Boycott this by-election stunt

So David Davis wants to stand for re-election to his seat of Haltemprice & Howden in a "noble endeavour" to shaft Cameron, get his face all over the papers and pose as the defender of liberty and the Magna Carta.  We shouldn't dignify this tawdry electoral stunt by lending it the slightest claim to legitimacy.  It demonstrates that the Conservatives have contempt for the principle of representative democracy.  Your view gets voted down fairly and squarely?  Just throw your toys out of the pram and hold a sham by-election in a seat you would have won anyway.  We should leave Davis slugging it out with the Monster Raving Loonies and their ilk.

And before anyone rushes to denounce me for being an illiberal authoritarian or the latest modish insult, I couldn't have supported the 42 day proposal either.  But if Davis felt the need to go into battle for habeas corpus why didn't he do it around the original 28 day measure?  And the bill hasn't passed into law, nor is it likely to do so anytime soon as the Lords will send it back.

Even if the Parliament Act was invoked, that has far greater consitutional legitimacy than a fake plebiscite in an area highly unlikely ever to be suffer the effects of terrorism anyway.  We might not come out of this episode exactly covered in glory ourselves.  But we shouldn't be pressed into fighting this meaningless contest/  We should expose the cynicism of the Tories for playing politics with national defence and by-passing the democratic will of the House of Commons. And move on to pick the kind of battles that can unite the party and win broad public support.

Comments

[John P Reid]

While I agree I.D cards shouldn't be mandatary or should be made compulsary for us to carry and While I agree that the wrongly accused who have had their DNA taken should have the right to the DNa destroyed as it can contain personal information on the genes,
The Human rights act (not the European Court of human rights as the Tories like to call it)is a Freedom the tories want to scrap, If davis is so dedicated to Freedom's he should persuade his party to keep the Majority of it (I accept Charles Clarkes view that in some parts the HRA should be tweaked)

[wozza]

Part of the problem - a large part of the problem - about the 42 day "win" for the government was that it was not done fairly and squarely. Very little in our parliamentary democracy is fair and square. FPTP, whipping, hereditary privilidge - but even built into all that a new low was reached in the way this bill was passed.

The American style pork offered to Labour back benchers was bad eneough - but the wholesale purchase of the DUP - the DUP ffs was an entirely new low.

[Richad Scorer]

Spot on Michael- my view exactly.

[John P Reid]

Although I think 42 days with the new safeguards is just about right, And Although I Am worried anymore would be an intrusion of our civil Liberties and I also feel even without A candidate we should continue to argue the case for 42 (What Lord carlisle said of the Glasgow bombers being in hospital and unable to be interviewed at first, The current 3 cases of alleged bombers who were held for 27 days and had there alleged colloeagues released at the same time, What Lord John Stevens said that there were 6 cases 4 years ago of suspects released after 14 days that may have needed 3 weeks more)
I also don't want to speculate about the only voice allegedly being put up in favour of the Government Former Sun Journalist Kelvin Mckenzie of such headlines Michael foot:-Do you really want this old fool running your country

Kinnocks boyo at top universtiy trying he had to pay to go there

Kinnock make plea to con kids (when Neil appearde on Going Live childrens Tv show)
Kinnocks loony tunes of (Paul Boateng,Nick Raynsofrd and Clare Short)
Why I'm backing Kinnock by joe Stalin/Hitler
IF kinnocks elected can the last person please turn the lights out,

And Not forgetting Mine Fuhrer for Arthur Scargill or Gotcha for the sinking of the belgrano
ALbour put a candidate up even if its unwinnable its still worth fighting for.

[Diversity]

The Government "bottled out" of an election last autumn - since when Cameron has never looked back. What does Cameron hope for now? He hopes Labour will "bottle out" again. If Labour contest the by-election, they will have a chance to really chew into the visceral Tory law and order vote. That is the last thing Cameron wants.

The only ground that I can see for not contesting the seat is that the Government cannot see any way of winning an open argument, even though they start with demonstarted stronger popular support on this issue than on practically any other. And that is the way it will look to the great British public if Labour stand aside.

If the Government don't fight this one, they will become dismissed as irrelevant by even more voters. Is that what we want?

[ian parkinson]

The frightening thing for me is the staggering arrogance of todays labour party that they think they know better than the general public and so batently misrepresent the reasons they want things like 42 days and ID cards. The truth is they want to control our lives "to keep us safe" The end result is we get smothered by repressive laws. I want a bit of risk in my life and would rather risk being blown up than have my freedom removed. What is the point of being safe without freedom?

[dissertation writing]

Blogs are good for every one where we get lots of information for any topics nice job keep it up !!!

[Research Proposal Writer]

Glenn, all it took was to present your proposal at the AGM and a vote would have been taken. But YOU chickened out. We like competition, and would preferred a proper election then just an ‘easy road to success’.

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