Could Ming be Gordon’s first victim?
June 21st, 2007
But would a new leader pose a bigger threat to Brown’s ambitions?
With the change-over in the Tory leadership being the catalyst for the January 2006 departure of the last Lib Dem leader, Charles Kennedy, could the arrival of a new Labour leader have the same effect on Ming?
For the reverberations from Monday’s offer to Ming of ministerial places for Lib Dems are continuing to dominate the political headlines and any change in the line-up of party leaders can have a huge impact on the political environment.
This is how the Independent is reporting it this morning: “Senior Liberal Democrats, including some of the party’s young high fliers, reacted with horror and fury to the news, which dominated two meetings of MPs yesterday..They protested that a clique of “elderly Scots” - including Sir Menzies and one of his closest aides, Lord Kirkwood of Kirkhope - had got too close to Mr Brown and the Scottish Labour establishment. One said: “This report has the distinct ring of truth. Amongst all the smoke there is definitely fire.” Another warned: “We are steaming about it.”
Clearly party leaders do have private discussions and other things apart from the Brown offer were discussed at Monday’s meeting.
- But what was always going to be problematic is the inevitable unease, reinforced by the proximity of their constituencies, that Ming and Gordon are just are too close.
All this was not helped by the way Ming’s Harrogate speech in March was reported. The idea that a coalition deal with Labour was possible but not one with the Tories ran so against the way third party leaders have traditionally positioned themselves. There are many LDs who are ready to believe that there will be a sell-out
Ingrained in the memory is what Paddy Ashdown did in the 1997-1999 period when he had secret talks with Tony Blair on a coalition. Ashdown mis-judged his party then and that makes it even more difficult for Ming now.
But what of Gordon Brown? Has he thought through what he is doing? The last thing he wants surely is to precipitate a situation that causes the Lib Dems to be led by a younger, more dynamic leader who could pose a bigger threat?
As I have repeatedly argued here the critical battle-grounds at the next election will be around the Lib Dems. They will be striving to defend seats from a resurgent Tory party and their main targets will be a number which are currently Labour held.
The forthcoming Ealing Southall by-election, where the Lib Dems came second to Labour in 2005, could provide an interesting test for the new Brown government. I would not rule out a Lib Dem victory.
The 1/5 the Labrokes are offering on Ming being the frirst leader to go is starting to look tempting.
UPDATE 0725. Paddy Ashdown told Radio 4’s Today programme this morning that Gordon Brown has “offered him a cabinet job” but has not accepted because of Ming Campbell’s opposition.
Mike Smithson
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You think that the Lib Dems, if run by Clegg or Huhne would pose a bigger threat to Labour?
A more rightwing Lib Dem party, as one led by Clegg or Huhne would be, would gain Labour more of the Iraq war/Tuiton fees/etc defectors that it lost to the Lib Dems in 2005 back than it otherwise would do AND would be better at retaining the votes the Libs are losing to the Tories.
Labour get more votes of previous LDs than they otherwise would do. Tories get fewer votes from previous LDs than they otherwise would.
How does Labour lose in that situation?
re 1. I think the critical element is not where the leader stands on a right-left scale but how dynamic they are and their ability to command media attention. Clegg, Huhne and Featherstone would all do better on that score than Ming.
I think that you are looking at this too much from the interested activist angle not from the average voter who has relatively little interest in politics. It’s the fleeting glances from 10 second snippets that they get of different politicians from the bulletins that influence their voting intentions. That’s where Cameron scores and where Ming and Brown do not
Yes, after all the spinning yesterday there does seem to be a bit of a consensus on LibDem MPs furious about this.
The question has to be will they act on that fury? Personally I would doubt it. But one more gaffe of this sort and that might change.
I agree with Mike at 2. In any GE campaign there will be focus on Cameron plus the other two leaders. He beats Brown and Ming. A new LD leader might be more of a challenge though.
So is Paddy the one who put this out. Surely the only reason to do it is to tip off the wider party and scupper it. Therefore it must have been done with that motivation right
2 quick thoughts:
1)remember the Dunfermline + west Fife by-election? The LDs won without a leader and with pretty difficult headlines about senior party members. But looking back this matches with Mike’s theory about the Tories doing well whenever Cameron is making the headlines for whatever reason. It’s not what the stories are about, it’s name recognition as much as anything. So to win the next election, the LDs just need to propose slaughter of the first born, banning all cars and compulsory sandal-wearing in schools. That should get us on front pages easily enough
2) I’ve long said that Ming is safe as houses until we hear of MP unrest with his leadership. I wonder if this genuinely could be the first sign of high-level discomfort? 1/5 still seems like short odds, but perhaps better value than a couple of weeks ago.
Paddy Ashdown has been offered a “cabinet-level” job according to the Today programme. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6224862.stm
O/T. Nick Palmer. On the previous thread, the DL prediction competition, I have proposed to you a small wager. If you want to take it up then I will email to Mike to include on the recorded bets page.
Isn’t the point that you’ve skipped over that Ming rejected Brown’s offers of deals - just as he previously rejected Cameron’s offer of a Mayor deal. If he had accepted either offer there might be trouble ahead, but he’s actually been very robust in protecting the party’s independent line.
6. Big story.
Brown apparently offered Ashdown a Cabinet job behind Ming’s back. Why Ashdown should have leaked the story is a mystery. Perhaps just his natural indiscretion. It’s clearly not good news for Ming-and in my opinion not for Brown either though Nick Robinson thinks otherwise-and a Lib Dem leadership challenge is now much more likely.He looks accident prone which isn’t good for a leader.
I can’t agrree that a new thrusting leader will be bad news for Brown but for cameron who will overnight lose his USP it couldn’t be worse. Particularly if he continues to underperform.
4. Not only put it out, but was himself offered a cabinet place. What’s particularly interesting here is Gordon’s method of working. After going to Ming and discussing a deal and Ming saying “no chance”, Brown then goes and asks Ashdown. Either he couldn’t see how doing that would undermine Ming’s position, or he didn’t mind doing so despite his protestations of wanting closer working with the Lib Dems.
Brown presumably thought that Ashdown was sufficiently independent of Ming to be able to say yes despite the opposition of his party leader - which he already knew at the time (I also get the impression that the Lib Dem spokesmen on the media yesterday didn’t know which way Ashdown would jump). That betrays a rather interesting double standard in the expecations he sees of opposition politicians and members of his own team.
As for the bigger picture, Ming and Brown have both been the losers here with Ashdown the big winner (not much good that it will do him) - Ming failed to prevent the offer, Brown failed to get his man. Brown can easily get over it but for Ming it’s another small indication that his control of his party is not what it should be and the respect in which others hold him is not high enough. For someone whose power-base is a bit shaky to start with, that’s potentially damaging.
The good news for him is the timing. It would only become really damaging if there were several stories in a close time period which all undermined his position. That’s unlikely to be the case with so much focus on the Blair-Brown handover and then the Summer down-time season.
As such, I’m not sure the 1/5 is terrific value. I posted the other day that the strain of office seemed to be showing on Ming and that his retirement on health grounds must be a possibility. I’d stand by that, but it’s only a possibility. If he wants to stay on, it will be difficult to get rid of him without causing the party’s image more damage - to remove one leader in a parliament might be considered ruthless; to dismiss two borders on self-indulgence. The next election might be nearly three years away and with no way of laying the bet off other than backing the others (which probably won’t be profitably possible given the short initial odds), it’s a stingy return for the risk.
8. Billy. But as stories in the Guardian and Indie point out today, LibDem MPs don’t buy that and are saying there is no smoke without fire.
It was Ming Campbell, nobody else, who had these meetings with Brown; Ming who gave the Harrogate speech where he laid out tests for Brown but none for Cameron; Ming who stopped the SNP from forming an SNP-LibDem coalition.
Ming is accused of being far too close to Brown and ready to sell out the LibDems’ independence for power.
The Ashdown story is huge because it directly contradicts what we heard yesterday that only Minister of State positions were on the table. How many more lies are there?
I am sure this is high politics from the Brown camp. Offer something you know will not be taken up and leak the offer in order to destabalise the LibDEms. Thereby improving your own poll rating in preperation for a snap election perhaps.
Mike @ 2 and Glass House @ 1. I think there is a point in both what you say to an extent. Campbell’s (main) problem has been perception of him as doddery and old and frankly not as ‘likeable’ as Kennedy. But there has also been a problem that (and you can argue this from both directions as to why this has occured) by trying to fight on a less distinctive set of policies than the Tories and Labour Campbell has lost some of the raison d’etre of supporting a third party. That is not to say that the LDs are not different, but just that the electorate would have to be more nerdishly discriminating to perceive the difference than previously.
It may then be very helpful for the LDs to have a fresher, more dynamic and media friendly leader. But it is perhaps also important for the LDs to be finding more and better ways of highlighting wedge issues between them and Labour and them and the Conservatives to remind people that all parties are not the same.
PS Nick Palmer. I wrote before, but I don’t think you saw. LD Lloyd was not me, and I have no idea as to what he/she was on about. Thanks though for the nice comment.
Well its put the Lib Dems back in the news!!!!!
The only bad news is no news?
Is that what it is all about?
Let’s look at some press coverage today
Telegraph:
“Sir Menzies Campbell’s grip on the leadership of the Liberal Democrats was under fresh threat last night after it was disclosed he had held secret talks with Gordon Brown about senior Lib Dems being offered Cabinet posts.
Sir Menzies Campbell denies that he and Gordon Brown discussed a Cabinet role for the Lib Dems
The Lib Dem leader was forced to issue a categorical denial that any member of his party would serve in a Brown government after the talks were leaked, triggering a damaging internal row.
After disappointing local election results last month, the prospects of Sir Menzies, 66, leading the Liberal Democrats into the next general election were called into question.
The disclosure of his talks with Mr Brown further infuriated Lib Dem MPs facing a challenge from the Tories at the next election.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/06/21/nlibdems121.xml
Guardian
Sir Menzies Campbell put his authority as Liberal Democrat leader on the line last night as he ordered senior party figures to refuse any offers to join Gordon Brown’s government despite revelations that he had held secret talks with the chancellor.
The disclosures in yesterday’s Guardian threw the Lib Dems into turmoil with one frontbencher describing it as a “hand grenade” which had destabilised the party.
“A lot of people are angry, but no one knows who to be angry with,” said one Lib Dem frontbencher. A furious colleague described it as “politically toxic”, playing into the hands of the major parties.”
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/libdems/story/0,,2107834,00.html
Ben Brogan, Daily Mail politics ed:
“The significance of the Guardian story - and it is significant - is that it reveals the lengths the Chancellor is willing to go to mop up Ming’s shattered forces. He calculates that a grand gesture announced next week to bring significant but non-partisan Lib Dem figures into his tent will help win over Lib Dem voters who feel squeezed by the return to two-party politics. The polls tell a tale of impending disaster for Ming.
So Mr Gordon’s talks with Lords Ashdown and Carlile and Lady Neuberger allow him to look ecumenical without having to do a deal with Sir Menzies or any of his MPs. It is coalition without politics. He must calculate that the pros outweigh the cons, that Labour will accept a move that neutralises the Lib Dems, and that more Lib Dems will come his way than go to the Tories.”
http://broganblog.dailymail.co.uk/
The idea of Cameron coming face to face with a genuine sandal wearing muesli eating windmill on roofer who has been riding a bike for years and without a trailing chauffeur who was a vegan when Cameron was chasing foxes and who meditated at the Hari Krishna center while Cameron was trashing restaurants must be the Tories worse nightmare.
10 Roger. “I can’t agrree that a new thrusting leader will be bad news for Brown but for cameron who will overnight lose his USP it couldn’t be worse.”
Could you explain the point that you are making here, please, it doesn’t seem to make sense?
I get the first part, and agree with it. I don’t think that a new leader of the LibDems would be bad for Brown either. But how does Cameron lose his USP? If anything, it is strengthened! If the LibDems are working with Labour then the ONLY way to get rid of Brown is to vote Cameron!
Proof, if ever any were needed, that Gordon knows he cannot win the next General Election without the Lib Dems.
To be honest, I didn’t think he would try to get them into bed with him before he even got the keys to Number 10. Just shows how desperate he is not to become the Bonar Law of the 21st century.
The Tories, surely, are the biggest beneficiaries of all this?
17 Roger, thank you for advancing the debate significantly with that insightful and well considered post. Fool.
18 Gladstone…”If the LibDems are working with Labour then the ONLY way to get rid of Brown is to vote Cameron!”
Spot on Gladstone, the only winners I can see from this debacle are the Conservatives. I would imagine southern marginal LD MPs are exteremely unhappy at the past couple of days, and (as ususal) the really interesting point is made by David Herdson, in what this tells us about the way Brown operates. It is either clumsy or deliberately divisive and disrespectful.
It seems strange that Brown should directly offer Ashdown a cabinet post AFTER Campbell had ruled this out.
Was Brown aware that Campbell had ruled this out when the offer was made to Ashdown? If so it smacks of political mischief making.
Quick replies to the personal ones - thanksz, Paul Lloyd! And stjohn, in view of what you propose I predict that Peter Hain will get no votes at all, and bet you £200,000 that he will do better than that - that bet should build a cats’ home all by itself
But no, I’ll pass on that one, thanks! I admit that my prediction (which is 15% in the first round) is mildly coloured by my preference.
I doubt if the story is having the seismic impact that activists may think, except insofar as it affects the activists themselves.
- The general public will be largely oblivious of the whole story, except Guardian and Indie readsers
- Guardian and Indie readers will be mildly impressed that GB is reaching out, and some will be mildly disappointed that Ming vetoed it
- A few people who vote LD as a protest will be put off, because they’ll read the story as being about politicians scrabbling for jobs (’huh, they’re all the same’). Rather more will be put off by the row - people dislike squabbles, especiallly squabbles about politicians getting jobs. LD activists should bear that in mind, perhaps.
- The more important issue is the strategic quesiton of whether the LDs should aim for equidistance or to lean to one party or the other - all three strategies have pros and cons and will affect voting behaviour a lot. I think that Ming judges that the Tories will not get close to a majority, and that it makes sense to keep on his current friendly terms with Gordon so as to keep a Lab/Lib option open as a plausible outcome, but he doesn’t want to commit in advance.
18 - I understand Roger’s point here - Cameron’s USP is “I am the only new one - and I’m young as well, look at me!!” would be taken away if Clegg were leader.
Oh Great. Ashdown offered Northern Ireland..at least that suggests that Hain as on his way out….ok, we’ll take it!
Mind you it would not have pleased Sinn Fein if Paddy had accepted, they were moaning he was an ex-Marine as it is.
The Libs show they’re not a serious party of power in Westminster. Ashdown, Lester and Neuberger was offered the chance to help shape real policies within govt, and Ming vetoed it.
Do the Lib Dems intend to be anything other than a protest party in Westminster? It appears not, which in my view is a real shame.
They could have changed British politics, but they’ve bottled it.
22. I think that is a fair point. Ming messed up in even holding the meetings, but it’s Brown who stands to benefit from this, not Ming. Benedict Brogan whose blog is full of insider stuff says that Brown holds the LibDems “in contempt” and it would make sense for him to give Ashdown a Cabinet job to show his “big tent” and bleed votes from Ming’s party - even if Ming specifically ruled it out.
I would be angry at Ming holding the talks, yes, but *furious* at Brown for stabbing me in the back like this if I were a LibDem MP in a Lib-Tory marginal. The Tory candidates in Chippenham, Cheltenham, Somerton & Frome, etc, must be rubbing their hands over this.
Have anybody noticed, that it was suggested in the comments of
Iain Dale’s Diary “that the Lib Dems will select Councillor Jon Ball to stand in Ealing Southall. He was selected to stand in Ealing Central & Acton in April, around the same time than Piara Khabra was hospitalised. As we know, the new borders of Ealing Central & Acton include parts of the old Ealing Southall, but as the by-election is held with old borders, the area must conveniently already be familiar to Ball…”
- For what it is it worth, at the website of Ealing Liberal Democrats there are news about the selection of Jon Ball to stand in Ealing Central & Acton in April.
17 roger - “Cameron was trashing restaurants” - source? The reports I’ve read have made point that, like Macavity, Cameron wasn’t there. Repetition of untruths doesn’t make them true and its a claim you keep making.
24: Don’t agree that “youth” is Cameron’s USP, it’s one of many “SPs” compared to Brown (and Ming so long as he lasts), but not the only thing he’s got, clearly. My only worry should Clegg take over is that he looks and sounds more like a Conservative than Cameron does.
But then I’m still not convinced that Clegg isn’t a Conservative, despite his denials.
Given Lib Dems’ inability to pick a winner, surely they’d end up with some dull leftie like Huhne?
What is very clear is that this was a strategm on the part of Brown to try to make his incipient Labour Government more acceptable. In that, he failed.
Several months ago, Ming laid down five criteria which Brown would have to meet before Lib Dems could even consider some kind of working arrangement in the case of a hung Parliament. I have not noticed that Brown has made any attempt to meet any one of these. So it is no surprise that Brown has failed to lure Lib Dems into his tent just now.
Our favourite Tory posters feign surprise that similar conditions were not also presented to Cameron, and go on to churn out CCHQ spin about Lib Dem bias in favour of Labour.
But I ask you! Nobody anywhere could possibly set five tests for Cameron. He has failed to define himself in terms of policy, and when he starts to do so, he immediately says the opposite the following day. He is in denial about all that the Tory Party has traditionally stood for. He is even in denial about the manifesto that he himself wrote as recently as 2005. One cannot carve a jelly, and a pretty watery jelly at that!
So this recent incident makes sense - but in terms of Brown’s team attempting to reposition Labour, but without making any real change. Pure image and spin. More of the same.
Can it be said that Brown is a second Cameron?
31 - can it be said that there is no point to the Lib Dems? You sound like the kind of ‘no compromise’ lefties that used to plague the Labour Party.
Do you think it would be easy for Labour to accept Libs in government? No. But Brown was obviously prepared to go out on a limb. The Lib Dems meanwhile are so timid they couldn’t even muster the courage to give it a go and actually implement policy IN GOVERNMENT for the first time in 100 years.
Sad, sad, sad.
[11] Not sure that Brown really is a “loser” - he’s shown that he’s willing to be “non tribal” - and he’s said for a while now that he wanted to go beyond his Party for his cabinet, so this exercise is a promise kept - and I think Brown will want to be seen as a man who keeps his promises (so probably he won’t make that many :lol:) if only as a way of distinguishing himself from You-Know-Who. Also he’s set the agenda for an opposition party, always a bright idea for a PM (ask Lady Thatcher).
For the Lib Dems, there must be a risk that, having dealt with this matter solely on activist opinion, the polls show disappointment in the outcome. I’d expect 2-1 “yes” majorities to both “was GB right to offer Paddy Pantsdown a Cabinet post?” and “do you think Paddy was wrong to turn it down?”
I wonder what the job was… Secretary of State for Getting Out of Iraq PDQ?
Will this cause any backlash in the Labour Party, as well as in the LDs? Or is “Stalin” now so unassailable in the Party that there will be no dissent whatsoever (for threat of the gulag)?
I love this site, but it reminds me of the quote by Mark Twain every day:
“Get your facts first, and then you can distort them as much as you please.”
33 - Ashdown was offered NI and presumably Neuberger a Health job and Lester a Home Office job.
One or two very silly posting from the usual Tory suspects, I think. There is nothing inherently wrong it talking to politicians of other parties. If the prime minister (almost prime minister) invites somebody in to discuss something, it would be a very strange politician (one of our Tory posters?) who would refuse to go and see what it was all about, wouldn’t it?
I seem to remember reading about one of Cameron’s shadow cabinet calling in - uninvited - to see leading Lib Dem MPs. I don’ remember that there was much talk at the time that Osborne (for it was he) was on the point of defecting to the Lib Dems, or that Cameron’s leadership was on the point of collapsing on the basis of that meeting.
The leaking of this has come from Brown and he has stoked its embers by formally approach Ashdown direct. Why?
The Lib Dems have the smallest core of voters than the other main 2. Some are former Labour (Iraq) some are former Tories.
At by elections they boost their vote primarily by attracting the “anti” votes.
So in Ealing Southall which was a favourite to become a by election, is Brown seeking to undermine the Lib Dem votes by removing their attraction to “anti-Labour” votes? If he is it could be a dangerous move because the Tories in 3rd are barely 1,000 votes behind the Lib Dems and could make a stunning breakthrough if they choose the right candidate and if they choose the right campaign (lots of ifs).
Robin - Roger a ‘fool’? flattery will get you everywhere.
On thread - the message remains the same as it has always been - ‘vote Lib Dem, get Labour’. Amazing that the Lib Dems seem to want to reinforce this message though.
HF - if you think the Tories will make a ’stunning breakthrough’ in Ealing Southall, I suggest you put some money on it!
20.Robin. Uncharacteristically testy this morning! I hope it’s just cornflakes spilt over the breakfast table and isn’t related to your Party’s belated realization that you might not have picked a winner?
Gladstone. Sorry to be unclear. Red Flump has interpreted correctly. Cameron’s USP is that he’s young and is therefore in-tune with the new concerns such as the environment. The choice of any of the touted leaders of the Lib Dems-particularly Clegg-would remove this USP at a stroke.
Ted. It was much publicised at the time. Try googling ‘Bullingdon club’ and you’ll see their modus operandi
37 - Tressage.
Meetings happen during the normal course of politics, and as Ming pointed out yesterday, he meets/met also with Cameron and Blair fairly regularly. This simply greases the wheels of government in its widest sense, and is entirely sensible.
What I think is important in this (and I used the phrase deliberately) debacle, is that:
a) it blows out of the water any pretence of equidistance ahead of the next GE. This will no doubt worry/anger a number of southern marginal LD MPs (I’m thinking here of people like my former university friend Jeremey Browne in Taunton, for example). Vote Lib Dem, Get Brown again will be a powerful message in LD-Con marginals. No amount of saying “more LD votes = more LD policies in a coalition” will counter this.
b) it demonstrates Brown’s approach to these matters. You can interpret this in one of 2 ways - politically naive because he knows Ming’s five tests and the party’s likely response, or b) as simply designed to create mischief by approaching Ashdown directly and without Ming’s knowledge, once Ming had turned him down. If the former, I am very surprised, if the latter then so much for trust and respect between supposedly close constituency neighbours.
41 - Roger. See, when you put your mind to it, you *can* string together a few cogent sentences that might pass for a valid point. I’d check those pesky facts again though… as has already been pointed out to you again this morning, repeating things does not of itself add to their veracity.
Agree with GlassHouse (1). The big loser if Ming fell would be David Cameron, since a Huhne/Clegg led Lib Dem party would eat much more into Tory support than Ming is currently doing.
Brown will get back the most of the Iraq/tuition fee defectors anyway, simply by virtue of not being Bliar.
Scallywag (39) - The message is quite the opposite. It has been very clear and consistent. Lib Dems are not prepared to help either Tories or Labour, unless they clean up their act considerably first.
In the case of the Tories, this means making a start by getting some policies that we (and the electorate) can consider. In the case of Labour, it means repenting of various authoritarian measures from the Blair era, and indeed backtracking on them.
So the message, Scallyway, is as it has always been: “Vote Lib Dem and get liberalism and democracy”.
Actually Ted your excuse that Cameron “Like Macavity”was never there when his club mates trashed restaurants is such a poor excuse that I’m surprised you are bothering to make it. That he happened to have a chill or some other minor ailment while his club mates wreaked their havoc makes him sound worse not better!
45 - vote Lib Dem and get nothing but another 100 years of pointless opposition.
43. Remember - in the minds of straightjacketed individuals like Roger there is no distinction between ‘facts’ and their own perception of reality, however fantastical and distorted the latter might be.
[45] “Vote Lib Dem and get liberalism and democracy”
- er, the last time your lot were in office there was total chaos in Northern Ireland and women prisoners were force-fed just because they wanted the vote…
A pedant writes: I see you’ve decided to descend to the level of the other Peebies this morning, then..
29. FFS Ted you are engaging in some bollocks over someone apparently trashing a resturant?
For gods sake man focus on issues that matter. To take an example say a political party, in the apparently enlighetened late 20th & early 21st centuries allow women molesters into high office.
Roger - you say he trashed restaurants; the facts say his fellow Bullingdon boys did and he wasn’t there. Guilt by association? I’ve certainly had fellow schoolmates, fellow workmates, fellow club mates who have behaved terribly - so I’m also guilty? Facts, Roger, facts.
The only unclear thing now is who it was gave the story to the Guardian , GB or ine of his acolytes , Paddy Ashdown or a LibDem MP .
It is quite remarkable that yesterday the Conservatives launched their supposedly important new policy on the NHS which has been totally ignored by everyone by this story . This reflects how irrelevant the Conservatives are .
17, 46:
This is so lame. “Man does something stupid at University” shocker.
YAWN
We all did, students do. Get over it is is utterly irrelevant to anything. His parents sent him to Eton, he arirved at Oxord, got invited to join a drinking club like everyone else from Eton. What was he supposed to do? Say “no thanks i will remain sober, because i may one day be leader of the tory party and I want to protect myself from small minded morons posting endlessly on websites 20 years from now” Jeez…
get over it you tedious bore.
This was not a clever move by Brown. To leave himself open to Tory taunting of not having enough good Labour members to fill a cabinet should keep a half decent Tory script writer going for several PMQ’s
49 IA - Even I think it is stretching it a little to hold the current crop of Liberals responsible for the last time they were in power!
News reaches me that our Gawd’s big tent approach to the Lib Dems included not only Potentate Paddy but also some other yellow peril faces in their specialist fields :
Ming Campbell - Foreign Office, Minister for the Spice Islands.
Limpdick Optic - MOD, Junior Minister for Asteroid Deflection.
Mark Oaten - Whips Office, Dungeons and Old Male Dragons.
Viscount Thurso - Scottish Office, Gaelic Waxed Moustache Dept.
Phil Willis - Education, Healthy Eating Tuck Shops.
Chris Huhne - Enviroment, Eggbox Recycling.
Vince Cable - Health, Hair Restoration Creams.
Matthew Taylor - Agriculture, Cornish Pasty Development.
Rev. Simon Hughes - Religious and Bi-Sexual Affairs.
53. It’s interesting how quickly a few indifferent polls and a leader who suddenly doesn’t look up to the job can shake your confidence. I might well be a ‘tedious bore’ but everyone knows that if I wasn’t striking a chord you would have quickly scrolled past and ignored it!
Bob Sykes @ 34 may have a point. This seems unlikely to please Labour MPs, activists, or, for that matter, voters. As when he axed the 10p income tax band, Brown may be too clever for his own good.
Meanwhile …. Neil Stewart, former aide to Kinnock says that Cameron might become PM with only 230 seats !!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/06/21/ntory221.xml
50 Yokel - just getting irritated at the repetition of spin. There are more serious things going on but we are in the silly season until next Thursday when UK politics starts again, the interminable leadership & DL changeover complete. Ming or no Ming won’t be decided till we see how he performs against (? with?) Brown; the chances of the Conservatives similarly.
Thanks for the article Mike. Just who is leaking these stories to the press? They may have their own agenda.
I do hope Ming can hang on!
[55] Quite so, Robin - your lot aren’t doing that badly in the polls
[56] Jack, you missed out Lynne Featherstone…
25 Yokel the viceroy moves from the Balkans to NI? That would be a clumsy appointment even for the Big Clunking Fist.
54 - Cameron hasn’t got a leg to stand on after the Greg Dyke debacle.
47. “vote Lib Dem and get nothing but another 100 years of pointless opposition”
I see Labour’s commitment to pluralistic democracy is as strong as ever.
Meanwhile II …. Peter Riddell in the “Times” on the “big tent” :
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/peter_riddell/article1963987.ece
63. Sure he’s already here at the head of some Parades review group.
Paddy was born here which just about qualifies him for nothing. Its the classic London fudge exercise which they often try. He’s callked Paddy (Irish), but he was an ex Marine who served (keeps the Prods happy) and so on…There are worse appointments but think about the job.
According to Peter Hain at least, and thanks to his mammoth solo efforts, peace reins and all is well. Paddy’s reputation is as a globe trotting troubleshooter of sorts. What is there left to troubleshoot on a big scale? In essence its a comparatively backwater job.
65 - sorry, remind me which party has just offered people from another party ministerial jobs?
42.”b) it demonstrates Brown’s approach to these matters.” Robin, that is a very important point and shows that Brown will carry on trying to do deals behind closed doors and off the radar. Not very democratic, and while there are ructions in the Libdem camp over this I see the foot soldiers in the Labour party are as usual impotent and unimportant in these decisions.
34&54. Bob and Roger make valid points about Brown being open to attack from the Conservatives, are Labour so lacking in talent on its own benches that they are having to rely on politicians from other parties? Will Labour backbenchers be happy to be sidelined in this way, and does it undermine their position when despite their numbers their leader thinks they are lacking in the qualities needed for a front bench career? Not the kind of perception that they would want the public to have about them.
Meanwhile III …. John Kampfner in the “Gruntfutock” on the significance of Brown’s approach to the Lib Dems :
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2107708,00.html
Well, what an interesting morning this has been.
The Scottish political elite really do fancy re-writing the rules, don’t they?
If I was a Lib Dem activist in England I would be spitting blood this morning.
How much longer can this go on? Lib Dems at Westminster must be about ready to wield the dagger again.
59 and that article still peddles the ‘fact’ that the Tories need a swing of 11% to have a majority. Political comfort food.
42 - Sorry, I fail to see how this equals lib-labbery any more than the meeting at which Cameron talked to Campbell about a joint London mayoral candidate equals lib-connery. On both occasions other party leaders approached Ming and he has given negative responses.
The press coverage about ’secret talks’ is unfortunate because of the impression this will give punters. But the actual story seems to be that Brown coveted talented Lib Dems for his government but Ming said no.
67 Not only that, Yokel, but now that NI has Home Rule or Devolution or Power Sharing or whatever it is called this week, the Viceroy (sorry, Sec of State for NI) won’t have very much to do at all. Maybe open a few primary schools or something, whilst Paisley and Adams get on with the real work.
68.”65 - sorry, remind me which party has just offered people from another party ministerial jobs?” There is only one party which can offer ministerial posts and that is the one in government. All the parties can “discuss or work together on policy initiatives” but this is something very different. Would Ashdown have a seat at the cabinet table, and if not would side lining such a post be advisable?
Re 40 ballyeric, no I do not think that the Tories will but they ought to have a really big go at it. Vote LD get Labour is a powerful message to attract anti-Labour voters.
From todays Telegraph
“A seminar in London on whether Mr Cameron has the potential to become Prime Minister also heard surprise praise from senior Liberal Democrat Nick Clegg MP over the Tory leader’s “admirable” rebranding of his party.”
Good week for the LDs continues…
74 He could even wear the full regalia and traipse around getting in the way waving his replica assault rifle and running up beaches scaring the birds. Plenty to keep him busy.
53:
whatever. How many other people post on this subject apart from you?
The irony is there are many much better ways to attack cameron, some of which I would no doubt agree with you on. But getting on your high horse for some drunken antics when he was a student makes you sound like a blue rinse old maid or ‘Disgusted of tonbridge Wells’.
69 & 71 - Remind me, which party leader was engaged in deals behind closed doors involving former Labour member and donor Greg Dyke standing for London mayor?
{SIGH}
This is exactly like the preposterous “David Laws negotiates defection” nonsense. This is Gordon Brown playing the same game for the very same reasons. For crying out loud actually read what happened according to Ashdown:
“It is true that Mr Brown suggested… that I might take a position in the Cabinet. … I told him that I could not conceivably consider such a position unless my leader told me that he thought it was a good idea and even if he did, I didn’t.”
So, it was it was an unprovoked move by Brown. Why should the LDs be held responsible for this?
St John: “Was Brown aware that Campbell had ruled this out when the offer was made to Ashdown? If so it smacks of political mischief making.”
Spot on.
It’s a controversial story, and it suits both Lab and Con for it to be true… but it isn’t true - there was never any chance of the post being accepted. It was just an unprovoked but well planned offer.
Mike and the media are both lapping it up because the “story” is big - except that it isn’t really a story at all, any more than David Laws defecting was.
Brown is playing a blinder, that has to be agreed. It’s also clear he does indeed have utter contempt for the LDs and their leadership. Ming and the LDs must not take being played like this, and must withdraw from any issues where Labour is benefiting from their backing. They must start to operate a policy of non-cooperation even on issues where they agree, in order to make Brown understand that they wont be played like this. Contempt must be thrown back at Brown to make his life difficult.
OT. Paddy Power have £5 still left at 10/1 for Blair’s next job to Middle East peace envoy if anyone is interested….
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uklatest/story/0,,-6725113,00.html
Meanwhile IV …. Sean O’Grady, former Press Secretary to Paddy on why Ming keeps on “running” for power !! ….. dawdling more like !!
http://comment.independent.co.uk/commentators/article2686801.ece
…………………..
Note to Nick Palmer’s be-tanned …. Paddy to Ulster = Hain to ??? … You certainly know when you’ve been Tangoed !!
81 Mboy then why are LibDem MPs quoted as saying there is fire in the smoke somewhere, and reported widely as being furious about the whole thing?
While they are also saying they do not know who to blame they have a pretty good idea. Campbell went in to talk with Brown as if they were still on the train to Scotland having one of those cosy off the record chats and did not see the danger and neutralise it straight away (a press briefing that made general points about no deals would have done).
But instead Campbell lets Brown steal the march on him. Well thats the best you can say. But from he press today clearly there is some suspicion in LibDem MPs that Campbell was more than careless perhaps even considering the offer, so a quick news briefing was out of the question in case the deal was blown.
Do you doubt Campbell would not like to be in the cabinet before he retires. What politician wouldn’t. And that was his weak spot and it still is for him and people like Ashdown who have been chasing a back door cabinet job since 1995.
73 says “The press coverage about ’secret talks’ is unfortunate because of the impression this will give punters. But the actual story seems to be that Brown coveted talented Lib Dems for his government but Ming said no.”
I thank that’s absolutely correct.
84. 11/8 now I’m afraid….
Well,. surprisingly, I find myself quite pleased about this.
Two thoughts- Cameron can’t simultaenously attack Brown for offering Cabinet jobs to the Lib Dems and being a top down machine politician control freak- It’s just not credible. He has to pick one or the other line of attack.
Secnd point. While I’m surprised about the offer to paddy, I think this does make Brown look pretty good. He appears to offered senior well respected Lib Dems jobs with very little quid pro quo. It shows an understanding of the big picture, and while I would understand some labour and Liberal MPs getting upset at the thought, we seem to end up with the Liberals looking tribal and petty, not Brown.
Hypocrisy alert- I asked myself why i felt that this was smart politics when i thought the Dyke stuff was a bad move. I think the difference lies in the fact that Brown has not desperate need to give Liberals jobs, so it appears magnaminous - while with Dyke it seemed a little desperate for the Tories to try and recrut Dyke to the cause.
Richard @ 85, don’t be so naive. There is fire amidst all the smoke and Ming (like Ashdown before him) can’t be trusted on this.
54
‘This was not a clever move by Brown. To leave himself open to Tory taunting of not having enough good Labour members to fill a cabinet should keep a half decent Tory script writer going for several PMQ’s ‘
I thought everyone accepted that as fact,just look at the serial failures that make up the cabinet now.
The start of things to come I think- Blair’s reference to Brown’s clunking fist was rather a reference to the guy’s intellect and sense of strategy, the real weapons of politics.
And these have well and truly clunked Ming and the LD’s; completely manipulated, out thought and out manoevred by Brown.
I am utterly convinced now that we are beginning to see the stranglehold that Brown will exert over British politics, possibly for the next decade. Opponents out thought, and Brown strategically keeping himself a country mile ahead of the rest (including the malcontents in his own party).
Whether Brown will face 5 Tory opponents is doubtful, but he will surely see out Cameron, and will probably see off the Tories as an electoral force, something Blair very nearly did.
89. Someone better than Beckett for FS ? I can’t believe a person exists…
87 Absolutely Right.
90. I think I agree with you in part Tyson - Brown will be all over the Westminster scene - however it is in the country at large where his popularity will lag far behind and will be his downfall.
Mike: PS - Ming looks well in that pic - when is it from?
90 - I hope this “intellect and sense of strategy” extends to him calling an early election. Come on Gordon, show some real balls…
I too welcome this, it is obvious to everyone, except the usual party hacks and sycophants, that party politics in this country is dead. Its time for new thinking, kick out all this nonsense of, ‘you did this, we did that’. Politicians should be big enough, to break out of the straight jacket of the political party and offer the voters something different. Lets hope that Brown’s offer to Ashdown and Ming is the start of a new approach.
74. The problem with the appointment is that Blair already stuck him into head up a Parades review commission, ironically some of whos members are people with, er, interesting pasts on both sides of the divide. They are now known as community workers.
But I digress. Apparently Sinn Fein were not excatly overjoyed by Paddy’s appointment. On what basis I have no idea, probably that he was a squaddie. The symbolism of putting Ashdown, an ex serving soldier in NI and an SBS members no less, may not look too great for some republicans who, no matter what his approach was, would think it a bit of a kick in the nadgers.
I have no idea how Brown’s other Lib Dems in government ideas will look but this one did have some logic. a) No one wants Northern Ireland except for the very young and/or ambitious or the plain stupid, its a poison chalice and now even less important now there is devolution and no one is officially shooting anyone (unofficial shootings don’t count). It also takes away the idea of Tories = unionists, Labour = nationalist perceived imbalance. Additionally, with the Lib Dems are linked with the middle of the road Alliance Party, from a distance it seems not a bad place to use for throwing the LD’s a bone.
86. Funny that…..I looked this up last night given all the talk coming out of Washington. If I was him I wouldn’t touch the Middle East with a barge pole, possibly he’s damaged goods. Here’s the rub on some of those markets though. What if Tony has more than one first action? For example he goes on a speaking tour and also does some shuttle diplomacy at the same time.
Witan: Of course the LDs are furious because this news frenzy is damaging. You are perhaps…perhaps… correct that Campbell may have been naive in not seeing that Brown would stab him in the back and leak the content of a Privy Council meeting. However, that is simply I think an indication of the great degree of honour and integrity of Campbell vs Brown. Campbell would never have expected Brown to leak it because he would never do so himself.
This has been a painful lesson for Campbell to learn, but it is better he learnt it now than near an election. Brown is the ultimate sneaky operator, and I hope Campbell wont be sitting next to him on the train again now…
79.It was never going to be the trashing of restaurants that people found offensive-apart from as you say some of his own blue rinses-it was the idea that a wad of Daddy’s money would make it all alright Your and others anger at the question being raised shows that you don’t have to be a pinko to find it offensive.
People change and everyone did things when young that they later regret-though the Tory party aren’t known for being strong on rehabilitation but we’ll let that go-but if Cameron did have a Damascene conversion when he stopped treating people less well off than himself like shit shouldn’t we be told when that happened?
Everyone’s love bombing the Lib Dems. It’s the new oldest game in town.
Has anyone though noticed that smaller parties are now bigger than the Lib Dems in combination - Green, BNP, UKIP plus the nationals? There won’t be many seats won by them, if any - but there will be distortional effects which change the results of many seats.
If the smaller party surge continues at its current pace, by 2009/2010 the smaller party game will have replaced Lib Dem love bombing.
Issues will be back in fashion.
The Lib Dem was a non-policy party - it had a chameleon-like approach to different areas - and spoke with many tongues to different audiences. It offered the safety of being in the middle - nowhere near the ‘extremes’ - providing the supposed cure to the confrontational politics of Labour and Conservative. With no risk of actually winning power, it could decouple from reality and offer people cake and allow them to eat it too (Boris Johnson’s phrase).
While Cameron and Brown jostle to pick up defecting Lib Dems, they might wake up to find that the bulk of the traffic’s actually moving elsewhere…into areas where the media rarely strays… over the edge of the known world - What will the major parties do then? Start trying to talk to electors about their main concerns? Unlikely but possible.
The remarkable thing about this affair is that the LibDems, for once, have been unananimous in rejecting Brown’s “joke” offer. The particularly hilarious element of his “joke” is that the job offered to Ashdown was Northern Ireland secretary. A non-job.
I have written more about this here:
http://paulwalter.blogspot.com/2007/06/northern-ireland-secretary-offer-to.html#links
Tapestry, dont you ever tire of such lame rhetoric?
98 Mboy I am not sure that this was a meeting falling under PC rules, rather cabinet making in Brown’s room at the HoC. Cabinet making is not normally a PC matter in any direct way.
Two misjudgements, one after another, from Brown, not a good start.
After his ‘more of the same’ Mansion House speech about education, Brown has, with this, also made clear that there is a lack of ability on his front bench and that he barely trusts his own party to do the job.
I said that as soon as Brown had to start doing something he would start to lose support and it looks as though he means to start early.
How he managed to concoct an education policy that is designed to appeal to neither parents or teachers beggars belief. It does confirm the idea that he sees nothing wrong with the last ten years, however, and is going to give us more of the same.
MBoy at 98, You seem to be saying that Ming has been made a fool of by Gordon Brown.
One would imagine that by putting your most experienced and senior politician in to lead the party he would be someone who wouldn’t still have ‘painful lessons’ to learn?
Morning all :). I’ve written something about this on my blog which is at the bottom of the linked blog sites here as, apparently, it is bad form to publicise one’s own blog here (sorry, Paul :))
I’m actually delighted with the past 48 hours. A big falling-out with Labour is the surefire antidote to the insidious “Vote Lib Dem Get Labour” nonsense being peddled in the Tory blogsphere.
Equidistance is NOT an easy option and the LD media management has to be better. By the by, I suppose the next time David Cameron has an “informal” chat with Gordon Brown about climate change or terrorism or any of the issues about which Party leaders communicate all the time, I’m sure we’ll be told a “Grand Coalition” is going to happen.
Some of the comments on here in the past couple of days betray a fundamental lack of understanding of how politics and political parties function at Westminster. Just because you may not have any dealings with your political opponents in your District Council doesn’t mean that for example Council officers don’t and that channels of communication don’t exist. Activists get very adversarial - in the real world, communication between and across Party lines is part of the process of governance.
I do wish there was a better general understanding of politics
34/50: no Labour MP who I’ve talked to sees any problem with offering to include a couple of non-Labour ministers to show openness - good idea. As for the tired jibe that it shows we’ve run out of people worth appointing ourselves, it’s so boringly partisan that I can’t be bothered to reply.
90. I’m puzzled that if Brown is the big winner out of all this and the Lib Dems are the big losers why was it Ashdown who gave the story to the press?
Nonetheless I agree that it’s beginning to look like Brown is going to exceed all of our expectations. The two articles in the Guardian and Times posted earlier point to this.
“but if Cameron did have a Damascene conversion when he stopped treating people less well off than himself like shit shouldn’t we be told when that happened? ”
I am not one of Cameron’s greatest fans, but I wish you would stop treating unsupported assertions about what you think he must have got up to at some stage as fact.
On topic - I think the Lib Dems would have been mad to go for this. If they were to take favours off Labour, they’d have about as much of a future as the National Liberals of the 1930s.
87& 90. But doesn’t inviting an unelected Libdem peer to hold a cabinet position show Brown’s “Stalinist” tendencies, the fact that Labour MP’s seem totally impotent doesn’t help either?
“Blair’s reference to Brown’s clunking fist was rather a reference to the guy’s intellect and sense of strategy, the real weapons of politics.” Tyson, that made me laugh. Blair was not being subtle but honest when he described “Brown’s clunking fist”, and to try and spin it as some subtle play on the Brown’s intellect and sense of strategy is wishful spin.
98.”This has been a painful lesson for Campbell to learn, but it is better he learnt it now than near an election. Brown is the ultimate sneaky operator, and I hope Campbell wont be sitting next to him on the train again now…”
After the way Brown behaved just a couple of weeks ago when he pinched Cameron’s idea’s from private talks he had with Blair, I don’t think that consensual politics will even get off the ground under Brown. He is not going to make many allies behaving like this.
Ashdown had no choice but to announce it because if he didn’t but someone else did then it would have looked s if he were considering it seriously.
Nick Palmer could you talk to a few more Labour MPs on the left of your party and be kind enough to let us know the result. Are they, too, happy to see Paddy A or Ming Campbell in the cabinet?
100
I think Tapestry is right, boredom with the main parties and what their offering is sending voters off into ‘The Twilight Zone’ Falling membership, falling voter numbers, what more do you need to know. Its the 21st century,yet we still have parties with their feet firmly planted in the 19th, time for change!!
I’ve read these posts saying Brown masterstroke or Brown mess up. Question is, which one will the media and the opposition go for?
Ignoring all the party political stuff, I don’t think it’s a bad idea to reintroduce senior, trusted figures like Ashdown (people liked him, more or less) into government.
There are all these fellas like him and Patten and Hattersley knocking around who have so much to contribute but are restricted to writing columns and showing up the current shower on Question Time
(is this one of my stupider postings)
110 - “But doesn’t inviting an unelected Libdem peer to hold a cabinet position show Brown’s “Stalinist” tendencies”
Desperate contortions. This “Stalinist” label is childish and ridiculous.
One inescapable truth is that Ming was in a weak position before this story break. He has been “talking” from a position of weakness not strength. His position has not been enhanced by this. Where does he go next. He doesn’t have a plan.
All this has empahsised that the Lib Dems are in a remarkably dire postion. A fact which was revealed by Cameron first, in his LibDems4Cam launch and their abject failiure in the locals.
This is very unfortunate. Ming should go as a last roll of the dice.
114 - Have you read any of Hattersley’s ramblings lately?
This also reinforces the fringe elements who say that all parties are the same and that, if you want change, you should vote for them (the BNP, most dangerously). Coalitions are fair, they involve compromise and proper organisation, ad hoc arrangements like the one proposed here merely send a message that government is down to patronage not votes (q.v. loans for lordships).
Sean. If this story in the Telegraph which explicitly says Cameron trashed restaurants is untrue why didn’t he sue the Telegraph?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/02/14/noxford14.xml
The idiocy of the Party position, is shown by this piece from the Torygraph, Cameron’s latest on the NHS. Cameron obviously thinks that there is nothing wrong with the NHS that more socialism wouldn’t fix, So Gordon offer Cameron Minister of Health in your government.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/06/21/ntory121.xml
Cameron is more of a socialist than most members of Nu-labour.
An earlier poster was absolutely correct - either Gordon is attacked by the Tories for being a tribal Labour Stalinist control freak, or he is attacked for having no Labour talent for inviting LDs into government. You can’t have both.
I personally think Gordon comes out extremely well over this - willing to do what is “unthinkable” as long as he gets the best people. Cameron would never be able to do such a thing as his right wing is so strong. And Gordon now can sit back and say, “well, they wanted big-tent consensual politics. I offered them a role in government and they turned it down - oh well, I tried.”
Also this appears to be the second time that LibDems have thrown the chance of government back in Labour’s face, first in Wales and now here. What the hell are the LibDems FOR?? Why on earth vote for a party like this?
What a lot of fuss over nothing. Politicians talk to each other SHOCK!
This story is of great interest to the westminster village and its extension in the blogosphere but of little or no interest to the real world. The thought that there are lots of voters in marginal constituencies who will be up in arms this morning is laughable. Folk round here need to get a sense of proportion, this is a classic meeja story it provides lots of commentators an opportunity to write lots of important sounding words ( not least on here )that really mean nothing at all. Does any of this affect schools, hospitals, mortgage rates, bobbies on the beat, child poverty or ( dare I say it ) european negotiations? Absolutely not. As Nick Palmer has said labour MPs really are not bothered one way or the other. A few liberal MPs might get hot under the collar about it but then whats new.
More relevant to this site does anyone have any thoughts on Guido’s DL ramping exercise yesterday afternoon which he is now proudly boasting about?
107. Nick Palmer “As for the tired jibe that it shows we’ve run out of people worth appointing ourselves, it’s so boringly partisan that I can’t be bothered to reply.”
Well, I know that - and you know that - but some of the voters will believe the jibe. Damage has been done, and it was all so unnecessary. Gordon had the wind in his sails - he didn’t need to take these kind of risks.
I don’t buy this theory that he is a master operator at all - or that he is a morose and brooding presence, either. He’s just an experienced politician on which we are all projecting our hopes and fears at the moment, until he actually takes over.
111 - witan, could you tell us how david davis and liam fox, shadow cabinet members, felt about the offer to greg dyke?
90: ‘I am utterly convinced now that we are beginning to see the stranglehold that Brown will exert over British politics, possibly for the next decade. Opponents out thought, and Brown strategically keeping himself a country mile ahead of the rest (including the malcontents in his own party).’
hEAR hEAR! Gordon has exposed hiself as the political genius we always knew him to be!! To recruit the respected ‘Paddy’ Lord Ashdown onto his cabinet as northern ireland secretary is indeed a coo :- Ashdown will bring to solving the desperate troubles of that providance all the skill, courage anbd diplomatic skill he showed when he brought peace to the former Czechoslovakia!!! This is a glorious recruitment by Gordon and Paddy is most welcome with us in Labour;
As for ‘Dave’ Cameron, as other psoters have said abovehe is finished. The ‘GrammarGate’ scandal did for him. What an elitist, snobbish and vile policy that was. It is appalling to suggest that grammar should be taught in schools:- it would be boring and demoralizing for pupils and would put additional stress and strains on techers. Unnecesary to: I always use the Microsoft Grammar Checker, and as you can see from my posts it never did me any harm.
97. Yokel, yes the wording is vague, but I think they’ll pay on the first thing Blair announces he’ll do, not when he actually goes there. With all his mortgages I originally thought he’d have to do a speaking tour or memoirs to pay for it all, but when i heard the US strongly want him in the Mid East, you can guarantee they’ll pay him very well and will probably pick up his (very high) security costs for free as well. Also it will look more statesman like (and less Cherie like) than just trying to cash in straight away and may even help his “legacy” if he actually makes some progress.
I’d already put a little into the EU presidency option at 66/1 from my leaving date winnings which I’m now resigned to losing, but got a tenner on at the 20/1 last night when I heard. We’ll soon know….
124 - shouldn’t you be revising for your GCSEs?
124. Technaicality, Ashdown wouldnt have been in cabinet by the looks of it.
What abotu the rumour of a devolved regions cabinet minister with a series of point juniors under him for each region?
125. Whens the next Euro presidency due?
Roger, the article states explicitly that he smoked cannabis, not that he trashed restaurants. He may or may not have done.
108/111 I don’t think it has been established with certainty that it was Paddy Ashdown who gave the story to the Guardian .
121. This isn’t a small story. It’s leading all the news on every station. I’m not as sure as others that it is in Labour or Brown’s interest to have the news start with the words “The Lib Dems have TURNED DOWN Gordon Brown’s invitation…..” To be ‘turned down’ doesn’t under normal circumstances sound too good.
128. Not likely to switch from a revolving presidency to full time until 2009 probably….
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=462487&in_page_id=1770
I’m with Glass House on this. A change of LibDem leadership to Clegg or Huhne would help Labour.
I’m puzzled by LibDem claims that they are equidistant from the two main parties. They fought the 2005 election from the left of Labour - 50% higher rate tax, no tuition fees, etc. Some of the voters the LibDems took from Labour were pure Iraq protesters, but some were from Labour’s left, and these people are now feeling puzzled and uneasy about the new LibDem stance and are trickling back. It would be a flood back if someone like Clegg took over. Plus Clegg is better looking than Cameron, so he’d take votes off Cameron from that small sector of the population that votes for the prettiest.
There’s also another aspect: Labour very rarely changes leader - this is our first change in 13 years, and it is progressing in a very stately manner. I’m agog at how eager the LibDem activists are to change their leader again. The Tories have had five leadership elections in the last 13 years - the LibDems have had two (1999 and 2006). If they had another one so soon, they’d be turning into the Tories Mark II, esp if Clegg got the job. You wouldn’t be able to tell the two parties apart.
And Labour would be left as the only stable party left that doesn’t change their leader every couple of years or so - very important if you are in govt, as voters get nervous about frequent changes of leadership.
115.”Desperate contortions. This “Stalinist” label is childish and ridiculous.” Is it? I would say that the modus operandi of Brown has left many in the Labour party sitting waiting in suspense along with the opposition and many voters to see what their new PM’s political platform is going to be. I suppose that Labour MP’s and candidates can only hope that Brown’s personal ambitions do not get in the way of their careers in marginals across the country.
Without a leadership contest or GE which I admit is not essential, what wriggle room does Gordon Brown have to deviate from the manifesto that won Labour the last election? Be interested to hear what other posters think?
132. Ah ok, I heard a story that Bertie Ahern might have been a possible, but 2009 might be too early.
By the way, I don’t know if anyone posted this already but Michael Bloomberg quite the Repoublicans the other day.
For many voters Ashdown is a has been. Poor man had suffered enough in Bosnia without having to deal with the Taliban in Northern Ireland. Nick Palmer should realise that for many voters this all looks like a Labour party in real trouble and with defeat at the next election a real possibility. It might cause Ming Campbell problems but it also dosn’t do much for Gordon Brown either. There is a big difference in bringing technocrats from a non political background into government for their expertise in a particular area and offering seats to former failed Lib Dem MPs and a minister of religion who occasionally pontificates on radio 4. Brown’s advisers might have thought that this was a brilliant move to cause problems for the Lib Dems but to the public it all looks pretty inept and frankly sleasy.It’s yet another example of how those who live in the Westminster bubble should get out a bit more and listen to ordinary voters.
For many voters Ashdown is a has been. Poor man had suffered enough in Bosnia without having to deal with the Taliban in Northern Ireland. Nick Palmer should realise that for many voters this all looks like a Labour party in real trouble and with defeat at the next election a real possibility. It might cause Ming Campbell problems but it also dosn’t do much for Gordon Brown either. There is a big difference in bringing technocrats from a non political background into government for their expertise in a particular area and offering seats to former failed Lib Dem MPs and a minister of religion who occasionally pontificates on radio 4. Brown’s advisers might have thought that this was a brilliant move to cause problems for the Lib Dems but to the public it all looks pretty inept and frankly sleasy.It’s yet another example of how those who live in the Westminster bubble should get out a bit more and listen to ordinary voters.
Roger at 118. You often post partisan rubbish but I can tolerate that as I do the same, I can accept and understand attacks on Cameron for his policies (or lack) and his style; but this constant attempt to slur David Cameron with a story about his past that you know full well is untrue puts you in the territory I usually reserve for Lib Dems.
Are you really that desperate?
134. Labour will stick to the manifesto till the next election. Brown though has a free hand in making the next manifesto, as he has not had to make any promises to any faction.
137. I don’t think the public will think reaching out to LibDems is “sleazy”. I think they will think it generous. And in particular they will have liked the idea that Brown was possibly thinking of a non-Labour person for attorney general (Lord Carlisle according to the guardian).
135. There’s a market on him running for Pres as an Independent on Intrade. It’s currently close to even money.
134. Loads. Parties do it all the time. A party with a new leader has even more opportunity.
More pertinently, Brown’s domestic platform seems to be pretty much exactly as it is under Blair’s front. Setting the Iraq issue aside (though it will get a bit more bloody for Britrain before they get everyone out), I would have guessed that some Labour supporters were hoping for some rollback on public service sreform, PFI, continued privatisation within public services and so on. That doesn’t seem likely to happen.
By the way someone should watch the Persian Gulf, the US is in the final stages of amassing enough firepower to turn the Straits if Hormuz into rush hour gridlock and bomb Iran back into the Stone Age.
I wonder if all this talk about LD’s going into the government is about the Eailing Southall by-election.
The timing of this foray into getting the LD’s into cabinet is very suspicious. Whilst i would not like to be castagated for mensioning the MP’s death, the timing could not be worse for Brown.
He will have to call a by-election in the next 6 months and it could have very bad impacts on his political future.
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/hoc/constituency/0,,-895,00.html
Shows how the LD’s are going to run Labour hard in this seat.
RedFlump: I used to think you were quite a smart poster, but I’m beginning to doubt that now. “What are the Lib Dems for” is such a lame question. Who do you think it was that sunk the FOI exemption for MPs? Before the LDs rattled the story, both Lab and Con were happy to let it pass through. There is more to good government than snatching ministerial positions you know…or did you think that parliament and select committees are a waste of time too?
I find it comical that for years the Lab/Con accusation against the LDs was that they would do ANYTHING for power. Now, the same people are saying they are pointless because they WONT do anything for power. Really now, you are sounding like a 6th former. Actually that is harsh, for all I know you could be a 6th former. Sorry if you are RedFlump…
140. Thats not bad if its a run/no run bet. I think he’s doing this is stages to test the water on the polls (a la Fred Thompson who just saw his stock rise every time the rumour mill said he was closer to running) but I suspect he may be the last of the potential big hitters to formally announce.
I know there are various views on Bloomberg’s effect if he stood and who it would hit worst. What I haven’t seen raised yet the US still does folksy and if the Democrats go Hilary & Bloomberg stands, I can’t see either of them exactly being tagged with that term. Cue a Fred Thompson?
Possible.
141. Intrade also do a market on that!
US/Israeli Overt Air Strike against Iran
By 30 Jun 2007 - Approx 33/1
By 30 Sep 2007 - Approx 9/1
By 31 Dec 2007 - Approx 5/1
Snowflake (139) - I can find some merit in appointing a person like Alex Carlisle as Attorney General. But it would have to be outside the Cabinet, wouldn’t it? Blair’s Goldsmith has brought the post into such discredit that appointing a Lib Dem - or even a Tory - to the post in order to regain some kind of impartiality, would make some kind of sense.
Marcus. I posted a tongue in cheek post (17) comparing Cameron to a ‘real’ Lib Dem where as one of many points of difference I mentioned his Bullingdon Club days!
I was surprised at how many Tories came on here to say it wasn’t true. As these posts were mainly from the Taliban wing of Tory supporters I answered in similar tone.
However when Sean F-an altogether different sort of Tory supporter- joined in I realized I’d have to take the argument seriously. So I posted a link from the Telegraph which I think most impartial observers would say-whatever you think of bringing up student misbehaviour so many years later-that it was at least true!!!
68. Hardly genuine constitutional progress is it? I doubt anyone sees Gordo’s motives as purely benign and for the interest of British democracy - especially given the suspicious leaks and inevitable rejection of the offers.
Johnson has now moved in to 1.23 on B/F for next Lab DL. The money has been steady but not a particularly large volume so prob just a hardening of sentiment as opposed to inside information.
Harman now second favourite 8.2; Benn 9; Cruddas out to 34 (to back) and somebody laid all the way up to 500.
143 - I am far to old to be a 6th former, you cheeky scamp!
I calls it as I sees it. Maybe I have been influenced by the LDs here in Wales, first talking to Labour, then flamboyantly withdrawing their support, then trying for a rainbow coalition, then trying to muscle in when it seems Plaid would join Labour, i.e. “oh, we’ll talk to you now!” They really are an opportunistic shambles and if I were Rhodri I would tell them to “do one”.
131 yes this story has now become a big meeja event but that does not mean it is important news nor does it mean that it will have any effect on how most voters view politics. The overwhelming mass of the population do not buy or read broadsheet newspapers and even many that do dont read the politics parts. Sky News and News 24 hardly have huge viewing figures. This story is of great interest to those who have already made up their minds how they will vote practically none to those that haven’t. It is difficult to see how any of this would affect GB policies on the economy, NHS,schools etc which are the things that most effect voting behaviour.
So lets all have lots of fun making bad guesses as to what it all means but lets not deceive ourselves that it has much relavence to the larger picture of politics.
OT, a peace offering to all - for Good News has been blessed upon us:
http://media.guardian.co.uk/site/story/0,,2107536,00.html
I do think this poses some interesting questions for the Lib Dems. Are they going to remain in permanent opposition hoping that once in a blue moon we have a hung parliament where their numbers can give them a place in government or will they take Browns offer which isn’t for a coalition but a few Cabinet seats as recognition of their support in the country?
147.”I was surprised at how many Tories came on here to say it wasn’t true. As these posts were mainly from the Taliban wing of Tory supporters I answered in similar tone.”
Roger, I think that most impartial observers would think that your constant spinning of this story is a desperate attempt at trying to turn fiction into fact. I don’t normal respond to these kind of accusations from you these days because it really does become boring for everyone.
As Marcus Wood said, most of us post partisan rubbish from time to time but I think that to constantly repeat these allegations (and that is all they are) does not help the debate.
Raving Roger has caused a stir today. Yesterday he described the Brown/Campbell revelations in the Guardian as a Tory plot, now it is a lead story.
In March of this year a man won £30,000 after getting fed up with allegatios made on blogs. There are some who have been attacked by Raving Roger (former school pupils) who might one day feel inclined to get the idiot to put up or shut up. Leading politicians tend to ignore the green ink brigade, but others can be less forgiving.
Roger, your are an elitist pseud. You post about your homes, public school, life in the South of France and your disdain for the little people, you know Sun readers and people who live in Labour seats like Basildon, as opposed to your “pad” in central London. Your view on Blair/Cameron is roughly, public schoolboy attacks public shoolboy on behalf of a public schoolboy for being a public schoolboy.
Post your garbage but stay this side of the libel laws. That means what you believe and hope is not necessarily true or fact. It would be tragic if someone took out this site just because your are a complete fantasist.
99: Anger?
boredom actually.
Any evidence for your last comment? No thought not.
Roger: The LDs only aim is more liberal policies. How we get that is largely irrelevant and depends on the times. Obviously, the best way to get it would be to win a General Election. Failing that they have to work with the tools they have. Of course, PR would give the LDs their fair share of representation, and by extension their fair share of policies.
144. Intersting poll numbers including Bloomberg
“Bloomberg-for-President? Not in New York State. At least, not yet.
http://www.quinnipiac.edu/x1318.xml?ReleaseID=1078
& GOP (and NRA) rocker Ted Nugent certainly seems to like Thompson…
http://race42008.com/2007/06/20/thompson-hooks-a-doozy/#comments
Pot and Kettle: Get back in your kennel.
149 at one stage last evening the lay odds on Cruddas went right out to 1000, which is crazy - a few folk could end up with a very expensive liability on their hands for very little potential gain. As has been the case all the way through the betfair odds really have not reflected the facts on the ground. Benn was favorite for a long time which made no sense and the current price on Cruddas is completely out of line and I would say that the Johnson price is now too low ( Guido thinks otherwise hence the tightening on Johnson yesterday afternoon ).
147: No-one cares if it’s true or not, that’s the point. it is student high jinks and too long ago to be of any significance.
BTW I am not a tory (not sure from your ramblings if you thought I was or not, but just in case).
So what is your problem 159. It is Roger that spins half truths and gossip, unless you are Roger.
Re 147, Roger, if you read the Telegraph story you will note that there is no alegation that Cameron trashed anywhere.
The club may have, and they name specific individuals, but not Cameron.
145. What a thing to bet on…
Having said that, I’m swinging back and forth on whether the US is going to go for this before George Bush moves on. I do not believe there will a joint US-Israeli effort here, it’ll be one or the other but the US has the ommph that the Israelis don’t.
The US can’t keep such a naval strike capacity there forever, 3 carrier strike groups and to add to that the ground based capacity. If its sabre rattling, its expensive so my assumption is at this moment and time that they are seriously considering using it. They also need to pretty much swamp the Persian Gulf to negate the threat of blokes in little boats trying to attack oil tankers. Difficult but largely do-able. 3 carrier battle groups plus other countries could do this.
From what I gather, any strike on Iran will be extensive and would be designed to ensure that even if they send their surrogates out to cause trouble elsewhere in the region they won’t too many working phones with which to call them up and tell them to do something.
Much reeasrch work has been done including US ground missions into Iran. I think the Saudis are relatively happy to allow the Iranians to take a hit, they are more worried than anyone about the prospect of Persian imperialism.
If they did it, taking a stab at when they’d do it, after September is a best guess. I notice a fall in US stocks of fuels depsite the oil price going up. In the last couple of years there has been a burst of rises on the markets then the US sudddenly announces it has bumper reserves in its tanks, mainly because its been buying the stuff up helping the price rise (though there are other factors too). The price then falls back after such an inventory report comes out. I’m guessing that if the US plans an attack they’ll want to top up the tanks first to account for some disruption in supply. Thus, watch the US fuel stocks reports as well.
As one who’s been critical of Sir Menzies Campbell in the past, I believe he’s come out with flying colours from this matter. This was clearly some sort of underhand scheme by Brown, probably designed to dilute the Liberal Democrats’ anti-Labour potency. It would have disastrous for the party, and Ming and Paddy Ashdown were entirely justified in telling him where to poke it.
And sorry, I’ve yet to witness the political mastery of Gordon Brown that some of the shriller Labour supporters on this thread believe (or claim to believe) is indubitable. We’ve had two absurd stunts by Brown so far. The budget tax cut that never was: a childish piece of game playing designed to wrong foot David Cameron, but which in the end made Brown himself look smug and duplicitous. Now this nonsense of offering Liberal Democrats government positions. Brown, it increasingly seems to me, is a very immature man and one prone to indulging in shallow tricks and gimmicks. Very poor politics from him; very wise politics from Sir Ming Campbell.
161.Your comment made me remember my student days. I don’t know how many times sheepish students were seen sneaking out of the halls with road signs, although I never did find out how two individuals managed to come home with a chicken (merrily clucking away) and a set of traffic lights!
Boy, Roger are they pissed off with you. On the rantometer you are but a kiddie compared with SeanT (who everybody seems to love - perhaps because he is a published author and it pleases their vanity, personally I think most of his stuff is tosh) or Will L, or several others
Your entries are also blissfully short - for those of us with a challenged attention span. I think you have struck a raw nerve about the Bully Club. The Tories do like their leaders squeeky clean in public.
167: ‘personally I think most of his stuff is tosh’
His novels, his posts, or both?
Nick Robinson saying on Jeremy Vine Show, Brown new the offer would be declined, makes Brown look good and inclusive, makes Lib Dems look messy. I assume this will be the BBC line on later news bulletins.
Saint Clare of Ladywood calling it a muddle, seems she doesn’t want to get in with Gordon then.
144 / 158 - One possibly intriguing (though completely theoretical) aspect to a Bloomberg candidacy is what would happen if he ran and won just enough states to hold the balance of power in the electoral college and deny both Republicans and Democrats a majority there (even winning one state could be enough for this if the election is very tight again). According to the fascinating article I read on wikipedia this would result in the House of Representatives voting on the President from the Democrat, Republican and Bloomberg and the Democrat would win but it could be very tight for him / her (they control 26 states and 26 states is the minimum number, ie a majority, needed to elect the president from the House).
Lembit seems to think it was a good idea!
168 (Spectacularly O/T)
By the way, Hermes Trismegistus, have you seen that a new book has been published about you?
173: No. Who’s the author? (Is it seant?) Out of vanity I must by a copy and put it on the shelf in my toilet.
174 It’s called “The Secret History of Hermes Trismegistus: Hermeticism from Ancient to Modern Times” by Jan Assmann, Florian Ebeling, and David Lorton. It was reviewed in the FT last Saturday, and costs about £20. Nothing personal, but I think I am going to wait for the smash West End Musical version myself.
LOL
It has been confirmed that the Labour Cabinet has uittely lost touch with reality!
Jack Straw thinks that John Prescott is responsible for the Channel Tunnel rail link! (which was finished in 1994!!)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6226082.stm
Mr Straw also led tributes to Deputy Prime Minster John Prescott, who is standing down as well. He praised Mr Prescott’s “courage” and said he had transformed the country’s infrastructure, with projects such as the Channel Tunnel rail link.
Oh the mirth!…
What ever the merits of the, ‘Ming thing’ its one in the eye for those who think GB is predictable: autumn election next.
173. Not me.
Tosh, John Wheatley? Tosh?? You have a long way to go before you can get a reaction with criticisms as feeble and effete as that. Time Out called me ‘an apology for a man’. Now THAT’s more like it.
169. If Brown knew the offer would be refused, going ahead with it could store up problems for the future. Sure, it maks him look inclusive now (though not that inclusive if it was never a serious runner), but if it ends up looking like a stunt then memories of this will cloud any negotiations following an indecicive election.
The more I think about the Ashdown plot, the more barmy and inept it seems.
It blows out of the water any suggestion that Brown is a great political thinker and able to outflank his opponents. What if they’d said “yes”? He’d have split the Labour Party in two, possibly lost many of his own Cabinet supporters, and had at least one LibDem sharing crucial information about the inner-workings of the Labour Government with a party which remained in opposition to Labour - if Pantsdown had been gagged and agreed not to impart any information to his own party, then he surely would cease to be a LibDem at that point and become a defector to the Labour Party?
Does Gordon not realise that Labour still has a majority; it’s only AFTER the election that Labour will not have one?
(And I still think won’t even be the biggest party)
[176] MBoy, surely you remember the time Prezza transformed the Chunnel by getting stuck in it & the French used his legs as a clothes horse until he’d slimmed down enough to get out again…
171, Just a thought here.
If it came down to purely number of states controlled (ie it doesnt matters about size of state and electoral college vote tally), surely in that scenario the benefit would come down to the candidate with more of the spasrely populated places which I think are, on balance more Republican. Obviously thats based on my faded memory of the last Presidential election and it could be very different this time.
Am I reading the voting process wrong?
Re 178, SeanT,
I like a man who gives as good as he gets!
176 - The channel tunnel rail link finished in 1994?! It’s not scheduled to be completed until November this year (and what are the chances it will be late?).
176 - the Channel Tunnel rail link is the “link” that joins the channel tunnel with london (currently Waterloo, but once Crossrail opens then with Kings X) & has been one of the major infrastructure projects under New Labour.
176
you are confusing the tunnel with the link
http://www.railway-technology.com/projects/chunnel/
182 - If there is no majority in the electoral college it is decided by the House of Representatives. But the House votes by state rather than individually (ie all the representatives for each state get together and vote for a candidate and whoever gets a majority takes that state’s vote. Ties are possible.) Based on the current make-up the Democrats control 26 states in the House apparently. (I’m not sure whether it would be the current House or an incoming House after the 2008 elections that would vote in this eventuality.)
It’s all here (and rather sadly I found it fascinating!):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Electoral_College#Electing_the_President_and_Vice_President
Aah, oops! All the times I’ve been on Eurostar got me confused…
76. What an idiot!
I thought Gordo was meant to be a change from Blair - Blair was pitching a spoof offer to the Limp Dems 10 years ago to screw em over - same old same old from Gordo..
179. David, I do wonder at the thinking behind this strategy to make Brown “appear” more inclusive when we all know that he has been incapable of being a team player in Blair’s government.
I await with interest to see if he will manage to give a convincing appearance of collective cabinet government in the next few months.
He has been the “clunking fist” dictating Labour’s domestic policy for 10 years, will some of the colleagues he has slapped down in the past all sit meekly on the backbenches in support?
180: ‘It blows out of the water any suggestion that Brown is a great political thinker and able to outflank his opponents.’
Well, it certainly shows that Brown has passed his noon as a political operator and his best achievements are behind him. I feel sorry for the likes of Alan Johnson. Going through the drudgery of the Deputy-Leadership contest, he’s surely looking on at this fiasco and thinking that maybe Brown wouldn’t have been so hard to beat after all.
” Well its put the Lib Dems back in the news!!!!!
The only bad news is no news?
Is that what it is all about? ”
What !!! - re-enforcing the idea that the Lib Dems will prop up Labour to keep them in power come the next GE is hugely, massively, absolutely bad news for them.
The cat’s out of the bag, stuff like this sticks like s**t to a blanket. Conservatives will be running with this from now on - it’ll be copy for all leaflets from now to the GE.
PREDICTION - 10% yougov rating for LD’s is on it’s way.
Matt.
Re 189 BurbachChris, please explain your comment “What an idiot!” about point 76.
some very generous person is offering 50s on Cruddas on betfair at the moment. I think Cruddas only has a small chance of winning but if he does a £2 bet would pay for a lot of beer.
187. Ah right with you now.
193. Absolutely correct.
You can see how I am treating the story on my blog:
http://www.marcuswood.blogspot.com/
I won’t be letting anyone forget the fact that talks had been going on for some days before Ming eventually turned down the offer, either.
If this is how things are when Labour has a clear majority I think most voters will coprrectly surmise how it would go if there was a hung Parliament.
71.
“Lib Dems at Westminster must be about ready to wield the dagger again.”
Step on a District Line tube Marcus and I’m sure they’ll be waiting for you!
What odds on Blair timing his resignation as an MP to coincide Sedgefield by-election with Ealing so less bad news when Lib Dems wil latter and Cameron is humiliated?
Interesting contrasts.
Cameron suggests the Tories and the LibDems cooperate in finding a candidate to take on Labour in London - Ming turns him down flat, not a word, no discussion, xxxx off.
Brown suggests the LibDems help him out by ‘lending’ him a couple of junior ministers as political figleaves - Ming goes off for a chat with his closest advisers, we’ll get back to you on that one, be seeing ya.
197 Marcus. Are you saying that liberal Conservative Cameron has ruled out a coalition with the Lib Dems in the event of a hung parliament ??
What of the Greg Dyke affair, the Con/LibDem coalition in Brum and other councils and the proposed rainbow coalition in Wales !!
You were correct earlier …. you do write “partisan rubbish” !!
197
Are you also making it clear on your blog Marcus. That in the event of a hung parliament, that the Tories would not negotiate with the Libdems at all, not ever, no way, and if they did you would immediately resign from the Tory Party??
Oh, and it’s interesting that Ming’s ‘closest advisers’ do not include any of his MPs. No wonder they are hopping mad today. Vince Cable once described me as ‘hapless’; I wonder what he’s saying about Ming today.
180/192 - what utter delusion! Gordon appears inclusive and generous and Lds just throw it back in his face. All he has to do is sit back and smile “i did ask!”
I find this approach very exciting and am totally relaxed about it. And have you also noticed - Tory NHS policy is totally crowded out of the media. Probably for the best for them, as their policies usually withstand, oh, 10 minutes of scrutiny before they implode.
201 coldstone. Hello little Sir Echo !!
Right, Peter the Punters tips of the day:
Firstly there are no “account tips” what follow are long shot each way bets for small numbers only, at your own risk.
I may have the spellings wrong:
2.30, Warsaw
3.05 Cosmodrome
3.45 (Winner will be Yates but to short to bother with)
Sgt Cecsil (sic)
Badam
Le Miricle (sic)
4.55 Desert View
5.30 Man of vision.
I don’t have the odds.
I stress these are all each way, some should get in the top 3, small bets.
Jack W I think Baskerville made my point at 199. This is nothing to do with us, it’s about what the Lib Dems would do in a hung parliament.
What the voters will want to know before they vote in a GE, and what they are entitled to be told, is which way the Lib Dems would jump in the event of no outright winner.
Since undoubtedly the Lib Dems will evade this question throughout the election campaign I will be happy to use this example, along with others, as evidence that Lib Dem claims to be ‘equidistant’ are false.
205. Yates to come out on top - may be a popular selection with some here on pb.com
It is amusing the way Roger tends to go into hibernation whenever his analysis proves less-than-adequate. But loveably, he pops back up later with no reference to before and will continue posting, no sign of contrition or having learnt from experience. A toy one never tires of.
206 Marcus. Well, there we have it. A hung parliament is nothing to do with the Conservatives !!
It’s the way you tell em Marcus.
206 I am sure that you will twist the rejection of GB’s offer to suit your own purposes , the only thing false will be your campaign literature , nothing new there as you are a Conservative .
Any chance of you answering 201 Marcus?
after all we’ve been here before!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,5094471-103690,00.html
Thought ming looked really bruised on Sky.
Wonder if Ashdown was tempted to say yes, but was restrained by Campbell, who had been convinced by those around him it would a bad idea.
Ashdown is peeved that he’s not getting a job he’d like, so tells guardian in order to show it was a “real” offer.
I have watched both BBC1 1.00 news and ITN’s 1.30 broadcast who have both pitched events surrounding the offer of a cabinet post as a snub to Brown from Ashdown/Lib Dems and underlined what Lib Dems senior politicians as dirty tactics employed by Labour. Rather than reinforcing the perspective that Lib Dems are in Labour’s pocket it is done quite the opposite as the political correspondents highlight the major areas of disagreement between Labour and the Lib Dems - ID cards, Trident, Nuclear Weapons etc.
193 - movement in next You Gov poll - I agree but upwards for Lib Dems I would suggest rather than downwards.
209,210,211 The three stooges strike again.
If Brown knew his offer would be refused, why did he make it? It must have been for other purposes than being inclusive, as he knew it was never going to happen and he could get ‘inclusiveness’ in other more certain ways.
So the only alternatives assessments are that either it was a propaganda ploy to show how he was inclusive and the LibDems were not,
Or, he did it simply to cause confusion in the LibDem ranks.
Both suggest he is concerned about the LibDem effect on Labour’s vote.
If either are the case then admitting that he did not expect the offer to be accepted will damage his objective and is clumsy, giving ammunition to those who want to say Brown cannot be trusted.
Very odd. Is there something else behind it all?
214 Marcus. More three strikes and you’re out Marcus !!
When’s the next poll?
176.
“Jack Straw thinks that John Prescott is responsible for the Channel Tunnel”
Might that have been because he was thinking of England’s most powerful and expensive boring machine?
213. I really don’t get this line from “senior” LDs.. how is proposing that opposition peers joing the government to the leader of that party, then offering a job to one opposition politician somehow underhand and dirty politics?
I can understand Liberals saying it was a terrible proposal and why would he think they’d agree, but “oooh, how dirty to offer us jobs” sounds like “your offer made us look stooopid and that’s not nice!”
Just watched Ming Campbell on Sky news, oh dear. He had the chance to put in a robust performance and take the sting out of this story from the Libdems point of view by turning this on Brown and the lack of talent in his party, he failed. “I went off to think about it, and then decided against it”
The Libdems need a leader not so personally close to Brown who can be ruthless enough to attack him full throttle, I don’t think that Ming Campbell has that “killer” instinct to go for the jugular.
Let’s assume some Lib Dems want rid of Ming and he won’t go. How do you challenge a Lib Leader. As it hapens I think he is safe foir the same reason Major was in 1995. It would need his two big rivals Heseltine and Portillo then, Huhneand Clegg now to unite against him. Both fear correctly the other will leave them in the spotlight with the dagger ensuring their own victory
The real problem for Ming Campbell is that he has caused ructions amongst the LD Parliamentary Party. As Charles Kennedy discovered this is the crucial pressure point for any leader. I don’t think anyone is about to table a motion of no confidence, but if one was tabled, it could now well be lost by Campbell. Or be close enough to make his position untenable. For as long as it was grumblings amongst some activists, Campbell was safe. But this seems to have really pissed off both the “old guard” MPs (who are pernially suspiscous of any senior figures getting ministerial posts) and the “English young turks” (who seem deeply pissed off that Campbell leans so strongly on Lord Kirkwood for advice only for them to then see their names attached to possible government appointments in the papers). These two groups together come close to being a majority of LD MPs.
I don’t think this is fatal for Campbell yet. But he’s probably on a yellow card. A good result in Ealing (e.g. a victory) probably buys him more time. A bad result (e.g. anything other than a victory or a very, very close second place) could spell the beginning of the end.
The trouble is Marcus we are not stooges. If the Tories are attacking Gordon Brown over this, (as is their right) if they honestly believe that to enter into negotiations with another Party, to offer deals to members of another party, to offer cabinet positions to another party ,is wrong, fine a clear position to take! Then the Tories must make it clear, that they will not be negotiating with the Libdems or others under any circumstances, such ‘grubby deals’ are not for them.
Witan et al, Nick Robinson’s timeline is illuminating. It is a complete lie to say Ming had nothing to do with this:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/nickrobinson/2007/06/timeline_the_de.html
”
• MONDAY LUNCHTIME:
Ming Campbell is invited to meet Gordon Brown. Brown makes a surprise offer of junior ministerial jobs for a handful of Lib Dem peers - thought to include Lord Ashdown, Lord Lester, Baroness Neuberger and Lord Carlile. Ming says that he needs to think about it. Another meeting is planned for the following day….Later Paddy Ashdown finds a pink note in his House of Lords message box inviting him to call Gordon Brown’s office to fix a meeting. This is fixed for Wednesday. Ashdown sees his party leader to discuss. They agree that Ashdown should not take a ministerial job but should go ahead and see Brown in case he has another offer to make
• WEDNESDAY MORNING:
The Guardian … speculates that two MPs - Nick Clegg and Vince Cable may be invited to join the Cabinet. Clegg and Cable are taken by complete surprise having known nothing about Brown’s offer to their leader. Faced by a furious reaction from within his own party Ming Campbell tells the BBC that no Lib Dem will serve in a Brown government.
• WEDNESDAY AFTERNOON:
Paddy Ashdown has his planned meeting with Gordon Brown at which he is offered the post of Northern Ireland Secretary. He tells Brown that as an old soldier he always follows the orders of his commanding officer. He adds that even if Ming Campbell had thought it a good idea, he did not.
• THURSDAY:
The BBC reveal the offer of a Cabinet job to Ashdown. Recriminations begin. Any prospect of a deal is off.”
The Three Stooges - combined age 128.
Conservative and Labour parties are going into the next election aiming to win a majority and form a government. What are the LibDems aiming for?
215. Witan. Or could it simply be that Brown has been clunkingly hamfisted? I think we too often forget to consider Captain Cock-up as an explanation.
If Campbell said (and I do not doubt you Chris D) “I went off to think about it, and then decided against it” about Brown’s offer, yet turned down Cameron instantly on the idea of a joint mayoral candidate, he will have clinched the case that he is for working with Labour at any time and working with the Tories at no time.
how extraordinary that Campbell should say that though, surely he understands what it means.
SeanT you can see more EU democracy in action form an old Maoist who, unsurprisingly, does not think people should be able to decide for themselves.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6225710.stm
Some political-sensitive person should change his name by deed-poll and stand in the Southall by-election as “Gordon Brown - Scottish PM for England”
I wonder if the real Gordon Brown would have the courage to do so?
I think this whole saga will be an useful dry run for all three parties in the event of a hung parliament. There will be much chewing of the coalition fat in the ensuing weeks.
The spotlight will undoubtedly fall mainly on the yellow peril, but it’s also important that both the Tories and Labour start to turn their minds more seriously to the mechanics of coalition politics. Certainly going AWOL in the debate as Marcus infers is no way for the Conservatives to get back into government. Brown will tempt and tease the Lib Dems and they’ll need to be better prepared next time should our Gawd come knocking.
Rejoice Rejoice Rejoice
Get ready for a massive celebration,in 7 days time no Tony Blair and equally as important no scouse scrubber.
A day many of us thought would never come.
Rejoice Rejoice Rejoice
Get ready for a massive celebration,in 7 days time no Tony Blair and equally as important no scouse scrubber.
A day many of us thought would never come.
Rejoice Rejoice Rejoice
Get ready for a massive celebration,in 7 days time no Tony Blair and equally as important no scouse scrubber.
A day many of us thought would never come.
Rejoice Rejoice Rejoice
Get ready for a massive celebration,in 7 days time no Tony Blair and equally as important no scouse scrubber.
A day many of us thought would never come.
Rejoice Rejoice Rejoice
Get ready for a massive celebration,in 7 days time no Tony Blair and equally as important no scouse scrubber.
A day many of us thought would never come.
206. “What the voters will want to know before they vote in a GE, and what they are entitled to be told, is which way the Lib Dems would jump in the event of no outright winner.”
In which case the public are entitled to know what the Tory and Labour policy would be in the event of a hung parliament.
I must admit that I haven’t been aware of this custom in other elections.
A good response quoted by the BBC, on this LibDem Brown farrago:
William Hague said: “There is nothing wrong trying to reach agreement across politics. I think this was a rather naive and bungled attempt to do so.”
He added: “A new kind of politics in this country is going to require some new politicians and that requires a change of government and David Cameron in as prime minister.”
225 Baskerville. Easy. The sandal brigade are hoping for a hung parliament then a coalition and then PR. Next question !
Agree strongly with #32, as a bit of an unreconstructed leftie myself, I’ve looked on with envy at the way that the Lib Dems managed to drag some concessions out of Labour at Holyrood, and would have hoped that they could have done the same at Westminster, eg, “Drop ID cards, spend the money elsewhere, voting reform and I think we can work something out” would be something I’d have seen as a valuable step forward.
The Lib Dems can always retain the option of walking away if a major point of principle comes up.
For gawds sake, it would have shown there was some point to having Lib Dem MPs! Compared to the dismissive condescending way Blair has treated them at PMQs… this was surely a golden opportunity. The Lib Dems have bottled it.
JackW, I have left a query about Jacobite rebels which you might be able to help me with on the “Was Paddy Ashdown behind the Guardian story?” thread to save clogging this one. Would appreciate any help you can give me.
What really interests me is why the Lib Dems are so sensitive about all this?
Labour, the Liberals and the SDP all share the same political roots; everybody knows where their sensibilities really lie, most people remember the Lib Lab pact in the 1970’s - why all the fuss?
Look will someone ask me this. The ashdown/LD int eh cabinet move was pretty obvious since that Brown “all the talents” speech weeks ago.
Why did it blow up now and why did it blow up in the way it did?
Who’s really behind this current story and why?
241 Marcus. Most political wonkers might recall the Lib/Lab pact but I venture to suggest it’s not on top of the average punters list of conversations to be had on a wet Wednesday !
Talking of SDP roots … are Rik and his nag still touting for North Korean defectors in the Royal Enclosure at Ascot ??
242.”Why did it blow up now and why did it blow up in the way it did?
Who’s really behind this current story and why?” I would be interested in those answers as well.
Genuine question rather than defection spin alert. Could this backfire on both Campbell and Brown by pushing one of the Orange bookers to defect to the Conservatives?
238. Precisely. They are campaigning for a hung parliament and to do deals off the back of it. The other two parties are not. Therefore, it is the LibDems who have to answer the question, not the others.
[The others would be stupid not to have thought about and planned for it, but as they are not campaigning for it, they are under no obligation to start discussing such hypotheticals.]
People here have too much time to think, so who is Mr Saxon?
240 ChrisD. I’ll reply shortly on that thread.
241 We can imagine the conversation between yourself and a LibDem waverer at the next GE .
LDW - I am very worried about your literature saying the LibDems will prop up Labour in a hung parliament .
MW - Yes there is proof of this .
LDW - What proof ?
MW - GB offered leading LibDems ministerial positions in his government .
LDW - Oh they accepted them did they ?
MW errr No .
LDW - what other proof then ?
MW - surely you remember the Lib/Lab pact of 30 odd years ago .
LDW - No actually I’m not old enough for that but I can just remember the incompetence and corruption of the Major government .
MW - Ah but we have Cameron now and that was over 10 years ago .
LDW - So you expect me to remember something that happened 30 odd years ago and ignore something that happened 10 or so years ago .
MW - Errr Yes
LDW - Think I will stick to voting for that Sanders chappy .
Red Flump. As one of the few people who heard Andrew Lansley announce the Tories ‘thoughts on’ the NHS before he was drowned out by Gordon and Ming I can confirm what you suspected.
He was so bad that if I was a conspiracy theorist I would suggest this Lib Lab story was dreamt up by a Tory who wanted to shut Lansley up. He got as far as saying he wanted the NHS taken out of the hands of government and put into the hands of a quango!
Re my 205, Some spelling correctios.
It should have been Sergeant Cesil
Le Miracle not Miricle.
Desert Dew (not view)
Baddam not Badam
Still, hopefully taht did not cause any confusion
247.Many thanks JackW.
245 Baskerville. CCHQ and the Brown brigade know a hung parliament is the most likely outcome of the next election and dependent of the parliamentary maths know where the most likely partner will come from !!
The punters are entitled to know where ALL parties stand in that event.
Sorry, Jack, I don’t buy that, even from a man of your age and experience. Labour and Tory are playing to win and have won before, LibDems are playing for a draw and for the first time in living memory might succeed. Who is the onus on to explain what they’d do?
Also, you haven’t responded to my contrast between Campbell’s response to the two offers and what that tells us about the party’s ‘equidistance’.
Some people are talking about a hung Parliament at the next GE - if this is the case the Tories will have an overall English majority and the WLQ should then explode. Please give us an English Parliament now even allow non British EU citizens the right to vote in the new English Parliament as they can in both Scottish and Welsh elections, the left no have nothing to fear so do it now. PS SBS I do hope your EU wife does obtain the right to vote in a GE. Maybe an English Parliament would be a start for her.
206 - Marcus - Which way will the Tories ‘jump’ in the event of a hung Parliament?
253 Baskerville. For the Conservatives and Labour as the senior partner to go walkabout on the issue is IMO not an option !
“Equidistance” is a Lib Dem tactical fig leaf. Frankly there are far too many issues where the parties are dancing on a pin head to prove a difference. Politically Social Democracy is the new black !!
Looks like Hills will shortly be offering 4/6 for Campbell to get the push before the next election. Can’t see it yet….
1430: William Hill are offering odds of 14/1 that Gordon Brown’s first cabinet will include one or more non-Labour politicians.
But the current row over whether any Lib-Dem should be permitted to join a Labour cabinet has seen Hills make Sir Menzies Campbell, who is warning his Lib-Dem coleagues not to associate with Labour, a 4/6 chance not to lead his Party into the next General Election and 11/10 to do so.
“If Gordon Brown calculated that this initiative might destabilise the Lib Dems, he seems to have been spot on as Sir Ming now seems to be damned if he says ‘yes’ and damned if he says ‘no’ and therefore we think he is now an odds-against chance to survive as Leader into the next General Election campaign,” said Hill’s spokesman Graham Sharpe.
Meanwhile sticking with politics and Alan Johnson is now a red-hot 1/3 favourite to become the next Deputy Leader of the Labour Party with William Hill, who have slashed his odds from 4/6.
“The support for Johnson is beginning to look conclusive - AJ seems set to deliver winnings to the punters who have backed the former postman as though he were a first-class bet ever since he was offered at 4/1,” said Sharpe.
256. I’ll spell it out again, then. Because Tory and Labour are competing to achieve their goal of being the next government, they have to answer questions on what they would do about Health, Education, Defence, Foreign Affairs - the stuff of government. LibDems have to answer questions on what they would do if they end up holding the balance of power in a hung parliament because that is their goal.
Not like you to be deliberately obtuse, so I wonder why you’re so prickly about it that you have to try to bully Marcus.
Meanwhile Ladbrokes have…
Next Permanent Liberal Democrat Leader
Chris Huhne 3.50
Nick Clegg 4.00
David Lewis 6.00
Ed Davey 9.00
Charles Kennedy 13.00
Simon Hughes 13.00
Alistair Carmichael 17.00
Lembit Opik 17.00
Michael Moore 17.00
Norman Lamb 17.00
Sarah Teather 17.00
Vincent Cable 17.00
Susan Kramer 21.00
Don Foster 26.00
Lynne Featherstone 26.00
Nick Harvey 26.00
Paddy Ashdown 26.00
Andrew Stunnel 34.00
Jo Swinson 34.00
Julia Goldsworthy 34.00
David Heath 51.00
Paul Burstow 51.00
Paul Holmes 51.00
Gabriela Irimia 501.00
253 - the Lib Dems are not ‘playing for a draw’ this time any more than the Tories were ‘playing for a loss’ last time.
The Lib Dems are playing for the maximum number of votes and seats they can get, and with two or possibly three more years to go before the next election, have no greater responsibility to discuss what might or might not happen if there is a hung parliamnet than anyone else.
231/235. Mervyn Hall. 5 identical tasteless posts. Sadly not a record on here.
Nonetheless You have managed to insult both Cherie and Liverpudlians. No doubt a Tory disciple of another leading light of the Bullingdon club Boris Johnson who not only insulted Liverpudlians but was arrested for trashing restaurants. What an attractive lot of followers Cameron has gathered..
255. Probably for the DUP + UUP + SNP in that order.
4/6 on Campbell going before the GE is an excellent bet. I’d probablt take 1/5 on a private bet, but if the market is offering better than that I’ll gladly do business with William Hill.
261 Roger - If you think the only people who are rejoicing at Blairs departure are ‘followers of Cameron’ you know Labour a lot less well than I thought!
259 - Doubt ‘David Lewis’ will do it - but David Laws might run. Steve Webb must be a possibility too.
258 Baskerville. It’s not obtuse.
The closer the GE comes and if a hung parliament appears most likely, it’ll not just be the quiche brigade who have questions to answer. Look at the Scottish and Welsh elections as examples !
As for Marcus, if he can’t answer a reasoned question what is he doing as a PPC ?? …. and that goes for all PPC’s of all parties !!
The oddity about the “maximum number of votes and maximum number of seats” approach is that this doesn’t necessarily equate to maximum influence/power. This isn’t the LibDems fault, just a fact that their influence is mazimised if the other two parties are close together.
I remember being asked by an ex-LibDem employee which result a LibDem should prefer from the following two scenarios (I’m not sure the %s and seats tie up but you’ll get the general point):
Scenario A
1st major party 40% and 370 seats
2nd major party 30% and 190 seats
LibDems 22% and 70 Seats
Scenario B
1st major party 36% and 280 seats
2nd major party 36% and 280 seats
LibDems 18% and 60 seats
If the “maximum votes and seats” line is true, then the LDs want scenario A. But it doesn’t take a genius to work out thye are much more powerful in scenario B.
How you try and bring about scenario B though is rather harder to explain….
Ashdown snubs Brown as lead on Telegraph, BBC, etc. As bad publicity goes, this isn’t.
I agree with Roger on the tasteless posts. I thought it was misogynist as well as anti-Cherie/Liverpudlian. And I will be happy to see her husband retired.
What tosh. Brown knows Nulab dont have a prayer at the next election so he is ducking and weaving. he will be crucified if he pulls out of iraq and so the libdums offered an easy way out, end of.
with a weaker economy and the cash for peerages court case pending they are simply dead in the water, the game is up for broon.
266. On another tack.
Hacks like us think there is a possibility, probability or certainty that there will be a hung parliament after the next election because we have all studied UNS and watch the seat predictors closely and understand the current in-built statistical bias in Labour’s favour.
I beg to suggest that for the majority of voters, however, it is a simple question of “Will it be Brown or Cameron, Tory or Labour”. They don’t know about the statistical bias in our FPTP system and so, when they see opinion polls putting Cameron four or so percent ahead, they assume he will win a majority if those figures are matched at the election.
Could this affect the result. Is this Baskerville’s paradox?
Baskerville’s paradox: As Cameron’s lead exceeds four percent (perceived winning margin) but stays below ten percent (actual winning margin required), Conservative voters assume he will win and therefore are less likely to vote, reducing his chances of winning.
I’m also looking forward to Blairs departure. The tasteless part of Mervyns posts was their reference to Mrs Blair as a “Scouse scrubber”
Well pardon me - but as someone who agrees that that kind of terminology is objectionable why must you suppose that Mervyn is a Cameron supporter?
270. Baskerville, you may be right at the moment - but if a hung Parliament looks likely throughout the GE campaign, the media will talk of little else. The “great unwashed” will get the message because every newspaper and TV news broadcast will be screaming “it looks like no party will win, so everything could depend on how the LibDems jump”. A month or more of that being blasted at the electorate and they’ll understand the basic situation by polling day….
270 Baskerville. Not too sure about that !
Turnout or perhaps more accurately differential turnout might be the key. The 92 election is the most recent example, where a close election drove turnout up and provided a suprise result. The difference in 09/10 is that the Lib Dems are IMO too well dug in to fall below 40 seats.
273. Grrrr. And I so wanted to have a paradox!
275 How about this? The more papers talk up a hung parliament, the more Tory voters will decide that they might just as well vote UKIP.
276. I doubt that. An election that is seen as close is likely to encourage people to return to the folds of Labour or Tory - even if they hold their noses. If I was a drumbeater for UKIP, I think I’d want Cameron to be miles ahead of miles behind in order to avoid the “wasted vote” atatck.
267 Actually, Arch (may I call you that?) if you look a bit deeper into your two scenarios, it does rather depend where the point where the media take your influence “as a 3rd party” seriously. At 70, I am not sure whether it would improve much, but at 80? at90? or possibly 3 figures? But every step moving back towards 1920s style figures will bring the LDs nearer the point of media “take-off”. The point I make is that at some point, long term strength is preferable to short term kingmaking. Apart from anything else, the electorate don’t necessarily respect kingmaking a great deal, and you can just as easily be squeezed next time around if your choice of “king” displeases the people!
If I had to guess where the take-off would be, it would be where Parliament is forced to recognise that there are more than one “HM Opposition”, which guessing would be at about the level where the third party has two-thirds or more the number of MPs of the second party. So as a scenario, Party A 375, Party B, 150, (say) LDs 100.
It is an open question, then whether, if it were Party A 300, Party B 225, and LDs 100 would be preferable. Of course in scenario 1 LDs have a strong position in coalition / working arrangement formation immediately, but the imminence of becoming 2nd party in the first scenario is also very tempting!
258 - Baskerville, you’re ridiculous. In 253 you admit that a hung parliament is a real possibility. Don’t the voters have the right know, what Conservatives and Labour would do in that event, whether they aspire to it or not. In 253 you said yourself, that the reason why Lib Dems should _this time_ tell in advance what they would do in the event of a hung parliament is the fact that they might succeed to obtain it, not the fact that they aspire to it, as that has been the case before.
Anyway, I think that the Lib Dems would be fools if they would show their cards before the elections, then they couldn’t bargain anymore for the best conditions to enter a coalition. It’s better to keep both Conservatives and Labour in excitement.
Finally, if Lib Dems would bind themselves either to Labour or to Conservatives before the elections, that would probably affect the outcome.
277 It might. It might not. IIRC at the last election a considerable number of voters wanted coalition (of various kinds).
278. Tim, you’re right of course. Getting more votes and seats is AN important factor (e.g. a hung Parliament with the LDs reduced to half a dozen seats would hardly give the party crushing influence…). And I’m sure that actually coming second in seats or votes would be preferred to holding the balance of power by virtually every LibDem member.
My point is that “maximum votes and maximum seats” is not the ONLY important factor. There is clearly some sort of trade off that LDs would be willing to do in some bizarre Faustian pact situation because their influence IN PART depends on the relative strength of the other two parties.
So, given there are - in my humble opinion - a wide range of plausible (indeed likely) counter-examples to the “maximum votes/maximum seats” mantra, the party should spend some seriosu time working out (and publicising) its red lines in a hung Parliament scenario.
If I was a journalist, I’d ask Campbell which of my two scenarios he’d prefer. The logic of his public position is he prefers the non-hung Parliament result. I’m not sure that’s really a sustainable argument under cross-examination.
279. My point, Magrat, was that both Cameron and Brown have approached Campbell with offers, implying that they both want a ‘new kind of politics’ (whether you believe them or not). Campbell’s responses were markedly different - rejecting the Conservative proposal out of hand and ‘going off to think’ about Labour’s.
The implication of this and earlier comments from Campbell, is that the LibDems lean towards Labour and won’t have anything to do with the Tories. This is a legitimate line of attack (Marcus) or query (the press) because the LibDems are actively seeking to be in a position to do a deal after the next election.
Cameron got plenty of stick about his Dyke offer, so Campbell supporters shouldn’t be surprised he’s feeling the heat from his MPs who weren’t consulted about his decision to ‘think about’ Brown’s approach.
I’d rather discuss my paradox, however.
The LD position on a hung Parliament should be as follows:
1. We hope to win with a majority - but accept it is unlikely that any party will secure an outright majority.
2. If we don’t have a majority, but find ourselves in the position of being the largest minority (again, we accept this is optimistic), we will form a minority government, try and garner informal support from moderate Labour and Tory MPs seek to change the electoral system and call a second election within x months.
3. If there is a hung parliament and we are not the largest party, it is unlikely that the Queen will call upon our leader to form a government. The ball will be in Mr. Brown’s or Mr. Cameron’s court. Buckingham Palace will be seeking an undertaking from them that they could secure a majority in the Commons for the Queens speech. We would be willing to enter negotiations with either, but we could not and would not support either of them unless the Queen’s speech included (a) reform of the electoral system (b) scrapping ID cards (c) positive engagement with the European Union and (d) a timetabled commitment to withdraw troops from Iraq within x months. (NB: write your own list, this is just my best guess at the LD’s red lines). If those four things were not included, we would vote down the Queen’s speech even if this meant an immediate second election. If those four things were included, we might entertain a more formal relationship with either Labour or the Conservatives.
Baskerville, your paradox is interesting, but I wouldn’t underestimate the level of human conformity and bandwagon-jumping.
Lots of people voted Labour in ‘97 when it was clear to all that they didn’t need any extra support and were going to romp to power with a grotesquely huge majority.
It wouldn’t surprise me that much if floating voters see ‘Cameron 4% ahead’ in the press, and instead think ‘he’s gonna win, I want to be a part of that!11one1′ then go out and vote Tory purely to be a part of the winning team, in the hope of recapturing the emotion of the moment from 1997.
Not that I’d complain if we won, but fairweather bandwagon Tories who don’t know how it feels during the lean times might be the decisive force in the next election.
BTW, Peter the Punter’s each way tip on Le Miracle came in a place so you would have been in there.
284. Good point, Tory Ben. Will Baskerville’s paradox and Tory Ben’s bandwagon protocol cancel each other out! It could be a good example of how media handling of campaigns can have an impact on turnout.
Roger-why are Scousers different from Poles, whom you had no problem making racist jokes about?
282 - Baskerville, Brown’s offer was about a cooperation in government during _this_ parliament. Cameron isn’t in a position to make any such offers for Lib Dems during this parliament, because these two parties don’t have the needed majority. What happens during the next parliament depends of the results these three parties will achieve in the GE, and before the results are known, it’s no use to count the chickens.
Re 287, Peter2, and indeed Roger does not mind seeing them racialy discriminated against.
Brown and Camerons offers were hardly in the same league.
Ming was much more likely to seriously consider a cabinet post, Camerons offer was rejected out of hand because it was a pathetic idea.
287: ‘why are Scousers different from Poles’
At least the latter actually do some work in this country.
286. There is of course the other possibility that the pool of potential Tory voters includes fewer rigid-minded, blinkered or even downright stupid people than the pool of potential Labour voters, which would render my ‘bandwagon protocol’ irrelevant.
New Labour have done a lot of things that really should have pissed off their core supporters - but, the heartlands (often areas of poor education and limited lifestyle choice, not to put too fine a point on it) still continued to vote for them in droves without question, because ‘it’s what their family has always done’.
When the Tory Party pisses off its less activism-inclined supporters, they will quite happily drift off to anti-Europe parties on one side, and the LDs on the othere, and probably some even to New Labour. There is a core bedrock of Tory support among *activists* but no uber-reliable yet politically fairly disinterested block vote, such as one would find for Labour in S. Yorks, Tyneside, and most of Scotland and Wales.
The results in 2005 in Blaneau Gwent and Bethnal Green and Bow /might/ signal the end of rigidly conformist voting behaviour from core (but casual) Labour supporters, but they have a long way to go to catch up with the Tories who seem to inform themselves better about the state of their party, and whom are far more ready to give them a bloody nose at elections, or even stop supporting them outright.
I do think there are a whole load of people out there who simply would never consider voting Tory. And a lot of natural-born Tories who will happily vote for others. And that could yet prove a big problem for Cameron.
Peter2. I don’t think I have made a ‘racist’ joke against the Poles or anyone else-unless you call the Tories a race! Infact I’m certain I havent!
206. “which way the Lib Dems would jump in the event of no outright winner.”
You mean which of the two bunches of dishonest unprincipled hypocrites they would plump for if push came to shove? Wouldn’t it be more logical for the ugly sisters to be forced to work with each other a la Rochdale, Darlington etc?
A little bird tells me that the Conservatives are heavily-tipped to use their minority votes to put the profligate unpopular and expensive Labour administration in Merseyside Passenger Transport Executive (Merseytravel) next week. more of the Blair-cameron Alliance?
Lab-con alliance in Bristol at the moment too. Tory votes prop up 2nd largest Lab party minority administration and threw out LDs.
Absolutely, I see the Grand Coalition Labour/Conservative as most likely, it seems to be holding in Germany.
How about his?
Ming Campbell reluctantly accepts a top foreign affairs job from Brown (maybe even FCO Sec).
Brown says “He’s one of the greatest and most principled politicians of modern times. He had the courage and bravery to challenge the war in Iraq. He has the credibility, respect and status to act for our country on the international stage”
Campbell says “I’m honoured to be asked to serve my country in times of trouble. As the new Prime Minister knows, I have had major disagreements with his predecssor’s approach to foreign affairs. I hope this could now be a new dawn for Britain.”
LibDems says “Ming Capmpbell is universally recognised as one of the greatest foreign affirs experts of his generation. It is a great pity that he has not had the opportunity to serve his nation in such a capacity until now. We are sad - but wholly understand - that he has tendered his resignation as LibDem leader. We are very confident that he will be a liberal conscience and a fantastic statesman as this country’s XXXX”
Isn’t everyone a winner here?????????? (other than the Tories)
You’re forgetting, that according to the Times story http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article1961314.ece “The plan applied only to certain Lib Dem peers and they would have been offered posts up to the level of Minister of State and not seats in the Cabinet. Lib Dem MPs would not have been included.” - Probably it would mean Paddy Ashdown.
298. Call me sad, mad or lunactic by all means. But I kinda assume any discussion on Cabinet seats should START with the party leader. Unless it’s a case of “sorry old chap, you’re over the hill…but we’d like some young turks like Paddy Ashdown (ok, we know he’s older than you)…but you know how it is…”
People pay good cash to the LDs to fight for power. The least the members and voters can expect is that those they have backed for power know how to use it.
It is utterly amazing that the party leader was unable to state his case to the future Prime Minister directly there and then (whatever these intentions may or may not be).
But there is no doubt, that to leave the meeting with a “let me think about it” and then go and talk to Lord Kirkwood and Ed Davey….and then still wait another 36-48 hours before saying ANYTHING AT ALL…and then get pushed into saying at least three totally different things…..BECAUSE the media demand it…..
Well, that’s just sad.