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Author Topic: Liberal Democrats outperform Labour in Local Elections
RedRover
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posted 02 May 2008 11:47 AM      Profile for RedRover     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Hi everyone.

Been a more than casual observer in British politics for the last few years, and I must say the events there between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown bore a striking resemblence to what was happening here between the Chretien and Martin camps.

Anyhow, the Liberal Democrats occupy what would be the NDP's ideological and electoral space in Canada. A competitive and progressive third party that spent a few years in the wilderness. So it is somewhat of a shocker that the Liberal Democrats have outpolled Labour in the local elections.

Is anyone here taking notes on the campaign? Have any lessons that can be learned for our situation?


From: Ottawa | Registered: Feb 2006  |  IP: Logged
Krago
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posted 02 May 2008 05:30 PM      Profile for Krago     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
And the racist British National Party (BNP) wins a seat on the London Assembly thanks to the Mixed Member Proportional (MMP) voting system.

London Assembly Results


From: The Royal City | Registered: Sep 2002  |  IP: Logged
Yibpl
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posted 02 May 2008 06:11 PM      Profile for Yibpl     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
UKIP successes in local polls
Friday, 02 May 2008

The UK Independence Party doubled its representation on Newcastle under Lyme Borough Council and gained its second councillor in Hartlepool in the local elections.

In Newcastle under Lyme, the two existing UKIP councillors, Derrick Huckfield (Knutton and Silverdale ward) and Eileen Braithwaite (Silverdale and Parksite) are now joined by David Nixon – who took Cross Heath ward with 507 votes (37%) – and Barbara Mary Lewis, who won Holditch ward with 39% of the vote. Labour came second in both cases.

Newcastle under Lyme has no overall control. The Tories are the biggest single group, with 25 seats, which leaves them six short of a majority.

In Hartlepool, Martyn Aiken was elected to the Unitary Authority by eight votes. Labour lost its majority on the council, which moved to no overall control when the Conservatives also won an additional seat.

In the Foggy Furze ward, Mr Aiken polled 396 votes against Labour’s 388 and pushed the sitting Liberal Democrat councillor into third place with 321 votes.

UKIP’s existing Hartlepool Councillor, Stephen Allison (elected 2006), says having another seat in the chamber will make quite a difference to the effectiveness of Hartlepool UKIP because it can now propose and second motions.

There were some disappointments for UKIP Hartlepool. The party’s second target seat was held by the Liberal Democrats on 419 votes with UKIP second on 417. The third target seat was Rossmere, held by the sitting Labour councillor with 488 votes, while UKIP again came second with 373.

Meanwhile in Dudley, UKIP councillor Malcolm Davis returned to the council after losing his seat last year. He won the St.James's ward. He said he was disappointed that other UKIP candidates narrowly missed joining him.


http://www.ukip.org/ukip/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=618&Itemid=57


From: Urban Alberta, wishing I was in Kananaskis | Registered: Dec 2007  |  IP: Logged
Doug
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posted 02 May 2008 06:18 PM      Profile for Doug   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by RedRover:
Hi everyone.

Been a more than casual observer in British politics for the last few years, and I must say the events there between Tony Blair and Gordon Brown bore a striking resemblence to what was happening here between the Chretien and Martin camps.


The story here is really the desertion of Labour and the consequent revival of the Conservatives much more than a victory for Liberal Democrats, who while still finishing a distant second, did not increase their share of the vote from last time.

They're only anecdotes, of course, but here are three people who decided not to vote Labour after having done so previously saying why they did that:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/talking_point/7380182.stm


From: Toronto, Canada | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged
Wilf Day
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posted 02 May 2008 06:57 PM      Profile for Wilf Day     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
In the London Assembly, despite a conservative Mayor, the Left has a one-seat majority if the Liberal Democrats are part of the Left:
Party, Seats, Gain/Loss
The Labour Party, 8, 1
Green Party, 2, 0
Liberal Democrats, 3, -2
Conservative Party, 11, 2
British National Party, 1, 1
UK Independence Party, 0, -2

So the Liberal Democrats lost one seat to Labour, one to the Conservatives. The UKIP lost one seat to the BNP, one to the Conservatives.

Will the Liberal Democrats side with the Conservatives when the Assembly elects its Chair? (Note that the Mayor has no vote in the Assembly.)

In London, unlike elsewhere, Labour's vote went up, while the Liberal Democrats dropped despite the huge increase in turnout:

Party, 2004, 2008
The Labour Party, 468,247, 665,443
Green Party, 160,455, 203,465
Liberal Democrats, 316,218, 275,272
Conservative Party, 533,696, 835,535
British National Party, 90,365, 130,714

The turnout went up from 37.0% to 45.3%.


From: Port Hope, Ontario | Registered: Oct 2002  |  IP: Logged
Wilf Day
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posted 03 May 2008 11:56 AM      Profile for Wilf Day     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Murad Qureshi, the only Muslim in the Assembly, made a come back in the Labour Top Up, and the first Hindu, Navin Shah, was elected in Brent & Harrow Constituency vote.

Murad Qureshi was elected in 2004 to a "top-up" list seat. This time he also ran locally against Tory Kit Malthouse for the West Central seat, which includes the boroughs of Westminster, Kensington and Chelsea and Hammersmith and Fulham. He lost that race but was re-elected to his list seat, being number two on the Labour list, just behind Deputy Mayor Nicky Gavron. Murad Qureshi belongs to a politically active family. His father is Mushtaq Qureshi, a Labour Party Councillor. His sister, Papya Qureshi, is also a Labour Party Councillor in the same council. Murad grew up in the area and has formerly represented Labour on Westminster City council.

Navin Shah is currently a Harrow councillor and leader of the local Labour Group. He also sits on the London Fire and Emergency Planning Authority.

The only black member was re-elected. Jennette Arnold, Chair of Labour Group and Assembly Member for North-East (Islington, Hackney and Waltham Forest), was born in Montserrat.

Gay Green Darren Johnson was re-elected, one of three or four gay members.

quote:
The far right British National Party has won a seat on the London Assembly. Their mayoral candidate Richard Barnbrook will join a handful of openly gay London Assembly members. . . gay Conservative Brian Coleman was re-elected to the Barnet & Camden constituency . . . gay Conservative former Hackney councillor Andrew Boff won a list seat.

[ 03 May 2008: Message edited by: Wilf Day ]


From: Port Hope, Ontario | Registered: Oct 2002  |  IP: Logged
RosaL
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posted 03 May 2008 11:59 AM      Profile for RosaL     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
Pardon my ignorance: The BNP candidate is "openly gay"?? That's certainly interesting ....

To clarify: What interests me is the reasons behind this kind of political move on the part of the BNP.

[ 03 May 2008: Message edited by: RosaL ]


From: the underclass | Registered: Mar 2007  |  IP: Logged
Doug
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posted 03 May 2008 12:53 PM      Profile for Doug   Author's Homepage     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by RosaL:
Pardon my ignorance: The BNP candidate is "openly gay"?? That's certainly interesting ....
[ 03 May 2008: Message edited by: RosaL ]

Here's a profile article on him.

I'm thinking perhaps this is a mistake as the article talks about him marrying a woman. Now that's no guaranteee of heterosexuality, but it's not being openly gay either.

[ 03 May 2008: Message edited by: Doug ]


From: Toronto, Canada | Registered: Apr 2001  |  IP: Logged
Wilf Day
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posted 03 May 2008 01:10 PM      Profile for Wilf Day     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
quote:
Originally posted by Doug:
If he's gay, at least he isn't foreign.

Note that Pink News is implying he's gay, not stating it. Maybe they know. Or maybe they're trouble-making.

The bizarre truth about the BNP boss, his ballerina fiance and bitter wife.

quote:
Barnbrook, 47, has been married for the past ten years to a well-educated young American who is a decorated, serving officer in the Metropolitan Police force.

Not only that, she has several prominent black friends, including the TV presenter Moira Stuart, and loathes her husband's Far Right ideology.

Their marriage broke down because of his "rotten politics". She joined the police force, she says, to do some good in the world and, in part, to make amends for him.

Little wonder, then, that Barnbrook has been so reluctant to volunteer her existence. Now, though, we can shed some light on the strange private life of Richard Barnbrook.

Certainly, if there is a more peculiar politician in the country, he has yet to emerge.

In public, Barnbrook has long favoured what one acquaintance calls a "Stormtrooper" brown suit and matching tie, which even his supporters feel is rather too suggestive of a Nuremberg rally for his electoral good.

"He looks just like Hitler," one person posted on the extreme Right-wing Stormfront website. "Whoever styles him needs a good kicking."

Barnbrook's time in this liberal artistic milieu will always be remembered for his writing and directorship of the 58-minute film HMS Discovery: A Love Story which archives describe as "Marxist Gay cinema".

Naked young men run about, flagellating each other and simulating gay sex acts while homo-erotic poetry is intoned.

Barnbrook, for whom the 1989 piece is an embarrassment among the homophobic Far Right, huffily insists it was an "art film".

Several years after its release he met a young American woman and surely dispelled any of those silly rumours.

She was a wealthy doctor's daughter 13 years his junior who had moved to Britain because, she says: "I didn't agree with U.S. foreign policy."

I met her yesterday, bleary with fatigue having finished her inner-city police shift at 4am. She has reverted to using her maiden name, and cannot be identified because of her job.

She is appalled at the possibility of being recognised as the London BNP leader's wife.

"I was 22 and I fell for him because I thought he was a great artist," she says. "He was different then."

They married a year later, in early 1998, at Lewisham register office. The couple set up home in South-East London and she joined the BBC, as an editorial assistant on Breakfast Time.

Alas, there were few happy times ahead for her. "Richard changed around 1999," she recalls. "That was when his views became very extreme. It was a total shock.

"Marriage means an awful lot to me, so I didn't want to walk away though I hated (their) rotten politics. I stuck with him because I thought I could persuade him otherwise. I thought that if he could change once, he could change a second time."

The Barnbrooks separated four years ago. His wife says: "In the end he said: 'If you don't like my politics you can get out.' So that is what I did.

She adds: "He used me and he has admitted it and apologised. He owes me a lot of money and is just starting to pay me back."

In the next few weeks, perhaps even days, the Barnbrook marriage will finally come to an end when their divorce is made absolute.

"I don't really have any problem with Richard saying he is engaged," she says. "Our divorce is so close now I can almost smell it. I can hardly wait.

"Let's just say that if Simone Clarke buys her wedding cake now, it won't be stale if she marries Richard at the first possible opportunity."

Ah yes, Miss Clarke - the principal ballerina who is said to be Barnbrook's fiancÈe. If his first marriage was dysfunctional, then the omens for Barnbook's second one are hardly more encouraging.

Not least as he will become stepfather to Miss Clarke's four-year-old mixed-race daughter - the product of her previous relationship with a Cuban-Chinese dancer - despite the fact that he has previously spoken out against inter-racial families.

But will the marriage to Miss Clarke take place? There has been talk in Far Right circles of a recent cooling between the couple.

She does not wear an engagement ring - an absence Barnbrook explained by saying it had been stolen in a burglary.

Some have even speculated that the relationship is just a publicity stunt. But Barnbrook's wife does not think so.

"I have met Simone. She was there when I went to see Richard to discuss our divorce. I have to say they did seem to be genuinely in love."

If that's true, then Miss Clarke will hardly have been delighted by the kiss-and-tell story which appeared in a downmarket newspaper-on Sunday.

Finnish-born NHS nurse Annika Tavilampi claimed the mayoral candidate had also proposed to her after they met through an internet dating site. She claimed to have found a copy of Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf under the bed in which they had "romped".


BNP boss Richard Barnbrook cheats on Brit with IMMIGRANT.
quote:
BNP frontman Richard Barnbrook has been cheating on his ballerina fiancée... with a FOREIGN NURSE.

The racist ranter —- bidding to be London mayor -— was secretly bedding Finn Annika Tavilampi when he proposed to English National Ballet star Simone Clarke. Barnbrook -— who studies Hitler —- ADVANCED on Annika, 28, after spotting her on an online dating site, BLITZED her with filthy texts and pictures -— and asked her to MARRY him too.

"Richard sent me photos of his private parts before I'd even met him," says the redhead. "I thought this was very odd for a politician."

"And then there was his drinking—I've only ever seen him properly sober a couple of times."



From: Port Hope, Ontario | Registered: Oct 2002  |  IP: Logged
Wilf Day
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posted 04 May 2008 03:22 PM      Profile for Wilf Day     Send New Private Message      Edit/Delete Post  Reply With Quote 
"One of the wonderful things we have got in London is fantastic diversity - we have got the whole world in a city."

A line David Miller could use.


From: Port Hope, Ontario | Registered: Oct 2002  |  IP: Logged

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