Michael Crick does make me laugh sometimes. He has just told Newsnight viewers that in a major concession to the right of the party, and in an attempt to get them on board with the LibDem coalition, David Cameron will offer Cabinet posts to Michael Howard, David Davis and Iain Duncan Smith.
There is a bit of a flaw there, as he already announced Iain Duncan Smith would be playing a leading role in his government at the last conference. Michael Howard was already pencilled in to be Justice Secretary and David Davis, with his stance on civil liberties, would be appealing to the LibDems anyway, especially if he returned to his old job.
From the reports I have heard from the meeting of the Parliamentary Party, there were no siren voices from the right and the whole party gave Cameron their backing.
If Michael Howerd is to be Justice Secretary, will he have to deal with prison governors?
ReplyDeleteI would be delighted to see Iain Duncan-Smith in a meaty role. He is hugely underrated and his Centre for Social Justice is startingly superb.
Iain, why are you STILL in cloud Cuckoo land?
ReplyDeleteThe Tories have been shafted like a rent boy on Hampstead Heath by the Lib Dems.
They will do a deal with Liebour, buy off the smaller parties with English money and dare the Tories to bring them down, Lord Mandelson and Campbell will spin it as the Tories spitting out their dummies and go for the election.
The joy will however be in seeing Liebour win the election and screw the Limp Dems (what's left of them) into the ground.
As for Crick, why do you think his nick name is Michael Prick?
This is turning into a farce, with Britain and Britain's markets the losers.
ReplyDeleteI can barely type I'm so angry but I shall try and articulate my feelings.
I'm trying to think what is making me most angry: the shamefaced duplicity of the Lib Dems; Clegg's backtracking about the Tories being the party to govern; Brown's 'resignation' which he spins as in the national interest but is purely political; Campbell and Mandelson, two UNELECTED slimeballs, being the puppet masters behind all this; the unfairness of the current voting system, where Labour need far fewer votes to win seats; Labour's policies of mass immigration and fattening the client state to ensure they get votes; the disgrace of Scotland over-ruling the English on who will govern them; Harriet Harman, Ed Balls et all STILL WALKING DOWN DOWNING STREET; the fact that PR could be introduced so we have this chaos after every single election...
I could go on. But I am too angry. I'll finish with two statements: Lab-Lib-et al would not be a PROGRESSIVE alliance, it would be a REGRESSIVE alliance, because it is socialism, and socialism is a regressive force, a tragic and disastrous 20th century mistake.
Lastly, there's a revolution coming, I'm telling you. The Poll Tax protests will be nothing compared to this.
It's been quite a day so let me just see if I've got this right.
ReplyDeleteGordon, the unflushable turd, wants to stay on as Prime Minister until September even though he lost the election. To do this he needs the support of a party that came third and also lost seats at the election. To get them on board he wants to unilaterally change the democratic process without asking the consent of the people.
And to get a majority of one in a Queen's speech (the majority of policies of which will affect the 85% of the UKs population which happens to be English), he will need to rely on the votes of the Scots and the Welsh, who have their own parliaments, and who will expect to be shielded from any cuts for their support. Those cuts then falling disproportionately on the English who actually voted overwhelmingly for a Conservative government.
In order to set all this up he did not ask for any view, permission or mandate from his MPs or his party but relied instead on the instructions of unelected Alastair Campbell and unelected Lord Mandelson.
His negotiating team currently offering the jewels of Babylon to the Lib Dems, now exists of a Milliband; Balls and Harman, the two most despised politicians in Westminster, and two unelected Lords. The deal will see an unelected Prime Minister foisted upon the country by October.
Iain, you've been round the block a few times; tell me dude, where's my democracy?
Surely Michael Howard stood down at the recent election. Is he to have a cabinet post from the lords?
ReplyDeleteKirsty Wark: as if the French Finance minister cares two flying f***** about the British election :-)
ReplyDeleteMichael Howard? Surely he's just stepped down from being an MP? Or am I being silly - is there another senior Tory of that name?
ReplyDeleteAs ever, Crick the prick...
ReplyDeleteWhen will people realise that Crick is as big a pillock as Brown?
ReplyDelete'Stepney' should be put on the campaign team fpor the next election. 'who stole my democracy?'
I'm a Tory, and I'd rather have Dominic Grieve than Michael Howard as Justice Secretary.
ReplyDeleteYou have to understand that in Guardian reader world "on the Right of the Conservative Party" means "dangerous heretics who obstruct our progress towards the Socialist New Jerusalem".
ReplyDeleteThe moral corruption of the Leftist elite was much in evidence today, but the Tory tax serfs who fund them (and their client State) are getting angry.
The fact that this anger will be ignored by the BBC (which is simply the broadcasting arm of that elite) will only increase it.
iain the mail is saying the same story about cameron having to make concessions to the right.
ReplyDelete@Me:
ReplyDeletethe unfairness of the current voting system, where Labour need far fewer votes to win seats;
Multiply your unhappiness by 10, and you know how the Liberal Democrats have felt for their entire existence.
I've just watched the exchange between Bradshaw and Boulton on Sky.The arrogance and conceit of Bradshaw and others in the Labour Party is quite staggering.
ReplyDeleteI was brought up to believe that you couldn't always win and that when you came second or third you accepted it with good grace and came back for another try at a time in the future.
The idea of 'fair play ' is anathema to many in the Labour Party. Their culture of spin and outright lies has debased the political process terribly. Is it any wonder so many of us have lost faith in politicians?
I heard some non-entity called Dromey saying that the country had voted for 'progressive politics'. I don't recall seeing a vote on a ballot paper for the 'Progressive Party'.
But let's just accept that Salmond, Plaid Cymru, Dromey, Bradshaw and all the other socialist apparatchiks are right. On the basis of Labour's record after 13 years in office, can I assume that 'progression' equals unsustainable debt/deficit, unreformed public services, pen pushing policemen, underfunded troops, illegal wars, politically correct madness, the sovietization of swathes of the country, failures in education and health, uncontrolled immigration ....!
I don't think anyone would vote for that. No, this is a spinmeisters wheeze invented by Mandelson and Campbell to divert attention from the catastrophic failure of Labour. Nothing more , nothing less.
Whoever does what, the Politicians need to get their act together and form a government or call a new election.
ReplyDeleteWho is doing what to who is of no interest to voters, who want real reform of the electoral system to stop this shambles happening again.
The Tories should consider going to form a minority government and to ignore the libdems, who have demonstrated their lack of integrity by starting to court the failed government of Gordon Brown.
Talking of jobs.
ReplyDeleteHe's lost his job under the Tories.
Time to downsize Michael.
Nick Clegg and the Lib Dems - living proof that you cannot polish a turd but you can roll it in glitter
ReplyDeleteMichael Howard will be justice secretary???? When did that happen. I'm appalled.
ReplyDeleteAfter three terms of disasterous mismanagement of Labour, the fact that the Tories are having to grovel to Clegg must surely beg the question where did they go wrong?
ReplyDeleteIs it David Davis' fault?
Is it Michael Howard's fault?
Is it IDS's fault?
Or is it Dave Cameron's fault?
Meanwhile, Mandelson and Campbell continue to strutt their stuff.
Iain
ReplyDeleteThanks for the insight into Cameron's cabinet choices. No liberal (of any Party or none) could conceivably sit at a Cabinet table with right-wing grotesques like IDS, Davis and Howard. It beggars belief that anyone would think that any LibDem would countenance this. It would be bad enough to be regularly exposed to William Hague's paranoid Europhobic rants. So that's the Lib-Con coalition gone for sure....
Why are the Conservatives letting this go on and not giving a deadline for approving their offer. Surely David Cameron needs to say we need an answer by 11pm tonight or the offer is off.
ReplyDeleteAre the Conservatives really going to keep licking the boots of Nick Clegg whilst he tries to get a better deal from Labour.
Worst case scenario, David Cameron watches a Rainbow Coalition cut spending in England and protects the Celtic fringes. Libs and Labour destroy any future they may have hoped to had in English politics for years to come.
Time Conservatives dropped the Unionist mantle and accept they are a English party and if we had a English Parliament David Cameron would be running one of the wealthiest nations, with some 60 million people able to compete on the word stage alone.
Currently David has less power than Alex Salmond,leader of a state subsidised nation of 4 million people.
Wake up Tories - the Union is just a fairy tell - it died when devolution became a reality - hitching your future to this arrangement that punishes the English into 2nd class citizens (the only nation in Europe without its own parliament) is going to anger the English people more and more. Slow burn issue that will bite you in the ass if you do not start addressing it.
@Twig
ReplyDeleteThe Conservatives fault.One simple addition to their manifesto.
"A referendum on membership of the European Union."
Would have won them this election. Instead they continue with the other 2 main parties in ignoring the fact the majority of the people want to leave the EU. They are scared stiff of giving the people a choice on the issue because they know the answer.
Seems the £2 million MEP term-ship is to big an appeal to them.
Michael Howard as Justice Secretary? You're having a laugh! Erm, what about that clown Dominic Grieve?
ReplyDeleteAt what point can Cameron call everyone's bluff and announce a Tory minority govt? He should've done that on Friday. I'm no Tory. I'm actually left of centre & voted Lib Dem, but this is starting to cheese me off. If you lose elections, you go, end of story. Cameron should've had more backbone, IMHO.
ReplyDelete@ Me
ReplyDeleteCalm down.
The Lib Lab deal was never really on.
From the Lib point of view it was just a negotiating tactic. And one that seems to have worked a treat. Pros like Cable and Ashdown have played the gullible Tories for fools.
From the Lab point of view, they were playing ball for the outside chance of a very brief pact, lasting only for as long as it would take (days?) for the Tories to collapse into recrimination and turn to an unelectable right wing leader and policy program.
In terms of the markets, obviously in the event of any serious difficulties the game playing would have ceased and the negotiations would have been concluded sharply.
Luggage van just seen leaving No. 10. About time!!
ReplyDelete"From the Lib point of view it was just a negotiating tactic."
ReplyDeleteMaking themselves look like unprincipled ***** putting Party interest before their Country was all part of a cunning plan. It all makes sense now.