"A Straight Choice" in Dunfermline

According to the Dunfermline and West Fife Lib Dems' web site, the "by-election will be a straight choice between Tony Blair's representative and Willie Rennie."

Nick Assinder says that a leaflet with the same phrase is also being distributed by the Lib Dem by-election campaign. Lib Dems claim it is an innocent coincidence.

East Midlands Hustings Report

Went to these "unoffical" hustings in Kirkby-in-Ashfield near Nottingham last night. Because the leadership election timetable is a bit more compressed than usual, not all the regions have offical hustings. For most of our region the Coventry hustings would be OK and would be closer for me. But I have a son who is nearly two years-old and Thomas The Tank Engine is at the Great Central Railway on that day! So many thanks to the Ashfield Local Party for organising these hustings.

Simon Hughes & Chris Huhne were there in person. Nick Clegg stood in for Ming who has to be at the Dunfermline by-election early today so couldn't make it.

Simon impressed, both as a public speaker and as someone apparently taking the week's events in his stride. He said he was ambitious for the party and looked at having at least 100 MPs. He'd done his research and knew the potential gains in the East Midlands. Simon also pointed to a poll in the Sunday Telegraph that put the party on a steady 18%. When all voters were asked whether the revelations had made them more or less likely to vote Lib Dem, 80 per cent said it made no difference.

As you'd expect Nick Clegg did a good job as Ming's representative. He expected the page to be turned fairly quickly after recent events and said that the media would be surprised at the "ferocity" of the Lib Dem response. He pointed to Ming's passion for liberalism as well as his authority - citing his opposition to the war in Iraq and reservations about Nuclear Fission power stations as examples of him being a "pinstripe radical."

Chris Huhne's delivery was measured but he still doesn't quite inspire me as a public speaker. Although I think this will come pretty easily to him with a few more set piece speeches. He was impressive in the subsequent Q&A section, building an impressive performance in the Sky News panel format. Again Chris thought that recent events would be forgotten pretty quickly. He stressed his environmental views. His most telling contribution was to point out that Lib Dem target seats are now almost equally Tory and Labour held. Prior to 2005, they were mostly Tory.

There were some questions to all candidates. This is summary of their responses and not directly quoted:

1) What will your first actions as leader be?
SH: A good Harrogate Conference speech to kick-start the leadership; Providing support for the May local elections; look at improving diversity of Lib Dem candidates.
NC: Look at improving the party's campaign techniques and use of IT for communications. We also need to provide a more detailed alternative to government policy in areas such as Housing, Finance and Devolution.
CH: Similar to MC, although he accentuated the need to learn the lessons in terms of planning, campaign techniques and financing from Tory - Lib Dem contests at the last election

2) What is your stance on coalitions?
NC: Speculation has damaged the party when we have allowed it to become the media focus of the campaign such as in 1992. The key is to elect as many Lib Dem MPs as possible.
CH: The media should be looking at the chances of a Lab/Con Grand coalition like we have now in Germany. They are so close together that such a coalition is more likely. Our record in the partnership govt. in Scotland has not damaged us as a separate party. The chances of no party having a majority of MPs after the next election are great. Labour need just a 1.5% drop to lose their majority. The Tories need a swing of 7%, which they have never achieved. Their best was 5% under Thatcher in 1979.
SH: The Tories have polled their lowest 3 shares of the vote since 1832 at the last 3 elections. Labour govern on the smallest share for a majority party ever. This re-inforces our case for a fairer electoral system. We would look at working with other parties only after Proportional Representation is in law. The more Lib Dem MPs that are in the Commons, the better chance we will have of being able to block poor legislation and getting Lib Dem policy into law.

Chris Huhne answered my concerns about his rather slim majority of 568 votes well. He was not the incumbent in 2005. The average swing against us in seats where our MP was standing down was 4%. In Eastleigh it was restricted to 2.6%. The Tories also poured resources into their campaign to defeat him. So as long as he works hard and builds a good organisation in Eastleigh he should be OK. Charles Kennedy's seat looked dodgy in 2001 after boundary changes but he held on well there.

Simon Hughes was asked my question about the disappointing result we had when he stood for London Mayor in 2004. He pointed out that he received more votes than any other individual Lib Dem candidate before or since. He said that he was unable to overtake the Tories because they poured far more money than us into their campaign. He also said his task was made more difficult by Ken Livingstone rejoining Labour.

Whilst I take the point about the Tories, I am disappointed that he didn't admit that his campaign could have been run better within the existing resources. There was a definite chance to improve our vote by regaining voters attracted to an Independent Ken Livingstone, who could not vote for him as a Labour candidate. I hope that Simon Hughes will use his experience of the organisational side of the campaign should he beome leader.

The upshot is that I am even more open-minded with my preferences than before I went into the Hustings. Previously I had ruled out Simon Hughes but now he could still get my 1st or 2nd preference. I think PMQs, Question Time, other media performances and the debates on the Lib Dem grapevine will determine my vote.

The Hustings also showed that Nick Clegg is definitely worth watching in the future (as if we didn't know)

The Media Witch Hunt: The Truth Part 1

All sorts of half-truths and plain lies are doing the rounds in the gutter press and broadsheets. Sometimes I think Murdoch has decided to be Witchfinder General trying to destroy the Lib Dems. The time has come to introduce a little Pravda.

Myth 1: The Scotsman reports, "Simon Hughes is now out of the running for the Lib Dem leadership after revelations about his sex life, rival Chris Huhne has said."

The lack of a direct quote from Huhne is suspicious. In fact the actual quote in the article is:

"It's a fact that in terms of the perceptions of both journalism and the bookies it is now effectively a fairly close race between me and Ming. So to that extent that is a consequence. But it certainly is not one that I sought and I had obviously moved ahead of Mark (Oaten) before all these revelations. This was something that I very much do not want to will on the party"

So the headline should have been, "Simon Hughes is now out of the running for the Lib Dem leadership after revelations about his sex life, according to bookies and journalists." But that might be just too accurate.

Myth 2: The Liberal/SDP Alliance ran a homophobic campaign in the 1983 Bermondsey byelection. See the BBC and several broadsheets and tabloids over the past week.

The phrase "A Straight Choice" was a standard Alliance squeeze message and used in many seats at the time. An example of the same slogan in a different by-election can be found from the the Brecon campaign in 1985, two years later.

A two horse race is more usual nowadays (see Dunfermline & West Fife literature for up-to-the minute examples).

The homophobia is just another urban myth propagated by enemies of Simon and the Liberal Democrats.

A lot of the Bermondsey byelection literature from the Alliance can be found here. The phrase "A Straight Choice" was used just once in the context of a squeeze message on a leaflet.

Complaints about a G2V star

Is The Sun making a "pejorative reference to an individual's .... sexual orientation" today?

Do bears......?

"Second limp-dem confesses": looks pretty pejorative to me, as does the Caldwell "cartoon".

An email to The Scum's "Editor" is en-route. Followed by a complaint to the PCC.

1, 2, 3 ?

I'm still undecided on who will get my first and second preferences. It won't be Simon Hughes though. He has a clear style of presentation but was our candidate in a poorly run London Mayoral campaign and has made some odd pronouncements during his term as party President. If he wins he will need to ensure that his leadership of the party is both organised and focussed. A trite point, but I don't approve of the Flash on his campaign web site. Awful for search engine optimisation and basic browsing.

So Ming or Chris? Menzies Campbell has the experience and steady hand that the party needs at this time. We are beginning to see glimpses of the authority that he brought to his role as Shadow Foreign Secretary but this is not yet consistent enough in the leadership context. Today's PMQ was worthy but rather safe and disappointing.

Chris Huhne has a more distinctive policy line and performs well in a question and answer/ panel style environment. I need to be convinced of his speech making and just need see more of him as until 2 weeks ago I knew very little about him. Any worries about his majority in Eastleigh are alleviated by the committment to his constituency that he has demonstrated since his election last May.

I think I will make my decision based on the hustings that I am off to and media performances over the coming weeks.

Are we heading for Ming's Coronation?

So Charles Kennedy has gone, although he may well be back on the front bench in the future.

Meanwhile the Lib Dems need a new Leader (we are not leaderless at the moment as Menzies Campbell is Acting Leader)

As I write potential candidates Mark Oaten & Nick Clegg are both backing Ming, who has already declared his intention to stand.

We could be heading for a coronation but if someone else throws their hat into the ring, it will interesting to see what Oaten & Clegg do. The only reasons for MPs allying themselves with a candidate is:

1. They want a quick move to a new leader and think the candidate will be unopposed - a leadership election can take up to 10 weeks so would end sometime in March 2006;
2. They don't have enough MPs to get themselves nominated;
3. The don't want to be Leader anyway.

In my opinion Oaten & Clegg fall into Category 1. If the election is contested then that becomes irrelevant. And they won't have to worry about splitting the vote. The AV voting system used (a single-winner version of STV) means that if they don't get enough votes to be among the leading contenders, then the other preferences of their voters will be counted (this is not a very good way of putting it but for more detail see the Wikipedia article) . It's a far more elegant and quicker method than the repeated ballots the Tories use to allow their MPs to whittle down their leadership contenders

Personally I hope for either a coronation of Ming or a completely open contest in which all the major players are on the ballot paper. I think Ming vs. a couple of outsiders will just distract from the normal campaigning activities of the Lib Dems.

An early Christmas present

As the nights got longer in late November, I finally bought a telescope. I had one loaned to me briefly when I was doing GSCE Astronomy at school and was also able to use the Manor Road observatory when I was Leicester University.

My new 'scope is similar to the one I had at school. It's a Skywatcher Explorer 150 - a 6" Newtonian Reflector on an equatorial mount.

I've had the 'scope for about 6 weeks now and of course on most of evenings when I might have used it the sky was cloudy. But I've had a couple of decent clear evenings now.

Mars is well-placed at the moment and Venus was a pretty good evening object in December but you had to be quick or it disappeared behind the trees soon after the Sun had set.

I hope to look at the Moon next and some clusters.

Ramm Must Go

There is always room for legitimate debate about any party's leadership and direction. But the anonymous briefings against Charles Kennedy before Christmas have now been followed by an absurd and ill-conceived petition over the New Year.

The petition is run by an independent magazine called The Liberal but is being portrayed by the organisers as a groundswell movement of Lib Dem members and supporters.

Just a few of the things that are wrong about this campaign:

• The petition website does not make it clear who is behind the petition. There are only obscure web and email links to the magazine in question;
  
• No checks about who is signing the petition. There are already reports of people signing on behalf of someone else without seeking permission;
• No checks whether signatories are in fact Lib Dem members. Tony Blair could sign and still be part of the total;
• No verification of email addresses. Creativity is encouraged;
• It won't achieve the aims of the organisers. There are constitutional means for this;
  
• Ben Ramm, the editor of the magazine behind the petition is happy to run to the media and claim the backing of MPs and councillors, yet he refuses to publish the signatories. Not exactly open and transparent;

Whatever the future of the Charles Kennedy's leadership is, The Liberal and it's backers do not come up smelling of roses. Rather like the anonymous anti-Kennedy briefers, the odour is more one of opportunism and desperation.

Fed up of this silliness, I decided to balance it out with some silliness of my own: Ramm Must Go