Tory leader David Cameron has said Gordon Brown's personal integrity is on the line after his general election fundraiser admitted knowing of the secret channels used by a millionaire property developer to give cash to Labour.
Mr Cameron told MPs: "The Prime Minister's whole explanation beggars belief. This goes to questions of the Prime Minister's own integrity.
"Does he really expect us to believe that someone who even his own side say is a control freak was preparing for an election, sorting out the finances and sitting round a table with everyone caught up in this scandal and yet didn't have the first idea what was going on?
"We have had 155 days of this Government. We have had disaster after disaster - a run on a bank, half the country's details lost in the post and now this.
"His excuses go from incompetence to complacency and there are questions about his integrity.
"Aren't people rightly now asking: Is this man simply not cut out for the job?"
Seems as good a thread as any to post
Sorry but links ad I are not on good terms at present The Labour party game
Pass the brown envelope (or who can avoid the blame in the dodgy donations scandal?) By Andrew Grice and Colin Brown
Published: 29 November 2007
Gordon Brown failed to distance himself yesterday from the scandal over Labour's secret donations amid growing speculation that it would soon be the subject of a police investigation.
The controversy moved closer to 10 Downing Street when it emerged that Jon Mendelsohn, who was appointed as Labour's chief fundraiser by Mr Brown, had known for weeks that the property developer David Abrahams gave huge donations to Labour through intermediaries. Labour had previously claimed the only party figure who knew about the arrangement was Peter Watt, who resigned as its general secretary on Monday.
The Tories and Liberal Democrats called on the Prime Minister to explain why he had not asked Scotland Yard to investigate what he admitted was an unlawful action. Mr Brown, who was put on to the defensive during Prime Minister's Questions in the Commons, said it was up to the Electoral Commission to decide whether to bring in the police. The Tories challenged that view last night.
MPs believe the launch of a second police investigation into Labour funding is only a matter of time. In July, the "cash-for-honours" inquiry which destabilised Tony Blair's government ended with no one being charged. The latest allegations are seen as more clear-cut and could be studied much more quickly than the 13-month inquiry in which Mr Blair was questioned. If there is a new inquiry, Mr Brown could become only the second serving Prime Minister to be questioned during a criminal investigation.
Mr Mendelsohn's involvement undermined attempts by Brown allies to portray the scandal as one stemming from the Blair era. Although the secret donations of £600,000 date back to 2003, £312,000 has been given since Mr Brown became Labour leader.
The mystery about who knew of Mr Abrahams' disguised donations deepened when Jack Dromey, the Labour treasurer, said he was in the dark about them and added that there had been "complete concealment". His wife, Harriet Harman, accepted £5,000 from one of Mr Abrahams' intermediaries for her deputy leadership campaign.
Opposition parties accused Labour figures of passing the buck and urged Mr Brown to take responsibility. Chris Grayling, the shadow Work and Pensions Secretary, said: "Last time I looked, Gordon Brown was leader of the Labour Party. Doesn't that mean the buck has to stop with him?"
Chris Huhne, the Liberal Democrat environment spokesman, who has asked the Metropolitan Police to intervene, said: "It does look as though everybody is trying to dive behind the sofa and pretend they were not anywhere near what was going on. That is precisely why the inquiry set up by the Prime Minister is not likely to get anywhere and why a police inquiry is essential."
Mr Mendelsohn said he was "unhappy" about the donations because they did not meet his "strict transparency test". He wanted to meet Mr Abrahams to tell him his method of giving money was unacceptable but he was assured by Mr Watt that the arrangement was legal.
The former general secretary denied a claim by Mr Abrahams that a letter he sent to him last Thursday was a request for more money, insisting it was designed to fix a meeting. But the Tories demanded Mr Mendelsohn's resignation and an explanation of why he did not tell Mr Brown or the Electoral Commission about the secret donations as soon as he discovered them.
Mr Brown defended Mr Mendelsohn in the Commons but had to endure a tricky 30-minute question session dominated by the affair. The acting Liberal Democrat leader, Vince Cable, told the Prime Minister he had gone "from Stalin to Mr Bean" in a matter of weeks and was "creating chaos out of order rather than order out of chaos".
For the Tories, David Cameron said Mr Brown's explanation "beggars belief", adding: "We have had 155 days of this government. We've had disaster after disaster. A run on a bank, half the country's details lost in the post and now this. His excuses go from incompetence to complacency and there are questions about his integrity. Aren't people rightly asking now, is this man simply not cut out for the job?"
The Prime Minister hit back by pointing to Mr Cameron's role on "Black Wednesday" in 1992, when he was a special adviser to the Chancellor, Norman Lamont. He said Mr Mendelsohn had "absolutely no involvement" in the Abrahams donations, which had been coming in for four years, and pledged that Labour would do "everything in our power" to ensure it followed acceptable standards on fundraising. "We are ready to take any further measures... so that everything in party politics is above board, including the use of third-party sources for donations," he added.
Ms Harman's friends said she was a "victim" and being made a scapegoat for the acceptance of proxy donations by Mr Watt. Her allies were also angry with Hilary Benn's deputy leadership campaign team for not having alerted her to the "dodgy" nature of the gift offered by Mr Abrahams' secretary Janet Kidd, which they refused. Ms Harman accepted £5,000 from Ms Kidd once her campaign was over.
"[Harriet] was pretty desperate to clear her debts from the campaign," said one friend. "She is still around £15,000 to £20,000 in debt from the campaign."
It emerged that Mr Abrahams was a member of the "1,000 Club" of Labour donors who were regularly "squeezed" for cash by the party's former chief fundraiser, Lord Levy. Mr Abrahams said he had been made to feel like a "serial criminal" when he was in fact a "serial philanthropist".
Last night the row moved north of the border as the Scottish Labour leader, Wendy Alexander, was engulfed in questions surrounding a donation to her recent leadership campaign.
In a statement after approaches by The Herald newspaper, Ms Alexander said the Electoral Commission was being kept informed about the donation, which she denied returning and which she said amounted to less than £1,000. The Labour leader in Scotland denied the donation was illegal as the businessman was named by Labour as Paul Green.
Read Andrew Grice's online column at independent.co.uk/todayinpolitics
The Labour fundraiser at the centre of the row...
"Jonny" Mendelsohn was urged by the Opposition toresign after it was revealed that Labour's director of general election resources sent David Abrahams what appeared to be a begging letter. Despite being absolved of any blame by Gordon Brown, who appointed him and yesterday defended him on the grounds that he had only been in the job since September and that the donations had been going on for four years, Mr Mendelsohn's reputation has taken a severe knock.
He had known for at least a month about the irregular payments by Mr Abrahams – with whom he had fallen out years before – and he is likely to face questions over why he did not tell other senior Labour figures, such as the party's treasurer, Jack Dromey. Although he is a friend of Lord Levy, Labour's chief fund-raiser under Tony Blair, Mr Brown had hoped to signal a clean break with the previous regime by bringing in his own man to look after party donations. In particular, he wanted to draw a line under the "cash for honours" affair in which Lord Levy was involved.
Enter Mr Mendelsohn. He was seen in the Brown camp as a safe pair of hands with business experience and a fat contacts book. "He is a man of great integrity," Geoff Hoon, Labour's chief whip, said yesterday. Now, the 40-year-old finds himself at the centre of a storm similar to the one that engulfed Lord Levy as it emerged that he was told last month that the property developer Mr Abrahams had given money to Labour through intermediaries.
It is not the first time that Mr Mendelsohn has been embroiled in controversy. After working as an adviser to Mr Blair from 1995 to 1997, he joined forces with other former Labour aides, Neal Lawson and Ben Lucas, to set up an "ethical lobbying" firm, LLM. Following the "cash for questions" scandal which undermined John Major's government, LLM was accused of offering "cash for access" after one of its lobbyists allegedly boasted: "We can go to Gordon Brown if we have to." They denied any impropriety in an affair dubbed "Lobbygate".
Mr Mendelsohn now insists he was unhappy about the lack of transparency over the donations and was determined to end the arrangement. He also had doubts about Mr Abrahams, with whom he had argued when they were both involved in the Labour Friends of Israel pressure group. Mr Abrahams gave money to the group but was expelled after the row. He refused Mr Mendelsohn's request for a meeting.
Mr Mendelsohn's letter to Mr Abrahams could be interpreted as a request for more money (as Mr Abrahams sees it) or an attempt to set up a meeting so that he could end the donations (as Labour claims). But Mr Mendelsohn faces questions over why he delayed taking action over Mr Abrahams – and why he did not tell Mr Brown or the Electoral Commission about the secret donations immediately.
... and the other names in the frame
Gordon Brown
Fought Cameron to a draw at Prime Minister's Questions. May be down, but not out for the count. It has been an appalling fortnight: Northern Rock, the missing discs, and now sleaze. But there is a growing mood of determination. He acted quickly, and heaped the blame for the "proxy" donations on Peter Watt, the general secretary of the party, who has resigned. Brown is badly wounded, but is convinced Labour will come good against the Tories with the economy.
Jack Dromey
The treasurer of the Labour Party has been made to look impotent. He blew his top in March 2006 when he discovered Labour had been accepting loans from donors proposed for honours by Tony Blair without telling him. Now he is angry again at being kept in the dark about Abrahams' use of proxy donors in breach of the electoral rules. Being out of the loop, he could not warn his wife, Harriet Harman, who took one of the "dodgy" cheques.
Harriet Harman
The chairman of the Labour Party is the most vulnerable. She could take the blame. She took £5,000 from Janet Kidd, Mr Abrahams' secretary, which had been refused by Hilary Benn. Her friends say one reason was her desperation to clear debts from her successful campaign for the deputy leadership. She spent £46,701 but is said to be £15,000 to £20,000 in the red.
Hilary Benn
The only person to come out of "Proxygate" smelling of roses. Refused the £5,000 cheque from Ms Kidd for his deputy leadership campaign, after Baroness Jay told him it was a "proxy", but took a cash donation from Mr Abrahams himself. Some are saying he should have blown the whistle.
Baroness Jay
The former leader of the House of Lords is being blamed by friends of Ms Harman for not informing her team that the cheque from Ms Kidd was "dodgy".
I doubt Gordon Brown will resign voluntarily - the Labour MPs would either have to vote him out (which is much more difficult to do than in the Tories or LibDems because of party rules) or he would lose the next general election. If Labour stay behind in the polls we may have to wait until summer 2010 before he calls an election.
Harriet Harman is in deep do-do, but not perhaps as much as Gordon Brown is in now. Adam Boulton has just reported on a statement from Harriet Harman which says that her campaign team hadn't got enough money to pay her campaign bills. She then went to Chris Leslie, the former Shipley MP, who was running Gordon Brown's campaign. Leslie then put her on to Janet Kidd. It appears that in May Leslie had had a phone call from David Abrahams offering money and saying he had "a friend" who wished to donate too.
So not only did Gordon Brown's personal fundraiser know about it, so did his campaign manager. And they seriously expect us to believe that the Prime Minister knew nothing.
Every time I see her the Flint woman, who is blessed with considerable good looks, comes over more and more like a bitchy frustrated concentration camp guard. Last night she didn't like the idea of free speech.
Canvas Certainly Mathew Norman of the Independent thinks it is time for Flypaper Brown to roll up and fade away
Independent comment
I don't do the Independent much
Yorkie I am not sure which of the ladies in the Brown cabinet affects me the worst... Hazel Blears probably (heebie jeebie time) but Yvette Cooper makes me want to break things. Caroline Flint is likewise ambitious and ruthless.
I don’t want el Gordo to resign. It would be far better for everyone if he was arrested while still holding office. The sight of him being led away from No. 10 in handcuffs would bring an end to Labour forever.
No way. We do not want Gordon Brown to resign. This is great stuff at the moment. The longer he is PM, the more damage can be done to the Labour Party, until eventually it is irreversible. We do not want a new face in the PM's chair, there would be too much of a risk that a new face will dampen the current public anger and the public may well adopt a "well lets give the new PM a chance and see how they do" philosophy.
The strategy of the Tories now must be to keep sticking the knife in, almost like torture, but never doing quite enough damage to kill. The longer a wounded, flailing Gordon Brown is at the helm, the better.
Oh Tony TT, where do you get your ideas from? The longer that Gordon Brown stays the more damage to the COUNTRY as well as the Labour Party!
And everyone out there who [rightly] considers GB a total waste of space, let us remember that while he was hatching his imbecilic and evil plots the 'mighty' TB was still holding Court!!! There isn't much to choose between them for being a danger to the UK. One is a pompous arrogant git who is so much so that he cannot see that the other, an equally pompous arrogant git, has been pulling his strings for the past 10 years and is now hell-bent on completing the job of destroying this country!
IS Gordon really so very daft or has he just been caught out?
The second concerns the conduct of the Prime Minister. Disturbing reports have emerged that Gordon Brown is rude to his secretaries — or garden girls, as they are known inside Downing Street. He is said to shout at them abusively. On one occasion he is reported to have impatiently turfed one of the girls out of her chair and sat down to use the keyboard himself.
All recent prime ministers — Thatcher, Major, Blair — were loved by the garden girls. All recent prime ministers from time to time endured problems. Only Gordon Brown has vented his frustration on secretaries, who can never answer back or speak for themselves. In the end this intemperate and regrettable conduct may cause him as much damage as Mr Abrahams.
I see your true colours Gordon Brown - and that's why I loathe you...
click here to read more about the failings of Gordon Brown. So - he apparently has 'a problem' with women? Interesting...
Jess, you need to look at the big picture. The last thing the Tories need right now is for a fresh face to become PM. As I said, this would reduce the current lead that we have over Labour because the public would react by giving the new leader the benefit of the doubt. The only way to prevent Gordon Brown from doing any more damage to the country is for him to remain in power and become unelectable. If Gordon was to resign the person who replaces him will continue to implement the New Labour agenda, so nothing in reality would change, the damage would continue anyway.
So regardless of who is PM nothing will change policy wise, but if Gordon stays the better chance we have of winning a majority at the next election. At which point the damage will be rectified (one hopes).
Big picture watching is where I get my ideas from Tony... hence I look beyond the Labour Party and its malfunction to the effects on society that have been growing insidiously for the past 10+ years.
Whilst I get the gist of what you are saying, and agree with it, hurrah!, that too quick a change of party could turn the fresh governement into the "bad guys" be default, I still think that the way things are at present points to utter disaster unless Labour's self-ruination isn't carefully orchestrated! And who's going to do that?!!
The truth is though, that the UK has done OK for the last 10 years. All you can do is compare yourself to similar countries, and compared with the likes of France and Germany, we are doing just fine thank you. I don't think that any government could have run the economy any better than Labour has done for the last 10 years. That is the truth.
But in areas like education they are still stuck in the "prizes for all" philosophy that has dogged left leaning governments in all countries for years.
And yes, the NHS has improved in the last 10 years, but it has cost far too much public money to attain the improvements.
But my biggest bugbear is the constitutional imbalance that exists. I very strongly object to the thought that a PM with a Scottish constituency can develop and implement education and health policy in particular, with no recourse to his own constituents whatsoever. If he cocks it up it has no effect on his constituents at all. This democratic deficit is really quite staggering, and I am amazed that it does not get brought up more often that it does.
I think my ability to agree with you has been short-lived...soz!
The NHS is wrecked; education has been wrecked... I heard only today that a lifelong and successful history teacher will no longer be able to teach this subject as it, alongside geography, art and religious studies is being removed from the curriculum. The identity of the people of the UK is being eroded. We are no longer "allowed" to speak freely, eat freely, get rid of our rubbish freely, be ill freely, etc etc. The last 10 years have been spent kow-towing to America whilst France and Germany have laughed at us and holding our own in the EU has become a laughing matter for other countries too.
Are you being provocative TonyTT, or trying to be funny?
The Harman campaign is about to issue a statement - she did extend the mortgage in order to fund the campaign. It wasn't registered with the Electoral Commission...
What concerns me about the latest sleeze is that this could become an excuse to make the electorate pay for party funding by a levy. The Lib Dems are allready making noises, besides lots of labour MPs.The Labour Party allready financed by the Unions have to break the rules for more are still heavily in debt, no wonder the country is in such a mess.Somehow we have got to get this rabble out before we all go down the pan.
For a start I don't care how much noise he makes DC isn't READY. And you really can't afford another battle of marginal seats to the gross dereliction of eveyone else.
NO it is NOT time for Gordon brown to resign. Not by a LONG shot. For a start, we NEED to get that police inquiry under way to expose the FULL EXTENT of the way the party has been funded by monies donated by persons wishing to avoid being identified as such. We NEED to expose the degree to which "traceability in financial dealings" demanded by Gordon Brown himself as necessary for the prevention of money laundering have been sidestepped by the labour party.
Then we need to expose the degree to which their cavalier attitude to personal privacy has allowed them to ignore over half the principles of the data protection act. This additional violation of their own amendments to existing legislation MUST come to light at the right moment, which is when the true size of the bill for their preposterous ID cards and the amount of money squandered on their 'mega databases' comes to light.
it is absolutely VITAL that the man who held the purse strings and approved the squandering of this mopney still be there to have hos neck put on the block.
Only after these facts are revealed in their true horror can we properly tar and feather the guy. To let him resign now is to let him slip the day of reckoning. Just keep the tar bubbling in the bucket for the moment.
Gordon Brown should call an election to verify whether he has the trust of the British people after the data-debacle and the 'latest' funding scandal. If he has one shred of decency about him he will face the people.
But for what noble end does Mr Brown's Government exist? Where are those great missions in whose cause big men grow impatient of the proprieties? It isn't, in the end, the lying and cheating I cannot forgive. It is the lying and cheating to no purpose beyond daily, weekly survival. When seized with some urgent national purpose, we may all be tempted to take short cuts. But Brown's people are cutting corners with nowhere to go. That is the real tragedy.
Yes Canvas - An articulated and caustic analysis of the state of Britain today. Nothing will refresh the stench of rotting Labour left behind by the back-side of her constipation. A red rose whose scent has decayed and whose petals have shrivelled and died. Only a strong disinfectant from DC will arrest the growing public resentment of our corrupt political system.
I don't think we should be crowing too much about the mess Labour is in right now.
I'm always uneasy with this kind of opportunistic attack. Certainly, this is no need to make it easy for the Government, but you can bet the Torys and Libdems (and the rest) will be scouring their own party contributions for any bloopers.
The more fuss that is made over Labours, let's face it, fairly innocuous (after all, there is yet to be any evidence of bribery or corruption, as such), cockups in this, the less easily anyone else will be able to shrug off their own mistakes, if any are found.
Uneasy Steve, yes, so am I, few would make a judgement in isolation, this is one of many instances where deceipt is evident and accumulative. This Labour government lost it's cred in my book when David Kelly died a broken man.
Actually Scrubbs you may have a point... David Kelly was the first real manifestation of the rottenness at the heart of Labour.
And if one considers that only 1/8th of an iceberg floats above the surface one can only wonder what there is yet beneath there waiting to bubble out and pervade Whitehall with it's stench.. to use heavily mixed metaphors.
LOL, Geoff Hoon says, "Gordon Brown has a real reputation around parliament as someone frankly not that interested in matters of money." How are we supposed to take this seriously when Brown ran the Treasury for ten years?
I bet everyone in the government is trying to be uninterested in party funding at the moment...
Gordo is the best weapon DC has. The longer he is there, the better for the opposition. David should not be triumphalst about NL's woes-but it is good to see he is abandoning the "don't attack 'em" approach.
There seems a slim chance that their own hubris-the belief they can do anything and get away with it-and they have thus far good reason for thinking this-may destroy them.
This is the worst, most dangerous regime in living memory. They coasted on a strong econony for years; an economy which owed its strength to reforms stridently opposed by Brown, Blair and the rest of Labour when they were being implemented under the Conservatives. Thanks to Major's bungling, this fell into Anthony Blair's undeservinfg lap in 1997.
However, their economic policies, squandring money and allowing the creation of an ocean of public and private debt, are causing things to come unstuck. Despite throwing billions at them, our "target" dominated education system and NHS are in a lot of trouble; endless third world and eastern european immigration is a recipe for societal catastrophe; our right to self government is betrayed; we have been thrown into ruinous evil wars by Blair, smashing one of the few things the politicians had failed to make a mess of, the armed forces; probably worst of all, we are being goosestepped into a totalitarian state, a surveillance society of the sort Mao and Hitler could only have dreamed of.
New Labour must go if this country is to be saved, it may already be too,late and it's a long time still to an election. But Gorgon can't hide now, his inadequecy is becoming obvious far more quickly to people who took years to see that con man par exellence Blair for what he really is.
So Brown and Harman-keep 'em there and NL will go down the tubes faster than it might with another leader. Hang in there McBroon. If Mr Plod takes some corrupt administration members and officials away at some point, all the better.
Yorker is right. Why should he go? He doesn't need or have to go. But finally there is light at the end of the tunnel DC can lead us to victory. Mr Bean sorry Brown keeps making mistakes and by staying he's doing labour more harm than good.
There is one fear that I do have. and that is the timing of the next election, and the next significant down turn in the economy. There is a real danger that we could win the next election (which would be good obviously) and then 6 months later the economy crumble under the debt mountain that Brown has created over the last 10 years. But the real danger is that it will tarnish the new Tory government and revive the accusations of the economic mismanagement that plagued the likes of Major and Lamont.
Timing like that could be a nightmare, because lets face it, the great British public do not have the time, patience or inclination to look too deeply into why we are where we are at any given time. Their view is, "if the economy is down, whoever is in power is to blame".
This present Labour government were lucky. They won an election just as the economic reforms of the last Tory government were about to take effect, and the general global economy was beginning to come out of recession. Lets face it, a monkey could have run a half decent economy over the last 10 years given the general good health of the global markets. Now it is turning again, and the timing of it may not treat us kindly.
Why do we have to keep on about the good of the party(ies)? I agree that the Tories would be taking on a heap of trouble were they to get into power now. People forget quickly and if the reorganisation necessary to put the country right took too long there would be a savage baying for Tory blood! But, at the end of the day, if Brown et al continue the way they have for much longer there won't be a decent economy or a decent country to re-organise!
It is very likely we are seeing a real slow down in the economy right now, but we are some way from collapse (except for unseen catastrophes). The level of Government debt is a big concern, in that it does limit fiscal controls and options, thus adding to any instability, but other factors may well underpin that. High employment, high consumer spending and yes even high consumer debt do play their part in keeping the economy strong.
Yes it would be better if all the consumer debt were based on strong earnings - more would be paid back, but despite the slow down, there is no real evidence that the economy is dangerously unstable.
We should pay close attention to how the U.S. economy fares over the coming years and if, as I suspect, it is strong enough to pass through its present troubles fairly healthily, we should be fine for some time.
What is very likely to suffer in the coming years, is public sector spending, because of the slow down and the Government debt. So expect to hear the Police, Health workers and other Government employees crying over the pain of an economic squeeze that will almost certainly begin to bite next year.
But if public spending is at risk, SteveMD, that could affect a lot of people. With MRSA a big issue in hospitals, how much worse could that become with a squeeze on health spending? That's just one example... there are loads of others! Care in the Community (so called), rising crime, refuse disposal, etc etc. It all contributes in my book to the downslide of Britain. Fair enough, the economy may hold up for a while yet, but do we really want to go on til we become part of the 3rd world... now called Developing Countries?!
Yes there is a slow down and it may be significant, but on the whole this is needed for stability. The economy, particularly housing prices and private borrowing, were in danger of 'overheating'. the trick is to manage a controlled slow down and not let it go into freefall.
Though much depends on consumer confidence, there is no reason to assume we are about to have a crisis yet.
Superbugs are a problem, but it is a problem that is exaggerated, as are the latest cancer scares.
We are an ageing population, we live longer, on average, than previous generations. As a consequence more of us spend time in hospitals when we are at our weakest and susceptible to infection and longer life also means greater risk of cancer.
As for crime, well violent crime does seem to be on a relentless rise and must be tackled, but overall, even the worst available figures show a fall to some extent or other, depending on who is reading them.
Third world country? We have the fourth/fifth largest economy in the world and punch well above our weight. Certainly we will have to accept that others, like China, India and Russia, may pass us on this scale, but that is just all the more argument for calm and avoiding panic in economic matters.
As with the fall of Northern Rock, the biggest danger is consumer confidence, we should not be talking up unlikely crisis', but giving calm and rational advice.
It all sounds so sensible when put like this, Steve. So why am I left feeling that there is insufficient confidence in the present government for them to continue much longer? Public confidence in social sevices, housing services, medical centres, police and so on is very low. And with very good reason. There has been a slow-streamed exodus of good professionals for far too long now and those who are still staffing the public services are either unable to go elsewhere or are so inadequate at their jobs that the lack of morale, good pay, appropriate support systems, experienced management and organisational competence don't really come into the equation.
Yeah, we are in the top 5 of wealthy nations now... but for how long after Blair and Brown have done their worst?
Well, there is little confidence in this government, of that there is no doubt, but they can and will, almost certainly, continue for another three years. Short of, yet unforeseen, catastrophic events, nothing can be done about that.
Many services are suffering, precisely because of the reasons you say, but again that is not all black and white. Despite the headline stories, large numbers have benefited from Gordons social policies too.
It's easy to see why so many are outraged and angry, but calm and rational appraisal of the situation is what is need at this point, we are still in the long-game. The recent furore over donations is all quite amusing, but in the long run a dangerous strategy, it is only a matter of time before 'irregularities' are found in the payments to other parties too.
Policy, policy, policy should be the watchword. The fuss caused over Labour stealing the stamp duty and inheritance tax cut ideas was silly. The bloke on the street is just saying, so what? Why should I care who's idea it was, I get the cash anyway?
Getting over-excited over the wrong events, simply builds a feeling of 'crying wolf'. Patience and disciplined attacks on the policies that clearly aren't working is they way to go and over-exaggerating or 'spinning' simply tars the Torys with the same brush as the Government.
I am not actually against what you say, Steve. It's still making a lot of sense. However, I can still feel the "buts" coming through. For instance, the press/media! Any government where mistakes of any kind are made are vulnerable to their 'stirring' desires. There was a distinct over-reporting of the issues within the Tory party in the 90s concerning the back-biting and the anti-leadership problems. It is still that that figures highly in my memory and the other problems of the day are much more vague. The general unrest that was reported had a huge effect on the landslide victory of Blair et al in 97. The general corruption hype in the NL lot now will live on in the memories of many too. The press has found a great number of reasons to encourage the public to Bay for NL blood. And confidence is waining big time. Whilst I am not a great fan of the press, I do think that Brown and his friends rather set themselves up to deserve the outpouring of venom and the general mistrust of the nation.
I don't think that there have been all that many benefits from GB's strategies... although I am intrigued to know what your argument is here. I don't need headlines to see filth and lack of care in our local hospitals; or the total disorganisation of community care to the elderly in a major city; or the lack of appropriate professional support to some children in need; or the frustrations of teachers in the education policies and general unruliness of children and young people; or the inability to get NHS dental support; or the avalanche decline of police staff morale as they realise that everything they do is going to be met with obstacles in the courts and government and not even a financial thank you for being attacked,shot at, wounded, spat on, etc. or the fact that the disabled live in constant fear of the degredation and humility of having to fight for the benefits that hardly level the playing field that they are meant to do; and so on and so on... because I have experienced or had first hand knowledge of all these. I can't imagine what atom of common sense provoked Brown into selling some of the gold reserves when the market was at rock bottom... and this isn't spin, I have family in the world of finance with knowledge. So although the press can over-milk a situation and may be having such opportunities on a plate at the moment, the bases for all this is all too real and I cannot see there is anything positive coming from Brown's direction to alter my opinion on this.
I don't think a lot of notice has been taken about the "stealing" of inheritance tax ideas, etc. Brown just made himself look stupider than usual. I don't think that people are OVER responsive to the issue of corruption. As you say there has never really been a time when any of the parties could safely air all their laundry in public. People look beyond all that on the whole. They swap around in the voting trends from one party to the other because each one ends up as disappointing as the last.
Reminders of how great our nation was and still could be should be a principle policy for this country, along with taking a complete overview of the issues that affect us all as a whole picture. It'll never catch on.
Gordon Brown should not be at the job, because the British people did not vote for him they voted for Tony Blair (I am no fan of Tony Blair).
I want to go to the polls and vote for David Cameron; I know that when May 2008 comes I will be supporting and voting Boris to the Major of London.. It is time for a change and this country needs it.
