Not a good Sunday for the Lib Dems
January 22nd, 2006
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Could Huhne be the beneficiary?
With the revelations in the News of the World about Mark Oaten and a rent boy and the admission by the party leader in the House of Lords, Lord McNally about his drinking problem it is not a good Sunday for the party.
Given the circumstances of Charles Kennedy’s departure only fifteen days ago the question has to be asked about the damage this is doing.
For all of this so quickly could make the party appear a bit of joke and this could undermine the efforts of activists ahead of the May local elections. For more than Labour and the Tories the Lib Dems look to hard work by supporters to get their vote out.
Any diminution of efforts ahead of May 4th could be seen in the results. In a way the leadership election could be very useful as a way of drawing a line under what has gone on.
That there could be revelations of this type about somebody who only four days ago was a candidate for the leadership is damaging amd one wonder why Oaten allowed his name to go forward knowing that this might emerge.
It is hard to assess the impact of the news on the leadership vote. My instinct is that it will undermine Simon Hughes and help Chris Huhne.
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Do you still plan to publish the pictures taken at the party last weekend?
Mike, why would these scandals undermine Simon Hughes?
Probably because it is feared that Simon Hughes may have similar skeletons rattling around in his private life. There has already been quite a lot of gossip and rumour about his sexual orientation.
It might help Hughes since the papers have found nothing on him.
Or Ming as a “safe pair of hands”. Or Huhne as fresh and untainted.
Why would his sexual orientation affect his chances of winning - thought it was 2006 and these are supposed to be liberlas after all ?
I have it on fairly good authority that the ‘Westminister gossip’ relating to Simon Hughes’s private life has nothing to do with homosexuality.
I think that this sort of revelation ought to be made illegal. If it involves no crime, then it’s nobody’s business but his family’s.
I hope Oaten does not resign his seat.
When will a politician face the cameras and say ‘You know what, my private life is my own damn business and that’s the only comment I’m making.’ I believe that s/he would gain respect from the country if they did so. Bill Clinton should have done just that.
You’re so liberal you want to make it illegal to provide information to facilitate moral judgements than aren’t so liberal?
Personal morality doesn’t relate to doing the job IMO. A chief executive couldn’t be sacked for an affair, could he?
I suppose you can’t legislate against it but any serious news outlet should totally shun it.
Nobody will ever stand if this constant digging goes on.
re the party pictures - these are on my PC in Bedford and we are spending the weekend on the North Norfolk coast. Today’s post and this are being written on my mobile phone.
I’ll try to get the party pics up later.
I think you’re talking your book Mike, even if it’s only subconsciously - the fact that you provide no real argument to back up your instinct is evidence of that. Logically i think it should help Campbell - members might shy away from a leap into the total unknown just as it’s becoming apparent how little they knew about even those they thought they had a handle on.
Very true Alex.
9 - I think you could argue that it was in the public interest in the light of the prostitution debate last week (although i don’t know what Oaten said in that debate).
It is worth pointing out Chris Huhne’s seat (which is already a bit vulnerable) is right next door to Oaten’s.
Personally I think this will further help ’self pair of hands’ Campbell.
Better to get these scandals out of the way now, rather than in the run up to a General Election.
Compared with Jeremy Thorpe and the Norman Scott affair all this is pretty tame - no dogs being shot dead on Porlock Hill etc
They did scandals so much better in the 60s and 70s.
116. Mike, have you read the NOTW’s piece?
Oaten allegedly liked to be humiliated with “a bizarre sex act” with the rent boy.
The most “weird” part in that when the rentboy discovered Oaten was an MP and he told him, Oaten replied “It can’t be me, I must have a double. I’m not a politician”!
Can’t personally see how/why Oaten’s faux pas will affect the remaining runners and riders one jot.
The individual pros and cons of each of them remain the same today as the were this time yesterday.
What a mess !!
Had ‘they’ known of the unintended consequences would they still have knifed CK ?
17 Morning Andrea,
“I’m not a politician”!
Not for much longer anyway !
Yes talking the book gets addictive after a while. The only thing this will help Huhne to do is lose his seat. Thankfully we still have four years to stop being a source of tabloid entertainment.
I spend the night wondering if I’m wild enough to be a LibDem.
Everybody will have forgotten thses minor difficulties by next week, let alone May.
The LDs to reasonably well in local govt, and I see more interest in DC than enthusiasm for him.
The present govt looks tired, and that will only get worse. The LDs will pick up their share of protest votes as usual.
I can’t see any markets where you can trade the local electios in May. If anyone can see any, please post. I’d be a buyer of LD performance at anything sensible.
…I wonder if the (now truly tedious) ‘revelation’ that allegedly Oaten loved having the rent-boy dress up in football gear gives a clue to the progeny of this story. Has all the hallmarks of that repellent specimen MC, and I don’t mean Ming….
[16] They did scandals so much better in the 60s and 70s.
I agree completely, Mike - along with booze, sex, drugs, strikes, inflation, socialism - or was it just that I was young then :lol:?
16. “Compared with Jeremy Thorpe and the Norman Scott affair all this is pretty tame” - you’re setting the bar pretty high there. Compared to that, pretty much every scandal seems tame.
Oaten was clearly too honest to be a leading politician. If every politician confronted by a newspaper with allegations of this type folded within a day then we wouldn’t have enough MPs to form a government.
The old “publish and be sued” line is far more reliable. Especially if the only evidence that the NotW had was the rentboy’s word.
25,
“Oaten was clearly too honest to be a leading politician”
God help the Lib Dems if this is what their members think.
Don`t think the majority of voters will see it that way, as a home affairs spoke person many will see it as hypocrisy.
26 - I can’t speak for their members. They probably won’t be best pleased.
Yesterday some people talked about him not having chances to hold his seat next time.
I don’t know how Winchester’s voters will react, but the good thing for MO is that this affair has been revealed years before the next GE, so it won’t certainly be the “hot” topic in 2009.
Then the MP caught with a rentboy in the last Parliament didn’t suffer a worse than average swing last may.
I think this will blow over pretty quickly. The press normally go wild when someone tries to hang on - and Oaten went straightaway. But the impact on neighbouring seats is something that will concern Huhne supporters.
This has got to have LibDems members thinking Hughes is too risky. The “I am not gay” response to a direct question from the Telegraph last week has not quelched the rumours.
29. Peter, newspapers didn’t seem to be all over this story.
The NOTW almost gave more space last week to the story about Clare Short consoling Mo’s husband!
Huhne said “it was regrettable” but “if you take a high-profile role, then you are going to be subject to scrutiny”.
Then he added he hopes to see Kennedy used on LD frontbench again
Oaten Caption Competition
http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/images/homepage/n2_04.jpg
“I’m telling you, it was this big!”
As an 18 year old recently arrived in Chelsea to start my first job I was taken to a very glamorous party. A rather famous man was sitting on the knee of another with his tongue down his throat. Now many years later having a flat in and working from Soho it’s not uncommon to see well known people at odd times in odd places and in odd company. It’s also not uncommon to be told stories about bar staff and waiters who are having affairs with/have been on holiday with certain known personalities. I’m sure anyone who works for TV, newspapers or even at Westminster hears of at least as many stories. Fortunately 99% of the time these things don’t get reported. It’s rather sad that the tittle tattle of a rent boy is still saleable. I honestly hoped that the Elton John case had put an end to all this. Charlie Kennedy had a case to answer to his party his constituents and his voters. Oaten has only to answer to his family.
Former Labour MP and MSP John McAllion will contest Dunfermline and West Fife by-election for the Scottish Socialist Party.
This sites biggest fan is on the Sky News review at the moment.
Was Perter Oborne drunk on Andrew Marr’s programme this morning or is he always a buffoon?
Most shocking story of the day- The NOTW editorial describes the Lib Dems as a ‘historic political party’ that deserves better, and doesn’t call us a bunch of sandal wearing, crime loving euro maniacs.
At last- respect from the NOTW (!)
37. The Indy described Oaten as “strongly tipped to take over from Charles Kennedy”!
Does anyone else smell a rat with the book that was opened earlier in the week about Oaten holding Winchester?
At the time, I thought this was very strange, but given that you could get good odds on him losing before the revelations were out, I am now even more suspicious.
I wonder if the bookie (I forget which) had a lot of NOTW journalists on the phone asking to place bets?
The Lib Dems are a party in change - out with the sandal, in with the scandal… (Thorpe tried this with his sharp suits and colourful persona - and poll ratings soared in the mid-seventies).
39. It was William Hill. The drift on betfair was ominous as well. Clearly, this info was known during the week and acted upon.
Peter @ 29 “But the impact on neighbouring seats is something that will concern Huhne supporters.”
Why would the neighbouring seats be affected? It’s not like Huhne or Gidley would have been caught of using the services of prostitutes. And the voters are likely to know, that same might happen and has happened in other parties as well, so voting for Tories or Labour doesn’t guarantee, that this will not happen again.
I noted yesterday that a book was opened on the future of Kennedy. The favourite option was for him to be home affairs spokesman under the new leader. This was before the Oaten news broke.
I smell another rat…
Canada, 37-27 Ekos poll nationally.
However in Ontario they say both losing to the NDP, whom they now have at 24, Cons still 3-4 ahead of Liberals.
My suspicion is the Liberals could get pasted, falling to the 30-40 seat range.
33 - er, Roger, what kind of job was that?
Re the Lib Dems. These things come in threes is the Lords alcoholism the third one?
Me, I am not at all sure it will make much impact, it hasn’t so far and most people these days seem to say these are private issues. They assume importance when people cover up and appear to be untruthful, and that was the real problem with CK and his problem. But even then the Lib Dems local election percentage vote has increased, certainly where they were first or second. This Thursday will be very interesting to see whether this weekend will change that or not.
33 - I think that you are now confusing two issues. The news, or at least the scandal, wasn’t that Mark Oaten was having an affair with another male. There are openly gay MPs in the parliament, and they haven’t been forced to resign.
The scandal was, that Mark Oaten was married and having an affair with a prostitute. If he had a similar affair with a female prostitute, I think the scandal would have been just as big, and he would have been forced to resign.
Still, I think that it’s none of the News of the World’s business.
JohnO 22. If I had a zap gun which could make people disappear after George Bush MC would certainly be next.
Sven Goran/Tory boy (You have more changes of identity than your unfortunate party!) I was an aspiring photographer.
22-48. who is this MC?
49 - his first name is the same as our regular Scottish Tory contributor, and his surname is the amalgamation of a rocky out-crop and a shallow river-crossing.
49. Google Max Clifford and see what you come up with.
48 - please don’t insult me by calling me a Tory…
Did you get any good pics from the party?
Anyone noticed that Huhne, unlike Oaten, had a massively negative personal vote at the GE? In the CC elections on the same day as the GE, the Lib Dems got 45% in Eastleigh, Tories 31%. In the GE it was 38%-37%, desperately close. As a Tory, I say ‘bring him on!!’
48 - 49 And why would he want to disappear after George Bush?
This isn’t another gay smear is it?
I don’t think that most people appreciate the difference between the actual and political consequences of what Oaten did. He’s made himself look like a fool and exposed himself and his family to the scum of the tabloid press. It doesn’t matter what he did or with whom but it matters that it showed he was so stupid he actually thought he would get away with it. What party wants a frontbencher who can’t even save their own arse and leaves a trail that even a guardian journalist could follow?
53 - How do you know he had a negative personal vote? He was a new candidate, the earlier MP of the seat retiring. The Lib Dem candidates in the CC election might have been incumbents with a massive positive personal vote.
49-51. Ah, I know who Max Cliffor is without googling!
The difference between this story and one involving a female prostitute is that there is no glamour here. This is a story which destroys Mark Oatens political career without satisfying it’s readers desires to slaver over a Mr or Miss Whiplash. As I said in 33 these stories are ten a penny. They only come to light if there is some glamour somewhere. Here there isn’t. This is a meaningless hatchet job without even satisfying the prurience of NOW readers.
To quote a Simon Hughes electoral leaflet from when he was first elected in Bermondsey (against Peter Tatchell…)
“THE STRAIGHT CHOICE”
Anyone who campaigns against the lib dems at a local level knows that they don’t usually play fair. If they want to be the third major party they can act like it.
Incidentally, when do we get a signed letter from Mings oncologist saying his cancer is cured?
58. Roger, would you have really seen “glamour” if the story would have involved a female prostitute?
well, what defintion of glamour are you taking in consideration?
56 - Eastleigh was always fertile ground for Libs in local government even back in the days when it was a safe Tory seat. Comparisons between CC and GE results are meaningless.
59 - Mr Not-a-Rah; Cancer is never “cured”; once you have had it you are thenceforward in remission. Can I recommend “Its not about the bike” by Lance Armstrong?
59 - I thought the most unpleasant campaign in the Hughes by-election win was by the independent Labour candidate. Tatchell was known as a republican at the time - I believe the Ind Labour leaflets said “Which Queen are you voting for?”
63. According to newspapers reports I read, the “Which Queen are you voting for?” leaflets were anonymous.
Then Tatchell is hoping Hughes will win the LD leadership.
Most sane party members wouldn’t want to live with that degree of uncertainty.
I’m sure someone once posted a link to an archive of the 1983 by-election leaflets.
Andrea at 60. Perhaps I explained myself badly. I was replying to kim at 47. I havent seen the NOW but I don’t imagine it has seventeen pages of this ‘rent boy’ in various rugby shirts or states of undress? If it was a female or a well oiled male I’m sure they would have. Then the story would have had titillation value for its sad readers. This is a hatchet job. No more and no less.
48 You talking to/about me Roger ?
63-64-65. John O’Grady (the Ind Labour candidate) was filmed touring the constituency on the back of a horse and cart singing a song which referred to Tatchell ‘wearing his trousers back to front’.
The people suspected to have worn the “I’ve been kissed by Peter Thatchell” bedge aren’t in LD anymore anyway.
Just reading the online edition of the NOTW and there is nothing glamorous about this. A squalid flat and bizarre sex acts too revolting to describe. Wonder which club the football strip was?
67. Roger, they don’t even name him and I think they’ve covered his face.
Sorry TB. I mistook your particular brand of humour and thought you were using the non de plume Sven Goran at 52!
39 / 41 And others re the Winchester Oaten Book.
It would be particularly interesting to see this book opened up for examination.
Were there any familiar (non jouno) names contained therein………..it could open up a whole new can of worms.
70 Woody, if it’s really as grim as you suggest it must be Millwall’s
72 Roger, No worries mate .. promise I’m only operating as TB !!
http://www.geocities.com/byelections79/bermondsey83/Liberal.html
“John O’Grady (the Ind Labour candidate) was filmed touring the constituency on the back of a horse and cart singing a song which referred to Tatchell ‘wearing his trousers back to front’”.
Any comment JohnO?
75 Dig the early Bar Chart on Rent !
TB - not the best word to use today ….
Ahem !!
75. Tabman, funny to see how the graphic of the time wasn’t so much developed. Now even an independent candidate without money would produce better leaflets!
69, wow, the bad old days were class. Perhaps the electorate would feel better about politicians if they were prepared to go that bit further for their vote these days. Like film and tv and music politics is getting stale. No wonder the public crave scandal, it’s the only time politics gets prodded out of its soporific blandness. New Labour won the last two elections on the back of a electorate that they had managed to send to sleep. It’s a sad state of affairs where Mark Oaten has probably managed to reach more people this morning with his political death than he ever did in life. Isn’t politics meant to be populist or is it just for geeks?
80 - yes, its amazing to see how much desk-top publishing has improved things. Even 5 years later PCs had become prevalent, and I can remember a friend of mine knocking up a student newsletter on an Apple Mac in 1989 that was light-years ahead of these typed, roneoed jobs.
Well back from the farmers market …… phone didn’t stop ringing from rent boys saying they’ll sell their story to the Harpenden Bugle about a party leader, pink sporrans and thistles. Bring it on I say !!
Anyhow, interesting at the farmers market to see the Lib Dems all buying hair shirts, the Tories buying Cheshire cats and cream and the Labour mob in search of a new seller for their weary product and UKIP loonies on the prowl for French cheese and Italian ham …. all very sordid. My turnips sold well though.
………………………………………..
BTW All the goss about the Bishop of Bermondsey and cassock lifting is way off beam …………. he really is as dull as ditchwater as he appears ……. almost asexual some might say !!
Also now the News of the Screws beast has whetted the appetite of the great British public over political sex scandals again, those Blue stories may see the light of day slightly earlier than had been thought !!
76
I’ve been finally unmasked after all these years. You can run but not hide….Still, I’m not doing so badly as a sprightly 108 year old.
Funny, the only enduring memory I have of that campaign was that the smelly aged bulldog (?) that was O’Grady’s mascot contrived to throw up during one of his press conferences: that became the undisputed metaphor for his voyage of hate. Yuk!
Just had a glance at one of the leaflets kindly posyed by Tabbers…and noticed how Livingstone, Benn and Tatchell were depicted as “New Labour” ! There’s justice in this world after all
75 -love the way the leaflets refer to Old Labour and New Labour - the latter being the party of Livingstone, Benn and Tatchell.
84.”noticed how Livingstone,”
Red Ken was in Milan yesterday campaigning for the mayoral race. If I had discovered it early, I would have gone to see him.
86 - Does he have to resign from London if he wins in Milan?
87
Interesting to see David Miliband publicly backing Gordon Brown for the Labour leadership on the Politics Show
83 - I find it somewhat unconvincing that the tabloids are holding off on stories about leading Tory MPs “because their isn’t a market for it”. When tabloids have juicy stories that will stand up in court… they publish them!
Considering what this Oaten story seems to be based on it seems pretty feasible that had he denied all and threatened the NotW with his lawyers then the story might never have seen the light of day.
Chris Huhne’s marginal seat isn’t relevant to the leadership election. If he becomes leader, he’ll get a big boost anyway. All leaders do.
Roger at 36 so this week its a drunken buffoon, is there no end to your wit and varied descriptions.
90 alex. Newspapers often sit on stories to ensure best effect and thus higher circulation …. it’s all about cash in the end !!
….. where there’s muck there’s brass !
Think you may be right Alex about keeping it quiet with ‘publish and be sued’.
59 - (a bit late): on the story of Simon Hughes and the Bermondsey by-election, it’s worth pointing out, since the claim keeps coming up, that leaflets didn’t describe him as ‘the straight choice’ - they said the election was a straight choice between the Alliance and Labour, using a phrase used in almost every Alliance/LibDem leaflet then and since in vaguely winnable seats. So it really can’t be described as some phrase dreamed up to embarrass Peter Tatchell. There was plenty of scurrilous homophobic leafletting in that by-election, but it invariably came from the “Real Labour” independent candidate. If you’re not convinced, you can find archived pictures of leaflets from the campaign on the internet.
I see Atticus AKA Roly White in the “Sunday Times” notes that two political websites had the Soames/Free Willy story up within a “couple of hours” ……. we’re not that slow here !!
….. they could at least have given Mike a plug !!!!!!!
It wasnt so much MIke as Iain Dale - credit where credit is due!
FWIW I think this story will have two long term impacts.
1) For Oaten it will increase the chances of him either not standing next time or losing his seat; Oaten has deceived his association members and I think they will be dismayed about that, which added to the embarrassment and the end of his Westminster front bench career is bound to increase tha chances that he will step down at the next election.
It’s worth remembering the history of how the Lib dems won Winchester in the first place. In the early 90’s local people (of whom I was then one) watched in horror as their local Conservatibve MP tried to have his (rich) wife imprisoned for not paying him a fair divorce settlement in a long running tabloid fiasco that was embarrassing and humiliating.
It was sleaze wot cost us the seat, and the local populace won’t react at all well to the discovery that their ‘honest john’ Lib dem Mp hasn’t behaved much better than his old Tory counterpart.
2) for the Lib Dems it raises the already very high chances that they will elect Menzies.
Any party membership facing the reality that a palace Coup by MP’s has deprived them of the best leader on offer and then having it’s confidence further shaken by todays revelations is more likely to choose a steadying hand.
If I was a Lib Dem member I would now be scared off Hughes, and not prepared to risk Huhne.
97. rik, what are you talking about?
98 -which MP for Winchester was the sleazy one - John Browne or Gerry Malone?
99 Andrea. I think Rik is implying it was Iain Dale in the Thames ….
I know Iain is on the slightly chunky side …. but whale never !!!!! …….. more cod (piece) !!!!
John Browne - although Malone did damage too when he challenged the 1997 result in court and won the right to inflict a by election for which the residents of Winchester rewarded him by electing Oaten with, I think, a 20,0000 majority.
98 Marcus. Ah ….. you mean in the same way that John Major deceived his association !! ……..Glass houses Marcus ….Glass Houses !!
I heard on the radio that Alistair Carmichael is going to stand for leadership, anyone else heard anything about that?
Rik @97 - What is more, I noticed that the selfless Iain posted the story here first before entering it his own website
Surely the sleaze issue would have been over by 1997 in Winchester. Malone had been MP for 5 years as a clean candidate having defeated John Browne (who I believe stood as an Independent having been booted out by the local Tories).
Interestingly, Browne thought he would win in 1992; Malone was sure he would win the repoll in 1997; perhaps Oaten may also have delusions about his chances next election.
103 Jack W- Calm down, mate. Lib Dems dined out on Tory Sleaze, in seats like Winchester and my own here in Torbay they have always ruthlesssly exploited any character weakness they can find in sitting Tory MP’s; or in challengers.
So don’t go all righteous when your lot find themselves tarred with the same brush.
Reap what you sow.
107 - I don’t think Jack W holds much truck for the libdems.
107 Jack is not a LD!!!
There were some suspiciouns about him being a closet Libdem, but nothing proven so far…the NOTW is still searching for more details.
107 Marcus. “Reap what you sow”
Indeed you will again Marcus …… and sooner than you think.
BTW I’m only alligned to my Jacobite Party ….. I treat the rest of you with unalloyed contempt and joy in equal measure ….. you hadn’t noticed ….. I think you should get the vertical hold on your political antenna seen to !!
Iain has rather more detail on his blog this morning, some of it I doubt would pass the filter on here. And it is all taken from Lib Dem blogs!
http://iaindale.blogspot.com
109 Andrea.
NOTW and the Harpenden Bugle and Hanovarian Gazettte !!!!!!!!
SBS at 106. Political damage is cumulative. In Torbay the Lib Dems still go on about our past MP Freddie Bennet (retired in 1987) ‘living in a castle in the south Hams (now a neighbouring constituency but they conveniently forget that at the time it was part of Torbay) and endlessly quote a high court judge who described his successor (Rupert Allason) as ‘the most dishonest witness I have ever heard’ (oddly enough, this was in a long running lawsuit against one Alistair Campbell!!) .
The Lib Dems used the Browne story for years afterwards to discredit the Conservatives in Winchester.
No matter that, as you say, Malone was a hard working and diligent MP the damage to the brand was enough to lose the seat in 1997.
110 why ’sooner than you think’ - are you betting on an early GE?
111 - do you not ever express doubts about the value of some sources you get your material from Rik? One might be tempted to hope you don’t make it to the House of Commons simply on the basis of what you might “reveal” under the cover of parliamentary privilege.
111. It was suggested here by some posters too yesterday night (woody for ex)
114 - Jack has been going on about Tory scandals the press are apparently holding on to to reveal at the appropriate moment.
58 - I don’t see how it would be better to be destroyed with glamour than be destroyed without glamour.
And besides, we don’t know yet how glamourous the rent boy actually is. You might see seventeen pages of him dressed up in football gear in the NOW any day now.
97 Rik. Having read Iain’s Blog I note the “Soames Speedo’s Scandal” was posted on Friday at 2.03pm, some 33 minutes after comment 110 on this site !
Modesty forbids ………
104. I think you might not have been paying attention properly, Noisy.
Alistair Carmichael is taking over from Oaten as Home Affairs Spokesperson.
Back on the leadership contest, I’m looking for some views of LibDem insiders. Huhne is currently flirting with overtaking Hughes as second favorite. If it comes apparent to many Hughes supporters that he can’t win what are the chances that they will switch their first preferences to Huhne as the only candidate who can “stop Ming”? (will there even be a desire to “stop Ming”?)
Or will Hughes supporters be essentially neutral between the other two candidates?
O/T but I see Michael Moore (who emigrated to Canada) is now bemoaning the fact the Canadian Conservatives are set to win the election there. That’s reason enough on its own to vote Conservative.
122 - The Libdems will miss him.
104 - I understand that Alistair Carmichael replaces Oaten as acting Lib Dem Home Affairs Spokesman, not as a leadership contender.
115 - Alex that is a quite frankly ridiculous comment.
I have not stated any of it as my opinion but have posted a link to an open source, the information in which is also from open source. So your statement is ludicrous!
To extend that to what “Might” be revealed is even more off the planet.
I stated MY view on this quite clearly on another thread.
125 - you’re very sensitive. Perhaps i should have included a
Mark Oaten on prostitutes, about three days ago:
“While the Government is right to highlight the abuse involved in on-street prostitution, this new strategy is a missed opportunity. It will do very little to reduce the number of prostitutes on the street, to improve the appalling conditions they work in, or to tackle health problems.
“We need smart solutions not the same old failed approach. We support the piloting of ‘managed zones’ in designated areas of cities, subject to a code of conduct and regular contact with police and health workers. “The object of these zones is not to ‘tolerate’ prostitution but to move it to a specified area where professionals can work with prostitutes to help them reach a point where they can choose other employment. The example of Liverpool shows that the idea is effective, and that plans for a zone can be drawn up without alienating businesses or local people.”
Would he have been one of the ‘professionals’? ‘Working’ with the prostitutes, to help them ‘reach a point’?
Sorry. Couldn’t resist.
Ps I think the above quote shows why the NOTW was quite right to publish what it did. If some idiot like Oaten is going to go around pontificating his pants off about prostitutes and society - WHILE PERSONALLY EMPLOYING PROSTITUTES for three in a bed bizarre-sex rent boy romps, I think we have a right to know. No?
“If some idiot like Oaten is going to go around pontificating his pants off about prostitutes and society”
Perhaps he should have got himself drunk and missed the Statement with a stomach upset.
126 -Alex I am not “sensitive” as most people on here will testify but you posted assertions and inuendo which I feel entitled to respond robustly to.
As I said, I have made the comment before that I do not support ANY politician having their private life trashed by the media to sell newspapers and I agreed yesterday with some who were outright in their condemnation of the NOTW. Having said that if a politician is hypocritical (as Oaten could be said to be on several levels) then they should know what will be likely to come their way at some point.
ALL of us have some skeletons that we would be embarrassed if they were on the front page of papers but we also have some rights to privacy and respect. I think George Hollingberry expressed it well yesterday.
127. Posted it last night. Very ironic. As this story is in direct relation to his job, then it clearly should have been printed.
128. As the Lib Dems Home Affairs Minister he would have to comment on the Government’s prostitution legislation; he can’t just tell the Lib Dems - ‘Wait I can’t comment on this because by the weekend I won’t have a job because of 3 in-a-bed romps.’
130 - What I posted amounted to a statement that you like gossip. I don’t know what you thought i was accusing you of.
127 - He’s hardly condemning prostitution with this statement, is he! Perhaps he was undertaking research for his brief…
[111] Thanks for the link, Rik. As a voter in the new (or should that be exhumed :)) Westminster North next time, Iain’s article on Margot James made me feel sorry for Jeremy Bradshaw (who lost to Karen Buck last May) - to say nothing of any number of ambitious Westminster City Councillors…
Does anybody think there will be a low vote in the Libdem leadership contest.?
Here’s another thing. Any reader of online gossip column popbitch might have seen this coming. Last week they mentioned a senior Lib Dem leadership candidate who liked to visit Paddington brothels and.. well, I spare you the details. I wonder if they are the same ‘bizarre sex acts’ alluded to by the NOTW.
Of course, they might not have been referring to Oaten. Because there are also rumours floating around about Simon Hughes and Chris Huhne; plus, we all know about ex-vicar Chris Bryant, and Matthew Taylor has been the subject of lurid rumours in my home county for yonks.
I tell you, what with their gin-soaked ex-leader, the Lib Dems haven’t been this interesting since, er, their last major bout of scandals. Shame their vote will now collapse. *Snicker*
Politicians pay taxes. It doesn’t stop them talking about them.
I take it all back. Whatever his standards, Rik has never quoted authoritatively from popbitch.
133 - ALex - for what it is worth, I know a lot of gossip about several senior politicians of all parties but I do not expose them (oooh er) or post about it on here because that would make me a hypocrite. What is already exposed and in the public domain fuels and informs our discussion!
Oh and BTW Margot James is a fantastic person and would make an excellent MP!
Just to keep the popbitch-rent-boy Lib Dem rumour bouillaibaisse bubbling over, here’s a pic of a young Chris Huhne MP, smashing his way into a University building. He’s the one staring at the camera thinking, Oh, is this is a photo opportunity?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tonibella/88526270/
137 - The sad fact is that there are always rumours flying about Westminster about MPs of all parties . Most of them are never actually published in local or national press even though some of them are undoubtedly true .
John Major having an affair as PM did not stop him commenting on and even promoting policies on many aspects of Home Affairs .
143.”John Major having an affair as PM ”
the affair with Edwina was pre-PM times, Mark, are you hinting to a new revelation?!
144 - No Andrea , just bad wording - too many B and C’s last night .
140 - Well what’s “in the public domain” in a question of judgement. Iain Dale seems to have a somewhat looser definition than you. And then when he is itching to say something but doesn’t feel he can he links to Guido. And he links to popbitch.
And SeanT will spread anything.
Goodness, I think this story reveals just how many so called ‘grown-ups’ on this forum, in positions of (somewhat limited) power read the always high-brow ‘popbitch’ each week.
Come on- how many of you get the Sunday Sport each week?
145. Is it me, or are MPs (of all parties) kinkier, on average, that the rest of us? I never felt like this before, but I feel positively bourgeois and humdrum compared to these guys. What is about pols that makes them (allegedly) such pervs? Does it just prove that all politicians are moral and intellectual dwarves, as Waugh thought? And they seek power to compensate for their personal and sexual inadequacies?
Or is everyone visiting Paddington brothels to have weird paid-for pervo-rama pant-filling games, and I’m just boring?
146. Yah book sucks to you too, Alex. Politicians exercise huge power over us, it is therefore our democratic right as free-born Britons to thumb our noses at them, pull their trousers down, and generally make whoopee with their reputations. Check Gilray, Rowlandson, Hogarth, and English Civil War pamphlets, passim.
148 - I dont think MPs are any kinkier than the majority of the population, it is just that their exploits are more likely to make the front page of certain Sunday papers!
If the general public had all of their sexploits printed I bet every street would have its own scandal!
You should come canvassing some times and see the people who answer the doors and what states of dress or undress some are in
“145. Is it me, or are MPs (of all parties) kinkier, on average, that the rest of us? ”
Matthew Parris believes so. He thinks politics attracts compulsive risk takers. I remember when I first saw “House of Cards” FU commented that he was tolerant of almost any form of behaviour among his MPs, but drew the line at incest.
151. but Parris doesn’t really count! I recall he wrote in his biography that all those gay men working for the tories came here in Italy to have gay orgies.
I declare I’m anything to do with that…and that I’m not a rent boy!
Good to have you back Sean T - did you enjoy Hawaii?
152 - Andrea - I think you mean that you are NOTHING to do with that
150 …Well, Rik, you could have given me some ’steers’(
)when I canvassed for you. My ‘highlight’:( was a typically supercilious LibDem whose sole and stuperfyingly silly purpose was to delay my greetings to the local citizenry. I made not so polite excuses and left….
150 Rik. I don’t recall you canvassing in Harpenden constituency Rik !!!!
151 Sean. I’m not sure I follow MP on this one. The political/power dynamic exists in family, company and most group relationships to one degree or another. And as for incest, well there’s nothing quite like keeping it in the family.
155 - JOhn O - there are a lot of them about but somewhat fewer now than last year I imagine. Yesterday’s doorstep canvassing had some useful feedback and a small but clear trend to us is emerging.
Early days but lets see how it develops. We have a huge effort going into telephoning in certain wards and the fall in LIb Dem support since the GE is noticeable. The comments fed back are also revealing.
WOuld love to see you again if you are free. You are always welcome
153. Oh, Rik, yes
Horrible spelling today!
Then you know there’s someone who thinks I’m a rent boy (and I tend to blame you for this!)
158 - Hey I didnt suggest you were a rent boy!!!!! I think he was just being careful to ask in case you were, since he doesnt know you! IN the light of recent revelations you cant blame him for being careful can you?
I told him you were not and that you were a respectable and well informed student of UK politics.
Rik @157 - I’ll try and make the trip over for a spot of “mutual aid” (of the non kinky variety!!) though I am also facing the judgement of the people in May, plus we stand quite a reasonable chance of moving this Citadel of Surrey to NOC.
159. Rik, was he thinking that there were many Italian rent boys who know him!?
Peter from Putney, aloha. Yes thanks I had a FAB time in Hawaii. Surprisingly cool and exciting place. Saw red hot lava pouring into the sea, where it boiled into halfmile high geysers of scalding acid steam. Probably a bit boring for your average Lib Dem MP, though.
Not a terribly high tone to discussion today. Schadenfreude is the term,, isn’t it. I wonder just how many politicians (and others in teh pulic eye) are thinking there but for the grace of God etc
158 Andrea. We certainly don’t see you as a “rent boy” …… more an exotic political paramour with a penchant for diminutive politicians of the Midlands variety :
Multum in Parvo.
163 - agreed! A lot I would imagine
07?-Marcus
‘Calm down, mate. Lib Dems dined out on Tory Sleaze, in seats like Winchester and my own here in Torbay they have always ruthlesssly exploited any character weakness they can find in sitting Tory MP’s; or in challengers.’
Correct.
Only a couple of weeks ago Oaten invited the cameras into his house to show what a great family man he was.
As an orange booker he of course strongly endorses the family.
And is this the same Mark Oaten that so readily condemed a Judge not so long ago for using rent boys?
Should’nt the elctors of Winchester be now allowed a byelection to see if they want the real Mark Oaten to still represent them?
166 john. Oh you mean like John Major did in Huntingdon !! …. and a whole host of others. Anyway we can’t have the voters exercising their franchise too often ….. they might get to like it ……. how about once every 6 months all round.
Hmmmmm - Im not sure that the Lib Dem campaign slogan in Dumfermline of “Winning with Willie” looks such a good idea now!
168. especially if Oaten will visit the constituency during the campaign….I could even picture Nicola Sturgeon complaining that he hasn’t used a Scottish rent boy!
66 - Do you really think we need another bi-erection? Have you seen the size of the Winchester member’s majority?
Ming has responded in the right way.
168 - The lib dems have got rather a lot of unfortunate slogans. “Ming to win” is perhaps the worst I’ve heard…
168 Rik. There you go again Rik …..you and your Willies!
170 - Was it really necessary??
GEORGE GALLOWAY TO RETURN NEXT WEDNESDAY
George Galloway has been nominated among two others to go to a public vote.
The other two include Chantelle (a non-celebrity who the public have taken too and the runaway favourite to win the show).
Big Brother have yet to tell housemates that TWO of the three nominees will be evicted.
This means we can say with near certainty that George Galloway will be back in the real world on Wednesday.
175- Pity!
Andrea, how much do you charge?