Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Lydia taking the leap--I'm a Tory now!
Hello Harringay,
A few weeks ago a good friend in the Conservatives asked me to run under their banner in the local elections and I didn't laugh right in his face.
My original excursion into politics was in 2001, when I joined the Conservatives because I was so angry about the Victoria Climbie thing but then I left them in 2005 because:
a) I got fed up of politics and
b) I got fed up of the Conservatives (mind you I was just as fed up of the other lot).
When, a few weeks ago, I was invited back to the treadmill, I wasn't any better disposed to the political life but there is so much sh*t going on in this borough that I decided I couldn't ignore it any more. I don't fit that well into a Party mold but seeing as the Conservatives are the only group really serious about opposition in this borough and seeing as I am an Angry Old Woman, I decided that *someone* has to do something. Don't talk to me about the LibDems. The place for nodding dogs is in the back of the car, not in the Council chamber.
*If you want to follow me on Twitter, the address is <@LoveHarringay>
*If you want to get in touch with me by phone, leave a message with Tottenham Conservatives on 020 8374 6305. I'll get back to you. Or email loveharringay@gmail.com.
*If you want to discuss political theory, ring the LSE.
And from now on, you can be as suspicious as you want about anything I say.
btw:
I and my two running-mates, Sean Rivers and Massimo Rossini (NB--Rivers, Rivlin & Rossini make The Three Rs, which all good Conservatives support) will be putting out a leaflet soon.
The local party have agreed to let us write up our own stuff, so we are actually going to be working hard on it, ourselves. At least take a look when it lands on your doormat.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Protheroe O'Shea on
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Lydia R. What do you think of the St Ann's debacle?
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Sod it I'll start this as a discussion. It would be interesting to here the views councillor's incumbent and prospective ......
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Permalink Reply by Lydia R on
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I have been shouting and screaming about the St Ann's mess for - oh, maybe ten years. I came to one of Mario's meetings with a map of Haringey once, in which I had filled with green all the parks in the borough. West was full of green, east had a few green spots. How do I feel about it? I feel that Tottenham is being cheated.
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Permalink Reply by Justin Hinchcliffe on
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I think TW is referring to Labour cheating in order to fix the St Ann's selection in favour of Koberites? John M has already said, given he considers it to be a "safe ward," the 'crowning' of the selection 'victors'. In other words, it's the only election that matters so you might as well cancel May 22. His words, not mine.
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Of course, the vote rigging.
TW, all you have to do to work out my attitude to the vote rigging is to see any comments I have made about democracy and voting in other postings. When one party or group tries to organise a political system that concentrates power in a particular elite it should terrify everyone. This scandal is one of the reasons I left my cosy hearth just a few days ago to venture into the hurricane-blasted wilderness that is the world of politics.
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Was the St Ann's issue written about in your Guardian news letter? I never received a copy so apologies if you did. If you did not, why?
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We haven't got the newsletters out yet--I believe printing will be finished some time mid week. Sean and Massimo and myself didn't deal with it in our Guardian though, because it is more properly a St. Ann's matter. You could quite rightly observe (good gracious, I managed to mention both the guardian AND the observer without foaming at the mouth even once--not bad for a Tory) that vote rigging is an issue that should be of borough-wide, possibly country-wide concern. However, we decided to concentrate on the gambling shops instead which is certainly a more obvious local problem. Last night we all met for dinner at Zed on Green Lanes and on my way back up towards Turnpike Lane, I stopped at a corner, there was one betting shop behind me and three in a row, just across the road. Simply on planning grounds alone, that is horrendous.
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I don't get it. The vote rigging is a significant vote winner for prospective candidates. Why are you not making the most of it? The vote rigging is not an obvious problem because councillor's and wanna be councillor's are not openly discussing it or publishing the issue in their news letters etc. I am seriously beginning to think you are all doing the same .
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"The vote rigging is a significant vote winner for prospective candidates. Why are you not making the most of it?" -- Tunbridge Wells
TW, as I understand it, about 5 of the 26 voters were ineligible, at least one candidate seems to have been pre-briefed on hustings questions, and there appears to have been a deliberate delay of the procedures in order to force one of the un-preferred contenders (who had a pressing engagement elsewhere) to leave the meeting before completion. There were also some concerns about the mysterious enrolment of several new members all within a couple of weeks of each other.
It is obvious that the Executive were determined to appoint specific people. I am doubtful that this was actually illegal, in fact I am pretty sure it was not. Nevertheless, there is absolutely no doubt that it was a colossal breach of trust. It is one of the many examples of misconduct that brought me back into politics just a few weeks ago. How can anyone stand aside and agree to be governed by a clique that en masse seem completely to have lost any sense of right and wrong?
However, although the subject keeps on coming up, it is fobbed off by the many St Ann's diehard Labour supporters--conditioned to use slogans instead of their brains--as the ravings of a bunch of rabid tory fascists, or running dogs of imperialism, or something of that stripe; and even though the intelligent Mr Stanton is obvious toweringly angry, still he cannot stop himself from redefining such pernicious behaviour as a 'tory' vice instead of seeing for what it really is--the corruption of autocracy.
He is not alone in his self-delusion. The local Labour party is rotting from the inside and yet you will still read postings on this forum in which people state in one way or another that they support Labour, regardless. It is such people who have given the Labour executive the unconstrained power to act as they like and indeed who have allowed the rot to extend further than it otherwise would. The executive is not so much the problem, as their typhlotic worshippers.
It is human nature, I’m afraid. Long-term devotees to a particular ideology do not easily relinquish it, especially when the faults are pointed out by people they have hitherto regarded as The Deadly Enemy. Giving up their loyalties would make them feel that their whole lives have been a waste.
As for other parties "all doing the same (shenanigans)", actually so far as I am aware, they are not and this includes the LibDems and the Greens as well as the Conservatives. That is, they all sincerely follow the conventions for selection to which their members have agreed. -
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Permalink Reply by Cllr Emina Ibrahim on
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Hi Lydia and Justin - how many Conservative party members in Harringay ward took part in your selection ? or any other ward. You suggested that the decision was made through at best a cup of coffee and at worst a telephone conversation! I think there may be a health and safety risk with the amount of glass flying. Justin I seem to recall that you stated you would be standing in Harringay? What changed your mind?
Emine
Labour Party Candidate (Harringay Ward)
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Permalink Reply by Thomas Hawkins on
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Is someone going to publish this? Reading this thread is so entertaining. I'd vote for Lydia regardless of the party she stood for (I am not a Conservative). Local government needs more Lydia's. Then maybe Central Government will give councils more power and responsibility.
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