TORY BOYS' ELECTORAL STITCH-UP

Why Cameron's and Clegg's attempt to fix the next election is fundamentally undemocratic at so many levels.

A version of this article appeared in Tribune (published 17/09/10)

Marjorie Smith

Despite claims to the contrary, this Conservative Government's attempt to remake the electoral map of the UK is a blatant attempt at trying to stack the electoral odds in its favour. If successful, it will severely restrict Labour's chances of ever ruling as a single governing party in the future (which of course, as well as trying to shore-up this Government, is its man aim).

Firstly, the proposals top reform the voting system; reduce the number of MPs and change the size of constituencies is nothing more than opportunistic gerrymandering. This squalid and seedy attempt to radically shift the electoral balance in this country is simply an attempt by the two Tory boys, Clegg and Cameron, to ensure that their type of politics is almost always guaranteed to have an influence in governing this country.

Remember, there is no electoral mandate for this Conservative government to railroad it through the House of Commons. There is no part if the Conservative Party's manifesto that mentions such radical constitutional changes that will have a massive psephological effect. This Government simply does not have a mandate to do what it proposes to do.

Any attempt to radically reform the electoral map of the UK will have no credibility unless it is as a result of a Royal Commission.

The Government's plans are deficient at several levels. Firstly the idea that a referendum of such constitutional importance is not important enough to have a stand-alone referendum is deeply worrying. Clegg and his ilk bleat on about the cost, but who said democracy was cheap. To hold the referendum at the same time as local elections is to demonstrate the lack of confidence the Government has in the electorate.

One of the major flaws in Clegg's plans for a referendum on electoral change in 2011 is that it will not be a level playing field. Local elections in England next year are not taking place universally, so any attempt to piggyback a referendum on such elections that take place will, in effect, produce a distorted outcome and discriminate against a large swathe of voters.

Furthermore, not only is there discrimination between voters in different local authority electoral districts in England, where only 33% of voters will have the opportunity to go the polls but also with Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, where 100% of the electorate will have additional motivation to cast their vote both in an election and in a referendum.

 The projected choice to be offered to voters is also discriminatory between possible systems of counting votes and is a take-it-or-leave-it choice about the Alternative Vote system.

A dead vote can still be a dead vote under AV. What if one doesn't want to transfer? I should imagine there are a significant number of Labour voters who no longer wish to see the Lib Dem vote enhanced by their transfers and do not ever want to see their vote ultimately transfer to a Tory.

Why should a vote be viewed as something vague that cannot be taken at face value, depending on the outcome of the totality of votes. No doubt, the big campaign in constituencies where the Lib Dems are second will be persuading to transfer, but why should they? For instance, why should hundreds of thousands of Labour votes in areas that have a Tory majority be viewed as transferrable votes to the Lib Dems?

Why is there not a system of equalization, whereby voters' intentions are still accounted for even if they are not for the winning candidate in a specific constituency? Why can't first preferences be totalled regionally so that a system of proportionality is introduced, but this is based on primary choices rather than second choices.

In many respects AV is as fraught with the same imperfections as first-past-the-post is, in that if for example you live in a constituency where Labour is in third place, your vote for Labour is totally disregarded and has no effect (concerning Labour), it is reduced to a full value vote for the Lib Dems, if you transfer your vote to them. A dead vote (i.e. one you choose not to transfer) is still a dead vote

Proposals about the North of Scotland as an exception so that three Lib Dem MPs with large constituencies but sparse populations, are ring-fenced from the proposal is a squalid scam, based purely on the self-interest of this opportunistic Government.

The proposals to reduce the number of MPs and equalize constituency size is another sordid manoeuvre to tilt the balance so far away from Labour , so as to make it extremely difficult to have a Labour Government with a working majority.  Make no mistake Cameron and his Tory backwoodsmen will be the main beneficiary of this so-called reform. Constituencies should be based on population, not on the electoral role.

It is the Tories exploitation of the electoral role as a base for calculation that gives credence to their proposals. Yet, it is also their greatest weakness; size of population should be the common denominator in these discussions. The electoral role, plus local Government and central Government records should all be used to calculate the size of constituencies. The results maybe extremely beneficial to Labour, in not just blunting the opportunistic aspects of the Tories proposals but actually identifying urban areas where mass-action campaigns to get people registered could produce highly beneficial effects.

Why not move elections to Sunday, so that the majority of working people have the same opportunity to choose when they vote as the rest of the electorate.  The concept of equality of constituency size, based on population and not the electoral roll, should never be considered until this levelling of the playing field is introduced.

Look to motivate and facilitate non-voters not tinker with an anti-working people system. Sticking with the tradition of holding Parliamentary elections on a Thursday is highly discriminatory in favour of the leisured classes and should be changed to maximise both turnout and non-registered peoples' interest.

This, of all choices surrounding the conduct of polls, should be a level playing field, i.e. hold elections over a full weekend with polls opening at 7.00 am on Saturday and closing 7.00 pm on Sunday.

It is the 'benign neglect' attitude of the right and centre-right in this country when it comes to increasing voter registration that is purely self-serving. The Tories know that the disenfranchised are more likely to vote for left-wing or centre-left parties if they are subsequently registered, hence the Tories' self-regarding disinterest in this issue.           

            The disgraceful scenes of voters being turned away in several constituencies at the last general election should never be allowed to re-occur.  This issue should not be allowed to be forgotten; a report by the Electoral Commission based on the information provided by returning officers said it was not a major problem. That's like accepting a report from the Metropolitan Police that the policing of demonstrations has the popular support of the people of London

The Labour movement as a whole should actively oppose this squalid and opportunistic gerrymandering by Clegg and Cameron. No reform of the voting system in this country should be carried out until it has been the subject of a Royal Commission and proposed changes are included in party manifestos.

IF COULSON KNEW, WHO ELSE AT NEWS INTERNATIONAL KNEW?

If one accepts the premise of the New York Times that Andy Coulson has blatantly lied about knowing anything about phone-hacking, this raise several very disturbing questions and has deeply worrying ramifications and possible consequences at many many levels.

Andy Coulson is no lone rogue who went off-piste when he was editor of the News of the World. He was at the heart of Rupert Murdoch's News International operation in the UK. Like the current News International Chief Executive Rebekah Brooks (formerly Wade), he had front-line high level experience both at the Sun and the N.OW. Both of whom would have reported directly the previous Chief Executive of News International's UK operations, Les Hinton.

When Coulson's time at the N.O.W. first became a matter of political controversy, News International launched a coordinated campaign to rubbish accusers, belittle witnesses, pay-off those who had deep pockets and generally try and stonewall a House of Commons Select Committee. The Coulson Affaire should now move on to include the senior staff at News International (i.e Wade and Hinton and to treat them as hostile witnesses.

As I said Coulson was no maverick working for Murdoch, every juicy story that the N.O.W. published during Coulson's time in the editor's chair, would have been seen by Coulson and he would have had to satisfy the veracity of the story, the legality about publishing the story and as part of both consideration, what was/were the source(s) of the story.

Coulson's obfuscation and sophistry cannot be allowed to continue and the trail shouldn't end with his resignation. Furthermore, David Cameron's judgement is in question as he continues to duck and dither about what to do next.

I wonder how much pressure was put on the Press Complaints Commission by Murdoch's henchmen to only conduct a token investigation.

Are PPC documents/correspondence covered by the Freedom of Information Act?

Is Deputy Commisioner John Yates becoming "Slippery of the Yard"?

TORIES' GROUP IN EU IS AN "UTTER SHAMBLES" AND NOW HAS NEO-NAZI LINKS

Terry Moore, Brussels
A version of this article will appear in Tribune Magazine to be published on Friday 10 September

One of David Cameron's first actions when he became Tory leader back in 2005 is rapidly turning into a farce of epic proportions five years later. It amply demonstrates that he puts rank pragmatism before high principle and raises uncomfortable questions about his judgement.

It is abundantly apparent to some seasoned observers in Brussels and London that the Tories' decision to split from the mainstream centre-right group and form their own right-wing group, has been a massive strategic error.

The Tories erstwhile EU allies in the the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group are shifting ever rightwards, whilst Cameron et al try to present a moderate face to the British public and their Lib Dem allies. There is also growing concern about the quality of the leadership. There are even well-founded accusations that a very senior staff appointment in the Group was as a result of a personal relationship with a former Czech Prime Minister.

Poland's Law and Justice party (the PiS), who are the only other significant party in the bloc, are now set on a course of right-wing populist nationalism underpinned by religious fundamentalism.  The PiS have just expelled one moderate MEP (Marek Migalski) because he publically expressed concern about their rightwards political direction, whilst hardliners continue to publish crude homophobia immune from any sanction by the party.

Richard Legutko MEP, writing in the Wiadomosci Gazeta, claims that "Homosexual activists are running a brutal campaign in order to blunt our sensitivity and humiliate critics". He claims that Europride "is an extremely stupid name" and that the recent Europride parade in Madrid was "a repulsive sight".

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Another influential PiS MP Antoni Macierewicz, who is a trusted confidante of his leader Jarosław Kaczyński, was previously a member of an electoral alliance with the Narodowe Odrodzenie Polski (National Rebirth of Poland – NOP), whose leader is Adam Gmurczyk.  This predominantly neo-Nazi group is linked to the fascist International Third Position in the UK and the Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands (NPD) in Germany

These are not the only major issues confronting the Tories' group. The journal New Europe, has this week exposes the deep dissatisfaction with the Group's often absent leader and PiS member, Michal Kaminski. The Tories are trying to stage a demi-coup (without informing their other allies in the group) whereby their leader, Timothy Kirkhope aspires to become joint-leader of the group with Kaminski. Wags in Brussels have already christened it the KK clan.

Besides often being absent from Group, Committee and European Parliament plenary meetings, Kaminski has a dubious history as a former member of nefarious extreme right-wing groups and having espoused anti-semitic sentiments in the past. Kaminski now claims in his defence that he is a great supporter of Israel (as does Nick Griffen). However, it is not mutually exclusive to be an anti-semite and take a pro-zionist viewpoint.

This on-going attempted demi-coup by the Tories has also deeply unsettled the Czech members of the Group (ODS) and they are also considering lobbying for a joint-chairperson position.

The Czech ODS also have their skeletons in the cupboard, with the ex-girlfriend of the recent former Czech PM, Mirek Topolánek (and former disgraced ODS leader) being safely ensconced as Deputy General-Secretary of the ECR group, a scandalous move in which the Tories have failed to block or question. Adela Kadlecova's affair with Topolánek has been widely (un)covered in the Czech press (e.g. www.Blesk.cz.)

All this has come about because Cameron and Hague have wavered and vacillated and continue to duck and dither about what to do about the group because of the fear of a right-wing backlash from trenchant eurosceptics on the Tory backbenches and in the ECR group (e.g. Daniel Hannan and Roger Helmer, their very ECR H-Block).

A seasoned observer of the Conservative Party's activities in Brussels recently described the ECR group as "an utter shambles".

All eyes will now turn to Riga where, Cameron's Conservatives are soon set to rally with their Latvian allies, the For Freedom and Fatherland/LNNK party. The ECR group have arranged study days for their MEPs on the 14-17 September in Riga.

Besides being apologists for the Waffen SS, the For Freedom and Fatherland/LNNK have very recently formed a close electoral alliance with the neo-Nazi "All for Latvia" group in an official and formal alliance called, Visu Latvijai – Tēvzemei un Brīvībai/LNNK. "All for Latvia" are an extreme nationalist group with a penchant for Nazi-inspired regalia and symbolism.

DID HAGUE RECOMMEND COULSON TO CAMERON?

Rumours are swirling around that it was William Hague who recommended Andy Coulson to David Cameron as his Communications Chief. Hmmmmm?

WHY DO PEOPLE BELIEVE THAT THE PHONE-TAPPING AT THE N.O.T.W STARTED UNDER COULSON?

It seems to me that the only rational explanation for Coulson accepting that he didn't need to know what the source of the phone-hacked stories were is because the system was all pervasive before he became editor.

In other words, when as any reasonable editor would ask, what's the source(s) of this scoop, the journo with the story would have to stand it up. In this case, could it be reasonable to assume that the hacking was already so pervasive that Coulson only needed to know a code word to know the veracity of the story.
 i.e. Q. What's the source, can we stand it up? A. 100% it's kosher from our listening pals.

Now all that explains such a scenario is that the same circumstances pertained under a previous editor AND that senior staff at News International could brief about it. Les and Alison have a few explanations to make?.
Hmmm, who was editor at the N.OT.W before Coulson? Did the same methods go to another national newspaper in the same stable? Surely Rebbecah, Les and Alison knew?

NEXT WEEK ON THE TORIES' GROUP IN EU

Read about their Polish partners ideologically exploding with the latest homophobic remarks from the Tories Polish friends and the expulsion of one of their more reasonable MEPs. The Polish Law and Justice party is the only other significant party in the group and is now set on a course of right-wing populist nationalism underpinned by a religious fundamentalism.
Read about how a high level post in the Tories group was given to a person who had an affair with one of the groups' party leaders when he was PM.
Read about the latest development about their neo-nazi friends (by association) in Latvia. Find out how they are one of the very most unedifying right-wing parties in Europe.
All this because Cameron and Hague have vacillated about what to do with the former shadow Europe Minister, Mark Francois' baby.

For the week after that a truly stunning revelation of a much more UK-relevant story, that will go to the very core of the Conservative Party. (Hague? Coulson? Liam? George? et al? who knows just yet)

CAMERON'S TORIES IN NEO-FASCIST LINKS

CAMERON'S TORIES IN NEO-FASCIST LINKS

CAMERON'S EU GROUP HAVE NAZI ALLIES

ANOTHER EMBARASSMENT FOR WILLIAM HAGUE

EXCLUSIVE  A version of this article was published in Tribune Magazine this week (03/09/10) 

Terry Moore, Brussels

In an astounding development, key allies of David Cameron's Conservative party have lurched to the far-right and made a faustian pact with odious elements of the Latvian extreme right.

The unashamedly neo-fascist "All for Latvia" is now an official political partner with the Tories' Latvian allies. "All for Latvia" platform is one of extreme nationalism and is inspired by Nazi ideology and imagery. Its logo appears to be a deliberate echo of the swastika.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:All_For_Latvia!_logo.png

The logo for the electoral pact between "All For Latvia" and Cameron's Conservatives' allies the For Fatherland and Freedom/ LNNK party appears to be no better in hiding their 'artistic' and political inspiration. See 'All for Latvia's' website.

http://www.visulatvijai.lv/images/vltblnnk_logo_sm.jpg

 

The Official Latvian section of the Tories European Parliament (EP) group is made of the For Fatherland and Freedom/LNNK party (TB/LNNK), which has one MEP in the the Parliament. The Latvian party has consistently been attacked for closely allying themselves with Adolf Hitler's Waffen SS veterans who fought for Germany in the Second World war.

The UK Conservatives have always sat uneasily in their political grouping in the European Parliament, the European Conservatives and Reformists. Beside the Tories, the rest of the group is made up of the mad, the bad and the truly awful. Or what Nick Clegg called a group of "nutters", "homophobes" and "anti-semites".

Now Cameron's Latvian allies have gone one step further and established a formal electoral alliance with Latvian neo-fascists. The TB/LNNK is now part of an electoral coalition with the "All for Latvia" party.

The "All for Latvia party" is led by Raivis Dzintars, an unreconstructed neo-nazi populist. Amongst Dzintars beliefs are that the common interests of the nation have a higher value than the interests of individual people.

http://visulatvijai.blog.com/files/2010/06/dzintars6vg.jpg

Raivis Dzintars (bottom right of picture) with 'supporters'.

Eric Pickles, the Conservative's Communities Minister has previously defended the TB/LNNK's actions in support of SS war veterans, claiming that they were Latvian patriots and has accused critics of recycling “old Soviet smears” about the Latvians. It now appears that the then Conservative Party Chair, Eric Pickles was naïve in the extreme.

The current Foreign-Secretary, William Hague, even went do far in defending the Latvian For Fatherland and Freedom Party last autumn, by attacking David Miliband, “David Miliband’s comments about the Conservative Party and their European allies are frankly preposterous. His suggestion that the membership of the European Conservatives and Reformists are anti-Semitic and Nazi sympathisers is unfounded and outrageous.

Hague's robust defence of the Tories' allies appears now to have been both unwise and a hostage to fortune. It is quite clear by the electoral pact established in Latvia that the Latvian far-right are anti-semites and Nazi sympathisers.

The far-right 'heroes' of the  Latvian Waffen SS had a founding ethos of direct involvement in the holocausts with the Latvian Sonderkommando Arajs, acting under German orders, directly murdering 26,000 Latvian Jews. It was the veterans of the Sonderkommando Arajs that were the founding fathers of the Latvian Legion of the Waffen SS.

The Tories appear powerless to control their far-right allies in the EU and because of the European Parliamentary arithmetic it seems they cannot afford to lose their support. Financial support for political groups is quite generous in the EP, however if the Tories were to expel their Latvian allies that would jeopardise the viability of their group and risk the ending of EP funding. It appears that Cameron, Hague et al are prepared to sacrifice their consciences for a few euros of lucre.

David Cameron must bear sole responsibility for the appalling political consequences of his decision (and it was his decision alone) to quit the mainstream centre-right grouping in the European Parliament (The EPP) and set up the new right-wing group.

The unholy alliance is due to contest the Latvian Parliamentary election on Saturday October 2^nd, just one day before the 2010 Conservative Party conference starts.

http://www.visulatvijai.lv/news.php

CAMERON 'S USEFUL IDIOTS (PART 2)

Why Coalition suits Cameron and the Conservatives

Marjorie Smith

            When David Cameron won the leadership of the Conservative party in late 2005 he promised to make people, "feel good about being Conservatives again" and said he wanted, "to switch on a whole new generation", this helped him to be seen as the fresh-face of  a new form of Conservatism. The Tories trusted him to make them electable and to win back power after three successive Labour victories.

            In fact the only obstacle to Cameronism becoming a notable political phenomenal was that he became the leader of a party that was utterly unelectable, rightly identified as a group of obnoxious reactionary right-wing ideologues. The Conservative party pre-2006 really was a motley collection of unpleasant right-wingers who had retreated to a core vote strategy many moons before. Their major problem was that the same core vote (like the Daily Telegraph readership) was slowly eroding as the core was dying out.

            Cameron's tight little leadership clique readily understood why the Tories had been unelectable for so long. It didn't need leopard skin shoe-wearing empty vessels to point out that the Tories were seen as the 'Nasty Party'. Cameron readily acknowledged that detoxifying the Tory brand was to be the core of his electoral strategy because it was his greatest hurdle in pursuit of regaining power for the Tories.

            However, it should be noted that party activists have always looked at him, purely as a tool to win an election. The Tories historical raison d'être has always been to represent the class interests of their backers. In Cameron they clearly had a thoroughbred leader whose background, upbringing and hinterland were firmly embedded in classic Conservatism. It is only because of his Conservative credentials that he has been able to take the party with him on a successful journey to deceive the British electorate.

            Ha and his cohorts such as Osborne, Gove, Steve Hilton, Edward Lewellyn and others recognised that they needed to define the Thatcher era (and its political legacy) as an interrregum that was far too driven by solely focusing on neo-liberal economic thinking at the expense of other more traditional Tory values.

            Intelligent Tories realised therefore that they had to not just adopt policies that echoed the concerns of the electorate (especially those in the middle ground) but also change the perception of their party as a right-wing, ideologically-driven, Thatcherite rump that had learned little from three successive election defeats.

            Perversely, the present-day Conservative Parliamentary party is probably much more Thatcherite and hence, ideologically-driven that it was, even when Thatcher was at the peak of her powers. It is though, a monument to the success of the Cameron project that the Tory backbenches are pretty mute, even if they have to accept that some Ministerial posts have to be reserved for Cameron's useful idiots.

            In fact, early on under this Conservative Government, many Thatcherite sympathizers clearly identified David Laws as one of their own and there was genuine sadness amongst the Tories about his defenestration. Law's appointment as Chief Secretary to the Treasury and his subsequent harsh pronouncements about public spending was the keystone moment that cemented the deal that has produced a Conservative Government.

            Discontent may well be brewing on the backbenches, but the Tories are now in the back seat of Ministerial cars and whilst kow-towing to a few Lib Dem civil liberty issues may be the price of power, it is a relatively trivial price to pay. This is not only because the present-day Tory parliamentary party is overwhelmingly libertarian and hence pre-disposed to support such civil liberty issues, but because they can see that the economic policies being driven forward by Osborne and other ministers are, at their core, anti-statist, pro-market and fundamentally unreconstructed Thatcherite in sheep's clothing.

            The great success of Cameronism is that what could be termed as mainstream right-wing forces are now intertwined with the acceptable face of the centre-right in a coalition of interests that is fronted by an apparent duopoly of reasonableness serving in the national interest. This is the big lie at the heart of this current administration. It is also the conceit that the Tories as well as Clegg and his cohorts want to continue to persevere with to the detriment of this country's medium and long-term interests.

            Both Cameron and Clegg all too readily understand that their 'arrangement' means that they are inextricably linked until at least the lead-up to the next election and probably beyond. Only by having an electoral pact not to stand against each other can they hope to continue down the political path they have chosen. For Cameron, that path can continue as before or lean ever rightwards. For Clegg, there is no choice, his political career entirely depends on Cameron's fortunes (both nationally and internally in the Tory party).

            Hence Clegg's room for manoeuvre is extremely limited, with his political career entirely dependent on the good grace of Cameron and on the electoral fortunes of the Conservatives. It should be no real surprise, considering his background, that Clegg seems extremely comfortable with the current arrangements. He has assumed a self-confident pomposity that is already emerging as he preens himself at the dispatch box.

            Therefore, what we have is a Tory-led administration that is Conservative in all but name and that will attempt to shift the political debate rightwards as it seeks to embed a centre-right political philosophy as the pole by which political discourse in the UK will take place. Cameron and Osborne have already had some success in undermining electoral support for the public sector as part of this approach.

            However, as Cameron has rightly tried to detoxify the Tory brand, there are valuable electoral lessons to be learned from his approach and apparent success. There is undoubtedly a residual toxicity about the Tories. The mere fact that they could not win a clear majority speaks volumes as to their electoral appeal. Despite the most fortuitous political circumstances and a pliant media on their side, the British electorate refused to give them a blank cheque.

            It is quite apparent that the word Conservative is still laden with appalling folk-memories for a large number of people and that their perception of Conservatism is still largely negative. There is a residual belief that a central tenet of modern day Toryism is that it is brutish and harsh. However, a major consequence of the current administration is that behind the mask of the coalition, Osborne and his ilk are able to slash public expenditure by an amount not even dreamt of by Thatcher.

            This is why, at every turn, this coalition of class interests, should be portrayed for what it is, namely a Conservative Government. Any continued reference to 'the Coalition' only serves to camouflage what this Tory dominated Government is all about. Make no mistake, this Tory Government is red in tooth and claw when it comes to the public sector. It must be portrayed for what it is.

If the Labour party refuses to acknowledge that this is anything but a Conservative Government, there is also a further positive side effect for Labour's pursuit of disillusioned Lib Dem voters. In that ignoring the Lib Dem element of the coalition avoids provoking knee-jerk defensiveness from Lib Dem loyalists, this in turn helps to negate any motivation such activists could feed off. Direct attacks on the Lib Dems only serve to encourage a siege mentality which leads to a binding together of most of their party, it raises their profile in the media and it gives the false impression that the Government is actually a true coalition of common interests, when it quite clearly is not.

It is the Tories that are in power in reality, not the Lib Dems, we have to take the fight to the Tories.

CAMERON'S USEFUL IDIOTS (cover story, Tribune magazine 13/08 issue)

By Marjorie Smith

            As Parliament rises for the summer recess one or two important highly negative pointers are already emerging about our new Government and we have also learned that the Labour Party has made little impact since the election.

            The savagery of the proposed cuts is startling and the lies about ring-fencing the NHS and Education are already exposed as deceitful untruths that spilled so easily from Cameron's mouth during the general election campaign.

            However, there is one vital but simple political lesson to learn already and that is that the Lib Dems are a strategic irrelevance. We have a blatant Tory-led administration in which Clegg and his cohorts are willing supplicants to Cameron's Conservatives.

            Direct attacks on the Lib Dems are becoming pointless, a waste of political capital and self-defeating. If they continue they will make the Labour party and its leaders look small and bitter in the future and play completely into the hands of the Conservatives. It will also help to define the Lib Dems as a political party of substance that should be taken more seriously than they are now, or previously have been.

            The scorn of many Labour activists was quite rightly directed at the Lib Dems in the days after the last election and in the first few weeks of the coalition. There did appear to be a chance that a sufficient number of supposed 'left-leaning' Lib Dems might be shamed into refusing to work closely with the Tories and therefore help to undermine the coalition or at least significantly weaken it. That is clearly no longer the case they have made their own bed, let them lie in it.

            It doesn't need the Labour leadership to undermine the Lib Dems they are doing it to themselves. It is quite clear that they are already seen by the electorate as Tory lackeys. Nick Clegg needs no help from Labour in portraying himself as 'Cameron Lite', in fact he is doing a sterling job in portraying himself as just another public school 'Tory boy' .

            The latest poll results in a YouGov tracking poll taken last week gave the Lid Dems a paltry 13% of the national vote, which would only give them 18 seats in Parliament. The converse of this is of course the continuation of the political honeymoon for the Conservatives, still riding high in the polls at 44%, nearly three months after the general election.

            The central political lesson to be learnt from the past three months is that the Lib Dems are a convenient lightning conductor for the public's dissatisfaction. They are and will increasingly become the scapegoats for this administrations savaging of the public sector. Cameron's has so far got off very lightly due to the political attention the Lib Dems have received.

            The long Cameron honeymoon is also partly due to Labour's dismal reaction to the general election defeat. An incoherent front bench and demoralised parliamentary party has understandably, but mistakenly, still reserves its greatest ire for the Lib Dems. Whilst the seemingly interminable Labour leadership election campaign lazily meanders its way to a conclusion, the Tories are making massive cuts in public expenditure and Labour is hardly landing a glove on them.

            Absenteeism from the front bench in Parliament by much of the shadow cabinet and former senior ministers (due to memoiritis?) only aggravates a rapidly worsening position for the public sector. The Tory lie that the NHS and Education would be ring-fenced from cuts is already exposed as the Big Lie it always was going to be. This is no Big Society it will be a Rigged Society.

            All of the Lib Dems in Parliament have adopted a siege mentality, most Lib Dems are currently in deep denial, accepting the conceit that they are making a real difference as to how Britain is governed. Accusations of careerism and selfishness will have no traction, these are the brickbats that all politicians get (even from within their own party/faction)

            Labour needs to adopt a fresh approach to this Government, one that places the Tories at the heart of it (which they are) and portrays the Lib Dems as an irrelevance (which they are increasingly becoming). The party needs to understand that we are living under a Conservative Government and should not only be treated as such but reffered to as such at every turn. Every time somebody refers to the coalition allows the Tories to hide themselves behind a vacuous political construct that only serves to disguise what this Government is really about.

            Every Labour MP, activist and member should only refer to this Government as a Conservative Government. The Lib Dems should be denied any recognition that they are making any positive difference. At every turn Labour should patronise the LibDems and merely ask them what will the Tories will decide.

            Make Cameron the architect of the cuts – Cameron has managed to construct two line of defence around his political appeal – one the fall guy Lib Dems and the fallback from that is Osborne and the right of his party. If Cameron is not nailed to the mast of this Government then he could disown the lot of them and win a second term for the Tories, campaigning on a neo-liberal economic platform.

            The Tories are already thinking of ways to raise the profile of the Lib Dems, in order to try and continue the usefulness of Clegg's idiocy in the furtherance of the Conservative party's base self-interests. Tory strategists know that a badly wounded and enfeebled Liberal Democrat party is of no use to the Conservatives until at the most six to twelve months from a general election.

            As the deserved backlash hits the Lib Dems, they will cling ever closer to the notion that coalition with the Tories was the right thing to do. The current Lib Dem leadership has nowhere else to go but remaining as junior partners to the Tories. The rest of the Lib Dem Parliamentary party have already demonstrated their weak and craven attitude and although there will be defections from the coalition in the future, it is now quite apparent that they will become increasingly insignificant.

            In dealing with the Lib Dems the party's mantra should be "I want to speak with the organ grinder, not the monkey". Diminish them with disdain.

THIS BUDGET IS LABOUR'S GREAT OPPORTUNITY TO START TO SPLIT THE COALITION

Why examining the coalition's DNA reveals the seeds of its own destruction

Marjorie Smith

One of Labour's main strategic pre-occupations has to be how to unpick this coalition of parties (if not of interests).  Any hope of returning to Government has to be dependant on the Tories and the Lib Dems either hanging separately or being hung together. Either the coalition splits, or it becomes overwhelmingly unpopular at the next election.

Whilst an extended marriage of convenience, at first glance, may well be in Labour's interest, with the probable deep unpopularity of this coalition becoming a political fact. It would also mean five long years in opposition and having to fight the next general election with a new 'reformed' electoral system stacked against the party.

The budget of Gideon Oliver 'George' Osborne (heir to the baronetcy of Ballentaylor), presents a golden opportunity for Labour to point out the massive internal contradictions that are presently submerged in this coalition of self-interest, exemplified by how so-called 'progressive' politicians are being mealy-mouthed in the face of a Tory ideological drive to reduce the power of the State.

Make no mistake, the sheep's clothing of a small rise in personal allowances for a few, does not disguise the devious impact of the 2.5% rise in VAT for all, the massive cuts to the public sector (both in terms of financial and personnel resources), slashing housing benefits and cutting future pension rights. This is a budget of deceit, sophistry, obfuscation and political fraud. Already, those on low incomes, benefits and state pensions will be hammered by the rise in VAT with no compensatory action to increase their incomes.

Nick Clegg may spuriously claim that these cuts are 'progressive' but the truth will be radically different for the many millions, both directly and indirectly, who depend on the public sector for their livelihoods. For example, a one year freeze in council tax allied to a 25% cut in central Government grants to Councils will guarantee massive cuts in jobs and services by local councils.

Since Tories like Cameron and Osborne can afford to opt out of Council provision (e.g. free education) so do not have to avail themselves of Council Services (beyond having their bins emptied and the odd PC to wander past their Special Branch-guarded residences), they like most of the rich in this country, will be able to remain completely unscathed by the cuts to come.

Furthermore, the claim that the coalition will be able to ring-fence budgets relating to health and education is mere window dressing, more designed to appease Liberal Democrats in Parliament than to convince the population as a whole.

Vince Cable's claim that the Lib Dems have tempered Tory policies by persuading them to raise tax allowances for some of the low paid in the country is a deceit. Like Lenin's 'useful idiots', the Lib Dems are being drawn into a glaring trap. Not only has it allowed Osborne the political cover to freeze child benefits for 3 years but it has also allowed the numerate Tories in the Cameron leadership clique to be happy to go along with the Lib Dems aspiration of a move to a minimum income tax allowance of £10,000 for a particular reason.

That is because both Osborne and Cameron are committed to the ideological prize of introducing a flat tax (in the region of 22% for all tax payers, including the mega-rich). Right-wingers see this as the holy grail of tax reform, whereby the rich and high-earners are able to insulate themselves from the needs of the population as a whole. Make no mistake Cameron and Osborne are committed to a flat income tax rate for all.

The introduction of either a Flat Tax or large rises in the threshold for Inheritance Tax (or both) will represent the greatest example of self-serving class interest at Governmental level since Robert Peel's 1845 administration, when the landed gentry fought tooth and nail to keep the pernicious Corn Laws in the teeth of evidence that it was the poor who paid the highest price for such iniquities.

Osborne's token gesture of a net rise of income for lower paid people is £170 per year, this will be completely wiped out by the rise in VAT. To put £170 into context it is the equivalent of two days tuition fees at Eton College, we are manifestly not in this together. The changes to the budget will not affect, by one iota, the family trust funds of the Camerons or the Osbornes, but millions of ordinary people will lose out.

Whilst most of the Mainstream media in the UK seems to have meekly accepted that the recent compact between the (what is now quite apparent) two UK parties of the centre-right is a sustainable concoction. The DNA of the two parties is still radically different, as any perfunctory analysis of the make-up of either party reveals.

The coalition's leadership may well sit (and fit) comfortably with each other, after all they share common backgrounds, common schools, common universities, all very different from the experiences of the common man. There is very little political capital to be made out of trying to divine differences between Clegg and Cameron (paternalistic 'One Nation' Tories in all but name). However, there are also significant elements in both parties, presently marginalised, that are as different as chalk and cheese. 

For simplistic (but pertinent) purposes, it is highly revealing to examine the two extremes of the coalition. If one accepts that there are still some well-meaning centrist, or even some who would claim they are of the centre-left, then they are to be found in the Beveridge Group of Liberal Democrat MPs. Whilst many of those on the right of the Tory party are members of the Bruges Group, a radically eurosceptic group that also appears to share a deep and abiding belief in free market fundamentalism with libertarian tendencies.

It is into these obvious fissures that Labour has to drive home the opportunities presented by this budget, at every opportunity, by exposing the crass hypocrisy that is so blatantly obvious in the make-up of the coalition. The idea that Lib Dem figures such as Simon Hughes and Don Foster can sit comfortably on the government benches with the likes of Bill Cash, John Redwood and the odious David Heathcoat-Amory is a vacuous illusion that deserves to be shattered.

The social market values that the Beveridge group used to share is a total anathema to most Tory MPs (including most Ministers) and that is why most of the Lib Dem MPs belonging to the group have been deliberately ignored for Ministerial posts (even at junior level). This faction of the Lib Dems should be a rich source of discontent and internal unhappiness with the direction of the centre-right coalition.

In Prime Minister's Questions, Deputy PMQs, Ministerial Questions, speeches in the chamber, Select Committee meetings, appearances on TV, radio etc, i.e. at each and ever opportunity, Labour has to focussing on exposing and magnifying the discomfiture of Beveridge group Liberal Democrat MPs. The idea that there is a permanent air to this coalition needs to be exposed as a lie as soon as possible. It is beset with strange bedfellows and internal contradictions.

Most Tories are virulently anti-statist and instinctively opposed to nearly all aspects of public expenditure (except for the Ministry of Defence obviously). The Conservative Parliamentary party is the most eurosceptic it has ever been and the most Atlanticist (in a neo-con sense) ever. This exposes a rich seam of discord that Labour must exploit mercilessly.

Every Labour party member and supporter has an opportunity to contribute to undermining this real threat to labour's interests by foreshortening the lifetime of the coalition by helping to spread a growing discord amongst its supporters and members, thereby establishing an irresistible momentum that will destroy this iniquitous government.

FROM BRUGES TO BEVERIDGE

Why examining the coalition's DNA reveals the seeds of its own destruction

Marjorie Smith

One of Labour's main strategic pre-occupations has to be how to unpick this coalition of parties (if not of interests).  Any hope of returning to government has to be dependant on the Tories and the Lib Dems either hanging separately or being hung together. Either the coalition splits, or it becomes overwhelmingly unpopular at the next election.

Whilst an extended marriage of convenience, at first glance, may well be in Labour's interest, with the probable deep unpopularity of this coalition becoming a political fact. It would also mean five long years in opposition and having to fight the next general election with a new 'reformed' electoral system stacked against the party.

Make no mistake, the early indications of this coalition's instincts concerning electoral reform do not presage well for Labour. Cameron's proposals to cut 100 plus MPs combined with significant changes to constituency boundaries is a direct threat to Labour's medium and long-term interests. Both the Tories and the Lib Dems will become increasingly desperate to hold on to power in a mutual embrace as electoral unpopularity will surely hit them in the medium-term.

The coalition's pre-nuptial agreement already includes proposals to shore-up the coalition in the face of real threats to its existence. The proposed 55% threshold of MPs needed to call a new general election before a government has completed its five years term of office is a naked attempt start building the first steps into locking Labour out of power for at least one to two generations.

The coalition's proposals to stack the House of Lords with well over a hundred new Tory and Lib Dem peers is a blatant attempt to gerrymander the constitution in favour of the coalition's political interests. A gerrymandering, it should be noted, that was completely absent from either of the coalition's manifestoes. It is also clearly in the interests of the Tories and the Lib Dems as separate parties, as they can reward their financial benefactors and influential supporters with the prizes of patronage.

Whilst most of the Mainstream media in the UK seems to have meekly accepted that the recent compact between the (what is now quite apparent) two UK parties of the centre-right is a sustainable concoction. The DNA of the two parties is still radically different, as any perfunctory analysis of the make-up of either party reveals.

The coalition's leadership may well sit (and fit) comfortably with each other, after all they share common backgrounds, common schools, common universities, all very different from the experiences of the common man. There is very little political capital to be made out of trying to divine differences between Clegg and Cameron (One Nation Tories in all but name) or, for example, between Osborne and Laws (Thatcherite free-marketeers). These are However, there are also significant elements in both parties, presently marginalised, that are as different as chalk and cheese. 

For simplistic (but pertinent) purposes, it is highly revealing to examine the two extremes of the coalition. If one accepts that there are still some well-meaning centrist, or even some who would claim they are of the centre-left, then they are to be found in the Beveridge Group of Liberal Democrat MPs. Whilst many of those on the right of the Tory party are members of the Bruges Group, a radically eurosceptic group that also appears to share a deep and abiding belief in free market fundamentalism with libertarian tendencies.

It is quite apparent that the fault lines between the Tory's Bruges group and the Lib Dems' Beveridge group are very deep and, in the main, irreconcilable on most social and international issues.

It is into these obvious fissures that Labour has to drive home, at every opportunity, exposing the crass hypocrisy that is so blatantly obvious in the make-up of the coalition. The idea that Lib Dem figures such as Simon Hughes and Don Foster can sit comfortably on the government benches with the likes of Bill Cash, John Redwood and the odious David Heathcoat-Amory is an illusion that deserves to be shattered.

The social market values that the Beveridge group purports to share is a total anathema to most Tory MPs (including most Ministers) and that is why most of the Lib Dem MPs belonging to the group have been deliberately ignored for Ministerial posts (even at junior level). This faction of the Lib Dems could be a rich source of discontent and internal unhappiness with the direction of the centre-right coalition.

In Prime Minister's Questions, Deputy PMQs, Ministerial Questions, speeches in the chamber, Select Committee meetings, appearances on TV, radio etc, i.e. at each and ever opportunity, Labour has to focussing on exposing and magnifying the discomfiture of Beveridge group Liberal Democrat MPs. The idea that there is a permanent air to this coalition needs to be exposed as a lie as soon as possible, before the commentariat in the UK media persuade everybody that this is an established fact.

What should also be exploited is the deep, but presently underlying, anger on the Tory backbenchers about Cameron's acceptance about the status quo in the European Union. There are a host of Tory eurosceptics, both inside and outside of Parliament, who viscerally hate the EU and deeply resent having to make accommodations with Clegg over the European issue.

These very same people are ant-statist and instinctively opposed to nearly all aspects of public expenditure (except for the Ministry of Defence obviously). Again, this exposes a rich seam of discord for Labour to exploit mercilessly.

This campaign against this contradictory coalition should also be extended to local government and with party activists. At every turn the Labour leadership, MPs, Councillors, party membership and the wider Labour movement should be exploiting the discomfiture that is already there about this posh alliance and the growing discomfiture that is to come.

Every Labour party member and supporter has an opportunity to contribute to undermining this real threat to labour's interests by foreshortening the lifetime of the coalition by helping to spread a growing discord amongst its supporters and members, thereby establishing an irresistible momentum that will destroy this iniquitous government.

WHAT IS IAIN DUNCAN SMITH UP TO?

Did Iain Duncan Slith really say on the BBC this morning that "work helps to make you free"?
Doen't this sound rather too similiar to the wording on German concentration and death camps , as in, "ARBEIT MACHT FRIE"? Just a thought.

LET'S TALK ABOUT EMMIGRATION

Why should we expect to be able to move anywhere if….

Marjorie Smith

Imagine the posters and leaflets calling for a halt to unbridled EU immigration, use of the words 'flocking' and 'floods' and 'hordes' widespread in the media. Imagine the references to distorting the housing market, to causing overstretch in public services such as hospitals, whose budgets are said to be struggling to cope with the influx.

Imagine a large and significant group of foreigners refusing to learn the native tongue. Shops such as ALDI and LIDL a metaphor for the Tower of Babel as customers speak in a multitude of tongues and are served by low-paid immigrants desperate for any work.

Imagine the drip, drip, drip, of continual antipathy to the immigrant community as parties of all points of the political spectrum acknowledge that immigration is a big political issue and has to be curbed.  As ever hiding behind the application of EU laws and saying "it's all that Brussels' fault" as political camouflage for their own inability to present a balanced case for immigration.

How would it feel to be part of that immigrant community accused of being a net drain on the public finances, when in fact the opposite was the case. That the taxes the immigrant community paid were in excess of any cost of the public services received and that this lie was a central plank of the political opposition to EU immigration.

Now imagine the plethora of political propaganda was in Spanish not in English, that the opposition to unbridled EU immigration was orchestrated by extremist Spanish parties. That the Spanish mainstream parties believed that using anti-immigrant sentiments as part of a populist electoral tool was acceptable.

How would the more than seven hundred thousand (yes, over 700,000) Britons who have made their home in Spain feel? Why is it that it is perfectly acceptable for the British to believe that they have the right of residency in any other EU country, yet it is apparent that people believe that the same right should not be reciprocated to citizens from other EU countries.

This seems to be the current political atmosphere that is pervading the country and seemingly has infected the Labour party.  It now appears that leadership candidates such as Balls and Burnham believe that playing the immigration card is way of selling their candidacy as an attractive option. They should hang their heads in shame, sacrificing decades of Labour party morals, for a squalid short-term fix in order to further their own political ends believing that an ill-thought out populist approach to immigration is either politically attractive or morally right.

There are currently one million, six hundred and fifty thousand (1,650,000)  Britons who live in the rest of the EU full time (less than 15% of them of pensionable age), if one includes those who live part-time in the UK and part-time in the rest of the EU that takes the figure up to over two million (2,000,000). We seem to believe we should be able to flock abroad at will but deeply resent the quid pro quo.

However, the deepest resentment appears to be amongst those who do not have the financial resources to choose. There is a case to be argued that unbridled immigration from the new Member States of the EU has had an impact on the lower end of the jobs market in the UK. However the economic growth under the Labour Government from 1997 onwards created large numbers of jobs that could not be filled locally.

It does seem to be the case that those who have been impacted on the most are the unskilled poor where competition for jobs may have suppressed wage levels below their normal historical relationship with more skilled pay levels. However, the role of family tax credits compensates for what may have been a suppression factor in domestic pay rates at the lowest level.

The case has to be argued that EU immigration to this country has had a positive effect on the pubic finances. That most of the immigrants from Eastern Europe have been relatively young and keen to work, that the tax take from such immigrants has led to a net contribution to the UK Treasury. Furthermore, many of the immigrants from the EU have already returned to their home countries and the arrival of newcomers slows down dramatically as the economy suffers under the Posh Alliances planned savage cuts in public expenditure.

It is also undoubtedly true that those whose quality of life has improved the most are those people who are the +/- 350,000 who live part-time in the UK and part-time in the rest of the EU. This group almost certainly contains a significant number of the rich middle-classes who delight in their second-homes on the Mediterranean or in Tuscanny or the Dordogne.

However, 'that's life', those with sufficient disposable income to buy holiday homes will spend the money on such homes. It can be argued that the freedom of movement in the EU has had a welcomed negative effect on house prices in the UK, with the South Coast, South West, Wales etc seeing house prices moderating as the attractions of second homes abroad compete with domestic options.

The Labour Party does itself no favours when it espouses policies based on anti-immigrant sentiment, when it employs phrases such as combating/halting/ fighting 'the  tide' of immigration. It is ill-served by leadership candidates who rather than campaign about the issue on the doorstep instead reach for the knee-jerk response in a tawdry display of triangulation, with the BNP being, imperceptibly, one of the angles.

Right-Wing Entryism and the Neo-Liberals

This article will be published in Tribune Magazine on 28 May 2007 -  http://www.tribunemagazine.co.uk/

The new Con-Dem coalition should come as no surprise to those who have studied the development of a free market philosophy at the core of current Lib Dem thinking. What we have witnessed since the election is the culmination of a right-wing grab for power in what was formerly (albeit loosely) perceived as a progressive centre-left party.

The actual final nail in the coffin for a progressive alliance of the centre-left was marked by the leadership contest between Nick Clegg and Chris Huhne in 2007. Both firmly on the centre-right of their party, the contest was between two free market fundamentalists far more interested in individual rights (by itself commendable) than in state intervention to address manifest injustices.

The party of Grimond, Steele, Ashdown and Kennedy has had its progressive heart completely hollowed out by neo-economic liberal activism in the party and replaced by a right-wing cabal of Clegg, Huhne, Davey, Laws and Cable amongst others. It should come as no surprise that a coalition with the Tories was no ideological barrier to their personal ambitions. Supposed left-leaning Liberal MPs such as Simon Hughes are either now Tory lackeys or simple hypocrites.

The only faction within the Liberal Democrats that would have been able to oppose the relentless drive to the right in their party, the Beveridge Group, made up of social liberals who are convinced that the role of the state should be a force to increase social welfare by state intervention, has been completely emasculated by the leadership cabal. It should be noted that only 2 out of their 28 members in the House of Commons have been given ministerial posts and inconsequential ones at that, one as deputy chief whip and one as a junior transport minister.

The Beveridge group (whose inspiration includes Keynes as well as Beveridge) would have been the core of any progressive alliance with Labour. Even if it was a loose arrangement in this Parliament, it would almost certainly have been able to help Labour block the worst excesses of George Gideon ‘Gus’ Osborne’s savage cuts to come. Instead they have meekly accepted the triumphant entryism from the right and allowed Clegg and his followers to lurch the party rightwards.

Chris Huhne, unsurprisingly, has tried to straddle both factions, being a member of the Beveridge group and former highly successful economist in the City, but crucially a contributor to the Orange Book. Of course, the ex-Labour party supporter has obviously been on a personal political journey, ‘rightward, ever rightward’, However, Huhne, owns seven houses (five of which are rented) and is independently wealthy.

In fact it can be argued that the current Lib Dems have reverted to being a party more akin to a historical Whig position, with its main concern being the defence of the merchant class with their interest in protecting property rights, laissez-faire economics and a penchant for free trade rather than any real or feigned concern for the working class.

What many term as a Blue-Yellow coalition is in reality a Blue-Orange coalition with the little-known Orange Book forming the core of current Lib Dem political thinking. To understand how this disreputable coalition has come to pass is to forensically examine the political thinking laid out in The Orange Book: Reclaiming Liberalism edited by David Laws (yes that Laws) and Paul Marshall. Particularly interesting are the contributions of the Lib Dems' current leadership.

The Orange Book published in 2004 marked the start of the decline of progressive values in the Lib Dems and the gradual abandonment of commitment to a social market system. It also provided the ideological pole for the party's right wing to coalesce around and start the march to seizing power in the Lib Dems. What is also remarkable is the complete failure of the former SDP (and originally Labour) element in their party to sound the warning bell as to the direction the party was going. Ex-Labour people like Shirley Williams and Tom McNally should be thoroughly ashamed about their inaction.

Clegg et al are a mirror image of Cameron's philosophical approach with its social liberal solutions to society's perceived ills. At the core of the Orange Book is an abiding belief in the role of the free market's ability to address most of societal issues, such as public healthcare, pensions, environment, globalisation, social and agricultural policy, local government and prisons. Laws even advocated replacing the National Health Service with an insurance-based scheme.

What is also remarkable is how easy the Lib Dem leadership sits within the Tory-led coalition. This is an arranged marriage between partners of a very similar social class. Even the historical Tory-Whig coalition of early 1780s, whilst similar in class, at least it had fundamental political differences. In many respects we are seeing a Government being formed made up of a single ruling elite that has previously manifested itself as two separate political parties whose leading figures can now be seen to have been divided more by subtle shades of opinion rather than any single ideological difference.

The Orange Book contributors of David Laws, Vincent Cable, Nicholas Clegg and Chris Huhne, Edward Davey are all Oxbridge-educated (as was the remaining member of the cabal, Danny Alexander) and four out of the five went to private schools with Cable an ex-Grammar schoolboy.

These are not people who know how it is to struggle financially, socially or academically. Its leader Nicholas William Peter Clegg was educated at the exclusive and highly expensive Westminster school (as was Huhne). He was also educated at his family's expense in the USA and at the very exclusive and super-elitist, College of Europe in Bruges, Belgium. He was a member of the Conservative Association at Cambridge University and was an integral part of Tory European Commissioner Leon Brittan's private office in Brussels. It should come as no surprise which party and which party leader he feels most comfortable with.

The idea that the current Lib Dem leadership clique could have easily sat with the Labour party; either in Government or in opposition was always fanciful and a forlorn hope to those on the right of the Labour party who thought that an accommodation could have been reached.  The electoral mathematics gave the perfect excuse to the Lib Dem's right-wing cabal (or more accurately neo-Liberals) to refuse to deal with Labour at a strategic level. Whilst hints of a deal with Labour were useful in dealing with the Conservatives tactically, Clegg was quite obviously never interested in a deal.

One salutary lesson to be learned from this squalid deal amongst the country’s forces of conservatism is that the Tories real intentions are plain to see. The Lib Dem Ministers have, to use the vernacular, got ‘the shitty end of the stick’. Appointed to Cabinet Posts with little power (i.e. Clegg and Alexander) or little room to manoeuvre as the Chancellor of the Exchequer holds the purse string (Laws, Huhne and Cable), the Tories’ disdain is manifest.

Finally, the main justification for this squalid coalition agreement being that the country needs strong and stable Government ((i.e. absolute power for a guaranteed five years and a signaled gerrymandering of national elections, Parliamentary procedure and a short to medium-term stitch up of the House of Lords) is vacuous in the extreme.

The basis for the Con-Dem coalition is nothing more than naked class interest that will cost the working class of this country dear and may well endure far beyond the initial five-year proposal, if their naked attempts to gerrymander Parliament bear fruit.