Politicians should be straight with us.

Well blow me if it isn’t raining men today, and more particularly men who like men. I must admit, I am one of those embarrassing heterosexuals who find them alternately fascinating and hilarious .I cannot ever recall meeting a gay man I didn’t like, so I hope they can put up with me .

On the other hand the behaviour of Greg Barker is quite disgusting and I don’t mean his little game of Lady Chatterly with Mr. Brush Strokes.

I have slightly amended the following plot summary and I imagine this is much the sort of vainglorious self fantasising Mr. Barker was up to. I wonder who was decorating whose interior ?

Lady Gregina`s Lover ( a story of unbridled passion across the class divide)

Lady Gregina Barker enjoys an extremely passionate relationship with the interior decorator on their estate. The truth is eventually uncovered and the novel ends with a sense of fulfilment for both Gregina and the decorator , although the situation is never fully resolved. The story and its sentiments suggest that the sexual relationship is the most profound of all and that it may be debased either by treating it lightly or by viewing it with shame ….its so beautiful I could cry !

He is, of course, not the first gay man to lie to the electorate, and while I can, to some extent sympathise, lying is lying, and only politicians think the rules do not apply to them . A particularly odious liar is ,“ nice”, Simon Hughes, who is about as nice as the rest of the Lib Dums. Let us take a trip down memory lane to his early career ……………through the round window….

“Hughes was first elected to Parliament in the Bermondsey by-election of February 24, 1983. The byelection was described by Gay News as "the dirtiest and most notorious byelection in British political history" because of the slurs against the character of the Labour candidate and gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell by various opposition campaigners. The Liberal Campaign leaflet described Hughes as the "straight choice". Hughes won the seat with 57.7% of the vote.”

Yes yes I know he apologised, but if I were Peter Tatchell, I would want him tarred and feathered, nonetheless.

To tell you the truth I have little sympathy for Celeste Barker, the wronged wife . I do not believe for one second that she managed to live with a man for that long and have no notion that he might, one day, snog the handy man . Oh no, her protestations that it was all out of the blue, ring false . Those of us that are married will know that you can hardly hide the odd cigarette . She knew , take my word for it . Another wife that knew, is the utterly implausible Tessa Jowell

Remember in the 1990s David Mills the hubbie acted as legal adviser to Signor Berlusconi, during the acquisition of Mediaset. The prosecution at that time , claimed that Signor Berlusconi set up a scheme that helped him to evade more than £40 million in tax, and kept a little something for himself . Every single married woman in the country must have laughed themselves sick, at Tessa`s ridiculous claim to be “shocked” . She knew , take my word for it , she bloody knew.

So if we know they knew , then what exactly were they up to ?Well in the case of Tessa it was of course spending the booty and having a good time, but for Celeste it’s a bit more complex.

There are many fake marriages in public life, and the most obvious of all of them is Gordon Brown`s. Have you seen the awful pictures of his off-the-peg, family . Try as he might to look fatherly he remains a reanimated corpse. The accessory wife is just a little something he picked up for his image . The Barker marriage was a deal they did between them, and to admit to it is probably more shameful to Celeste than the news of Greggy`s painterly high jinx. I feel sorry for the children, who have been unwitting extras in this farce. My suggestion is that they are immediately removed to the kind and affluent protection of Madonna .

Of all the press pickings, the most tragic was this from Georgina Harrison, the mother in law. She tried ,desperately, to make sense of the corruption of human feeling involved.
“Its sad”, she said ,“But its not unusual any more . Its modern life isn’t it ? Men think they can get away with it now …” No Georgina the vast majority of men have absolutely no inclination to do any such thing even if they could get away with it .. Poor woman..

So what are we to make of gay men in public life .Nothing much actually, today there is a gay liar in the news, tomorrow there will be a straight one . Only yesterday we were chatting about the world’s `s ugliest politician ,there was ,of course, no denying the urgent claim of the Deputy Prime minister. A corrupt lecher batting on our side and there are many more.

For the Conservative Party there is a more serious problem , the Mayoral fix is in for Nic Boles, the lifetime Policy wonk and “out” Etonian Cameroon . Ken will make mince meat of him. You see, for gay men there is a problem. They are tolerant of us, and we are tolerant of them, but there are far more of us.

This is fortunate for everyone involved, otherwise where would all the little gay chaps come from. Generally sspeaking, it would matter no more than having red hair. In London though, there is one big issue they cannot address. Families.

Families are under desperate pressure. The cost of housing requires a high income ,and usually two, so the marginal affect of Nu Labs wicked taxation has nailed us all to the budgeting wall. When Nic Boles opens his mouth to speak on this subject, Ken Livingstone,and everyone else, will chorus ;“What do you know about it?”.

In fact he may well go on to ask what Nic Boles knows about anything, as a privileged life avoider. This will be the height of hypocrisy as King Ken is himself is the possessor of an accessory family and a long career ,starting in Lambeth, of “public service”. We need hardly say that a teeny problem of this sort will not dissuade the great fraud from punching low, whenever the ref`s back is turned.

Sorry Mr. Boles, but whatever your qualities, you are absolutely not the right man for the job. You will do the Conservative cause great harm (.We must hope he decides to take the safe seat his connections will provide, but the appearance of a Boles Bus at Bournemouth is not a promising sign.)


The Conclusion:

The conclusion oh best beloved is this . Gays are no better or worse than anyone else . Politicians are a lot worse than anyone else and live hermetically sealed lives to prevent them or us noticing it .
Nic Boles is the wrong man for London now, but like all minorities, gay men and women, should have a proper representation in as much as have a specific agenda, which is not much. Tessa Jowell , Greg Barker , Simon Hughes , John Prescott and many more are liars In short the passionate story of Lady Gregina`s Lover changes nothing at all.


P. S.
The single most surprising thing is that Tony Blair continues to stomach Jowell in the cabinet. This is one of the many signs that he has entirely ceased to care about the country .

PPS I will be interested to see if the one man Conservative tidal wave Justin Hinchcliffe makes of this,if he bothers . Now there is a gay man who is straight with the voter.

Beatrix Potter and Freedom

The following is slightly adapted from a discussion I was having about fox hunting . The subject , which frequently crops up is a good test of Libertarianism. From the general it drifts via the semiotics of the burqa to the Alan Johnson’s proposal that all Church Schools should accept pupils from other faiths . I am against the idea of mucking up faith schools, for fox hunting (just), and firmly against burqas in schools . I should explain that the “Squire” as I call him had tried the old , “I have far to much respect for you …“ ,gambit. His point was that hunters were merely out for a jolly good ride. Now , are you listening carefully ...then I`ll begin.

The Beatrix Potter view of animals should be discarded at adulthood. This country has a peculiar attachment to anthropomorphising, which I attribute to the early industrial revolution, and the consequent separation from agri-business. I eat meat with relish, and would be prepared to kill my own if I had to. In fact, I suspect I might rather enjoy it. I can shoot the dickens out of a clay dish!

Like any sane person, if pushed, I will admit that the taxing moral conundrums of torturing animals for pleasure, are not worth much political time, and I wouldn't disturb it myself . Nonetheless there are moral difficulties that the threat of a bucolic bewhiskered squire, in deer stalker and plus fours , tapping my door with a blunder buss will not dissuade me from probing a little further.

Speaking of an old blunderbuss, congratulations to the Squire for getting this one out to the closet ." I like you enormously ...BUT...etc." ...Ooo sneaky! Have you been reading Potter's one-upmanship? Allow me to assist you in clarifying your argument for hunting, which at present is full of holes. This I do in a charitable spirit, and because I like you, if possible, even more than you like me......( The standard , not the Sicilian counter)

Yes fox torturers are probably better people than puppy burners, but this is beside the point.If , Squire , you were under sentence of death, for the sheer pleasure of some charming rustics, I imagine you, incarcerated like woebegone Toad in a cell, in no end of a funk.. Never fear, for around the corner Newmania is hurrying to announce the good news..." Thank god, sirra , we've persuaded them to enjoy an invigorating ride while the torture proceeds " How you would thank me for this stay of execution,"God bless you Newmania .", you would cry ," the sheer knowledge of the wind in their hair reconciles me entirely to the show . Taran tara , bring it on!!" In short you have forgotten how the fox feels about it ? Having done that, quite obviously, there is no problem with fox hunting; neither is there any difficulty with puppy burning.I conclude that if you are going to justify hunting, it is not sufficient to vaguely assert that hunters are jolly good chaps , true though that may be . You have to examine the human relationship with animals, the importance of custom, and the Libertarian backdrop, which in itself, as I have quite clearly shown ; will not do.

So how do we decide what is allowable and what is not , some say that if I does not harm anyone else then it must be ok. Well yes ,that is a good starting point, but the definition of harm proposed must be adequate to the connected lives we have in a modern society . To take one example; the burqa . Does it harm anyone?Yes it does
1 It tells little girls that their nascent sexuality is wrong and sinful
2 It tells little boys that woman are property
3 It offers support and succour to fascists and terrorists worldwide
4 It challenges the free society in which we live and is a quite deliberate political statement to that effect

Does it actually leap of the face of the anonymous wearer like the a clothy "alien" and inflict physical pain ? No it does not , but it will cause pain and suffering endlessly as the ripples of its effect spread outwards into the actions of others.

While I am happy for the rustics to enjoy chasing wily Monsieur Reynard . I do not want burqas in schools. This distinction is to do with custom. One is a custom of this culture, the other is an alien political attack on it.
If the Labour party, or the politically correct in general, accepted there was such a distinction, how quickly we could solve absurd mess they are in, disrupting our best C of E and Catholic schools. The real objective is to be seen to be bullying two or three Islamic schools and therby suck up to the working class they betrayed . For this tawdry end thousands of our best educational institutions must be undermined ? .The answer is simple .The church schools can stay , the Islamic ones cannot .

The Chimera of UKIP

I have been bashing a UKIP defector on Conservative Home . I seem to write better when I `m not thinking to hard and amongst the ad hominem abuse you will find my reasons for a Euro sceptic like me not to join UKIP. My foe was a certain MH who , if truth be told, seems not at all a bad chap and took it all in good spirit. I do worry about defectors , I know David Cameron is on the right electoral path and I think I trust him but when Conservatives like MH leave the party it is upsetting there’s no denying it. I will put MH`s profile below to show he is not a person the Conservative party should be taking lightly . Troubling , but in the end the system we have forces us to take grown up decisions . Otherwise I would simply start the Newmania party…….
Don’t think I haven’t thought of it.
This is exactly the area where I would like to see the shadow cabinet reassuring true Conservatives that in its heart this is still the Conservative Party. It isn’t a job for David Cameron.

Any way this is what I had to say ( oh MH had called me barely literate ….poor thing)


Barely literate eh? Well my punctuation is better than Shakespeare’s. I can be quite confident that like many, who profess to be attached to this countries heritage, you know nothing whatsoever about it, so I had better explain. He wrote plays. As to your own style, you manage a fair impression of a smug little bureaucrat and seem inordinately proud of your achievements in precisely this role. It takes a certain sort of person to describe what, he thinks, is his own vast importance to the world, like an Estuary English speaking estate agent, and you have not let me down. We can safely assume you are the modern incarnation of the bitter brilliantined oddities that were the typical anti marketers of 1975.
You are too young to remember, but the thrust of the Yes campaign, as described by its treasurer McAlpine, was, “to depict the anti-Marketeers as unreliable people - dangerous people who would lead you down the wrong path”. This tactic was greatly assisted by the right wing detritus that clung to the campaign as the only log floating nearby. It reminds me of the miscellany of wastrels attached to the anti -hunting and animal rights lobby .Often these people were embittered Tories who for very good reasons had been unable to gain the advancement their ego’s craved within the party.Do you know anyone like that MH ?
The rational, democratic and self interested argument against Europe, which I broadly support, has made great strides into the world of moderates since .This is what has saved the Conservative Party, not a drift in the other direction as wrongly perceived by political illiterates like MH. On the other hand, because Euro scepticism has won ground across a broad spectrum, the same rules apply today, to those who have actually become traitors. People like MH, who would rather let Brown-nose in than knuckle down to winning an election. Look at the party he is joining. Richard Suchorzewski(defeated UKIP leadership candidate) recently pulled the rock up to reveal business as usual
“Nothing however prepared me for the scurrilous behaviour, defamatory comments and downright dishonesty of some of Nigel Farage's & David Bannerman's staff, supporters and members of the Press Office staff, in which they clearly colluded. I was accused of having associations with the BNP – even when these scoundrels knew that my grandfather was murdered by the Nazis in a concentration camp and my Great Grandfather was discovered hanged by them from a lamp post near his home by my 14 year old Father.” ………………………and much much more of which I trust you are aware. .
From what I can tell MH will fit right in, and this was clear from the moment he began to attack Justin Hinchliffe in the infantile way he did.Moving on from pointless fantasists l there is a real problem here both for the Conservative party and, ironically for UKIP. The types of people that become involved, not only undermine UKIP, which so badly needs respectability, but also the debate within the Conservative party. If you were go to the Bruges group, as I have done, you feel amongst friends with a valid point of view that you might have a slightly different take on. Other UKIPs remind me far too much of the doctrinal religionists of the Labour party or, at worst, of the BNP. They remove the ground on which a Christopher Booker stands the moment they open their mouths …..Salutations MH
The Europe case is sound but the baggage that comes with it is unattractive and in any case a world of electoral dreams The other problem is that this attitudinising will leave the Conservative party entirely in the hands of Liberals with any move towards UKIP policies, which are widely supported, appearing actually treacherous This is very bad indeed and entirely the fault of UKIP who have failed to maintain respectability and civility. I see there will be no end to this.
I am not the same sort of Conservative as Justin Hinchcliffe. He is on the other hand worth any number of self satisfied poseurs who have expressed, in effect, an intention to work on behalf of the Labour Party. As for Conservative home , if it is going to be renamed, “Conservative (and those who hate the Conservative Party) , Home” , then you can expect frank exchanges of opinions which , in Islington and Tottenham ,we are more than used to.


MH Profile :
My resume is that I was a Conservative Party member for 20 years. I was Chairman and then President of a safe Conservative seat from 2002-2006, where we were a Premier League association and had 1,300 members. We never lost an election in my time as Chairman, returned our MP with 13k majority and 53% of the vote in 2005 and gave £15k to other local marginal seats. To boot, I am also a serving councillor who took his seat from the LibDems after it had not been Conservative for 30 years.
Yes, I have resigned and joined UKIP because, like many people I know (and yes, some like me who work in the City and are in their 30s), despair of what Cameron is doing and refuse to participate in him turning the Conservative Party into a social democratic farce.

My Summary is this , with the prospect of a virtually Stalinist Labour Council hoving into view we should all get the things that divide us into proportion . We need every good man and woman to role their sleeves up put differences aside an get involved in the fight to stop the Brown years ever becoming a reality .Once the battle begins there are only two sides and those unable to pick one are “useful idiots “ for Labour .

A Picture of Mel (plus bits)

Women and gags , I `m going for the Loaded Audience.

This is pretty much a gratuitous picture of a very lovely and charming woman and I am filling up with a couple of things that have amused me . Mel is Boris Johnson`s PA and a delight both to look at and to listen to. Conservative women cannot be beaten.






NEW WORDS FOR LONDON

Faux -mosexual -A word for men that pretend to be sensitive to get action .

Foxier-moron - A word for women promoted because they are pretty

Had a chat with Croydonian about a silly story:

Under-Statement Of The Day
The detective constable pursuing a serial defecator who has caused £60,000 worth of damage to trains over the past year by smearing excrement inside carriages on approximately different 30 occasions has described the culprit as "being exceptionally anti-social".

CROYDONIAN: In Ulster they would call it a dirty protest
NEWMANIA: In the Tate Modern they would call it "Genius"

The spirit of levity also overcame me in a discussion following the letter in the Telegraph comcerning a Constitutional Convention to discuss the "English"question.
I said this :

"Chris Whiteside has a refreshingly calm summary of the position on his excellent blog. He concludes:“Frankly, whether you call this "an English parliament" or "English votes for English laws" is a matter of semantics rather than substance. What I am clear about is that I want to see a fair and even-handed democratic solution for the UK and I want to see it without an increase in the number of politicians.” Worth reading as is everything he writes actually .

This is not quite the Iain dale position which to me is unduly nationalistic ( calls for a full seperate English parliament), a most un-English trait.
I prefer to leave the tit for tat mud slinging to the non-footballing , oil greedy , racist, Barnett Formula teat sucking , pictish horde sulking in their midge infested bogs. We must retain our sange froid, recognising the childish inferiority complex of a nation whose contribution to literature is third rate novelty act they cannot bear to read themselves. Burns night ?! Why not Pam Ayres night. Also the only game of rugby they ever won was by constantly lurking offside."......ahem.

In fact I wento to school with Chris Whiteside and would dearly like to see him in parliament. Have a look at his blog which includes the piece I refer to above . An erudite thinker and a Conservative to his fingertips .
http://chris4copeland.blogspot.com/

Someone`s Knocking at Door.

Judging by the Letters in the Gazette this week Labour are starting to get the old arrogance back . The mask they have worn so long is beginning to slip and our own wonderful Oriel Clohessy seems to have startled them into letting their fangs show :

This is my reply . Their load of nonsense is below:

Neither Councillor’s Kelly nor O` Sullivan would have supported the creation of the Leaseholders in the first place. To them, Leaseholders are class traitors and their homes were stolen for them , by Margaret Thatcher, from the state. We need hardly dignify anything they have to say on the matter further. Meanwhile councillor Peasnell would like the good old tax payer to dig deep, and buy her a house here, because she “Loves Islington”. I rather fancy Mayfair, Kelly, but if you could stretch to Highgate that would be nice.

On the other hand, how kind of Mr. Kelly to remind us of Labour Councils under Margaret Hodge. We all remember that period with a warm glow of nostalgia do we not? Oddly, Catherine West the Armani clad leader of local Labour, hardly ever refers to these halcyon days. Why would that be?

Back then Islington was a veritable paradise. At this distance it’s hard to know which stories of the “The Socialist Republic of Islington “,are apocryphal, and which were true .These all appeared in the press.

Council funded lesbian self defence classes, non sexist jigsaws and the bust of Lenin in the town hall. An Islington action group for the unemployed collecting money, food, booze, fags, cans and bricks, to send to striking miners. The collection of only £4,000,000 of the £20,000,000 of council tax due in 1990, and the attempt to ban dealings with the Islington Gazette. Child care was, of course, a scandal which is too fresh and distressing to repeat.

The sole SDP Councillor was David Hyams, and he has had much to say. Labour, according to Councillor Hyam, “.left the chairman of social services to negotiate with the unions despite the fact that the unions were led by his brother.” They “ divided up the council into a series of 24 neighbourhood offices that cost a fortune, and cut a deal with the City to fund services we are still paying for” .Is this the “imaginative borrowing”, of which Councillor Kelly is so proud ?

This is why we have had a Liberal Council for so long, because the long shadow of those terrible years still darkens Islington. Now things may well be about to change .The Liberal majority was only one, and at least one of them is having “loyalty issues”. They have been held to ransom by a single Green party extremist and some sort of power sharing is going on. Any by-election could tip us back into the arms of a Labour Party some of whom think the Hodge era was one to be proud of.
Thank you Councillor Kelly for your timely reminder of what a delightful prospect that is for us all.


Councillors Phil Kelly and Mick O` Sullivan have done a team job on Oriel:

LABOUR councillors in the 1980s and '90s knew that we were not spending enough to keep homes in decent order. The level of local spending on housing was determined by the then Conservative Government. Labour in Islington tried some imaginative off-balance sheet borrowing to get extra resources but that was stopped too.The Labour Government has tackled the cumulative effect of Conservative restrictions through the Decent Homes Standard. The current programme of investment in social housing - for which the Lib-Dem Council can take no credit at all - is the result. Oriel Clohessy (Viewpoints, Gazette, October 12) has done some valuable legal research for Islington leaseholders. There seems to be a legal precedent that leaseholders should not be liable for repairs which are required because of past neglect by the freeholder. If I were a council leaseholder, I would put all my effort into pursuing this through the courts. - Councillor Phil Kelly, Labour member for Finsbury Park ward, Town Hall, Upper Street, N1.Oriel Clohessy (Viewpoints, Gazette, October 12) failed to mention that 20 years of neglect of the council's housing stock was thanks to successive Tory governments siphoning off tens of millions of pounds from Islington resident's service charges and rents. This left scant resources for the vital, regular maintenance that should have been carried out. - Councillor Mick O'Sullivan,
Town Hall, Upper Street, N1.

Meanwhile another Kelly thinks she is hard done by

I'm a social worke (What else ...), I grew up in Islington and like many other people my age I want to have a place of my own, but in the current market I don't think I'll ever be able to afford it. That's why affordable housing is so essential.I love Islington, I don't want to leave and I'm glad we are making real changes to ensure that our young people and young workers can go on calling Islington their home. - Councillor Kelly Peasnell, Clerkenwell Ward, Town Hall, Upper Street, N1.

And what of Hodge nowadays . Well I think it may give us a clue to what Labour will have in store for us
“In BarkingCouncillor was strongly criticised for giving the BNP publicity in the local election campaign, which combined with heavy media coverage, and led to the BNP delivering a bouquet of roses to her office to thank her for her contribution to their cause”

There maybe trouble ahead………….lets face the music and COMPLAIN!!!

Presidents Reception

What a fantastic evening it was. I met my hero Boris Johnson and his lovely assistant Mel and was highly gratified at the attention the great man bestowed on me . Oh yes I `m very `umble in the presence of quality. Thanks to Margaret for organising the whole thing and encouraging to see so many Islington Conservatives about .

The words of the dedication are : "To dear Newmania , with thanks for all your brilliant blogging contributions . Best Wishes Boris Johnson"


The man is without equal .

Tax Hurts

I picked up this quote from Hansard . There has been a lot about taxation this week and this gives a good perspective in my view


Mr Dorrell ... there was an unheralded tax increase after the 1997 election and another after the 2001 election. ... Last week, the Institute for Fiscal Studies published a report on the movement of disposable incomes during recent years. It reported that, for the first time since the early 1990s, real disposable incomes fell in 2003–04 compared with 2002–03. Why did they fall? They fell because of the £8 billion tax increase that the Chancellor introduced after the previous general election, having promised beforehand that an increase would not be necessary. ... The Chancellor is very fond of saying that he has not increased rates of income tax. That is a dishonest argument for two reasons. First, it draws a polite veil over the fact that he has increased the rates of national insurance contributions. ... when the Chancellor of the Exchequer talks about tax rates not having gone up, he is wrong on two counts: first, national insurance contributions; and secondly, the unplanned and unfair effect of holding down the allowances and bands in the tax system and not indexing them to earnings.

Sorry Gays .

Justin Hinchcliffe( North London Conservative legend ) has taken me to task on the use of the word. Homosexualist. I think , despite the feeble defence I attempted he is right and would like to withdraw it . On the other hand I am not going to start taking the whole thing seriously . See below:

Its amazing to think that for all of time
There must have been an unbroken line
Of fathers and sons , ending with me
It started in the Cretaceous sea
When a single celled whats-it first procreated
Leaving its girlfriend drowsy and sated
Then a fish that crawled up on land with its fins
That handsome one there , (yes that’s him)
All manner of lizards and birdlike things
With feathers and teeth and claws and wings
And furry animals furtively mating
While dinosaurs slowly forgot about dating
Bears and apes and cavemen to
Each one of my fathers knew just what to do
Neither famine nor pestilence, clashes of nations
Stood in the way of their copulations
And now I have managed to pass the baton
To you ,little Elliot , my only son
No pressure we’ll love you anyway
But think of your fathers
And don’t turn out gay !

A correction

JT has asked me to correct my misrepresentation of his views on the provision of health care. I am delighted to quote his eloquent summary:
“The widespread takeover of healthcare provision by the state in the twentieth century, centrally directed and controlled, and funded exclusively through taxation, was a mistake. It has not led to the benefits which were promised. There are various reasons for this, which are the subject for a lengthier posting at a later date. But I think that there are a range of other options which need to be seriously and urgently considered. For example, along with some state provision, I think that there is scope for a greater role for private insurance and co-payments in the funding of healthcare. The delivery of healthcare services should also be opened up to independent companies, charitable organisations and other such bodies. In many circumstances, people would get a better service, with shorter waiting times, if they could choose where their own money was directed. I think that more people could afford some degree of health care insurance to complement other provision if their taxes were cut. There is no doubt that there is ample scope to cut a significant amount of waste from current Government spending; blogs such as http://burningourmoney.blogspot.com/ list examples every week. Whilst I support a campaign against what new Labour has done to worsen provision in the NHS, I think it is important that the Conservative party should look to develop new models for healthcare delivery. Keeping exclusively to the current top-down, centrally controlled system is not sustainable”