Normanton ward in Derby is turning into a livelier political contest than most. Not only is it home to the political genius that is Ashley Waterhouse, but now Labour candidate Balbir Sandhu is in the news.
Following a local newspaper campaign to force candidates to publish details of their past lives, “Anything to Declare?”, he has admitted to serving a two year jail sentence for possessing drugs 27 years ago:
Mr Sandhu said he supported the campaign and wanted the public to make their decision on who they voted for on May 5 with all the facts.
“People should know if a candidate has done anything wrong,” he said.
“If you are in the front line, whether it’s standing as a councillor or being a community leader, people should know your past.”
Mr Sandhu said he spent two years in prison from 1984 after being found in possession of heroin.
“I got mixed up with the wrong crowd one summer and it was the biggest mistake of my life,” said Mr Sandhu, who was 25 at the time.
“I let my family down and the community down.”
On the face of it, a two year jail sentence 27 years ago is not something you should necessarily hold against a candidate. So I will admit to being a little surprised at the reaction of one local Liberal Democrat:
Liberal Democrat candidate Dawn Gee said she felt Mr Sandhu should stand down.
“If we are talking about honesty in politics, the whole point is to clean up politics. I believe that anyone convicted of a serious crime should not have the opportunity to represent the people of our city. The candidate should immediately stand down.
“In addition to this, the nature of this crime is also very worrying. We are wanting to eradicate drug crime within our city and I do not believe that the way forward is to be represented by an individual that has a background of serious criminal activity in this area.”
Unless there’s more to the story that meets the eye, on that I disagree – serving this sort of two year jail sentence should not ban you from every standing for office again. Rehabilitation anyone?
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14 Comments
Exactly, as I commented elsewhere, it’s comparable to the argument on priosner votes and cases need to be judged individually.
Jonathan Calder’s Liberal England blog carried this story last night , my comment there in full was:
“Just as there should be no blanket ban on prisoners having right to vote, I don’t believe there should be a blanket ban on people with past or spent convictions on standing for public office.
Such an approach doesn’t strike me as either Liberal or Democratic.”
And Dawn Gee is a Liberal? Perhaps a short course on the values of Liberalism would be in order.
Dawn Gee doesn’t seem very Liberal. How can you offer a future to anyone if you deny them the right to participate in society fully? One crime doesn’t mean a life of it.
Reprehensible opportunism there from Dawn Gee. If anything, I’d say such a ‘colourful’ history would make this Labour candidate a better councillor, well-placed to understand some deep social problems!
Perhaps this should also help demonstrate that drug possession shouldn’t lead to convictions. Treatment and rehabilitation, yes (when necessary). But a criminal record, no.
Adam Corlett, Liberal Democrats for Drug Policy Reform
Sadly there are some people in the party who really don’t belong here at all. From their attitudes they’d be far better off amongst the tories.
How ridiculous. Moralising about ‘honesty’ right after a candidate has shown himself to be particularly, erm, honest.
Agree with all the above comments. Props to Balbir for being honest, and shame on Dawn Gee. No wonder people accuse us of saying whatever people want to hear when we.. er.. say whatever people want to hear. Aside from the fact that she’s adding fuel to the flames of drug warrior zealots who believe that only bad people take drugs.
This all seems pretty tame when compared to events in another Labour council…
http://livingonwords.blogspot.com/2011/03/good-labour-council.html
Before we rush to hang Dawn, checking whether she has been misquoted, out of context etc might be in order…
27 years ago?
Wouldn’t that make it almost contemporary with Nick Clegg’s conviction for alcohol-fuelled arson?
George Potter I kind of resent that as Tory. When I read this I thought typically LibDem opportunism.
As a Lib Dem candidate with no criminal record or who has ever been arrested, I find that at election time the Labour supporting criminals have been known to invent one for me!
Sending five police round to your door in the middle of the night looking for people that don’t live here or have a connection to the address, repeatedly during an election period is one way to annoy me.
In elections past, this went so far as the police locking up a counting agent for polling day, then dropping all the arrestable charges (which having witnessed the whole thing was a wonderfully imaginative piece of fiction on the part of the police anyway).
Strangely enough when I explained all the above to a police inspector and gave the police a brief taste of their own medicine, it stopped. 😛
Unfortunately we don’t (yet) have free and fair elections in this country when one political party’s supporters can use the police to commit election offences, harrass candidates and make sure campaign teams are locked up on bogus charges. The fact I voted Lib Dem last year but don’t appear to have voted on the marked register, the fact that myself or my agent weren’t invited to the opening of the postal ballots, the fact that many people didn’t receive their postal votes makes me despair at times as to what democracy is coming to….
As a recovering addict myself, i fully support this guy. addicts don’t choose to be born into a life of self doubt and fear- and they need representation and understanding just as any vulnrable adult would! Recovery is about helping others and being selfless – truly, qualities we need to see more of in councillors (and the labour party as a whole!)
I’m not being funny but 27 years ago? This is hardly newsworthy. I hate the way the Derbyshire papers do this, trying to “out” people to get a story. They did something similar 4 years ago (Derby are up in thirds but it was before our all-up in Chesterfield) and it’s just scare-mongering and bad journalism. The initial story posted here about the guy calling into the radio station was worth documenting but this one isn’t. And yes, as most people seem to have pointed out: we’re supposed to be liberal