, and for me from 1980 onwards, when I came to Exmouth, to know him and to share the earth with him. His legacy is a challenge to us to match his purpose and sincerity.</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2007/10/18/the_body_politic~3154631/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2007/10/18/the_body_politic~3154631/Thu, 18 Oct 2007 09:32:39 +0200<p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2007/10/18/the_body_politic~3154617/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2007/10/18/the_body_politic~3154617/Thu, 18 Oct 2007 09:28:20 +0200 <p>TWO PRESCRIPTIONS FOR LABOUR’S ILLS<br> Ray Davison reviews Jon Cruddas’ and John Harris’ Fit for Purpose – a programme for Labour Party renewal. Compass, 2006 pp. 1-34 and Renewal – a two-way process for the 21st century, an Interim Report 2007 from LabOUR, an independent commission on Accountability, Party and Parliamentary Democracy, LabOUR Commission, 2007, pp. (ii)-59.</p> <p>Those who metaphorically donate their organs and life-blood in the service of the Party, its historic vision and values, will find significant interest in these two pamphlets seeking the prescriptions of renewal and revival for a Labour Party not in the best of health. The symptoms are there for all to see: dramatic haemorrhaging of its membership, down by over 50% since 1997, widespread inertia and atrophy of its vital limbs - its branches and GMCs - chronic abulia, disaffection and alienation of its once active and engaged body of members and supporters. Both documents examine the ailing organs with acuity, pointing out the areas of degeneration and failure like Rembrandt’s Anatomist. Fit for Purpose ranges freely over the Party’s history as an organisation born to fight for the industrial working class and uses a compelling blend of sociology, philosophy and general cultural perspectives to identify the challenges facing Labour policy makers in a post-industrial social order with a much more fluid class base and where politics is centred on a terrain much wider than the workplace.<br> LabOUR’s Renewal constructs its not dissimilar arguments in a more down to earth language, making really good use of what it calls ‘an evidenced based approach’ information gleaned from focus groups supervised by Professor Stuart Weir of the Democratic Audit, University of Essex and commissioned LabOUR /You Gov polls of members and lapsed members. Both pamphlets emphasise the negative and morale- breaking effects of New Labour’s top-down authoritarian model of policy–making and control freakery; both dwell on the imperfection and sometimes inanities of Partnership in Power; both, of course, have a lot to say about the Party’s financial management and our government’s relationship with money.<br> Finding the antidotes to our Party’s multitude of afflictions is the pivotal aim of these contributions but there is not going to be an easy answer and certainly no systemic viagra to revitalise, re-engage, renew and even resuscitate. Both works want to retain the federal structure of the Party and keep Conference as its sovereign body; both want to reform the NPF and have its CLP delegates elected by OMOV regionally; both want to empower members and end the era of imposed, monological policy formulation ( LabOUR even advances the idea of a Charter of Members Right to enhance and give a quasi statutory authority to the voice of members); both, crucially, recognise the determining role of egalitarianism, redistribution and democratic procedure in the motivation and political aspirations of members of the Party.<br> It is to be noted that both these documents pre-date the Brown Coronation and the launch of the new Leader’s own initiative, the so-called consultation Extending and Renewing Party Democracy. The words of the Brown invitation make one wish for an additional section to each contribution, although LabOUR’s report is only interim, so a supplement will come. Timeo Gordonum ac dona ferentum! Like a cunning Dr Finlay with a casebook, Gordon sends us a welcome chance to get better but like that other equine structure, we must beware the swollen underbelly, potentially full of bowmen with their arrows pointed at Labour’s primary organ, its heart. *</p> <p>*This review was written for Campaign Briefing70, which is the Newsletter of the Campaign for Labour Party Democracy. The Newsletter is prepared annually for distribution at the Labour Party’s National Conference, which was in Bournemouth this year (go to CLPD.org.uk for current edition). Brown’s proposals were heavily endorsed at the Conference, thus what was left of the sovereign voice of Conference has now been abolished and the annual event has become a rally and fan-club for the Labour government. Attendance levels and payment of exorbitant attendance fees are likely to shrink. Why pay for no say? Also, if the Latin bothers you, think of Trojan horses and suspicious Greeks bearing gifts.</p> <p>MING TO THE KNACKER<br> Cursed are the merciless for they shall receive no mercy. He that profiteth from alcohol abuse shall be soberly dispatched. Like poor, exhausted Boxer in Animal Farm, the tired old cadaver to be of the sweet and dignified Ming was unceremoniously sent to the knacker. What a sorry sight was this. This frail and venerable gentleman, with failing teeth and pipe-cleaner limbs, a pitiful shadow of those doric Olympian legs of yore which scorched the very earth they barely touched, was untimely plucked from his dotage. Where there should have been affection, warmth and respect, a celebration of wisdom and experience, there was only a cold steel arrow pointing to a colder coffin. Will Ming now join Gordon’s big tentism to end his days away from the Kafkaesque jackals and ghouls of Liberal Democracy? It was the socks what dunnit(proposal for a Sun headline).</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2007/10/17/title~3150900/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2007/10/17/title~3150900/Wed, 17 Oct 2007 15:45:27 +0200 <p>ON THE LIZARD<br> Yarder sat on the Lizard enjoying the October sunshine and musing on the benefit of climate change. He looked at the rocks and the cliffs: they were indeed lizard-like, dark and reptilian, muscular. The sky was clear and he had that sense of suspended time and immobility that the sea can bring. A large seal suddenly emerged from the water and appeared to frolic in the sun. Yarder wondered if a seal could feel happy and enjoy rousseauistic moments.<br> 'What are you day-dreaming about?'asked his companion Spike who sat beside him. She had finished her cigarette, her sugared coffee and her daily perusal of The Racing Post.<br> 'I was thinking about perception, rocks and metaphors, seals and happiness.'<br> 'Well, I wonder if you ever actually see anything at all since you are so bloody self-absorbed. For example, Yarder, have you noticed anything odd about the last twenty minutes?'<br> 'If you are referring to the 110 people who wandered past us in the last half-hour, I did notice them'.<br> 'Yes but what did you notice about them?'<br> 'I noticed that a majority of them were very large females with enormous bums, so much so that if you sprayed this attribute with grey paint, they could easily be the back-end of a pantomime elephant without further props or pass for a seal.'<br> 'That is funny, I was thinking about that too. I mean, not the seal or the elephants, but their fat arses. Why did we both think of that?'<br> 'Because of all the recent publicity about the obesity of the Brits. Our perception was coloured by that. All perception is coloured, even that of a happy seal'.<br> Spike went back to the horses. Yarder surveyed the coastal path: the elephant trail crawled over the Lizard from cove to cove, thundering like dinosaurs of old to the next feeding station. And the rocks of ages seemed to sigh but not sag under the weight and pressure.<br> PITY THE PALL BEARERS OF BRITAIN<br> A side-effect of the alarming increase in the obesity of the British is the health and safety threat posed to the poor pall-bearers of our nation whose heavy job it is to carry these giant corpses to their final resting place. At a recent meeting of the Pall-Bearers Co-0perative, it was resolved that enough was enough and a limit of 20 stone per cadaver per 4 bearers was agreed. Over that weight a corpse will have to be cut length ways or centrally agirth and an additional coffin ordered. The Giant Casket Company of America looks poised to break into what is always a vibrant market with a tempting upper limit of 40 stone per six. Over this a crane and pulley service is available for hire.<br> OF GIANT CASKETS AND HUMAN RIGHTS<br> America has cabbages and contraceptive sheaths larger than other countries of the world, so much is natural and acceptable for a superpower. It also has a growing population of obese people, making the British look positively sylph-like. The American market is responding to the expansion in the form of companies offering outsize coffins for the corpses. This may help the mammothian dead but there are other problems. There is a growing need for bigger beds and sofas not to mention toilet seats and baths. Culturally the phenomenon is generating demands for larger cinema and theatre seats and the tourist industry is also feeling the pinch as traditional train and aircraft seating cannot cope with the pressures. It come as no surprise that ascetics in the States take a negative view of thick girths and are demanding punitive action against the excessively fat. In England, most people would understand this, for gluttony is a traditional sin and obesity is lived largely in guilt and shame. However the fat of America are anything but supine and are making this a human rights and constitutional issue. They claim discrimination and the right and freedom to be as fat and large as they like. In other words it is not their problem. I find the debate of some interest as it poses the problem of individual freedom in relation to others in a pressing sort of way. Very few things that we do, do not impact on others; in fact I can only think of one and in folklore it causes ocular difficulties. Now where did I put my glasses?<br> OFF TARGET<br> Water boils at 100 degrees and at lower temperatures the phenomenon does not occur. The same is true of humour and satire and, of course, metaphor, as Proust once said. You either hit the target and get a laugh or you slide into the faeces of failure. What garbage then is this from the punctured cerebellums of Labour MPs Simon and Watson? To produce such rubbish is already an achievement in the sense that it would be difficult to do worse but to publish it for human consumption is an offence. Exposure to this is akin to sex with cold noodles or coition with a dead cod. Spare us that fate at least and say no more. We need more retirement homes for failed comedians.<br> TONY ROBINSON SEES RADICAL LIGHT<br> We give credit to former NEC member, Tony Robinson, who did not need to set off for Damascus to experience revelation: he just watched New Labour in action. Writing in the November 2005 issue of Red Pepper, Robinson encapsulates the depth of the revelation in a stunning iterance<img src="/img/smilies/icon_razz.gif" alt=":p" class="middle" border="0">ower tends to corrupt; and follows up thus:In the Labour Party, of course, politicians are so governed by the experience of the Militant Tendency in the 1980s that they are in terror of their own members. They manipulate the membership. They parachute in their own favourites to constituencies as parliamentary candidates. To all intents and purposes they have got rid of the party conference as a policy-making body and replaced it with the national policy forum. This might be potentially a very good idea, except that it is a complete fix and filled with people who are very close to the leadership. Editorial comment: complete the conversion, Tony, and join CLPD.<br> MEACHER’S WINDOW VISION<br> Ray Davison reviews Michael Meacher’s The Politics of Conviction, a Catalyst Working Paper, The Catalyst Forum, 2006, pp.(iv)-46. £5. Reprinted from Campaign Briefing 69, Summer Edition, the Newsletter of CLPD.</p> <p>Michael Meacher straddles the decades from 1970 when he first won Oldham and, like David, the French painter of the revolutionary years, he is a survivor and keeps his head. On the evidence of this pamphlet, it is a head well worth keeping. After the multitudinous mountains of New Labour policy documents, where the classical art of saying the least to mean the most has been put into reverse and we prospect wearily for significance in a sierra madre of verbiage, it is a pleasure to read a text where concision, analytical acuity and astute political judgement blend impressively. This head perceives a window of opportunity as it surveys, like a modern Descartes doing a second meditation, the present state of the world and international power relations. But it is more than a window of opportunity – it is a vision. The sub-title of this paper is ‘Vision of a Socialist or Social Democratic Society. The telescoping of socialist and social democratic is of interest. There is no conflict between them for Meacher, as some might anticipate, for example those who would prefer democratic socialist to social democratic. Meacher’s window vision defines a political space wide enough to build a consensual and pragmatic politics among left radicals and the now disenchanted Blairites of yore. Meacher argues that the political centre of gravity, now entrenched on the right, with its neo-liberal policies driving privatisation, deregulation and vast inequalities of wage and wealth, is about to shift. The contours of international power will be re-configured as American dominance is challenged by the growing strength of China, Russia, India and Brazil. Environmental factors (which figure prominently in the argument) will create unavoidable and extreme challenges for laissez-faire capitalism and ‘we thus face irrevocably an era of fundamental change.’ Meacher wants us to seize this historical moment and his programme for change will be sweet music to many left ears. Domestically, his policies are re-distributive, anti-privatisation and demand a strengthened public sector. He looks to Sweden for his economic model. There is a strong anti-authoritarian and anti-Leviathan element to his thought and he calls for the abolition of the royal prerogative, increased civil rights and indeed for the restoration of the sovereignty of Labour’s Conference. Internationally, our subordination to America must end and the post-1945 IMF/World Bank/WTO settlement must be redrawn. This short review cannot do full justice to a paper which is a really well thought-out and convincing contribution to present political debate. It places Meacher at the centre of attention.<br> Blog readers please note that two months after the writing of this review, Michael Meacher announced that he would stand in Labour’s leadership election.</p> <p>END THIS CRUELTY TO CHAMELEONS!<br> That ‘great clunking fist’ about to land on a flyweight chameleon has roused the wrath of the politically correct banana brains of our time. I know I have extended the metaphor of the boxing ring to include a reference to a camel lion but I felt at liberty to do this as clunking already seems odd when applied to a fist and is no doubt a back formation from hammer blow. The great leader was in fine form that day and the chameleon flushed and blushed, went white, yellow and sickly green, as if he could actually see the fist about to crush him. How predictable that the leader, who mocked bogus love and punched holes in facile utterances, should come under fire for using images of violence and cruelty by pc wonkers (Baroness Kennedy, for example). I know where that clunking fist should go next to fill a hole of inanity.</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/10/19/weighty_problems~1239645/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/10/19/weighty_problems~1239645/Thu, 19 Oct 2006 18:32:09 +0200 <p>The Great British Press is renowned throughout the world for the acuity, depth and balance of its political coverage and it is surely a monument to our democracy. Thus, when Prescott plays away or wastes the country’s resources on croquet, when Gordon has his teeth polished to outstrip Tony’s chirpier choppers, the Great British Press can always be relied upon to give due prominence to such important news. Be warned Heather, your past is of global interest and no screens will protect you. Thus also, when Chavez visited London, the Great British Press went out of its way, in a quasi-neurotic frenzy of fairness, to denigrate a person who stole his country’s oil from respectable capitalists for the benefit of his people and did not have the decency to pay any compensation. He also had the cheek to lift peasants from poverty, disease and illiteracy, the bastard, and, sin of all sins, he was elected to do so. None of this dastardly regressive action escaped the watchful eyes of Heffer and his like. Nor did the treacherous and dumb film director Ken Loach have any chance with The Wind That Shakes The Barley. The silly judges of Cannes, full of Mediterranean hot air and plonk, needed their unanimous brains tested to throw away a Palme d’or on this anti-British rubbish. Thank God for the intelligence of the Press.What would we know, how could we form judgements without your guidance and management? And where are the Ashford millions?<br> CHEZ LE COIFFEUR<br> LC ‘That will be £250, Madam’<br> CB ‘ A real snip, especially as the Party is paying. I really am a credit to it.’<br> LC ‘Something for the weekend, Madam?’<br> CB ‘You must be joking. I’m Catholic.<br> LC ‘They are free, Madam.’<br> CB ‘Well, in that case, count me in. I can always sell them on to Twoshags. Give me two large boxes. Have you got them in cocktail sausage fit? And here’s something for you.’<br> LC ‘Spray on dung soak, madam, just what I’ve always wanted.’</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/06/15/the_politics_of_soap~882485/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/06/15/the_politics_of_soap~882485/Thu, 15 Jun 2006 12:14:01 +0200 <p>OF LIBERALISM AND THE PORCINISTS (d’après Voltaire)<br> Worship of the pig has a long history in primitive, tribal culture (see Hogwash and Sow 1852) and trace elements of its existence are evident even in today’s more sophisticated world. For our purposes, it suffices to note that the modern cult of the Porcine and its adherents, derives from the XII C roasting of the primal pig whose crackling and garlic –pickled flesh were credited with divine powers and revelation. Modern pig idolatry dates from 1970 and claims as many as 15000 sty altars, a number likely to double in the next five years. The sect has a sacred text, The Book of Pig whose pages allegedly derive from the leftovers of the primal pig roast. Members of the sect are called porcinists and vehemently proclaim their right to freedom of religious worship and to dress in their sacred garments. They want social inclusion and access to public bodies including schools on the basis of their freedom to wear the traditional hog-head (with or without ears) and the right to display trotter necklaces, preferably fresh ones as closer to the primal pig or caramelised at a pinch. This caused some strife, particularly in schools. Western Liberal opinion quickly supported the porcinists in the name of tolerance and respect for religious beliefs, arguing that members of the sect should be able to dress as they please. Such Liberals are strongly supported by the organo-naturists who want to walk around naked and the all-female cult, known as the vaginistas, who believe that God communicates directly with them through their exposed vaginas and that they should in consequence never have to cover this part of their bodies. Much schism did then occur in the school of humanity and the principal of the school was sorely tested in his management. He was an avid reader of Tony Benn who had himself advocated tolerance and freedom on Question Time. But the principal was much alarmed when the porcinists captured Benn and declared; 'We thank you for our freedom but The Book of Pig declares Pighad on all infidels like you’. Whereupon they cut off his head and squealed all night long in ecstasy. Another sage, a secular socialist humanist much versed in Confucius, called Ynot Rialb, spotted the head, dolefully picked it up and lamented ‘What a sorry, sorry sight is this, that a head with so much wisdom should fall victim to the delusions of the porcinists. You should have seen this coming old man’. Ynot in tears began to spin the head around with greater and greater force and then released it, propelling it into the stratosphere, where it self -incinerated by its own velocity. The burning head caused a visionary glow in the world of humankind and a determination in the mind of Ynot. He took a big stick from the Garden of Confucius and headed towards the nearest sty, rehearsing his lines as he went and flexing his muscles: ‘You are not here to define difference nor to individuate but to discover a common humanity through co-operation. That is the socialist project’. And Ynot vowed to conquer difference while the Twhataadsa slept.</p> <p>THE WAY OF THE ££ORDS & ££OANS<br> It is a credit no doubt to the Labour Government that we introduced a greater degree of transparency and regulation in the matter of political donations. How ironic and how predictable that it should expose itself to allegations of sleaze and corruption by clumsily trying to circumnavigate its own rules with clandestine loans, seemingly linked to Honours, without the very Treasurer of the Party knowing anything about it.'Thus the House of the Lords was open to purchase by the few and the many did feel much resentment at their exclusion. For the race shall be to the bung and victory to the loan, as time and chance happeneth to no man with a dark million. But the strumpets of the Lords did sound in protests multiple that they had done no wrong, governor, but all actions followed His true and saintly Law and that they were innocent and most legal. And the Almighty did look upon the deed and forthwith cast his great Blotch upon their Houses and their mortgages and they did disappear into a wilderness.'</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/04/03/number_3_march~699679/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/04/03/number_3_march~699679/Mon, 03 Apr 2006 18:39:53 +0200 <p>ISSUE NO 2 FEBRUARY 2006<br> THE JOWELL IN THE BROWN<br> The old adage declares that, if you look after the pennies, the pounds will look after themselves. The Jowell evidently ignored this wisdom of<br> the ages and 350.000 carefree £££s started to drift artfully round the global money markets, colliding eventually with her domestic mortgage arrangements without her really knowing or understanding anything about this in her busy, busy life. Yes, we all know how easy it is to sign up for a mortgage, especially when the sum of money involved is such a trifle and, in between the ministerial boxes, the washing up and especially, it seems, the laundry, it is almost inevitable that an oversight will occur. Luckily Tessa had a supportive husband who could help her in her confusion, especially, apparently, with the laundry. He is obviously a very nice man, much appreciated by others, who take a lot of trouble with the wrapping when they want to give him a gift. It is so distressing and even tragic that this very nice man should have to suffer the indignity of being Jowell-jettisoned at a strategic moment. Where will he go now? Dubai? Doubtful! Some villa in Italy? He really did deserve a better and more financially secure future like the rest of us.<br> GOD HELP US<br> The appearance of our leader on the Parkinson horror show appears to have generated some controversy; for some it is the long awaited objective confirmation that he has finally lost all his marbles; for others, it represents a demonic attempt to hijack God to the Iraq war and even to suggest that God was the true agent of the initiative; yet others feel that the sight of the leader on a chat-show diminishes his personal stature and brings into disrepute the very office of the Prime Minister. Blair's ventures into the demotic are not without their interest: our old friend Ynot, who is to return from Tora Bora shortly, would certainly have disapproved. Leadership for Ynot has to be remote and distant from the ever muddled multitude, fickle, capricious and subject to vulgar instincts. He would certainly not have approved of bringing religion from the private to the public sphere or of invoking a Christian God in this sensitive age of multiculturalism and polytheism. Yet Blair is a Christian and so we can expect him to pray to his God and God, for all we know, might, in Blair's own view, answer him. The Almighty after all is not such a bad source of advice: being everywhere always, omniscient and omnipotent, He must be a front-line service for those who know how to communicate with Him. But as it is for Abraham deliberating about the sacrifice of Isaac, communications from God is uncertain and human agency thus reasserts itself as the true source of our decisions and actions.<br> THE TWHATAADSA<br> It seems that some readers were over-excited by my reference to this new genus (pronounced twatadza) and could not find the weed in their horticultural reference books. They should not worry. It seems likely that the weed will continue to grow and indeed flourish in the troubled waters of our times, where the word and the deed are unwed and the sofa and the bed sickly over the native hue of resolution.<br> NEW HOPE FOR INSOMNIACS<br> If I could make a private confession: I used to suffer from insomnia, like some readers of On Target, even though my most passionate relationship is with the unconscious state which I am always reluctant to leave. In my youth I used to read Hegel to cure the problem. Although I have the greatest admiration for this brilliant dialectical wizard, his orchestrations of History would rock me to sleep in no time. But now a new product is on the market and guarantees the deepest sleep for the most angst-pickled of subjectivities.It is called Jack Straw's Oratorical Medicine, Som for short. Som makes Horlicks seem like a stimulant. It is available in two strengths, short and long. It should be handled with extreme caution and it is dangerous to exceed the stated dose or use for too long a period. Counter-indications from prolonged exposure include abulia (chronic loss of will power), accidie (loss of will to live) and homicidal and self-immolatory yearnings of abnormal intensity. Used prudently, som will cure insomnia. For even faster relief, try looking at his picture.</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/03/08/february_2006_the_jowell_in_the_crown~624990/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/03/08/february_2006_the_jowell_in_the_crown~624990/Wed, 08 Mar 2006 21:54:32 +0100 <p><strong>LIBERAL DEMOCRATS IN SEPPUKU MODE</strong></p> <p>The unpredictability of politics is part of its excitement and appeal as well as a source of pain (Cook, Mowlam et al). It is often claimed by the TWHATAADSA (pronounced twatadza) that nothing ever changes, that politics is a waste of spirit, that the human leopard will never change its spots and other such defeatist platitudes. Yet the reality that we experience is one of constant change and uncertainty. I do not usually like to see the Labour Party taken off the front pages; even if the coverage is negative, it is better to be in power under fire than in the wastelands of irrelevance. Yet I make an exception for these Liberal Democrats who, like dormant volcanoes, have suddenly erupted and discharged their lava into our living rooms. A leader with a drink-problem is callously shafted; an aspirant leader with a thoughtful approach to prostitution, family life and freedom is exposed, it would appear, as an aficionado of rent-boys and triangulated sex. Well, fine, we are all human and we must not be judgmental in this liberal age (yawn, yawn) but methinks the political map will be shaken like a kaleidoscope (to mix metaphors) in the months to come and a judgement will be made but to the Benefit of whom? Who does not fear the Tories bearing gifts?</p> <p><strong>OF THE DRAGON AND THE DORMOUSE</strong></p> <p>The Government’s curious White Paper on Education is certainly causing rumbles in the normally serried ranks of New Labour. Adonis and Tony not only face the ire of a significant corpus of Labour rebels, causing them to undergo the humiliation of Tory assistance in the House, but they have managed also to create a frightening alliance between the Fiery Red Dragon of Wales, Neil Kinnock, and the educationally well-informed but ministerially vapid Estelle Morris who sometimes seems to come out of a teapot. We should listen to both. Kinnock knows about education: remember that speech about the Welsh (those people who could sing and make beautiful things with their hands and why was he the first Kinnock in a generation etc.?). And Estelle has a deep knowledge of what really happens in schools, although regrettably she did not use it to any great effect in post. Tony and Adonis sense what they think is the dead weight of local government on educational advance, creativity and energy. They want to give schools greater freedom to become trusts, to promote choice and competition to drive up standards. What a good idea, you might think, so where is the problem? The problem is that these proposals will generate a general instability in schools and from the turmoil will emerge the bourgeois creamers and selection by any other name will be back to the disadvantage of students from less affluent backgrounds. The so-called Admissions Code, statutory but without legal backing for enforcement, offers no real protection against this return to a selective system which we are traditionally committed to eradicate. We need a secure comprehensive schooling policy, equalising and maximising possibility for all. We have never had this because of residual grammar schools and the poisonous private sector but we have made some strides towards it. The present proposals, for all their spin, take us in the opposite direction, and should be blocked.</p> <p><strong>THE TWHATAADSA</strong></p> <p>Just in case you have not come across this term, it refers to a genus of half-hardy perennial weeds that thrive in the vegetative state on old political ground. They lie upon the land and rarely climb. They require patience and attention and realists usually do not have time for them. They do not blossom and can be intrusive. It is they who have all the answers and do sod all. They can become pot-bound.</p> <p><strong>OF THONGS AND BLOOMERS</strong></p> <p>Within the range of political reporters on offer to provide us with their views, one Martha Kearney, of Newsnight and Radio 4, must be credited with a higher rating. She is pleasant, balanced and effective when interviewing. It thus came as something of a shock to my delicacy of soul when Martha, in the course of an interview with the two Davids for the binnable Women’s Hour programme, took a plunge into their under-wear proclivities and their taste in women. Plumbing the depths of triviality and indeed the nether world, she asked these so-called political eagles if they favoured boxer-shorts or Y-Fronts and probed even deeper to see if they preferred blondes to brunettes. The old Etonian opted for boxer shorts and declined to answer the second part. The single-mothered progeny from the council estate and bog standard comp opted for traditional Y-fronts and even more traditional blondes, forgetting, as no politician should, that he might thus lose the vote of a sizeable slice of the female electorate not to mention his brunette of a spouse. Neither candidate, in my view, should have answered either question but should have turned their guns or metaphorical contents of their underpants if you prefer, on Martha herself and demanded a less trivial question. You can just imagine what the public reaction would have been if a Paxman or a Humphrys had been in an equivalent situation. Just think of it: two women competing for leadership of a major party and they are asked whether they prefer thongs to bloomers or baldies to hirsutes or whatever. Imagine Thatcher against Heath and Maggie is asked whether she prefers front-opening bras to back-fastening ones or padded to steel-braced radials to make it easier for D after the final gin. Well, the handbag would have travelled with force and speed into the Y’s and boxers. Come on Martha, we expect and deserve better but you do have an ally. A Sunday Times female reporter, unworthy of a name, said that nothing activates a woman’s intuitive power more readily than underpants style. Well, now you know and, just for the record, I wear both interchangeably and none in Church or when eating curry. As for blondes or brunettes, my eyes are so challenged these days that I can hardly see the difference. As my mum would say you don’t look at the mantel-piece when poking the fire! Anyway, Boxer will win so Gordon better get it sorted beneath the Kilt in the lowlands.<u></u> </p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/01/25/january_2006_lib_dems_in_seppuku_mode~576863/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2006/01/25/january_2006_lib_dems_in_seppuku_mode~576863/Wed, 25 Jan 2006 11:46:30 +0100 <p>THE POWER OF A WORD<br> Walter Wolfgang is 82 years old and has been shuffling around Labour Conferences for as long as I can remember. I first met him in 1975 and he looked like a veteran then. He is intelligent, articulate and knows a thing or two about war and peace. He is a member of CND with sincerely held views on nuclear weapons, Iraq and so much more. Walter is also Jewish and left Germany to escape Nazi persecution. Although intellectually robust and formidable, he is in no great shape physically and both his body and his suit appear to have been partially nuked at some time in History. Well, this fragile senior citizen was listening, yes actually listening to one of the greatest orators of our times, the redoubtable Jack Straw who provides all year relief to insomniacs throughout Britain as they rush to the unconscious state to avoid the pain of his mutterings. But Walter did not sleep. He uttered a word, not a long word but not an abusive monosyllable either and not even a particularly challenging or acicular word, just a harmless: ‘NONSENSE’. This almost anodyne utterance released a hurricane on hapless Walter who found himself surrounded by Labour’s muscle- bound stewards intent on ejecting him from the hall with disproportionate force. A young man, Steve Forrest, sitting near Walter, saw all this and with parabolic speed decided to play the Good Samaritan by telling the courageous heavies to: ‘Leave that old man alone’. The great socialist stewards of New Labour then surrounded the samaritan, pulled him from the hall and pushed him into a corner, threatened him and only police intervention save him from who knows what. Meantime Walter tried to bumble his way back into the hall only to be detained under the Prevention of Terrorism Act. The rest is history: Walter and Steve became instant celebrities, Labour lost control of the Conference with this spectacular own-goal and important debates were subordinated to the most abject concatenation of risible apologies ever to have been articulated in our movement. An enquiry was announced but it has not yet reported This was a seminal moment for me and many others: we have some very nasty people in our ranks and they must be exposed and relieved of their duties. Who authorised such thuggery in our name and shamed our Party so comprehensively? And if the TV cameras had not captured all this, would the apologies have flowed so fully? And if all this had resulted in Walter’s death from shock and strain? What then? One word too many, Walter…!</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2005/10/01/the_power_of_a_word~580136/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2005/10/01/the_power_of_a_word~580136/Sat, 01 Oct 2005 14:53:09 +0200 <p><strong>BRIGHTON 2005</strong><br> It has to be said that I did not depart for this year’s Annual Conference in Brighton with much of a spring in my step. Initial analysis from progressive contacts in London suggested that it would be largely triumphalist but the triumphalism would be flat and eclipsed by spasms of terror-induced anxiety. Prospects for improving Partnership in Power, by establishing the final year amendment procedure (promoted by our CLP) which would restore some life to our debates, were not good. Security would be tighter and more oppressive than ever before and there was half a chance of being blown to bits and left looking like the West Pier. Even the cards for the Brighton Races failed to inspire and with no Robin Cook around to assess the form or the odds, the chances of financial compensation for enduring the events of Conference appeared remote. How very wrong I was: all this negativity soon evaporated in the intermittences of the Brighton sunshine as Stanley Kubrickism and rewrites of scenes from A Clockwork Orange displaced New Labour control-freakery and stage-managementism. Find out all about it at the October Meeting when I give the Annual Conference Report: a must for all volcanophiles and idle and dejected activists in East Devon.</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2005/10/01/brighton~580112/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2005/10/01/brighton~580112/Sat, 01 Oct 2005 12:40:58 +0200 <p>ISSUE NO 6 OCTOBER 2004<br> BRIGHTON 04: A VISITOR VIEW<br> Looking at the skeletal wreck of its once inspiriting West Pier, how could this visitor to a wet and windy Brighton not see, in this ruin, images of our Party in these so testing times? I see the Eighties Left’s vision of Democratic Socialist advance battered and smashed by the waves of History, so many good socialists having foolishly quit the Party to float aimlessly like fragments of the pier in a sea of impotence with no prospect of a lifeboat. Do I see here also the shredded and shattered wreckage of our Government’s case for War? Possibly and certainly for some, but the vision of a democratic Iraq and a world beyond terror and despotisms will continue to glow in the deepest darknesses of today. Do I see our Prime Minister, tempest-ravaged and besieged, about to bend and break under the impact? Well, no I do not, much as it would please some, especially the press. Either God made him in his own image or used a stronger iron in the soul. He has remarkable control of the ship but there may be a steering problem and a mutinous crew hiding below the deck. Staring at desolate piers is dangerous; suddenly it becomes my own body image but it soon passes. No, its not my inner dejection projected onto these writhing joints of steel; despite the aching shoulder, the lacerated neck, the scary vertigo from my staircase fall with all its divine connotations, despite all the difficulties with Iraq, the target must be to remain committed to a continuing Labour Government under the present resolute leader unless…</p> <p> <small> <a href="http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2004/10/01/title~580053/#comments">Comments</a> </small> </p>http://ontarget.blog.co.uk/2004/10/01/title~580053/Fri, 01 Oct 2004 12:25:13 +0200