Normfest memorial

This is a little late but after this event last month I "Ken Biked" to a "real-world celebration of Norm and his blogging".

Norman Geras, Marxist professor, Cricket fan, supporter of the invasion in Iraq and author of "Normblog" died of cancer last month aged 70.

This event was organised by fellow Euston Manifesto-ite Paul Evans at the Yorkshire Grey Pub in central London.

I was late but the event was still busy and it was striking to see so many people with a wide range of views gathering in appreciation of one incredibly honest, lucid and intelligent blogger.

Check out the tributes at Normfest.

Libel Reform Celebration

Last Wednesday evening I was invited to take part in an event organised by the Libel Reform campaigners to celebrate the Defamation Act which received Royal Assent in April.

This Act has been achieved very much against the odds and is a real victory for free speech, reasoned argument and citizen power.

It has still not been "enacted" and there are concerns that much of the detail on regulations and procedures have not been clarified. Also Northern Ireland needs to ensure that citizens have the same protection as elsewhere. But the Libel Reform campaign has been incredibly successful in such a short period of time (2009). There is still more to do of course.

I met my old blogging mucker, fellow Labour Party loyalist and Libel Survivor Dave Osler in the Betsey Trotwood Pub beforehand. At the event (next door at the Free Word Centre in Farringdon, London) itself we met up with Alex Hilton (see photo right) and Libel freedom fighters David Allen Green,  Robert Dougans and Nick Cohen.

After the event we retired back to the Betsey to continue putting our world to rights. Interestingly, Dave Osler is going to provide me with evidence that Trotsky was actually all the long a mixed economy reformist - just like me :)

(sorry picture is a little flat but surprisingly cannot find anything better on internet to pinch)

Rally for Libel Reform

Picture is from last night's Rally for Libel Reform which took place at the Great Hall in the historic Inner Temple.

There was a number of speakers including Lord McNally, who is the Lib Dem Minister for Justice ,who said about the (probable) Libel Reform bill "This is not the end, not the beginning of the end but the end of the beginning".

Sir Stephen Sedley "The draft bill hasn't answered all the questions but has some of the answers", Simon Singh (a libel survivor see in picture with the fetching Mohican haircut), Nick Cohen (Observer) "not one of the stories in the NOTW and Sun enquiry has a public interest defence. Not a single one", DAG (New Statesman and free speech libel hero aka Jof k), Charmian Gooch (Global Witness), Tracey Brown (Sense About Science), Jonathan Heawood (English PEN) and Jo Glanville (Index on Censorship).

While picture on the right is of DAG, me, Vaughan Jones and top solicitor advocate Robert Dougans.  Vaughan is currently being sued by a Creationist for libel in the High Court. There is a strike out hearing next Friday. I am convinced that the litigant in person who is trying to sue him must be related in some way to my own favourite litigant ever!

Check out the radio podcast (36 minutes) interviewing Vaughan and Hardeep Singh (who is also in the top picture and who I met in the pub afterwards. He won the barmy libel case taken out against him but now has to sell his house to pay his legal costs! Which is an absolute disgrace. I can't at the moment find his interview. Will update when I do)

James Purnell - DWP Minister (and bad photographer)

Tom P has reminded me that while new Work and Pensions secretary, James Parnell may have many talents, photography is not one of them! In March last year I asked James to take a picture of Tom and I with the journalist Nick Cohen (see photo). We had just been to see Nick talk about his book “What’s Left”. I’ve spoken to James briefly a couple of times since on pension issues. While I don’t agree with everything he says, he knows his stuff (The Radio 4 “Today” programme this morning tried to catch him out by asking "what is an annuity"?).

While many in the trade union movement will regret Peter Hain leaving the Cabinet, I doubt if we have seen the last of him. I believe he will “clear” his name and resume his "colourful" career at some point soon.

A Conversation with Nick Cohen: "What's Left? How the Liberals Lost their Way"

Just back from a very interesting evening with Nick at Red Lion Square. "Democratiya.com", "The Euston Manifesto", "Engage" and "Mishcon de Reya" hosted "a conversation with Nick Cohen". Author of "one of the most discussed current affairs books of the new year" (Guardian) Cohen tells the story of how parts of the Liberal-Left of the 20th Century ended up supporting the far Right of the 21st in the shape of Islamic extremism. Interviewing Nick was Anthony Julius, lawyer and academic, founding member of both Engage and The Euston Manifesto, and author of TS Eliot, Anti-Semitism, and Literary Form.

Nick (middle) was an absolutely brilliant speaker, even though I do not agree with all (but that is not the point) of his views. I must write up my review of his book (which was the topic of my first ever post).

In the meanwhile I must post this quote again from Nick (my favourite) "George Galloway, was a bombastic Scottish Labour MP who combined blood-curdling rhetoric with a whining sentimentality, like many a thug before him".

By co-incidence the above picture of Tom, Nick and I was taken by James Purnell MP, Minster of State for Pension reform (a subject close to my heart). I must get a better camera.

The Beginning - Why and How

It seems that there is a lack of blogs written by centre left trade unionists who are Labour Party supporters. So, from time to time, I will post stuff which I think like minded people might be interested in (or not as the case might be). Hopefully, comrades who do not share my views will enter into the spirit of things and make constructive and reasoned comments. But I doubt it....

Still, lets have an interesting debate...

I thought that I would start things off my copying the New Stateman article on Nick Cohen's new book "What's Left?: How Liberals Lost Their Way". Its out today. I have just ordered the book from Amazon for £7.79. I will post a review when I have read it.

How the left went wrong
Nick Cohen
Published 05 February 2007

In early 2003, the largest co-ordinated protests in history took place against the Iraq war. This, argues Nick Cohen, was a failure of solidarity with the Iraqi people.

No one who looked at the liberal left from the outside could pretend that it provided anything other than token opposition to the "insurgents" from the Ba'ath Party and al-Qaeda. The British Liberal Democrats, the Continental social-democratic parties, the African National Congress and virtually every leftish newspaper and journal on the planet were unable to accept that the struggles of Arabs and Kurds had anything to do with them. Mainstream Muslim organisations were as indifferent to the murder of Muslims by Muslims in Iraq as they were to those in Darfur. For most world opinion, Tony Blair's hopes of "giving people oppressed, almost enslaved, the prospect of democracy and liberty" counted for nothing. The worst of the lot were the organisers of the UK anti-war demonstrations who turned out to be not so much against war, but on the wrong side.
Their leader, George Galloway, was a bombastic Scottish Labour MP who combined blood-curdling rhetoric with a whining sentimentality, like many a thug before him......


For the rest of this article click on New Statesman



"What's Left? How liberals lost their way" is published by Fourth Estate (£12.99).