Police

Part of Point of Order – in the House of Commons at 2:15 pm on 31 January 2007.

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Photo of John Leech John Leech Shadow Minister (Transport) 2:15, 31 January 2007

Has my hon. Friend ever met a single constituent who has told him that they would prefer an identity card to more police on the street?

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Withington Observer
Posted on 9 Mar 2007 4:40 pm (Report this annotation)

This is a false dichotomy. Though i suspect the Hon Member for Manchester Withington is far too dim to know what that is!!

Let's try one on him:

Would you prefer a Lib Dem chancer for an MP or a hospital hoaxer and general lying scumbag?

Do you see John? It's not really an either or question.

Or another:

When it comes to condemning Cluster Bombs would you prefer an "anti-war" Lib Dem (not Lords Garden or Ashdown then) or a man who was a PR and lobbyist and recent factory visitor and complementer for Raytheon, the fifth biggest arms dealer in the world?

Do you see John?

Personally I am against iD cards for all sorts of reasons - not principally cost, there are more important principles, don't you see? - but one can have more spent on police and iD cards. It is a wholly false dichotomy. We HAVE had much more spent on police these last 10 years, the Lib Dems have voted for the budgets and then slam them, the Lib Dems are quite simply lying hypocrites.

The fact is that there were THREE MAJOR ERRORS in Leech's "debate":

- he insulted Anne Coffey MP, 10 times better than he could ever be
- he had to concede immediately that the budget balanced
- he had to concede that the clawback he was aksing to stop had already been stopped, but he was too dim to notice

Withington Observer
Posted on 9 Mar 2007 4:42 pm (Report this annotation)

PS

How was that a Point of Order you doh! brain?

Tim Kinsella
Posted on 19 Apr 2007 11:07 pm (Report this annotation)

Perhaps one should realise that one does not refer to members of the House as honourable unless a) one is a member of the house and is speaking within the chamber or b) the member has previously held office, in which case the member thus becomes the Right Honourable.

Mark Bestford
Posted on 19 Apr 2007 11:15 pm (Report this annotation)

Tim, in all honesty the majority of the public do not know and do not care.

The whole thing is archaic and disguises the fact that in all reality the "honourable friend" opposite is probably a) not honourable and b) not their friend.

In fact the majority would appear quite happy to use every cheap trick in the book in order to stab the person they are talking to in the back at every opportunity possible and the majority of the population would rather such schoolground behaviour had no place in today's politics.

Tim Kinsella
Posted on 19 Apr 2007 11:15 pm (Report this annotation)

Perhaps one should also realise that Mr. Leech was speaking on a Point of Order put down by the Rt. Hon. Tony McNulty MP regarding a report on the police grant. If one took the time to read the title and the first two sentences of the debate then this would be apparent.

"Tony McNulty (Minister of State, Home Office)

As a Middlesex MP, I beg to move,

That the Police Grant Report (England and Wales) for 2007-08, House of Commons Paper No. 207, a copy of which was laid before this House on 18th January, be approved."

Tim Kinsella
Posted on 19 Apr 2007 11:28 pm (Report this annotation)

Mark, I wholeheartedly agree. Many of the systems in Parliament are utterly absurd and are not conducive to increased participation in politics.

I have to admit though, I do have a soft spot for some of it. Personally, If I were an MP, my first act would be to ask the sergeant-at-arms' office for the snuff which they are obliged to provide me.

P.S. I was merely trying to emulate Withington Observer's marvelous pomposity

Mark Bestford
Posted on 20 Apr 2007 1:03 pm (Report this annotation)

I find it quite amusing myself, given that the school I went to had set in it's Rules that should the Head Boy marry while still at the school he would be allowed to wear a frock coat, grow a mustache, smoke a pipe and be housed in the 2nd Master's House. No mention was made on where the 2nd Master was supposed to move to however. Makes all the pomp and circumstance of Parliament seem quite sane in comparison.

It is about time that the parties realised that "Party Politics" is dead in this country. What is the point of endlessly condemning the opposition when in reality most policies are exact clones of each other and not one party has had a genuinely novel idea in decades. Mind it does just go to show how much further out of touch the average MP is nowadays.