NuLabour

Gordon Brown has now appointed an astonishing number of Apparatchiki from the unelected, unaccountable House of Lords, to serve as Cabinet Ministers, Ministers of State and Parliamentary Under Secretaries.

In theory, Ministers are kept in check from misbehaving, somewhat, by the fact that they have to justify their conduct in office to their Constituency electorate as a Member of Parliament.

This is what has led to Ministerial resignations as a result of fiddled expenses, or the appearance of impropriety, even for some expense claims which were technically within the rules e.g. Jacqui Smith, Hazel Blears, Tony McNulty etc.

This democratic safeguard does not apply to unelected Members of the House of Lords, who have been parachuted into Ministerial office and have had their ennoblement rapidly rubber stamped, simply through the patronage of the Prime Minister (Tony Blair or Gordon Brown).

Gordon Brown's shambolic regime now includes 21such Apparatchik Peers (when Glenys Kinnock is ennobled) . In some Departments, they outnumber the elected MPs serving as Ministers.

Her Majesty's Government - Tuesday 9 June 2009

The Cabinet

[...]

First Secretary of State, Secretary of State for Business, Innovation and Skills and Lord President of the Council

* The Rt Hon Lord Mandelson

[...]

Leader of the House of Lords and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster

* The Rt Hon Baroness Royall of Blaisdon

[,,,]

This is the only actual Ministerial position which needs to be held by a Member of the House of Lords.

Secretary of State for Transport

* Lord Adonis

[...]

Other Ministers

[...]

Law Officers

* Attorney General - The Rt Hon Baroness Scotland of Asthal QC***

* Advocate General for Scotland - Lord Davidson of Glen Clova QC

[...]

Department for Business, Innovation and Skills

[...]

* Minister of State - The Rt Hon Lord Drayson* & ** (jointly with the Ministry of Defence)

[...]

* Minister of State - Lord Davies of Abersoch CBE* (jointly with the Foreign and Commonwealth Office)

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* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Lord Carter of Barnes (jointly with the Department for Culture, Media and Sport)

[...]

* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Baroness Vadera (jointly with Cabinet Office)

* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State* - Lord Young of Norwood Green (and Lord in Waiting - paid)

There are more apparatchik Peers appointed as Ministers in this department , than there are elected MPs serving as Ministers !

HM Treasury

[...]

* Financial Services Secretary - Lord Myners CBE‡

Foreign and Commonwealth Office

* Minister of State - The Rt Hon Lord Malloch-Brown KCMG**

* Minister of State - Lord Davies of Abersoch CBE* (jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills)

[...]

* Minister of State - Glenys Kinnock

[...]

* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Baroness Taylor of Bolton (jointly with the Ministry of Defence)

Presumably Glenys Kinnock will be rapidly ennobled after her term as an MEP runs out in mid July - she is forbidden from serving as a national government Minister whilst she is still a Member of the European Parliament.

Ministry of Justice

[...]

* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Lord Bach

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Home Office

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* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Admiral Lord West of Spithead GCB DSC

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Department for Children, Schools and Families

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* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Baroness Morgan of Drefelin

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Department of Energy and Climate Change

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* Minister of State - Lord Hunt of Kings Heath OBE; and Deputy Leader of the House of Lords

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Department of Health

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* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Professor Lord Darzi of Denham KBE

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Cabinet Office

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* Parliamentary Secretary - Baroness Vadera (jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills)

[...]

Ministry of Defence

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* Minister of State - The Rt Hon Lord Drayson* & ** (jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills)

* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Baroness Taylor of Bolton (jointly with Foreign and Commonwealth Office)

[...]

Department for Work and Pensions

[...]

* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Lord McKenzie of Luton
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Department for Culture, Media and Sport

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* Parliamentary Under Secretary of State - Lord Carter of Barnes (jointly with the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills)

[...]

† paid as a Parliamentary Secretary
‡ unpaid Parliamentary Secretary
* unpaid
** attends Cabinet
*** attends Cabinet when Ministerial responsibilities are on the agenda
# Provides Ministerial support to the Prime Minister in the Cabinet Office on the coordination of Government Policy and Strategy

Countries with residential forms of Government, e.g. the United States of America obviously appoint their Cabinet Ministers or equivalents, but these usually require some sort of cross party political consensus, after confirmation hearings in public, in front of a parliamentary committee.

None of that applies to this bunch of apparatchiki, who have been appointed on the whim of the weak and desperate Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown, further showing up his promises to enhance the democratic scrutiny of the Executive by the elected House of Commons, as simply lies.

The politicians and media pundits in the "Westminster Village", seem to be wittering that if the Labour party has failed to beat the share of the vote in the European Parliament Election of UKIP, i.e. that they are in 4th place, then this would be serious enough for their General Election prospects that Gordon Brown would have to be replaced as their leader ?

This sounds like media spin to prepare the ground for claiming a "victory" if Labour only get beaten into 3rd place by the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats.

How will that not be defeat, pointing to a General Election rout, as well ?

It also seems likely that disgust with this NuLabour regime, will have let in the odious BNP into at least one MEP seat. They will no doubt use the European Union expenses, to trough as much money as possible, and to employ BNP apparatchiks, whilst doing nothing effective in the European Parliament, rather like UKIP have done.

Petitions are usually ignored by this Labour Government (and by other previous Governments in the UK)

This non-partisan Please Go ! petition on the Number 10 Downing Street website, might be worth a few moments of your time, to express your dissatisfaction with this mendacious, incompetent, yet still smug and patronising NuLabour regime:

Please Go !

We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to resign

Remember to take suitable precautions to protect your Communications Traffic Data from being captured "for national security" and then abused for political smear purposes by Labour party appartachiki e.g. use Tor to hide your real IP address and the use of a temporary or "throwaway" email address, based outside of the UK. e.g. from https://hushmail.com

The Independent on Sunday has another report about the sneaky lobbying , which has been going on for over a year, to appoint the disgraceful, untrustworthy former Prime Minister Tony Blair, to the unelected (by the people) position of "President of the European Union".

Blair steps up fight to be crowned first 'President of EU'

Brown gives grudging blessing to his old rival's return to new job at centre of the global stage

By Jane Merrick, Political Editor

Sunday, 5 April 2009

Tony Blair has emerged as the leading candidate to become the first permanent president of the European Union after Gordon Brown gave his grudging blessing to the plan. The former prime minister has stepped up his campaign for the job, which he wants to use to build a bridge between Europe and the new Obama administration.

Tony Blair has emerged as the leading candidate to become the first permanent president of the European Union after Gordon Brown gave his grudging blessing to the plan. The former prime minister has stepped up his campaign for the job, which he wants to use to build a bridge between Europe and the new Obama administration.
Related articles

His return to the global stage would be a shock to his critics over the Iraq war and dismay many in Europe.

But The Independent on Sunday has learnt that Mr Brown has accepted that his old rival should be in pole position for the appointment, on the basis that Britain needs to have a key figure in the architecture of the "new world order".

A senior British official said: "He [Brown] will have to swallow hard to sit down in meetings once again with Blair. But he accepts that there needs to be someone from the UK in the new global architecture. There is no opposition to the plan. Things have moved on, people have moved on."

[...]

There certainly is opposition to this plan from the people of the United Kingdom and the rest of the European Union.

There is a European Union wide petition website opposed to such an insulting nomination

Stop Blair!

currently with over 27,000 signatures.

Apologies for not posting about Labour / New Labour / NuLabour recently, they are too depressing to waste too much valuable blogging time on.

George Monbiot, has excoriated the totalitarian Hazel Blears in a Comment id Free opinion piece in The Guardian.

Just what exactly do you stand for, Hazel Blears - except election? An open letter to Hazel Blears MP, secretary of state for communities and local government.

How can we get rid of Hazel Blears and her colleagues in this repressive Labour government, without getting anyone else who is just as bad or worse in power ?

The Great and the Good (including George Monbiot, Henry Porter, David Davis, various pressure groups like the NO2ID Campaign and Liberty Human Rights etc.) from The Guardian reading intelligentsia (together with some people who might well be "wolves in sheep's clothing") will be pondering this at:

Convention on Modern Liberty to be held on Saturday 28th February 2009

The Convention on Modern Liberty is being held in the Logan Hall and adjoining rooms at the Institute of Education in Bloomsbury, central London.

Address:

The Institute of Education
20 Bedford Way
London
WC1H 0AL

Loacation Map

Nearest Tube Stations: Russell Square or Goodge Street

There are video linked screenings or other parallel meetings being held across the UK in Belfast. Bristol, Cambridge, Cardiff and Manchester.

This event is quite expensive (£35 a ticket or £20 for concessions), and it is in central London, so it may be better to spend the money on a party with a few friends and debating the issues around a broadband webcast link to the main speeches.

David Davis has now officially resigned as an MP:

The official announcement on the HM Treasury website:

Three Hundreds Of Chiltern

The Chancellor of the Exchequer has today appointed the Right Honourable David Michael Davis to be Steward and Bailiff of the Three Hundreds of Chiltern. The Chancellor has also granted Mr Davis's request to be released from this appointment today.

Having been released from the appointment, means that David Davis can stand for re-election.

The mainstream media seems to be saying that July 10th looks likely to be the election day.

Still no sign of any official Labour party candidate.

Labour also seems to back tracking on promoting proxy candidates like the former editor of The Sun newspaper Kelvin Mackenzie (how was Rupert Murdoch, a US citizen ever going to fund his campaign legally ?) or the rumoured candidacy of John Smeaton the former Glasgow Airport baggage handler who showed bravery when subduing an insane suicide attacker who had set himself on fire last year, but who now seems to be off to the USA.

David Davis is due to formally resign as a Member of Parliament on Wednesday, to fight a by-election against the Labour government's creeping surveillance database state and the "slow strangulation" of our freedoms and liberties, without any resultant increase in real security from terrorism or crime.

His campaign website (DavidDavisForFreedom.com - also .org, .org.uk, .co.uk domain name suffixes and also DavidDavis4Freedom.com, .org, .co.uk. .org.uk), seemingly registered by Paul Borge, an employee of a large Public Relations company Fleischman-Hillard, is obviously work in progress, and has been intermittently online , sometimes showing a holding page, and sometimes displaying blog content from http://testdd.terapad.com e.g.

David Davis For Freedom - by-election re-election campaign website.

Welcome to my Blog

By info@daviddavisforfreedom.com on Welcome

Welcome to my campaign to preserve our fundamental freedoms.

On 12 June, I resigned from Parliament to take a stand against the sustained assault on British liberty. I resigned after the vote on 42 days, because it marked a watershed. Prolonged detention without charge undermines a fundamental liberty. But it also likely to prove counter-productive - with a range of security experts warning of the security risks presented by this draconian measure. I do not believe we can defend our security by sacrificing our liberty.

My campaign is not, however, just about 42 days. It is about the relentless erosion of our fundamental freedoms over the last eleven years.

The growing power and reach of the state has not made us safer. It has made us less secure.

The growth of the database state has not protected our privacy. As data fiasco after data fiasco demonstrates, reliance vulnerable databases has left our personal data more exposed than ever.

The surveillance society has not improved public protection. Violent crime has doubled under this government, whilst neighbourhood spies check rubbish bins and conduct surveillance on school runs.

And freedom of speech - the hallmark of any democracy - has been stifled by repressive laws. Peaceful protesters have been prosecuted for demonstrating outside Downing Street, whilst extremists have been left free to incite violence and vitriol against Britain for years.

My real fear is that there is worse to come. Having rigged the voted on 42 days - through bribery and bullying - this government will be tempted by the politics of terror to come back and ask for even longer periods of pre-charge detention. And they still plan to introduce ID cards, which will leave us vulnerable to criminal hackers and even terrorists. So I believe it is time to take a stand. But I appreciate there are different views on these important issues - I want to hear them all.

Over the last few days, I have received support from across the political divide on issues that transcend party politics. But most of all, I have been surprised and humbled by the public response, with thousands of people sending messages of support. Today I am launching this website to take this debate to the country. We must preserve our fundamental freedoms. They are the crown jewels of our democracy, part of the very fabric of this great nation. Please join the debate - and send me your views.

David Davis

You can sign up with other people who are pledging their support for this defence of our civil liberties:

More Parliamentary Written Answers, to Questions askked by the Conservative MP Eric Pickles, on the subject of the "Disgrace and Favour" house last occupied by the notorious, multiply disgraced former Labour Cabinet Minister David Blunkett:

The Government has been dithering for over 2 years now, about selling off this property, valued at £ 2.4 million, but they do now seem to have instructed the estate agents Savills UK (Sloane Street branch), to start putting it onto the property market.

See the previous blog article Disgrace and Favour official residences:

[...]

62 South Eaton Place, is on the southern edge of the much more posher district of Belgravia. Despite this, it looks rather prison like, with its bullet proof and blast resistant windows and curtains and CCTV cameras. It is right next door to The Belgravia public house, and within line of sight of the Belgravia Police Station, and the Victoria Coach Station terminus.

Obviously this is not a very good photo, but this bit of history, the last exit of Tony Blair from Downing Street as Prime Minister which NuLabour blog witnessed at about 11 minutes past one on Wednesday 27th June, was worth a small cheer - hooray !

There were relatively small crowds on either side of Whitehall, with the "Stop the War" demonstrators penned in on the Ministry of Defence side, and with NuLabour apparatchiki and some school children etc. who had been bused in on the Downing Street side.

We do not look forward to the misrule of Gordon Brown, who we simply cannot trust not to be a meddling micro-managing control freak, especially as he has such a dearth of competent Labour politicians from which to chose his Cabinet Ministers.

The fictional character of Sir Humphrey Appleby, played by the late Sir Nigel Hawthorne, in the popular satires "Yes, Minister" and "Yes Prime Minister" has stood the test of time since the first broadcast back in 1980.

The Sunday Times has published an extract "Brown v Whitehall: the coming battle" from the book "Gordon Brown Prime Minister" by Tom Bower.

The pusillanimous surrender of supposedly top Civil Service mandarins, when faced by the authoritarian control frekery of Gordon Brown and his cabal, does makes one pine for a competent and devious Sir Humphrey Appleby, who might be able to protect us from the worst excesses of the new Unelected Prime Minister in Waiting Gordon Brown and his NuLabour cronies and apparatchiki.

It does not appear from this extract that Sir Gus O'Donnel, the present Cabinet Secretary. is up to the task: