Birmingham University Labour Students

The boys over at BUCF have very kindly asked for our verdict on the premiership of Gordon Brown one year on. I will not deny this is a very challenging time being a Labour member and supporter. I remember watching the Leadership Conference being held in Manchester and at that time there was hope and [...]

Filed under: Compass, Conservative Party, Labour Party | Tagged: Gordon Brown | No Comments »

Now I am sure this is not news to most of you though events surrounding the Rise Festival will certainly provide amusement.
Firstly Boris scraps the biggest anti-racism event in Europe. But then it turns out he actually knows nothing about the actual decision he supposedly made. This really calls into question who the real mayor of London [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Tories | Tagged: Boris | No Comments »

Steve McCabe, MP for Birmingham Hall Green and campaign manager for the Crewe by-election, gives his account.

Filed under: Conservative Party, Labour Party | Tagged: McCabe | 1 Comment »

I have never really liked BB1s Question Time. To me it resembles low-brow political point scoring. Compare the way in which the London Mayoral debate was conducted compared to that by Newsnight. Paxman focused on the policies of the three candidates and that was when Boris’s Routemastergate first came to light. On the other hand David [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Economy, Labour Party, Tories' Porkies | Tagged: Question Time, Tax | 1 Comment »

Every 20 - 30 years there are cataclysmic elections. Moments in history that re-define the political and social outlook for the ensuing period or generation. Perhaps we can draw on the 1997 Labour victory as being one such instance.
In 1997, people came out in droves, not just to reject a tired incumbent Government, but to [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Labour Party, National Politics | 6 Comments »

I’ve only just watched this programme after recording it on Monday evening.  If the opinion polls are pointing to more people like this getting elected to our legislature, I’m moving to Iran.
 

Filed under: Conservative Party, Tories, Women | Tagged: Mad Nad | 7 Comments »

I stole this headline from the Family Planning Association because it says it all. Regular readers may have noticed I get rather angry about the Human Embryology Bill. I am utterly delighted to see it pass another hurdle tonight, but I am still apprehensive about tomorrows vote on the abortion limit.
MPs from all parties, including most [...]

Filed under: Brigid Jones's Diary, Cameron, Conservative Party, Tories' Porkies, Women | Tagged: abortion, fucking morons, Nadine Dorries | 28 Comments »

Good post by Hopi Sen analysing the latest speech from Cameron. Rather then keeping with old policies to cut waste and spending he’s taking the detail out and asking the electorate (and the media) to believe him.

Filed under: Conservative Party, Tories, Tories' Porkies | No Comments »

Since Cameron took over the Tory Party he has been keen to demonstrate how they are changing. Ideally he is attempting to model his party on New Labour in the vain hope that he can lead the Tories to a landslide on par with 1997.
In December 2006 I first highlighted the defect in Cameron’s hand. [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Labour Party, National Politics | 2 Comments »

Congratulations to all newly-elected Birmingham City Councillors.  I happened to be browsing through the Birmingham Conservatives website, and found a page containing lovely pictures of all Conservative Birmingham City Councillors, sorted by ward.  I would encourage everyone to go and take a look - it appears not to have been updated with the new councillors [...]

Filed under: Birmingham, Birmingham politics, Conservative Party, Race | 5 Comments »

When Tony Blair famously said “power without principle is barren, but principle without power is futile,” he was setting a mood which has dictated the Labour Party’s attitude to policy-making ever since.  Many of the party’s grassroots at the time called it a sellout on their principles - many more accepted that a degree of [...]

Filed under: Cameron, Conservative Party, Labour Party, National Politics, Tories | 1 Comment »

The Torygraph reports that their political namesake is considering reducing the “power of the unions.”
There’s no real question that this is simple knee-jerk opportunism on the Tories’ part.  We’ve had a teachers’ strike (whose justifications were admittedly dubious) and a strike of chemical workers (whose justifications seem perfectly commendable), and Osborne is trying to craft [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Left Wing Politics, National Politics, Tories, Trade Unions, unions | Tagged: Trade Unions, unions | 1 Comment »

I stumbled across this page whilst browsing the Parliament website.  It’s quite interesting to browse down the party affiliation list down the right hand side…
At least one of the two main political parties have much to do…

Filed under: Conservative Party, Labour Party, Tories, Tories' Porkies | 14 Comments »

 
From today’s Independent:
Lord Laidlaw, the multimillionaire Tory donor, has pledged a £1m donation to an addiction charity after a Sunday newspaper published lurid claims about his addiction to sex.
The Monaco-based peer admitted his lifelong problem after the News of the World claimed he had held sex parties with prostitutes. In a letter to the newspaper, [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, National Politics, Tories, Tories' Porkies | 1 Comment »

Here’s a new post from our friends at Birmingham University Conservative no Future.  Mr. O’Doherty, under the headline ‘Bring Thatcher Back’, cites a recent poll in which two-thirds of Tory voters prefer Thatcher to Cameron.  Although, this may have been a poll of the O’Doherty household, it is quite interesting to see the extent of support [...]

Filed under: Cameron, Conservative Party | 4 Comments »

The BNP have told their supporters to give their second preference vote to Boris.
The article also notes how the former Conservative councillor for Southwark and second preference choice for London Assembly for the BNP has had to be dropped after posting on his blog statements that appear to advocate violence against women, including:
“I’ve never understood [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Far right, London, London Elections 2008, Tories, Uncategorized | No Comments »

Daniel Cowdrill, Tory extraordinaire and possible maestro of the stock exchange in the future, has given himself a tough mission.  Some would say impossible, as Daniel seeks to put an end to our belittling fallacies of thatcherism expressed here nearly daily.  Today, Daniel explores how Thatcher made a small group of yuppies uber-rich.  He doesn’t [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Tories | 2 Comments »

I never wanted a referendum anyway. but at least now its over.  The Government defeated a Tory amendment to put the EU Bill to referendum with a comfortable margin.
Interesting that both Gisela Stuart (whips love her, Birmingham Edgbaston) and Lynne Jones (whips hate her, Birmingham Selly Oak) both joined up on this one.  Roger Godsiff [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Europe, Labour Party, Liberal Democrats | 10 Comments »

I don’t think I’ve ever been referred to as a left-winger in my entire life.  So I was honoured to see this post on the “award-winning” Birmingham University Conservative Future blog, accusing us comrades of harbouring secret left-wing tendencies.
The problem with BUCF is that they mostly appear to spend all their time on their own [...]

Filed under: BULSInside, Cameron, Conservative Party, Student Politics | 7 Comments »

The Red Flag is a popular and uplifting song for socialists during hard times.  One of BULSinside’s moles has revealed that a certain former chair of Birmingham University Conservative Future and new comrade has returned to his former haunts of Thatcherism. 
Having attended a BUCF event with Rt. Hon. Michael Portillo, Joseph Brewer (spotted here in the [...]

Filed under: BULSInside, Conservative Party, Tories' Porkies | 9 Comments »

Uncle Dave announces a new ground breaking scheme today to encourage the Tory front-bench (stalwarts of moral integrity) to reveal any family members they have working for them.  This is clearly in light of Derek Conway’s ordeal earlier in the week.
Does anybody else think he should extend it to all Tory MPs?  What’s he hiding?

Filed under: Cameron, Conservative Party, Tories | No Comments »

Listening to the Today programme this morning, I heard prominent Tory donor Stuart Wheeler rant about how the new EU Treaty was a disgrace, and how he was presenting a case to the High Court in order to have the Commons debate withheld.  One thing to note here is another example of how right-wing lunatics [...]

Filed under: Cameron, Conservative Party | 6 Comments »

Rosalind Ryan writes an interesting article in the Guardian, referring to an interview with young Henry Conway (see right - you know, Derek’s the MP’s lad, the one who did a bit of work for his old man - no not Freddy, he’s the one who has already been exposed and caused Dad to be suspended [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, National Politics, Tories, Tories' Porkies | No Comments »

Towards the end of Prime Ministers Questions today, a senior Conservative MP admitted his habits of planet hopping.  Brian Binley, arose to ask a question but failed to get the words out of his mouth.  After some gentle nudging from colleagues, Mr. Binley was stirred from his daze, admitting “Mr. Speaker, there are times when [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Immigration | 1 Comment »

David Cameron has recently gone off on a rather odd track.  His latest attempt at appearing to be on the side of ‘normal people’ and being a ’strong leader’ is to threaten people - with removing their food and home unless they accept the least worst of the minimum wage jobs.  On top of that, [...]

Filed under: Britishness, Cameron, Conservative Party, Labour Party, Left Wing Politics, National Politics | 1 Comment »

 The BBC reports today that foreign students who overstay their visas will no longer be automatically deported unless they have broken other UK laws during their stay. Most would think this is a perfectly reasonable policy which will cause minimum disruption to the studies of thousands of law-abiding, hard working students, who often only miss the [...]

Filed under: Brigid Jones's Diary, Conservative Party, Tories | Tagged: David Davis, Foreign students | No Comments »

In a random yet socially important and highly academic literary point, I just watched the J K Rowling programme which followed her through the final year of Harry Potter.
In talking through her characters lives, she mentioned the death of Fred Weasley.  The astute among you will remember that he died in the Battle of Hogwarts [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Tories, World news | 5 Comments »

Having recently consulted a lawyer over a practical issue closely related to the hot-topic of Freedom of Speech, I was extremely relieved to find that I am covered by a number of fundamental protections under the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR - pictured in all its splendour) and the Human Rights Act.  Under Article [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Constitutional Reform, Europe | 1 Comment »

Many thanks to Cory for brightening up my day with this little joyful story, of a Tory donor who a high court judge ruled “would not have given the money to the Tories if he was of sane mind.” Priceless.

Filed under: Brigid Jones's Diary, Conservative Party, Tories | No Comments »

I have previously claimed the Tories do not currently have the hunger for power that Labour had in 1995, hence why Cameron was stalling. Tara Hamilton-Miller has expressed doubt at this assertion - the Tories are enarmoured after the election speculation - Cameron sees it as a victory - and over the next few months Labour will be on the backfoot.

Filed under: Cameron, Conservative Party, Tories | No Comments »

Since the last fifty posts have been about the elections I thought I’d change track ever so slightly and look back at the policies that came out of ToryFest ‘07. As far as I can see they consist mainly of:

People with rich parents who live in nice houses deserve to be rich themselves once their parents are dead.
Married straight [...]

Filed under: Brigid Jones's Diary, Conservative Party, Tories | 1 Comment »

My brother turned 18  last month, and like all those “coming of age” in my home constituency, he received a card from the local MP. It seems that in the years since my 18th the Tories have ditched the traditional Big Ben card for something a little more…er…. well… just check it out. What were they [...]

Filed under: Brigid Jones's Diary, Conservative Party, Tories | No Comments »

Oh how I miss thee, Birmingham. A Freshers’ Week has come and gone and, for the first time in nine years (yeah, nine), I’ve not seen a bit of it. I gather from the new committee that Freshers has been a great success yet again this year, building on the huge success of previous years.
This [...]

Filed under: Cameron, Conservative Party, Labour Party, National Politics, Opinion polls | 3 Comments »

The Iron Chancellor isn’t meant to like the Iron Lady, I daresay he probably wasn’t that keen on inviting her round to tea.
Yet above all I don’t think Brown would have passed up the opportunity to further rile the Tory backbencers who have done so much to destablise Dave.
This was a slick piece of media management by Labour. Just [...]

Filed under: Cameron, Conservative Party, Tories | 2 Comments »

I saw a post on the Tories blog which made me think two things.  The first was ‘why do the most frequent readers of the blogs of the Guild of Students political societies appear to be the other side?’.  The second one was ‘Is it a singularly Tory habit to think that the heart of [...]

Filed under: Cameron, Conservative Party, Tories, Tories' Porkies | No Comments »

Cameron recently had his first interview on Newsnight.
Check it out here.
 Cameron is certainly taking a more serious tone and approach to politics. Gone are the days of ‘heir to Blair’ and attempts to rebrand the party. Cameron didn’t talk about the Tories capturing the centre-ground at all. Instead the Tories have realised that the country [...]

Filed under: Cameron, Conservative Party, Tories' Porkies | No Comments »

As sad as it sounds I am getting excited about the prospect of an election.
For all the junkies out there who can’t get enough of the opinion polls check out politicalbetting.com. They know what the polls mean and can give you good odds(!)
The NHS is heading for a £1bn surplus this year according to todays [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, Labour Party, NUS, National Politics | 2 Comments »

A few days ago I blogged about how Cameron was attempting to get his party talking about soft topics. This was so he could support the image his party is changing. His attempts to do this though have been proved as nothing but a facade, a PR stunt, as he is being forced to revert to policies that will [...]

Filed under: Conservative Party, National Politics, Tories' Porkies | No Comments »