Imagine what you could do with £200,000...That's the cost to the taxpayer of David Davis's daft by-election stunt as estimated by The Daily Torygraph.
Polls opened earlier this morning in what is surely the most meaningless and needless by-election in the history of British politics.
David Cameron's rival for the leadership of the Conservative Party comfortably won the Howden and Haltemprice seat in the 2005 General Election. But after a democratic vote in the house of Commons went against him, he threw his toys out of his pram, causing an unnecessary and costly by-election...in which he is standing as a candidate.
Bizarre.
With neither of the mainstream parties getting sucked into the daftest Tory trick, voters today face a daunting choice of 26 candidates on the longest voting paper in history all hoping to cash in on Davis's publicity stunt.
As well as 13 candidates claiming to be 'Independent', the residents of Howden and Haltemprice also have the chance to vote for the so-called Mad-Cow Girl who is standing for the Official Monster Raving Loony Party.
There's also the Make Politicians History Party, the National Front Britain for the British Party, the Miss Great Britain Party, the Christian Party, the Freedom 4 Choice Party, the Green Party, the New Party, the English Democrats: Putting England First party, and of course, the Socialist Equality Party.
But the favourite has to be the Church of the Militant Elvis Party.
Then there's the original David: ie, the man who once claimed to be a re-incarnation of God, who's so well known, he's standing in his own name with no party label.
(That's David Icke of course, not David Davis).
Then there's the ego himself, David Michael Davis, the Conservative Candidate.
They're all totally bonkers, of course.
Don't bother staying up for the result. I can confidently predict that David Michael Davis will fight off the other nutters and comfortably be declared the winner with a massively increased majority...and he will then declare a great victory for freedom and democracy without even mentioning the word 'hollow' or who picks up the tab.
So will Mr Davis have to pay for his stunt and have £200,000 docked from his MP's wages to be paid back the taxpayers of Britain...?
Nope. Didn't think so.
UPDATE: I see that even the local paper the Hull Daily Mail is having difficulty taking the by-election seriously - and who can blame them with one candidate campaiging for 'nil votes' so he can get in the Guinness Book of Records...
The Mail predicts that the winner will be the Willerby Manor Hotel, unofficial headquarters for press conferences, campaign launches, events and late-night plotting over a few drinks.
The paper reports:
As one staff member told me the other day: “I'm all for these kind of by-elections, business is booming.”
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8 comments:
He is entitled to put an important point to the people.
A free country may not be cheap, but an unfree one is more expensive in the long run.
Hi Brynley, hope you are well...
Yes, Mr D is entitled to his stunt and I certainly agree that democracy doesn't come cheap...
but i wonder if he would have had made the same so-called 'principled' stand if he wasn't in a 'safe' Tory seat and there was a real danger of him actually losing...
You really have missed the point here Phil.
First of all, given the Government's pathetic failure on every issue, almost every seat in England is safe Tory territory. At least Nu Labor soon to be ex-MPs have a couple of years to line up new jobs. You can't even control a gerrymandered Scotland any more, and have resorted to fixing by-election dates in the vain hope of SNP voters being too busy.
The vote in the Commons was not democratic. Ulster Unionists(DUP) were bribed with considerably more than than 200k of English taxpayer's money. Labour MPs, most naturally inclined to Davis' position, were threatened with all sorts if they didn't trot through the lobbies. Most of them shamefully capitulated. Shame on them.
The two other parties can be summarised in very different ways. The Lib Dums agreed with Davis' position. Why would they stand in a single-issue contest if they didn't disagree? For once they are right. Labour on the other hand do disagree. They, and their ridiculous leader, are just terrified of losing. Broon is the most gutless PM in the history of this country.
Davis will win of course. Several of the nutters you mention would probably have beaten the Labor candidate if he had stood. Davis is a man of principal, which is why such a broad coalition has gathered around him. I disagree completely with him on this. I would lock up these people for years without trial(most of them are Muslim radicals, I doubt Davis' claim that this would affect ordinary people). But I admire the courage of a man who gave up a high ranking post in the next Government to make a point, when the Parliamentary system had been abused so disgracefully. I suspect that explains the vitriol of your above post. You are surely embarrassed by the Government on this issueas on so many others. Hence the absence of the crony-ing Stalinesque praise of your "leader" I saw on here a year ago.
You can bleat about Johnson and Dave as much as you like Phil, but it doesn't disguise the fact that you are losing and you know it.
I would suggest sticking to the retirement of school lollypop ladies in your fiefdom. It is less embarrassing for all concerned.
Michael:
pathetic failure of our Government...?
er, no.
toughest economic times for a decade, yes, but thank goodness we have the Iron Chancellor to see us through to the other side with measured, sensible policies that are right for Britain, and not the salesman Cameron...
you may chose to forget, or maybe are too young to remember, what it was like to suffer real failure: Tory policies that gave us boom-n-bust and the two deepest post-war recessions.
Today, thanks to GB, we have:
Unemployment - much lower than under the Tories.
Interest rates - less than a third of the spiralling mortgage rates we suffered under the Tories.
Inflation - consistently lower over the past 11 years than in the previous 18...
All this despite a tough global economy, with world oil prices increased tenfold since 1997.
And thanks to the tough decisions that were right for Britain - taken by GB - a British economy that is STILL growing...
On 42-days, yes, there is a broad coalition against.
But there is also a broad coalition for - as well as a majority in the Commons with the help of the Democratic Unionists who know a bit about terrorism.
Here's some of those supporting the Government on 42 days (source: The Sunday Telegraph)
1. Sir Ian Blair, current Metropolitan Police Commissioner, who gave evidence to the Commons' Counter-Terrorism Bill standing committee in favour of 42 days.
2. Peter Clarke, former head of Scotland Yard counter terrorism command. He's concerned about the current 'race against time' to retrieve evidence buried in the encrypted files of dozens of computers and says: "We should legislate now, and not in panic in an emergency.
3. Lord Carlile, the Liberal Democrat peer and Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation who says "I do really appeal to people to read this legislation before rushing to judgement."
4. Sir Hugh Orde, current chief constable of Northern Ireland argues that the 42 detention plans would not be a return to internment, a term which still has highly charged connotations in the Province.
5. Graham Foulkes whose son was was killed in the July 7 London terrorist attacks.
He told the BBC's The Politics Show: "It's wrong to place a higher value on being detained for six weeks than on people's lives."
6. Ann Widdecombe, Conservative MP...
Is there ANY senior Conservative who actually believes Davis's stunt was anything more than exactly that...?
Interesting analysis on the Howden and Haltemprice stunt at 'Conservative Home'.
http://conservativehome.blogs.com/torydiary/2008/07/was-it-worth-it.html
Michael:
happy to have robust debate, and not afraid of critical comment, but can't publish your latest contribution in its present form...
i suspect i'd fall foul of defamation laws by accusing a Police Commissioner of murder...
could you possibly tone it down a tad..?
ta.
Haha, I think your problem is that you are afraid of robust debate. Familiar tactics.
If i were afraid of robust debate, i wouldn't have published your previous contribution and would have rejected the potentially libellous one.
i only asked you to tone down one word to turn potential defamation into robust comment which would still allow you to make the points you wish to make without danger of bankrupting me!
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