The selection process for Calder Valley is about to start and we now have the list of names of the local contenders who have put themselves forward. They are Kerry May (GMB) Jane Lewis(AMICUS/UNITE) Steph Booth and Janet Oosthuysen. In the interests of fairness and good relations with my CLP colleagues, I will not be commenting further on this until a decision has been made. However, I have already made my preference clear.
Janet Oosthuysen, who four weeks ago almost WON a council seat from the Liberal Democrats, is by far the best candidate for the task. Not only does she work and campaign tirelessly, she is a committed socialist with Real Labour values. She is also a mum with teenage kids who unlike other politicians doesn't have to give patronising lectures about "hard working families." because she is part of one and knows exactly what life is like at the sharp end. Good luck Janet. We'll be working hard to try and get that selection through. Because the only way we can win this seat again is with a Labour Left - not New Labour - candidate.
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16 comments:
A bee for your bonnet.
The Indy today reports on the Blairites calling for tax cuts with a specific demand that a left agenda should be ignored.
If New Labour want to sleepwalk to disaster at the election that's up to them - in Calder Valley we can only win with a proper Labour agenda.
tax cuts for the less well off, I think we can all agree with that.The problem is New Labour have saddled themselves with the public image of tax rises for those least able to afford it and tax breaks for the super rich. That means we can't even rely on the core vote when needed. It's not as if no one saw it coming either...the fools.
This is a hypothetical.
Assume Labour couldn't get arrested if it adopted a hard-left agenda of a sort urged by the Hebden Duchess.
But it could save its deposits and do enough to stop Cameron sewing up the whole shebang if it stayed in the centre - and had a leader who had mastered pre-school SAT in humanspeak.
Would HD agree move to centre? Or would HD keep her principles pure but excluded from the game?
The NL right just don't get it.
They think it is worth chasing after voters who opted for labvour once and once only - in 97.
They don't seem to realise that those voters abandoned labour in 2001. Mostly to abstention. Some of them then went back to the Tories in 2005.
Now they have enthusiastically returned to a rejuvenated Tory party.
And the NL clones want to try and win back them as a priority, whilst goodness knows how many Labour voters are giving up in disgust?
What is required are policies to win back the support of the core labour vote. It may still not be enough to gain a parliamentary majority, but the thought that there is any chance of winning back natural Tories is a joke.
And I don';t believe that 'more of the same' is the way to do it. It needs to be remembered that the Tory policies aren't all that different from those of NL. But they appear freah and new, NL tired and anything but new!
Anonymous, what are you talking about?
The kind of agenda I would like to see (I am NOT the candidate) is not purist propaganda but impacts positively on people's lives. It would include more social housing, living wage, better transport (rail link direct to London!) trade union rights extended, no to Trident renewal, in short, Real Labour agenda. You are way off the mark. As is New labour. Such an agenda can and would win widespread support.
I'll just take one policy.
Social housing.
The government has now spent billions on the Decent Homes standard ie refurbishing the social housing stock. It has also spent to the limit of its borrowing capacity on hospitals, schools and public sector jobs.
It will not be able to spend more without taxing more. I think it is self-evident from recent election results that this isn't an option anymore.
So where exactly do you think the money is going to come from to pay for a social housing building programme? With Brown having blown the piggy bank and the economy going underwater.
Cutting defence spending, for a start. Actually, there is plenty which could be done to housing already here which is unoccupied and sometimes simply abandoned - I think any house empty for longer than 6 months should be compulsorily reclaimed for use.
It' called political will.Money was found for a totally needless war in Iraq, money will be poured down the drain on a totally needless ID card scheme. It isn't the spending the public has a problem with, it's seeing where the money has gone and what the wider benefit is to society. 4 million on local authority housing waiting lists is an obvious sign of a housing crisis.People on average earnings are completely priced out of the housing market before we even get to people on low wages and people in real social need.These are the things governments, particularly Labour governments, are meant to address.
What you mean the 139 billion spent of special advisor's and think tanks and other groups over the last eleven years, you know the jobs for the boys brigade, hold on we could have used that for housing, phew thats it I shall pop down to my local Tory HQ and ask can I become an MP. I would go to Labour but the last time I went to a meeting it was called off something to do with not enough people to hold a meeting, the reason whats left of the members decided to sit and watch the football and have a pint.
I kid you not.
Interesting to think that some of Labour's policies on housing are hyping the market and making it impossible for many to get an "affordable" home, whatever that means.
Take London. Labour has developed a massive "intermediary" sector. This is where local authorities enter into three-to-year leasehold agreements with private landlords to house those entitled to social housing.
The property has often been purchased on a buy-to-let agreement. The landlord will receive a market rent for the property paid for by housing benefit of which the managing agent, the local authority, will take an £80 per week cut.
BTL landlords have been lactating about this one-way deal, like elephants on heat, so much so that they have been quite willing to purchase a property where the rent never covers the interest payment on the loan. They were playing for the increase in capital value.
You can see in the round, however, that state intervention in the market through the provision of housing benefit has led to the creation of a false highly inflated market - which excludes Joe and Jill trying to get their first home.
The true state of the state's books are a lot worse than the public is told.
Annual liabilities running into billions of pounds for PFI contracts are not recorded.
These alone would push the UK well north of the 40% target set by the government.
Ministers such as Yvette Cooper making airey-fairey plans to build 3m homes by 2020 know that this is never ever going to be achieved because there is no money to do it.
But they figure that if there are questions subsequently, and there's not likely to be, it can always be defended as an aspiration rather than a firm commitment.
But there are at least 120 Labour MPs going along with the deception because they believe the ruse can save their seat.
Never mind seats, Labour is in danger of losing its deposits en masse.
Lets have less anonymous people and lets have real debate in the party, Janet is the local choice and a Unite member anyway!!
There is a clear winner!
John Wiseman
ROFL - I do like your idea of not commenting further :)
I am quite shocked by your comments - althuogh I don't know why as they are so often ill informed. Steph Booth is also a LOCAL candidate and IMHO could also be referred to as the best candidate for the task, despite what I can predict your comments will be about 'family connections' yawn! Steph has been a labour councillor, a committed party mmeber and activist since the 1980's and INCREASED THE LABOUR VOTE BY 25% in the recent local elections. I could go on but as you quite rightly say, in the interests of fairness - blah, blah, blah...
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