ralasdair's posterous

As per the Conference Delegate's Report.

The Labour Party is a socialist party committed to democracy, human rights and the promotion of human welfare.

Labour recognises that the capitalist economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production, distribution, and accompanying financial system, has historically provided for an expansion of output and hence a basis for higher living standards. It has, nevertheless, always been associated with successive booms and slumps, periodic mass unemployment, social deprivation and gross inequalities in the distribution of wealth, income and opportunities for social improvement. Capitatalism is motivated by the pursuit of private profit. This motivation can sometimes stimulate initiative and enterprise. It can also lead to catastrophic downturns in economic activity and has been an important factor contributing to war.

Socialism, based upon public ownership of key sectors of the economy, control of the financial system, and the democratic participation of the workforce in setting and checking of objectives, would provide the basis for steadier expansion, higher living standards, much less inequality and the elimination of periodic mass unemployment.

We recongise that private trade and enterprise will continue to occupy an important role in distribution, services, many sectors of manufacturing and some financial services. We are committed to providing an economic and social framework within which private firms will be able to prosper and contribute to public welfare.

We seek at all times to promote economic progress, sustained unemployment, and social security affecting health, pensions and disabilities. We will work for equal rights regardless of race, gender, class, age, disability, sexual preference or religion. We recognise the important role of trade unions in protecting and advancing the interests of working people and hence are committed to good international standards on trade union rights, including recognition, collective bargaining, workers' participation in decisions affecting their welfare, and employment rights, including rights in conduct of disputes.

Similarly, we recognise the importance of cooperative principles in productive industry, distribution, in the provision of mortgages for housing and in other areas of activity. We encourage the application of cooperative principles.

Labour is committed to the maintenance and strengthening of democracy, in which government at all levels is elected by and held accountable to the people.

On the basis of these principles Labour seeks the support of the public, and encourages public participation in democratic discussion and the machinery of politics.

Castle Point CLP

Ceredigion CLP

Dagenham & Rainham CLP

Click here to download:

Warwick South Leaflet.pdf (1.63 MB)

(download)

Click here to download:

Warwick South Leaflet.pdf (1.63 MB)

Check out the by-election leaflet I've just sent off to the printers for our great council candidate in Warwick South. Would be great to increase the Labour vote in this Tory-held seat. The outgoing councillor is the Tory MP who beat our excellent incumbent James Plaskitt in May, so would be nice to wipe his eye too!

UPDATE: Ahem. Thankfully, the typo on page 2 ("threatening our dire services", indeed!) wasn't in the version that went to the printers...

Bloody hell. I really do have some cretins from school on facebook, don't I...

I've been discussing The Duchess on Twitter with @judehanlon. I remember not liking it, or it's politics, at the time. And I've dug out an old blog post I wrote about it just after I'd seen it... It's reproduced below.

I went got dragged to see The Duchess on Wednesday. Unsurprisingly, it was poor.

Cinematographically, it was a series of close-ups of Keira Knightley’s face, which, let’s face it, isn’t exactly her best feature. Her breasts, which are a bit of a bonus, did make a brief appearance, but not even that was enough to make up for the bad characterisation and frankly, not very good acting. Knightley just plain doesn’t have the gravitas to pull off the more serious personal scenes. Which of course means that the film just wasn’t very compelling.

And don’t get me started on the politics. At one point, Georgiana and Charles Fox are talking about extending the vote. Okay, Fox was a radical for his day, but there was little talk of extending the vote or ‘the people’ until fifty years later, when the unrest arising from the end of the Napoleonic Wars meant that Parliament felt it had to extend the vote if the United Kingdom were to survive as an institution.

The Whigs in the film are turned into some sort of former-day Obama’s, right down to talk of ‘change’ and being all decked out in Blue. I’m just surprised there weren’t Donkeys all over the place.

In fact, this anachronism runs right through the film. The outrage Georgiana feels when she finds out her husband has a mistress strikes me as somewhat ridiculous. He was a powerful man in the late 18th Century. Of course he had a mistress!
And later, when Charles Grey (later Earl Grey, of the tea) returns from France, Georgiana asks him “No revolution yet?”. Nobody in 1788 thought knew there was going to be a Revolution in France, let alone five years earlier.

Ralph Fiennes was fairly good, and it was he who actually provided the tragedy for the film – that of a man so oppressed by his society’s expectations of him (to sire a male heir) that it drives him to cruelty and in the end even rape.

The story of one of my constituents sums up the unfairness that many see in the current system. Having been made unemployed, she claimed jobseeker's allowance, council tax benefit and housing benefit. As someone who wanted to work, she did the responsible thing and sought new employment, and after much searching she found a job in a nearby constituency, just over 10 miles away. She earned about £120 for a 20-hour week, and with rent of £30 a week and council tax of £12 a week to pay, she was left £11 a week better off. Unfortunately, travelling to work cost her £18 a week, which meant that, unbelievably, she was made worse off by trying to do the right thing.

It's been weird over the last few weeks since the election, deciding who to support for the leadership. This must be what 'real' voters feel like in the run-up to a general election. Undecided. I don't like it. I want my moral certitude back. And I think, over the last few days, I've found it - with Ed Miliband.

On Thursday, I saw David Miliband speak in Coventry. And while he was interesting and fairly engaging, he wasn't impressive. He didn't seem to have the fire I expect from our next leader. He also pre-empted Ed Balls' line over the weekend on transition controls for EU accession states, calling for us to have imposed them on the 2004 accession countries. I disagree quite strongly. Equally, Ed Balls and Andy Burnham fail the immigration test for me.

As I said in my last post, immigration is a symptom. And I don't believe it was the cause of our loss. I believe immigration as an election issue another symptom of the real cause of our loss - which is our failure, as a government, to work for the ordinary working people in this country.

Diane Abbott, finally making it on the ballot, is an interesting candidate, and will add some much-needed diversity, both in politics and background to the race. But I don't think she's a serious contender to lead us from opposition to government again.

I like the fact that Ed Miliband launched a campaign on a Living Wage, and I like the fact that he doesn't seem to making the cheap shot of advocating higher immigration controls. I thought he was good in the House during Energy Questions last week, and I think he's the kind of guy who's going to be able to reach out to the country as well as the party activists and lead us from opposition into Government again.

That's why I'm supporting Ed Miliband for Labour leader.

The root of the argument, as made by @2Pallas on Twitter is that "Either women are less capable than men or there's discrimination / barriers to participation." Now, I don't think there's many sensible people who would argue that women are less capable than men. And I don't for one believe the PLP is a bastion of sexist discrimination. My view is that there are very real barriers to participation and promotion of women from the bottom up. But that doesn't mean we should elevate those women who, often because they were born into advantaged backgrounds, manage to break those barriers. But rather, let's raise female participation in politics, the Labour Party and Parliament as a whole.

In fact, my last point leads on to my next - the working classes still make up the majority of the people of this country. So why isn't anyone calling for them to be equally represented in Parliament or the Shadow Cabinet?