Comments on: Political Propaganda - At Your Expense

By: Still Paying For Labour Leaflets at Cllr Iain Lindley’s Diary

Still Paying For Labour Leaflets at Cllr Iain Lindley’s Diary — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 23:57:30 +0000

[...] few weeks ago I wrote about Barbara Keeley MP’s dubious use of the House of Commons “Communications Allowance” - basically a propaganda fund for (usually Labour) sitting MPs at the considerable expense of [...]

By: Iain

Iain — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 12:50:53 +0000

Well first of all, “Anon”, I’d take your opinions more seriously if you had the guts to put your name to your opinions. One can only assume that you are a Labour attack dog otherwise, particularly given your in-depth knowledge of the leaflet in question!

The “Short Money” you refer to is there for a reason - the governing party have the civil service to do the sums on their policy proposals, and the offices of the Prime Minister and cabinet ministers are paid for directly from the public purse. The Short Money is there to provide a semblance of political balance.

I am aware that every MP gets the same communication allowance, and if you’d read my piece I acknowledged that in the first place. My point was that I do not agree with this allowance in the first place - and as you’ll notice above I do not consider this a partisan issue.

The idea that Barbara’s newsletter was not pseudo-party-political campaigning is laughable. It was full of “the Government is doing x” articles and was printed in Labour colours - pushing the boundaries of a supposedly impartial taxpayer-funded leaflet to the limit. Do you really think it is a coincidence that having heard nothing from our local MP for months if not over a year, suddenly this leaflet appears out of the blue (or out of the red, perhaps) a few weeks before a possible General Election?

By: Anon

Anon — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 08:45:22 +0000

Iain,

Clearly you aren’t a big fan of impartiality, but let’s set the record straight. This year opposition parties have recieved nerly £7.5 million of taxpayer money - £5 million of which have gone directly to the Conservative Party. The Labour Party recieves no such donation. Every MP gets the same communication allowance - there is no bias towards the governing party.

There is no mention of the Labour Party in Barbara’s newsletter, and it is almost entirely devoted to local priorities. The picture of Gordon Brown you are referring to was taken at a carers event in Downing Street during carers week - for which Barbara was Parlimentary Champion. It doesn’t surprise me that you do not like the idea, after all the Tories have never done much for carers. But considering there are around 20,000 carers in Salford, i think you should be delighted that our MP is taking the issue direct to the Prime Minister.

Also, at a time when election turnout is at its lowest level ever, newsletters are a vital way of communicating with constituents. It is important that people know what their MP is doing for them and I, for one, am grateful that Barbara has made this effort.

By: S Penketh

S Penketh — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 14:39:12 +0000

I agree Iain, we had one from Ivan Lewis last week. to thing every leafelt I put out I have to fund myself or at least raise the funds.

By: Chris Paul

Chris Paul — Sun, 30 Sep 2007 00:06:11 +0000

I agree with you Iain. Shock horror. “Parliamentary reports” paid for by the tax payer should (a) be strictly business with no boosting of local candidates and (b) be published at a set month.
Or they should be specified to be a two-page, four-side letter on HoP paper and not as glossy as you like propaganda.

Actually September wouldn’t normally be a bad one to choose. Chance to review last 12 months (June to June) and get it ready and published.

Leechy stuck his out in April 06 and 07 with a lot of bigging up for LG candidates (unnamed but same pics and stories as in their own leaflets) AND stuck it through doors outside his constituency.

He is Lib Dem, but even by their standards he is a chancer.