Mat Bowles

Dear Govt.

We haven't exactly been on good terms for some time now, but even so, please understand that if it gets to the point where I read a Mail on Sunday scare story entitled "Stasi HQ UK" and find myself agreeing with them against your actions? You're Doing It Wrong.

Seriously, know any vegetarians? Or someone involved with a "foreigner"? How about a fear of flying so you prefer sitting above the wing, or a tendency to make last minute decisions on travel plans?

An internal Home Office document obtained by The Mail on Sunday reveals that during testing one 'potential suspect' turned out to be an airline passenger with a spinal injury flying into Britain with his nurse.

'Suspect' requests likely to cause innocent holidaymakers to get 'red flags' as potential terrorists include ordering a vegetarian meal, asking for an over-wing seat and travelling with a foreign-born husband or wife.

The system will also 'red flag' passengers buying a one-way ticket and making a last-minute reservation

There are, we know, nasty people out there. And some of them want to try to blow up aeroplanes. But treating those who believe animals deserve a little bit of respect as potential terrorists?

That's fucking stupid!

I tick so many boxes on this system it's silly. And I know several friends (including those reading this) that tick even more.

FFS. My friend Dr Packula has created a Facebook group, which essentially will share information and link to WriteToThem. Contacting your MP about this insanity would probably be a good thing.

I need to go hit something. Oh, wait, the bread is rising downstairs, I'll go hit that before it goes in the oven. I have photos. If they come out, a post may be pending.

Jack Straw has decided not to appeal a decision and instead the Cabinet has voted, using the power allowed it by law the law, to prevent the release of documents, for the first time since the FOI Act was passed. Y'know what? I disagree with Jennie and most Lib Dems on this. He's right to do so. We can, and should, be attacking this, but not because Cabinet minutes aren't going to be released. Cabinet minutes should not be released, it's one of the basic principles of our Parliamentary democracy. Here's how it's supposed to work:

• The House of Commons is elected as a representative cross section of British interests and opinions
• A Cabinet is formed representing the views of enough members of the House to command a majority
• Appointments are made based on support within the house and talent
  
• The Cabinet discusses all major aspects of policy and agrees major decisions
• The Cabinet is bound by Collective Responsibility and do not disagree in public
• Ministers that cannot agree to a decision at all should resign
• If the Cabinet no longer commands the support of the House, then the government should fall

In order for this system of government to work correctly, ministers have to be able to have free, open and frank discussions within Cabinet. If after discussion is over they come to a decision that a minister personally dislikes, the minister chooses whether this is a resigning issue or not. Robin Cook chose to resign before the Iraq War started. Clare Short was given assurances by the PM and had those assurances broken, so resigned after the war.  That's the way it's supposed to work. That the Government didn't fall is not the fault of the Cabinet/Parliamentary system of government.

The problem lies not with the way this individual decision was made. The problem lies with the corrupted system that our Parliamentary democracy has become.  This is the way it actually works:

• The House of Commons is elected using a gerrymandered system created in 1947 that encourages:
• an unrepresentative House with a two-party duopoly
• A predominance of white middle class men in suits
• Safe seats allocated by party fiat in which the rebellious are penalised
• Party loyalty over individual thinking
• A Cabinet is formed by the party leader, made up mostly of his/her friends or political allies
• Appointments are made based on presentational ability and sucking up
• The Prime Minister makes most major decisions and reveals them to Cabinet
  
• Groupthink is both likely and encouraged
• Discussion and debate is discouraged
• Ministers who disagree with the PM are aware that challenging is a threat to their career
• Super majorities from one party mean the Majority is rarely threatened

If a precedent is set for Cabinet minutes to be revealed during a period in office, then full and frank discussion within Cabinet is threatened. That it currently doesn't happen enough is part of the problem. If we are to retain the good aspects of the British system of Goverment, we need to get rid of the corruption and the parts that aren't working. Not attack the chances of the bits that sometimes do from happening.

British politics has allowed, over the last 60 years, to become increasingly corrupt and partisan. This is a fault of the electoral system, and specifically the introduction of uniform single member constituencies and the abolition of alternative voting methods made by the Representation of the Peoples Act 1948. We need to remake and revitalise the Parliamentary system of government. For that to happen, we also need to examine how and why the Cabinet system works.

If it's decided that the Cabinet should have disagreements in public, that Collective Responsibility can be abolished, etc, then so be it. I can see arguments favouring that, especially in the new information age.

But to call for the abolishing of a fundamental feature of the British system, that has been working effectively for over 300 years, over a single, specific issue in which an abominable decision was made, is to throw out the baby with the rather murky bathwater.

Parliament voted for the Iraq war. The nation almost certainly opposed it. That is the real problem. In defending the principles of our democracy, for once in his life, Jack Straw is right.

And if you think I liked typing that last sentence you really don't know me.

I guess an advantage of moving to a new area is not knowing exactly how your MP will react. My old one was Adrian, who I trusted before I got to know him and I got involved in party politics again, but my new one? She's one of the Labour "awkward squad", but I never know on what issue she's going to rebel. Problem of course being that Gordon Brown is to order Labour MPs to back a controversial plan to exempt details of MPs' expenses from the Freedom of Information Act. And she's been absent for most previous votes on this issue.

She first was elected in 1997, and the Freedom of Information Act was, to me, a crucial part of the Labour 1997 manifesto. While there is a lot of overblown hype about MPs expense claims, there has been some corruption, and there are some stupidities; I agree completely with Jennie when she says stuff like You pay peanuts, and you get Hazel Blears. And Derek Conway, frantically defrauding the expenses system. Lets at least pay bananas and get apes ;) or:

I am one of those rare people who thinks that MPs should be paid a lot more than they currently are for basic salary - on the grounds that if we want the best people to represent us, we should pay the sort of wages that will attract the best - but I also think that people HUGELY resent the fact that MPs get to claim expenses for the sort of things that normal people have to buy from their own wage.

ETA: Brown has backed down. Good. caramel_betty thinks Whips tell Brown rebellion will be BIG. No, bigger than BIG. HUGEMONGANTIC. Still worth writing to them, they'll try and do something else. Rest of original entry below:

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( Letter to my MP about the vote in Parliament tomorrow )

If you live in the UK, take 5 minutes of your time

Use the easy tool with links and info that MySociety have created and contact your MP asking them to vote against this measure.

Several people are linking to an ill-informed post by Mike Smithson at Political Betting entitled Is Labour about to clamp-down on the blogsphere? about possible reforms to the UK defamation and libel laws. I have no idea what Mike's source is, but mine is open and to the point. Padraig from Index on Censorship attended a Westminster Hall debate this week and wrote it up for Liberal Conspiracy.

He, and I, are very hopeful about the results of the debate, and the Govt has agreed a consultation that will pay specific attention to libel and the internet. As this is something I've been calling for for some time, it's great to see progress being made. My comment to Mr Smithson is below the cut for those that don't like wading through 350+ off topic tangents about unrelated subjects and discussions from previous thread:

ETA, before the cut, Padraig's posted an update on LC, definitely worth a read for everyone that allows open comments and talks about, well, people on their journal.
ETA2: John Hemming MP also agrees on comment screening—"In the mean time (and rightly) we have the odd situation that someone who moderates comments can be liable for libel, but someone who doesn't moderate comments cannot."

( Summary of why Mike Smithson has got the wrong end of the stick )

I added a link to the Eady case as it's important, other useful links are:
Defamation
Basic Libel for Idiots

All three have been in my 'to post' folder for far too long. Really should remember that a quick knockabout post with links is frequently more effective than articles so well researched they never actually see the light of day.

You don't need to know anything at all about the farce that is the Torbay mayoralty to get this one:

Closure will actually breathe life into Eastphalia.'

The master plan would be for one developer to link the Woolies building, Victoria car park, Crossways and Station Lane sites and merge them into one massive regeneration project, including such things as a multiplex cinema, indoor bowling centre, new shops and homes, and with each financing the other. 'Ahmad Hatter explained: 'It's a brilliant plan, especially the way each thing will finance the other in the middle of the deepest recession in living memory. In fact we will probably end up knocking Woolies down to make way for the new 'porcine runway' - at busy times there will be pigs taking off and landing every five minutes

For the uninitiated, Westphalia=Torquay, Eastphalia=Paignton Brixham Fishhole=Brixham, Ahmad Hatter=some bloke even the local Tory Cllrs thought incompetent and got rid of, and Mayor Nick Bye=a useless waste of space that's achieved nothing except prove what a bad idea the Govts elected executive mayors system really was (and how awful the implementation legislation). The blog's syndicated at thisiswestphali.

Oh, also, they've revamped the news section of the UK Parliament website. Using Wordpress. No idea how much they were overcharged, but the feed is: parliament_uk

ETA: The MP for Torbay points out in the comments that Eastphalia is Paignton, not Brixham. Which makes more sense as Victoria Park and Crossways are both in Paignton. Um, about 5 minutes walk from the hospital where I was born. Oops. Thanks Adrian.

Really pleased that the radical shift to the left in taxation policy was passed at today's Lib Dem conference--couldn't make it into the hall to hear the debate unfortunately, but a genuinely redistributive policy that will genuinely help those earning the least in society has to be a bloody good thing.

Shift to the right?

For some reason there are a bunch of people convinced that it's some sort of shift to the right, and I haven't yet seen a decent explanation as to what definition of 'right' they're using. Admittedly, I've been utterly swamped on the registration desk and attending fringe events, so I've not had time to read through the debate, and as it's 3am and I'm back on the desk at 8.30am I'm not going to now.

Can someone please explain what the 'rightwards shift' is supposed to mean, as having finally read a copy of the Make It Happen paper I can see something that's both genuinely Liberal and nicely left wing in a genuinely radical way.

I'm not too keen on the tone of some of the marketing language they've used, and the over use of 'families' combined with 'no child left behind' did piss me off a bit, but having read the underlying ideas behind the rhetoric and knowing that it's aimed not at a BA politics type like me but at journalists and actual real, sane, normal people, I can get over that.

Decent left wing tax & reform agenda

So now we have a decent left wing tax policy reducing taxes for those earning the least combined with the traditional radically left wing political reform agenda. Now all we need is a commitment to level the playing field for those wanting to set up or convert to co-operatives, and this l'il liberal socialist will be very happy.

For the majority of non politics geeks that hang around this place, I'm at party conference in Bournemouth, I'm exhausted, and now I need to sleep. That's assuming Jennie's snoring doesn't keep me awake all night. Wish me luck...

Oops!

I always like reading Mr Steel--I don't always agree with him (y'know, trot and all) but he is damn funny. In an article about Obama's triangulation exercise:

when Obama meets Gordon Brown next week it's going to make Brown feel even worse. Maybe Obama will advise him "Gordon, you need to come up with a snappy three-word slogan that sums up your demeanour, the way I did with 'Yes we can'." And as a result the Labour Party's slogan for the next election will be "Where am I?"

Sounds about right for the moment. Or in the aftermath, regarding their MPs--"where'd they go?"...

Everyone's favourite insubstantial careerist appears to have made a bit of a cock up:

A personal computer holding sensitive documents relating to defence and extremism has been stolen from Hazel Blears' constituency office in Salford.

The theft may mean the communities secretary has broken rules on the handling of restricted government information, the BBC has learned.

On the one hand, crime, break in, naughty theives, get 'em. On the other, what was she doing leaving a laptop full of confidential data in her constituency office? Oh, wait, smug, complacent, convinced of her own rightness Blears. It didn't occur to her the rules her Govt itself created were there for a fucking reason.

ETA: Oh, what a surprise—it wasn't her fault,t hey were emailed to her by a flunky, and her chief bean counter has taken full responsibility:

Thankfully no damage has been done since the documents sent to her were not classified as secret or top secret. And in any event the computer was password protected ... I take full responsibility for ensuring this is done.

Completely ignored as an issue at PMQs as well FFS.

Via and also.

David Davis (Tory Shadow Home Secretary) has resigned on a point of principle and as I start writing this I hear that Clegg has announced the Lib Dems won't stand against him (ETA: confirmed at the Spectator).

Clegg is 100% correct

That was what I was going to suggest should happen, Labour were a distant third last time but as this is a single issue resignation in order to reinforce there is no mandate for the use of the Parliament Act, and Lib Dem party policy agrees completely with DD's stance, Clegg is correct to suggest no candidate. I believe that constitutionally the local party should be consulted, and I strongly hope that Haltemprice and Howden Lib Dems will not only acquiesce, but will also get out and back him on the campaign trail to strongly reinforce and fight on the issue.

Dodgy polls asking push questions show there is support for the 42 days measure, but an uninformed opinion based on a question that summarises the issue isn't enough.

I never thought I'd say this, but David Davis just went a long way up in my estimation.