Month: August 2014

More on Southend Politics and the 2015 General Election

Published by neilmonnery on August 28, 2014

Sometimes folks I get frustrated. No not at my pathetic lack of a private life but more at how some people can read what I write here yet not understand a word that I have written. In the past week I have written extensively about Labour’s decision to select Cllr. Ware-Lane as their PPC for Southend West. In isolation it was the obvious choice but in terms of delivering a Labour MP for one of the two Southend seats then it was not so much of a good move. I explained my reasoning in a simple and logical way. However unsurprisingly said councillor missed the point entirely, which isn’t the biggest shock in the world considering but still.

He writes in his blog post, whose title is taken from a Dale Winton Lottery Programme, In it to win it

I am not sure quite what Neil’s campaigning credentials are although I do know he stood in Westborough ward in 2012. He came sixth place in a ward that at the time had Lib Dem representation; sixth out of six, with a 90 votes and 5.4% of the votes cast. I will leave it to the reader to pass judgement on this but if the strategy was to do as badly as possible then Neil’s campaign was a roaring success.

So he’s not quite sure what my credentials are but he does throw out my Westborough result in 2012 to pass judgement on my credentials. I would expect nothing less from said councillor. I got smashed in 2012 but also I didn’t run my campaign. Also my dad died during that election process so I had no time to actually campaign. I’m sure even Cllr. Ware-Lane would concede that my dad having a major stroke, being on life support and subsequently dying is a fairly good reason for not being busy campaigning but you never know.

My credentials are simple. I work in my day to day life in analytics. I analyse data, a lot of data, for a rather big company. I suspect said councillor is not a fan of sabermetrics, heck I wouldn’t be surprised if he had never even heard of the term. There is a reason Nate Silver correctly predicted all 50 American States in the 2012 US Presidential Election and it isn’t because he is a soothsayer. It is because he analysed numbers and analysed them well. The more data you have them the better your accuracy of predicting a result can be. This data isn’t just about canvass data but looking deeper. It is what I do to earn a living and I like to think I’m at least semi decent at it so my credentials in analytics and therefore reading data aren’t too shabby.

Politics isn’t just about banging on doors and writing leaflets these days (and it should be said to my lot that this is something to learn as well) but the world of politics has moved on. An energetic campaigner can bang on say 200 doors in a canvass session but may only find 50 doors that open for them. People want their information as and when it suits them. Advanced sabermetrics, demographics, social media etc. are all vital tools in analysing a candidates chances of winning an election.

The rest of his blog is a meandering prose of limited facts and more dye in the wool hope. The fact is even in Tony Blair’s surge in 1997, when Labour were sweeping all before them and the Tories were as popular as I am…well anywhere, Labour still fell 8,000 odd votes short. If Labour can’t get remotely close when the Tories were embarrassingly unpopular and Labour were the great hope and riding as high as Ricky Williams did whilst on his year out of the NFL in India, then why would anyone with any semblance of nous believe that Labour can win this seat in 2015?

Another part I want to opine on:

The Nick Clegg bounce significantly boosted the Lib Dem vote; this time around it will be what is known as a dead cat bounce – voters are deserting a party that has kept Cameron at number ten and enabled him to foist all sorts of unpopular legislation on the UK.

The Clegg bounce. Yes it was very significant and very much helped the Lib Dems in Southend West. However the degree of the national Lib Dem bounce wasn’t as much down to Nick Clegg as I think Cllr. Ware-Lane believes. Again I have number crunched and I know more than I suspect he does. Will the Lib Dem vote go down in 2015? I fully expect so. However the last time the Lib Dems (or Lib Dems in previous guises) failed to reach the 9,000 vote mark in the constituency was 1970. What does that tell us?

Well it tells us that a significant number of people in the constituency are inherently liberal. The fact is that the Tories have only once come remotely close to losing the seat (in 1997) and that was to the Lib Dems. In fact had the national Tony Blair bounce not been a factor then it is eminently possible that Nina Stimson would have won in 1997. What would have happened had we seen that result we’ll never know but it does show that Labour do not poll well in Southend West and the reason isn’t because of poor PPCs or councillors or anything like that it is because the demographics aren’t right for them to succeed.

Southend West is generally relatively affluent, certainly when you compare it to Rochford & Southend East. Like most seats there are wards and polling districts that look good for Labour but in general the people in the ward would lean towards voting for the party they trust most on the economy. The Conservative party always poll higher in economy trust compared to Labour.

However this is what I want to write about – Cllr. Ware-Lane’s belief that lots of unpopular legislation has been foisted on the UK. Whilst it may be true that a lot of people are unhappy with the ‘Bedroom Tax’ as the Labour Party and media have dubbed it, more people in Southend West will be effected by the rise in the income tax threshold and the Pupil Premium and the free school meals for under 7s than will be effected by benefit changes. The fact that a million public sector jobs have gone is an issue but not a big issue in Southend West, the fact over 1.5million private sector jobs have been created is just as big a factor. That isn’t spin, it is just demographic fact. If the economy is on the up then Southend West constituents will vote Conservative or Lib Dem and even when it wasn’t – they still voted Conservative or Lib Dem.

Just because one person believes something is unpopular then it doesn’t automatically equate to others believing the same thing. If you put me in a room of fifty blondes and they all turned me down then it wouldn’t necessarily mean the same would happen in a room with fifty brunettes or redheads, oh wait, maybe that is a bad example but you get my point. People come from different backgrounds and have different thoughts as to what is important to them.

He says that voters are deserting the Lib Dems, I would say deserting is a strong adjective in Southend West but a significant proportion are indeed leaving but they aren’t all flocking en masse to Labour. They are going back to the Tories or they are staying at home. Labour will not sweep up 2010 Lib Dem votes in Southend West to any significant degree. In fact I would suggest that more people who voted Lib Dem in 2010 but won’t in 2015 will vote Conservative than vote Labour. So a collapse of the Lib Dem vote actually doesn’t help Labour one jot in their goal is indeed to unseat David Amess.

Next his opening paragraph:

My selection as Labour’s General Election candidate in Southend West has inspired the Liberal Democrat’s sole surviving blogger in the borough to write not one, but two, pieces about it. You can almost sense the rising panic at Southend’s equivalent of Lib Dem Central, so much so that they want to me to give in just as I am getting going.

It is nice that he considers me a Lib Dem blogger now as he questioned whether I should be classed as such when I pointed out to them that my blog is actually far more well read than his, ‘Maybe, although if it is yours that out-performs mine I could question whether yours is really a political blog, or a blog that occasionally has political bits in it, he typed. Not that he has a big ego or anything but when I said there was a blog more well read than his in the local blogosphere them boom, he tried to find a way around it. Genuinely amusing.

However it is the panic rising at Southend’s equivalent of Lib Dem Central bit that is truly misplaced. I blog purely in a personal capacity here. I always have done and always will do. I have blogged openly and critically of the Lib Dem party both locally and nationally should I feel it was warranted. I can detach myself from typing with a Lib Dem hat on. I have heard absolutely nothing from Lib Dem Central as to their reaction to Cllr. Ware-Lane’s selection as the Labour PPC, so as for how anyone can sense rising panic is beyond me.

My blog posts were purely looking at things objectively. If Labour do intend to run two significant campaigns across both constituencies instead of prioritising the one that they are more likely to win then it is just poor strategy. Plain and simple. In a Utopian world then every voter gets the full attention from every party at every turn but this is the real world and that just isn’t possible.

To end:

I am in the contest to win it. Southend West Labour Party members deserve a candidate who tries his best, Labour supporters deserve a candidate who tries his best, the electorate in Southend West deserve a candidate who tries his best. David Amess deserves an opponent who will take the fight to him. That a Liberal Democrat views this as bad news merely serves as an additional incentive.

One day Julian will learn to comprehend basic English, sadly this is not that day. I said that it is bad news for the Labour party in their hopes to get an elected member of the House of Commons in 2015, I never said nor implied it was bad news for the Lib Dems. If Cllr. Gilbert won in Rochford & Southend East, it would give Labour a foothold in SE Essex, it would also bring more money from Labour HQ, also they would be able to afford full-time or part-time people on the payroll to help spread the Labour word. Getting an MP in an area which isn’t natural home to a party is key because local activists can rally around that seat and numbers can swell if the MP is doing a good job. It is like a snowball, you have to start the snowball rolling to see speedy progress and to get the snowball rolling you have to win, so when you have a chance to win you go all out for it as the long-term benefits will be far greater.

If Labour want to help ensure the Tories win both seats in 2015 then keep doing what they are doing. Labour have a chance (albeit not a big one but significant enough) to stop the Conservative monopoly in Southend in terms of parliamentary seats, it is a shame for those non-Tories out there that they are doing their best job to pass on this rare opportunity. The Perfect Storm is brewing for Labour in Southend and instead of planning for it, they are busy shooting themselves in the foot to make the task much harder for themselves than they need to.

You know what, I’m going to miss this when I’m gone. I hope my next home will be as interesting politically speaking. Considering I have an inkling of where this may well be, it might even be more exciting!

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Give Douglas Carswell his due – this is how you defect and what a UKIP coup

Published by neilmonnery on August 28, 2014

I have written before that I think as a matter of principle that anyone who is elected but who decides to change their political allegiance should resign and go back to their electorate to seek re-election with their new party hat on. I firmly believe this is the case at both local and national level. This goes for members of any party going to members of any other party or indeed independents joining a party or vice versa.

This morning Douglas Carswell resigned from the Conservative Party and promptly joined UKIP. However in doing so he also resigned from his parliamentary seat and said that he intended to seek re-election as a UKIP MP in the by-election.

All I can say to him is essentially well played and no-one can really complain. He was indeed my MP very briefly when I lived in Harwich in 2005-2006, a seat he won in a very tight contest in 2005 from Labour. Due to boundary changes he took on the Clacton seat, much of which encompasses his former Harwich seat. He won very tightly in 2005 but he waltzed away with it in 2010 with over 50% of the vote and a majority in excess of 12,000.

Clacton profiles as traditionally a very safe Conservative seat but it also falls into the trap of profiling as a potential slip up seat if UKIP really surged. Plenty of the older generation live in this seat and could easily be swung to UKIP. The big problem the Tories have is that Douglas Carswell is a genuinely popular guy locally and plenty of his activist base and his voters will go with him due to the fact that they like him personally.

This is going to essentially be a flash vote based on Europe. He has left the Conservative Party based mainly on the fact he thinks that the party are not serious about change in terms of our relationship with the European Union. That is what he’ll campaign on. Real change between the UK and the EU. Scarily he could come through and pull it off.

Whatever I think about his politics though, you can’t knock how he has gone about this (bar maybe the fact he seemingly didn’t tell David Cameron about this in advance – that reeks of a lack of class). He is going back to the voters in Clacton and giving them the option of voting him back into Parliament. I suspect they may well do as the UKIP protest vote is still very much out there and couple that with a personal vote and they could well win.

Of course even if they don’t win, this move keeps UKIP very much in the news over the next few weeks. Whatever we all may think of Nigel Farage and his press team, you would struggle to really criticise how they run their media game. The BBC are wooed by them and the other news organisations aren’t too far behind. They find ways to keep their story, propaganda, manifesto, policies, whatever you call it, they find a way to keep it in the news and the more they do that, the more people are likely to start to believe that they can actually deliver on their promises.

Depressing.

Do Southend Labour want to win or fight the good fight but lose?

Published by neilmonnery on August 23, 2014

In 2010 a lot of political analysts believed that Labour wanted to lose so they could sit on the opposition benches for five years, throw stones whilst the economy turned around and then promise the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow to lure people back. It was a very persuasive argument and one that I thought actually carried some merit. Sometimes in life it is better to fight the good fight but lose and say that you’ve fought the good fight without actually then having to make the big decisions.

Yesterday I wrote what I thought was a fair and honest critique of the decision by Labour to essentially run two legitimate campaigns in Southend next year instead of really aggressively targeting one of the two seats. There were two people I expected to rile by my comments and unsurprisingly they both were. I maybe a member of the Lib Dems and therefore I may have a vested interest in things but I can also look at things from a logical point of view and not just spin and push the bandwagon (I initially mistyped that as bangwagon and have smirked to myself).

The fact is political parties do not have an infinite amount of resources, either in terms of dollar dollar bills nor in terms of manpower. Labour of course know this and that is why I never see a Labour leaflet in Thorpe Bay despite living here for several years. They know it is a waste of time and money to write, publish and deliver leaflets in this area. Thorpe Bay is not what you’d call Labour territory as the demographics and mathematics are all wrong.

Cllr. Ware-Lane tweeted me last night that my blog post reminded him that he needed to start his Leigh ward campaign. A nice shot at saying that he was coming to get the Lib Dems at the heart of their western operation. I cried all night I was so frightened at the thought of Labour pulling in the votes in Leigh to come through the pack and beat out the Tories and the Lib Dems in a General Election year. Give me a fucking break. There are votes to be had for Labour in Leigh of course but they’ll be third at best, they will not beat either the Tories or the Lib Dems there even if they ran their whole GE campaign on a ‘Leigh Independence Movement’ backdrop. The numbers nor the demographics are there. It’s not rocket science.

This is where I think a lot of people fall down. Just because I myself am a liberal doesn’t make me think that other people will be just because I am, or I talk to them about liberal values. The same with all the other parties from across the political spectrum. There are swing voters out there, a good chunk of them, but the vast majority will only swing between two parties (although having said that I did meet someone the other day who told me they had voted Lib, Lab and Con within the past five years) but those people are few and far between.

Matthew Dent says that in part he suspects my blog post was at least partially motivated by my own party’s interests, you can read his full blurb here. I can assure him it wasn’t. I know the Tories are winning Southend West next year and deep deep down whilst being second would be great, second gets you nowhere in this game bar momentum. I’m all but certainly out of Southend in the near future (landlord wants to sell and it is time for me to go elsewhere) but even saying that, I still fully expect the Lib Dems to be second next year in the west, with or without a concerted effort by Labour there and even if they aren’t – it won’t be by any significant amount. The Tories will still run away with it and long-term the demographics of the west is more Lib Dem than Labour.

Lets put it into context, Labour came last in five of the west wards in the 2014 local elections, last. It would have been six had it not been for the Greens. They won one ward (the same as the Lib Dems) but the Lib Dems were only last in Chalkwell and Belfairs. Here is the breakdown of the 2,014 council numbers in the west (I have only used the top result for each party in Westborough as two seats were up).

3645 – Labour
4126 – Lib Dems
7945 – Conservative

So even in a down year for the Tories where UKIP had a significant impact on their vote, the Tories cleared Labour by more than double in terms of votes cast and the Lib Dems by nearly double. I just don’t see any reason for any optimism for any party to overtake the Tories next year, certainly when you look at the 2010 numbers and see that the Tories may lose split votes locally but gain them nationally (Amess received around 3,000 more votes than the Tory council candidates in 2010). Of course UKIP could impact the Tory vote should they field a candidate but I would expect their impact to be less dramatic than in the east.

I maybe a Lib Dem member and activist but I am not blinded by loyalty and believe that we can win every battle no matter what the realistic situation is. I can write open and honestly and do so frequently without my Lib Dem hat on but more my Journalism degree hat on and yesterday’s post was one of those occasions. Labour’s high mark in the west is second, Labour’s high mark in the east is first, why not just go for it and go for the win instead of fighting to be best of the rest?

I think the best metaphor I can give is if you are a sprinter going for the Olympic double and someone offered you a chance for a gold in the 100m and a bronze in the 200m or a guaranteed silver in the 100m and a chance for a second silver in the 200m then which do you take? Do you go for gold or do you set your sights on two silvers? I know what I go for…

Politics is not ideal. Yes all parties should be able to put their full resources behind every potential councillor and every potential member of the House of Commons. Every single voter should get the full treatment and should be treated as equal but we all know that is impossible under the current system. You have to prioritise otherwise you risk not getting any member of your party elected. People understand that and strategically I wonder just how much Labour do…

Labour shoot themselves in the foot in Southend

Published by neilmonnery on August 22, 2014

Sometimes you think it is just about getting the best candidate for the gig, however sometimes it really isn’t if you actually want to win. The more you get exposed to the inner workings of politics you come to understand that to win you have to prioritise, you have to work out where your money is, how to spend it, where to spend it, how the activist is, where the activist base is, how best to use the activist base and so on.

When the 2015 General Election comes round it is highly unlikely I’ll be voting here as it seems now all but certain I’ll be moving out of Southend in the near future. However the seat where I am living is, despite what might be seen as an extremely safe Tory seat, actually not that safe. James Duddridge is an odds on favourite to win again but if you delve into the numbers (which I like to do) then you’ll see that he’s a big favourite, but a big favourite who could lose if everything goes against him. Should Duddridge fall short then it’d be Labour who’d pick up the seat.

Over in the west of Southend David Amess will win another term at as the MP. Of that there isn’t any doubt whatsoever barring a significant scandal coming out about him and even if that happens, I’d expect him to still hold on just. If he lost he’d lose to the Liberal Democrats.

So why am I talking about Labour shooting themselves in the foot? Well they’ve decided to field their arguably two strongest candidates in both seats. Cllr. Ian Gilbert beat out Cllr. Julian Ware-Lane for the Rochford & Southend East nomination. At this point it still was a long shot they could pull off the win here but the fact the Tories failed to win a single seat here in the council elections this year, coupled with the rise of UKIP and what will be a total collapse of the Liberal Democrat vote in the east of the town then Labour are live dogs. If Cllr. James Moyies stands in the seat for Parliament next May (as far as I’ve read there hasn’t been any decision on this) then Labour are very live dogs in this seat.

Labour lost by 11,000 odd last time around and 11,000 is quite a majority to overturn, certainly if the party trying to overturn it isn’t exactly sweeping all away in the council elections (which they aren’t) but lets look at the maths again.

The Lib Dems will lose 4,000-5,000 votes in the seat at a pretty well educated guess. You would expect Labour to pick up around half of them, so that majority is now around 9,000 to win. The Tories have been in power, so Labour now aren’t the party of government. This means that the vote for change now is in the hands of Labour and for whatever David Amess’ faults on the other side of the borough, people you speak to (who aren’t staunchly political) say that he is a good constituency MP, I don’t hear the same about James Duddridge. He is kind of an anonymous MP. So his name carries very little cachet. So his personal vote will not be strong.

Then throw in the UKIP factor. I don’t want to put words in Cllr. Gilbert’s mouth but you have to think that he is out in his garden every night looking up at the sky searching for a shooting star and has his ‘Please let UKIP stand here’ wish ready to go. The Tories got just a tick over 19,500 votes last time around, if UKIP took 20% of that vote (which is entirely possible and might even be a low estimate) then that is 4,000 plus votes. Now of course UKIP would also take votes from Labour, certainly in places like Kursaal but not to the same degree.

Strangely the key ward may actually be right here in Thorpe Bay, where Labour are nowhere and will get very few votes. The Tories should sweep this seat in a General Election and this ward votes. If UKIP (or heck how about an ambitious independent?) could make serious inroads into the Tory vote here then it is really game on.

All sounds good for Labour, no?

Well, yes and no. To win they have to throw every resource they have at Rochford & Southend East. They need to run a skeleton campaign in the west and put all their eggs in the one basket. They have a straight choice whether to go for first in the east and finish third in the west, or settle for second in the east in an attempt to finish second in the west. Personally a shot at first and settling for third seems like a no brainer.

Yet they have chosen a man who will certainly go and try to win in the west in Cllr. Ware-Lane. Admirable yes, good politics, most certainly not. Good strategy wins elections often just as much as good policy. I just cannot see Cllr. Ware-Lane being a paper candidate who would spend his time in the east trying to get Cllr. Gilbert elected, which would certainly be the best decision for them strategically. Of course I could be wrong and whilst Cllr. Ware-Lane is saying all the right things publicly, he knows the best thing for Labour would be to hit the east and support Cllr. Gilbert to the fullest of his abilities.

In 2010 the Lib Dems had the most votes in Oxford yet won neither seat, they came a close second in both seats. Had they concentrated on one seat, either seat, they would have won. There are many stories similar to this. If Southend Labour want to gain an MP then they know all their eggs have to be in the east because they have a shot of winning. If they decide to fight both seats to any significant degree then it is highly likely we’ll end up with two Conservative MP’s again across the two seats.

If I was a betting man I’d back Amess and Duddridge to both be returned to parliament next May but on a very good day for the Labour party, they have a shot at dethroning Duddridge. Amess is safe as houses but Duddridge, whilst looking safe could go if the dominoes all fall the wrong way for him and the right way for Labour. So it should be full steam ahead for Labour in the east but you just get the sense that by selecting Cllr. Ware-Lane in the west that they aren’t putting all their eggs in one basket and on this occasion, that would have been the most logical strategy if their end goal was to return an MP to parliament in 2015.

Lord Rennard kinda but doesn’t really win, the Lib Dems lose. Sums up a lot doesn’t it?

Published by neilmonnery on August 21, 2014

First things first. I have no idea what Lord Rennard did or did not do. I don’t have access to the evidence. I have an opinion but that is based solely on the evidence that has been leaked through the media. This opinion is pretty hardened and it would take significant new evidence to move me from my position but I suspect that will not happen.

Lord Rennard was ‘won’ in that he’s had his party membership restored. The allegations against him are credible but not proven. A situation that happens all the time in many different guises in many different professions. In many of these situations I look at those accusing and try to work out if they have a hidden agenda or a bias that would make me skeptical as to their allegations. In this situation I haven’t seen any of that.

The problem Lord Rennard has is that whilst he may feel vindicated, he is perceived as guilty by the vast majority of Liberal Democrats. Most want him gone because they feel he encapsulates the older part of the party and doesn’t embrace what younger liberals think. The Lib Dems as a party do have an issue with gender equality but I don’t think this is because of any inherent sexism within the party, but more to do with legacy and some older members of the party (and lets be honest here – some older members of society as a whole) still struggle with equality as a concept.

The Lord released the following statement:

I am obviously pleased that all disciplinary investigations against me have been brought to an end and that the suspension of my party membership has been lifted.

This has taken a long time. The English Regional Parties Committee began a new disciplinary investigation in January 2014. I was informed by the Committee that this latest investigation was on the basis of, “media and social media comments made by you, endorsed by you and made on your behalf that have attacked the party and the party processes publically (sic) since the announcement of the Webster report results.”

This investigation followed the one conducted last year by Alistair Webster QC, and which resulted in a finding of “no further action through insufficient evidence.”

I am grateful to Chris Willmore, a barrister, parliamentary candidate and now a law lecturer who acted as the ‘independent investigator’ in this latest process. She was extremely thorough in her approach. I was informed by telephone late this afternoon of the conclusion that “there would be no further action”. The rules provided for the investigator either to recommend “charges,” or to say that there was insufficient evidence to proceed further to a disciplinary hearing.

All allegations made about me have now been investigated thoroughly, including by the Metropolitan Police Service, and fell at the first hurdle as there was insufficient evidence to proceed further.

The English Appeals Panel confirmed in July that I could not be criticised over my reaction to the previous report by Alistair Webster QC, as I was not given sight of the report for eleven weeks. The worst that might be said of me in that independent report was that I may have inadvertently encroached on the “personal space” of some of the complainants, and I apologised for this to all four of them.

I remain a committed member of the Liberal Democrats and a strong believer in the principles of the party, as set out in the constitution, and based on the values that led me to join the Liberal Party in my teens.

So basically reading between the lines his defence is that there was insufficient evidence to move forward. He never once said he did not do what he had been accused of or that he was innocent. Just that there was insufficient evidence to proceed with disciplinary procedures and the same at the Met.

He says that at worst he inadvertently encroached on the personal space of several people. Now not to be a wise-ass here but it is pretty hard to inadvertently encroach on someone’s personal space. As human beings we all know what our personal space is and should know what another person’s is. If you don’t then I have serious doubts as to your ability to function as a human being. It isn’t rocket science.

I am very much an innocent until proven guilty guy but in this case I think it is pretty clear that Lord Rennard’s behaviour was not acceptable. Whether that equates to criminal charges I think possibly not because they have investigated and cannot prove anything, fair enough. However internal disciplinary requires a different standard of proof. the fact the Lib Dems bottled it – and lets not beat around the bush here – the people who had this decision to undertake bottled it – the fact they decided to take no further action showed two things. They didn’t want a long protracted fight that would have rumbled in the media for weeks and months more and secondly that Lord Rennard believes that he didn’t do anything significantly wrong.

And that folks might be the most depressing thing of this whole matter. Lord Rennard doesn’t believe his actions were wrong to any significant degree. If I inadvertently encroached on someone’s personal space and they informed me of it I’d be freaking out about it for months. He seems to not see it as a problem. I’m sitting here writing this and still shaking my head.

He hasn’t won anything bar his membership of a political party that doesn’t want him any more. He won’t be a pariah but he is the figurehead for everything wrong within the party according to many people. The Lib Dems should be the radical party who want to make the world a better place, a more equal place, equality in all terms, sex, race, background, sexual persuasion, equality across the board and you have a senior party member who at best (and I stress at best) seems to not know how to act as a basic human being when it comes to women that he has come in contact with.

Now I’m not saying the Lib Dems are the only party with these issues. I am positive other political parties have similar issues as do many businesses. I would like to think that these issues are being dealt with and that the next generation of people coming through are more about equality and believe in it not only to give it lip-service but also in terms of actually looking at other human beings and treating them as equals no matter what their differences are.

The end game is though that the public perception of the party is not good. As the party of the radicals, it comes across that we aren’t that radical and that we can’t take the big decision when faced with one. The party would without a doubt be stronger had Lord Rennard either not been allowed back or had he walked away. Sometimes in life you find that you are not wanted and that the best way to move on is to walk away.

I have found that recently in what was a significant aspect of my life and no matter how much I didn’t want to walk away, it was the only way forward. Lord Rennard should have done the same. If he truly believes in the Lib Dems as the radical party of change then he should know that by him being in the party, that radical change will be harder to accomplish and that is the dagger to the heart. He is too selfish to put the liberal philosophy before his own ego and sense of self-worth.

Lord Rennard will never have the respect of the Lib Dems again and the party as a whole has another big bruise that it will struggle to shake off. All in all everyone loses and nobody wins.

The Rambles of Neil Monnery hits One Million Page Views.

Published by neilmonnery on August 14, 2014

This is a purely vanity blog post but this morning this blog ticked over the one million page view mark and that number is completely insane, so just wanted to say thank you to those of you who’ve actually read my rubbish over the years.

The number is actually far higher than a million page views as I moved from a WordPress hosted to a self-hosted blog about nine months in to this blogs existence and therefore my stats started from zero again.

When I started this blog I did in mainly because I wanted to own the neilmonnery.co.uk domain and didn’t really know what I wanted it for. I just wanted to ensure that I owned it so no-one else could. I decided to blog because I had in the past worked in writing and obviously have that degree in Journalism lying around somewhere. So it would be a place where I could vent or air my thoughts on anything that tickled my fancy.

I know this blog has at times been controversial. I know at times this blog has cost me dates (true story) and I know at times I have opened up to such a degree that it seems less of a blog but more of an online diary. At times I have wrestled with the idea of not being so open on here but have decided that I want to be true to myself and anything I write, I know there is a chance people will read it. I do have my secrets that don’t get aired on here (although often you’ll find subtle hints woven into blog posts) but I know the line between my privacy and those of others.

In the first couple of years I had a pretty decent readership amongst Lib Dems and was a well-read writer but in the past couple of years those readers have drifted away to other blogs. These days more people read about my life – certainly my dating exploits (or lack of them) and of course whenever Take Me Out gets going I may get one or two views for those pieces but all in all to get a million page views is far and away in excess to what I ever thought would happen.

So for those who agree or disagree, think I’m great, think I’m dumb, whatever, I hope that I’ve made you smile or made you think. If I’ve done one or the other then I’ve done something right. Whether I’ll ever make two million views, who knows but for now, I’m pretty darn impressed that this blog has been clicked on more than a million times – and that is quite something.

One million page views on some nobodies personal blog…madness.

UKIP MEP Louise Bours wants to bring back the death penalty. Quelle Surprise.

Published by neilmonnery on August 13, 2014

Why a UKIP MEP is sending me a Press Release I’ll never know. Maybe so I’ll write about it on this very blog and in that case her devious plan has worked. Although a) I doubt it was devious and b) I doubt she has any idea who I am but still here we are.

So yes, using the 50 year anniversary of the last execution in the UK, Louise Bours has decided now is the time to get the national debate going about the death penalty. She fired out the following e-mail to many people seemingly:

“The public are fed up with the government’s concentration on the rights of the criminal, and are demanding the rights of victims and their families should take priority.

“The death penalty won’t bring back a tortured and murdered child, but it seems natural justice that the family will know the killer has paid the ultimate price and isn’t still breathing when their child is not.

“An innocent child has more of a right to life than the monster that took their life, so I see no ethical reason why we are obliged to keep him alive.

“Why should double cop-killer Dale Cregan be kept alive, after shooting them more than 8 times and using a hand-grenade. His crime wasn’t impulsive or emotional, he lured them in with a fake 999 call and he’d killed two other people prior to that.

“Paul Bone, the father of murdered WPC Fiona Bone agrees that the death penalty should be brought back, and as his life has been devastated by a cold-blooded killer, I think his views should be listened to.

“The killers of Lee Rigby despise the UK and want to kill us all, yet we have to use tax-payers money to keep them alive and well in prison, and look after their ‘human-rights’.

I do love the fact that human rights is in inverted commas. Yeah those humans having their human rights. However the key issue is what she says with regards to Paul Bone. She believes that his views should be taken into account with regards to what should happen to the person who took away his loved one. What would happen if say a husband or a wife was pro death penalty but a mother or a father was against? Whose opinion should carry more weight? Should people who have been wronged have first dibs with regards what should happen to the person who wronged them? That to me sounds like a very slippery slope.

Look, I make no secret that I am anti death penalty, always have been and always will be. Taking a life is wrong and two wrongs do not make a right. That is something that many of us have had drummed into us throughout our upbringing. I still firmly believe this. I know many people are pro death penalty but only for those who are beyond doubt guilty, at what point do we go from not guilty or guilty to not guilty, guilty or guilty guilty?

Also she makes a distinction between the right to life. Some people have more rights to life than others. Therefore she doesn’t believe that we are all created equal. That is something I have a huge issue with. I am no better or worse as a human than the next person. I may be better or worse at many things but in terms of being a human and my right to live – I don’t see myself as better or worse than anyone else.

So a UKIP MEP is all for bringing back the death penalty. This is probably not exactly a huge surprise. Apparently she was on Question Time and was more shouty and aggressive than Joey Barton and Piers Morgan. Again that doesn’t surprise me. UKIP seem to believe that those who shout loudest have the most important things to say and by the sounds of it Louise Bours fully endorses that philosophy so I think we’ll have to be prepared to listen to her for many years yet. As for her views on the death penalty, she is fully entitled to them, I vehemently disagree and on this issue I morally will always do so.

Nick Clegg will win Sheffield Hallam. I don’t understand why Labour disagree?

Published by neilmonnery on August 12, 2014

Sometimes I read something that I want to blog about so I leave it on a tab on my Google Chrome and it can stay there for days. This time I’m blogging about it within a day. Not too shabby for me.

Rich Clare wrote yesterday in an article entitled Nick Clegg to lose Sheffield Hallam? You’re having a laugh where he speaks about all the reasons why Nick Clegg will hold on to his seat, despite lots of press stories suggesting this he is at best, in trouble, but at worst set for a slam dunk defeat that would rival the Portillo moment from 1997.

The thing is, anyone who has any sense of numbers will know that Nick Clegg isn’t in trouble next year. That might sound ludicrous considering national polling and how disliked he is but the people of the United Kingdom are not voting on whether to have Nick Clegg as their local MP, the people of Sheffield Hallam are and that is the difference. Until people can get their heads around the fact that national polling cannot be extrapolated across different constituencies to give accurate predictions then all this crap will never stop.

Students used to love Nick Clegg. Now they are at best indifferent and at worst down right angry. I suspect most are in the latter group depressingly but such is life. However as Rich points out quite pointedly, the university itself is not based in the Sheffield Hallam constituency and students do not live in that constituency in great numbers. This is one of the lazy misnomers that people have regarding this seat and how Clegg won here and how the Lib Dems turned it into a relatively safe seat 17 years ago.

Labour control South Yorkshire but they’ve never returned an MP in this seat, never, never ever, never never ever. I think you get the point. Since 2010 that constituency has seen 21 councillors get elected, of those 21, 19 were Lib Dems and two were Labour. In a recent by-election Labour threw the kitchen sink at the Lib Dems expecting a win that would cause panic and embarrassment for Nick Clegg. The Lib Dem candidate won with over half of the vote.

Sheffield Hallam is affluent, not just affluent, but stinking rich. The average income is higher than places like Windsor and Twickenham. It has the lowest level of child poverty amongst any constituency in the country. More people in Sheffield Hallam have a degree than Cambridge. The level of professionals in the constituency exceeds practically every other seat in the country. What about all of this screams out a Labour victory?

That’s right. Nothing.

Of course the Tories could take back the seat but they have no real local campaign and are fighting with UKIP, their vote is getting split. so they aren’t going to mount a significant challenge to Clegg next year and nor are UKIP. Seats with lots of rich, educated and professional people are not going to be at the top of the UKIP plan to win seats. Immigration is not exactly an issue in Sheffield Hallam.

So it comes down to whether Labour can change the narrative in the next nine months which they haven’t been able to do in the past four years. Of course they could but I could also get second dates with women that I want to – and we all know that doesn’t happen. Labour need to gain at least 12,000 votes and nothing about the ward demographics or recent history suggests that they’ll get anywhere near that.

Personally I hope Labour keep believing they can unsettle and beat Nick Clegg. If they throw the kitchen sink at an unwinnable seat then they’ll be taking resources away from other places. It would be terrible strategy for Labour to go after a seat they have never won and are in no position to win. However I wouldn’t be stunned if terrible strategy gets deployed and Labour make Sheffield Hallam one of their key battlegrounds. If they do, they’ll lose and lose badly and all they’ll say if they were never expected to win anyway. Sounds like they can’t lose.

Yet if they don’t win a majority and fall just a few seats short, they’ll rue the fact they spent so much time and effort on a vanity campaign. Nick Clegg’s majority will no doubt go down but it will not collapse. Rich sums it up well and if you get on the ground with an open mind then you’ll come away with the feeling that the Lib Dems are safe in this one, but I doubt that will stop the stories because ‘Nick Clegg safe in Sheffield Hallam’ isn’t exactly a sexy story and won’t sell papers or garner page views. Sometimes the news can be just factual but those times are sadly few and far between.

Nick Clegg doesn’t get tough on drugs – he gets smart

Published by neilmonnery on August 8, 2014

A lot of people think being tough on drugs is the only way to combat the use of drugs that society is plagued by today. I have never had this thought. Whilst at the age of 31 I have never tried – nor had any desire – to try out illegal substances, I think those that do should be helped to get over their problems should their drug use consume them.

Nick Clegg has spoken about this today and has indicated that the party want to end imprisonment for those who are caught with drugs for their own personal use and instead get them medical treatment to get over their drug addiction.

Speaking on the Lib Dem website, Nick Clegg said:

“We are never going to win a ‘war on drugs’. Illegal drugs still cause immense harm to the people who use them and to the communities they live in. We need a radically smarter approach if we are serious about tackling this problem.

“Liberal Democrats believe the first step to ending the war is to recognise that drug use is primarily a health problem. Addicts need treatment, not locking up. And it is a nonsense to waste scare resources on prison cells for cannabis users.

“That’s why we will commit to ensuring that nobody in future will go to prison where their only offence is possession of drugs for their own personal use.

“Instead these people should receive non-custodial sentences, and addicts should get the treatment they need to stop using drugs.

“In the longer term we will develop a more effective approach that frees up resources currently spent on prosecuting users, and reinvests that money in treatment and in the fight against organised crime.

“Liberal Democrats believe in a stronger economy and a fairer society. These liberal reforms will ensure that drug users get the help they need and that taxpayers don’t foot the bill for a system that doesn’t work.”

In short, it is a new grown-up approach to drug issues and one I stand up and applaud. As a society, many people think that punishment is more important than dealing with the cause of the problem. People going to jail are only going to spend time with more criminals and therefore find it much easier to get on to more hardcore drugs and come out of prison less prepared to become a productive member of society.

Drug use is a health problem. That is clearly what it is first and foremost. You don’t punish those caught up in it if you can help them first. Those who are addicted to drugs can turn their lives around and shouldn’t be left to fend for themselves. We all need a helping hand in life from time-to-time and getting over addiction, whether it be drugs, alcohol, gambling or anything else is something people both want to do but they also need someone to help them.

This has been one of the best things Nick Clegg has said in a very, very long time. Rehabilitation is just as important as punishment for criminals and when you can help small-level criminals with drug issues, to a) help them get their lives back on track but also b) will long-term ensure their drug problem doesn’t get worse meaning they are less of an effective member of society and in turn more of a danger to others then it is something that we should do.

Drug use is a big issue and being tough on drug users has not really helped, so it is time to take a different approach and this is personally one that I’m very much in favour of.

Are my Care Bears hurting my potential love life?

Published by neilmonnery on August 8, 2014

(That is arguably, well not arguably as a matter of fact, this is clearly my favourite headline that I have ever written).

So anyway a bit of background on why I own all the ten original care bears. You see I have had Tenderheart since I was knee high to a grasshopper (I actually had a large Bedtime Care Bear too but he has got lost somewhere along the way) but Tenderheart bear (not the full 13″ version, but the half size one) has been with me for a long, long time. He became my unofficial mascot. First things first he does not and has not slept in my bed ever as far as I’m aware but has lived on my headboard, on my desk, on my wardrobe, on a shelf over my bed, he’s lived around me. He came to university with me and has moved with me everywhere I’ve gone.

Now it probably isn’t unfair to say that he is more than a stupid soft toy to me, he has legitimate sentimental value. In fact I can’t think of anything else I own that has as much sentimental value to me. I know to many people this shows a lack of masculinity but if a burglar came into my property then I would prefer him or her to steal my iPad than I would my Tenderheart bear. True story.

I have for a long time said that I would give my Tenderheart bear to my first true love. Now of course whether a woman these days would appreciate the sentiment behind doing that is very much up for debate. However as we all can clearly see, I’m 31 and I still own it. That either means I’ve yet to be in love or it means that I’ve changed my mind and can’t bare to part with my bear. The answer is maybe both but as I have never been in love, I have yet to face that internal dilemma. I can tell you the reader this for nowt, if I ever gave him away to someone that it would certainly be a sign I was well and truly in love. He’s going nowhere without me being head over heels.

A few years back I did a quiz on the radio show I used to be part of. The quiz was name the ten original care bears. Sadly I looked at several blank faces and it made me sad. One of the studio had nightmares about the care bears. The next day I went on eBay to see if I could source all the ten originals (the half size ones like my Tenderheart bear) and it turned out that I could – and rather cheaply. So I bought them all and they now all live together on my headboard watching over my world and enjoying life, well apart from Grumpy bear but that is to be expected.

Why am I writing about this today? Well I have a couple of tales to tell from the recent past.

About what, a month or so ago now, someone sent me a message on OkCupid. I’m not going to tell you the full story but the short version is many messages were exchanged but then suddenly she deleted her profile. A couple of days later she Googled me and found this very blog and my e-mail address and sent me an e-mail saying she still wanted to speak to me, a couple of e-mails exchanged and silence again but we had added each other to Facebook. We didn’t really speak much but her last message to me was, ‘So what’s with the Care Bears?‘ and I told her the story that I am telling you (although a very abbreviated version) and her response wasn’t to just ignore it, or to unfriend me but to block me on Facebook. All class. She becomes the third person ever to block me on there as far as I’m aware.

Now it would possibly to harsh to say she is a Care Bearist, who decided that she couldn’t stand to know anyone who owned Care Bears and there was probably another reason for doing it (I’d hypothesise that she obviously now has no interest in knowing me, either because she’s found out more about me or what is more likely is she’s found another guy and therefore I’m not wanted nor needed in her life anymore) I have seen that a lot with regards to online dating, once a person decides that you aren’t a potential love interest then they have no desire to know you anymore. I find this sad, I have made actual friends via this route even if there wasn’t anything more but I suppose some people look at it differently.

So whilst I don’t think the Care Bear issue was the defining matter here, it was the last communication I had before I was summarily dismissed from her life.

Going back a few weeks and this topic came up in the studio of my last radio show. The women in the studio all said they would look at a guy who owned Care Bears in a non-favourable light. They would find it strange and unmanly. Once I told them the back story, they thawed somewhat and certainly thought it was sweet how Tenderheart and I had lived together and that I had earmarked him as a gift to my first love but the instinct was very negative.

As far as I can recall only two women have ever seen the full gang together and both were unnerved to some degree. One was rather weirded out and the other just rolled with it. Apparently both didn’t like the fact that they thought the Care Bears were watching them. I was told a while back on Facebook when this discussion came up that if I ever wanted to get a girlfriend then I’d have to give up the Care Bears as no woman would ever consider a relationship with a guy who owned any. You don’t need to know me well to know my reaction to that. Hint: It wasn’t favourable.

Sometimes I do genuinely wonder just how much influence my furry friends have on how another person sees me. I don’t bang on about them. To ever even see them then you’ll have to be in my bedroom and lets be honest here, if you’ve got past my awkward personality, my less than stellar looks and my inept amount of experience with the opposite sex, then I wouldn’t think the Care Bears would be the straw that broke the camels back as it were regarding what a potential beau would think about me. Maybe that is naive and I should do everything I can to make myself less weird because I need all the help I can get but I’m also stubborn to some degree.

I don’t want to consign them to a life in my spare room or to the back of the wardrobe. They deserve a happy life too and living on my headboard is I like to think a good place for them to live. They are all together. They can see the TV. I’m around to keep them company a lot. Heck even reading this back I wouldn’t touch me with a barge pole either.

So to conclude, I certainly don’t think owning Care Bears helps my potential love life chances that is for sure. No woman is reading this and thinking, ‘oh my, that guy sounds really sweet and lovely, just what I’m looking for,’ instead they are either thinking that is matters not or, ‘what a fucking weirdo’ – there is no positivity, only potential negativity from this revelation.

However having said this, am I going to change my viewpoint towards my gang of furry pals? You the reader know me well enough to know that I will not be. If owning Care Bears is such an important issue then I’m probably not the right guy for them anyway. It probably does to some small degree hinder my chances but I have so many things against me anyway that this is a minor issue. The Care Bears are going to stay and if someone thinks that is such an important issue in how they perceive me then I frankly don’t give two hoots and wish them well.

I’ll end with this.

Care Bears & Neil — My furry pals and I…