The Moon of Liberty

Are The Sun Opening a dangerous box?

It's one the the most emotive questions of all, how would you react if someone you loved or cared for was murdered? The reality is of course, you don't know, and hopefully you never will as that would mean it has happened to you. I would guess the reaction would be absed on emotion rather than logic, and human beings should surely be no other way, but it is no way to run a justice system.

Murderers it would seem, are not hard to find in the news these days. From the recent conviction of Steve Wright for the Soham murders, to todays conviction of Levi Bellfield. The question of how to repsond to murder, personally and in terms of law is right at the front of the agenda. The mother of Sally Ann Bowman was clear in her response, she wanted the murderer dead. It's impossible not to sympathise with her position, but is a life for a life really the way forward?

The Sun used this call to 'open the debate' on the reintroduction of capital punishment. Despite the paper making clear it's instinct was not to bring the death penalty back, they wanted a big debate on the issue, the reasons are perfectly noble of course, my guess is they expected the poll they ran to produce an 80-20 split in favour of the reintroduction, in line with previous polls. The debate would create an element of mischief, becuase even the possiblilty of bringing it back would be a clear breach of EU law, and by debating this the paper, while not supporting reintroduction, is clearly stating that we refuse to rule something out just because the EU says so. It's nice bit of EU bashing nicely thrown into the mix by default as a result.

They probably assumed there was a reasonable minority against reintroduction, and they could then say they understood the calls for the death penalty to be brought back, but we can't run a justice system on that emotional response, and the fact a sizeable minority agreed justified themselves going against the majoirty.

However they got a major shock today. The poll was not 80-20 in favour, not even 90-10, but 99-1. That's 99% in favour, and 1% against. True it is only a poll of it's readers, but is it really sustainable for the nations biggest selling paper to hold it's position whilst 99% of it's own readership disagree? What is more there were more than 95,000 votes cast, so it can hardly be dismissed as a small, self selecting sample as most Sun polls can.

It will be facinating to see how the Sun can hold it's position, if indeed it can. Our system is certainly not so perfect that there are no miscarriages of justice, to take the chance of killing one innocent man is surely a dangerous route to go down. This 'debate' however is not as clear cut is the editors of The Sun probably first thought, and if our biggest selling newspaper, the one every politician courts assiduously come election time, switches sides on this issue, the consequences for Britian could be great, in my view for the worse. Whichever side you are on, I advise to keep watching, the outcome could have big ramifications for the mindset of the British attitude to our justice system for a long time to come.

After a break from the blog I begin with a look at the facinating picture in Brtiish politics. Over the last few weeks we have seen the emergence of Prime Minister Brown. He has claimed to be the end of spin over substance, and yet, the opposite appears to be true. During the 'honeymoon', which is all about spin and presentations, Brown has done exceptionally well. Now we are getting back to substance as the honeymoon ends, his lead is starting to evaporate and his Conservtive opponents are back in the game.

Today poll reports are suggesting the gap has narrowed to as close to all square as possible. One poll even has it all square, another that gave Brown a 10 point lead only a few weeks ago now had it cut to three. It is being reported tonight that a third poll to be published tomorrow has a one point Labour lead. Taking margin for error into account, and the ability of polling data to consistantly over estimate the Labour position, we are effectively all square with everything to play for.

The interesting thing about what we are seeing now is that it coincides with a dominance of a key area of politics in which Brown is widely considered strong and Cameron weak, notably that of policy. If Cameron's position on family policy porved a disaster, which it did, he has recovered the ground on tax and crime. His attack over prison policy and early release schemes, the ambitous plans in John Redwood's report to cut red-tape for businesses and cut tax have all gone down well, despite the BBC's attempts to rubbish the Redwood report in a manner they had to apologise for.

In addition, you only have to look at the editorial line of the Sun newspaper to know Brown has many problems. They have attacked Brown day by day, on Europe, on immigration, on tax, on the economy, on crime and disorder, on education, on hospitals. Day after day the editorial line of the UK's leading paper has been a drip, drip, drip attack. Todays polling news suggests this is having a major effect, Brown's problem is that it will be difficult to stop them doing it.

So we go into the conferences and it is truely game on. Over the next few weeks we will see the true opening salvos of the next general election. It could still go either. Browns support for the EU treaty is very unpopular, and he has much to do in reassuring pepople on crime after recent high profile murders. in the measures in the report on family policy Cameron has many pitfalls too, he also has to resist the temptation to vere too much to the right, while mainitaining enough of the polcies that will keep traditional Tories and the likes of the Sun and the Mail on board, without scaring the horses.

This summer we have seen Cameron, who has looked like a winner from day one, wobble, now we are seeing Prime Minister Brown wobble for the first time too. In a long campaign you get wobbles. Everyone from Bill Clinton to Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher to Tony Blair had them. You may not remember them, thats because in the end they are forgotten if you are a winner. You may remember more the wobbles of the likes of Neil Kinnock and William Hague, beacuse they are only remembered if you are a loser. When it comes to Brown verses Cameron, this conference season may give us the first real indication of which one of these formidable operators is a winner.

New Prime Minster Gordon Brown has had a pretty good first few weeks. His job has been made easier by many mistakes during that same period by his opponents, but still Gordon himslef has run a steady as she goes regime so far, and he has not frightened the horses in the way many thought he may.

He dealt with the Terrorist attacks with a calm, reassuring manner that impressed many. His brave decision to promote the MP for Redditch, Jackie Smith, has been welcomed by many, and vindicated in the way she has dealt with the position so far. His honeymoon period has allowed him to turn the polls around for Labour from a minor deficit to a lead of around 6%. There are signs however the these polls are stabalising and you would expect some edge to come off that lead in due course. So if the honeymoon is coming to an end, could things now begin to go wrong.

The answer is of course that this will depned on what events get thrown up. He has controversial decisions to make over new anti-terror laws. His support for ID cards and wanting to increase the detention period without charge could lead to opposition. His early release scheme for prisoners has come under fire, so has his decision to rule out a referendum on the new EU treaty. The ecomomy is also not as strong as it was, and if that continues, the man who has run it for the last 10 years, Mr Brown himself, could get the blame. So there are many pitfalls that could cause problems on the horision.

We do however live in an age where often perception and image are sometimes as important as reality. So for all the policy areas I have just mentioned, Brown's biggest danger maybe more of the sort covered by this article in the Mail on Sunday documenting what Gordon has had to deal with in his short time as Prime Minister. First a terrorist attack, then floods and now foot and mouth disease's return. None of these are issues that the opposition can make any capital out of directly, to try would actually damage them, but the image of Gordon Brown's regime following one crisis after another could become a big problem for the Government.

Gordon could be in danger of becoming a victim of circumstances through no fault of his own. If people begin to link his Governemnt with crisis after crisis, the view that something different may be needed to stop the rot may become subconciously prevelent in the minds of the public. There is only so long the media can begin with the words 'And Gordon Brown is facing another crisis today' before Gordon Brown and crisis become inextricably linked. If this happens, Gordon could find himself in danger dispite having done nothing worng personally. He must surely hope nothing else out of theordinary happens for a while, or he could become 'Crisis Man,' which will not help him fight a furture election anymore easily.

Last Thursday two by elections took place for two vacant seats in the House of Commons. One was due to the standing down of Tony Blair in Sedgefield in County Durham. The other took place in Ealing Southall in London, where the Labour MP there recently passed away.

In Sedgefield Labour held the seat comfortably as had been expected. The Liberal Democrats came second but well behind and the Conservatives third. Nothing out of the ordinary happened there as this was the expected result. The more unpredictable election was in Ealing. Labour began with a majority of 11,000 and by the end of the night they held the seat with a majority of only 3,000. The Liberal Democrats came second and the Conservative, who put a huge amount of effort into this seat, including speculating they may even win it or at elase come a close second, ended up a fairly miserable third.

For Labour there will be some releif they have held both seats. A Governemnt defending seats in a by election is always very difficult. It reinforces the polling evidence that while new PM Gordon Brown is doing well with a steady as she goes approach and is not yet at least scaring anyone away as some in the Labour party had feared, some his opponenets had hoped he might do.

For  the Liberal Democrats it is a mixed bag. They will have hoped to run Labour closer in Sedgefield as it was clear from the off they were the main challengers there. In Ealing they will have been pleased to secure a resonable second, cutting Labour's majority and holding off the Conervatives push to move ahead of them. Having said that, passed experience shows this is the sort of seat that in the past they have actually won in by elections. There by election strategy is a formidable one but on this occasion had not had any huge impact. Liberal leader Ming Cambell will still have plenty of critics on the back of this, but has done just about enough for now to remain leader.

The biggest impact of these results will be on the Tories. Leader David Cameron has from day one tried to make the Conservatives approach a softer and in many ways more Liberal approach. His right-wing critics are already getting the knives out. They state the Conservatives are being punished for not being Conservative enough and state Cameron must do this to get his act together.

Are these critics correct however. In the last couple of weeks the Conservative coverage in the news has been all about exactly the sort of issues these critics have been going on about. I discussed the alcohol tax in a previous entry on here, an attempt to stop 'binge-drinking,' exactly the sort of issue the moral right like to talk about. Cameron has also committed himself to tax breaks specifically for married couples, something these same people fully support. Since these measures were introduced, Labour have taken the lead in the polls and the Consevratives have fallen behind.

Why would this be if traditional Conservatove polices are needed as Cameron's critics suggest? The reality is probably that the sort of voters Cameron has been targeting with his new approach, do not like the moralising that goes with the sort of measures that came out of Iain Duncan-Smith's report. These ideas of the moral right are why the Tories are behind, are why they did so badly on Thursday. The irony of Thursday is those who cirticise Cameron for Thursday, are actually the people who have pushed Cameron into backing ideas that have come out in the last couple of weeks. It is they who are to blame for Thursday's failure, not what Cameron was doing before this point.

We are in a strange position in politics right now. Usually the Governemnt and what it does drive the political temperature. Not now though. Brown is a caution man and will continue to play safe, it is what the opposition leader Mr Cameron does that will be the key. The right will use this result as a means of trying to push the Conservtives towards more of the sort of ideas we have seen in the last two weeks, they don't understand that this is the reason why Cameron is now struggling. Now we will see if Cameron is really fit for Governemnt. Does he have the courage to decisively ignore and defeat his critics, or will he cave in some more, and hand Gordon Brown an easy ride on a plate?

So it's official, the Conservatives finally have a candidate to take on Mayor of London Ken Livingstone next May. It took them a long time to get here, several bizarre daliences with certain people, and finally it comes down to what we now know.

First the Tories tried to team up with the Lib Dems to get Greg Dyke to run, a man as far away from Conservatiism as it gets. Then they tried to get Digby Jones, then Director General of the CBI, to stand as their candidate. He is now of course a Labour minister in the Lords, how fickle political allegences can be in the modern day and age.

And now, tep up none other than Boris Johnson. He has today confirmed he will make a bid for the biggest office in London. If he wins he will become the most powerful conservative in Britian, Boris Johnson, fancy that.

Boris of course came to national fame after being given a complete mauling on the TV comedy show 'Have I Got News For You,' particularly by Ian Hislop. Thsi went down so well, he appeared again, and then again, and before long Boris was a national phenomonon, with many university groups up and down the land claiming our Boris should by PM.

Before his appearences on the show, he was a little known Daily Telegraph journalist with a Tory edge to his articles as many Telegraph journalists tend to do. By now however he was on any TV show that would take him. He has since even hosted on a number of occasions the show that made him famous and he has driven cars with Jeremy Clarkson on 'Top Gear.'  

He is gaffe prone too. His well publicised affair with Petronoella Wyatt did not go down too well with traditional Tories. His attack on the people of Liverpool infuriated then leader Michael Howard, he has also managed to alienate the people of Portsmouth, Papua New Guinea and been not too nice about Jamie Oliver's healthy eating campaigns.

But the people of Liverpool, Portsmouth and Papau New Guinea don't get a vote in the contest for Mayor of London. Whats more Boris Johnson is the sort of man whom, to his fans, pretty much gets away with anything. His opponent is gaffe prone to, Mr Livingstone's comparison of a Jewish journalist to 'concentration camp guard' was not exactly good manners, and deeply offensive to many in the Jewish community.

So Boris Vs Red Ken. Can Boris really win? Go on any news site where readers are invited to add comments and you will get an inevitable split down the middle. Everything from 'Boris you are great, Boris for mayor, GO Boris!!!' to 'Boris is a complete buffoon who stands no chance.' and every possible view in between. Some say they would rather vote for a prize pig rather than Red Ken, others retort if they vote for Boris, they are close to doing just that. One thing is for sure, the early signs are Boris Johnson has raised the passions and tempreature of this debate. This may just be the most facinating political battle in the UK for over a decade. Mr Livingstone, Mr Johnson, bring it on!!! I can't wait!!!!

Today the lead story in the Mail, the Telegraph, the Times, the Guardian and the Independent, five pillars of our newspaper establishment, in unison lead on the same story. You may think therefore the stroy must have been of some huge significant importance for these competing forces to all agree on one thing.

Could it be Iraq, or Afghanistan? How about the state of schools or the Health Service? Maybe it is the aftermath of flooding or further such wanrings about, and the potential consquences to the planet of such a change to the climate. Perhaps, if they wanted some more light hearted, they could feature David Beckhams arrival in the United states.

But no, all of these papers lead with the story of the demise of former Daily Telegraph owner Conrad Black. I'll link one of the links to the stroy here in case any of you really want to read it. Now if this was amongst the smaller stories you could understand it, but is this really front page news? Is this really what the people of Britain are most interested in? Somehow I doubt it.

Newspapers have long had a love of themselves and their own self importance, none more so than in 1992 when The Sun claimed it was the newspaper, not the thirteen million people who voted for John Major, that won the Conservative's the election. Few will forget the 'Its the Sun what won it' claim. The Sun also had a long standing war with The Mirror, especially in the days of the editorial battles between David Yelland of The Sun and Piers Morgan (now a superstar of 'Britains Got Talent' fame) at the Mirror, to the point where tha battles amongst each other almost overshadowed the news in the paper itself.

So today we have Conrad Black, facing a jail sentence according to most reports, as front page news. Such newspapers should be careful, in the age of the internet, you can argue the newspaper industry needs to adapt as it offers only a once a day experience where you can get updates on a 24/7 basis through TV and the internet. For newspapers to be relevent in this environment it must ensure the front page stories are of interest to those who go into the newsagent and by the paper. Spending it's front pages talking about one of it's own, someone few of the people reading it have ever heard of, will only send circulation figures falling and reinforce an emerging view that the newspaper is out of date.

Ealrier today a little known politican from Wales, a man few outside of Wales or the political anorak community (like myself) knows who he is, was elected Deputy First Minister of the Welsh Assembley. His name is Ieuan Wyn Jones. You may ask, the Welsh assembley? It's not even a parliament, surely that doesn't matter.

It's true to say this will little impact on your everyday lives, or indeed, given how little power the Welsh Assembley has, a huge affect on the everyday lives of even the people of Wales. This election however is the start of a trend that began when devolution was first introduced. in 1997 Tony Blair's newly elected Governemnt promised a Scottish Parliament, a Welsh assembley and a Northern Ireland assembley. All these were delivered.

Blair and Labour argued that for years the Scots and Welsh, who had voted Labour in election after election, still got a Tory Minsiter who they had not voted for running their affairs. At that point they did not know they would become a three term Govenrment, so to guard against this in the future devolution would ensure key decisions in the other nations of the United Kingdom would be made by the devolved bodies. Some in Labour also took for granted that they would have big majorities in Scotland and Wales, ensuring their hold on power there.

The Tories were opposed to this (except in Northern Ireland which they saw as a special case), arguing it would lead to the break-up of the United Kingdom. The Nationlist parties in Scotland and Wales agreed, and obviously supported the proposals seeing them as a trojen horse to independence.

Referendums were won and the bodies were eventually set-up. One promise at least you can't accuse Blair of breaking, but should he have done? At the time the Scottish Parliament referendum was won the then defense secretary George Robertson stated the setting up of the Scottish Parliament killed the argument 'dead.' The Nationalists scoffed. 10 years on, where are we now?

In Northern Ireland things are slighly different. Nationalists and Republicans there don't want Northern Ireland independence of course, but want the province they call 'Ulster' to be under the rule of Dublin. Their opponents, the unionists support the union and Northern Ireland's place in it. In the early days of Northern Ireland devolution, the moderate Ulster Unionsist Party and SDLP from the Nationalist side dominated, the hard line Democratic Unionists and their Republican counterparts Sinn Fain (who many argue have links with the IRA) were very much in the background. Today Ian Paisley of the Democratic Unionists is the leader of the assembley, his deputy is Martin McGuiniss.

McGuiniss leads Sinn Fain in the assembley. With the IRA effectively dispanded, Sinn Fain have one aim, a united Ireland. As part of the devolution package it has been agreed a referendum will be held once a generation, and if a majority want it, Ulster will return to Dublin. Demographics suggest the nationlist/republican side of the argument, currently around 46%, could soon become the majority, this means McGuiniss, the Sinn Fain Presindent Jerry Adams and company, have not only grown as a result of devolution, they may not be far off getting what they want.

Across the sea in Scotland there is another story of Nationalist gains.  In the recent Scottish Parliament election the Scottish Nationalist Party (SNP for short) became the biggest party for the first time. The results break down also suggest that if the wind is against Labour next time, there is scope for a new series of SNP gains at the next election too. There are as many as 16 constituencies where if Tory or Lib Dem voters can be pursuaded to tactically vote against Labour, the SNP could win the seat next time.

The SNP leader Alex Salmond does not have an overall majority, but has for the first time been elected First Minister of Scotland. If his support grows further, he could soon be in a position to push for an independence referendum. It may take one more election for him to be in this position, it may even take two, but Salmond and his party are not going away and support for them is growing. The SNP have unquestionably benefitted from devolution, the independence argument is far from 'dead.'

That brings me back to Mr Wyn Jones. He is the leader of Plaid Cymru (Welsh for 'The Party of Wales') They are the Welsh Nationalists. In his election as Deputy first minister, Mr Wyn Jones has negotiated a refurnedum to give the Welsh assembley offical law making powers, effectively making it a parliament. Not only this, but Labour as part of the agreement are committed to supporting this. If the pattern with Scotland having a Parliament is anything to go by, this is a great opportunity for Plaid Cymru.

This is little evidence for support for Welsh independence now, but today's election of Mr Wyn Jones may be the first step for Wales to follow Scotland down the same path. It also means all three devolved bodies have people commited to the end of the United Kingdom as leader or deputy leader of the body. Nothing will happen overnight, but this could be the beginning of the end for the United kingdom. It is not clear what will stop the path towards this, maybe nothing can. So if in five, ten,  twenty, event thirty or forty years time, Northern Ireland is under Dublin rule, Scotland and Wales are independent and the United Kingdom no longer exists, remember the day I introduced you Ieuan Wyn Jones, he may be far more significant than you may have first thought.

After the smoking ban it's a good question as to how far the nanny state can or should go. Labour is already planning a clampdown on alcohol, with new warnings and the banning of aclohol sponsors on replica football shirts. These measures are the brainchild of Caroline Flint, who for those who don't know (and it will probably come as some suprise to her that anyone wouldn't) is the Minister for public health. She is the current nanny of the nation, she know whats good for us, because of course we don't. In the light of Miss Flint, it would be nice if we had an opposition that did not want to lecture us all on how to live our lives.

Well I'm sorry to inform you that we can only dream. This morning samples of a new report commissioned by the Conservative Party, a report that David Cameron, the Conservative Party leader, has said he supports 'the thrust of' suggests a new tax on alcohol that would increase the price beer by 7p a pint, 20p on a bottle of wine and 70p on a bottle of whisky. Apparently this alcohol tax is, according to Tory MP for Chingford and Woodford, Iain Duncan Smith, 'required to improve the health of the nation.' Mr Duncan Smith did of course lead the Conservative Party once, and many argue he was the worst leader in the history of the party.

It should said this idea has not yet been adoprted as party policy. But given opinon polls now put Gordon Brown and Labour back in the lead, it will be interesting to see what Cameron does. Cameron set this report up in the first place, if he rejects these proposals he will be open to ridcule about his judgement of setting the report up, but the idea that forcing low income people to pay more for the night out through higher alcohol taxes is going to reduce alcohol consumption is nonsense. All it will due is add to the financial pressures which create the very social breakdown this report claims it wants to get to the heart of. It also smacks of moralistic undertones that have damaged the Conservative Party's image for so long, and reverses the trend Cameron himself has been trying to move into over the last year.

After the devisive Grammar schools row, and the new Prime Ministers impressive start in his new role, the fair wind Cameron has had so far is now turning cold. The positions is not a disaster, but it depends on him holding his nerve. This report is one of a number of traditionalist forces trying to move Cameron into a more old-fashioned direction, which will only lead to the wilderness of a fourth election defeat. Enraging drinkers (of which there are plenty) into voting against him, will not help his cause.