So just why do we bother to go to the seaside once a year to make policy if our MPs just ignore us?

Jo Swinson introduced her 10 minute Rule Bill Packaging (Reduction) yesterday in House of Commons and seemed to forget the amendment to her motion passed at the Brighton Conference. The amendment called for a plastic bag tax similar to that in Ireland and was passed overwhelmingly. But yesterday Jo seemed to forget the party’s commitment to a plastic bag tax altogether because this is what she says:

Disposable plastic bags are a highly visible symbol of wasteful practice on the part of supermarkets. An estimated 17 billion plastic bags are given away annually by United Kingdom supermarkets, enough plastic to cover an area the size of London, Liverpool, Manchester, Newcastle and west Yorkshire combined. Some countries have attempted to tackle excessive use of disposable plastic bags by introducing bag taxes, but evidence of their effectiveness or otherwise is mixed. Supporters of the idea point to the example of Ireland, where a 15-cent bag tax resulted in a 90 per cent. reduction in plastic bag use, but critics argue that the alternatives to plastic bags are heavier, and that the additional carbon emissions from transporting them offset any gains.A better alternative to a plastic bag tax would be requiring supermarkets to participate in a deposit scheme for carrier bags. It would take the form of a levy of 10p paid on a bag at the point of sale, which would be redeemed when the bag was returned to the store. The charge would encourage customers to use bags sparingly, and in practice customers bringing the bags back would reuse them until the end of their useful life, when they would redeem the deposit or receive another bag. Attaching a redeemable deposit value to the bags would also create an incentive to reduce plastic bag litter.

This is very much what she said in her speech in Brighton. So it’s like nothing ever happened there. So it begs the question: why do we bother to go to the seaside once a year to make policy if our MPs just ignore us?

Report from the first Euro hustings

So the first of Yorkshire & the Humber region’s two Euro hustings took place on Saturday: the first in Sheffield and later in the afternoon in Leeds. Given the delay in members receiving the ballot packs with the details of the hustings, I suppose we should be amazed anybody turned up at all. Inevitable then the numbers were pretty poor: just 11 in Sheffield and about 20 in Leeds and several, in both locations, were family and friends. In addition, only six of the nine shortlisted candidates turned up. Two of these sent a statement to be read out whilst one didn’t say he wasn’t attending even though he had the shortest distance to travel for the afternoon meeting!Many thanks to those attending for submitting some interesting questions which covered topics like CAP reform, enlargement, economic migration, regional governance amongst others. I would much rather have preferred a debate format but in this case we all just answered the same questions in a rote format. It must have been pretty boring for the audience. I wanted a bit of cut and thrust and there seemed to be enough nuance of difference between the candidates on my panel to have a genuine debate, especially on the benefits of migration.

Next Saturday onto Hull where I hope the turnout (from both members and candidates) is much better.

The first hustings

Just off to the first Euro Hustings in Yorkshire today (in Sheffield this morning and in Leeds later). Given that the ballot packs which included details of the hustings venues and times only seemed to arrive across the region yesterday, I will be very interested to see how many members are able to attend. I am not expecting more than a dozen at each. I will post later on how it went.

Was Ming’s ‘old man’ caricature his David Steel Spitting Image moment?

 I go off campaigning in Harrogate for a couple of days and the party Leader resigns. This first came to my notice when sitting talking to a man in Starbeck in his front room when his wife rushes breathlessly into the room saying that Ming is about to make a statement. So we gather round the TV and there it is – he’s resigned.

My views? Well, it was a surprise but not a shock. Having seen at first hand the relentless attack on Ming because of his age through the cartoonists and the sketch writers it was going to be very difficult to pull back. I had wondered if they might not have been a bit more sympathetic given the speech he made at Conference which, by all measures, was very good. But it just went on: Zimmer frames, cadavers, stair lifts, skulls, the abuse was relentless (if had been black or disabled then the cartoonists would never have dared go down that route) but attacking somebody because of their age, regardless of whether they could do the job or not, was quite ok. This remorseless attack was very reminiscent of the David Steel Spitting Image puppet caricature in the 80s and in the same way Steel could not turn it round neither could Ming shake off the ‘old man’ tag.

So he’s off and I think we ought to respect him for his decision. The runners and riders to replace him are yet unknown aside from a couple of predictable names but we’ll see what unfolds in the next few days.

‘Star Wars’ base demo – over the top police presence but excellent soup

I was delighted to be able to give my support to the demonstration at the US spy base in Menwith Hill, North Yorkshire on Saturday.The Campaign for the Accountability of American Bases (CAAB) who organised the demonstration objects to the base’s links to the so-called “Star Wars” programme.

I read out a statement (below) from the Liberal Democrat MEP as one of many speeches and chatted to several people there including Lindis Percy, a leading member of CAAB, who has been steadfastly campaigning on this issue for many years. Also spoke to Joyce Wainwright, the widow of former Liberal MP, Richard Wainwright, who was in good form.

Things have certainly moved on at these demos since the early days. Now there are toilet facilities, tea and coffee (fairtrade of course) and excellent soup. What has not changed is the quite incredible numbers of police present – way over the top for a rather modest demonstration of about 100 people.

Message from Diana Wallis, Liberal Democrat Member of the European Parliament for Yorkshire and the Humber to the Campaign for the Accountability of American Bases demo 13 October 2007

Where is the outrage from Britain’s right-wing press, politicians and commentators over the transfer of British sovereignty in crucial areas of national security to the United States? Whenever it comes to power-sharing in Europe they have an unshakeable habit of working themselves into a fury.

They like to portray themselves as the great defenders of British sovereignty. Yet those same people remain largely silent when the government allows the continuation of American enclaves on British soil, protected from Parliamentary scrutiny or public debate.

In a three-paragraph written statement slipped out in July, just one day before Parliament rose – and almost completely unnoticed by the press – the Defence Secretary announced that the Government is permitting the US administration to install additional equipment here at Menwith Hill, to support its unproven missile defence system.

There has been no public debate in Britain about the desirability, or workability of missile defence, let alone about the strategic assumptions that underpin it. The American programme has suffered from successive test failures and critical Congressional reports over the past 20 years.Parliamentary scrutiny is denied or obstructed in the name of national interest. It is inconceivable that if circumstances were reversed, the US Congress would tolerate such limitations on its powers. The British Parliament seems supine in comparison.Those who defend against the infringement of British sovereignty should take note of this issue, rather than battering at the compromises British Ministers make in European negotiations. Others, in cosy consensus, justify the use of

UK bases as extra-territorial enclaves that serve American ends.The drive towards missile defence in Washington is driven by a mixture of industrial and military interests, and the identification of Iran as an existential enemy of the West. The British Parliament has the duty to question whether such motivations are compatible with British national interests.

Perhaps a couple of independent candidates might force the Humber Bridge debt into the national arena

 Saturday saw another demonstration by the local campaign to axe the debt on the Humber Bridge and lower the tolls. This follows the one which took place in September.I thought it interesting to make a comparison on last week’s announcement that the Government is to support London’s Crossrail project. Even allowing for the fact that the Government will finance only one-third of the Crossrail project, this still amounts to about £5 billion. The sum required to scrap the debt on the Humber Bridge meanwhile is about £350 million; a comparatively small amount.

The part financing of Crossrail is added to a long list of public and privately funded projects in London and the south-east planned to help economic and social regeneration; the 2012 Olympics being the largest of these. If there is one project that would help such regeneration in this sub-region it is scrapping the debt on the Humber Bridge and bringing the tolls down to a sensible level.

So the case is made, but what happens next? Well it seems we have cross-party support; consumers and industry, including the Hull and Humber Chamber of Commerce are behind the campaign. And there is a very dedicated band of activists. It occurred to me over the weekend that until Government takes up the issue it is doomed to remain on the fringes. One way around that would be to put up candidates in a couple of marginal seats in the sub-region. One obvious seat would be Brigg and Goole in the South Bank of the Humber Estuary where the Labour MP, Ian Cawsey has a majority of just over 3000 and where the Tories are fighting hard. The MP and his Tory opponent are supporters of the campaign, but maybe, with the threat of an independent standing on a scrap the tolls ticket, their respective parties might be willing to take this up as a manifesto promise.

So does the media revert to the leadership again?

So the election will not happen after all. Instead the media start to cast around for another story. Let’s open up the Ming leadership challenge file again they say. So Simon Hughes is wheeled onto the Andrew Marr Show this morning to answer an entirely predictable slew of questions regarding the party and its position and the Leader.

I was at a Lib Dem dinner in York on Friday evening where the guest of honour was Nick Clegg, often touted as a possible leader. Well, I can say that in his speech there was no reference to the leadership, rather there was a very clinical and, at the same, humorous analysis of the current political situation. I have known Nick since his time in Brussels and his ability to remain upbeat whatever is going on around is infectious. He also has a very clever use of English, after all there are not many speakers who would use the word ‘atavistic’ in an after dinner speech even if it was to Liberal Democrats in York. I expect, at some point down the track, that he would make an excellent leader of the Liberal Democrats.

Hull and Charlton fans find common cause in probably the worst refereeing performance I have ever seen

Hull City 1 Charlton Athletic 2. A game enlivened by some atrocious refereeing which at one stage had both sets of fans standing and chanting together ‘you’re not fit to referee’.

As the generally dull first half wore on, Hull got on top and seemed to be unlucky to have a goal disallowed. After this incident, Charlton’s first goal and the two sendings off, the game started to be littered with crude tackles and inconsistent refereeing.

Charlton dominated the midfield in the second half with Semedo, Zheng and especially Reid dominant. Iwelumo scored a breakaway goal as Hull sent their centre half up top. All looked to be plain sailing for the points, but Hull’s pressure told as they got a goal back. As the referee somehow found 10 minutes of added time away fans had a few nervy moments.

It was the first time I had watched Charlton this season and it is hard to draw too many conclusions given the referee’s nonsense, but they looked comfortable enough. Hull will not be an easy place for teams to come and pick up three points, so a win for Charlton

What did surprise me during was the continual goading by both set of fans. Hull and Charlton fans expended so much energy gesticulating, chanting and shouting obscenities at each other (apart from the common frustration at the referee’ performance) that the game on the pitch seemed to be a sideshow for a lot of people. In the first half I had a bloke sat near me who, not content with gesticulating from his seat, took to running over to the edge of the away fans area and shouting some obscenity to the home fans. I moved away from this idiot at half time.  

Oh and the attendance was 15,001. As I bought my ticket a minute before kick-off I claim to be the 1!

Strange incident with Dennis Wise

Sitting in my car in Sainsbury’s in Harrogate yesterday evening, a black Mercedes pulled up in front of me and two, what I would say ‘geezers’ got out. One was carrying an old styrene coffee cup which he then placed in the seat of a trolley which was in one of the bays. They went up to the supermarket, presumably to get some money because they were back in a couple of minutes and without bags. I thought was this bloke so feeble that he couldn’t carry the styrene cup up to the bins outside the supermarket? And on closer examination the (much) smaller of these two was Dennis Wise, Manager of Leeds United. Now I know people who would have jumped out of their car with their camera phone and got a picture with him. But I ignored him. Well, he did manage Millwall for a long while so what is a Charlton supporter supposed to do? I know the rivalry isn’t what it used to be (I guess Palace have become bigger rivals), but you know how it is: old rivalries die hard. (One of the reasons I could never vote for Simon Hughes as Leader of course). And on this Charlton theme I can say I am beginning to get excited about the game at the KC Stadium this evening as the Addicks come to Hull for the first time in 16 years. But more of that later.