Monthly Archives: April 2010

Voting conservative would be a bad thing to do.

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Journalists usually ask politicians questions in an election campaign to catch them out, trip them up and cause a gaffe. Not this time. I genuinely wanted there to be no story yesterday when I asked Michael Gove a question that matters more than most things. I asked if he could guarantee that nursery schools would not be allowed to charge top-up fees for the currently free places of every three- and four-year old. I asked it this way, that way and the other way. Other journalists joined in, too, but no. He would not, could not give that pledge. I sincerely hoped he would kill the story dead, but no.

Polly Toynbee | The Guardian.

Voting

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Your heart might say Clegg. But vote with your head

“Until the electoral system is reformed, progressives are stuck. If you do not want a Tory government, it’s tactics, not romance Get real. Keep your head screwed on. What result do you want? I will assume, dear Guardian reader, that like me you have two prime purposes. One is to prevent Cameron walking into Downing Street on 7 May. Equal first is to secure electoral reform so that we are never again presented with such a disgraceful voting choice. If that’s not your view, you can save time, stop reading here and push off to some Murdoch organ that will amply satisfy your needs.”

(Polly Toynbee | guardian.co.uk.)

Miss the vote

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Phone call earlier from someone representing the Labour Party. He told me that there was a meeting of Labour supporters tomorrow and would I be interested in going? I said ‘not really’. He then said that there would be someone from the Labour Party there (that’ll be everyone surely?) and went into conspiratorial mode, he said there would be a high ranking member of the Labour Party there, a minister, a senior minister. And did I want to go? I said ‘No, not really’. He said thanks, would be in touch (I hope not) and rang off.

I suppose they want turnout and that’s fair enough but I certainly don’t want to go simply because I’ll be within a few dozen yards (maybe) of someone in the government. Except they aren’t, they are all PPC’s, not ministers afaik. And it’s not like I need to go to convince myself that this person is real. TV and media has not yet got to the point where I believe everything is made up just for the proles.

And I’m sorting a proxy vote as I’ll be in the US/in the air on the 6th. Annoying that I will miss not just voting but the staying up all night watching the coverage. I’ve done that every year (remember Portillo losing to Twigg?) and I really will miss that. It will make the event less real. Unlike the elected.

Along a street

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Wandered to and around Camden Market – http://www.camdenlock.net/- http://www.camdenmarkets.org/ – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Camden_Market – with some friends yesterday. Some of the shops are below. What you can’t see here is the wide variety of people wandering round too. The last image. There is a shelf on the wall above them. You sit on the seat to eat the food. There was one overlooking the river but the pic isn’t as nice to look at. Inside the market there is probably every cuisine you can think of being cooked right in front of you. Fantastic place to go.