Sunday 24 February 2019

Sunday Roundup - Time for change

Official portrait of Chuka Umunna crop 2 (cropped).jpg
Photo:By Chris McAndrew

Breakaway MP's bring new hope to broken politics

The decision of 8 Labour and 3 Conservative MP's to leave their respective parties to become an "Independent Group" on the backbenches was not just a brave decision but the right one. For too long the main political parties have been dominated by their extreme wings the Corbynistas a narrow minded mixture of old Trots, those that spend their lives going to demonstrations and the politically naive sprinkled liberally with anti-Semites.

Meanwhile the Conservative Party has been held to ransom by the ERG and the like of Boris Johnson and Jacob Rees Mogg, the latter being the MP for the 17th Century taking us backwards.

In a an interview with The Times newspaper (no link £) with Chuka Umunna explains the situation further:

The Independent Group is, he argues, different to the failed attempt to break the mould of politics in the 1980s. “The SDP was basically Labour 2.0, whereas this is a genuine coming together of people from different political traditions.” Those involved are nothing like the Gang of Four, he says. “We are a diverse group of people, of different generations, backgrounds and political traditions. We are two-thirds women and I suppose I provide a bit of ethnic diversity. We’re not grandees.” The political landscape has also been transformed, he says. “In the past people tended to vote along class lines but now other cultural issues play more strongly. It’s about whether you have an open, more global view of the world or whether you have a more closed nationalistic view.”

Westminster, he argues, is stuck in a previous age. “We’ve still got a politics that’s operating like it’s in the 20th century, with two old parties which have coalitions within them that are fighting each other and have fragmented.” More than two thirds of the electorate say they don’t feel represented by the existing system. “You’ve got a huge number of people voting for parties to keep the other lot out, or because it’s the least worst option. That’s just not sustainable.”


It's well known that the Labour Party has developed a toxic internal atmosphere with anti-Semitism (thinly disguised as anti-Zionism) which is why Jewish MP luciana Berger was forced to leave follwoing a witch hunt led by an adbmirer of mad conspiracy theorist David Ike.

The MP's are not alone.

Councillors leave the Labour Party

Three local councillors made the local news on Tuesday starting with Brighton & Hove Council.  Anti-Semitism UK reported:

The Labour Party is set to lose control over Brighton and Hove City Council as one of its councillors, Anne Meadows, has told the BBC that she is leaving the Labour Party and joining the Conservative Party after what she described as “18 months of antisemitism and abuse”. Her defection means that the Conservative grouping on the Council is now larger than the Labour one. The Council has been led by the Labour Party since 2015.A shame she went straight to the Tories but at the moment there is nowhere to go, though the following day a further resignation came from fellow councillor.


The Argus reported:

Cllr Morgan said: “This morning, after more than 27 years as a member, I have submitted my resignation from the Labour Party to the General Secretary Jennie Formby, citing Brexit, anti-Semitism and the toxic culture of aggression and bullying within the Party and the broader Corbyn-supporting base.

Warren Morgan has been standing up to Momentum bullies for a long time.

Finally The Derby Telegraph reports:

A Derby councillor has decided to leave the Labour Party because he feels its views and values at national level no longer mirror his own, especially with regards anti-semitism.

Councillor Dom Anderson, who was elected to represent Boulton ward in 2016, will continue to do so as an independent councillor on Derby City Council.

Mr Anderson was loathe to give many details about his decision but indicated that widely-publicised claims of anti-Semetic views in the Labour Party had helped to make up his mind.

He issued an official statement which said: "I took the difficult decision to leave the Labour Party but will continue to represent the people of Boulton as an independent councillor and vote with the values I have always held, in mind."
















This morning The Sunday Times Reports:

Labour councillors in more than a dozen local authorities have resigned to become independents because of anti-semitism and bullying.

The news comes after eight Labour MPs defected to a new centrist grouping, the Independent Group (TIG), last week.

In Brighton and Hove, three independents intend to align formally with TIG as soon as this week. Warren Morgan, the former Labour leader of the council, is leading a plan that would see TIG hold the balance of power ahead of local elections this spring.

Labour representatives from 10 councils wrote a joint letter to The Sunday Times last night declaring they had defected. “Having witnessed the hard-left takeover of Labour, we believe that their harsh, uncompromising and dogmatic approach to politics poses a genuine threat,” their letter read.

“The Labour Party has changed beyond all recognition. A culture of bullying, intimidation and hostility towards Jewish people is becoming common-place. We therefore welcome the new Independent Group.”


Members leave in droves

The website of The Independent Group went down as 700,000 people attempted to access it at once. Thousands of ordinary people have been making donations. I have watched as people on one of the Labour Facebook groups I belong to have resigned cancelling their standing orders posting pictures of cut up membership cards.

One letter of resignation from academic David Hirsh read:

This is my resignation from the Labour Party, my political home since I was 18 years old.

Personally, I have had enough of being humiliated by antisemitism in the Labour movement. I have fought it for years, in the student movement in the academic unions and in the Labour Party. I won't subject myself to it any longer.

Politically, the most important thing to me at the moment is democracy. I mean by that our democratic states in which we look after each other and our civil society in which we are free to do what we choose.

I mean the principle that human beings are in a fundamental sense of equal value, and so opposition to discrimination against people on the basis of their designated race, gender, sexuality, religion or nation is a fundamental principle......

...I do not want Jeremy Corbyn to be the next Prime Minister; he is so wedded to antisemitic politics that he has been quite unable to address the antisemitic culture which he imported into the Labour mainstream. And that is linked to his anti-democratic worldview. While Corbyn himself may not be around for very long as leader, his politics and his culture will be, in my judgement.

Adam Langleben wrote his letter of resignation directly to Jeremy Corbyn in which he stated:

There can be no racial, social or economic justice whilst antisemites have completed a hostile takeover of the greatest force for achieving those aims. Antisemitism is a corrosive conspiracy theory that blocks the achievement of all justices. You represent the ultimate betrayal of Labour values. I thought naively that it and you could be changed. That very naivety or belief in the good in people is why I and so many others are part of the Labour Party. You have abused and manipulated the idealism of hundreds of thousands of good people, whilst allowing the antisemites to become evangelists for hate.

The time for the old Labour Party is at an end and the one nation conservatives need a new home. A new party is promised by the end of the year. Vince Cable seems exited but his party has lost all credibility so any Liberals wanting real change should be ready to defect.

It's time to build a new politics a radical party of the centre to change politics rejecting the outdated ideologies of centuries past.

The manifesto is yet to be written but there is now a glimmer of hope.....

And the usual piece of music on a Sunday to end this post with the latest single from Italian metal band Walk in Darkness:

No comments:

Post a Comment