Sunday 14 September 2008

Defective Matters

I wish to correct a previous statement about Daniel Finkelstein. He was in fact the SDP candidate for Brent East in 1987, and the Conservative candidate for Harrow East in 2001. Perhaps he should have done an Adonis, from the SDP through the Lib Dems to a Labour peerage and red box, with a Cameron Cabinet seat to follow?

Will Adonis and James Purnell defect to the Tories in order to take up their positions in Cameron’s Cabinet? I very much doubt it. In fact, they will not even lose the Labour Whip.

Meanwhile, as the Tories crow about defections from the Lib Dems, they should instead be asking themselves, as we should all be asking, what it is about them that is so attractive to active members of a Eurofanatical, anti-family, pro-crime and pro-drugs party which says totally different things in different parts of the country, and which gains support for what it is not rather than for what it is.

21 comments:

  1. Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac.

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  2. This could be really interesting. What would Andrew Adonis do on education votes where the two parties differerd? There are plenty of examples, as even a basic skim of Hansard shows you.

    So what happens if Lord Adonis, as a Conservative Cabinet Minister is ordered to vote one way, but is ordered by the Labour whip he apparently still would hold to vote another way? What would you recommend he do?

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  3. It's simply absurd to think that Adonis, Purnell or anyone else could, or would wish to, serve as Conservative ministers while continuing to hold the Labour whip. They would automatically lose the whip if they took a job in a Conservative government. This is pretty basic stuff, and both Adonis and Purnell would accept it. That, incidentally, is one reason why I don't believe either of them would take a job under the Conservatives. But even if I'm wrong about that, I'm certainly right about the whip. Anyone who disagrees simply doesn't understand how the Labour Party works, or how the Labour Party thinks.

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  4. You are still living in the Eighties or the early Nineties.

    They would just tell the Whips when they were going to vote against the Whip (on their own areas of responsibility), and probably absent themsleves from other votes. Nobody would care. Those days are long gone.

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  5. David - you are proposing an Education Secretary actively voting against his own party on an issue he has personally steered to the dispatch box? That's clearly ludicrous.

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  6. There is simply no way Purnell could continue as a Labour MP under those circumstances. Nor would he want to. The Labour leadership would not allow it, and his local party would deselect him as a matter of course. He would no longer be able to be a Labour MP in any meaningful sense, because he would be working to advance the policies of their opponents. This is pretty basic, uncontroversial stuff. You're living in fantasyland.

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  7. If nobody cares about whipped party affiliation, why do we still have a whipping system? Why are MPS promoted or denied promotion on the basis of their loyalty to the party line? Why do Ministers fly back from overseas to make sure narrow votes are won?

    You say some silly things David, but this really is the silliest of al. There is no conceivable way any senior politican will ever hold two party whips at once

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  8. You'll probably write a post shortly along the following lines:

    "My, but haven't I upset a lot of poeople today! Clearly, the very fact that I am exposing what both parties have long accepted, but never admitted publicly, has caused some hackles. No they won't, no they won't, NO THEY WON'T they all cry.

    But they will. And anyone who doesn't accept this is simply living in the past"

    You don't need to do it now, so I've saved you some time.

    It is worth pondering that one other reason why you get a flurry of comments disagreeing with you might be when you say something jaw droppingly idiotic, that people feel the need to take issue with you.

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  9. He would only have "steered" them as Education Secretary, not as a member of that party.

    It'll happen. I'm surprised that it hasn't already. Indeed, it very nearly did. Brown wanted Ashdown to become Northern Ireland Secretary while remaining a Lib Dem peer. He saw nothing at all wrong, or even difficult, about that.

    Several current Ministers are not Labour Party members, and one of them is on record that he has never voted Labour in his life. Hes till has a vote in local and European elections.

    Britain is a one-party state. The people at the top constitute that one party. And to hell with minor irritants like the electorate.

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  10. "There is no conceivable way any senior politican will ever hold two party whips at once"

    I never said that he would.

    It is worth noting just how rarely the Tories do now bother to vote against the Government. This is obscured by the fact that they quite rarely even demand a vote at all these days.

    "The Labour leadership would not allow it"

    Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha. Who do you think are "the Labour Leadership" these days, never mind post-Brown? Trade union officials? Old hands from local government? Hradly!

    "and his local party would deselect him as a matter of course"

    Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha, Ha.

    CLPs these days make 1950s Conservative Associations look uppity and rebellious.

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  11. I'm a Labour member. If my Labour MP (she's a minister, as it happens) became a Tory minister, there would be absolute uproar, and she'd be deselected straight away. I'd start the process myself if necessary, but I wouldn't be the only one. I can't imagine that any local member would vote for her in those circumstances.

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  12. "I never said that he would [hold two whips at once]."


    That was the clear implication of your statement. If Adonis becomes Conservative education secretary, he would need to take the Conservative whip - otherwise, they wouldn't have him. And you claimed he wouldn't lose the Labour whip.

    "It is worth noting just how rarely the Tories do now bother to vote against the Government"

    Absolute rubbish. Philip Cowley does some great analysis on backbench revolts. He writes thst "Taking the 2005-07 period as a whole, therefore a Conservative backbench rebellion takes place in just one in every ten divisions, which compares very favourably with
    the rate of rebellion in the Parliamentary Labour Party, which in the same period saw
    a rebellion in roughly every four divisions"

    "Ha ha ha ha ha ha" etc

    Wow. That's some really insightful political analysis and rebuttal you have there

    Sometimes - not often but sometimes - I think you are a clever man who is tragically misguided in his opinions. Other times, like this, I think that you are just breathtaking ignorant and silly.

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  13. No she wouldn't be (the NEC wouldn't approve the alternative candidate), and yes they would (because they'd vote for absolutely anybody with the words "The Labour Party Candidate" next to their names). And you know it.

    Anyway, she wouldn't be a "Tory Minister". That is the point. The PM would be a Tory, but she wouldn't be. It was never suggested to Ashdown that he join Labour (not even when he was in the Commons and Blair wanted him as Foreign Secretary), and four serving Ministers are not Labour members.

    But they are part of the club, the One Party. And that is all that matters.

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  14. "That was the clear implication of your statement."

    No, it is exactly what I said wouldn't happen.

    "otherwise, they wouldn't have him"

    Of course they would. Which planet are you living on? There are four Ministers in the Lords today who don't receive the Labour Whip, because it can only extend to Labour members, which they are not.

    "Taking the 2005-07 period as a whole, therefore a Conservative backbench rebellion takes place in just one in every ten divisions, which compares very favourably with
    the rate of rebellion in the Parliamentary Labour Party, which in the same period saw
    a rebellion in roughly every four divisions"

    What has that to do with anything? How often is there no division anyway? (Rather often, I think you'll find) And I wasn't talking about Tory rebellions. The Tories are no quite (and increasingly) rarely whipped to vote against the Government, not least because there is quite (and increasingly) often no vote at all. That won't change after the Election, whatever the outcome.

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  15. There is a substantive difference between a non aligned peer taking a Ministerial position without holding a Labour whip (Digby Jones et al), and a peer or MP *who is an active member of another party and takes their whip* who is a Minister for another party. The first occurs, the second doesn't. There's a reason for that.

    Similatly, the fact that many issues don't end in division absolutely does not mean that the Tories agree with the government. Absence of division happens for a whole variety of reasons, including lack of Parliamentary time. But we do know that where there is a vote, the Tories oppose the government almost all the time.

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  16. "a Minister for another party"

    You're not a Minister "for a party". I'm about to do a full post on this.

    "the fact that many issues don't end in division absolutely does not mean that the Tories agree with the government"

    Well, either that or they are bone idle and shouldn't be paid.

    How come there used to be far more divisions, then?

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  17. The status of Paddy Ashdown within the Lib Dems after becoming a minister under a Labour PM would, of course, be a matter for Paddy Ashdown and the Lib Dems to sort out between themselves. It would be none of Labour's business, and would carry no precedent for the Labour Party's management of its own members. It is, however, perhaps relevant that Ashdown refused the ministerial post that he was offered - this may give some clue as to how the Lib Dems would have regarded it. The offer was at least partly a failed attempt to destabilise the Lib Dems and signal that Gordon Brown was an inclusive national leader - the GOATs were part of the same process (they weren't Labour members, but importantly the ones who were actually appointed weren't members of other parties either). There's no reason why Labour should play along with Tories trying the same thing.

    Any minister in a Tory government is a de facto Tory minister - they are formulating, driving and implementing Conservative government policy. That's why no CLP would accept their MP doing the job.

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  18. 1. There is no such thing as a Tory, or any other party, Minsiter, as such - they are Ministers of the Crown;

    2. CLPs (or Tory Associations, for that matter) - blah, blah, blah - ha, ha, ha.

    3. Ashdown is on record that he only turned down the offer because he didn't agree with ID cards, and for no other reason.

    Now, to that full post.

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  19. "How come there used to be far more divisions, then?"

    Short answer - there didn't - you're factually wrong. See here:

    http://www.parliament.uk/commons/lib/research/notes/snpc-04670.pdf


    Do you do *any* research before you write your posts?

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  20. 1. There is no such thing as a Tory, or any other party, Minsiter, as such - they are Ministers of the Crown;

    Tell that to the Labour Party.

    2. CLPs (or Tory Associations, for that matter) - blah, blah, blah - ha, ha, ha.

    Tell that to CLPs.

    3. Ashdown is on record that he only turned down the offer because he didn't agree with ID cards, and for no other reason.

    Tell that to the Lib Dems.

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  21. Consider them told.

    And I am talking about rather longer ago than that.

    I have just done a full post on all of this.

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