Here on The Voice, Mark Pack previously wrote about how Labour MP Joan Ruddock is claiming to have been more opposed to the Iraq war than she actually was. Now one of the Lib Dem local council candidates, Max Calo, has returned to the story on Comment is Free:
Questions have to be asked about what has moved Joan Ruddock to write a letter to voters trumpeting her record on the Iraq war. In a personally addressed letter to electors, she wrote:
“I have always acted with integrity and stuck to my principles – voting against the government going to war in Iraq.”
The facts state otherwise. She was absent on the vote for the use of force in Iraq, just as she was absent on most parliamentary votes on the issue. Her claims do not match what she really should have done. Admittedly, she voted in favour of defeated attempts to amend two important motions, but when Parliament was ultimately asked to authorise the use of force she expressed no view, when 85 Labour MPs had the courage to oppose the government.
You can read Max Calo’s full article here.
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3 Comments
This is more Lib Dem lies about Iraq. The fact is that the key vote on Iraq was the Kilfoyle amendment. Anyone voting for the Kilfoyle amendment voted against war in Iraq. Once that amendment was defeated it was clear that the main question was going to be agreed to.
I don’t really think so. There were 85 Labour MP that thought it necessary to stay and vote against the main motion, including Peter Kilfoyle MP.
Those are entitled to claim that they voted “against the government going to war in Iraq”.
Those that voted for the amendment but didn’t stay can only claim that they did not support, but not that they expressely voted against.
But it’s not just because the wording chosen by Ruddock say a very specific thing that did not happen, it’s mainly because with those words she chose to depict her opposition in very strong colours and made that passage into a powerful character reference for the electorate, only that it’s not a description that fits her parliamentary record on the issue.
She only displayed a moderate opposition to the war in Iraq, she didn’t miss only that crucial final vote but also three other crucial votes on Iraq.
Had she wrote that she opposed the war without going into details there wouldn’t be any objection, but she chose to say something different and it must be pointed at.
Joan Ruddock MP herself wrote now a reply from the Guardian CiF.
Very much worth reading:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/apr/25/general-election-2010-iraq