Mornin’ all, welcome to Monday, and to the beginning of the last full working week before Christmas. What other things happened on this day in history, you ask? Well, 54 years ago, Hugh Gaitskell was elected leader of the Labour party, succeeding Clement Attlee, and six years ago Saddam Hussein was captured. But enough of the past, and on to the present …
2 Must-Read Blog-Posts
A couple of weeks ago, Iain Dale was casually dismissing the revelations that trustafarian Tory millionaire candidate Zac Goldsmith has been avoiding tax by registering for non-dom status: “lots of sanctimonious guff,” he told us. Well, the Tory leader David Cameron has been busy peddling a load more of just such guff as he attempts to regain the initiative after a rocky few weeks. Here’s what two Lib Dem bloggers had to say on the issue:
- Come on Dave, This is Just Pathetic (Nick Thornsby)
- What’s the delay Dave? (Nich Starling)
2 Big Stories
Huhne: 40,000 child alcohol crimes in five years
Lib Dem research has shown that nearly 40,000 children have been fined, cautioned or taken to court for alcohol-related offences in the last five years, an increase of over a quarter in that period. This includes 124 children aged 10 to 12 and 6,111 aged 13 to 15.
Lib Dem shadow home secretary, Chris Huhne, commented:
“These figures paint a shocking picture of how many children are being dragged into the criminal justice system through alcohol abuse. The problem appears to be growing worse by leaps and bounds. Ministers talk a lot about the alcohol crisis in this country but have completely failed to tackle it.
“Unless we change our drinking culture, we will condemn many of these children and adolescents to serious long-term alcohol-related illnesses or a life of crime. We must put an end to alcohol being sold at pocket-money prices and start educating our children about the dangers of drink or these figures will continue to get worse.
“Rather than more posturing, the Government should enforce a strict policy that those who sell alcohol to under-age children will lose their licence.”
Opinion polls all over the place
If you wanted proof that opinion polls results should be taken with a large pinch of salt, and by observing trends over time, then the weekend gave us just such evidence …
- Labour Closes The Gap On Conservatives (YouGov, Sunday Times)
- Cameron’s lead bounces back to 17 per cent (ComRes, Independent)
And, for the record, the Lib Dems either dropped to 16% or were up to 21%. Perhaps.
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7 Comments
Good old Clenet Atlee. I think he took over the reins after his more famous brother stepped down as Labour leader. Didn’t last long though.
It’s always the words one spells wrong that people notice, isn’t it? Yet one never gets praise for the words – the majority, I maintain – that one gets right.
Oh Chris, Chris… Educate, by all means, but ban? Carck down? I thought we were supposed to be Liberals.
Surely the scandal here is that children are being criminalised for something we all did and grew out of?
“Rather than more posturing, the Government should enforce a strict policy that those who sell alcohol to under-age children will lose their licence.”
Thought we were against mandatory sentences as well….
Don’t Fale & his pals hate Goldsmith, anyway? I seem to remember that before the media started criticising him they themselves were slagging him off for breaking conservative correctness by caring about the environment.
I was just expecting to read Chris say that we should stop criminaliasing these children for alcohol offences by striking the offences off the book – I had to read twice to make sure that actually, he said nothing of the sort.
“children are being criminalised”
No, Chris is proposing to get tough on those who sel them the booze.