Dream BBC Question Time Panel

OK, so it might not be he most fascinating topic in the world, but after various discussions over the weeks about who is worth having on BBC Question Time and who is as pointless as Jarvis Cocker (pretty much no-one it turns out) I was wondering about a dream line up.

I've tried asking people on Twitter who they would like, but it seems to be too sad a question even for the Twitterverse.

In case anyone gives a tiny rat's bottom, my lineups would be (one Wales based, one not):

A Welsh Question Time (filmed here in Wrexham at the University of course)

Rhodri Morgan (Labour)
William Hague (Conservative believe it or not)
Eleanor Burnham (Liberal Democrats)
Nerys Evans (Plaid Cymru)
Ben Goldacre (even though he'd be too well behaved to call anyone a cock-end. He might wear his f***ing cape though)

Deliberately not all Welsh as devolution hasn't gone far enough for that to be even slightly sensible

An Ordinary Question Time

Lord Drayson
Kenneth Clarke
Norman Baker
Caroline Lucas
Frankie Boyle

Ian Hislop as guest Chair

On Twitter it's a real dream line up:

Melonhead999 suggested:
Bin Laden,
Tony Benn,
George Galloway,
George W Bush
Nick Griffin

Which would certainly be rather more entertaining than usual.

I'd like a selection of slimy and/or evil politicians and some rabid lions, but sadly that's probably less likely than the Bin Laden/George W Bush one.

So, anyone want to have a go at either a proper dream lineup or a possible one?

Shock! Horror! A Hypocritical MP

Whatever your feelings on climate change it is (believe it or not) big news at the moment.

Last week I noticed that our esteemed MP Ian Lucas was taking part in a question and answer session on climate change a few days after voting against the 10:10 motion.

To me the timing exacerbated the hypocrisy - telling the peasants how important it is to reduce emissions while voting against a bill to reduce Parliament's contribution to climate change. The full text of my letter:

Dear Sirs

I was very interested to read that Labour MP Ian Lucas was taking part in a Climate Change question and answer session in Oswestry at the weekend.

Sadly I couldn't make it to the event, but was struck by the incredible timing. Mere days after helping the Government to defeat the 10:10 motion in Parliament - a pledge for the Government to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions by 10% by the end of 2010 - he appears at an event to warn people of the effects of those very gasses!

This seems all too typical of the hypocrisy infecting the Labour Government

Yours faithfully

Matt Raven
Wrexham

Surprisingly enough Mr Lucas wasn't impressed:

It is sad that a Wrexham Liberal Democrat activist calls me a "hypocrite" Leader Letters) - so much for lifting the level of political debate.

The spurious ground is an effort by the Liberal Democrats to make party political capital from what should be the cross-party issue of climate change.

As the letter writer notes, I spoke at an event addressing the issue of climate change recently - an event he could not be bothered to attend.  I made time to attend because I think it is an important issue.

The government is not opposed to 10:10, as the writer suggests - every member of the cabinet has signed up to it and I support it myself.

But I disagreed with the way the Liberal Democrats used 10:10 for their own political purposes in Parliament which is why I voted against the Liberal Democrat motion referred to.

I also disagree with the way their Wrexham activists are using the campaign to attack me.

Warm words from the Lib Dems won't cut climate change - action will.  I have campaigned on climate change for many years and will continue to do so.

Ian Lucas MP
Wrexham

(Notice I hadn't mentioned that I was a Liberal Democrat, I assume he must read my blog.  Hello Mr Lucas.  Try leaving a comment instead of lurking.  Or get one of your activists to do it.  If they are even vaguely polite I'll publish it.)

So he is proud of voting against a measure he supports?  That's politician logic for you.  Presumably it is not the first time either as despite campaigning locally to prevent Post Office closures he voted repeatedly in Westminster against halting the closures.

So I replied:

I am disappointed at the double standards employed by Wrexham MP Ian Lucas in his attack on me (Leader, 2 Nov) for pointing out his hypocrisy on fighting climate change.
First he tries to politicise the attack by dismissing my views as those of a Liberal Democrat, then he claims to believe that fighting climate change should be a cross party issue!
Mr Lucas also claims to be a supporter of the 10:10 initiative to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 10% by 2010. Yet when it came to committing his government to action he voted against it. It is hard to defend voting against a measure with which you claim to agree.
As Mr Lucas says "warm words won't cut climate change - action will".  Perhaps Mr Lucas should heed those words. He could use his position to vote in parliament to bring about change instead of just going around lecturing people! It is fairly pointless for him to continue his alleged campaigning if he fails to take action when given the opportunity. He could have shown that fighting climate change is indeed a cross-party issue by voting for another party's motion. Instead he voted against it. 
Mr Lucas criticises my choice of words, and specifically the use of the word "hypocrisy". For his information the definition of hypocrisy is "The claim or pretence of holding beliefs, feelings, standards, qualities, opinions or virtues that one does not actually possess." 
I realise this Government is famous for its "creative" use of language, but clearly claiming to support a cause while voting against it is hypocritical, whether that cause is halting climate change, opposing the Iraq war or fighting local post office closures!

I think the nice people at the Leader are enjoying it - my original letter was just mixed in with all the others, then his reply was top right with a photo of him.  My response was printed today - top centre and with a bigger font for the title than his, and a pull quote.  Yes, I'm easily pleased.

There is no reply yet, it must have been lost in the post.

Really, do MPs think people won't notice when they say one thing locally and vote exactly the opposite way in Parliament?  I know Westminster is a fair way from Wrexham, but a while back some enterprising chaps invented movable type, and slightly more recently that internet thing has become a fairly popular way of obtaining information.

It's arrogant and cannot possibly increase trust in our elected representatives.

Poetic Justice or Democratic Failure?

After a brief discussion on Twitter I seem to be having my first difference of opinion with the excellent Mark Thompson of Mark Reckons. Actually the extent of it seems to be that he is nicer than me.

To save messing around with twitter, the conversation is below. Mark's stuff is in bold, mine is in italics.

If I was a Eurosceptic, thinking of voting Conservative, at the moment I would be thinking the only safe bet for my views is UKIP.
You wouldn't be hoping their vote will be split by any chance? :)
No. I'm actually hoping that more eurosceptic Tories will start to understand the unfairness of our electoral system.
Fair enough. Do you think it will be split to any great degree though?
Because of FPTP it could end up costing them seats where it is very close between Tories and nearest challengers.
Poetic justice really
It's as unfair for those on the right as it is for those on the left or centre ground. I do not want to see that. I'm a democrat.
Yes it's unfair, but surely after defending the system so strongly they can't then complain about the result when it costs them
Might finally understand though

Now, my feeling on the matter is that if it takes losing some seats thanks to a split vote with UKIP to bring home the limitations of First Past the Post then good, serves 'em right. Mark (to pick a blogging STV enthusiast entirely at random...) could follow the results up with one of his excellent posts/guest articles explaining that they would probably have won a/some seat/s using the Single Transferable Vote.

This might finally get the message home that they are supporting an inherently undemocratic system. I also do not think they would be in any position to complain, and again it would be easy to highlight the fact that their love affair with FPTP caused their losses. Of course, their disproportionate trouncing in '97 didn't do it, but this time they are certain that they are destined to win so any losses will probably hurt more than when they were expecting a kicking.

As I said, the difference seems to be that Mark is nicer, so while I think it serves them right he appears to hope they can be warned and informed.

Great, a post all about what a petty vindictive bastard I can be.

Full text of Letter from Ian Lucas Regarding Gurkha Vote

In the interests of fairness, here is the complete text of the letter from Ian Lucas regarding the Gurkhas:

Dear Mr Raven

Thank you for your email concerning the issue of the Gurkhas Brigade and the calculation of the figure of £1.4bn, as a potential cost of allowing Gurkhas to settle in the UK.

I do understand that this is a very important and sensitive issue, and I am well aware of the strength of feeling on it. I would like to make it clear that I fully acknowledge and respect the service, commitment and bravery of those serving with the Gurkhas Brigade. However, as you mention in your email, I voted against the motion to grant the pre-1997 Gurkhas settlement rights, and I will set out my views for voting this way.

I am very proud that this Labour Government is the first to give a number of rights to the Gurkhas Brigade, long before the Commons vote in May, and I think it is important to set out the background to this issue.

in September 2004, the then Prime Minster, tony blair, announced the Government's decision to amend the Immigration Rules. On a discretionary basi, Gurkhas who had completed at least 4 years service and been discharged from Nepal from 1 July 1997 onwards, wereable to settlein the UK within two years of their discharge, where there were strong reasons why settlement in the UK was appropriate. As I have pointed out, this was the first time that any Government has brought in rules to allow Gurkhas to apply to stay permanently in the UK. However, at this stage there was never any suggestion that the opportunity to settle in the UK would be offered to every former member of the Brigade of Gurkhas.

A Judicial Review was launched against this policy on the treatment of Gurkha veterans by 6 former Gurkhas. On 30 September 2008, the High Court found that the 1997 cut off date was not discriminatory, as the circumstances of Far-East based Gurkhas were not comparable with those of Commonwealth citizens serving in HM Forces pre- July 1997.

Instead, the judgement found that the Goverment's discretionary guiidance for Gurkha veterans discharged before 1997 was not sufficiently clear, and this guidance was judged to be unlawful. However, reports seem to have misinterpreted this as the judge finding that the entire policy was unlawful and that all pre-1997 Gurkhas should now have the right to settle in the UK.

The High Court found that the policy should be reconsidered in line with the Court's judgement and the revised guidance would have to indicate the relative weighting to be given to factors, including length and quality of service. Up until May, the rules relating to Gurkhas discharged post-1997 remained unchanged. Instead it was the guidance that was changed.

As you are aware, in May, the Government was outnumbered in the House of Commons on the issue of extending the right to all Gurkhas to settle in the UK. While I did not vote for this, it is right that the will of the House of Commons was respected. I am pleased that, after the vote, and agreement was able to be reached acoss Government, across the House and Gurkha representatives, and that all Gurkhas won the right to settle in the UK.

It is always very difficult to calulate the cost implications of such legislation. You are right that the figure of £1.4bn was the maximum cost, but it was still the potential cost. However, as youpoint out, it is very unlikely that all Gurkhas will choose to settle in the UK, and that they would bring over their entire families. I can assure you that when I voted for against the motion to grant the pre- 1997 Gurkhas settlement rights, I was mindful that the £1.4bn was the maximum potential cost, and that it would not necessarily reflect the actual cost.

I am sorry that I have set out the position at some length but I am afraid that there has been much misepresentation of the history of this matter, much of it for political advantage by parties who have not supported the Gurkhas when they were in power. I also do not believe that this issue is as simple as the media coverage suggested.

I do appreciate you contacting me concerning this issue. If you would like to discuss it further, or any other issue, it may be helpful to contact my office to fix an appointment.

Yours sincerely

Ian Lucas

Unanswered Questions on the Lib Dem Policy on Gibraltar

I have some questions on the Lib Dem policy on Gibraltar, prompted in part by posts on "A Gibo's Tale" blog (Does Duff support 'Britishness' and the British in... and Duff refuses to answer questions on being British) run by a friend of mine. Why not just ask them? I did, they didn't answer. This is very disappointing for me.

The email I sent was:

Dear Sirs

I have recently joined the Liberal Democrats as I tend to agree with the party's policies which are generally properly considered rather than designed to appeal to the Daily Mail. I would however welcome some clarification on an issue that is important to my family and me.

Gibraltarians have repeatedly expressed a desire to remain British despite harassment by successive Spanish governments. The Liberal Democrats' position on the Gibraltarians' right to self determination appears to have changed recently for the better, although possibly this should be explained to Andrew Duff who seems to think that Gibraltar should be given to Spain against the democratically expressed wishes of the Gibraltarians. Please can you explain the current position and the reason for the change?

I realise that this is not top of most people's priorities, but having married into a Gibraltarian family and experienced the smears and pettiness of the Spanish Government and opposition politicians at close quarters it is something I feel strongly about. I know that a number of Gibraltarian voters were put off by the historic position, the fact the position apparently changed at about the same time that Gibraltarian votes counted in the European elections and the views expressed by Mr Duff. It is great that a Gibraltarian candidate was listed but having him so far down the list made it easy for people to dismiss it as a cheap stunt as Mr Stagnetto was obviously not going to be elected.

Thank you for your time and consideration.

Yours faithfully

Matt Raven

Now, I don't really know what response I was hoping for, but anything would have been nice.

If anyone has the answers, please let me know...

Ian Lucas Replies re: Gurkha Settlement Rights

Further to my FOI reqest regarding the Gurkha settlement issue (also covered by the excellent Mark Reckons) I recently sent an email to my MP Ian Lucas (through Write to Them) asking why he voted against the motion on the Gurkhas.

Dear Ian Lucas,

I have recently received information from the Home Office explaining how the figure of £1.4 billion was reached as a potential cost of allowing all Gurkhas the right to settle in UK.  It seems that figure (repeatedly   quoted by Phil Woolas and Gordon Brown) assumes that every single  living Gurkha who retired from 1948 onwards would instantly bring his entire family (including elderly parents) over and that none of them would ever work.  The information is here:http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/basis_for_14_billion_cost_of_gur#incoming-38596 in case you do not have a copy.

I note from TheyWorkForyou that you voted against the motion to grant the pre-1997 Gurkhas settlement rights.

Given that the figures were clearly desperately overstating any potential cost, please could you explain why you chose to vote against this motion?

Thank you for your time.

Yours sincerely,

Matt Raven
I was pleasantly surprised to receive a long reply in which Mr Lucas set out the history of the Gurkha settlement rights and the Judicial review, the fact that  the Government was "outnumbered" in the vote and that he knew the £1.4bn was an unlikely maximum cost.  Something that he seems to have forgotten to include is his actual reason for voting with the Government.  He covers the fact that it was the unclear guidance that was illegal, not the 1997 cutoff but ignores all issues of fairness.

He ends the letter with:
I am sorry that I have set out the position at some length but I am afraid that there has been much misrepresentation of the history of this matter, much of it for political advantage by parties who have not supported the Gurkhas while they were in power.  I also do not believe that this issue is as simple as the media coverage suggested.
Given this was largely a Liberal Democrat issue, I'm glad he chose to level misrepresentation claims against the Conservatives not us!

Government's Ridiculous £1.4 Billion Gurkha Settlement Figures

OK, so I wasn't alone in thinking that the £1.4 billion figure was a little suspect, but let's pretend that you thought it was potentially accurate...

A Freedom of Information request that I sent via the fantastic Whatdotheyknow.com on 29th April has finally been answered a mere two months and one internal review late.

I asked them to "Please supply details of the calculation used to determine the £1.4
billion cost of settlement rights for Gurkhas."

Their eventual reply (obviously available on WDTK) was that the figure assumes (among other things) that:

• All 36,000 who retired between 1948 and 1997 would choose to settle if they were able to do so
• None of the dependants (including spouse, children under 18, unmarried dependant children 18-30, elderly parents living with the main applicant - and assuming half of children 18-30 are married) work
• All settling families are on Child Tax Credits maximum award.

And do not take account of any tax or national insurance contributions that former Gurkhas may have made in the past or that they may make in the future

While I am obviously not a Gurka expert I would not have thought that those assumptions were particularly likely to apply to any group. No wonder that nice Mr Woolas so stenuously avoided answering any questions on the figures...

Is voting Labour like electrocuting a puppy?

A ComRes poll (in the Independent on Sunday) has put the Lib Dems within one point of Labour (22% to 23%, Conservatives out in front on 38%). Obviously I'm happy to see the Lib Dems closing the gap (less happy with the YouGov poll for ITN), but it did make me wonder why Labour is still so popular. So I asked the question on Twitter, which feeds through to my facebook account. One of my friends on facebook answered:

People are afraid of change; they would rather sit on in misery with a known quantity then take a chance to improve their situation because there is always that nagging doubt that things may change to much from their comfort zone or get worse (which would then be THEIR fault and not be able to blame their misfortune on some one else). In any situation people will always fall back to the lowest common denominator which is fear of the unknown - "it could be worse", "better the devil you know". A person is smart and can be reasoned with but people in a group are stupid and easily led; Labour are in power therefore they belong there.

Which seems worryingly accurate. He later made reference to the Milgram Experiment which shows that people are easily persuaded to do objectionable things by authority figures - one version even had people giving real electric shocks to a puppy because they were told to. He noted:

This study showed that people would follow orders to do pretty much any thing if told by a person in authority. Humans are a herd animal and will do almost any thing to "belong". Most people would not want to stand out or be different and history has shown that even enlightened, intelligent people will follow the crowd and do awful things.

I imagine for a lot of people there are several sources of authority in this matter: Their parents if they are from staunch Labour household; peer pressure if it's a Labour area, linked to a lack of debate on the issues because everyone is pro-Labour; and of course the Labour Party itself with the "Vote Lib Dem get Tory" type lines.

All of which might go some way to explaining why some people would vote for a pig with a red rosette (and in some cases seem to have done).

Of course, there are other issues, some closer to home. Despite great successes with the Gurkhas, taking the lead on Trident, the 100 day plan and of course the marvellous Vince Cable people still don't seem to know what the Lib Dems stand for. While it is difficult for the Lib Dems to get equivalent coverage to the big two parties there must be some way to get the main messages across.

For example, the Freedom Bill should be outstandingly popular (how widely hated can repealing oppressive laws be?), but ask 20 people in the street about it and you'll get 18 blank looks, one "Oh, I think I've heard about that" and one blow to the head (at least on some streets).

I know Vince Cable is on TV a lot and that most people seem to agree with him, but somehow they don't link agreeing with him and thinking he'd be the best Chancellor of the Exchequer with looking into or supporting the party that could put him into that position.

Maybe during this recess something magic will happen. Maybe news coverage will become fairer to us - although of course I'm biased as to what constitutes "fair". Maybe the entire Labour (ha, vaguely amusing typo of "Labout" corrected) party will forget to register for the next election. Or maybe we need to expand the way we try to get the message across. Without irrelevant graphs. We have some excellent bloggers: Costigan Quist, Mark Thomson and Charlotte Gore to name but three, but it takes a "special" sort of person (which I am proud/mildly depresed to be) to want to spend their free time reading politics blogs when they could be having fun/watching paint dry.

I do have some experience with these issues - I have recently returned from Gibraltar where I was proud to be a member of the Executive of the Progressive Democratic Party, the third party over there. Our membership was much smaller than the other two parties and we had the same difficulties with fair coverage - even to the point that we had to take the local TV station to Court to try to enter the pre-election leaders debate. Unfortunately the attempt was unsuccessful, but it did generate some coverage in its own right.

Of course, I'm not belittling the hard work that is put in trying to get the message across; I just think that even given the low spending power and so forth that there must be a better way, even if I only have vague ideas of what it could be. I'm working on a post to flesh out those ideas a bit :) Charlotte Gore's letter is an amazing idea for starters.

So, more in Part 2...

Prime Minister's Questions

As pointless as all of the other petitions, but:

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to properly and fully answer the questions put to him at Prime Minister's Questions

http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/AnswerPMQs/

Go on, sign it...

Freedom of Information

The Freedom of Information Act (2000) allows the general public to find out information that their elected representatives were not planning to release. Unless the invoke one of the exemptions. Or claim they do not have it. Or tell you it will cost too much. Or just ignore you.

You can of course complain to the Information Commissioner, but since the complaints are taking up to three years you have to really want the information to go down that route. Having said that I'll probably refer one of my requests to them even though the information I asked for is already fairly irrelevant (see £1.4 Billion cost of settlement rights for Gurkhas below).

I currently have three requests being processed, but will soon be adding more. The current requests are:

1. The Basis for the claim that allowing the Gurkhas to settle in the UK would cost £1.4 billion
2. The reasoning behind the budget cut to the Venture in Caia Park Wrexham
3. Processing times for Child Benefit claims

All three were made through the excellent www.whatdotheyknow.com

I have received a partial answer to the question regarding child benefit claims, but HM Revenue and Customs' email system does not seem to be working any more to get a full answer. Oddly the answer given said that they did not have a breakdown of how long claims took to process, yet they did now the average processing times. Surely one is needed to calculate the other? Slightly amusingly, on the day that they told me that on average all claims are dealt with within 28 working days our claim was completed. After FIVE MONTHS.

The Venture budget cut request has another few days before the time limit expires and will be the subject of a full post. I'm not necessarily against the cut, but there has not been enough information released so far for anyone to form a reasoned opinion of the matter. And that is the problem.

As for the Home Office, frankly I'm disgusted. They did tell me it would be impossible to give the answer within the 20 day limit (bizarre, but at least they warned me), but then ignored me for three weeks forcing me to request an internal review. An internal review is supposed to take no more than 20 days without an explanation for the delay. I really don't think

We are currently gathering all the information needed to complete this review and we will respond as soon as possible.

counts. Still, at least they are responding now, and there is a requirement that the review is carried out within 40 working days, so we're more than half way. I am really not keen on taking it further for the reasons mentioned above - especially since they apparently changed their minds about it costing too much anyway - but I probably will just because they should have answered.

So, three requests, one partial answer, one internal review and one in progress. Not exactly a stunning success for FOI, but it's a start.

Pendants' Corner

In a blatant rip off of something I saw on the delightful Charlotte Gore's site, this is the place to point out my stupid mistakes.

Have fun.

Welcome

Who
Hi, I'm Matt Raven. Welcome to my blog. My family and I have just returned to Wrexham after nearly 10 years away - six months in Hove, the rest of the time in the slightly more exotic Gibraltar.

Why
During my time away I developed an interest in politics and was proud to be invited to join the Executive of Gibraltar's Progressive Democratic Party, a new party which thoroughly deserves to get into power there. Now that I have returned I have joined the Liberal Democrats and will give them whatever help I can to increase their vote in future elections. So far it has mainly taken the form of sticking labels onto things :)

What
In theory this blog will be the usual sort of thing - my thoughts on current issues plus rants/info about certain "key" issues, Freedom of information, Education and Health among others. I'm new to this and I'm out of practice writing for an audience, so please be patient :)