UK General Discussion

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http://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/jul/30/bbc-welfare-reforms-impartiality-john-humphrys

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Bizarre display of comic evil from Tory peer: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-23505723

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Doreen Lawrence is to become a Labour Peer.

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Most of the other people who were named as new Peers yesterday, however, pretty clearly bought their peerages in the traditional manner.

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There is a case for that, but wrt this kind of petty (legal) corruption, well, such people would only find another means of compensation for their generous donations. But there's no doubt that the government is appointing too many peers and using increasingly absurd excuses for doing so.

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The last thing I want my party subs to be wasted in is on some American scam artist in a bad suit.

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Ed Miliband is (notoriously) a fan of Geoff Boycott, which means that he would likely beat the others at beach cricket without exactly cheating, but would leave them feeling somewhat cheated regardless.

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Sir Alan Beith, the longest serving LibDem MP, is to stand down at the next election. He was first elected for Berwick-upon-Tweed at a by-election in 1973 (triggered by the resignation of its aristocratic Tory MP following a prostitution scandal) and has spent subsequent decades failing to make any kind of meaningful impact whatsoever. His retirement means that Berwick will likely be a top Tory target in the election.

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You know, other than the circumstances of his initial election, there's nothing interesting to say about Beith. I bet his favourite colour is beige.

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This is a picture of Alan Beith:



This is probably the first time that most British posters here have ever seen his picture, even though he's sat in parliament for forty years.

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Indeed he does. I imagine that he has personally attended every single tedious local ceremony that he has been physically able to since 1973.

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Regarding the issue of 'meaningful impact', I would once have cracked a joke about Cyril Smith, but given recent revelations that seems in poor taste.

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Except in the 1931, 1935 and 1945 General Elections, people in Britain don't vote for political camps, so that kind of analysis is pretty much useless. The electoral system works very heavily against it.

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Grow up.

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Which links into confidence in that kind of situation, which links in to class.

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Ah, but there's no point in looking at this in terms of individuals. You can only look at this sort of thing in an at all honest way at a social level. Because while some people from ordinary backgrounds will indeed be sufficiently full of themselves to be alright in that sort of situation, the vast majority won't. A situation that starts to reverse itself in rough proportion to privilege.

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...at, it ought to be pointed out, a demo.

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Ordinary people don't pay attention to politics during the summer (and, frankly, hardly do until a General Election is called).

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Labour back flip on Syria overnight.

Not exactly, it's more that the media did more than scan-reading this time.

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So what's Labour's position here? No one much bothers reporting anything beyond the rumor mill out of Washington, really.

Government line will not be backed unless the UN provides 'compelling evidence' that Assad has used chemical weapons.

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Somewhat unsurprisingly things have turned all ultra-partisan and unpleasant.

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Random

(though Fitzpatrick wasn't in the shadcab: just an ordinary shadow minister)

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The government will win the vote if Team Yellow is as obedient as it usually is.

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Government's defeat here isn't of the sort that would trigger a new election right?

In this post-war period this would have been seen as, at the very least, a resigning matter for the PM (one reason why Wilson got away with supporting the Americans in Vietnam without actually sending troops was his tiny majority in the 1964-1966 parliament). But convention changed after the watershed hung parliament of February 1974, so the government is as secure as it was this time last night.

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What a total screw-up by Cameron. Why on earth would he call this vote if he weren't sure of getting a majority?

Cameron is an appalling parliamentary manager, basically. Someone else must have cocked up as well though. Would suspect that there's a reasonable chance that one or both of the Chief Whip and Leader of the House will resign.