Charles Kennedy’s Cheerful Descent on Sutton
Posted by jonathanfryer on Saturday, 11th July, 2009
Charles Kennedy flew down from sunny Glasgow today to be the guest speaker at Sutton LibDems’ annual garden party (held as usual in the spacious garden of Jayanta Chaterjee), accompanied by his wife Sarah and their young son Donald. The rain more or less held off and there was plenty to be cheerful about, in particular Gerry Jerome’s win in the recent Nonsuch ward by-election, which I blogged about the other day, and the swing from the Conservatives to the Liberal Democrats in the borough in last month’s Euro-elections. Charles has held his seat in Parliament for 26 years, which is only three years longer than the LibDems have been controlling Sutton Council. The borough is a prime Tory target in next year’s London local elections, as are Sutton’s two parliamentary seats, Sutton & Cheam and Carshalton & Wallington, currently held by Paul Burstow and Tom Brake. However, as Charles said, incumbency is a great asset, especially for hard-working LibDem MPs. Nonetheless, the Conservatives have reportedly been spending three times as much money as the LibDems campaigning in the borough in the hope of unseating both MPs. In this regard, it will be interesting to see how the parliamentary vote on the funding of political parties goes next week, which could lead to the barring of donations from non-domiciles, which may or may not include the Conservative party’s sugar daddy, Lord Ashcroft (up until now, he has refused to disclose his tax status, despite saying that he would move formally to England when he was granted his peerage). And then there is the Cameron factor, at first so dazzling, but now looking a bit lack-lustre. The verdict of the neighbourhood’s local peer, Graham Tope, on David Cameron: ‘a supercilious git.’
Dominic Black said
I couldn’t see a more appropriate entry to add this comment on but I feel this needs saying.
There are countless numbers of British people who would love to see a defence policy that does not waste lives of British people with no gain for Britain whatsoever. This is not out of nationalism or racism. Many of these people would be prepared to vote for a Liberal at least once if not all the time. The Liberal Democrats have let these people down by not standing up for British interests on defence. The conflicts in Iraq and Aftghanistan have nothing to with Britain any more than it was in Britain’s interests to join with USA in violently overthrowing the Iranian government in 1953. The USA has never and will never fight alongside Britain unless an American dies first; since when was that the definition of an ally. If the Liberal Democrats adopt a defence policy that is based on both putting Britain’s interests and the principles of a just war first then a lot of votes could follow. By the principles of a just war I mean the commonly accepted ones. These include no non-combatants deaths, all methods for trying to resolve the conflict by peaceful means must be attempted and the war must not be for territorial aggrandisement. If modernises these points by adding to that last point that a just war must not be for economic aggrandisement this further rules out Iraq due to America’s desire to get control of their oil. A more recent wording of these traditional points is:
1. The damage inflicted by the aggressor on the nation or community of nations must be
lasting, grave and certain;
2. All other means of putting an end to it must have been shown to be impractical or ineffective;
3. There must be serious prospects of success;
4. The use of arms must not produce evils and disorders graver than the evil to be eliminated. The power of modern means of destruction weighs very heavily in evaluating this condition
(The source for the above 4 points is page 496 of the latest edition of the Catechism of the Catholic Church.)
More specifically on the Afghan conflict it seems very like imperialism going into a country to make it ‘better’. There are many things wrong with Afghanistan and very much so from where we are here in the west. Moving from that conclusion to the idea that British troops should be there is a leap too far. There are a great number of people throughout Britain who take a similar view. This opinion is added to even further with the lies that have been told concerning the reason for the British military presence. I realise that these are not the same lies as were told with regard to Iraq but the suppression of drugs is so blatantly a lie considering the suppression of the drug trade under the Taliban rule that it just insults people to propogate this drivel. There are advantages to this in that the chief liars are the Labour Government but only as long as there is no agreement with the government on this.
British interest does not include Afghanistan. It is incorrect to say otherwise as unlike in 1839-41,forty years later and 1919 (the dates of the three Afghan Wars) Britain no longer rules India. Neverhtheless British troops are being overstretched in Afghanistan and Iraq. British military interest does include Belize, Oman and southern Africa. In the latter case there was an agreement with the last regime for the Royal Navy to use Simondstown whenever a need arose.
This agreement proved usefull in the Falklands War when British ships used this base. If there
is ever to be an action to repair the damage to Zimbabwe and Britain is to be involved in this it would be far more sensible and beneficial to Britain’s relations with other countries to spend money on Simondstown naval base and so revitalise the agreement with the new regime.
Britain has few real allies in the world and with a defence policy that includes protection of
the interests mentioned above friends could be gained from such actions. Belize, the former
British Honduras only took independence with the promise of a continuation of a British military
presence and its location in central America can be very useful for any of the former British colonies in the area who may wish to call on aid from a stronger power. Oman is one of Britain’s most ardent friends and it has a similarly advantageous position in the Arabian gulf
and there are British military personnel constantly present in the country.
France has benefitted from aiding its former colonies and been an active member of the EU at
the same time it would be useful from an international perspective if Britain took a similar
course of action. Unlike the action in Afghanistan as long as it is handles in an appropriate
manner this policy would not be imperialist but instead based on what is mutually in the
interests of all countries concerned.
If the Liberal Democrats called for a policy along these lines rather than tugging at the coat tails of the USA then gains could well be made. I do not speak from the standpoint of the neo-Nazi Parties in this country but I think that this sort of policy could be mutually beneficial to all countries concerned. From this platform more friends could be added to the FCO’s address book.
Dominic Black.