Hustings Hustling
You know that it’s going to be a freakish evening when the opening salvo at the Lambeth Stop the War hustings proclaims:
I have been attacked online by a leading South London blogger who claims that I only talk about the international agenda.
It wasn’t a great a start for the local offline love affair between Joseph Healy - the Green Left PPC for Vauxhall - and the leading South London blogger. If international banner waving ‘aint yer thing, then there’s no need to scroll down to read the happy ending.
The PPC and the *ahem* leading South London blogger kissed and made up, all thanks to much love for @audioboo of course.
But yeah - it was something of a weird Brixton evening…
Stop the War is a very active group in South London. It’s a political domain which although I broadly support, I confess to showing little interest. This probably explains my online tiff with the internationalist Green PPC.
It’s all about the local for me. I want to find solutions and make progress around my little patch of South London. Palestine is important, yes, but it doesn’t occupy my mind when I see yet further fly-tipping around Palfrey Place, as was the case when I went out for the milk this morning.
The hustings organised by Stop the War drew in a packed crowd at Babalou in Brixton. This was old skool Lambeth politics. No surprises then that squeaky clean Nu Labour in Lambeth decided not to take part in the debate.
Tally Hoey demonstrated her passion and concern for the constituents that she has represented for the past twenty-one years (and in all honesty, probably the next four or five years) by sending a brief letter of apology. Oh, and an email address (although her site remains borked.)
@ChukaUmunna, the Labour PPC for Streatham, also sent out a letter of apology, as well as offering some thoughts on his policies regarding issues raised by Stop the War. Not ideal, but at least Chuka had the decency to make an apology and post it on his blog earlier in the day.
As for our friends in the blue rinse part of the borough? Bugger all.
It was probably for the best, given that the other members of the panel included @VoteDrinkall, the Anticapitalist candidate, Dan Lambert from the Socialist Party of GB and yer Green Left guy, Joseph Healy.
Oh, and also @Chris4Streatham, the LibDem candidate whose odds of winning the Streatham constituency were dropping by the hour ahead of the meeting.
Each candidate was given five minutes at the start of the hustings to bash a local blogger introduce themselves and set out their solutions for the issues posed by Stop the War.
@VoteDrinkall made the connection between the “one billion pound bail out of the banks” (his figure) and the gap in public spending. The link of global capitalism was given, as the Anticapitalist candidate then argued that working class kids in South London have more in common with kids in Iraq, than the bankers benefiting from the bonuses.
Tally Hoey was referenced for voting against the war in Iraq, yet still supporting it during subsequent parliamentary debates. @VoteDrinkall claimed that the Greens are inconsistent, and concluded by saying that “a vote for me is a vote for the troops out of Afghanistan.”
It was fighting talk, in every sense, and a speech that Joseph Healy from the Greens was going to find to difficult to follow. “The whole debate is about the enemy within,” claimed the Green Left guy. I shuffled nervously in my seat.
Keeping it in line with the style of his blog, Healy name checked the many fine causes and demos that he has supported of late. Not one of them was in Vauxhall, but at least Healy is passionate and true to his cause. Oh, and at least he turned up…
Daniel Lambert from the Socialist Worker’s Party of GB (sitting to the left of the Anticapitalist candidate, natch) came up next. Lambert didn’t get past his “war is an instrument to overt a worker’s revolution” before I was transported back in time to my Essex sociology undergraduate days. Happy memories ‘n all that, but once again, Brixton? Vauxhall?
It was strange to see @Chris4Streatham cutting a lone figure on the top table. The LibDem candidate has probably been in more voter friendly environments, and it was weird to see a Love Me I’m a Liberal guy singled out by the other politicians as being part of the old political problem.
@Chris4Streatham almost seemed lost without @ChukaUmunna, his sparring political partner over the past six months. He was brave enough to state that:
I don’t agree with Stop the War, but I am in favour of withdrawing our troops from Afghanistan.
The LibDem then set out a timetable of leaving Afghanistan before the end of the next Parliament. He voiced his anger in the way that Nu Labour flaunted international law over Iraq.
Questions from the floor then followed - Afghanistan, Iraq, Palestine and Iran - are we at war with the latter two? Each candidate pretty much moulded an answer to fit in with their opening declarations. With three hard Left candidates and a Love Me I’m a Liberal sitting on the top table, the divisions were hardly going to be the tense affair that you find at a full @lambeth_council meeting.
@VoteDrinkall did take issue with his Socialist comrade over Palestine. The issue seemed to be one of direct action (@VoteDrinkall) and a more theoretical socialist revolution. I almost longed for @ChuckaUmunna to be around, to try and unite the Lambeth Left.
And that was about your lot. We ended as we began, as I headed over to the top table to thank Green left guy Joseph Healy for giving a name check of my blog. I actually rather like the agenda he is proposing locally, as outlined over at the wonderful Lurking About in SE11, earlier today [final comment, epic debate.] It’s just a shame that it took a hefty online prod to get back to the South London patch.
Joseph very kindly agreed to a brief chat, and over the love of @audioboo, I think we finally found some common ground. I wish him luck with his campaign.
Likewise @Chris4Streatham. It was jolly decent for a mainstream candidate (with a very realistic chance of becoming the next MP for Streatham) to actually turn up and stick to his cause against an unsympathetic audience.
As for @LambethLabour? I’m sure our hard-working local cabinet had more pressing #hyperlocal #labourdoorstep duties to carry out, rather than discussing Palestine. And quite rightly so.
@ChuckaUmunna is almost excused because he sent a decent letter outlining his policies (and he would actually blend in rather well with the general Left feel of the panel.)
Tally Hoey?
Ta ta.
If only. If only…
20/04/2010 at 4:21 am Permalink
“Daniel Lambert from the Socialist Worker’s Party of GB (sitting to the left of the Anticapitalist candidate, natch)”
That’ll be Daniel Lambert from the Socialist Party of GB.
Sorry to appear pedantic but the SPGB has very different politics and a very different historical background from the Socialist Worker’s Party.
Jeremy could have put you right because his organisation, Workers Power, traces its origins back to the SWP’s antecedents, the International Socialists, and it’s also the case that, but for Jeremy and his colleagues getting the bumrush, he would rather have stood under the TUSC banner rather than the overly grand ‘anti-capitalist’ banner.
Nice write up. Wish I’d been able to be there.
20/04/2010 at 5:39 pm Permalink
Hi - have reported the dumped rubbish, not I realise the main point of your thread!
Cllr Rob Banks
Lib Dem, Oval Ward
20/04/2010 at 6:43 pm Permalink
The figure for the bank bailout is £1 TRILLION – £1.2 trillion, in fact, not a meagre billion
Incredible but true!
I thought it was a well worthwhile meeting and thanks to Stop the War for organising it and everyone for coming.
As I said in the summing up, I think the Lib Dems were exposed as having opposed the war – until it started, when they fell in behind the generals – and want to scrap Trident – but maintain Britain’s huge armed forces ready to participate in the next adventure.
I thought Joe Healey spoke well, but his party is all over the place. Against the “war on terror” – Green GLA member Jenny Jones whitewashed Met Commissioner Sir Ian Blair over the shooting of Jean and subsequent police misinformation that tried to smear Jean Charles’ good name.
21/04/2010 at 12:06 am Permalink
In agreement with comments above, it was an interesting debate. Thanks to all the candidates who came and contributed, and to the audience for such engaged and thoughtful questions.
Jeremy, it was a shame Joseph did not get time to give his opinion on the domestic war on terror. As you can see from his blog and his letters to the SLP - http://greenmpforvauxhall.blogspot.com/2010/01/vauxhall-news.html - Joseph is an absolute critic of the Met’s handling of the de Menezes case and the award of a Queen’s medal to Cressida Dick. Along with many others in the Green Party, Joseph is in support of the Ian Tomlinson Family Campaign - http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/apr/01/ian-tomlinson-wait-answers - the Green Party in general and London Green Party in particular have been actively involved in campaigns against police violence, whether that be deaths in custody or the violence against protesters at Climate Camps and G20. And while I, and I’m sure Joseph too, disagreed with Jenny Jones over the handling of the de Menezes case, she’s not exactly a Metropolitan Police apologist. You’ll note her signature on the Ian Tomlinson Family letter too.
As for wider civil liberties, the Green Party opposes ID cards, the Digital Economy Bill, support an amnesty for undocumented immigrants (and have vociferously spoken out against detention centres and the treatment of migrants at Calais), and would end torture and arbitrary detention. Oh, and would repeal the anti-trade union laws. I’m sure much we could agree on. I do suspect you and I would disagree on the need to ban video games though
21/04/2010 at 7:07 am Permalink
It’s all very well Jeremy criticising the Greens and the LibDems but it seems to have been overlooked (perhaps because he didn’t highlight it) that he’s calling for voters in Streatham to vote for the Labour candidate there (and for voters in Dulwich and Norwood to vote for Tessa Jowell, who actually voted for the war). A copy of his party’s magazine handed out at the meeting carried a middle page article headed “Vote for Socialist and Labour candidates” in which the author called “on workers to vote anticapitalist and socialist candidates in the 40 constituencies where we can, and for Labour everywhere else in the country”, ie as Streatham is not one of the 40 to vote there for Chukka Umanna. So there was no need for Chukka to turn up. Jeremy was there to bat for him.