“Booze shame” in Bristol!

Late blogging about this story, but still worth a mention. The Bristol Evening Post ran a feature a few days ago about the “Booze Shame List”. Bristol, you will no doubt be relieved to know, doesn’t have as many shameful boozing hussies as other cities. We only have four.

“Booze shame girls list revealed – JUST four girls in the Avon and Somerset area were fined for being drunk in a public place last year, new figures reveal. A league table, published yesterday in the Sun newspaper, found only the City of London force area to have had fewer women aged under 21 fined. http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/Booze-shame-girls-list-revealed/story-16021025-detail/story.html“

I am awaiting with great anticipation the booze shame boys list, which I assume is on its way?

Politics Home awards

Some interesting nominations in this year’s Politics Home awards. Steve Rotheram certainly deserves his speech of the year nomination for the Hillsborough debate, and so does Tom Watson for his speech on hacking – although I think I’d go with Steve for the speech, and Tom has got to win MP of the year, surely? Even if he is up against the mighty Mogg?

As amusing as Nadine Dorries’ two arrogant posh boys’ remark was, it’s extremely trivial in comparison with the phone hacking debate, which I would think is a dead cert for political moment of the year. Willy Bach would get my vote in the Lords category, for securing a series of Government defeats on the Legal Aid Bill. If not Willy then Anyone But Shirley. Campaign of the year is a tough one. Stella Creasy has shown immense persistence in pursuing her loan sharks campaign, but John Healey’s quieter fortitude in pushing for the release of the NHS Risk Register shouldn’t be overlooked.

Not surprised to see Jamie Reed (@jreedmp) in there for best political tweeter – Paul Waugh of Politics Home is his number one fan – and no, I’m not bothered about not being shortlisted for that! Having won the Dods social media award last year and being totally fed up with the constant association with tweeting, I am more than happy to pass on the crown. Besides, it was me who persuaded a reluctant Jamie onto Twitter, so he’s my protegee!

If I’m backing Jamie for Tweeter of the Year then I’d better give John Prescott my vote for hashtag of the year, for #godisgove – although if #popleveson had made it in there, I’d have plumped for that. Maybe it was just too late for the deadline? And Political Scrapbook for best blog. (Yes, I am biased in favour of the sole left-wing contender, and no, I’m not voting for Tories).

And then there’s “MP contribution to Central Lobby” for which my World Vegan Day debate has somewhat bizarrely made the cut. I wouldn’t have thought you could find a more obscure topic… maybe that’s why it got noticed. Or the fact I got booed in the Chamber. I will probably get two votes, from the two other vegans.

Here are the other contenders.

• Steve Baker MP – We need a responsible, self-regulating financial system

• Kerry McCarthy MP – Leads debate on World Vegan Day

• Grant Shapps MP – 10 tips for Twitter

• Dominic Rabb MP – We must end feminist bigotry

• Julian Huppert MP – Riots are no excuse for this authoritarian knee-jerkery

 

Private Members’ Bills ballot update

Further to my post earlier this week about the Private Members’ Bills ballot, here is the result:

1. John McDonnell
2. Richard Ottaway
3. Barbara Keeley
4. Gavin Barwell
5. Peter Aldous
6. John Hemming
7. Neil Carmichael
8. Sir Paul Beresford
9. Richard Harrington
10. Mike Weir
11. Stuart Andrew
12. Sheryll Murray
13. Lindsay Roy
14. John Glen
15. Jo Swinson
16. Mark Hendrick
17. Simon Kirby
18. Michael Meacher
19. Michael Connarty
20. Douglas Carswell

So, not a great result for Labour and, with a few honourable exceptions, not much opportunity for progressive measures to be advanced… John McDonnell, who topped the ballot a few years ago too and introduced his Trade Union Freedom Bill, has already indicated he will be bringing in a bill about the appointment of the Governor of the Bank of England. Barbara Keeley is very interested in – and very good on – social care/ carers issues, so I’m sure that will be one of the topics she’ll be considering. Sir Paul Beresford is another one who has done well in a previous ballot, introducing a rather good child protection bill in the last session, which actually became law in March - the Domestic Violence, Crime and Victims (Amendment) Act 2012. John Hemming has had problems with cat burglars. Jo Swinson has long campaigned on body image and airbrushing in adverts, so perhaps she’ll be doing something on that? Michael Meacher has a letter going viral on Facebook right now, about tax avoidance and the Sunday Times rich list – his blog is here. And as for Douglas Carswell… abolishing Europe or something along those lines.

The dairy debate

Interesting… Have had a couple of emails this week from Bidwells Agribusiness (who I’ve never heard of) urging me and presumably all other MPs to complete a survey about the UK dairy industry. £5 goes to FARM-Africa (or a couple of other charities) if you do.

After a few opening questions like do you think you’re well informed, where do you get your information from, do you have contact with dairy farmers in your constituency, etc, they ask about whether we have contact with Compassion in World Farming, WSPA (which campaigned against the Nocton dairy farm), 38 Degrees and the Badger Trust. To which I answered yes. They then asked if I’d heard of DairyCo, to which my answer was no. I suspect that the industry is worried about the influence organisations campaigning for better welfare standards in the dairy industry, and against the badger cull, are having, and this survey is something to do with setting up a rival lobbying operation.

As it happens I already get the NFU South West weekly email updates and I do read them, not to mention getting the highly partisan line from the Farming Minister at every Defra Qs. (Pro-cull, pro-Nocton, wants ‘sustainable intensification’, will pay lip service to animal welfare concerns provided nothing gets in the way of farmers getting more money for their milk… which they should do, but not by forcing cows to produce far more than they are designed by nature to do.*) So I’m not sure I need extra lobbying for DairyCo, whoever they may be, but I will watch out for it with interest.

*Subject to vegan caveat, that I’d rather cows milk was consumed by baby cows, not people. 

PMB Ballot

On Thursday we’ll find out the results of the Private Members’ Bills Ballot.

20 lucky backbenchers will get their names pulled out of a hat, which means they get priority listing for debate on a Friday. I say ‘names’ – actually there’s a book, with numbers listed chronologically, and MPs get to choose what number they put their name against. Interesting to see which MPs just go for the sensible next number available on the list option, and how many choose their ‘lucky’ numbers.

It’s all entirely random as to which numbers are selected. I’m hoping to be successful in the ballot so I can resurrect my Food Waste Bill, but with 300 or so members entering the ballot, the chances are pretty slim. My next option would be to try to persuade one of the twenty, or better, one of the top ten, to take it up instead, but there will be loads of charities, campaigns, lobbyists, etc trying to get them to consider other options. I know when one of my colleagues, Sharon Hodgson, topped the ballot in her first year in parliament, the office fax machine went into overdrive. Great feeling of achievement though, to get legislation on kids with special educational needs through in your first year of being elected; which she did.

Today in Parliament

Busy day today. Started off doing emails, then had a shadow Foreign Office team meeting, then took part in a CPA (Commonwealth Parliamentary Association) seminar for women parliamentarians from Pakistan and Afghanistan. After that it was a phone call with a journo re the Music is GREATBritain campaign, then another call with a senior police officer about the proposed EDL march in Bristol and what the police can and can’t do to stop it. Then looking at blog comments, and more emails in the House of Commons library.

Now off to an event unveiling new research from UWE and SPAN (The Single Parent Action Network) about how difficult it is for single parents to move from Income Support to JSA. Then at 2.30pm it’s Justice Questions – I’ve got Q10 about anonymity for rape victims, which I will use to raise the online ‘outing’ of the Ched Evans victim – and then I’ll be donning my shadow foreign minister hat to be on the frontbench for the opening speechs in the Queen’s Speech debate, which today is on Foreign Affairs and International Development. Expect to hear Opposition MPs asking why there wasn’t a bill enshrining the 0.7% aid spending commitment in the Queen’s Speech.

That takes me up to about 5pm with another five hours to go after that…

“Bad boyfriends”

This was written on Thursday night… Given that my resolution was to start blogging every day from the beginning of the new parliamentary session, I have 20 minutes to avoid failing within the first 36 hours! I’ve just been (half) watching Question Time and a rather frustrating debate about the men imprisoned this week for grooming, exploiting and abusing teenage girls. I may have missed it but I haven’t heard anyone this week pay tribute to Ann Cryer, who did so much to raise awareness of this during her time as MP for Keighley.
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I’ve worked with CROP, which campaigns against child exploitation, on a couple of cases. Both involved young women (15 year olds) who were groomed by older men, lured away from their families in the Home Counties, brought to Bristol, and suffered various degrees of abuse. Their families feared they were being regularly beaten, and involved in drugs and prostitution. Thankfully both were eventually reunited with their families, and I hope they both got their lives back on track.

Despite the girls being 15 when the abuse started, it was very difficult for their parents to get social services or the police in Essex and the Thames Valley to act, and once they had turned 16 the parents were told that the agencies couldn’t get involved in cases of ‘bad boyfriends’. The police in Bristol were, it has to be said, more helpful as were SW Barnardo’s who kept in regular contact with one of the young women at a time when she was estranged from her family. But others seemed to take the view that the girls, being almost adult, had to be allowed the freedom to make the wrong choices. There was little recognition of their youth and vulnerability, or that what had happened to them went beyond simply choosing a ‘boyfriend’ their parents didn’t like.

I should also say at this point that neither of these cases involved gangs of men, and neither involved Asian men. One of the men was known to have a track record of grooming young women over the internet, but had never been prosecuted and still hasn’t, as far as I know. So although the convictions this week do raise difficult issues about religious/ cultural attitudes towards women that we need to discuss, we shouldn’t see everything through that prism. We also need to look at how vulnerable young women can be protected, not just from gangs who systematically prey on them but from so-called ’bad boyfriends’ too, and where the line between state intervention and state interference should be drawn.

Equal Marriage #C4EM and Pride

Just to put a couple of things in the public domain…

I have just written to Avon and Somerset police asking them to reconsider allowing the English Defence League to march in Bristol on the same day as Pride, on July 14th. I’ve been told after making earlier representations that the EDL have a gay section, so they’re not homophobic [perhaps should clarify this - "so they're not homophobic" was reporting what I was told, not my own conclusion], but their message of intolerance and their intimidatory tactics run counter to everything that Pride stands for… and many people will be worried about attending Pride if there’s a chance that violence could kick off between the EDL and anti-fascist protestors in the city centre, or if EDL thugs could be hanging around the city after the official events have finished and the police presence has diminished. This isn’t about curbing the right to protest; it’s about making sure Pride is a success and that everyone who wants to – including LGBT people from BME communities – feels comfortable attending.

There is, by the way, a petition onthe council’s website about this: http://epetitions.bristol.gov.uk/epetition_core/community/petition/1858

I have also pledged my support for the Coalition for Equal Marriage campaign. (I think in the early hours of this morning on Twitter I also found myself pledging my support for allowing gay penguins to marry, although I’m not sure the heterosexual penguins bother?)

I don’t actually think the proposed law – well, the floated but now shelved law – goes far enough in fact, in that it’s mainly about terminology and ending the distinction between civil partnerships and civil marriages. It doesn’t tackled to thorny issue of religious services, and I can see that there would be difficulties in persuading all religious establishments to co-operate (although if we don’t allow discrimination by religious B+B owners, should we allow it elsewhere?) But if a church is happy to conduct a gay marriage I don’t see why they shouldn’t be allowed. 

The example I always use is Chris Bryant MP, a former priest who has married at least one MP in the St Mary’s Undercroft Chapel in the Houses of Parliament (ie officiated over her marriage to her now husband) and also christened Tom Watson’s kids there. But when it came to his own civil partnership, he had to hold it in one of the Commons dining rooms. Atheists like me could do a Britney Spears and just waltz in off the street and get married in the chapel (well, perhaps not, I suspect you have to book) but someone who actually is a Christian and a regular church-goer – and in Chris’ case, an actual priest – can’t, because they happen to be gay.

On EDMs

My plans to blog every day from the beginning of the new parliamentary session were somewhat scuppered by the fact that I was away from Thursday to Sunday, and my iPad doesn’t like the new WordPress format – it simply wouldn’t publish anything. But now I’m in a rather cold office, at my PC so here’s one of those little guides to parliamentary procedure in which I occasionally indulge…

With the advent of online lobby your MP sites and Twitter, more and more voters are aware of the existence of Early Day Motions and are urging their MPs to sign them. But at the end of each parliamentary session, all the Early Day Motions fall, and the whole process starts over again. So, please note, there’s no point lobbying or tweeting MPs to sign any of the 3024 EDMs tabled during the 2011/12 cycle. They can’t do it.

Number 3024 by the way, which just slipped in under the wire before prorogation, was calling for a blue plaque to be erected for Dame Thora Hird. It got one signature, but no doubt lots of local press for the MP for Morecambe who tabled it. Ditto number 3023, which was the Shrewsbury MP congratulating his local football club on their promotion.

And so we start again… as is his wont, Bob Russell managed to get first in the queue, possibly by camping out overnight, and tabled the first ten EDMs of the new session. He doesn’t always get first place – John Leech triumphed last year, but Bob has upped his game this year.

So EDM Number 1 is, once again on cystic fibrosis and prescription charges; I support this, and have signed it in the past, but it has been one of the first EDMs tabled for the last ten years. I’ve just looked back – it’s been tabled every year since the 2002/3 session and possibly before that too. I provoked a bit of a storm when I tried to explain to people in an earlier blog post that EDMs aren’t the silver bullet people believe they are, but doesn’t this prove it?

We’re already up to EDM 47 – with only two days worth published. Almost all of them good causes (I haven’t checked them all out, but you can see them here.

#allinittogether

The bootleg tapes… we’ve obtained secret footage of Cameron in rehearsals for today’s Queen Speech debate (before he was sedated by the spindoctors).