How much damage has Miraj done?
July 31st, 2007
Was Cameron right to reveal the peerage request?
The ongoing saga that is the Tory party took another turn today with the revelation from David Cameron that Ali Miraj, the former parliamentary candidate who had attacked his leader, had only yesterday asked to be made a peer.
My first reaction on hearing this on Radio 4’s Today programme was to think that Cameron had made a big error. But now I’m not so sure. I thought that Miraj came off worse to Cameron in the bulletin clips and looked like someone who was taking revenge because his ambition had been thwarted.
Alas it will be some time before we find out what the public reaction is. After today’s two surveys we are about to enter a polling famine with perhaps only two to three surveys appearing during the month and then in a few weeks time.
Whatever it has at least kept politics in the headlines as we enter the silly season and when you produce a blog like this that is to be welcomed!
If you want to bet on Cameron’s survival this appears to be the best market.
Mike Smithson
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Not much, IMHO. Ali Miraj is far too marginal a figure to carry much weight among the voting public.
Mike, you are right, I think Ali Miraj came off worse as well. It looks like Cameron showing some grit and stamping some discipline on the party.
still, we will have to wait and see what the result is.
I agree. I thought Guto Harri’s piece on the 6 o’clock news was good for Cameron, albeit slightly comical setting. Came across more as firm leadership, and while putting Miraj’s “smear” claim to camera left no doubt that he believed Cameron. Cameron also got probably his longest News TV piece in months on Schools discipline, with a lot of sympathetic comments from parents edited afterwards. More importantly all the critics were harmed by being associated with Miraj. The implication being they all had axes to grind. All in all the best media day Cameron has had for about two months I would say
In the personality polls it seemed as though Cameron was starting to drift downwards in terms of strength and decisiveness, it looks like he’s taken that to heart.
Amazing how this guy thought that he could ask for a peerage and mouth off the day after and get away with it though. If I was thinking in terms of conspiracy I’d say he was doing it to make Cameron look good at a time when ne needs it.
15 seconds of fame for this nonentity - will make no difference to anything apart from his sad life.
5 - 15 seconds maybe, but it’s just a bit more ‘yuk factor’ in the backs of peoples’ minds iro Cameron, and they won’t really remember the details just the broad ‘Cameron was slagged by his own man’.
Interesting point in the Indy - hardly any polls over the last 6 months have given Cameron a likely working majority if it were an election result!
Miraj has caused no problems-Cameron’s overreaction has caused lots. A completely non event has been allowed to blow up and make the Conservatives look shambolic. I doubt any of the details will enter anyones consiousness but you can imagine what’s happening in the Party. To start insulting Miraj in those terms was as foolish. It’s not relevant whether his attack on Cameron had personal motives or not. Cameron should have simply swept them away. His Party will be in despair.
Some people who join the main political paries are absolutely pathetic - its no wonder the UK has become a laughing stock. Labour and Tory are just equally useless parties and equally useless and corrupt when in government. Don’t trust either and wouldn’t touch either of them with a barge pole!!
4. The guy must have thought Cameron wouldn’t bring it up. He clearly thinks too much of himself and it looks good for Cameron to take him down. Like Punter says, it just makes the Cameron critics seem like nasty types. It also reminds people of peerage appointments and how they think badly of Labour over that (but not Brown himself). The Conservatives should do what they can to prolong this row, it looks good for them. Perhaps they could expel him just before tomorrows evening news deadlines?
7 Roger your beloved Labour Party is no better than the Tories - youe two parties are absolutely useless and sleaze ridden. I just hope both Labour and Tory keep on killing each other and hope that a new democratic nationalist party replaces both of you.
4
‘Amazing how this guy thought that he could ask for a peerage and mouth off the day after and get away with it though. If I was thinking in terms of conspiracy I’d say he was doing it to make Cameron look good at a time when ne needs it.’
The guys a complete idiot,he’s already played the race card when he didn’t get a safe seat,although one of the safe seats he went after was won by an asian candidate.
Hopefully he will defect to the Labour party,but maybe they would even draw the line at Ali Miraj.
Woudn’t that be great: The Mirage Defection, no doubt a novel written by Dan Dare Brown?
He’s obviously a totally c%ap prat and also obviously a lot better candidate that Tony (been in the party five minutes) Tony Lit of the PODWAS Party who never made the A-list did he?.
The main treo Lib-Lab-Con are all taking us into the federal EU superstate - thats why their support is falling. The future belongs to the Nationalists - SNP in Scotland, three nationalist parties in England - BNP, UKIP and English Democrats. Whats the betting of the UK’s first Nationalist Prime Minister?
Miraj is an odious little hypocrite but I fear, if anything, this episode will have done a little further damage. After all if he’s so obviously such a creep people will ask why he was so favoured by the hierarchy up until now.
Needless to say the education theme of the day was completely lost. Only one question at the Press conference. Channel 4 was awful. GB ‘triumph’ over Darfur versus DC ‘over reaction’. I don’t think DC mishandled it; it was just pretty difficult to handle.
What DC desperately needs now is time to recover. I only hope September’s polls and GB caution gives him that time. This year’s Party Conference is pretty vital; that is if there is one.
I do wonder if Miraj was meant to be the next defection after Quentin Davies as his comments seemed very much on the Brown anti-Cameron line?
I don’t see this as causing any real trouble. He had no profile, and the revelations over the peerage request make him look bitter. Cameron probably made a good decision in that - if someone’s going to leave themselves open, don’t waste the opportunity to expose their agenda.
Roger, your posts crack me up even more. If Cameron had said little or nothing you would have used his passed-up chance to undermine Miraj as a sign of indecisiveness or something. Whatever Cameron does, you hold it against him - ridiculous!
15.
“Miraj is an odious little hypocrite”
A bit much to be talking him up as a future Party leader.
The problem that all the Tories here are missing is that no one is hearing Cameron being tough. All the bulletins are saying is ‘Conservative supporter accuses Cameron of smearing him’. No one knows who the Consevative supporter is so why would anyone be interested in what his motives were. Cameron is the only story.
He might be saved though by Bush’s insane decision to massively arm all the countries in the Middle East in order to nutralize Iran. The news might move on to another inept leader
I agree with all the above. DC being firm can only benefit, agree it shows Tory peerage integrity vs Labour peerage flogging. Also, Miraj may have done more to unite the party behind Cameron than anything for a while. It’s instructive to read the flood of disgusted comments on ConHome, even from ant-Cameroons. It was a line nobody was willing to cross.
Combine it with the anemic Labour polls and I’m pretty happy today. Also, Labour putting clear red water as they attempt to undermine marriage with these stupid cohabitation rules, enabling Nick Herbert (himself a gay man) to argue for the family.
Good Tory day.
18 Very drole.
There are two slightly different questions here: who has come off better/worse, and have either or both been damaged?
One part to both answers is easy: Miraj has come off worse and his political career has been fatally damaged. He’ll not recover from this, though you get the impression that if he was asking for a peerage, he’d already given up to some extent on getting into the Commons.
How it will pan out for Cameron is harder to tell. He’s dealt with the fallout pretty well - his defence is reasonable and he’s taken sufficient action to demonstrate his authority, but only after Miraj had continued the row - which is to say that Cameron didn’t act so quickly as to allow claims of control freakery.
Cameron’s problem is the substance of what Miraj originally said. While there are policies coming out, and we’ve seen more today (good timing), there is a media narrative building up which Miraj has fed that the Conservatives under Cameron have no policies and the whole edifice is built on nothing but illusion. These narratives can generate a momentum of their own and the impressions they create can be difficult to shift, no matter how false they may be.
That said, the impression is neither totally false nor totally true. The Conservatives are policy-light at the moment, but then oppositions often are 28 months into a parliament; the policy commissions are beginning to report but their recommendations are still being reviewed; a number of policies have already been released and taken up by the government. Ironically, it’s not an excess of presentation but a failure to deal with it which has allowed this situation to develop.
15. Yep, pretty crap for the Tories. Everything they touch right now turns to dross. And it makes an unhappy contrast with Brown looking dignified at the UN.
But what happened to that famous party discipline? It’s gone AWOL ever since Maggie was knifed. Don’t you guys want to win? What are these people like? Weirdly self destructive.
Then again maybe this is the Peter Hitchens thesis coming to fruition. A party that includes virulent eurosceptics along with europhiles like yrself, and passionate libertarians along with pro-ID-carders, can never really unite ever again. These divisions are too basic and profound for people on either side to really pull together. i.e. There’s a broad church, and then there’s a fissiparous hodge-podge.
Perhaps this is the problem. The Tory party is now fundamentally split, only Cameron’s apparent success stuck it together. Now it’s coming unstuck.
Sad.
17. There’s several left-wing posters on here who are as silly as Will L was, only they post in shorter chunks so you don’t realise it as immediately.
I am not sure. I think that David Cameron needs to dress up issues rather than be brutal. I did not need to know that this man had requested a peerage. Rather, I needed to know that he was disappointed in not being selected as a prospective MP and had many issues surrounding this. Rather than face up to his own diffuclties he sought to blame the leadership.
It does distress me that leaders seek to undermine those who challenge policies. this does not work - better to be sympathetic to the position those who challenge are in. This is much more effective!!!
Cameron came out looking tough
I think Cameron should review his personal security detail. How did this bloke get into his office?
Good to know the police have their priorities right, as usual…
http://www.metro.co.uk/news/article.html?in_article_id=59428&in_page_id=34
26. I’m afraid he didn’t come out looking tough on the news. It just sounded like “Tory split” - that’s the impression the average punter will take away.
Sadly this really is adding up to a narrative now, albeit one cooked-up by a hostile liberal media - especially the BBC and Channel 4 (along with the anti-Cameron right, natch).
It all started with grammar schools. At the time I thought this was footling, but now I see it was the thin end of the wedge. Cameron got wobbly then and he’s never really recovered. Maybe he isn’t made of the right stuff after all. Hmm.
The next few months will test him to the core. Gaylording ponceyboots or The Man Who Can.
23. One of the most dangerous things is to learn the wrong lessons from success. Party discipline, especially in the parliamentary party went to pot precisely because Margaret Thatcher was knifed and the party won the next election. Conclusion: indiscipline and changing the leader pays off.
Except it doesn’t, or only very rarely. It wasn’t just Thatcher who was dumped, but her style and her flagship policy as well, all three of which were unpopular. Just changing one makes far less impact. And of course, if party discipline can be trumped, that presents all sorts of excuses to allow indiscipline to develop ‘in the greater good of the party’.
There have been all sorts of counter-factual theses on what would have happened if Kinnock had won in 1992. IMHO, one would have been a much more disciplined Conservative parliamentary party.
I think the row has played OK for Cameron. For Christ’s sake it’s nearly August. Are any floating voters following politics?
If the murmurings do rumble on, that’s bad for the Tories, however decisive Cameron may be. A divided party is not popular, and will poll at or around it’s lowest based - eg Labour 1983-7, LDs 1988-90, Tories 1994-2005.
francis - you’re a hoot!
Off to Finland tomorrow for my annual reminder of why I don’t like very high tax economies.
Raj. As Britspin explained earlier the way you deal with these things is to answer Miraj’s points-easy to do-and then get your press people behind the scenes to brief the press on his motives. That way you keep the leader out of the slime. If you thinks this looked seemly for your leader you are obviously approaching full bodhisattva of the cult Torydom!
re 31, SBS, “Off to Finland tomorrow for my annual reminder of why I don’t like very high tax economies.”
Let us know how you get on!
30. One obvious lesson to learn from all this is that Cameron is not a political genius to compare with Blair.
Blair just had that sure touch - certainly in the early years. He chimed with the public. He managed to seem charming… yet ordinary, charismatic.. yet decent, affable… yet determined. Cameron just.. doesn’t, yet.
Blair was all lies of course, as we now know, but he was very very able.
On top of that, Early New Labour had the acute if serpentine skills of Mandelson, the bruising ruthlessness of Campbell, and the wide-bottomed thought machine that was Gordon Brown.
They were a busload of freaks, a quartet of shysters, but they were a formidable political team.
I’m not sure I see anyone of that calibre in the Tory frontranks.
23: ‘Then again maybe this is the Peter Hitchens thesis coming to fruition. A party that includes virulent eurosceptics along with europhiles… and passionate libertarians along with pro-ID-carders’
I think you’re being a bit misrepresentative of Hitchens, seant. What he really thinks is that Tories are split between a clique of careerist, liberal sell-outs and the noble but silent majority which (like vast swathes of the population - though they’re too frightened to admit it) wants a return to the eleven plus, national service, chastity before marriage, short trousers for boys, the cane, the birch and the gallows. (Plus a bit of criminalizing abortion and buggery thrown in.)
Re 34, SeanT, “They were a busload of freaks, a quartet of shysters, but they were a formidable political team.”
Perhaps you should be a political sketch writer!
Very good!
20.”these stupid cohabitation rules, enabling Nick Herbert (himself a gay man) to argue for the family.”
So a cohabiting couple (maybe with children) is not a family in your opinion, isn’t it?
“On top of that, Early New Labour had the acute if serpentine skills of Mandelson, the bruising ruthlessness of Campbell, and the wide-bottomed thought machine that was Gordon Brown.
They were a busload of freaks, a quartet of shysters, but they were a formidable political team”
You’ve read AC’s book! Pity Cameron hasn’t. I can’t imagine Blair ever attacking someones motives in such a crude way.
29 Not to me. I’m only one person.
For me, Cameron is lightweight. He isnt an orator - which is a prerequisite in my book. However, he is where he is.
Appearing like a face painted on a balloon he is no use. He needs to grow a pair, start talking or let others do some talking.
That all said, the best way for the Conservatives to rally around Cameron - is to be attacked by the likes of the BBC, an Indian nobody(*) or the likes of Roger.
(*) What is with the patronising term ‘Asian’. He isn’t Chinese, Japanese or Pakistani. Since when was ‘Indian’ an insult?
15&23 What 6 o’clock news were you watching? Blue Moon in blunt terms who gives a monkeys about a news conference. I along with 99% of mankind didn’t watch it. What I did watch and I am in full accordance with Mr Smithson what counts was the news clips, which is what 99% watched I promise you. In that Cameron had his best media for months. What was significant for me was the editing of comments after his Education speech which certainly featured on the news. We all know it could have been slanted any way, but it was slanted in Cameron’s favour. As for Miraj, well did Charles Clarke’s subsquent attacks on TB or GB post hors de combat hurt them hardly. I think you need to read Mr Smithson’s article again
” with these stupid cohabitation rules……….”
You obviously don’t know anyone who has been kicked out of their home with a child after five years of cohabiting with an entitlement to nothing. It’s a very real problem and not one to be dismissed.
35. lol. Fair enuff. Have never actually read Hitchens P., in great depth - this is what I hear second hand….
That said, I agree with the idea that the Tory party is now all over the shop. Witness the debates on this site about Europe.
Whoever you think is right on that issue, it is one of utterly profound implications. Ergo, it’s difficult to see how a party can contain passionate europhiles and passionate eurosceptics and maintain any kind of ideological coherence.
Yes Labour have their own eurosceptics but they tend to marginal figures. The Tories have europhiles right at the top - Ken Clarke etc.
I don’t want to kick off the EU argument again - ! - just trying to illustrate my thesis that the Tories are all-over-the-place philosophically. Because it’s not just the EU - you could say the same about civil liberty issues, immigration and race, etc etc.
This is a crying shame, coz Britain needs a united and powerful opposition. Labour suck and they are getting away with it.
The Cohabiting ‘rights’ is more typical Labour Truth-Speak.
There are no rights - just legal implications.
Why do it? Couples who like each other, would like to have regular sex and share costs, choose to share a roof. If they want to get married, they would do so.
These are not new ‘rights’. They are a loss of rights. The loss of the right to share a roof with a lover without the state sticking their oar in and grasping aroung with fat sausage fingers.
Perhaps the reason for the removal of the Right to Share a roof without commitment is to bolster further house prices(?) Higher earners will be reluctant to share with lower earners. The demand for property will be increased. The lower earner will lose out and more women will have to struggle in poverty - or become wage slaves earning the traditional male rights of growing old before their time, premature hair loss and ulcers.
I pityu young people living in Britain today. What happened to free University Education? They start their life with enourmous debts, no chance of buying a home, suppressed wages and no right to share a roof without commitment.
Australia must look tempting
‘We all know it could have been slanted any way, but it was slanted in Cameron’s favour.’
I agree with you there. Dave’s enemies were made to look ridiculous: they pictured Saatchi, Bradey (sp?), Kaalms (sp?) and Co. as cardboard cut-outs behind school desks while a young, pretty, bespectacled woman thrashed a cane about. Pressed all my buttons I tell ya!
41. One rather doubts you know any such person either, given your obvious lack of contact with anything resembling the real world.
I have never heard of Ali Miraj and I have no idea what this thread is about. And I watched the 6 o’clock news. My brain must have filtered out the story because it’s so unimportant.
Re 41 Roger “” with these stupid cohabitation rules……….”
You obviously don’t know anyone who has been kicked out of their home with a child after five years of cohabiting with an entitlement to nothing. It’s a very real problem and not one to be dismissed. ”
The problem is not the cohabitation rules, the problem is that for years people have thought that if you live with X for 1 minute, 1 month, six months, 2 years or what ever the pratt talking rubbish is saying, you are as good as married when in fact you are not.
The way to deal with people who are ignorant of the law is not to impose a new law which give rights and responsibilities some may have specifically been avoiding, but to educate people.
In contract law, you have to show an intent to create legal relations. In the case of marriage that does create legal relations and it is both easy and cheap to get married if that is your intent. If you do not intend on creating such relations then they should not be assumed.
I also note that many gay campaigners who campaigned for civil partnerships are against the change for similar reasons.
If you want to be the equivalent of married, get married.
he has been suspended as a candidate, well done DC !
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6924988.stm
30. David what happened to Thatcher should have been a salutary lesson for the party. Sometimes the short term gain is out weighed by the long term damage, sadly the party ignored this and kept repeating the same mistake over the last 10 years. Question is, have the Conservatives finally learned the lesson?
We have the usual Conservatives in disarray or leadership under threat media hype, but it will only catch fire *if* a real mutiny within the party happens and keeps this story going into Conference season. So far I have not seen any real evidence of this happening other than a few discontents shouting from the rooftops while grinding personal axes.
In fact it seems to have been a wake call for most members of the party, I think Tory posters in the blogsphere are reflecting this mood. Cameron has to remain on his strategic course and act firmly against those critics and the media, much as he did during the campaign by newspapers like the Daily Mail who demanded he answered their questions on his personal drug use.
44. And of the cardboard cutouts, I noticed my MP, Philip Davies, was there. Anyone know what he’s done recently to merit inclusion?
34.”One obvious lesson to learn from all this is that Cameron is not a political genius to compare with Blair.”
Seant, I am not so sure that is true. Remember Blair took over a party which Kinnock had spent years trying to bash into shape and against a back drop of a 4th defeat.
I think you are comparing apples and oranges, Cameron has had a much tougher job and if he succeeds then he deserves the accolade.
I think it might make the Conservative party look like it’s divided and petty, and it’s on the same day that Gordon Brown is doing a pretty good job in America. It will only exacerbate the image that Labour is the serious party and the Conservatives are not, and nowhere near ready to be trusted running the UK.
47. Benedict. The new proposals say you have to have lived together for at least two years and have a child.
41. Peter Hall. Assuming you want a serious answer and didn’t just want to insult….I do know just such a person and she’s having a terrible time. She moved out of her house and into his five years ago. Two years ago they had a baby and now she has had to move out. I was shocked to hear that she’s entitled to nothing and the child is entitled to 15% of his income which as he’s self employed is very difficult to establish let alone get him to pay.
41: Well they could get married. Check out the ‘have your say’ on the BBC news website on this issue, almost all the comments are along those lines.
It makes sense for society to have some form of official commitment thing, be it marriage or a civil partnership, which should confer extra rights. It doesn’t need to be religious, or exclusively heterosexual, or expensive, but it should exist. The consequences of the gradual loss of (for want of a better phrase) strong families has been disastrous. Giving people extra rights for not being bothered to commit (are they on a rolling weekly contract…??) doesn’t seem a great idea to me
(yes I know there are some highly successful single parents, including FWIW my mother-in-law. I hope, probably in vain, to pre-empt some predictable retorts.)
57. spin spin spin
60 - as a fairly neutral observer, I have to say I agree with 57.
Whereas for most of the 20th century the Tories could claim to be the natural party of government, Labour has some claim to that now. Division looks really crap.
55. Just being Philip Davies is enough isn’t it? He recently criticised Lib Dems in Liverpool for producing Polish language election leaflets. He should come to Ealing where one of his colleagues not only put out leaflets in Polish, but also holds a Polish language surgery. The Conservatives also had Punjabi lealets in the recent by-election, not that it did them much good.
Re 58 Roger, “47. Benedict. The new proposals say you have to have lived together for at least two years and have a child.”
Reports are mixed on that, but so what?
The problem is that some people think they have rights when they don’t, they just need to be told.
“41. Peter Hall. Assuming you want a serious answer and didn’t just want to insult….I do know just such a person and she’s having a terrible time. She moved out of her house and into his five years ago. Two years ago they had a baby and now she has had to move out. I was shocked to hear that she’s entitled to nothing and the child is entitled to 15% of his income which as he’s self employed is very difficult to establish let alone get him to pay. ”
Did she think she was being the equivalent of being married?
Why did she not make sure she had protected her rights?
41
‘You obviously don’t know anyone who has been kicked out of their home with a child after five years of cohabiting with an entitlement to nothing. It’s a very real problem and not one to be dismissed.’
Why get into that situation in the first place when you can get married and get the legal protection,they have a choice.
Many people cohabit because they are much better off from a tax standpoint,for example they can own two properties and claim both as their main residence or if eligible for tax credits then its very easy to exploit the system and obtain benefits well in excess of those available to married couples.
My 58 should of course refer to Rogers now 53.
56 - ok - so the multiple posts have been removed -
55 - as a fairly neutral observer, I have to say I agree with 52
Under AV, I would be a floating voter for second preference. For most of the last 18 months, the Tories would have been my second choice. Now it would be Labour. Cameron’s recent performances make me firmer in this view - but I await something from Gordon on ID cards.
56. But what about Labour divisions on a major issue, with senior MPs strongly criticsing the PM - which the BBC doesn’t see fit to cover?
Cameron should not have responded. Beyond spin, beyond policy beyond the stuff that political junkies (and I include all of us in that description) love to argue about, lies unity and the perception that one is voting for an organisation instead of a rabble. Casual internal attacks are what did for the Labour party for so many years. As a Labour activist I cannot believe my luck that the Tory Party is still so divided after all these years out of power. They still don’t really want to be in government. They are more insterested in winning thre argument, whatever that means to them. They seem to be stuck in Labour mentality circa 1987.
58. Is there not the likelihood that in cases like that, there will be an enhanced chance of the relationship ‘breaking down’ after 23 months?
I obviously don’t know the case you’re referring to so will comment in general terms: why do you think the woman (as opposed to the child) should be entitled to anything? Indeed, why the automatic assumption that she should be entitled to keep his child?
The new cohabitation laws gives rights to women. Plus it will deter young people from Living in Sin.
Choice is confusing. The people need guidance.
Who would not want that?
Many apologies for the multiple threads PC went haywire.
Off current thread, Interesting that when GB mentions Darfur , everyone in the media applauds, yet when DC goes to Rwanda, a country that has suffered far worse from genocide, he gets panned. Where’s the balance ?
32.
Roger, Cameron isn’t my leader - I have no leader because I’m not a member of any party. I hope you aren’t so crass as to associate anyone who thinks Cameron can do well as being a Tory.
Countering what he said point-by-point would be to admit there was anything of substance to his piece - it would also then allow the journalist to come back and criticise the counter. Dismissing the original claim quickly is the best way to get control of the situation.
A.
“So, David Cameron, how would respond to the recent comments by Ali Miraj?”
“Well, I would say that ………, ……….., …….. and ……..”
“But surely that is an overly-optimistic view of your party’s fortunes and, etc, etc, etc.”
“I would disagree with that…….”
B
“So, David Cameron, how would respond to the recent comments by Ali Miraj?”
“I’d say that this is someone who asked me for a peerage recently and is throwing his toys out of the pram.”
“Oh.” *Moves on to something else*
B let’s one get control of the situation faster. Destroy the credibility of the critic and one doesn’t need to address what they say.
The contrast couldn’t be starker Brown at the UN, Cameron involved in a squalid little squabble at home. The Peter Hitchens analysis of the Tory Party, seems more and more convincing.
66: ‘…when GB mentions Darfur , everyone in the media applauds, yet when DC goes to Rwanda, a country that has suffered far worse from genocide, he gets panned.’
Quite simple! As mere Leader of the Opposition Cameron can’t actually do anything about Rwanda, whereas if he’d stayed at home during the floods… No, that’s not right…
:roll:
66 - GB is PM and can have some influence in Darfur. He is there to try and do something about it.
DC in Rwanda to show how the Tory party has changed. He can have no influence on what goes on.
On Miraj- I think it does DC good to look decisive- he almost needs to look nasty now to distance himself from the ‘nice but useless’ impression that was developing.
However, surely this makes the famed ‘A-list’ look even more dodgy than before. Local parties will now have a very strong case for telling him to go to hell, now the dangers of picking candidates with such shallow roots in the Tory party have been so graphically shown twice over.
68: ‘The contrast couldn’t be starker Brown at the UN…’
I’m standing up and saluting at this very moment!
Punter. My remarks related to Channel 4 News which I saw. If the Party didn’t give a monkey about press conferences it wouldn’t hold them. They have a direct bearing on how tomorrow’s papers will cover the issue. I think that, on balance, the issue was mildly damaging given the context of ‘tory splits’ etc. Evidently you don’t. Fair enough. Why are you so irate for a neutral observer?
71 - “now the dangers of picking candidates with such shallow roots in the Tory party have been so graphically shown twice over”
The danger for the Tories is that after these events very unmodernised, uninclusive local Tory parties might be fearful of any Asian candidates just as Cameron has tried to make his party appear inclusive.
47 - HEAR HEAR
If you want to be in a legally recognised relationship GET MARRIED.
Particularly if there is a child involved.
75 - But you must also bring in proper gay marriages, not “civil partnerships”.
(I feel little sympathy for heterosexual unmarried couples whinging that they should have the chance of a civil partnership too.)
Is Punter a neutral observer? I’d always thought of him as an uber Tory.
26.
“Cameron came out looking tough ”
The butch ones always leave it the longest before they reveal themselves!
Roger. He has denied that at least once on this site.
Wait! I just remembered. The BBC said that Cameron and Miraj were friends originally. You don’t supposed they hatched all this do you? What a plan:
1) Steal the headlines from Gord’s US jaunt.
2) Contrast themselves with Labour: they flog peerages for cash; we won’t even hand them out to the most hard-working party activist.
3) Dave comes across as the man of steel: ‘Anyone else want to call me all PR and no substance? Try it and this is what happens.’
4) Policies on disruptive pupils get good coverage as clever TV editors compare it with Dave’s imposing discipline on Tory Party.
Brilliant.
Well after only a few weeks in office, Brown and Sarkozy have managed to get a resolution through the UN to send 26,000 peacekeepers to Darfur. Well done them.
81. Which countries are providing the troops?
The Machiavelli in me says that this is a stunt, gives the party leader the chance to appear strong. Me I am becoming the total cynic, must be memories of watching “Yes Minister”, do not take anything as it seems, look for the hidden agenda.
All - it could be a MIRAJ
:lol: 
It remains to be seen David but I think we’re talking about an African Union force under Chapter 7 which means they would be able to use force to protect themselves and to get humanitarian aid through. It’ll take 12 months to put together.
I wasn’t aware that the Resolution had actually passed; the Chinese were the blockage. However, it did seem likely to go through and GB and Sarkozy are getting the credit, it seems.
While I would agree with much of what Benedict et al have said about getting married, I do think that if you have chosen to have a child with someone that entails moral responsibilities, even if the other partner isn’t bright enough to demand marriage. Thus the law should reflect those responsibilities and give both partners rights if the other one buggers off. Those rights shouldn’t be as strong as marriage rights, nor should they apply for childless couples, but there has to be some legal responsibility to someone youve started a family with, and especially the child.
Apologies to Martin I see that the Resolution has passed.
Not a good headline for Gaylord P. Boots Esq.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/07/31/ntory531.xml
In the Torygraph, too.
I used to think the Tories were at the late Kinnock stage. Now I wonder if they are more like the liberals after Lloyd George.
Chinese removed any objections. Will be mainly and African Union operation I think.
88. The Telegraph is right-wing rag that publishes junk science from nutty aristocrats denying global warming. It doesn’t have any credibility any more. When we get negative headlines from a media operation that doesn’t have an ideological axe to grind, I’ll start caring.
90: ‘…a media operation that doesn’t have an ideological axe to grind…’
Is there such a thing in this country these days?
Pretty damning article for Cameron. As I don’t normally read the Telegraph, I don’t know what George Jones’ usual stance is. But from the Telegraph!!!
I’m starting to believe that there is a concerted effort to remove Cameron by destablising him. Does any serious paper support him now?
Reading that Telegraph article maybe Mike’s suggestion of a ‘back me or sack me’ wasn’t so far off the mark. George Jones seems to think it’s crackers attacking one of his own activists.
88 - “I used to think the Tories were at the late Kinnock stage. Now I wonder if they are more like the liberals after Lloyd George.”
That’s exactly the problem. David Cameron has been preceded by 3 Michael Foots and no Neil Kinnock.
90. Depends who you are! If you’re Nigel Farage then the Conservatives don’t have an axe to grind against you! But as for Cameron, because there are no centre/centre-right papers, I guess you’re right.
90. I’m sorry, but this is Denial with a capital D.
I’m on your side! - sort of! I may not be a Tory but I’m a rightwinger, I want someone to Oppose Labour, not least cause of the EU.
But the Telegraph is a serious paper whether you like it or not, and it is the inhouse magazine of most conservatives, as the Guardian is the trade journal for Labour.
Can you imagine the Guardian running a headline ‘Blair smears Labour activist’ in, say, 1995?
No. Something is going on. Something very bad for the Tories. It feels like a kind of suicidal psychosis. Kick out another leader. Try again. Kick out another leader. Try again.
It’s a gruesome spectacle, like watching a schizo shouting on the street.
Cameron has tried to adopt a Blairite stance in a post-Blair era. He also doesn’t have the ‘quality’ of the (quite horrible) team which did most of Blair’s thinking for him. Probably not the most obvious recipe for success. The global economy is such that we cannot afford to have mindless narcissists leading the country any more. Not that we ever could but we somehow tolerated it for a decade.
73 My apologies. I assumed you must have been watching Sky or BBC News 24. I was going by the BBC coverage, hardly the most rightwing organisation. You are correct that Parties do care about news conferences, but what they really really care about is the news bulletins, else Blair wouldn’t have done his Education etc or Brown this is a Government of Change Change etc. I was no more irate than you apparently were on the issue of an early election. As you say difficult to read words without speaking them. For Roger’s benefit no I am not a member of any Party
George Jones is one of the doyens of the Parliamentary lobby. He’s had the job of political editor of the Telegraph for many, many years and is just about to retire. I’ve no idea what his politics are but he is a pretty straight down the middle guy in terms of coverage.
The lobby usually run in a pack so I guess that ‘the view’ is that DC was unwise to go after Miraj personally rather than let Andy Coulson do it behind the scenes,however strong the temptation given Miraj’s behaviour. Unfair one could argue but there we go….
“For Roger’s benefit no I am not a member of any Party”
Neither am I but I’m not neutral.
32. I’m with Roger and BritSpin on this - if Ali Miraj is really as insignificant as Tories on here say (and I’ve no reason to disbelieve them), then it was beneath Cameron’s dignity to even respond. He should have simply brushed it off and refused to be drawn and let his acolytes do the press briefing on Miraj’s true motives. By personally attacking Miraj, he makes him important and makes it seem as though Miraj’s critique was significant - and hence all the news bulletins are covering it as though it was so.
Someone mentioned Charles Clarke mouthing off at Blair and Brown - but note that neither Blair nor Brown dignified his diatribes with a response.
43. Cohabiting Rights is simply a reintroduction of into the law of Common Law marriages that were recognised in English (and Scottish) law from the early Anglo-Saxon period up to 1753. Tories complaining about this appear less compasionate than the medieval English, who recognised that co-habitation esp where there were children, posed important questions for the welfare of the woman and children. Being less compasionate that even medieval England is one of the reasons that the public continues to shun Tories.
95: ‘…there are no centre/centre-right papers…’
I wonder how this will all end for the Tory Party. If Cameron and the modernisers eventually decide to give two fingers to it all, there will surely be a huge number of Tory activists, members and MPs who wouldn’t be able to stomach the dream ticket of Liam Fox and Edward Leigh that would inevitably ensue. Would the forming of a new party be on the cards, a sort of Euro-sceptic centre-right SDP? Could happen.
96 - It’s the point I made last week, Cameron has to take on those who are attacking him now, it’s him or them and, frankly, if he goes then the tories are finished and we are left with a permanent labour government and a divided opposition. Anyone who doesn’t want that had better get working.
101. The dominant reason that those laws existed pre-1753 is because rural couples often didn’t have a registry office they could get to - something snowflake conveniently doesn’t mention. That clearly isn’t the case now.
101: ‘…hence all the news bulletins are covering it as though it was so.’
No I don’t agree with that. Such is the weird atmosphere at the moment - perhaps it’s because it’s the silly season, perhaps it’s because the rain has messed up everyone’s biological clock - that Miraj would still now be a media superstar even if Dave had kept shtum.
BBC News didn’t mention that Miraj refused to deny asking for a peerage. That really is incapable journalism, especially considering they aired his argument that Cameron was “smearing” him.
There comes a time in the life of a political party, when enough is enough, for Labour it was the early eighties, when the SDP split and the shock wave from that event eventually produced New Labour. Labour has not won, three elections because it didn’t split, it has won three elections because it did. It is time for a new centre right party to emerge, free of those who are pulling it one way or another.
102. It does seem to me that British politics needs a fundamental realignment.
There are loads of Labour party members who were sickened by things like Iraq, many must remain sickened by things like 56 day detention and ID cards. Can these really be “Labour” policies? Since when?
Another tranche of Labourites surely find the lies and deceit over Europe very hard to stomach.
So what keeps them united in Labour? Sheer hatred of the Tories, that’s all. Without that they have no coherence.
Ergo. If the Conservative party were to dissolve and reassemble into more natural alignments - eurosceptic versus europhile, libertarian versus authoritarian, I reckon we’d see a similar dissolution of Labour fairly soon after. And maybe even the Lib Dems.
Identity is often formed as a kind of opposition to the other. “We are what we are because we are not Them”. Take away Them and you have no Us. Take away the Tories and you take away the only raison d’etre of the Labour party.
This is inevitable in the end. Class politics is over, yet Britain still divides politically on class lines, like it did during the time of Kier Hardie.
Eventually we must all realign on more natural fault-lines.
Punter My apologies for misunderstanding you. Enough said I think. We all greatly benefit from your expertise on matters welsh and elsewhere.
105:
Of course, these bizarre media-led kerfuffles do tend to vanish as quickly as they arrived, when everyone gets bored, when there’s nothing else to dig up, when there’s nothing else to say. The hoo-ha surrounding Mrs Blair, a flat and some Australian was a similar phenomenon. (What was that about again?)
103. Almost, ukpaul. Brown is not really particularly conservative but neither is he at all radical. He has sleepwalked his way into a situation where he is running a government which is almost indistinguishable politically from John Major - if anything slightly to the right of the bashful bus conductor. His party is still not sure whether it wants to completely give up the ghost of socialism - hence the Cruddas challenge with the transfers to Harman - but there is no sign that it will be wanting to return home in a hurry.
The real problem of the Cameronites is that they haven’t really got any significant differences with Brown but believe his/their stance should be the Conservative position, not the Labour one. So they sit and shout insults at him “You euro-fanatic! You socialist!” of which the public take even less credence than does Brown.
Both the largest parties (and the Lib Dems have their fair share too) are mostly a mixture of pragmatic managers and narcissists: they neither believe in anything enduring nor represent any particular faction or element in society. They are not so much drifting hulks as pedalos with bent rudders, zooming all over the pond but getting absolutely nowhere. They should really join up with each other if it were not for a mixture of pride and chutzpah: they have far more in common presently with each other than they do with Michael Meacher or Edward Leigh on their respective wings.
“Identity is often formed as a kind of opposition to the other.”
Never has a truer word been spoken. That accounts for much of Scottish and Welsh nationalism in recent years, and, increasingly, English natinoalism.
Also, I suspect many right-wing Lib Dems that are natural counterparts of centrist Conservatives, but they won’t join them because “we’re not Tories”. i.e. they refuse to be in the same party as the Edward Leighs of this world.
105. I don’t think Miraj would have been a superstar if Cameron hadn’t allowed himself to be riled. Peter Hitchens isn’t a superstar and he makes similar criticisms.
The real story is that Cameron reacted. Miraj’s criticism is mild stuff really - when you are in government you get pounded, absolutely pounded and have to be able to withstand it without losing your cool. If Cameron finds this mild stuff difficult to deal with without getting personal, he’ll never be able to handle the serious stuff. That is why it’s become a big story.
If something is true, how can saying it become a smear? (especially if the thing in question is asking for a peerage not having killed a baby)
“The real problem of the Cameronites is that they haven’t really got any significant differences with Brown.”
IF you believe that you really don’t understand what liberal Conservatism is about. ID would never be accepted by people like Cameron & co.
Gotta laugh - I distinctly remember on “the other place” countless tories who have posted above harping on about what a wonderful candidate miraj was and how he was going to win watford at the last general. tee hee
Andrea. It can’t. Miraj used the word so his use of it got reported. He never denied DC’s charge, presumably because he couldn’t, so he never remotely justified his use of the word.
116 - he nearly won!
We will win Watford next time.
I do miss the civilised debate of vote2005 - I thought that ‘Ave it 05′ was really good
118 - no you won’t. You may in fact come third!
111 - I am also astonished that any labour supporter from the 80’s can believe that they are supporting the same party, labour have moved so far to the right that they are, as you say, pretty much indistinguishable from the tories. It’s what makes the faux anger at each other all the funnier.
112 - Was that a dig at me tjm?
I’ve said it before but I’d give a Cameronite candidate my second vote as you need a liberalising influence to negate the Leighs of this world. People like him are also the reason why I’d prefer a labour majority a little more than a tory one.
hello just a thought, miraj and that ES candidate, the 10 minute tory, damages the brand image of “who are the new tories” rather than the conservative party per se…?
That one was fast tracked into being a candidate in an important by election and the other was on the “a” list. Someone close to DC has been hand picking these guys….and it says what about their judgement?
66. Noticed that too.
Brown got an nice headline today but you will have to excuse my cynicism, I will wait to see the delivery. Resolutions at the UN are one thing but action on the ground is another.
After what has happened with Nato in Afghanistan and the UN in other conflicts I really hope that the promised number of troops materialise on the ground, then I will be first in line to applaud Brown’s initiative and the achievement of the countries involved.
118 - looking good in Watford
I believe the mighty IAN OAKLEY will be standing.
Swing to Con +10%
re 86 TJM “While I would agree with much of what Benedict et al have said about getting married, I do think that if you have chosen to have a child with someone that entails moral responsibilities, even if the other partner isn’t bright enough to demand marriage. Thus the law should reflect those responsibilities and give both partners rights if the other one buggers off. Those rights shouldn’t be as strong as marriage rights, nor should they apply for childless couples, but there has to be some legal responsibility to someone youve started a family with, and especially the child.”
What about where the party who would get the rights refuses to get married because they do not want the attendant responsibilities?
You can’t create imbalanced rights.
There is already child maintenance. if you want more, get married.
120 - I couldn’t agree more!
123 - actually, with complacency of such Lit-ish proportions I withdraw my comment “you may in fact come third!”
You will come third!
120. Labour and the Tories increasingly remind me of the old political factions in the Byzantine Empire (if that isn’t the most pompous sentence in the history of pb.com)
The Blues and the Greens were the two principal parties in Byzantium. They started off as factions supporting different chariot racing teams, then they evolved into serious opponents - divided by religion and class - then, over the centuries, their differences disappeared and they forgot the reason they ever hated each other - but they carried on hating each other nonetheless.
You were born a Blue or a Green and that was jolly well it. If you were a Blue your job was to hate Greens, if your dad was a Green then you loathed Blue, for some reason or other.
Same goes for the two or three parties in Britain. Their origins are lost in history, there was a time when they used to represent serious divisions of faith and class, and now… now they are all mixed up but they carry on opposing each other regardless, the existence of each being justified by the existence of the other.
Labour are now slightly to the right of many Tories. Some Tories are more liberal than the Lib Dems. All three parties are run, to a significant extent, by upper middle class poshos, with a sprinkling of plebs. All are liberal capitalists, in the main.
So? What gives? Why do they bother hating each other, apart from the reason that they’ve always hated each other?
Spooky.
126. If the GE had been held last May, I would have not surprised to see Lab going from first to third in Watford.
Snowflake 5, Do you really believe that medieval marital arrangements were “compassionate?”
108. “Class politics is over, yet Britain still divides politically on class lines, like it did during the time of Kier Hardie.”
Really, the electoral system has been the major factor in keeping the party system alive in its present form, leading to these weird coalitions that you don’t find in any other countries (even in the American parties seem more homogenous than ours).
The point is, really, that Britain no longer does divide politcally along class lines, and hasn’t done since the 1970s, but the electoral system expects it to still.
Some form of PR could go some way to solving this. Politicians would no longer need to be so duplicitous and thereby some of the apathy and distrust problems in British politics might dissipate.
127. SeanT - you are really making an argument for electoral reform, aren’t you? If not, you should be…
Re 101. Snowflake “43. Cohabiting Rights is simply a reintroduction of into the law of Common Law marriages that were recognised in English (and Scottish) law from the early Anglo-Saxon period up to 1753. Tories complaining about this appear less compasionate than the medieval English, who recognised that co-habitation esp where there were children, posed important questions for the welfare of the woman and children. Being less compasionate that even medieval England is one of the reasons that the public continues to shun Tories.”
I knew you were ignorant but I had not realised quite how ignorant.
In those days the man got the kids the house and everything else unless he did not want them.
That system was replaced in the 20th century by the exact and equally as iniquitous reverse.
Since th 1989 Children’s act that was supposed to have been replaced by a system that looked after the children first, though the family courts have of course done their best to ignore this.
130, 131.
Yes.
Reluctantly, I am coming round to your way of thinking. Until very recently, I was a firm proponent of FPTP but now… I’m not so sure. Yes FPTP provides definitive results, and I cherish the constituency relationship, but in the face of ever-widening apathy, cynicism, spin, corruption, falling turnouts etc.. Hmm…
We need to do something. A change in electoral system may be the answer. I don’t know enough about it to recommend an actual voting method. Will have to research,
Shock horror! Political Betting Commentator Possibly Changes Mind!
“In those days the man got the kids the house and everything else unless he did not want them.”
In those days most country folk didn’t own anything. I would imagine the kids went to the workhouse, if they were lucky.
133. Is there a form of PR which produces good firm decisive results? And keeps the constituency-MP relationship? and doesn’t have party lists?
Am I asking too much?!
133.Shock horror! Bi-polar commentator dosn’t realise he changes his mind every post!
135 - yes, there’s AV, and it’s cack.
130 The Class system is more alive today than since before the 60s.
Talented working class children were able to excell via Grammer Schools. Now, top schooling is limited only to those who can pay. 1 Nothing to the rich.
Under the Conservatives, Free University Education was available to able working class. Now, the barrier to University Education is not ability, it is ability to pay. Anyone can get in, if they have the money to pay. 2 Nothing to the rich.
Under the Comprehensive system, disruptive pupils block the education of the able.
When the parents try to escape from bad schools with poor discipline, poor methods and distractive political correctness - Labour introduces buses to send the able across cities to be beaten up by scummy hoodies.
It would be far more economical, efficient & ecological to send children to local schools - but Labour has other plans.
The Soviet Union would send conscripts to opposite ends of the Soviet empire - as far away as possible from their homes, away from their own people to become more Soviet, more Russian.
The more I look at Labour, the more it seems they emulate the Soviet Union.
130 FPTP delays political change until it bursts through like water breaking through a dam. Class is less and less important as a voting determinant, but our political system still pigeon holes people into choosing between a “socialist” party, and an “anti-socialist” party.
136. Heh. OK. It always shocks me, at least, when I change my mind. I imagine myself a dogmatist. But maybe I am more labile than I realise.
Shock Horror! Bi-polar pb commentator with acute short term amnesia erroneously claims he changes his mind for first time!
Not such a good headline.
137. Why is AV cack? I know it’s 11pm. so your answer can be pithy to the point of abuse.
“The more I look at Labour, the more it seems they emulate the Soviet Union.”
My wife was educated in the Soviet Union. Her school took a local in take, but was also able to select bright kids - of which my wife was one.
Most Eastern Bloc countries retained selective education throughout Communism.
131, 133. I actually think Single Transferable Vote would break down the partisan system, because once you start to rank candidates you start rationally thinking of the merits of parties other than your own in non-tribal terms. Once the psychological barriers are broken then the party system would follow and restructure. No need for this PR nonsense! I also like STV because it encourages parties to reach out to a wider audience, and not just certain segments of society.
120. Not at all, ukpaul! I actually think of you more highly than several other posters on here for being so candid with your own past political views, amongst other things. I was actually bearing in mind that Lib Dem MP who said “I’m not a Tory” when Osborne wanted him to defect. His name slips my mind.
124. I’m sorry, but if you have a child than you should be forced to get “attendant responsibilities”, whether you like it or not. Saying otherwise suggests having a child with someone s