Saturday 6 June 2009

1736 Mrs Obama for Prime Minister!

This should have been primarily about by new car and indeed Thursday morning and early afternoon was devoted to it. However political events have overtaken with the media dominated by the fate of the Prime Minister and his government whereas for me I see the end of the Labour Party as a significant political force at national and local level for next 25 to 50 years. Only a major natural catastrophe or all embracing war which would result in a national government will prevent the demise of the Political Party having alienated it core conservative vote among manufacturer and industrial workers and then the upper working and lower middle classes attracted by Tony Blair. I appreciate that I am unlikely to be alive to see if my prediction is accurate but it is nevertheless well founded based on my knowledge and involvement with the Labour Party directly and indirectly for fifty years.

First the car. I worked out the timing through the Tyne Tunnel to miss the morning rush out and arrived within a minute of the agreed appointment at 10am. My contact had not arrived from Tax Office because he had discovered that the vehicle had previous been classified for use by a disabled driver and could not be re-taxed in the usual way. It took about half an hour to complete the paper work and then to check out the vehicle.

I drove first to the nearby shopping centre to check that I had understood how the reverse worked and then to get the correct payment for the going through the tunnel. I returned home on what was a cold day compared to the previous ten days and transferred maps and other items into the vehicle. The two main street directories and maps were placed in the driver’s side door and those for the trip to Oxford, Portsmouth and the Isle of Wight on the front passenger. There are two netted storage areas in the boot areas and in these I placed those previously kept in the vehicle. Those for Northern in England and Scotland in one and those of the Midlands and the South in the other. Prior to returning home I had called in at Lidl to get some salads and also two inexpensive watermelons. In the afternoon I went to Asda for a stock on tins, beans, pudding rice, sardines and crab meat, some bread rolls and pastry cakes, Coleslaw, a whole bream for Friday. In addition some packet rice and packet soups, The bargain was some packets of ginger. I got some eggs for omelettes this Saturday evening with ham and then next week. I thought I was out of cereal bought two boxes and then found I had one in store, The disappointment was that all the stock of frozen prawns in shell had been sold.

Rather than go home and unpack I decided to get petrol at Morrison’s Seaburn and then found I had a five pound shopping voucher. I could not resist two small packs of blackberries for £3 and to celebrate the new car two apple turnovers with cream, one on Thursday and one for Friday. I forgot to mention the bags of frozen lamb and pork chops from Lidl. I also bought hand washing powder and to further clear the sink draining system of accumulated gung. Rather than use the laundrette investigated earlier in the week I decided to go back to basic and hand wash and then dry in the garage area and then iron. I am sure the energy consumption will be less and the extra activity involved with be beneficial. There is a moral is this note on back to basics!

There was the start of a new season of Big Brother House on Thursday evening and Durham playing cricket at Lancashire. I was looking forward to watching Question Time at 10.40 and This Week immediately after. I had voted the European Elections and wanted to know what the impact would be of the expected collapse of the Labour Party vote in the municipal elections and the anticipated collapse of the vote for all three major political parties in the European Elections.
The media had been fixated on the Departure of Hazel Blears, not that there was universal agreement that her political future should be terminated or that Gordon had appeared to dither over sacking her for the misuse of tax payer’s money to profit from property dealings whether doing so was within the rules set by Parliament or not. The interest was on the position her departure before the polls closed placed the Prime Minister in. The media was at their mischievous and subversive best so that everything that happened was being twisted in such a way to promote mayhem within the Labour Party and bring about the fall of Gordon Brown.

The Party had made a disastrous mistake in appointing him its Leader and Prime Minister, and he and his government had made a series of accumulating disastrous mistakes by not seeking a public mandate for his leadership in the first Autumn of his internal appointment, in abolishing the ten pence taxation rate, in not understanding the inevitable collapse of capitalist banking and market speculation, in taking draconian measures against the failed bankers, in appreciating the significance of the publication of the expenses of Members of Parliament, in taking an immediate robust and ruthless approach to the main offenders and on responding to the request of the Ghurkhas to be able to settle in the UK in the context of having opened our door to middle and eastern Europe. He was unable to say sorry and appear to mean it. He always appeared to say that black was white when the evidence was that it was black or at best a murky grey. However, a year ago the Party funked the opportunity to change from someone else who would inspire in the mould of President Obama than David Cameron and now it was too late. The Government was doomed and major political changes were necessary.

My impression was that David Cameron and the Conservative party leadership having seized the initiative over the expenses scandal and used the opportunity to strengthen his personal position realised that if a General Election was immediately held there was a chance to form a majority government, whereas the longer the Labour government had to regroup and reverse unemployment as well as get rid of those tainted by the expenses scandal and set in motion some electoral constitutional changes, then the best he could hope for was to become a minority Government relying on other parties for legislative changes. The result of the County Council elections proved this to be right and the European elections can be disregarded as a protest vote against both the Labour and Conservative Parties with the United Kingdom Independence Party being the main winners. The Prime Minister who should have been told that he now needed to take a back seat to survive then destroyed the credibility of his Cabinet reshuffle be being called a liar by the leading political commentators in Britain at his hastily called and ill advise media conference late on Friday. He undid the good work of Peter Mandelson, other re appointed or newly appointed Member’s of the Cabinet determined to unite the Party in the face of the combined assault from the media and the public vote.

What caused this situation has its roots in what has happened since he took over, and before with the embracing of international corporate capitalism and speculation, the exportation of manufacturing jobs after the destruction of the heavy industries, the escalation in property prices and the freeze on the development of social housing and the widening of the gulf between the haves and the have not. There development of Muslim extremism and terrorism and the existence of a significant Muslim population is some areas of Britain commenced the feeling of being threatened from within and then the widening of the ECC resulted in almost everyone feeling overwhelmed by the arrivals from middle and eastern Europe. Another factor has been the growth in higher education and the abandonment of traditional authorities couple with the failures and status of the Monarch apart from the Queen, particularly arising from the death of Princess Diana.

What happened to precipitate the last crisis is that just after 10 pm on Thursday the Minister of Works and Pensions, a Blair loyalist, the relatively unknown James Purnell delivered his Exocet resignation letter to the Prime Minister without warning, having released copies to the Times and Sun Newspaper so they could immediately make the letter headline front page news. This argued that the Prime Minister should go because the party would have less chance to regain public confidence with Mr Brown remaining in power.

100 minutes later the position was summed up with brilliant political accuracy by Michael Portillo on This Week. Gordon Brown had one opportunity to save himself as Prime Minister. He had to immediately contact the core members of his Cabinet and seek their willingness to continue to serve under his Leadership in whatever post he had decided for them given the changed circumstances.

All week the Prime Minister‘s team at Number Ten had been briefing against the Chancellor who it is believed Gordon felt must go because of his involvement in the expenses scandal and the calling for his departure by Vince Cable of the Liberal Democrats. David Miliband went on the record to say he wanted to stay as Foreign Secretary. The rumour mill at Westminster claimed that Ed Balls would become the Chancellor and Peter Mandelson would become Foreign Secretary as his grandfather had been. The Prime Minister was going to attend the D Day commemoration in France at which French Government has snubbed the Queen as British Head of State. He was then expected to reshuffle his cabinet with a team designed to cling to power to the last possible moment. He suggestion was that if the result were as bad or worse demand than anticipated sufficient Members of Parliament would demand a leadership contest although at that moment there was no indication of who would stand against Mr Brown if he chose to contest the challenge to his position.

The advise given by Mr Portillo was in fact what then happened. It is now evident that the Prime Minister immediately telephone Mr Miliband to seek his willingness to continue as Foreign Secretary, Mr Miliband agreed and issued a statement saying that he believed Mr Purnell had made the wrong choice to resign and issue his open letter. It is evident that Mr Darling was confirmed as Chancellor and then the only task was to fill the vacancies that had arisen. Mr Hoon who had trouble with his expenses resigned but was promised various roles in the run up to becoming the British European Commissioner. Margaret Beckett only recently brought back into the Cabinet also resigned, officially it as said because she did not get the promotion she craved but where also questions about her use of expenses had been raised. Carolyn Flint the Minister responsible for the Labour’s campaign for seats in the European Parliament resigned and released a vitriolic letter claiming the Prime Minister was anti female and used those in his government for window dressing.

During Friday afternoon the results of the County Council Elections were announced and Labour lost control of its heartland Counties, Lancashire, Derbyshire and Nottingham and now controls no county council and where four out of five existing labour Members being defeated. The first British National Party Member was elected to a County Council. There was a five point difference between the Labour and Liberal Democratic party although if there was a General election while the Conservatives would have a slim overall majority of under 30 seats, but because of the electoral system and changes to the boundaries of seats at he next General Election the Liberal Democrats were only expected to gain one or two more seats than at present overall despite the five point advantage. In the light of this result I anticipate the Labour Party will be annihilated in the European Elections, getting under 20% of the vote and coming behind the U.K.I.P.

The Prime Minister then decided on a Press conference to confirm that he had no intention of resigning who ever spoke out against him within the former Cabinet and Government or whatever the back bencher’s did. He then pretended that what had happened the previous week had not. The journalists were not impressed and called him a liar to his face and subsequently, and he has no credibility with them or with a section of his Parliamentary Party and the survival plan was unravelling before it had began. Having said that, his performance was courageous, confident and clear. The problem he and his supporters now face is that the British Public do not listen to him any more and here in the North East he has the same level of respect as Mike Ashley the owner of Newcastle United. They may talk of political renewal, of a new Cabinet with a new purpose, of tackling the economic situation and cleaning up politics but no one believes they will do anything different than before except within the Labour Westminster Village and the some party activists. election.

However this does not mean that the Government should yield to calls for a General Election or to now replace Mr Brown unless they could unite behind someone with the communication ability of Mr Cameron and political weight of Vince Cable. Ideally the individual should be female, black and have a Muslim sounding name but be an active Christian and support the Queen. Mrs Obama, are you sure you do not have any British Ancestry? A state visit might help.

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