A Conservative-Ulster Unionist merger?

The news that the Conservatives and the Ulster Unionists are to explore moves towards a joint party (ConservativeHome: The Conservative AND Unionist Party and Conservatives in Northern Ireland: A Historic Statement by David Cameron and Sir Reg Empey) has come as a surprise to me, which is a credit to the discrete negotiation skills of Owen Paterson and stands in complete contrast to the way attempts to form a new group in the European Parliament have been handled. But it's also a good move for not only both parties but the whole of the United Kingdom. For too long Northern Irish politics has been an isolated microcosm, with only half hearted efforts at organising by a handful of parties from both Britain and the Republic of Ireland, give or take a few small parties, and the result has been alienation and sometimes hatred, most recently when the DUP provided the majority of 42 days' detention or Iris Robinson MP's horrific comments about homosexuality.

A party that is a strong and credible contender at all levels of Northern Irish and UK politics, that can allow for full engagement with national and international politics, can only help to move political debate forward in the province. It also helps to anchor the Conservative Party in all nations of the United Kingdom, a contrast to Labour who've had to be dragged into allowing even membership by the courts and is determined to remain a Brits only party.

Will this lead to a sudden landslide in Northern Ireland at the next election, with seats turning blue all over? Well let's not get carried away - there's a lot still to do and hundreds of thousands of voters to engage with. But it's a good start with promising signs to come.

Inhuman MPs?

Tom Watson has beaten Kerron Cross to this one. (Tom Watson: Biohazard in the House of Commons & Kerron Cross: In Loo Of Recent Posts...) This is the scene in a House of Commons toilet:

When people say MPs are inhuman I didn't think they mean it quite like this!

Welease this film!

Many years ago some people heard about a film and shouted "down with this sort of thing". It wasn't about the Messiah it was just a very naughty film. And many councils banned it. Even those that had no cinemas.

It seems some of the bans are still in the place today. Life of Brian actress Sue Jones-Davies has now become the Mayor of Aberystwyth and wants to lift the ban. (BBC News: Mayor wants Python film ban ended) However as nobody in the Ceredigion council licensing department is aware of the ban it could prove harder to lift than expected.

In the meantime here's the scene all political bloggers remember:

And the British extreme left still acts like this to this day!

Cheeky Boy no more?

News has emerged that Lembit Öpik has been dumped by his fiancée, Cheeky Girl Gabriela Irimia. (Daily Telegraph: Lembit Opik ‘dumped by his Cheeky Girl fiancée Gabriela Irimia')

Once again Öpik is in the news for all the wrong reasons. There have been murmurings of dissent in the Liberal Democrats about him before (see Liberal Democrat *leaders* in trouble, admittedly several leaders ago) and I wonder just how much further his stock can fall. And will Liberal Democrat activists want to fight the fight in Montgomeryshire for him? (See Can a political Jonah save himself?)

A beautiful defection?

News of the latest possible recruit to the Conservative Party has come through - Gemma Garrett, the current Miss Great Britain and Miss Belfast and founder of the Miss Great Britain Party, who recently stood against David Davis. (Daily Mail: A glamour move? - Gemma Garrett may switch to the Tories) It's an interesting possible move but if true I suspect she won't get so much publicity as a mere regular on the candidates' list. Also the policies of the Miss Great Britain Party contain some things that aren't out of place on a Conservative manifesto but some of them, like two new tax rates, are not exactly expected!

Hattip to Guido Fawkes: Beauty and the Basher for this story.

A battle of equalities - or the onset of culture wars?

It's hard to know what to make of the Lillian Ladele case. But it has plenty of elements to make various people's blood boil. Discrimination on the basis of religion. Discrimination on the basis of sexuality. (Which puzzles me as talking about equality between marriage and civil partnerships is a total oxymoron.) And of course it had to happen in Islington.

Now I've not yet had a chance to read the tribunal outcome but from what I've seen in the media the tribunal focused on the point of whether or not she was being bullied in the workplace for her religion and whether Islington was still able to deliver the service rather than over whether she was right to refuse to perform civil partnership ceremonies. (As an aside if you were entering into a civil partnership wouldn't you want a registrar who actually wanted to do the job, rather than one who was forced to by their employer and the law?) Also a point that hasn't received that much attention is that the nature of the job has changed since she took it - until late 2007 Islington registrars were effectively working freelance and thus her colleagues were taking civil partnerships and so it wasn't an issue. (The Guardian: Paying to be discriminated against - The decision in favour of a registrar who refused to deal with gay couples sets a hugely dangerous precedent) So it's not a case of someone taking up a job even though they disagreed with part of what it entailed - the requirements of the job changed whilst she was in post. This may also have some bearing on whether or not it was possible to resign.

But what is worrying is the way that so much of the reaction to the tribunal outcome is deeply polarised, going beyond the issue of the balance between equality of religion and equality of sexuality and into what feels scarily like the opening shots in something like the US "culture war". Some of the comments I've seen on the web have been incredibly anti-religious whilst other comments sound like a gloating victory over "political correctness". Naturally the case emerging from the UK's answer to San Francisco adds to fuel to the fire.

For a long time issues of both religion and personal behaviour have traditionally been regarded as "issues of conscience" and not made party political issues. Quite apart from the party management advantage it has also meant that the parties have not been divided down such lines and the UK has for the most part avoided the US "Red States-Blue States" divide that leads to radicals on each side almost demonising the other and making control over issues such as education ridiculously tense. And it encourages minority mentalities whereby particular groups in society get told they must support a party not because they agree with it on the basics but because only that party looks out for it and the other hates it. In turn it leads to a belief that when the other party is in control everything will be bad.

Some of that last paragraph doesn't sound too dissimilar to behaviour in certain quarters of UK politics does it? Is this really to the benefit of the country?

David Davis vindicated!

The results of the Haltemprice and Howden by-election, 2008, courtesy of Wikipedia:

Haltemprice and Howden by-election, 2008
Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Conservative	David Davis	17,113	71.6	+24.1
	Green	Shan Oakes	1,758	7.4	N/A
	English Democrats	Joanne Robinson	1,714	7.2	N/A
	National Front	Tess Culnane	544	2.3	N/A
	Miss Great Britain Party	Gemma Garrett	521	2.2	N/A
	Independent	Jill Saward	492	2.1	N/A
	Monster Raving Loony	Mad Cow-Girl	412	1.7	N/A
	Independent	Walter Sweeney	238	1.0	N/A
	Independent	John Nicholson	162	0.7	N/A
	Independent	David Craig	135	0.6	N/A
	The New Party	David Pinder	135	0.6	N/A
	no label	David Icke	110	0.5	N/A
	Freedom 4 Choice	Hamish Howitt	91	0.4	N/A
	Socialist Equality	Chris Talbot	84	0.4	N/A
	Independent	Grace Astley	77	0.3	N/A
	Christian Party	George Hargreaves	76	0.3	N/A
	Church of the Militant Elvis Party	David Bishop	44	0.2	N/A
	Independent	John Upex	38	0.2	N/A
	Independent	Greg Wood	32	0.1	N/A
	Independent	Eamonn Fitzpatrick	31	0.1	N/A
	Make Politicians History	Ronnie Carroll	29	0.1	N/A
	Independent	Thomas Darwood	25	0.1	N/A
	Independent	Christopher Foren	23	0.1	N/A
	Independent	Herbert Crossman	11	0.0	N/A
	Independent	Tony Farnon	8	0.0	N/A
	Independent	Norman Scarth	8	0.0	N/A
Majority			15,355	64.2	+53.5
Turnout			23,911	34.5	-35.7
	Conservative hold		Swing	N/A

With Labour running away from the opportunity to defend government policy the by-election could have had micro turnout but it didn't. David Davis has been vindicated in his courageous stance on forty-two days detention.

Looking at the also-rans, amazingly there are six women immediately behind Davis but this could just be because of candidate selection. And the Official Monster Raving Loony Party's hopes of getting their best ever result have been thwarted once again. Ronnie Carroll was looking for the lowest number of votes ever and failed - he didn't even finish in the bottom five. Here's a couple of tips - don't tell everyone that's your goal and don't run with a description saying "Make Politicians History" that was bound to pick up a few votes.

So this is IDS's idea of Heathcliff!

On Question Time tonight Iain Duncan Smith said that he thought Heathcliff was a cartoon cat. I guess that he, like myself, has never read Wuthering Heights (I was forced to read Jane Eyre instead for GCSE) and it's nice to see a politician who is aware of culture other than lengthy novels that were seemingly designed to terrify a generation of students, especially one of the cartoons of my childhood.

So here's the intro to the second Heathcliff cartoon, thanks to YouTube:

So what would it say about Gordon Brown if he'd been comparing himself to this Heathcliff?

Bureaucracy gone mad!

You couldn't make this up - Jayne Jones, a mother in Aberfan has been told by Merthyr Tydfil council that she cannot travel to school with her severely epileptic son Alex because she hasn't undergone a Criminal Records Bureau check. (BBC News: Mum's police check for school run) A system that was set up to protect children and put parents' minds at rest when other people are looking after them is now being used to stop a mother from being with her son in case he has an attack and needs drugs administered by someone trained. How is this benefiting anyone?

A spokesperson for the council said:

"We cannot comment on particular cases but can confirm that CRB checking is a requirement of our transport provisions in relation to adults travelling on home-to-school transport in the capacity of an escort.

"This is a standard requirement and has been for several years.

"Any adult acting as an escort will, in the public gaze, be viewed as acting with the full acquiescence of the council and hence with its implied authority.

"For the protection of the council and all vulnerable persons in its care it's essential all those endowed with an authority, implicit or explicit, should meet the security requirements within the transport contract provisions."

Can anyone make any sense out of this?

Outrage! backs Boris's move!

In an interesting follow-up to the news that Boris abolishes a do-nothing advisory panel, the move has been backed by none other than OutRage! (PinkNews: OutRage! backs Boris over abolition of gay advisory panel)

Brett Lock of direct action LGBT rights group OutRage! said that Mayor Boris Johnson was "quite right" to scrap it.

"It was elitist, unelected, unaccountable and anti-democratic," he said.

"No one elected the panel. They were hand-picked by Ken and were not necessarily representative of the LGBT community.

"Instead of negatively sniping at the Mayor, LGBT groups should concentrate on presenting Boris with practical and constructive policy ideas for the benefit of LGBT Londoners," he said.

Note also Brett Lock's comments about LGBT Labour activists being more concerned with LGBT for Labour than Labour for LGBT:

"Instead of petty party-political point-scoring, gay Labour activists should concentrate on pressing their own party to stop mistreating LGBT asylum seekers and end the ban on same-sex marriage," said Mr Lock.

Unfortunately it seems some are determined to make party matters of the personal.