Half Bricks and Abuse of MPs

by Les May

HARRIET Harman has been at it again.  In last Saturday’s Times she was reported to have said that some MPs had changed their stance, presumably on Brexit, because of threats and abuse they had received.   But as is often the case with Harriet the story she is telling is a bit lacking in detail. Or to put it another way we have only Harriet’s say so for it.

As I pointed out recently, Luciana Berger has been repeatedly verbally abused and physically threatened, but the people doing it are not connected with the Labour party.  It’s not good enough for her to say that she believes that the abuse she received after the incident with the mural in 2018 came from ‘left wing individuals’.  Without some firm evidence I am not willing to believe claims of this kind.

This is a re-run of what we saw in July 2016 when The Guardian ran a story about a brick being thrown through the window of Angela Eagle’s constituency office after she declared her intention to challenge Corbyn for the Labour leadership.

According to the paper, ‘Eagle called on Corbyn to rein in his supporters, saying attacks such as the vandalising of her office were “being done in his name, and he needs to get control of the people who are supporting him and make certain that this behaviour stops and stops now.  It is bullying.  It has absolutely no place in politics in the UK and it needs to end”.'

What’s interesting about the Berger and Eagle cases is the lazy assumption that it is supporters of Jeremy Corbyn who were responsible and that he should somehow or other ‘control’ them. I’m a supporter of Corbyn, but if I write something to which you take exception, take it up with me, don’t try to blame Corbyn.

If you make lazy assumptions like this and are not meticulous in finding out the facts before rushing into print it’s easy to give the impression that Labour is a hotbed of bullying and anti-semitism.  Just because they print it does not mean we have to believe it. 

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Not A Clever Idea

by Les May

Just after the 2016 Referendum I met a someone who is a member of the Heywood and Middleton Constituency Labour party. He was not impressed that our MP, Liz McInnes, had resigned from her shadow post as communities and local government minister as a gesture of no confidence in Jeremy Corbyn.

Now Liz is one of the few MPs who have ‘had a proper job’ before becoming an MP so I am happy to vote for her. (I also have it from an impeccable source that a political opponent once said admiringly of her that she was known as ‘The Rottweiler’ for her determination to defend workers’ rights.)

A little lamely I muttered something that she would have come under a lot of pressure to join the herd who were calling for Corbyn to go.

An enthusiastic Corbyn supporter he was having none of it! He argued that Labour MPs should listen to the views of members of the local party and could not expect members to do the leg work for them at election time if they didn’t. And he was quite right of course.

I remembered this conversation last night when I read the response of Joan Ryan, the chair of Labour Friends of Israel, to losing a vote of no confidence at her local constituency party where she was accused of smearing Jeremy Corbyn.

So what was Ms Ryan’s response? She called the people who had voted against her ‘Trots, Stalinists, Communists and assorted hard left’.

Given that just over half of the people who attended the meeting voted against her, 94 out of 186, this may not have been the cleverest idea.  Why would any of these people who she has attacked in this unpleasant way want to go round the streets at the next election trying to persuade people to vote for her?

Joan Ryan is not a woman who is meticulous in checking her facts as you will see in this video.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L3dn-VV3czc

The video is about 26 minutes long.  The incident involving Joan Ryan starts at about 7 minutes and 40 seconds.

Chuka Ummuna’s recent comments are thought to have been prompted by the votes of no confidence in Joan Ryan and Chris Leslie.  It may just be a coincidence that both these MPs are members of the ‘Friends of Israel’ group. It may also be just a coincidence that Chuka Ummuna (and Angela Eagle) are seen in the video at the Friends of Israel stall asking to be updated. 

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Considering a Labour Party Split

by Les May

THE stories about an imminent split in the Labour party are brought to us by the same people who have been busy telling us that Jeremy Corbyn was half hearted in his support of the Remain campaign in the EU referendum, that Corbyn inspired thugs smashed the windows of Angela Eagle's constituency office and that found themselves accused of bias by an LSE investigation into media coverage of Corbyn in the period 1 September to 1 November 2015... need I go on?  These are the people for whom the 'story' matters more than the truth.

I've briefly dissected some of these stories in Northern Voices during the past couple of weeks and Tim Fenton dissects the latest one from Dan Hodges on the Zelo blog.

Media talk of a split pre-dates the events leading to the current leadership contest.  The same Dan Hodges had been promoting a Labour split with an article in the Mail on Sunday on 8 May.  Read this carefully and you'll spot his reference to a four week 'window of of opportunity' to challenge Corbyn between the EU referendum and the summer recess.  Notice also the reference to 'planning for Labour’s long-awaited leadership coup'.

Some of the stories implying there will be a split are more subtle.  Who 'owns' the name 'Labour' is a question which is suddenly being asked.  Why? If not to implant the idea of an imminent collapse of the party.

Whilst I think it is right to talk of a coup being planned within the Parliamentary Labour Party I think the attempts to infiltrate into the discussion the notion of a Labour party split was and is just a ploy to egg on the plotters and encourage the uncommitted to join them.  Presenting the present contest as a fight for the 'soul' of the party is an attempt to promote an apocalyptic message by people who have anything but the best interests of the Labour party at heart.  

There's one excellent reason why the Labour party will not split.  It's called 'follow the money'.

Labour receives a significant amount of funding from unions affiliated to the Labour party.  Speaking to a group of peers about the then 'Trades Union Bill', in March Labour's general secretary Iain McNicol revealed that, out of the £22m ($30m) which Labour-affiliated unions raised in political funds in 2014, £10m was handed to the party.

Now ask yourself a simple question. Will unions like Unite and Unison be more likely to spend their political funds with a party led by supporters of Corbyn or one led by supporters of those Blairites whose sense of entitlement that they, and they alone, have the right to determine party policy makes them incandescent with fury that they have been denied?  

If you object to the notion that in the end pragmatism will rule and the outcome will be decided by where the unions are prepared to put their money, ask yourself whether you prefer Labour to be funded by the pennies of a lot of ordinary people or the millions of a few of the very rich.

Interested readers might like to follow the link to the 'Labour Leaders Office Fund'.
http://northernvoicesmag.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/performance-figures-in-referendum.html
http://northernvoicesmag.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/angela-eagle-brick-coup.html
http://northernvoicesmag.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/jeremy-corbyn-misrepresentaion-in-media.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-3579033/DAN-HODGES-Congratulations-Sadiq-just-proved-Labour-split.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-3705171/DAN-HODGES-Reckon-s-nice-decent-bloke-let-dark-menacing-reality-Great-Corbyn-Myth.html
http://zelo-street.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/dan-hodges-sells-corbyn-pass.html
http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/trade-union-bill-conservative-crackdown-funding-will-significantly-hit-labour-party-finances-1547099
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labour_Leader%27s_Office_Fund

Owen Smith - Corbyn-lite?

by Les May

AT first sight it looks as if the decision by Angela Eagle to pull out of the contest for the Labour leadership is, from the 'plotters' perspective a good one, because it ensures that the anti-Corbyn vote will not be split.  But in the interval between now and the leadership vote there is enough time for things to turn sour, not because of anything Corbyn says or does, but from what Owen Smith himself says.

Now I was not an Eagle fan as I showed in some recent articles for Northern Voices.  There were two reasons for this. The first was that if she was as left wing as was proclaimed in the media, why should I settle for voting for a Labour party led by an ersatz version of Corbyn, when I could have the real thing?

The second developed more slowly.  I began to see that her supporters, and especially her supporters in the media, were going to fight her leadership campaign on the basis of 'intimidation' by Corbyn supporters, 'sexism' and 'homophobia', and that she was not going to set the record straight.

In fairness I should point out that it is possible to generate claims of 'homophobia' from the most innoccuous of statements as happened to Owen Smith after he talked about his family life as a married father with children and describing himself as 'normal' and there is no suggestion that Angela Eagle would endorse such nonsense.

But one thing I would not accuse her of is being someone who makes rash statements just to get elected.  Appearing to make vague promises and then not being able to deliver on them has a habit of coming back to haunt you.

Two days ago Owen Smith was quoted as saying 'I would renationalise our railways tomorrow'.  Sounds radical, but it's just playing to the gallery and telling Labour people what he thinks they want to here.  As I pointed out in this extract from an NV article in August 2015 ownership isn't the issue.  The problem is to make the system work for the benefit of the public.  

So why do I care?  Why do I, and people like me, find Corbyn by far the most appealing of all the leadership candidates? I'm not hung up on renationalisation of the railways.  But I do want them to work.  I want to be able to go into any station and book the cheapest ticket to anywhere in the country using any train.  I don't want to be crammed onto a train with too few coaches every day. I don't want to surcharged if I find myself paying the conductor.  If it takes nationalisation to make the system work so be it. If you object to nationalisation just make the system work.  Or would doing that not be 'business friendly'?

Yesterday, we were told that Smith has 'promised a second referendum on EU membership or a general election to influence how Brexit goes,' and 'it would be “tempting” to stop withdrawal from the EU if he became Prime Minister.'

Again this is just telling people what he thinks they want to hear.  If he really believes it then he clearly does not understand what is going to happen once a UK government triggers Article 50.

As I wrote in a NV article two weeks ago:

What is clear even now, and becomes clearer every day, is that try as it might, no UK government, whether Tory or Labour, is going to get access to the so called 'single market' unless it accepts free movement of workers, a.k.a. immigration. This is why: 'The internal market, or single market, of the European Union (EU), also known as the European single market, is a single market that seeks to guarantee the free movement of goods, capital, services, and people – the "four freedoms" – between the EU's 28 member states.'

There is not going to be any 'pre triggering' negotiation designed to give the UK a relationship with the EU more privileged than any of the remaining 27 members enjoy.  The choice is stark, leave the EU and maintain access to the single market by allowing free movement or negotiate with the rest of the world and pay the tariffs imposed by the EU on external trade. a.k.a increase the cost of British exports to the EU.

Owen Smith is a 'loose cannon' liable to say things he is not going to be able to deliver on.  The media love him at the moment because he's not Corbyn.  But if he keeps on making rash half promises it won't take long for someone to spot that he's just playing the game of being 'Corbyn lite' to garner votes for the leadership election.  How long before some wag asks if promising a second referendum isn't just a bit like the whole leadership challenge: keep them voting until they come up with the right answer!
http://northernvoicesmag.blogspot.co.uk/2015/08/labour-party-corbyns-policy-proposals.html
http://northernvoicesmag.blogspot.co.uk/2015/09/corbyn-northern-voices.html
http://northernvoicesmag.blogspot.co.uk/2016/07/brexit-fall-out-little-local-problem.html

Angela Eagle: the Brick & the Coup!

by Les May

I HESITATE to say that Angela Eagle lied about having a brick thrown through her constituency office window, but she is certainly guilty of of not having done anything to correct the impression given in some sections of the press that it was done by a Corbyn supporter and had been done to 'bully' her after she announced she was challenging Corbyn for Labour leader.

But as is clear from a statement made by an Eagle supporter and reported in The Guardian, Eagle's office just happens to be in the same building.  The accompanying image shows that the window was at the foot of a stairwell and not in an office.

According to a local councillor, Bernie Mooney:
'Someone put a brick through the window last night. At the side of Angela’s office there is a massive window from the floor to the top with six or seven panes and it’s broken one of them. They had come up the side of the building. There are three or four businesses in here as well as Angela’s office.'

It seems that for Angela the brick through the window has been much the same as the failed coup in Turkey for Erdogan; something to be taken advantage of.

Even his enemies agree that Corbyn is a decent man.  How about Angela showing she's a decent woman by setting the record straight?
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jul/12/angela-eagles-constituency-office-vandalised-after-leadership-bid-launch
http://voxpoliticalonline.com/2016/07/17/angela-eagle-lied-about-her-office-window-being-vandalised-by-a-corbyn-supporting-bully/
https://wirralinittogether.wordpress.com/2016/07/17/brickgate-angela-eagles-office-window-was-not-broken/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ppnKHmuVA1s

Performance Figures in the Referendum

Les May

IN an article in yesterday's “i” Angela Eagle showed where she gets her information about Jeremy Corbyn.  It's the media.  Referring to Corbyn's ability to 'hold Boris Johnson's feet to the fire', amongst other things, she wrote 'The tepid words and lip service he paid to the Remain campaign showed this past month.' 

According to the media it's received wisdom that Corbyn's performance in the referendum was poor.  And Angela Eagle has swallowed that story without bothering to check the facts. 

According to an analysis of media coverage by Loughborough University for the period 6 May to 22 June, Corbyn scored 123 media appearances.  Eagle scored 15, one less than Angela Merkel who is Chancellor of Germany!  Alan Johnson who was supposed to be running the Labour party's Referendum campaign scored slightly better with 19. 

So how did Corbyn do in mobilising the Labour vote for Remain? You can check out the exact figures on the link below, but in round figures, 40% of the people who voted 'Remain' had voted Labour in the 2015 election and 40% of those who voted 'Leave' had voted Conservative.  Put another way 60% of Labour voters supported 'Remain' and 60% of Conservative voters supported 'Leave'. 

Dumping the blame for Brexit on a few northern towns where Labour had performed well in past elections and ignoring the vast swathes of the country which were solidly Conservative in the election and solidly for 'Leave' in the referendum, won't wash.  Check it out on the appropriate maps if you doubt it. 

The witless bunch of plotters who have tried to launch a coup against Corbyn  missed a glorious opportunity to dump the responsibility for the vote to leave the EU fairly and squarely where it belongs on David Cameron and his Tory party.   

Had they pointed out how well Corbyn had mobilised the Labour vote for Remain whilst David Cameron had pointedly failed to do so, it would have been difficult for anyone in the media to argue differently because that is what the facts point to.  On this matter Corbyn showed far more leadership than Cameron whose troops ignored his pleas. 

Angela Eagles' leadership style would certainly be different from Corbyn's.  We'd be back to a world where Labour's policies would be determined by what suited the media. 

Incidentally, Angela just what did that sentence you mangled actually mean?

 

https://blog.lboro.ac.uk/crcc/eu-referendum/uk-news-coverage-2016-eu-referendum-report-5-6-may-22-june-2016/ 

 

http://lordashcroftpolls.com/2016/06/how-the-united-kingdom-voted-and-why/ 

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/brexit-map-uk-eu-referendum-2016_uk_576cf29fe4b0232d331db2b6 

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:2015UKElectionMap.svg 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/04/evidence-blame-jeremy-corbyn-brexit-remain-labour-conservative 

 

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/26/corbyn-leader-brexit-labour-rebels-sabotage 

 

Getting Rid of Corbyn!

by Les May

RECENTLY at a fund raising event John McDonnell, Labour Shadow Chancellor is reported to have denounced those seeking to get rid of Jeremy Corbyn saying, 'They have been plotting and conniving. The only good thing about it, as plotters they are fucking useless'.

Now having said much the same thing myself a couple of days ago I am unlikely to disagree with this sentiment, though I would not have given the media a stick to be me with by using those exact words!

Just how useless they are can best be seen by watching them toy with the idea that the best way to proceed is to field a second candidate and so split the anti- Corbyn vote.  But as a Labour voter happy with the direction in which Corbyn is trying to lead the party I would say that wouldn't I?.

So what do other people think?

Two days ago Matthew Norman writing for the Independent attached the sobriquet 'Tiny Tears' to Angela Eagle and yesterday Richard Godwin wrote in the Evening Standard:
 'With the best will in the world, if the answer to Labour’s woes is Angela Eagle in a fuchsia blazer — capable and honourable politician though she may be — then you have to wonder at the phrasing of the question.'

As for Owen Smith, who is being talked up as a 'soft left' candidate by people who think we Labour voters are soft headed, this is what Guido Fawkes had to say, 'Owen Smith is hoodwinking people on the left of the Labour Party into believing he is one of their own. Nothing could be further from the truth. Smith’s nickname when he worked as a corporate lobbyist at Pfizer was “Oily Smith” because everyone was wise to his habit of telling people what he thought they wanted to hear.'

Time to remind the plotters of Denis Healey’s first law of politics: 'when you’re in a hole, stop digging.'
http://www.standard.co.uk/comment/comment/richard-godwin-labour-must-get-real-if-it-wants-to-fight-the-tories-a3294761.html
http://order-order.com/2016/07/13/241581/
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/oct/03/denis-healeys-10-most-celebrated-quotes-former-labour-chancellor

Angela Eagle & Labour Party Unity

by Les May

ANGELA Eagle:  Labour's Unity Candidate?

Anyone thinking that Angela Eagle is going to be a unifying force as Labour leader might like to check out this link.

https://medium.com/@pitt_bob/how-angela-eagle-got-to-be-mp-for-wallasey-e30d4ad9483#.mlktq1pbn