You’d have thought that having splits in the Henley Conservatives over the selection of their by-election candidate, or having a Shadow Cabinet member flatly contradict what the Conservatives are claiming in their leaflets would be enough bad news to be going on with for the Conservative by-election campaign.
But oh no. Now Mark Stevenson, the Green Party candidate in the Henley Parliamentary by-election, has attacked Conservative candidate John Howell and his campaign for the content of its leaflets: “It’s interesting that the Conservatives should already feel so insecure about their candidate that they appear to have resorted to deliberate lies before the campaign is a day old.” (Source: ThameNews.net)
Although Mark Stevenson doesn’t mention it, Stephen Kearney – the Liberal Democrat candidate – also lives in the constituency, in Aston Rowant.
UPDATE: Conservative by-election candidate John Howell has now come under scrutiny for his links to property developers.
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52 Comments
How long has Stephen Kearney lived in the constituency?
How long has John Howell lived in the constituency?
Did Stephen Kearney recently described himself as ‘settled in Plymouth’?
Did the LibDems dump their former PPC to install (for no obvious reason) Kearney? (And yes, I know about that weird rule where the other candidate stands down, but let’s just say she wasn’t too happy about it….
Visiting Tory, you won’t score any points here with that kind of behaviour.
If you’d care to engage with the topics, or at least be honest enough to provide your real name so that we can ascertain you aren’t a fingerpuppet trolling for confrontation you’ll find we are more than happy to oblige.
In the meantime we must assume it must be a slow day for you in the office.
Well, he isn’t me. although you are right about the slow day in the office.
But, out of interest, how long has the Lib Dem candidate been living in the area (I really don’t know(not my part of the world, I’m afraid) and if these Plymouth quotes are true then it seems like a bit of a schoolboy error on the part of the Lib Dem vetting committee)
“Did Stephen Kearney recently described himself as ’settled in Plymouth’?”
Ah, but the advantage of living on a boat is that all you need to do is weigh anchor and head up the Thames.
“Stephen Kearney, 49, and Julia Olsen, 57, have lived on board their “unsinkable” 37ft Etap boat at Plymouth Yacht Haven for the past year. They say it’s cheaper than a house.”
http://tinyurl.com/5dzfs9
Not to mention more mobile …
Passer-by, perhaps you could have a word with the visitor, he’s giving you a bad name.
For the record I’d have thought a boating enthusiast would be emminently suitable for the Henley constituency.
I think Henley boat enthusiasts tend to go for something longer and thinner. There ain’t too much room to tack on the Henley reach, espaically when the booms are out.
So, did they sail it round from Plymouth and chug up the Thames then? Sounds like a nice trip although I am surprised that a boat with a keel like that could make it up as far as Henley without any problems.
Ahem, it would make a change for the MP to be more interested in the sport than the champagne when the regatta comes round.
…and there’s always Sonning lake!
Right OK, if you want me to engage more with the topic….
Following your argument to its logical conclusion, every candidate in every election who even rents a house is a local resident. Tamsin Dunwoody, who as was well publicised really lived in South Wales, rented a house in Crewe. Did that make her more local than Edward Timpson or Elizabeth Shenton, both of whom lived near the constituency? Blatantly not.
What my point is, and I think it’s a valid one, is that John Howell is unquestionably local. By all means, challenge him on policy, but when he points out that Stephen Kearney lived in Plymouth up until very recently (in fact until the by-election was seen to be imminent) he is making a valid observation.
And whilst the Green guy is technically right, I don’t blame John Howell for ignoring him since the Greens are a political irrelevance, and have no chance of winning the seat in a million years.
Look at it this way, if the roles were reversed you would doubtless be making political capital from one of our candidates being parachuted in when he had recently said: ‘I am now settled in Plymouth, and I love it.’
Hang on a second there VT, which subject are you trying to engage with? The one in this article or the one in your head?
If you are admitting the Green candidate is technically correct, then you accept your campaign has resorted to telling ‘deliberate lies’.
The substansive fact behind this story is that Stephen Kearney has written to the Conservative campaign to retract and withdraw a leaflet.
I’m imagining the damage to the Conservatives that a successful court case would do. Not a pretty sight.
I said that he was technically correct, by which I accepted that he does live in the constituency. However, it’s normal, particularly in by-elections, for an Independent candidate (Walklate in C&N) to live locally. I still don’t think that should stop any of the three main parties from saying that they have the only local candidate, because by ‘local candidate’ I think they mean someone with serious local political experience for a serious political party with a chance of winning.
Stephen Kearney’s letter is actually unconnected to the Green claim, but is in itself less credible. Living somewhere for a month simply doesn’t make you local. I don’t know what his objection is to that principle.
So on the day the Government is negotiating to get its 42 day extension through Parliament we are obsessing (again!) about candidates being “considerably more local than you”.
You want Lib Dems to burn petrol at 115p/l to come to Henley. Why don’t we start running campaigns that make us feel it’s worth us bothering.
Spot on Hywel
Visiting Tory,
What do you actually have to do to be “local”?
Join the Freemasons? Participate in the neighbourhood hunt? Bow down to the Lord of the Manor?
Everyone who lives in Aston Rowant is local to Aston Rowant, whatever snooty Tory xenophobes might feel about it.
Orangepan:”Stephen Kearney has written to the Conservative campaign to retract and withdraw a leaflet”
Stephen must be bonkers to make an issue out of this. How much more emphasis does he want put on the local-ness of the candidates?
As for a court case; if he really wants to indulge in the most petty form of politiking he should have a go but I can’t see it doing him much good. I can’t imagine it would result in anything more terrible than another leaflet along the lines of – “we were terribly sorry to inform you that David was the only local Candidate. In fact the Green and the candidates also live in the area. It is only the Lib Dem candidate that was happily settled in Plymouth until he heard there might be a by-election here. We apologise unreservedly for any hurt we may have caused the Green party and the .”
In fact I think I should encourage Stephen to have a go. Go on Stephen!
As this article points out the issue is whether the tories have been telling “deliberate lies”, and I wouldn’t presume upon the outcome of any court case if it came to that, considering both the tories present concede the point.
In such a court case an apology and retraction would seem appropriate recompense, although as that has aleady been requested for the Conservatives to waste court time it wouldn’t be beyond imagining that the Conservative campaign could be censured.
Now that would make things more interesting.
Anyway that is a mere sideshow to the real event which is looking very positive.
FWIW Hywel, there are plenty of public transport routes into the constituency and we don’t even require you to go to Henley if you want to organise yourself before you leave.
In contrast to C&N and some other recent by-elections this one is being run on a less centralised basis, which is an innovation and an improvement.
I don’t recall expressing an opinion on whether the statement was deliberate or not; I am simply not privy to that information, I’m afraid. It seems more likely that it was lousey editing than anything else.
I would be interested to track a court case, though; I had some outrageous lies put out against me in Lib Dem leaflets. My view was always to rise above such pettiness and I find it hard to believe tha court would disagree. But each to their own.
The thing I can’t get over is why the Lib Dems have put someone up from outside the constituency (come on Mark, he’s only renting in Aston Rowant and it’s a 3 month lease) and then go on about it.
Is this a new campaign tactic?
Did Rennard decide that you guys were unlikely to get much coverage being so far behind last time and so wanted an issue, any issue, that would get a bit of traction and your candidate talked about?
If so, it’s kinda working, but it’s got to be the thinnest proposition yet from the Lib Dems as to why anyone should vote for them.
So, let’s move on and hear why Oxford City Lib Dems want to build on the Green Belt. How about a head to head with Kearney and John Goddard – Lib Dem ferrets in a sack!
Passing Tory wrote:
“My view was always to rise above such pettiness and I find it hard to believe tha court would disagree.”
The court will determine if the statement in question (i) was published, (ii) refers to the claimant, and (iii) is defamatory.
There are defenses applicable such as qualified privilege and fair comment on a matter of public interest. I am unaware of “rising above pettiness”, however. (Even calling someone “ugly” is capable of being defamatory – see Berkoff v Burchill.)
Defamation has an added dimension with respect to election campaigns in that the RPA makes defaming a candidate a crime, and offenders may be prosecuted by the Crown at public expense. Ask the homophobe, Miranda Grell.
Having said that, I hope this campaign will focus on the really important issues.
Do we elect a party that works for all the people or one that cares only about those with incomes over £100,000 a year?
Do we elect a party that opposed the Iraq war and will stand up for British interests and the international rule of law, or one that is even more grovelling to Cheney than Tony Blair?
Do we elect a party that has positive proposals to protect the environment, or one that has always been in the pockets of environmental vandals despite its public posturings to the contrary?
Who allowed the gerrybuilding? Who tried to slam the M40 across Otmoor? Who permitted farmers to grub up all those hedgerows? Who paid landowners to destroy ancient woodland and plant non-native conifers? Who tried to relax planning controls?
Sesenco, your talents are wasted on the Lib Dems. You should be taking the class war forward by voting for the Left List like your comrade in arms Brian Paddick.
Pasing Tory,
So you do agree with the propositions that I have attributed to the Tory Party?
What have environmental protection and grovelling to Dick Cheney got to do with class?
Sesenco, the angle you take represents the misguided perceptions of an increasingly small number of people, too many of who seem to base their politics on hatred.
passing tory, I’d consider you misguided except you continue trying to perpetrate the fraud of characterising us non-conservatives.
Now, instead allowing your behaviour to be interpreted as malicious or distracting why not engage with the points raised and answer the question.
Sesenco, by no means do I tar all non-conservatives with the same brush. As far as I can see, you seem to be the one engaging in generalisations.
In terms of the points above; 100k? where did that come from? Do you think that all the work that IDS does with the CSJ is targetting that bracket? What about Shaun Bailey? Or Ray Lewis? I think that you fundamentally fail to understand what the Conservative party is about.
In terms of Iraq I will conceed, although even here you need to be careful. Why did a lot of Tories instinctively support Blair? Because they felt that the situation was much more dangerous than it actually was and this was in part because of some very dodgey tactics by the government. As it happens I was against the war from the beginning and marched with, I suspect, you.
But, in any case, arguing against received military wisdom is not encessarily the way to win votes in Henley.
In terms of British interests over international law, I would bet you a dime to a dollar that in the nightmare scenario where the Lib Dems to form a UK governement they would suddenly discover their oppopsition to all sorts of high-minded ideas they had in opposition, for a whole host of reasons. Responsibility has that effect; Labour wanted an ethical foreign policy and look what came of that. I think that the good voters of Henley are more than capable of understanding the wisdom of the Tory position against some of the more fanciful Lib Dem notions.
In terms of the environment, isn’t it the Lib Dems that as recently as last autumn were putting together policies involving the greater use of biofuels – long after the problems of poor efficiency and world food shortages were clear? The critical thing here is to have a set of realistic policies that actually aim to help the environment. For instance, the biggest single increasing pressure on the environment in the UK is population growth. This underlies much of the development / taking land out of greenbelt for infrstructural reasons in recent years. Are the Lib Dems planning to do anything to curb this?
As for the more local points, I don’t know. Not my area. Although some of the other posts suggest that there is certain friction between the positions of Henley Lib Dems and those closer to Oxford.
Sorry, to Orangepan … too many people from too many angles …
I am getting fed up with all this nonsense about whether a candidate is local or not. It does us no good at all.
Passing Tory,
Don’t you worry yourself. I understand fully what the Tory Party is about. It is the party of the rich and privileged, supported by the servile and the aspiring in equal measure. It exists to look after the interests of its paymasters. Nothing more, nothing less.
Is there anyone left simple-minded enough to imagine that the Tory leadership believed Blair’s lies? Of course they didn’t! They knew perfectly well there were no WDMs. They voted for the war because they wanted the US elite to extend its control and ownership of the world’s resources.
Duncan Smith’s attitude to the poor is basically: work for a pittance, do what you’re told, kowtow to your “betters”, and let the elite carry on lording it over you as they have always done.
Senseco – please be cautioned against painting all tories as ultra-conservative extreme right-wingers, passing tory does make some effort!
They depend on a coalition of forces as much as anyone else so it’s entirely plausible that some mistakenly promote the more moderate method all the while others go for the malicious and vindictive harder line.
It is unclear right now whether Cameron would be able or actually wants to escape the clutches of the hard-right, but what is clear is that they recognise they are unelectable if they are portrayed as in hock to the more extreme parts of their party.
passing tory – maybe you don’t see how you contradicted yourself from one comment to the next, or maybe you do but are deluding yourself, so I’d recommend you reread your comments in order before you are uncovered in excusing another mistake.
Well, you go on believing that, Sesenco. Even better, send a leaflet to that effect round Henley so that the general public can understand your take on the Lib Dem message load and clear. I am sure they will be most appreciative.
If it’s a horrible typo then I’ll stick my hand up now … my spelling is terrible today. Other than that, you’ll have to point it out and we can take it from there.
passing [email protected] – “…too many of who seem…” is a generalisation.
passing [email protected] – “…by no means do I tar all…with the same brush” contradicts statement 1.
passing [email protected] – “…you seem to be the one engaging in generalisations” is an immediate and classic transferance of the guilt proved above.
Please try ‘arder, guv.
Oragnepan, with all respect (err…) the only problem with ‘too many of who seem’ is that it should be ‘too many of whom’. It is not a generalisation. In fact, implicit within the phrase is that more than one subgroup exists, one of which is larger than might be desired (by whatever criteria, in this case my personal judgement :-). For example, one person who determines their political position by hate, from a total pool of thousands might be too many. Sadly, it is a greater proportion than this.
So, I am explicitly NOT tarring all with the same brush. Back to logic 101 for you, I’m afraid 😛
Passing Tory,
How about a leaflet explaining to Henley voters how their villages will be less attractive and their property prices lower if Cameron’s big business paymasters get their way?
Sorry, I meant property VALUES.
BTW, there are “libertarians” in the Tory Party who oppose ALL planning controls.
Tories hate poor people and eat children!
I don’t like them.
Sesenco: “BTW, there are “libertarians” in the Tory Party who oppose ALL planning controls.”
Yes; I know quite a lot of them and I have certain sympathy with their position. Indeed, it would quite interesting to have (small) zones which did operate in this way. I bet they would end up being more interesting places than a lot of the identikit estates being built currently. But I think we probably agree that overall it would be a disaster if applied to a country as a whole.
Where I live there is minimal planning control over most of the country and I have to say that it is a liberating feeling to know that one can save up pennies and have a realistic chance of building your own house to a spec that you determine – something that is extremely diffult to do without very deep pockets in the UK now.
The other thing is, Sesenco, if you are really advocating that we find a way of building less housing, and less of it on greenbelt land, then you have my total support. As I have said previously, increasing population (along with North to South migration and smaller family size) is the major drive for new development. What are the Lib Dems proposing to do to address this issue? If the answer is “build lots more houses” then of course greenbelt is going to be developed, and of course developers are going to get rich. What do you expect??
passing tory, the whole of the referenced sentence is a characterisation, moreover it is questionable to the extent of dubiousness.
Additionally, implications are by their very nature generalised, except where they are explicitly specified – which you didn’t do – so you then compound your self-negating mistake by claiming exactly that inverse connotation.
Either you were making an implicit or an explicit statement – you can’t be making both at the same time.
So it’s back to dictionary corner for you.
There is a clean and profitable way of solving all those problems raised regarding development and migration which can all be filed under the heading ‘decentralisation’.
It is a central principle of LibDem policy.
Maybe if we could advertise our policies better, then maybe one day we’ll get to implement them in a whole-hearted manner.
Passing Tory,
Yes, there is a place in the UK that has minimal planning controls, and it is called Docklands.
Aesthetically, the results are mixed. Economically, the place is a runaway success (and I have worked there). On balance, I would say it is better to stick skyscrapers on derelict brownfield land than cram up city centres. A truly special case.
There does need to be more land for housing. Much of it can be built on brownfield sites, and some of it on low grade greenfield sites. I have never said no land should ever be taken out of the Green Belt, please note. Some Green Belt land has nil amenity value and is underutilised.
The poor architectural quality of much new housing is a product of weak planning controls and inadequate building regulations. Where you have an absence of both, what you get is gerrybuilding on a grand scale (take a look at the suburbs of Istanbul for an excellent example of this).
Henley, Thame and Dorchester are relatively unspoilt towns, unusually so for the South-East. Who would want to surround them with Noddy houses or gouge out their historic cores for supermarkets and carparks? Apart from property developers, that is?
But there are in the constituency a number of airfields that might cease to be used one day, and collections of abandoned Dutch barns surrounded by nettles and dead elms. Prime candidates for affordable housing developments, I’d say.
I’ll grant you the explicit should better read “clearly”. I was wondering about it myself but then decided I really couldn’t be bothered to change it. Just too many posts today. Sorry. As for the rest, I think you are grasping at straws. It is entirely clear that I did not mean “all Lib Dems are motivated by hate”, and if that had been true then I would have said just that. It was sufficiently clear that I meant that a subset of people (not only, but including some, Lib Dems; including Sesenco), appear to be motivated by hate of Tories.
Is that clear enough for you? But next time, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll keep it short again as I think most people understood it first time round.
Sesenco, I suspect that the reason that the towns in Henley and so on do not have lots of noddy houses already is because the (Conservative) councils are very efficient at keeping control of development. I do not know the area that well, but I would be highly surprised if the Councillors were not just as aware of the need to balance affordable housing and maintain the feel of the area as you are. In short, I think you will find that your concerns for the constituency in this respect would be more than adequately handled by John Howell.
After all, he has the advantage of actually having had long-term contact with the local councils.
What better reason could you have for voting Tory 🙂
Personally I’m motivated by the experience of lax and inconsistent discipline demonstrated by self-declared conservatives who’ve lapsed into complacency (be it through arrogance or tiredness or whatever).
Now a vote for the tories is a vote for abandoned buildings, weeds and a rotting countryside? No change there then.
Next you’ll be offering free tumbleweed and vultures for every village in an attempt to aid the tourist economy!
On an individual level I find conservatives are fine upstanding defenders of liberty, but in a group you let yourselves turn into rats.
Passing Tory wrote:
“In short, I think you will find that your concerns for the constituency in this respect would be more than adequately handled by John Howell.”
So why has John Howell acted as an adviser to firms of planning consultants, a fact which he has concealed from his constituents by laundering the money through a holding company?
Whom does he put first? His constituents or his clients?
“Next you’ll be offering free tumbleweed and vultures for every village in an attempt to aid the tourist economy!”
We don’t need vultures in Henley. We already have the red kite!
No blue kites, though.
Orangepan: “Personally I’m motivated by the experience of lax and inconsistent discipline demonstrated by self-declared conservatives who’ve lapsed into complacency (be it through arrogance or tiredness or whatever).”
Well, those are human, rather than political, failings that could affect every one of us.
Sesenco: “So why has John Howell acted as an adviser to firms of planning consultants, a fact which he has concealed from his constituents by laundering the money through a holding company?”
Dunno. Has he? You would have to ask him although it far from unknown for politicians of all parties to be employed as advisers, as a quick dip into the register of interests would reveal. Although I would watch about about using words like “laundered” unless you are pretty sure of your facts. After all, you wouldn’t want to concede moral high ground by being caught out misleading people on an issue like this now would you?
Passing tory – haven’t you noticed that all liberals and particularly LibDems are denigrated for being able to accept our own and others human failings and trying to deal with them, while both tories and Labour politicians are lionised to messianic status until they bring everything around them crashing down?
Orangepan: “Passing tory – haven’t you noticed that all liberals and particularly LibDems are denigrated for being able to accept our own and others human failings and trying to deal with them, while both tories and Labour politicians are lionised to messianic status until they bring everything around them crashing down?”
You what? Not particularly. Certainly being in government (or even being likely to be in government) opens you up to greater scrutiny and if you do mess up then the impact is likely to be greater. The chances of a Lib Dem “bringing everything around them crashing down” is limited by the fact that they haven’t been in government for the best part of 100 years and so memories have faded a little. But if you are trying to pretend that Charles Kennedy wasn’t lionised before being fed to the dogs, or Menzies Campbell after him, you are deluding yourself.
As for party tendencies; many of the staunch Tory “little old ladies” I used to work with were, in private, incredibly both aware of their own foibles, and forgiving of those of others. They just didn’t wear it on their sleeves. And that, in my opinion, is no bad thing.
If only electoral law banned the phrases “lives locally” and “local candidate” !!!!!
Cannot believe that Henley is heading down the same nonsensical road as Crewe & Nantwich. Not a pretty sight!
If it’s SO important perhaps electoral law should simply require a factual statement of residence for past (say) five years ?
And what if we had multi-member STV constituencies?
Sorry PT, must disappoint you again, Kennedy is more popular now than he ever was as our leader, while I think you’ll find it hard to find one person who was convinced Ming was the saviour of the cause during his stint.
To be fair to those in other parties who stick around when a regime unravels, it is still their liberal tendency which clears up the messes left behind, as you yourself condescendingly describe is characteristic of the “little old ladies'” staunchness.
Anyway, considering the LibDems have only existed since 1988 in the currently constituted form, for you to ascribe the tendencies of one of our anteceding parties is to grossly underestimate the evolution that has occurred and to indulge in wishful thinking.