Simon Heffer casts aside his former hero

Simon Heffer has come to a realisation in his latest column:

1. Labour are in government and have been for some time.
2. They aren't very good.
3. The only way to remove them is to support the Conservatives.
   

Previously Simon's line on UK politics has been that Labour in general and Gordon Brown in particular were quite impressive. His love for Gordon Brown was quite evident on September 5th 2007:

Mr Brown is doing so well not because he has better policies than his rivals (insofar as his rivals have any), but because he is a better politician than any of them.

There was also a continuing theme in Simon's work that the Conservatives, and especially David Cameron, were basically crap, to the point that they represented no improvement on the current government. However, Brown's unfunded £2.7 billion tax fiddle to buy off his own backbenchers seems finally to have punctured Simon's illusions. In truth Brown's actions are quite appalling. Adding to the national debt in this way will also add to inflation, which will in turn keep interest rates high, which will hurt the whole economy. At the same time he is doing that he is at war with public sector workers because he needs to keep their wages down so as not to increase the national debt and so add to inflation. So the government is operating a wholly contradictory policy, which will cause nothing but grief in the medium to long term. But Brown does not care about the medium to long term, he cares about next week at Crewe and Nantwich because if he loses the by-election there, he may be out of a job. So, hang the economy, my survival is more important. This leads Simon to say:

We must hope the electors of Crewe and Nantwich make this point forcefully next Thursday, and throw the bribe back in his face.

The only way to do that of course is to vote Conservative. Any other vote and Labour wins, and so Simon is finally getting with the programme. It is also an interesting sign. For the Conservatives to win a General Election they need people who are not natural supporters, like Simon, to decide that they are the best route to oust Labour. The signs are that many people have reached the same point in the road as Simon. Next he will be giving David Cameron some credit for getting the Conservatives into a potentially winning position. I wonder how long we will have to wait for that?

Racist Labour message on Local Party Website

For anyone who doubted the story about the racist Labour leaflet, here it is on the website of the Crewe and Nantwich Labour party. However, I bet that it won't be there very long, especially in the mainstream media pick up on it. To their credit, Labour activists on the Labourhome blog aren't too impressed either.

Unbelievable Labour By-election Leaflet

I lifted this from Guido, but it is so appalling that I couldn't but comment. The first two points are sheer class war. This leaflet has apparently gone out in the poorer parts of Crewe and what they are trying to sell to the worst off there is the idea that if someone is economically successful then they cannot be in politics. Of course it won't go out in Crewe's richer areas and this is from a party whose former leader has just bought a £3.5 million house. Labour don't really believe this stuff any more, but they think it will appeal to the narrow prejudice of a segment of the electorate and so they are happy to run with it. This is simply dishonest.

The next point is an interesting counterpoint to Labour's claims that crime is falling. Unless there is some particular crime wave in Crewe fuelled by specific local incompetence then they are again not saying what they believe and trying to convince that public safety has nothing to do with the Labour government. This is simply dishonest.

Then comes the direct lift from the BNP's approach to political campaigning. The 'foreign nationals' thing is a direct appeal to xenophobia, and of course they don't mention that everyone gets an ID card under Labour, not just foreigners. This is not just dishonest, this is reprehensible. Labour, the master non-racists, unless it increases their chances of winning a by-election when they are happy to take lessons from Nick Griffin.

The last point is just a flat-out lie. There is no Conservative policy to cut funding for schools and children's centres.

So, there we have it, vote Labour for lies and racism. No doubt this is what Gordon Brown calls listening and leading.