Reports have appeared this morning confirming what many of us suspected. The Bush regime is interfering in the Venezuelan elections in an attempt to depose President Chavez. Funds are being deployed by the US to mobilise support against Chavez. This is an unacceptable act of imperialist inteference in a foreign country which must be condemned by democratic governments across the world.
As joint president of the "Hands Off Venezuela Campaign" I am calling on our Prime Minister, Tony Blair, to issue immediately a statement condemning any such interference and calling upon the Bush regime to disengage in this illiegal activity. The UK government must insist on the democratic rights of the Venezuelan people being respected and must disassociate itself from any acts by the US or any other government seeking to undermine democracy in Venezuela.
Under a real Labour Government Britain would work co-operatively with the Chavez administration to tackle poverty and inequality in both our countries and to secure peace and justice globally. This includes upholding the rights of the people of Latin America to determine their own futures democratically and to secure the full benefits of the natural resources of their continent.
The message to Bush is "Hands Off Venezuela."
Wednesday, 30 August 2006
Message to Byers and Milburn: People aren't Interested and aren't Listening Any More
The press have been briefed that New Labour outriders, Byers and Milburn, are to make major speeches over the next few weeks, to accompany major policy announcements and speeches from the Prime Minister to demonstrate that New Labour still exists.
They clearly just haven't got the message yet even though the rest of the country has. People aren't just not listening to them any more they are just not interested.
The only questions of any interest to most people are when is Blair going and what does the future hold.
Whilst Blair, Byers and Milburn desperately plot how long they can delay the innevitable, we continue to reap the harvest of the failed policies of their New Labour. Another British soldier dies in Afghanistan and the bumper drugs harvest from that country floods the streets of Britain. Iraq continues to degenerate into civil war and the US army is staging another new battle for Bagdad. Health workers are demonstrating against closures and job cuts in their local health services, and it is revealed that BP has been allowed to get away with manipulating the energy markets aginst the interests of consumers to maximise its profits.
The considered view amongst even some of the MPs who have been the most supportive of Blair and New Labour, is that Blair and his courtiers should now just go quietly.
But what are Gordon Brown and his supporters offering? Absolutely nothing. No change. Nothing new.
For Brown Ed Balls has taken on the mantle of Milburn and Byers as Brown's representative on earth, tactically manouevring to hasten Blair's demise but vacant wneh it comes to explaining what the difference would be under Brown as leader.
Next week in Manchester I start a national campaign tour explaining to rank and file party members across the country why there needs to be a challenge for the leadership of the Labour Party and the policy programme upon which we are campaigning.
Come along and get involved in this debate. Let Milburn, Byers, Balls and all the other New Labour outriders continue to engage themselves in a self interested, self serving discussion of their own futures, cut off from the realities facing our communities.
Let us get on with the real debate about how we secure a world free of poverty, war and the grotesque inequalities we witnesss today.
Come along if you can.
They clearly just haven't got the message yet even though the rest of the country has. People aren't just not listening to them any more they are just not interested.
The only questions of any interest to most people are when is Blair going and what does the future hold.
Whilst Blair, Byers and Milburn desperately plot how long they can delay the innevitable, we continue to reap the harvest of the failed policies of their New Labour. Another British soldier dies in Afghanistan and the bumper drugs harvest from that country floods the streets of Britain. Iraq continues to degenerate into civil war and the US army is staging another new battle for Bagdad. Health workers are demonstrating against closures and job cuts in their local health services, and it is revealed that BP has been allowed to get away with manipulating the energy markets aginst the interests of consumers to maximise its profits.
The considered view amongst even some of the MPs who have been the most supportive of Blair and New Labour, is that Blair and his courtiers should now just go quietly.
But what are Gordon Brown and his supporters offering? Absolutely nothing. No change. Nothing new.
For Brown Ed Balls has taken on the mantle of Milburn and Byers as Brown's representative on earth, tactically manouevring to hasten Blair's demise but vacant wneh it comes to explaining what the difference would be under Brown as leader.
Next week in Manchester I start a national campaign tour explaining to rank and file party members across the country why there needs to be a challenge for the leadership of the Labour Party and the policy programme upon which we are campaigning.
Come along and get involved in this debate. Let Milburn, Byers, Balls and all the other New Labour outriders continue to engage themselves in a self interested, self serving discussion of their own futures, cut off from the realities facing our communities.
Let us get on with the real debate about how we secure a world free of poverty, war and the grotesque inequalities we witnesss today.
Come along if you can.
Sunday, 27 August 2006
Surely the Message to Blair and Brown Coming from All Sides is that Time is Up for their Policies
In a week when nearly 40 members of Margaret Beckeet's local party have resigned in protest at Blair's international policies, and AMICUS's General Secretary, Derek Simpson, has described New Labour's domestic policy programme as being infected by Tory ideology, the message coming from all sides to both Blair and Brown is that the time is up for their policies and politics.
It appears that the only minister New Labour could field to defend Blair was his old flatemate, Lord Falconer, a person who owes his whole political life to the powers of patronage of the Prime Minister. However Lord Falconer's response unwittingly confirmed our own view that removing Blair and simply changing leader will do nothing to halt the slide in support for Labour in the polls.
Leadership change without a radical break with New Labour's policies will be totally futile.
The response to New Labour's failed and unpopular policies from Labour Party members is not to leave the party but to stay and campaign for change. The reaction from trade unions should not be simply to voice criticisms of the policies but to work for a radical break with New Labour's programme of privatisation, flexible employment exploitation and anti trade union rights.
This requires the development of an alternative new Warwick agreement setting out the programme trade unions want a real Labour Government to pursue in power. Central to this Warwick Mark 2 programme should be the end of privatisation, the promotion of public ownership and public services, and the implementation of the Trade Union Freedom Bill.
The media have been briefed this week that the Prime Minister is to undertake a series of major policy speeches to bind the future programme of the Labour party for a decade. It is clear that he and his dwindling entourage have just not grasped the growing reality that increasingly people are just not listening. After nearly 10 years of office and having the opportunity to lay the foundations of transforming our society in a way few other Labour Prime ministers have had, the Blair administration has demonstrably failed. The very simple message to both the key architects of the New Labour, Blaur and Brown, is that time is up.
Radical change is needed and our campaign for the leadership will give the rank and file of the Labour party, trade unions and progressive organisations the opportunity of participating in the creation and advocacy of that radical new agenda.
One way in which people can participate in this creative policy process is just simply letting us have your ideas via this website and blog of the policies a real Labour government should be implementing in office to transform our society.
We will publish these ideas for debate on the site and bring people together to work up their ideas into practical programmes for government.
Over to you.
It appears that the only minister New Labour could field to defend Blair was his old flatemate, Lord Falconer, a person who owes his whole political life to the powers of patronage of the Prime Minister. However Lord Falconer's response unwittingly confirmed our own view that removing Blair and simply changing leader will do nothing to halt the slide in support for Labour in the polls.
Leadership change without a radical break with New Labour's policies will be totally futile.
The response to New Labour's failed and unpopular policies from Labour Party members is not to leave the party but to stay and campaign for change. The reaction from trade unions should not be simply to voice criticisms of the policies but to work for a radical break with New Labour's programme of privatisation, flexible employment exploitation and anti trade union rights.
This requires the development of an alternative new Warwick agreement setting out the programme trade unions want a real Labour Government to pursue in power. Central to this Warwick Mark 2 programme should be the end of privatisation, the promotion of public ownership and public services, and the implementation of the Trade Union Freedom Bill.
The media have been briefed this week that the Prime Minister is to undertake a series of major policy speeches to bind the future programme of the Labour party for a decade. It is clear that he and his dwindling entourage have just not grasped the growing reality that increasingly people are just not listening. After nearly 10 years of office and having the opportunity to lay the foundations of transforming our society in a way few other Labour Prime ministers have had, the Blair administration has demonstrably failed. The very simple message to both the key architects of the New Labour, Blaur and Brown, is that time is up.
Radical change is needed and our campaign for the leadership will give the rank and file of the Labour party, trade unions and progressive organisations the opportunity of participating in the creation and advocacy of that radical new agenda.
One way in which people can participate in this creative policy process is just simply letting us have your ideas via this website and blog of the policies a real Labour government should be implementing in office to transform our society.
We will publish these ideas for debate on the site and bring people together to work up their ideas into practical programmes for government.
Over to you.
Tuesday, 22 August 2006
Conservative 9 point Lead in Poll Confirms our Warnings and Requires a Radical Break with New Labour Policies.
Apologies for lack of postings over last 10 days.
I have been on holiday with my family sailing round the Norfolk Broads in largely wind and rain but having a great time. So it is particularly depressing to get back to a Guardian poll showing the Tories with a 9 point lead over Labour. It gives me no pleasure in saying that the poll simply confirms the warnings we have been issuing that New Labour policies and activities in Government are alienating whole sections of that broad coalition that threw the Tories out of office and decided to give Labour a chance in government in 1997.
This is just one poll but it adds further evidence to confim the trend of the 2005 general election, the 2006 local elections and other polls that more and more people are losing trust in Tony Blair and New Labour.
When people vote they do so on the basis of a leap of trust. They take a conscious decision for a whole range of motivating factors to place their trust in the party they are voting for. Often they are motivated by a longstanding commitment to that party, sometimes passed on over generations. For others it is because they have lost confidence in the existing party of power and have gained sufficient trust in an alternative party to enable them to undertake this leap in trust.
Labour Party members and the organisations affiliated to the party need to wake up fast to the fact that large numbers of people who have supported us and who have turned out to vote for us in past elections have lost trust in both Blair and New Labour. This breakdown of trust is so fundamental and deep rooted that without sigificant change the party is drifting to loss of office and allowing the return of the Tories.
Of course Cameron is vacuous when it comes to deatiled policies but that isn't the point. His strategy is simply to create an image of the Conservative Party as a safe pair of hands in which to catch the falling disillusioned Labour supporters.
Support for New Labour is falling apart because its policies, particularly its international policies, are not just unpopular but also have meant that members of the public are increasingly feeling that they just can't believe a word the Prime Minister or any government minister or spokesperson tells them any more.
This latest poll is interesting not because of the Tory 9 point lead but startlingly because it has demonstrated that trust in the Government under Tony Blair has fallen so much that only 20% of the public believe that the Government is telling the truth over the terrorist threat. For all John Reid's appearances in the media, people are not reassured about the trustworthiness of the Government. The poll also reveals just how out of touch the Government is with the judgements of the British public.
For over a year now minister after minister have repeatedly asserted that there is no link between the Government's policies in the Middle East and the risk of terrorist attack on Britain. This poll demonstrates that 72% of people do not find this credible and judge that Government policy has made Britain more vulnerable to terrorist attack. Staggeringly only 1% of voters think that the government's foreign policy has made Britain safer.
What has been New Labour response over the last week to the obvious plummeting of support for the Government? Extraordinarily New Labour is so lacking in anything new to say it falls back on the traditional neo con solution of offering a tax cut. Bizarrely the person they roll out to float this new policy of abolishing inheritance tax is Steve Byers, the very person who as a minister embodied along with his press officer Jo Moore the breakdown of trust the public had in New Labour ministers telling them the truth. This is how desperate and how far the New Labour project has sunk.
How do we regain the confidence of the British public? Only a radical break with New Labour will restore some basic trust in Labour. Simple changes of personnel in leadership positions won't be enough, especially as all of them Brown,Reid, Johnson, Hain, have all been architects, advocates and loyal supporters of the existing policies.
If one of the main reasons people no longer trust the government is its foreign policy then this is the ideal place to start the radical break with New Labour.
Step by step this would involve a declaration of independence from the foreign policies of George Bush, the withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, a return to the United Nations to seek new initiatives under the UN for Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan and the reformulation of British foreign policy as a peacemaker lead by a new British Ministry for Peace.
A radical break of this kind would give us the chance of convincing people that Labour can be trusted once again. Without it we will continue to allow New Labour to put us out of office and let the Tories back.
I have been on holiday with my family sailing round the Norfolk Broads in largely wind and rain but having a great time. So it is particularly depressing to get back to a Guardian poll showing the Tories with a 9 point lead over Labour. It gives me no pleasure in saying that the poll simply confirms the warnings we have been issuing that New Labour policies and activities in Government are alienating whole sections of that broad coalition that threw the Tories out of office and decided to give Labour a chance in government in 1997.
This is just one poll but it adds further evidence to confim the trend of the 2005 general election, the 2006 local elections and other polls that more and more people are losing trust in Tony Blair and New Labour.
When people vote they do so on the basis of a leap of trust. They take a conscious decision for a whole range of motivating factors to place their trust in the party they are voting for. Often they are motivated by a longstanding commitment to that party, sometimes passed on over generations. For others it is because they have lost confidence in the existing party of power and have gained sufficient trust in an alternative party to enable them to undertake this leap in trust.
Labour Party members and the organisations affiliated to the party need to wake up fast to the fact that large numbers of people who have supported us and who have turned out to vote for us in past elections have lost trust in both Blair and New Labour. This breakdown of trust is so fundamental and deep rooted that without sigificant change the party is drifting to loss of office and allowing the return of the Tories.
Of course Cameron is vacuous when it comes to deatiled policies but that isn't the point. His strategy is simply to create an image of the Conservative Party as a safe pair of hands in which to catch the falling disillusioned Labour supporters.
Support for New Labour is falling apart because its policies, particularly its international policies, are not just unpopular but also have meant that members of the public are increasingly feeling that they just can't believe a word the Prime Minister or any government minister or spokesperson tells them any more.
This latest poll is interesting not because of the Tory 9 point lead but startlingly because it has demonstrated that trust in the Government under Tony Blair has fallen so much that only 20% of the public believe that the Government is telling the truth over the terrorist threat. For all John Reid's appearances in the media, people are not reassured about the trustworthiness of the Government. The poll also reveals just how out of touch the Government is with the judgements of the British public.
For over a year now minister after minister have repeatedly asserted that there is no link between the Government's policies in the Middle East and the risk of terrorist attack on Britain. This poll demonstrates that 72% of people do not find this credible and judge that Government policy has made Britain more vulnerable to terrorist attack. Staggeringly only 1% of voters think that the government's foreign policy has made Britain safer.
What has been New Labour response over the last week to the obvious plummeting of support for the Government? Extraordinarily New Labour is so lacking in anything new to say it falls back on the traditional neo con solution of offering a tax cut. Bizarrely the person they roll out to float this new policy of abolishing inheritance tax is Steve Byers, the very person who as a minister embodied along with his press officer Jo Moore the breakdown of trust the public had in New Labour ministers telling them the truth. This is how desperate and how far the New Labour project has sunk.
How do we regain the confidence of the British public? Only a radical break with New Labour will restore some basic trust in Labour. Simple changes of personnel in leadership positions won't be enough, especially as all of them Brown,Reid, Johnson, Hain, have all been architects, advocates and loyal supporters of the existing policies.
If one of the main reasons people no longer trust the government is its foreign policy then this is the ideal place to start the radical break with New Labour.
Step by step this would involve a declaration of independence from the foreign policies of George Bush, the withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, a return to the United Nations to seek new initiatives under the UN for Palestine, Iraq and Afghanistan and the reformulation of British foreign policy as a peacemaker lead by a new British Ministry for Peace.
A radical break of this kind would give us the chance of convincing people that Labour can be trusted once again. Without it we will continue to allow New Labour to put us out of office and let the Tories back.
Wednesday, 9 August 2006
The Government Must Recall Parliament Without Delay
Last Wednesday, I called for an immediate recall of Parliament to give MPs the right to discuss the escalating crisis in the Middle East and decide Britain's strategy in a free vote. A week later, the Government is still resisting these calls despite the utter failure and moral bankruptcy of its position.
Like hundreds of other MPs, I have been absolutely overwhelmed by the response from constituents who want an immediate end to the bloodshed. At a time of such crisis, it is crucial that MPs are able to represent the views of their constituents. Only an immediate recall of Parliament will allow our voices be heard.
Like the vast majority of the British public, I simply cannot comprehend why the Prime Minister still refuses to demand an immediate ceasefire, even as hundreds of civilians continue to die, thousands are forced from their homes, and Lebanon's infrastructure is systematically destroyed. Just today, the Israeli Government has approved military plans to further extend the invasion of Lebanon. How many more innocents have to die before the Prime Minister supports our calls for an end to this violence?
I also want to thank everyone who has been in touch to offer their support. I share your anger and grief at the senseless loss of so many innocent lives.
Like hundreds of other MPs, I have been absolutely overwhelmed by the response from constituents who want an immediate end to the bloodshed. At a time of such crisis, it is crucial that MPs are able to represent the views of their constituents. Only an immediate recall of Parliament will allow our voices be heard.
Like the vast majority of the British public, I simply cannot comprehend why the Prime Minister still refuses to demand an immediate ceasefire, even as hundreds of civilians continue to die, thousands are forced from their homes, and Lebanon's infrastructure is systematically destroyed. Just today, the Israeli Government has approved military plans to further extend the invasion of Lebanon. How many more innocents have to die before the Prime Minister supports our calls for an end to this violence?
I also want to thank everyone who has been in touch to offer their support. I share your anger and grief at the senseless loss of so many innocent lives.
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