Let them eat cake

Don't really have time to post but am listening to the Any Questions panellists line up to give various versions of 'cut off unemployment benefits - that'll learn 'um'. Not a single member of the panel put the case for why the dole exists, reducing it down to some sort of reward for immorality, which including those on invalidity benefit.

The first point is if you want people to riot, if you want them to rob, if you want them to take up drug dealing make sure you have communities of people with next to no income. Forget being nice to lazy people, or however you want to frame it, think about how safe you'll be in your bed at night.

The dole keeps you safe, cut it off and the crime rate will soar, for everyone.

The second point is if you want your streets strewn with homeless people make sure that anyone who isn't working cannot meet their rent. You might find this is more expensive than the social security bill.

The third point is there are so many myths around how much people are entitled to on the dole. If you're single with no kids you have below subsistence payments. You are not living the life of Riley. Those with kids *are* better off which is only right and proper because a society that allows its children to starve is not worth having. That said they're not living in gold plated mansions either.

The fourth point is the level of unemployment and dole determines the rights and wages of those who are in work. If losing your job is the end of you it means that employers are dictators with carte blanche to bully, to pay the lowest possible wages, to do anything they choose to their workforce. Leaving the morality of that aside this is a recipe for economic disaster.

The last point I'll make is this - and there are so many but don't have time - making the unemployed live in misery does not magically create jobs for them to go to. There is no point pursuing a policy of zero unemployment without a policy to create full employment to match it. This government is committed to laying people off and then beating the victims of that policy.

This knee jerk response of attacking people who claim benefits (who are often fictional tabloid stories anyway) is not big and it isn't clever. It amounts to blaming the victim and does nothing to tackle to causes of unemployment. If any government ever did pursue this kind of approach we would find ourselves making the latest sequel of Mad Max before we knew what had hit us.

Manchester Convention of the Left 24-25 Sept

Just thought I'd flag up an event in late September in Manchester. The Convention of the Left is an initiative that's been going on for a little while now bringing together people on the left and trying to facilitate a bit of conversation between the often fractious and warring left factions.

Rightly it has quite modest aims. It does not set itself up as a new coalition or party of the left, but simply tries to get people in a room with each other and being nice to each other. That's a good place to start I think.

This September will see some speakers like Ian Angus on ‘Climate & Capitalism’, Gregor Gall (strong lefty on industrial relations), John McDonnell MP and Matt Wrack (General Secretary of the Firefighters' Union). However the main session will be an open forum on building alliances against the cuts. Seems sensible and well worth attending.

Visit the website at conventionoftheleft.org for more details. Download the flier here. (Reminded by Liam)

Is Cameron a loud mouth?

David Cameron is in trouble with the former Foreign Secretary, David Miliband, for being direct and clear in his speeches about foreign affairs.

First Cameron called Gaza an "open prison" and then he criticised elements of the Pakistan security services for aiding the UK's enemies in Afghanistan. Miliband described the PM as a "loud mouth" although he made no comment on the content of Cameron's speeches.

We know Miliband would never do such a thing. After all, his tour of duty was not known for either criticising the actions of the Israeli government, no matter how revolting, nor taking an open and honest stance on the Afghan situation - we didn't even need the recent leaks to know that.

Miliband's outburst attacking Cameron is in stark contrast to his mumbled and embarrassed comments during Israel's bombardment of Gaza that had to be wrung out of him, so reluctant was he to use the UK's clout for good.

During the Blair years the fact that business was always done behind closed doors was always made a virtue of so you'd see Blair claiming he was "influencing" Bush behind the scenes as the war machine pushed ever onwards unabated.

Various diplomats have rushed to Cameron's defence saying that direct language can be completely appropriate on the international stage, it's just we haven't seen much plain speaking for the last thirteen years. I think I agree.

For me a bit of honest speaking is just what we need to clear the air after years of manipulation and distrust. A large number of countries do not see the UK as an honest broker and that is unlikely to change if we continue with a Miliband style policy of half-truths, mumbling and blood.

Bits and bobs

• I've only just realised that Kemptown Ben is back to blogging. Hurray!
  
  
• For fans of the Spirit Level you might like to check out the Equality Trust
  
  
• Talking of which be sure to peruse their Wessex chapter's group blog, here.
  
  
• Have you seen this extra-ordinary Lib Dem leaflet? Courtesy of Left Foot Forward.
  
  
• If you don't mind me asking... who made your pants?
  
  
• Natalie is away in France which explains there has been a sudden spurt of Grade A blogging at Philobiblon.
  

Jane Austin's Fight Club

Excellent stuff.



Via F-Word, Via Jezabel

Three quick reminders

First, don't forget you still have a few days to vote in the Total Politics Awards. It's not to be taken too seriously but it's always good to see progressive, lefty, green types do well compared to the buggers of the right. Sorry, that should be bloggers of the right, the buggers.

You need to vote for at least five blogs (or should that be four other blogs?) so if you lack inspiration as to who else to vote for you can check out my list of Green blogs here, and my short list of lefty blogs in the right hand column which includes the likes of AVPS, F-Word, Third Estate, HarpyMarx and Dave's Part - who would all be worth a punt as well.

The second reminder is for Green Party members who I'd like to remind that the GPEx (Green Party Executive) nominations are still open and are, currently, massively skewed towards London residents.

I personally believe it is very important that these elections are all contested so that the party actually gets a choice as to who sits on the executive rather than simply getting lumbered with whoever has a big enough head to put themselves forwards... or to put it another way I think the executive should be decided by more than just who is capable of filling in a form.

I certainly will be voting for most of the seven people who've put their names in the hat so far, it's not their fault others have not put themselves forward - but it's very unhealthy that the party will have so little say over our exec. which essentially eliminates one of the largest mechanisms we have for holding the exec. to account.

It can't be right that the national chair, for example, is an uncontested position when we're in such a new period for the party. Do let me know if you need help or advise about these elections.

Lastly, it was announced today that the police officer who struck Ian Tomlinson from behind,leaving him dead, is to face disciplinary charges for his actions. No one could accuse the Met of rushing into that decision could they?

I mean most employers would probably be irresponsible and immediately discipline a member of staff who assaulted and killed someone while on duty - but the Met is more considered when it comes to this sort of thing and no one should assume that this announcement is in anyway connected to the outrage at the CPS's decision that a jury will not be allowed to judge whether this was murder.

This Friday, the 30th July, there is a lunchtime protest outside the Office of Department of Public Prosecution (Rose Court, 2 Southwark Bridge, SE1 9HS). It starts at noon and it would be a very good thing if we could ensure the DPP is not allowed to forget the public's disgust at their decision.

You may also wish to donate to The Ian Tomlinson Family Campaign. Incidentally this piece by Unity on Liberal Conspiracy is a must read when assessing the gross injustice of the DPP's decision.

Dave and Nick, sitting in a tree K-I-S-S-I-N-G

David Davis, that well known defender of civil liberties and airfix SAS commando, has dissed the government saying that the Prime Minister and his deputy get on really, really well. Apparently that's a bad thing.

Davis told "businessmen [sic] during a meeting" that the government was a "Brokeback Coalition", which was a term coined, apparently, by Richard Littlejohn. Waaa- Waaa- Waaa ALARM BELLS!

Quite what the Tories have to complain about I'm not sure. In terms of policy they are basically having it all their own way. Perhaps there are less top jobs going round the big table, but they've not had to make any ideological sacrifices in order to remain in government.

I guess Davis is just one of those tribalists who hates to share. Perhaps he's an only child.

I do have a question though. I might be being over sensitive or censorious but am I wrong in thinking that Davis' remarks are homophobic?

There are numerous close male friendships depicted in film - the Blues Brothers seems a particularly apt one in the context for example - but in order to find an example of a bad male friendship, one that's too close, Davis goes straight for the gays.

Butch and Sundance, good, Starsky and Hutch, good, Bill and Ted, good, Brokeback Mountain, bad. Why's that then?

Like I say I'm careful of reading too much into this and don't want to get all up in his shit, he obviously would not like that, but I'm right aren't I? He is basically saying calling someone gay is an alternative way of saying they're crap isn't he? Anyway, he obviously longs for the days when the two most powerful men in government hated each others guts. Good times Davis, good times...

Pic credit Lakelander.

Prisons: short blunt shock

The Tory Justice Minister Crispin Blunt was quite right to say that we should lift the blanket ban on parties in prisons imposed by the super-authoritarian Jack Straw. Straw's ridiculous over-reaction was typical of the man who personified Labour's autocratic sledge hammer style.

Sadly Number Ten has over ruled the Justice Minister for fear of looking soft on prisoners. Although he was talking about Labour Blunt could have been talking about Cameron's reaction when he said; "At the slightest whiff of criticism of from the popular press, policy tended to get changes and the consequence of an absurd over-reaction to offenders being exposed to comedy in prison was this deleterious, damaging and daft instruction."

Quite what is happening in the Tory Party on prisons I'm not sure. First you have Ken Clarke saying that prison doesn't particularly work and now Blunt hints that a more relaxed regime might help with rehabilitation of prisoners. Sadly the party hierarchy has yet been won over to a more liberal position.

Interestingly Iain Dale came out in defence of Blunt saying; "I hope under a Conservative government that will change. Being tough doesn't just mean locking people up and throwing away the key. A tough politician will take tough choices - and that means locking fewer people up and devoting more resources to preparing prisoners for life on the outside. Only in that way will reoffending rates drop."

While, cynic that I am, I thought Clarke's suggestion might have been about cutting costs rather than addressing our failed and over crowded prison system - but there's nothing in Blunt's suggestions that were about cost cutting and everything about treating prisoners with a bit more humanity.

Ian Tomlinson: police escape prosecution

We're told today that the police officer who made an unprovoked attack on Ian Tomlinson from behind will not face prosecution. This is, we are told, because of the conflict between the two postmortems.

The first autopsy exonerated the police and claimed he had not been attacked and died of a heart attack, the second was conducted after witness statements and video footage came out showing that he had been attacked and said he had died of internal bleeding.

The police lied and lied again to cover up the actions of their officers - and on this occasion were caught out time and time again. How many other autopsies are as keen to deliver a result that the police want over the facts I wonder. Why does the law not see the first autopsy as a scandal?

What I don't understand is this, does the CPS's reasoning make sense even in their own terms? If the postmortems make it difficult to prove a murder charge (and I think we'd all prefer a jury to make that decision not an arm of law enforcement) why does that mean that a lesser charge could not be considered?

We know Tomlinson was the victim of an unprovoked attacked, it's on film from several different angles for a start. We know that Tomlinson was the victim of an attack from behind while he had his head down and his hands in his pockets. He could have done nothing more to pose less of a threat.

Why were lesser charges not being considered?

It turns out it's because the CPS took so long to make up it's mind. They could have brought a charge of common assault within a few weeks of the incident (when the officer finally came forward) but they chose to string it out and once six months had passed no lesser charge could be brought.

At the end of the day if it had been Ian Tomlinson who had attacked a police officer from behind who then died later that day there would have been no question of him escaping prosecution. He'd have been behind bars long ago. What a disgraceful double standard, utterly corrupt.

Nerdism: which party got best value for money in Camden?

After having my appetite whetted by the Camden New Journal the other day I thought I'd take a quick look at the election expenses of the Camden general election candidates. There are two constituencies in Camden Holborn and St. Pancras and Hamstead and Kilburn - both of which were held in the end by their Labour incumbents (cuddly Frank Dobson and thespian Glenda Jackson respectively).

So let's take a quick peek at Hamstead and Kilburn first.

		Total spend	Votes	Pounds per vote
Lab	Glenda Jackson	£27,192.02	17,332	£1.57
Con	Chris Philp	£39,739.57	17,290	£2.30
LD	Ed Fordham	£29,418.83	16,491	£1.78
Green	Beatrix Campbell	£810.38	759	£1.07
UKIP	Magnus Nielsen	£459.99	408	£1.13
BNP	Victoria Moore	£400.00	328	£1.22
Ind.	Tamsin Julia Muca Omond	£6,327.62	123	£51.44
Ind.	Generosa Alcantara	£2,360.19	91	£25.94

As you can see this was a hard fought, three way race between the three headed monster of Labour, Tory and Lib Dems. Glenda Jackson won the seat by a whisker no doubt due to "finally understanding the need to fund raise" as her charming election agent put it in an email available in the election returns. I didn't know you could slag off your candidate in your official returns - this opens up all sorts of possibilities!

Chris Philp was literally a couple of hundred quid away from the legal limit despite splitting numerous leaflets and items of expenditure between the Parliamentary and council elections. Let's hope he didn't make any accounting errors! One slip and it's chokey for Philp :)

Over all the candidates you can see the Greens had the best value for money with Beatrix Campbell who was "essentially a paper candidate" according to Tamsin Omond. And fair enough, that's true - still more than a pound per vote though due to one freepost leaflet.

The least value for money campaign was Tamsin's who spent three quarters of her campaign fund (all donated by one Poole resident) on her office. Over fifty quid per head is a bit rich - she might have been better off handing out tenners, if by better off we mean jailed for electoral fraud.

Now we come to Holborn and St. Pancras.

		Total spend	Votes	Pounds per vote
Lab	Frank Dobson	£22,752.27	25,198	£0.90
LD	Jo Shaw	£17,190.14	15,256	£1.13
Con	George Lee	£28,283.59	11,134	£2.54
Green	Natalie Bennett	£10,895.48	1,480	£7.36
BNP	Robert Carlyle	???	779	???
UKIP	Max Spencer	£166.00	587	£0.28
Ind.	John Chapman	£519.79	96	£5.41
Eng Dem	Mikel Susperregi	£1,900.00	75	£25.33
Ind.	Iain Meek	£9.50	44	£0.22

Once again we see that Labour ran the best value for money campaign at just ninety pence per vote and the Tories struggled the hardest to win over voters. It will come as no surprise to locals that George Lee spent a large sum of money on his campaign with paid delivery and glossy leaflets the wealth was there for all to see, and no doubt abhor.

The Green's Natalie Bennett was a higher profile candidate than Bea Campbell, hence the higher spend. This was partly down to the fact that we hoped to win council seats - sadly the London effect left us with just one Camden councillor and the election spend had less direct impact on votes than we'd hoped. Move away now, there's no euphemism to see in this paragraph!

The award for best value for money goes to Iain Meek whose photocopying bill of £9.50 sees an admirably low carbon footprint campaign that spent just 22 pence for each of his 44 voters. If we forget about the five hundred pound deposit he lost, not included in the expenses, it sounds quite worthwhile.

The English Democrats probably misjudged their own demographic by running a Greek candidate which may well explain the fact they spent more than twenty five quid for each vote they received. Ouch. It's not fair really because the leaflets were hilarious.

One thing you wont see from these numbers is that in the 'short campaign' the Lib Dems spent more than any other party as they suddenly poured money into this unwinnable campaign overcome by Clegg-mania. Distributing leaflets with slogans like "Did you see the debate?" turned out to be a colossal waste of money as people had seen the debate and decided to vote Labour.

One last point, the election expenses of the far right (the absence of returns for Holborn not withstanding) show that it was right to ignore their lacklustre campaigns as the far right themselves had made no commitment to these elections. The best work against the fascists in constituencies like this is, in fact, to build the alternatives rather than to spend time asking people not to vote for candidates who most people wont know are even standing.

At this election the anti-fascist campaigns admirably mirrored the BNP's targeting strategy putting in the work where they were a threat and ignoring areas like Camden where there was little chance of them gaining a credible vote or, as it turns out, even campaigning.

Interview: AVPS's Phil on being a new Labour recruit

I'm becoming increasingly interested in Labour's membership surge in the wake of the new coalition government. On the spur of the moment I decided to ask Phil, long-time lefty from the blindingly delightful AVPS blog, a few questions on how he's finding his new home - Stoke Labour Party.

• Do you feel there's space for you to make an individual contribution?

It depends what you mean by contribution. In terms of an activist contribution, then yes. Our CLP has effectively been run down over a period of years and has recently undergone a split. So there is plenty of space for people with an activist conception of politics to get stuck in.

If by contribution you mean being listened to and taken seriously by other, longer standing members then the answer to that is yes as well. I haven't hidden my politics from anyone. People know until recently I was active with the Socialist Party, and some have proven curious about how we organised things there and how that experience can be applied here.

To be honest, any half decent ward branch and CLP should be able to accommodate the experience and energies of those who cut their teeth in the far left and/or other radical political traditions.

• Do you feel there's space to influence your local branch from the left?

Yes, and in a modest way I already have done. The bottom line for any socialist not involved in one of 57 varieties of party-building is to spread socialist politics the best they can and encourage "normal workers" to get involved in political activity.

At our annual general meeting just over a month ago I was elected the CLP's political education officer. Some might see this as an opportunity to lecture the membership on their hobby horses once a month, but I don't. I outline what I think can be done in the role here.

The first thing I did as PEO was to organise a monthly political discussion in my ward branch on a topic of members' choice (readers familiar with the SP and SWP will know the deal). The first discussion? 'Is socialism out of date?' In addition to this, I put together a monthly report every CLP member gets to see. This is an opportunity to plug a few hobby horses and introduce members to decent political writing they may have otherwise missed. But I am balanced and draw attention to pieces from all wings of the labour movement.

I've also been elected the trade union liaison officer. I intend to use this position to encourage the sizable number of local affiliated union branches to send representatives to our meetings and encourage them to become more involved in the political process. While it is true the upper echelons of the party have treated unions with barely-concealed contempt since Blair captured the leadership in 1994, the failure of unions to not properly use the thousands of links they have with party organisations did nothing to strengthen their hand when it came to confrontations with the previous government and local authorities. A politicised trade union movement active inside the party it founded is the best way of insuring the sorts of neoliberal excesses we saw in the Blair/Brown years are avoided in future.

• Is there an active membership to engage with?

Yes, there is. In the SP you had the inactive members, the comrades who'd infrequently attend meetings, and those who would attend and do the bulk of the work. There's a similar pattern to local Labour membership, though as you would expect the numbers are bigger for all three categories. My CLP's new executive has an activist conception of politics and are looking at ways of encouraging the bulk of the membership to become more involved in party work. Part of the PEO role is making this point of view part of the CLP's common sense too.

During the election we spoke to people who'd never been canvassed by Labour activists before, despite Stoke Central being a stronghold since the year dot. That, frankly, is a scandalous situation and one we're still in the process of rectifying.

• Do you feel membership is affecting your own political positions?

No I don't. But I cannot give a solid guarantee this will always be the case.

It's a basic truism of Marxism that social being conditions consciousness. You only have to look at the numerous examples of militants who've entered Labour and come out the other end with knighthoods and gongs to prove this. It wasn't because they lacked sufficient will power or didn't have enough Bolshevik iron in their souls: it was years of commitment to electoral politics around ever narrower definitions of 'what is possible' that did the job.

Now I'm in the Labour Party and know I will be constantly exposed to the same processes I cannot say, hand on heart, it will have no effect on me. But at least in my case there are things about my political activity that can shield me from this.

First there is my existing politics - 17 years of professing Marxist views in circumstances one could hardly describe as "germane" do not pass quickly. Second, among my closest comrades are a group of ex-SP'ers who've come to similar conclusions about Labour as I have. Third, I write left wing political stuff on an (almost) daily basis and mainly read the blogs of like-minded folk. Fourth, I do work outside the Labour party too. And lastly, I am conscious of the "moderating" influence Labour politics has had on others and could have on me.

I'd like to thank Phil for his interesting and honest responses.

Is deception rape?

This is one of those stories which, when I first saw it, I thought it could not possibly be true - and then all the news agencies started reporting it.

The BBC reports that Sabbar Kashur, who has been under house-arrest for two years was sentenced to a further 18 months in jail for "rape by deception".

The pair met in Jerusalem and had sex that day. The woman later discovered that the man who had introduced himself as "Dudu", which is a nickname commonly used by Jews, apparently, is an Arab and was not interested in a serious relationship. He denies ever having said he was Jewish and that his nickname is one used by his friends and family, although he may not have helped his case when he said "My wife even calls me that".

In the court's ruling the judge, Zvi Segal, wrote: "If she had not thought the accused was a Jewish bachelor interested in a serious relationship, she would not have co-operated."

"The court is obliged to protect the public interest from sophisticated, smooth-tongued criminals who can deceive innocent victims at an unbearable price - the sanctity of their bodies and souls," the court judgement was quoted as reading.

I think that there's some really odd language going on there. Shall we start with "co-operated" when they mean "enthusiastically fucked him"? It looks to me that the judge is saying that women's role in sex is to passively allow men to have their way with them - otherwise how do you explain all this "sanctity of their bodies and souls" business?

I suspect the extraordinary judgement and sentence are a product of a revulsion on the part of the law that a Jewish woman was defiled by an Arab man, who is defined as a "smooth-tongued criminal" on the basis that he had consensual sex with a Jew whilst in possession of an Arab penis.

Neither side disputed that this woman met a guy she fancied and they decided to have sex on that first meeting. I don't think I'm being overly controversial by saying if you have sex with someone the first time you meet them it's quite likely that you don't know them very well and that it should not entirely surprise you if your new romance does not necessarily blossom into a life-time's love match.

If you only want to have sex with people who want to have a long-term relationship with you I advise a bit of differed gratification. If you don't mind having sex with people you may never meet again feel free to fuck on first meeting. Fill your boots, as it were.

That's fine and dandy, why should we know someone well if we want to have sex with them? We shouldn't be surprised though that a one-night stand did not end in either a serious long term relationship or that the other person wasn't 100% honest. A reasonable person would not expect to know someone well enough on first meeting to know whether they are an honest person.

A serious jail term isn't the appropriate response here.

Ethically it is quite possible this man hid the "shameful" fact that he's an Arab and was wrong to do so. He certainly hid the fact he was married. That pales in comparison to the ethics of having someone you were, up to that point attracted to, sent to jail when you find out they are an Arab. There are no Israeli Jews getting sent to jail for having affairs.

The "victim" in this case is someone who made a judgement call she later regretted - nothing more. That is her responsibility and no-one else's, and she certainly was not raped. If she'd made an error of judgement and found herself in a position where she was forced to have sex against her will, that would have been his responsibility and a (far longer) jail sentence would have been appropriate, but the undisputed facts show she wanted to have sex and approached Dudu with that in mind.

We cannot start having such a broad definition of rape that the seriousness of the crime becomes diluted by this sort of case.

Moreover the law should not be used to regulate our personal lives in this way. I'm certain that the fact that this man was an Israeli Arab is more than just an incidental fact here, but even if it wasn't the law's still wrong.

High Court Justice Elyakim Rubinstein said a conviction of rape should be imposed any time a "person does not tell the truth regarding critical matters to a reasonable woman, and as a result of misrepresentation she has sexual relations with him."

Well hold on, isn't this tantamount to criminalising adultery? In fact it criminalises all sorts of commonplace situations.

What if I don't mention my criminal record, or my model train collection or my secret desire to be rithlessly flogged with liquorice bootlaces? All things that might make a new lover regret having got involved in the first place. Under this definition any of these could find someone locked up and that has to be wrong.

Without going into too much detail I've had sex with women who, it turned out, had not been wholly truthful about themselves. Did these women rape me? No, of course not, jail would be a bizarre response. Were they unethical to be less than honest with me? I suppose so, but the law is not there to turn us all into saints - that's setting the bar unreasonably high.

This kind of paternalist attitude towards women's sexuality is not healthy and tends towards the idea that women are possessions that men must take good care of. We all make mistakes that we later regret, but when the state steps in to legislate the nuances of sexual relationships we're in very dangerous territory, all the more so when it becomes a crime to conceal your Arabic decent (although this man probably did not do this).

The law is not there to protect us every time we feel hurt or betrayed. It should not treat adults as children, nor should it lock up men for being Arabs.

Six Slinky Links

A quick round up of a few things I've spotted that you might be interested in.

• Cartoonist Alan Moore, whose credits include V for Vendetta and Watchmen is interviewed in the Stool Pigeon. Brilliant, rambling, psychedelic and savage by turns.
  
  
• F for Philistine is keeping her beady eye on the Islamophobes after the French veil ban.
  
  
• The Morning Star interviews Unite's Gail Cartman whose running to lead her union.
  
  
• In Germany something like three million people have been partying on their motorways. I have no idea why, but jolly good!
  
  
• Arizona's racist laws are creating fear and division, according to the Guardian.
  
  
• Meanwhile the Independent looks at a bad week to be a woman.
  

Democracy Turfed Off

It's so long ago it gives me a little warm glow of nostalgia, but time was that New Labour tried to ban the largest demonstration in British history, all for the sake of some grass. No, no, no - not the sort Ministers stuff into their crack pipes, the grass in Hyde Park of course.

The demonstration, which eventually attracted over a million people, making it the largest mobilisation in the history of the UK, was to be cancelled because the grass issue may also mean "People can get crushed, people can break their legs - there are a lot of things that happen at this time of year and it would be very unwise of us to take such a risk" which, as an official statement, reads more like a local mafioso saying "Shop windows can get.... broken... if you're not careful."

This all flooded back to me when I saw that Boris Johnson had made these comments about the eviction of the "Democracy Village" camped outside Parliament. "I think it's wonderful that as a city we can protest. But it is nauseating what they are doing to the lawn."

Quite correctly Johnson has identified that democracy is a lovely idea, but not when it comes at the price of a nice bit of the green stuff. You need to pamper your pampas, after all. (Evening Standard has pics of the great grass massacre, here)

However, while I have little sympathy for the argument that grass has more rights than people, I am slightly more concerned about the rights of individuals to permanently rob everyone else of common land. It's not simply the uber-hierarchical model of moralising protest that Brian Haw typifies, it's also the fact that if you're opposed to, say, privatising public property, you shouldn't then claim personal ownership over common land yourself.

These protesters made the Square unusable for everyone else, and they hoped to do this on a long term or permanent basis. Is that democracy or simply giving yourself property rights over land that was held in common? Is it wrong for the State to sell off public property but ok for a self-appointed group of randoms to rock up and claim our land for themselves?

Even those poor little blades of grass were part of the common treasury until this small squad of elitists squatted on them. I'm not entirely sure I 100% approve.

I'm certainly not saying that these issues are not complex and, usually, require some sort of negotiation but I am saying that democracy is not just about everyone being allowed to do whatever they like, no matter how anti-social.

Manufacturing austerity

There's nothing like an economic crisis to provide excuses for your ideological commitments. The government's announcement that the BBC license fee may be cut is a case in point.

The Tories have long held a grudge against the BBC, because it isn't directly owned by one of their pals (which is why they've scrapped rules saying that newspaper owners can't own TV stations). It's also increasingly clear that whilst many cost cutting measures are taking place under the heading 'tackling the deficit' this really isn't the whole story.

After all why cut corporation tax if your worried about the gap between income and expenditure? Why say you're going to ensure council taxes do not rise unless you want to ensure that councils do not act to create jobs while the national government is slaughtering them?

Jeremy Hunt, the Minister for Culture, simultaneously attacked the BBC's independence and revenue when he said that "There are huge numbers of things that need to be changed at the BBC. They need to demonstrate the very constrained financial situation we are now in."

Surely though Hunt is talking about artificially creating a "constrained financial situation" by cutting their funds? Certainly Hunt is suggesting maximising it. It looks to me like the government is ideologically committed to laying people off.

That's not to say that there is nothing to criticise in the license fee, which is the kind of flat tax that Tories used to like, when it might be fairer to include the BBC's funding in income tax - although there is something to be said for a hypothocated tax if it allows for more political independence.

It's also true that the BBC could spend it's money more wisely. The mega-fees paid to competent entertainers like Graham Norton or Jonathon Ross seems disproportionate when compared to the salaries of other staff members. However, I suspect Hunt is not looking for anything except scaling down of the size of the state broadcaster.

Soon the number of people able to pay tax at all is going to be severely reduced - and where will the deficit be then, hmmm?

Zac Goldsmith interviewed on Channel Four news

This is absolute gold - do watch! New Tory MP Zac Goldsmith was on C4 News to be grilled over his potentially dodgy election expense returns, but in 13 minutes of interview he spends the almost entire time trying to skewer Jon Snow on some minor point of scheduling that no one cares about.

When he does get round to speaking about the issue in hand he utterly bungles it, and it's clear he knows he's on very dodgy ground. In my view he'd have been hard put to come across more like an aristocratic baddie even if he had a duelling scar and a henchman hovering just behind his right shoulder.



Goldsmith is clearly a man who regards the media making legitimate enquiries as total impudence.

JR goes solar?

I've just seen this inspired ad for some US company or other. Ah.... eco-friendly nostalgia.



Glad to know we've got JR on our side...

Back at you Mr Mayor

To think I voted for Sir Steve Bullock second preference at this year's Lewisham Mayoral election. Anyway, he's repaid my act of charity by branding protesters against the cuts "fucking idiots" and demanded that they "get real" - all while he was chairing a cabinet meeting. That's multi-tasking for you.

So much for Labour being the anti-cuts party. In Lewisham we're blessed with the fact that those fighting the cuts find themselves opposed to both the Liberal-Tory national coalition and the Labour council who were announcing closures before we even knew who the national government was.

Last night around one hundred protesters lobbied the council over their plans to, among other things, close five local libraries, shut down nurseries and reduce council staff. For an area where unemployment is on the rise the loss of local services and laying off workers seems completely the wrong way to go.

Hangbitch who attended the protest says that "we all know that these immediate economies are false economies. Bullock’s huge list targets people we (literally) can’t afford to target."

Meanwhile what does Sir Steve have to say about his disrespect for those who want decent public services and had hoped that this Labour council would fight to keep every job? “I think I may have left the mic on while I was making an aside.”

I'm assuming "aside" is a euphemism that we'll all be taking up soon in Lewisham. I'm pretty sure they'll be plenty of "asides" made about Sir Steve's attitude in the coming months as the council prepares the redundancy notices.

Green Party National Executive elections

It's that time of year again when the Green Party elects it's national executive. As usual we're in a position where no one wants to take on what's seen as a thankless role with too much work and too little support.

It's not a big surprise that the leadership role is uncontested with just Caroline putting herself forwards - although it is disappointing as it's an opportunity for the party to debate it's direction outside of the more narrow confines of specific conference motions. However, I'm pleased that the deputy leader post *is* contested as I mentioned a few days ago.

These two posts will now go to postal ballot with the results announced at September's conference.

The Green Party national executive has eleven named posts of which seven have had one candidate put forward their name and four posts have no contestants. The nominations for all these posts are still open and I'd like to encourage anyone who is a member of the party to consider putting themselves forward for one of these posts (request a nomination pack from the Electoral Returning Officer on ero@greenparty.org.uk). These positions will be elected at conference in Birmingham.

There will soon be candidate statements available on the national website for the following contested positions.

• Chair: Jayne Forbes
• Campaigns: Romayne Phoenix
• Elections: Judy Macieowska
• Finance: Dean Walton
• Local Party Support: Gayle O'Donovan
• Management: Tom Beaton
• Publications: Edward Milford

There are no candidates for the following posts: Equality & Diversity, External Communications, Internal Communications, International, Policy. In fairness I should point out that I think many members thought the incumbents for three of the four would be standing again and that they would have been uncontroversial which is why these roles are currently uncontested.

Now all these candidates are lovely, but I was particularly pleased to see Gayle's name in the list as she's from Manchester, unlike the other six candidates who all live in London. Come on Green Party, we can do better than that!

The party could make a big advance in the European elections in the North West and South West in 2014 where we came so close last time, but it's unlikely to happen if there is no-one from those regions fighting their corner on the executive. I really do think it's important that the executive reflects the geographic spread of the party.

If you're not from London, or even if you are I suppose, and want advice/help around standing for one of these posts I'd be happy to help, as would Jon Nott, the ERO, I'm sure. I'm not guaranteeing to vote for you, obviously, but these elections really do need to be contested, not to mention the posts that no-one wants to do.

Raoul Moat, David Cameron and Facebook

David Cameron was taking a swipe at Facebook users today. The Prime Minister spoke for a lot of people when he spoke of his disgust that people had been expressing admiration for the wife beating, misogynist murderer Raoul Moat.

Moat had recently been released from prison after serving time for assaulting a child. His widely reported last, self-pitying words "I had no Dad" were uttered moments before he left his own children fatherless. This was no radical, anti-police, community champion but a reactionary thug whose violence was usually directed towards working class women and children.

I'm all for attempting to understand Moat's motives but some have bordered on sympathy, something I think we should strongly argue against. Empathising with a perpetrator of domestic violence without any but the most cursory nod towards the victims of that violence is to place the importance of Moat's feelings above those of his victims.

However, Cameron has asked Facebook to remove Moat fan pages where tens of thousands have signed up to say what a "legend" the killer was. Facebook, I think rightly, refused to take the page down - although their inconsistency on what they censor is frustrating. You can't ban these ideas, you need to argue against them.

The fact that large numbers of men and women are leaving supportive messages on the page speaks to something that many people never see spoken out loud, and it's an opportunity to look facts in the face. A few examples of posts left by women on the site include;

• love got the better of you moat, RIP x
• His head went, simple as that, anyway he had a fucked up childhood, his baby mom was messing with his brain while he was serving a sentence. them man up newcastle there heads are all fucked, beer drinking steriod taking dudes. Never the less rest in peace Raoul Moat I don't think you are a legend, but a man whos' heart is torn and whose integrity was no more, R.I.P.
  
• RIP, guess it all just got too much for you man :/

The fact that people can say things like "love got the better of you" in response to Moat's killing spree is a product of the way the media focused its attention on an "exciting" movie-like narrative without once giving the thing its proper name - domestic violence.

If you're ex-partner beats you or tries to kill you it is not because "love got the better" of him but because he's a violent misogynist. By turning Moat into the central figure of an exciting man-hunt media circus the press inevitably gave him a more glamorous appearance than he deserved.

But back to Facebook for a moment - the reason it works is by harnessing the enthusiasms of the general public. Cameron is opposed to that when they express ideas he doesn't like, but this comes just a week after Cameron hoped to harness the site for his cuts agenda.

Here he is speaking to the owner of Facebook about winning the hearts and minds of the public for cutting public spending by using social networking.



The fact is you can't have it both ways. If you want to use social networking you have to understand that it works because it is unfettered, and if you start banning groups because you think they're distasteful - guess what - some people might find laying off public sector workers a downright disgrace.

For me I've no particular time for those criticising the police on this occasion. While there may be lessons to learned it is the extraordinary behaviour of the media that needs to be under the spotlight. Hyping up a sad little man into a hero while cavalierly putting his life, the lives of the public and the police in danger is beyond excuses.

See also Obsolete, Organized Rage, Green Reading, Doc Richard, The F Word, Richard Osley, Martin.

The last sane man in France

With the news that the French Assembly has overwhelmingly passed a law against the wearing of the veil I've been in a blistering, fuming rage. The law, which was introduced by a "delegation for the rights of women" criminalised women who choose to wear the "wrong" clothes.

If the senate passes the law it will be illegal to wear a full face-veil and you can be fined and forced to go to citizenship classes. It's also a crime (rightly) to force someone to wear a veil, including your children.

The fact that there is no distinction between criminalising someone who forces a woman to wear a veil and criminalising a woman who wants to wear a veil is a complete disgrace, but the worst of it is that this law had almost no opposition in Parliament.

Obviously the right voted for the measures but the left just gave these racist measures a free pass either voting for them or, more often, abstaining. Just one Parliamentarian voted against, just one. Daniel Garrigue.

Garrigue is a former UMP (Tory) member who resigned the whip in 2008 citing undemocratic processes in the party, some tax law I know nothing about and disagreeing with his party's support for Nato.

On his blog Garrigue explained that he’s happy for there to be laws against people forcing others to wear the veil and for a law to prohibit the veil on the grounds of security in particular places – but in general he sees it as a massive restriction of liberty, which it is.

He believes there is a climate of racism growing across Europe and this law will legitimise the National Front. The stunning thing is that he is the only one of the lot of them that accepted these blatantly obvious arguments.

This law will entrench the ever deepening racism in French society and embolden the Islamophobes across the continent, not to mention criminalising women for daring to wear what they like.

Bits and bobs

• Who says twitter isn't useful? Without it we wouldn't be able to see first hand what irresponsible idiots the press are, out of their own blackberries. Example.
  
  
• Talking of that lovable murderous misogynist Raoul Moat the New Statesman has an interesting piece, in defence of the police while Martin lays into the press.
  
  
• Charlie Brooker tears a strip off of limp vampire films. Includes the classic statement; "If Twilight doesn't culminate in a 28-minute shot of her lying spread-eagled on the marital bed tearfully rubbing the leathery, disintegrating corpse of a 200-year-old bat against her marital sector, the entire saga has been a cop-out and a lie." Quite.
  
  
• Liberal Conspiracy points to a conversation with Oona and Ken where Oona King sees the job of Mayor as helping trim the fat and Mr Livingstone looks to fighting the cuts.
  
  
• Talking of the Labour Party I notice that Diane Abbott has a new website to support her leadership bid which can sit snugly in these links next to Ken Livingstone's.
  
  
• Capitalism Bad, Tree Pretty writes of abortion laws and abortion rates. "To be absolutely clear - when New Zealand passed what was then one of the most restrictive abortion laws in the Western world and the cost of abortion increased dramatically - the total number of abortions New Zealand women had went up."

Religion: women, know your place.

I was interested to read in Haaretz that Anat Hoffman (a leading activist for Movement for Progressive Judaism) was arrested at Jerusalem's Western Wall for holding a Torah whilst in possession of a womb.

Apparently it's not just frowned on for women to read the Torah in this holy site it's actually an imprisonable offence.

In November a woman was arrested at the same location for wearing a prayer shawl. I've heard of the fashion police but this is ridiculous.

Western Wall Rabbi Shmuel Rabinowitz said "We must distance politics and disagreement from this sacred place," which is hilarious because in fact he means people should not disagree with him by promoting gender equality - politics that he evidently doesn't like.

I wish these people would be a little more honest. If Rabinowitz was a man of his convictions he would have said "Women should know their place and stop disagreeing with me" but he's a spineless, reactionary coward so he tries to make out women who get arrested for expressing religious freedom are just horrid troublemakers.

I wonder what Rowan Williams thinks about this?

When the General Synod, democratic institution of the Church of England, voted that it intended to allow the ordination of women bishops last week it rejected his suggestion of creating no go zones for women bishops. He argued that some parishes could opt out of the twenty first century, although he made no mention of whether they would be allowed to stone adulterers.

This comes hot on the heels of his veto of the decision of the Southwark diocese to appoint Dr Jeffrey John as their bishop. The problem with John is that he is openly gay, although he insists that he is chaste - which means Williams is practising that good old tradition of hating the sinner and not the sin.

Not that gay sex is a sin (unless you do it really well or claim it on expenses).

Of course Williams, who twice in one week has sought to over turn the democratic will of his Church, has done all this in the name of holding back progress. While the synod thought that women bishops were "theologically justified" and the bible has nothing bad to say about gay people who don't have sex Williams decided that Realpolitik trumped his God.

Wouldn't want to be him when/if he reaches the pearly gates. Some people say his god can be an angry one.

Rioting as an absence of democracy

In the last two days there have been two community riots provoked by outrage at reactionary movements.

Yesterday in Belfast three police officers were shot and around two hundred people took part in throwing missiles and petrol bombs at the police. A total of twenty seven police officers were injured during the disturbances, although the press seems to think that none of these injuries is life threatening.

Facing water cannon and baton rounds residents were opposing the loyalist twelfth of July parades that commemorate the killing of Catholics by the forces of William of Orange and the 'traditional' bonfires held on the night of the eleventh.

Over the years these marches have resulted in civil disturbances, violence and an escalation of community tensions. It's understandable that many residents see these celebrations as a deliberate provocation and are consistently frustrated that they seem to have no say about whether they are allowed to take place in their neighbourhoods.

It's no surprise that when people feel they have no democratic option available to them some resort to undemocratic and violent actions. Last night's events really should be a sign that the state's attitudes towards the Orange marches has to change for facilitating their celebrations to regarding them as inciting violence.

However on Friday, in Oakland, California, the rioting was in response to far clearer state complicity in racist violence. Police officer Johannes Mehserle found himself acquitted of murder after he shot an unarmed black man dead.

The court accepted that Oscar Grant was unarmed, and lying face down at the feet of Officer Johannes Mehserle while surrounded by a ring of police officers when Mehserle took out his service revolver and fired a fatal round into his back. The court accepted that because they had no choice, it was all filmed by a by-stander, and yet it still found that the officer had not committed murder, nor had he intended to kill Oscar Grant.

I mean who would expect a man to die after being cold-bloodedly shot in the back at point blank range? And just because grant was unarmed and prone there's no reason to think that this white officer was safe from this extremely black man at his feet. I'm surprised they haven't given Mehserle a medal frankly.

A demonstration of over a thousand people marched after the verdict of non-guilty was announced bearing signs saying "Oakland says guilty". The demo turned into a riot with shops smashed and police lines attacked.

You can watch video here that shows locals speaking for themselves about what they feel about the verdict. The video goes on to show the police response to the peaceful protest although it cuts short before the riot begins.

I'm tempted to say I don't welcome the riots, but frankly I think it's far more important to say that I far from welcome the institution bigotry that allows the Orangemen to dominate Catholic areas with their hate, or the courts that allow police officers to shoot unarmed men in the back just because they're poor and black.

Spain wins: Octupi all over the word cheer!

As the Octopus predicted Spain won 1 - 0 over the Netherlands in an, at times, uninspiring final of the World Cup having scored eight goals in seven matches. At other times we saw the kind of fighting display that only the likes of Cantona and Zidane would normally treat us to.

We had the fan, obviously having overdosed on vuvuzela juice attempting to rush the "cup" itself.

Then we had the play itself which was, at times, hair raising. The British ref had his yellow card out so often he was considering not putting it away again. I counted 13 yellow cards and one red, although I might be off there. I wonder if this is a record for Cup final?

But though they marched into the valley of death the Spanish team triumphed, bruised and unbeaten, to much cheering from some and horror from others. Certainly my part of London was roaring when the final whistle blew.


It was good to see Mandela there to see the final, after much hoo and ha, and I hope he enjoyed the culmination of what has been seen as a successful hosting of the World Cup, although we've seen it has not been without it's problems.

Andrés Iniesta celebrated his 116th minute winning goal by tearing off his top revealing a T-shirt with the words "Dani Jarque siempre con nosotros", which apparently translates as "Dani Jarque is always with us" referring to the 26 year old team captain of RCD Espanyol who died of a heart attack while on the phone to his girlfriend.

Congratulations to Spain even if my prediction of an all Latin American final turned out to be monumentally wrong. Ha!

Bits and bobs from Green blogging

• Adrian Hollister reviews tea pigs. Makes me want to get back into the coke.
  
  
• I notice another Young Green is blogging, check out Ruth Bergan.
  
  
• Also the Sussex Greens are getting in on the act too.
  
  
• Natalie has done another Brit blog round-up today.
  
  
• Brighton councillor Jason Kitkat has got into hot water for letting residents know what's happening in their council. Outrageous. It was good to see this post by Andy Richards in support.
  
  
• Talking of Brighton it was good to see that the Greens won the by-election caused by Keith's promotion, caused by Caroline's victory. Congratulations Lizzie Deane.
  

Deputy Leader Contenders Announced

The contenders for the post of Deputy Leader of the Green Party have been announced and it's going to be a run off between Adrian Ramsay, the incumbent, and Derek Wall, the ex-male Principle Speaker and doyen of the Green Left.

For your reading pleasure I have put together some information on each of the candidates to help you decide. I won't be plumping for either candidate until nearer the time. There will be hustings and candidate statements to follow;

Candidate:	Adrian Ramsay	Derek Wall
Employment:	Politician	Teacher in economics
Age:	28	45
Length of Party membership	12 years	3o years
Internal roles	Deputy leader from 2008, leading roles in Green Group on Norwich council	Male principle speaker 2006-08 A number of leading positions in party from 1989 through 90's.
Electoral highs:	Local councillor in Norwich's Nelson ward since 2003, 14.9% in Norwich South in 2010	2.46% in Windsor at the 2005 General Election.
Support base:	The Norwich machine, "respectable" Greens	Green Left and the indigenous peoples of Latin America.
Personal factlets:	Adrian is a vegan who likes to go walking on the Scottish islands	Derek is a Zen-Buddhist, non-driver with three children
Last two statements on current issues	Party funding reform	Proportional representation
.	The coalition government	Polish elections

Help Norwich make history

As many of you know due to an ongoing and ridiculous saga one third of the Norwich councillors were given the boot recently and, at a date as yet unknown, there will be a kind of super citywide by-election. While this is a complete pain in the bum it's also our chance to make history.

Right now the Greens are joint largest group with Labour (nine each) and so, if we get more councillors elected this year Norwich will be the first city in history to enjoy some kind of Green dominion.

To this end I suspect some readers would like to help make that happen. Below I copy some of the text from the official appeal for helpers;

Norwich Action Weekend:

17th & 18th JULY Saturday 17th & Sunday 18th July - 10am to 6pm, at 27 Clarendon Road, Norwich NR2 2PN

Help is needed with door-knocking local residents near the city centre area, or helping to deliver some of our new ward newsletters. Please come along and support us if you can.

Refreshments are provided for helpers, with a vegetarian lunch available between 1 and 2pm.

We now hold Action Weekends on the third weekend of every month. This month we need to get a lot of door-knocking covered, and a lot of newsletters delivered, as we will very soon be facing new local elections in Norwich.

We therefore have a good chance of becoming the largest party on Norwich City Council (and the first Green council in the country) in the next couple of months - so it's an important time to get involved.

The door-knocking sessions will begin at 10am and 2pm, and it would be helpful if you could arrive near to one of these times if possible. However, if you do need to arrive at a different time, please let us know in advance and there will be someone here to welcome you and provide you with all the necessary materials and briefing.

For more information, directions, or to offer your help, please email ngpvolunteers@yahoo.co.uk or phone 01603 611909.

It would be great to see you there.

Best wishes,

Ben Duffy
Norwich Green Party

Keep the door to PR open

The door to proportional representation is not yet shut. While quite a few commentators are talking about how they'll vote in a referendum whose question is not yet set I happen to think that's a bit premature. The bill has not yet been written, nor has it gone through the process of amendment and voting. We don't know what is going to happen.

No one gives a toss about Alternative Voting, and if Proportional Representation was on the ballot the vast majority of those voting for reform would vote for PR over AV any day. It's one thing to accept a "miserable little compromise" has taken place, it's quite another to quit pushing before the battle for PR is lost.

I've no illusions about the Parliamentary. But if we're to keep PR on the agenda, not just for the Commons but also for the House of Lords we need to keep MPs aware that there are millions who want it. I've no idea how a referendum would go, but I do know that PR is the preferred system to replace FPTP for millions in this country.

Today I sent this letter to my MP, Joan Ruddock, and I think it would be a good idea if others were to write to their local MPs too.

Dear Joan Ruddock,

while I'm very happy to see that electoral reform is finally on the agenda for the House of Commons I'm far from happy that the coalition government wants to push for Alternative Voting (AV) as an attempt to head off a system of proportional representation.

AV, just like First Past The Post, leaves millions of people unrepresented and millions more massively under-represented. A truly democratic system would allow for every vote to count equally and for every party with significant support to have a voice in Parliament.

As yet the bill is not written and I'm writing to you to ask that you try to ensure that Proportional Representation is not taken off the agenda. The people should have the option of choosing PR rather than being given a non-choice between two systems that entrench the unfairness of our electoral system.

I'm sure the majority of MPs are fully aware that there is a mood for fundamental democratic reform, and that they are also aware that there has never been any public pressure for AV, this is simply a dodgy Tory stitch-up to prevent the public being allowed to choose a fairer electoral system.

There is still time to ensure that the case for PR is at least heard in Parliament and I'd like to ask you to help ensure that it is.

Yours,

Jim Jepps

If you do write and get an interesting response - let me know!

BNP beaten in Barking, again

Last night the results for the Barking Goresbrook by-election came in where the great white hope Richard Barnbrook was sent packing, again, after there was an administrative cock-up on the part of Labour (standing an ineligible candidate) and the council election had to be taken again.

I thought it might be useful to give the results for May at the same time. They need to be taken with a small pinch of salt though as people had three votes in May and the Lib Dems and Tories only stood two candidates in May.

	Vote		May result
Labour (elected)	881	46.59%	(51.03%)
BNP	642	33.95%	(29.20%)
Lib Dem	136	7.19%	(6.86%)
Tory	108	5.71%	(10.05%)
Ind	63	3.33%	(2.86%)
UKIP	50	2.64%
Ind	11	0.58%

The much reduced turnout of 25% compared to 58% in May is only to be expected as the General Election boosted turnout all over. Interesting that it didn't make a massive difference to the actual vote proportions though, apart from the dreadful result for the Tories.

This result is a real blow to the BNP who are already feeling like they are being pulled downwards, back into the sewer that they came from. If even 'high profile' members like Barnbrook can't hold onto a council seat what hope for the future? Ho hum!

One last word, well done to UKIP for standing this time, but they could have tried a bit harder to filtch some of those hard right votes couldn't they? It could've made all the difference.