When I agreed to write this monthly round up of Labour and Tory blogging I said I would aim to “keep a balance between pointing to interesting postings that we Lib Dems may have missed and laughing at the folly of our opponents”.

So here goes.

Labour

Disloyalty is common in politics, so its refreshing to come across Kezia Dugdale and her staunch defence of Gordon Brown’s decision to scrap the 10p tax band:

Pensioners and families are better off. Childless adults of working age are a little worse off. Would you rather it was the other way around?

Gordon Brown had to make a political calculation as to how best to lift the income of low earners, without spending so much that he had to do something extremely unpopular to pay for it. Most Labour MPs like it, 70 don’t.

I have not been back to check her blog since Gordon Brown’s U-turn, but I bet you will find she has written an equally staunch defence of his new position. I predict this woman will be in parliament before long.

Unfortunately, not everyone is so loyal. Take John Wiseman, for instance. Here is the Labour PPC for Westmoreland & Lonsdale writing on Labour Home:

I seem to be in the middle of a nightmare at present. The BNP are standing all over my home constituency. Everyone seems depressed where I am standing for parliament. Gordon has decided to take money away from his core vote, PPS’s are threatening to resign!! When are we going to wake up!!! There is hundreds of councillors who are going to lose their seats if Gordon doesn’t listen. I am asking please Gordon for the last time wake up and smell the coffee and save the party as in rectify the tax change!!!

Doesn’t he realise what our Glorious Leader is doing for the country?

Elsewhere in the Labour photosphere there have been some moving tributes to Gwyneth Dunwoody. Harry Barnes, the former Labour MP, came to appreciate her worth even though they came from opposite wings of the party. And Paul Flynn points out that she was:

the last of a generation of women MPs of exceptional talent who succeeded mainly because they were tougher than their male counterparts. Gwyneth was generously endowed with strength, guile, humour, courage and integrity.

Back on Labour Home, Mike Ion exposes links between the Pensioners Party and the BNP and seems to have dissolved them in the process.

And Theo’s Blog reports on a row about parking in Hampstead between David Aaronovitch and Tom Conti. Hampstead is like that.

Much as it pains me to say it, the Communist-turned-Blairite Aaronovitch appears to be in the right.

Tories

Back to loyalty. You would have to be a very loyal supporter of Tony Blair indeed to write about the invasion of Iraq in these terms:

But in twenty years from now, even the most defiant anti-war protesters may concede that maybe, just maybe, when Iraq’s children are running around in the street with full tummies and free from the fear of brutality, when our children can sleep safe in their beds still free British citizens, that a good job was done by brave men and women.

A very loyal Blairite or a very stupid Tory. Step forward Mad Nad.

And then we have Dizzy Thinks and his remarkable take on Christianity:

If you start setting limits on earning that what would that do for wealth creation? What’s the point in trying to earn more money if a limit is set on how much you may earn? That’s not even socialism, it’s bordering on communism.

It’s a point of view, but maybe the Archbishop was thinking of camels and needles’ eyes? There are still some Church of England clergymen who read the Bible.

Then there are a couple of stories from Conservative Home.

First there is The story of how the party’s EU enthusiasts fixed the MEP selection process. You can see why the website is so cross: there are a lot of headbangers in the Tory Party and they deserve to have their views represented in the party’s decision-making process.

Then there is its guileless appeal to Help us make the ‘Nasty Ken video’. Conservatives, you understand, are really nice people, but Ken is so nasty that he forces them to be nasty too.

At least one Tory is on the side of the angels. Hunter and Shooter went on the demonstration against the parading of the Olympic torch through London:

The icing on the cake, when I got home, was to see that Gordon’s Gang were just too gormless to have seen this PR disaster unfolding all day, and actually allowed these Chinese security ‘guards’ to enter Downing Street, push people around in front of the TV cameras and organise the photo shoot! How weak! How pathetic! Gordon isn’t even master of his own doorstep, let alone the country! That’s one video clip I hope gets repeated endlessly…

And this just in… Mr Bean has a blog and is standing for the Conservatives in Manchester.

* Jonathan Calder blogs at Liberal England and for the New Statesman.

When I agreed to write this monthly round up of Labour and Tory blogging I said I would aim to “keep a balance between pointing to interesting postings that we Lib Dems may have missed and laughing at the folly of our opponents”.

So here goes.

Labour

March began with Margaret Hodge attacking the Proms for being elitist. But how does Hodge’s attendance at arts events display her own democratic tastes? Fortunately we have her own blog to tell us. Here she is writing in February of this year:

Since I last posted here, I’ve seen Othello, Swan Lake, Nutcracker (Matthew Bourne’s exuberant production at Sadlers Wells this time), La Traviata, Much Ado about Nothing and Madam Butterfly at the ENO. Despite my very best endeavours, I have only been able to get to one of Barenboim’s concerts playing all the Beethoven piano sonatas

So why is Hodge turning her fire on the most democratic high art events we have?

I have complained before of the overwhelming dullness of Labour blogs. Things have not been much improved by the appearance of the Redcar Labour Party blog.

Most of it is devoted to rather unpleasant attacks on the local Lib Dems, but the very first posting is a classic of unconscious humour:

We believe in a stronger more resolute Redcar. A Redcar ready for the future; a Redcar that can link first class leisure with first class opportunity: A vision of education, innovation and expertise.

Tom Watson is interested in the news that Iain Dale’s new magazine Total Politics is being funded by Lord Ashcroft.

Writing on Labour Home, David Rowntree looks at the unwillingness of young people to join political parties:

In February 2003 up to 2 million people marched though London against the war. That’s more than 4 times as many people as all the political parties put together.

If all those people had joined their local party, they could have de-selected every MP who voted in favour of the war, and brought about a complete change in Government policy within a couple of years.

Bob Piper does not think that things are that simple. The Sandwell councillor says:

De-selecting a sitting MP now is almost as difficult as it was in the 1970’s, and don’t bother thinking about policy making. Even if you successfully moved a resolution through your constituency party meeting it would be highly unlikely to make it on to the Conference floor unless it gushed with buttock clenching praise of our glorious leaderships’ endeavors or had been neutered or butchered beyond recognition by a sub-committee of the conference arrangements committee.

And Brighton Regency Labour Supporter admits “It is a pretty miserable time to support Labour, at least it is if you judge Labour success by the recent polls.” He puts his hope in Ken Livingstone seeing off Boris.

Tories

My Nasty Tory Councillor of the Month was going to be John Ward from Medway, who resigned after calling for jobless people with more than one child to be sterilised. But first resigned and then he had his thunder stolen by Hugh Jackson from North Tyneside, who was suspended by his party after calling for the euthanasia of children in the council’s care to save money.

Apparently it was a joke.

But John Ward still makes the Dirty Dozen because he gave us the benefit of his wisdom on his blog. The posting which got him into such trouble was deleted from his blog soon after the story hit the national press, but now he is a free agent:

No doubt they think they’ve won a victory over me, but nothing could be further from the truth. Now I am unshackled from the various restrictions that are placed upon elected members (well, once my resignation has been accepted/confirmed) the gloves come off!

So no more Mister Nice Guy then.

Elsewhere on the Nasty Tory front we have Mad Nad — and she is not very funny either.

Writing of a plan to build a mosque in Oxford (scroll down past her expression of affection for Bob Spink) she says:

Apparently, the minaret … will stand taller than the dreamy spires.

Standing taller is all that matters, it’s the most important thing. Symbolic.

To the Islamist, America is a Johnny come lately, it’s England that matters.

Whereas anyone walking by may not even notice the towering height, casting a shadow over a dreamy spire, to the Islamist it represents a triumphant call to arms.

And the passer-by will think it’s just another innocent call to prayer.

Talking of unpleasant right-wingers, Iain Dale recently had a good story on the BNP’s attempt to recruit the English Democrats’ London Mayoral candidate.

At the start of the month Lee Jasper (Ken Livingstone’s “Senior Policy Adviser on Equalities“) was still in position. James Cleverly had some trenchant things to say on the subject.

Writing on Conservative Home, Graeme Archer offers a glimpse of school life in Hackney.

And finally, John “The Vulcan” Redwood shares his views on space travel.

Beam me up, Scotty.

* Jonathan Calder blogs at Liberal England and for the New Statesman.

When I agreed to write this monthly round up of Labour and Tory blogging I said I would aim to “keep a balance between pointing to interesting postings that we Lib Dems may have missed and laughing at the folly of our opponents”.

So here goes.

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When I agreed to write this monthly round up of Labour and Tory blogging I said I would aim to “keep a balance between pointing to interesting postings that we Lib Dems may have missed and laughing at the folly of our opponents”.

So here goes.

Labour blogs

The Labour blogosphere is a strange place. Tory bloggers may often be barking mad, but there opinionated approach and lack of concern for the party line means that Liberal Democrat bloggers are likely to recognise them as kindred spirits however much we differ on policy.

Labour blogging does not feel like that. It seems that many Labour supporters prefer to blog at Labourhome rather than maintain their own sites. No doubt they can all write what they want there, but the exercise does make you suspect that Labour bloggers can be haled off to re-education camps at a moment’s notice if they are insufficiently euphoric about their Beloved Leader.

On the individual Labour blogs, Kerron Cross reveals that the high-profile Tory PPC Esther McVey has had to pay £6,500 to Stephen Hesford, the sitting Labour MP for West Wirral, after settling a libel claim out of court.

Dave’s Part mounts an effective attack on Peter Hain simply by quoting from one of the many books he wrote to explain socialism to new comrades after the left the Liberal Party.

And Paul Flynn offers what can fairly be called a candid portrait of Paul Murphy upon his Lazarus-like return to the Cabinet.

Tom Watson has some fun at the expense of the West Midlands Conservative MEPs. They illustrated their website with a picture of Birmingham. Fair enough, you will say. But this was Birmingham, Alabama.

Enough of being fair minded.

If you have the outlook and sense of humour of a 1947 Stalinist you will enjoy John’s Labour Blog and his joke beginning “An old scab postman lay dying…”.

And Labour like controlling us, don’t they? To this end, Bob Piper wants all alcoholic drinks to be barcoded so that the authorities can trace it back to the shop that sold it.

But it’s hard to get to ideological about this. It will probably be Lib Dem policy in six months.

Conservative blogs

You know where you are with the Tories. Forget all this stuff about windmills and hugging huskies: you need only scratch the surface to find the same old attitudes.

So Nadine Dorries began the year by writing to Ofcom to complain about Catherine Tate’s Christmas special, which was broadcast after the watershed. She was not complaining that Tate is being overexposed or that the words “Christmas special” generally translate as “Not at all funny”. No, Mad Nad though it “was offensive and violated the expression ‘family viewing‘.”

And Shane Greer cannot contain his glee over the red blood of the party’s latest policy announcement:

David Cameron’s plan to strip benefits from unemployed people who turn down offers of work should be greeted with delight by anyone with sense. But his plan to cut the number of people on incapacity benefit should met with unparalleled glee.

I have been know to write in favour of grazed knees myself, which made me warm towards Boris Johnson’s article from just before Christmas on playgrounds and safety. Unfortunately, I could not follow every step in his chain of argument that soft play surfaces lead to gang violence.

Incidentally, I have had to link to the Daily Telegraph version of this article as Boris’s own website is behaving oddly at the moment. Rather like Boris.

A more serious take on gang violence is offered by Elle Seymour, who writes of a friend’s experiences of teaching in Hackney.

Or perhaps it is all down to the bad example offered by David Cameron and reported by ConservativeHome?

Finally, best wishes to Iain Dale, the Daddy of Tory blogging, who tells us that he had been diagnosed with diabetes but that he still counts himself very lucky.

* Jonathan Calder blogs at Liberal England.