Archives for May 2010

Dorset will continue to have a Labour voice in Parliament with the news that former MP Jim Knight has been made a life peer.

Dissolution Honours Lists are made with the approval of the Queen at the end of every Parliament, and provide outgoing Prime Ministers with an opportunity to reward colleagues. They also allow the new PM to appoint working peers.

Former Dorset South MP Labour MP Jim Knight qualifies on both counts. He's been a hard-working and loyal supporter of both Gordon Brown and Tony Blair before him. As schools minister, and an enthusiast for new technology, he's built up some enviable experience.

"When I lost my seat I was particularly concerned that Dorset had lost its only Labour voice in Parliament and I'm delighted to be able to provide that in this new role."

But he added that he doesn't want to get in the way of Conservative Richard Drax doing his work as local MP.

"He won fair and square and I will not set up a rival office dealing with casework and helping individuals. That is the MP's job."

"I will campaign on issues locally and nationally. I will use my new status to try to bring people together to improve things, and highlight problems as I see them in Dorset. I will want to continue to hear from people about these wider issues to inform my work."

So will it be Lord Jim? Or Knight of Weymouth on the red benches? As a lifelong Arsenal fan I suspect Lord Knight would be just as happy if the PM had left him a pass to see a different set of reds at the Emirates, but it doesn't quite have the same ring as Knight of Highbury.

And what about his previous campaigns to reform the House of Lords? Jim says

"I strongly believe that members of the second chamber should be 100% elected. The Lords themselves are seen as a block to this. I will join the Lords unashamedly as someone wanting to continue to campaign and vote for a fully democratic Parliament."

For the full list of peers from all parties click here.

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New Forest Conservative Julian Lewis is a supporter of speaker John Bercow, and for more reasons than you might expect.

When things looked rocky for him before the election Dr Lewis was happy to stick up for an old pal.

"I bet he'll still be there after we come back" was his assurance to the assembled company.

Fellow MP Nadine Dorries was not so sure, and was happy to accept the wager. Dinner would be on the loser.

Ms Dorries was among those making a considerable noise to oppose the re-election of the speaker. A noise that was correctly ignored by Sir Peter Tapsell.

But at least she has the consolation of a dinner date with our man from the Forest.

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Who can forget Tony Blair's verb-free speeches? At times New Labour seemed to have its own language.

This was his conference speech, heading for a record third term in Brighton in 2004:

Record economic stability in the first term. Record investment in the second. Record numbers of jobs in both. A fairer Britain, yes.

The NHS safe in the patient's hands. Life made easier for families. More choice for mums at home and at work. Security and dignity for everyone in retirement. Our country and its people prospering in the knowledge economy.

OK, maybe the biggest shock from this nostalgia is how the optimism crashed and burned, but it's also worth looking at the change in the language now being used in government.

This is the first press release from the Lib-Con Coalition's new Efficiency and Reform group, headed by Sussex MP Francis Maude, I've highlighted the verbs:

The group's first priorities, with immediate effect, will be to:

Conduct centralised procurement for commodity goods and services to drive down prices;

Implement an immediate freeze on all new ICT spend above £1 million;

Review the Government's biggest projects to see where costs can be reduced or wasteful projects stopped altogether;

Start renegotiating contracts with major suppliers across Government to reduce costs;

Freeze all new advertising and marketing spend. Only essential campaigns will be allowed;

Cut spend on Civil Service expenses, including a clamp down on first class travel and on the number of Government cars; ..

And it goes on... Freeze, Renegotiate, Sign-off, Clamp down, Eradicate duplication...

Strong words. And they'll need strength to carry it through.

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A strong opposition is a vital part of democracy, but for a journalist it fulfils a second function. A strong opposition is a useful source of stories.

Holding the government to account is much more fun with access to the pick of an opposition MPs postbag... a constant drip of case examples of wrong doing and mismanagement.

But that drip has now firmly dried up.

All the keen young things are Conservative. Both (!) our Lib Dems are in there with them - Chris Huhne's a cabinet secretary for heaven's sake!

That leaves just two Labour MPs in the South of England, Alan Whitehead and John Denham in Southampton, to keep the executive in check.

So we're having to cast the net a bit wider. The Green Party candidate in New Forest East, Beverly Golden, is a lawyer and impressed us on the Politics Show this weekend.

Anther option is to go for "former" big hitters. Jim Braithwaite used to be chairman of the South East England Development Agency and had useful things to say about Conservative plans to axe the quango (though the blade seemed to have stopped half way through the neck in the end...).

And what's the shelf-life of these "former" MPs? Sarah McCarthy-Fry got a good run out on Radio Solent this week - she knows where the elephant traps are in the Treasury, having been a minister there - but as weeks go by the relevance of that knowledge decays.

There's Jim Knight in Dorset. He was one of the longest serving schools ministers, and has a lot to say on a flagship Conservative policy. But now that he's an un-elected voice his legitimacy in any discussion is halved, at least, and falling fast.

Should we make exceptions, for exceptional times? Search out new voices of protest, from academia? the unions? Or just accept that the coalition itself presents enough potential for internal protest that we simply have wait patiently for a new opposition to come along?

As ever, all suggestions welcome.

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The staff at the House of Commons are famed for their knowledge of faces. But even they have been hard-pressed to learn the names of 250 new MPs all at once.

So I was more than a little impressed by the greeting that the new MP for Dorset South, Richard Drax, received when walking in with me through St Stephen's entrance.

My impeccably dressed former BBC colleague was struggling to find his pass under layers of fine tailoring but the policeman on duty waved him through with a cheery "That will be fine, Mr Drax."

As we walked on I commented on the hard work they must have put in mugging up on the new intake.

"Don't be fooled" says Richard. "They only know me because I went around on the first day introducing myself to them all."

Good army officer training you see - defuse the security risk and secure an easy line of escape, all in one simple act of good manners.

Now he's just got to straighten out things with the whips after his comments about the "appalling" deal with the Lib Dems...

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The Downing Street garden was an oasis of calm after the tumultuous last days of this campaign. Order was restored, albeit a rather gooey, strange new order. The birds were singing, and the storm clouds hadn't yet rolled back.

While the two nice young men above were cracking jokes I found myself reflecting on some of the stranger things we came across during this campaign.

We always expected UKIP's Nigel Farage would inject some colour into the campaign, but black and blue was not exactly what we bargained for.

The contest with John Bercow in Buckingham had not grabbed viewers' interest. The Prime Ministerial debates became a distraction from local campaigning. But when Farage's plane turned out to have two right wings this blog instantly doubled its readership.

The best election quote surely came from the ambulanceman who announced with a straight face that "Mr Farage was unconscious but still talking".

The local radio debates worked well too. Radio Solent's "Megaphone Tour" managed a constituency a day throughout the campaign, really getting under the skin of some great local talking points: the sort of gritty things listeners didn't realise they cared about until they found themselves arguing back at the radio.

The regional TV debate proved a real hit with our audience as we took over The Hexagon in Reading, the place where they hold the snooker, and our viewers whooped and cheered as Greens potted reds and blues colllided with yellows, all captured on a six camera OB that really showcased the in-house talents of BBC South's excellent technical and creative team.

Who said politicians weren't honest? One sent me a long email on the horrors of the campaign trail, telling a journalist in writing that "I'll be glad when I lose". Another candidate replied to a question about whether he'd sign up to a pledge of honest campaiging with "I don't think I should, given what I'm up to".

Who will forget that bitter spat between Conservative defence spokesman Julian Lewis and his Lib Dem rival Colonel Terry Scriven in the New Forest, revolving around the military man's attempt to pull rank by using photos of himself in ceremonial uniform?

Or our former BBC colleague Richard Plunkett-Ernle-Erle-Drax who survived attempts by the Liberal Democrats to brand him too posh and then found his criticisms of the Yellow peril getting headlines on his day two in Westminster.

How quickly those bruises are forgotten may determine how well the coalition survives. And of course we're all looking forward to Nigel Farage getting his breath back when his broken ribs heal.

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With the Conservatives offering a referendum on the Alternative Vote, rather than full proportional representation, we get to the meat of this negotiating process.

David Cameron seems to be going out on a limb. Risking the wrath of his core supporters in the South, who worry that he's going soft to get into No 10.

But how much has really been given away?

The Electoral Reform Society has this afternoon issued what it says would have been the results of this election, in the South East Government region, under three different systems of voting:
The top line is the number of MPs gained under first past the post. Conservatives won the huge majority of seats.

The next line is the result under STV - the most used form of proportional representation.

LIberal Democrats would add another 19 seats in the South East: MPs like Sandra Gidley in Romsey, David Rendel in Newbury, Evan Harris in Oxford and more than a dozen others could take their places on the green benches.

But on the third line - the Alternative Vote, or AV - there would be hardly any change from the current system.

Dr Ken Ritchie, Chief Executive of the Electoral Reform Society said:

"Gordon Brown's departure has opened the door for coalition talks with Labour.

"Clegg now has three clear choices on voting reform, but only one can deliver on the promise of a New Politics. First-Past-the-Post is the politics of no change, the Alternative Vote, a modest reform for those who don't 'do' change. Only a shift to STV can rebalance our politics in favour of the public.

None of this is a precise science. The chart shows no Green Party MP under STV. The Electoral Reform Society agree that when people knew even small numbers of votes would stack up they would be more likely to go for it.

The model uses the second preference data of a ComRes poll on 26 April 2010. They admit that this data has a number of shortcomings when it comes to estimating how votes for smaller parties might transfer. But they claim that in most seats the simulated outcome is not particularly sensitive to the accuracy of the assumptions made on transfers.

There would also be other variations from the tactical choices we make now, and might make differently under STV. And of course, many others systems are available and already in use in the UK.

Professor Simon Hix of the LSE, Professor Ron Johnston University of Bristol and Professor Iain McLean of the University of Oxford have produced a study of the various trade-offs for the British Academy.

The Conservatives say that AV is their "final offer" - going the extra mile. They are suggesting a referendum at which time all these factors could be properly examined by the British people.

So right now for the Lib Dems it's take it or leave it: Deal or No Deal?

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What have we voted for? On today's Politics Show debate I was struck by how downbeat our three politicians felt about the chance of striking any sort of coalition deal.

Liberal Democrat Sandra Gidley has lost her seat to Conservatives in Romsey, but take a look at the quote below: Sour grapes, or someone with the freedom to speak candidly?

"David Cameron has made a big mistake by suggesting that it [PR] is not on the agenda. He's shown that the party hasn't really changed and they quite like it when it's buggins turn again. So PR has got to be first on the agenda.

And it's not on the agenda, so what do you say about the coalition?

I think a coalition is probably not possible and a lot of our party members would be upset."

Newly-elected Conservative Penny Mordaunt felt that her leader David Cameron may have to give more ground, but the pressure is on the Liberal Democrats.

"This is a test for Nick Clegg to put the country before his party. Yes, we can have discussions about electoral reform but there are more important things - the economy being top of the list - we need a government that's going to get to grips with that."

Southampton Labour MP Alan Whitehead felt a LibCon deal would be unworkable:

"If there was a coalition a number of Liberal Democrats would have to sit on their hands while a government passes measures that they would find completely anathema."

Of course it could all be sorted out tonight.. but if you'd like a snapshot of the unfolding scenario as seen from a South of England perspective take a look at the Politics Show discussion on the iPlayer by clicking here.

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Reading West has the single biggest swing in the South Today Broadcast Area with 12.1% from Labour to the Conservatives.

8 seats have swung Labour to Conservative - with an average swing of 7.5%

In 29 seats there's been a swing of votes from Liberal Democrats to Conservatives - with an average swing of 3.8%

In another 8 seats, there's been a swing from Conservatives to Liberal Democrats - average of 1.8%

And the only other swing is from Labour to the Greens (Brighton Pavilion) with a swing of 8.4%

BBC Online is doing a great job presenting all the results in nationwide analysis here.

At a constituency level here.

And here's a round-up the old fashioned way - county-by-county.

Hampshire

Dorset

Berkshire

Oxfordshire

Surrey

Sussex

Wiltshire

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Reading was once Labour's stronghold in the South. Alok Sharma banged the final nail into the red coffin this morning as the result of the election in Reading West was announced, with a swing of more than 12%.

Don't forget this was Martin Salter's seat - the result that crowned the 1997 Blair result on the foundations of Labour's domination of the Borough Council.

Now the Council is split, and Conservatives safely hold both parliamentary seats.

The rising Tory tide toppled Labour in Portsmouth and Dorset South and swept away the Lib Dems in Romsey and Winchester and Oxford West.

And it was a tide - an upswelling of support even in safe Conservative seats - fully justifying the Conservative assertion that in his heartland at least David Cameron sealed the deal with the electorate.

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We've just heard that John Denham, Labour's most senior politician in the South, has squeaked back in Southampton.

It should have been the safest seat - with a 9,000 majority - so what cost him so many votes? Boundary changes play a part, but his colleague Alan Whitehead took a pasting too, and fellow cabinet minister Jim Knight paid a price for a high profile in this government.

Compare that result with Oxford East, where Lib Dems really thought they'd beaten another Labour top gun - Andrew Smith.

He won that 4,000 majority with a strategy of door-to-door campaigning, positively rejecting media interviews for the best part of three years.

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I just love this photo - a clear message for voters at Plaistow in West Sussex. Although, given the problems with queues at some polling station, perhaps it should have said get yourself in gear and hurry up and vote!

Or perhaps more seriously this is an explanation for the Liberal Democrat vote drying up?

Portsmouth South's Mike Hancock and Chris Huhne in Eastleigh were the only Southern Lib Dems to increase their majority.

Dr Evan Harris was the shock casualty in Oxford West and Abingdon. Winchester and Romsey were more predictable losses.

In Dorset Annette Brooke just hung on, but maybe more damaging for the party in the long run will be all the dashed dreams - Guildford, Dorset West, Newbury - last week they were thinking maybe Reading, maybe Meon Valley... maybe not.

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We haven't yet heard the first results, I'm poised in our Southampton nerve centre, but already the back-biting has begun.

Of course we're expecting jostling within Labour as the few surviving MPs in the South try to work out the party's future direction.

UKIPs Nigel Farage will be asking whose idea it was to put him in that plane for the photocall.. not the sort of bounce that he wanted!

And it's only the start of working out what's happened to the Liberal Democrat vote.. But some are already telling me they may have made some poor campaigning choices.

Perhaps overcome by Cleggmania they're suggesting that some poor calls were made in week two of the campaign, switching resources from seats they were defending like Winchester into ones where they suddenly felt they had a chance.

Perhaps it will prove a brave move later tonight. But I'm told lobbying from the two former MPs carried the day, when others felt that newer candidates had a better chance.

Watch Newbury and Guildford carefully. If David Rendel and Sue Doughty are victorious then they've proved the doubters wrong. But if Liz Leffman manages to run it closer in the new Hampshire seat of Meon Valley then the knives will be out.

And the Conservatives? I ran into a Shadow Minister a little earlier. "Looking forward to a shorter summer holiday if Dave's in charge?" I asked.

"Well, of course. Ministers of State have to get straight down to work!" He shoots back.

Precisely how many different chickens were being counted in that one answer?

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The South East of England MEP and former leader of the UK Independence Party Nigel Farage has been injured in a plane crash this morning.

He was in the front seat of a light aircraft which was taking off around 8 o'clock from Hinton-in-the-Hedges airfield near Brackley in Northamptonshire.

Eyewitnesses say the plane had a voting day promotional banner attached. As the plane banked the banner was tangled on the tail fin.

The dark blue light plane crashed upside down in a nearby field.

The pilot and Nigel Farage have been taken from the aircraft to an ambulance. Police say their injuries are not thought to be serious.

The pilot was airlifted to the University Hospital in Coventry while the passenger - thought to be Mr Farage - was taken to the Horton Hospital in Banbury.

A spokeswoman for UKIP has confirmed that Mr Farage was injured but said "He's going to be fine." The former party leader is standing in the Buckingham Constituency at the UK General Election.

Earlier in the campaign Nigel was telling me how much he was enjoying being part of British domestic politics.

Let's hope he and the pilot are OK.

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Once all the arguments have been had, the promises made, the pictures taken, what's left for a candidate to do?

If you're a campaigner who's not quite sure of your support - and many of them aren't - these last desperate days can lead to desperate measures.

Taking it out on rivals' posters seems to be order of the day. In the normally tranquil New Forest Conservative Julian Lewis reckons more than 200 have been "systematically defaced, destroyed or vandalised."

"Every hour my people spend replacing signs is an hour they're not knocking on doors" he says. "It's very serious."

He's hot on the heels of the culprits, tracking down a conversation on Facebook where he says the vandals boast of their work - and he's sent it to the police.

These things can be serious. In Weymouth a Labour supporter woke in the night to find his front porch on fire after a poster was set ablaze.

He damped down the flames, and I went to see him the next day. Remarkably he'd already replaced the poster!

In Romsey Liberal Democrats were perplexed when they caught a rival at work with a roller applying what seemed to be water on his own poster.

They photographed him and rang police with tales of what they claimed was a double-bluff, perhaps involving a paint that went black when the vandal was well away from the scene.

Several days later they've decided it was probably an anti-vandal precaution...

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As an undecided voter in the closely fought marginal seat of Portsmouth North Nicki Fletcher has seen plenty of election literature coming through her door.

She tapped me on the shoulder after we parked the South Today satellite truck near her house last night.

Nicki saw me blathering on her TV about how "every vote counts" and how the parties were all working so hard to win people over.

The problem is that none of the election literature she's been sent has been addressed to her - every single pamphlet and flyer has been addressed to her husband, Lee.

Nicki is so fed up that she's written an email to the three party leaders offering her vote - possibly a vital vote - for the best answer:

Dear Mr Brown, Mr Cameron and Mr Clegg,

Don't any of you believe your party's position on equalities?

I would like to be treated as an intelligent person with a mind of my own.

Please rectify this by sending fresh copies of your election material (that are currently being waved under my nose by my smug git of a husband)

And please make sure they are addressed to ME this time.

Yours Sincerely

Nicki Fletcher (Mrs)

With both Labour and Conservatives fielding female candidates in Portsmouth North, let's hope she gets proper attention now.

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I took a quick break from rehearsing for The Politics Show live hustings in Dorchester yesterday and popped outside still wearing my radio mic. These little devices are devilishly clever at picking up your every word but they're also a faff to put on, as you feed the wire down your shirt and around the waistband to the transmitter pack.

Cabinet Minister Jim Knight started to chat about what people were telling him on the doorstep, when he spotted the tiny black mic on my shirt. "Is that on?...."

Oh, how the Prime Minister must regret not taking his radio mic off, or realizing his bigot comments might still be heard. But was it really his fault?

These things are always operated on an element of trust. You wear it, but expect some discretion from the person overhearing your conversation at the other end. Especially if your break from filming is to answer the call of nature.

Charles Moore writes in today's Daily Telegraph how he feels broadcasters broke the rules of confidentiality - that if it had been a BBC microphone the recording might never have come to light.

He ridicules the BBC's rules as "bureaucracy" but others would say they're there to establish what should and shouldn't be recorded.

Or was Gordon Brown's comment fair game?

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