Cameron and Apologies

I read in various newspapers that following then spat between Michael Gove and Theresa May over the Islamification of schools in Birmingham, Michael Gove was "ordered to apologise to the Prime Minister and to Charles Farr, a senior official at the Home Office".

I find this amazing. The fact that some unknown Civil Servant, believed to be the Cabinet Secretary, can order a cabinet member to make an apology is weird and to my mind throws considerable doubt on Cameron's abilities as a manager.

That aside,  how can you order somebody to apologise?
Surely a person who is ordered to say "Sorry" is unlikely to mean what they say and show genuine remorse for what they have done, and thus giving such an apology becomes a totally pointless activity. Indeed, a reluctant apology is more likely to make things worse, the one giving it resents having to do so and the one receiving it knows that it has no meaning.

But why didn't Cameron sort out the problem himself? When I was working, arguments between my staff were fortunately few and far between, but when they occurred, I had to sort them out and would have considered myself a failure if I'd had to call upon the Personnel (now HR) Department for assistance. It meant, of course, that I had to make a judgement of who was in the wrong, but that was all part of the job. Invariably I got the matter sorted out and things settled down. Certainly, I wouldn't have even thought of ordering either party to apologise, either to the other or to myself, that was left entirely up to them.

So why didn't Cameron do anything himself, after all he has far more power over members of the cabinet than I had over my staff. He could get rid of them next time the cabinet is shuffled whereas all I could do, in the limit, was to issue a formal warning or mark them down in their annual reports. To my mind this shows up Cameron more than Gove or May; a good manager should have realised that trouble was on the way and taken preventative action. Even then, when trouble occurred, why did Cameron off-load the problem to a Civil Servant? He's the boss, for goodness sake. Why not "I want you both in my office at 9 am in the morning without fail"? That's how things are done in the real world!

From my point of view, this whole affair shows how weak or lazy Cameron is. He is unwilling to face the realities of dealing with his cabinet appointees and delegates the matter to a Civil Servant. I remember reading Churchill's war memoirs and somewhere he wrote that on occasions he had "to knock heads together" when there was squabbling about priorities. I simply don't understand how someone can get to Cameron's position without the ability to manage staff - more to the point I wonder who would lead this country and inspire confidence if we had a real crisis.

Is the Conservative Party in Terminal Decline?

The Conservative Party is steadily loosing members at constituency level. Although they never announce their membership numbers, various media sources suggest that the membership has probably fallen to probably a tenth of what it was in Margaret Thatcher's days and is now at around the 100,000 level.

Today, we have Lord Howe, the traitor in Mrs Thatcher's cabinet, telling David Cameron that he has lost control of the party, a report that follows closely on one which suggests that a senior party member has referred to the ordinary members as being swivel-eyed loons.

Now I have always believed that it is the members of any organisation who appoint the organisation's leaders and decide its policies and it is for the appointed leaders to do their best to carry out those policies and not produce new policies without the approval of their members. If for some reason, the members are pressing for a policy which the leader is unwilling to pursue, the normal procedure would be for that leader to resign, or in the limit for the members to put forward a vote of no confidence and require his resignation at a special meeting.  Indeed this has recently happened at a (non-political) organisation to which I belong where the chairman stood down because he disagreed with the policy required by members. All very democratic and as it should be.

But somehow with politics, the whole scenario is turned upside down. Once a leader is appointed, he takes it upon him self and his cronies to decide policy and expects the members to support him, even if they disagree. He is expected, in Lord Howe's words, to control the members, who, in the view of an unidentified party official are "swivel-eyed loons"

Now, I have never been a member of a political party, but were I a member, I would expect my views to be taken into account on a democratic basis when deciding party policy; I would certainly not pay my subscription in order to be told how to think, and to be just seen as an available pair of hands to stick leaflets through letter-boxes. Pay £25 to the Conservatives for that privilege - they must be joking.

So where is the Party going? We now have two right-wing parties, the Tories and UKIP. The Tories like to see themselves as "centre-right" and in general are little different from the Blair administration. With Labour moving steadily leftwards under Miliband, this centre-right position is also moving leftwards and now is probably more left wing than, say, the post-war Atlee administration. Meanwhile UKIP is picking up traditional right-wing Tory policies and is probably in the same position in the political spectrum as the Tories were immediately after WW2. According to a recent poll they are now attracting something in excess of 20% public support.

A lot will depend upon how UKIP performs in next year's elections for the European Parliament, but if they do well, there is no doubt that many more will support them at the next General Election. So unless those at the top of the Conservative Party come to their senses and start putting forward true Conservative policies, we could be looking forward to a long period with Labour in power, essentially as happened in Canada when the right wing split into two factions. There, the right only got back to power once there was agreement between the two factions and a leader appointed who returned to true Conservative values. This, as Nigel Farrage has made clear, won't happen here whilst Cameron is leader of the Tories.

The grass-roots, the paid-up members of the Conservative party, will soon have to decide what to do about Cameron and his out of touch old-Etonian clique. The sooner the better; I've no desire for a Labour government.

Nigel Farage declares war on David Cameron

According to the Telegraph
"Nigel Farage declares war on David Cameron over Ukip racism 'slur' "
This is an interesting development, and one might say "about time too".

The matter of "Racist" UKIP has been brought to a head by the child fostering saga in Rotherham and could become quite personal between Farrage and Cameron.
Cameron said back in 2006 that UKIP members were "fruitcakes, loonies and closet racists, mostly". Downing Street has been trying to backtrack from this statement, but has only infuriated the party further by suggesting that this weekend that not all UKIP members are racist. Presumably those of us who are not racist are "fruitcakes and loonies", and there are a lot of us about as polls are suggesting that UKIP's support is now running at 9-10%.

Of course, it all depends on what you define as racism, the only definition that I have seen is the ludicrous one from the Macpherson Enquiry which defines it as "any incident which is perceived to be racist by the victim or any other person", which is an open door for any individual to claim that any other person is racist by simply stating that they perceived what was said or done to be racist. On this basis it seems that Rotherham Council, or at least some of its officials have "perceived" that UKIP is racist because of its immigration policies and because it advocates withdrawal from the EU.

A number of senior politicians from both the Labour and Tory parties have condemned this point of view and indicated that they consider that UKIP is a "mainstream" party, and whilst the LibDems have been totally silent (for once), Cameron seems the only person.to be totally out of step.

I think that it is time for Nigel Farrage to declare war and kill of the idea that UKIP is racist. I oppose the present mass immigration into this country, but it is nothing whatsoever to do with race, my views would apply equally were the immigrants coming form Australia or America. This country is overcrowded, we don't have the infrastructure to cope and at the moment we have very high unemployment. Similarly with the EU, I object to being ruled, in effect, by unelected commissioners and not by our elected MPs. But in no way is my position motivated by race, it is motivated by what I consider to be best for my country and my family.

Nigel Farrage said that UKIP, would tackle the Prime Minister on his immigration policies in the run-up to the 2015 General Election. He emphasised that
"At a time of youth unemployment of 21 per cent in Britain it does not make sense to have an open door, I want people from all over the world to come and work in Britain, good skilled people who come here on work permits, not people who come here, compete for unskilled labour, qualify automatically for Job Seekers Allowance, that doesn’t make sense."

I don't think it makes sense to anyone except Cameron and his old Etonian friends who have never had to fight for a job in their lives and know that if they loose their present jobs, they can walk straight into others elsewhere.

The Rotherham by-election, caused by the resignation of Denis MacShane, the former Europe minister who resigned in disgrace after fiddling his expenses, is on Thursday. UKIP will be pulling out all the stops and trying to bring immigration issues to the fore.

Let Battle Commence!

Late note: It now seems that Conservative Party vice chairman Michael Fabricant, has told the Tory Leaders that they will need to come to some arrangement with UKIP or else they will be certain to lose the next election with the result that has been "slapped down " by Cameron. Meanwhile Farrage having previously said that the would want any agreement signed in (Cameron's) blood, has now said that he won't be bought off.  Interesting times!

Ken Clarke and the EU

The Telegraph today reports on a number of remarks made by Ken Clarke.

Apparently according to Ken, Britain must stop having a "nervous breakdown" over Europe as it would be a economic "disaster" to leave the EU.

Sorry Ken, its you that is having the "nervous breakdown" over the fact that Britain might leave the EU. Any economic "disaster" would be for the other countries, not us, as presently we have an adverse balance of trade with the EU, and our non-EU trade is steadily expanding.

However, of far more concern is his reported remarks that
"David Cameron assures the public, he’s always assured me, that he believes, as I do, that Britain’s place in the modern world has got to be in the EU.
"It would be a disaster for our influence in global political events. It would be a disaster for the British economy, if we were to leave the EU. It damages our influence in these great critical events of the moment if we keep casting doubt on our continued membership."

This, of course confirms what we have all known for a long while that Cameron, who has promised to to renegotiate the UK's relationship with Europe, is not likely to agree to an IN/OUT referendum on the E.U.

So nothing has changed, if Cameron remains leader of the Tories, we will remain in the EU in order that, inter alia, we have "influence in these great critical events of the moment" !   I just wonder what influence that Britain or indeed the EU has over what is happening in Gaza, which is surely  "a critical event of the moment" as, in that in the limit, it could end up with a war involving the major powers.

Nothing that Ken has said will make me change my mind about getting out of the EU, and whilst friends of mine who live in his constituency tell me that he is a very good constituency MP, in this matter I feel that he his sorely out of touch with his electorate.