IF, LIKE me, you spend much of your working week in front of a computer at home, checking and re-checking your email inbox every few minutes becomes almost a compulsion. How else do you catch up on the gossip and those “water-cooler” bulletins of such importance that they cannot wait until a regular break in the working day?
Weekends, when those who are sensibly employed during the week undertake the kind of essential housekeeping that freelancers squeeze into a “normal” working day, become an information-free desert and an unwelcome period of cold turkey to be endured until others return to the hurly-burly on Monday morning.
But last weekend was different. I have been so overloaded by emails expressing concern about MPs’ expenses and the situation “on the ground” from fellow activists that I feel more than ready for rehab.
First up is a message from the Labour leader, reiterating last week’s apology and reminding us why we joined this proud party in the first place. And boy do we need reminding. The general feeling, as we read of yet another Labour MP submitting a claim for a television set that costs considerably more than the annual disposable income of some of their constituents, is one of disgust.
It is precisely because Labour was established as the defender of those who know the difference between essentials and luxuries that the party has taken a harder hit over the expenses scandal than the opposition, for whom a house with a moat or tennis court is a perfectly natural aspiration. However, when Labour MPs are found with their snouts buried so deeply in the trough, party activists have surrendered our last line of defence – the line that states: “’Vote for us, we are not like the Tories”.
What with one thing and another, pictures of swine seem to be everywhere at the moment. Another email lands in my inbox, this time from a friend in the north of England. It is a photograph of a billboard, featuring two porkers. “Punish the pigs’”, urges the slogan, “Vote BNP”. Given that MPs from all sides have contributed to the current political swill, there is a strong argument to be made in favour of local pacts to prevent the British National Party from capitalising further on the whole sorry mess. If a Tory has no chance of winning a particular council seat in, say, Oldham, perhaps they should absent themselves from the campaign trail, allowing their local Labour or Liberal Democrat rival a better chance of victory. Labour and the Lib Dems could do the same elsewhere, depending on which party is most strongly placed.
Of course, any such agreements would never be countenanced by the national Labour and Conservative leaderships, both of which are desperate to blame someone – anyone – else for the current public revulsion they preside over.
However, now is not the time for party politics. Democracy and trust in our elected representatives are more important than digging ourselves into a hole so deep that only the extremists can benefit.
There are many parts of the country where this strategy might work– not just areas such as Oldham, where the BNP vote was decimated at the previous local elections by a successful anti-fascist campaign.
In 2009, the BNP is contesting a record 459 council seats throughout the country – up from just 39 in 2005. In Essex alone, the BNP is fielding 75 candidates, compared to just two in 2005. There are real fears that the BNP could win the mayoralty in Doncaster, North Tyneside and Hartlepool. If this happens, it would give the BNP a centralised power base from which to spread, virus-like, across the north-east. Now is not the time for finger-wagging arguments about whose mortgage is bigger. The mainstream parties must agree a timetable for rapid change, present this to the electorate and then act to defeat the racists.
As the press officer for my local CLP, I am somewhat relieved that, due to boundary changes, the constituency in which I will be campaigning will have no sitting MP. We should be in a position to approach the next general election with a candidate untainted by the expenses scandal. Although, sadly, the stench of this scandal is so strong that anyone who even aspires to sit in the House of Commons cannot hope to remain completely odour-free.
It would be a tragedy for democracy if we were to lose a generation of brilliant young men and women, committed to public service, because of the activities of a collection of spivs and aristocrats dedicated to furnishing their homes and lining their pockets at public expense.
A final email message is sent to me by Colin, from my CLP. It’s a photo of a notice in a Feltham shop window, which reads: “Sorry. Only two MPs allowed in at the same time.”
