Cool on global warming

Russell Lewis, former Daily Mail leader writer whose impressive CV includes stints as director of the Conservative Political Centre and general director of the Institute of Economic Affairs, has sent me a copy of the speech he gave to a fringe meeting I attended in Blackpool last week. 

The meeting - entitled 'Let Cooler Heads Prevail' - was organised by the Freedom Association and chaired by TFA chairman Roger Helmer MEP, who spoke at our reception the previous evening. It tackled the thorny issue of climate change and provided a platform for those of us who are sceptical about global warming or, at the very least, the impact of global warming. (See Guardian report HERE.)

I hope that Russell, who is also on the board of Forest,  will be a regular contributor to the new Free Society website when it is launched. In the meantime, here's a snippet from his speech:

"What started me on the sceptical path was the family likeness of this scare to so many other scares, which have turned up in the last few decades. Only forty years ago there was great alarm about the imminence of an ice age, which would kill billions of people. Some of its most prominent publicists, like James Lovelock, have since become equally avid propagandists  for global warming. 

We were also told,  back in the seventies that there would be mass starvation through overpopulation and food shortages. The whole world population was apparently fated to die of cancer due to DDT. The  forests, we were told, were destined to die because of acid rain, at a time when in America they were expanding. At the same time there was the angst about depleting resources. President Carter no less said that we would run out of oil by 1990. All these doomsday forecasts were completely wrong."

See also The Great Global Warming Swindle.

Liberated from the lure of the net

When I got back from the Conservative conference in Blackpool last week I discovered a fault with my home phone line. After I received a text from BT saying the problem wouldn't be fixed until October 17th (!), I rang the company and was told that thieves had raided the local exchange and stolen miles of copper cable. (See story HERE.)

Without a phone link I have been unable to send emails, access the Internet etc from home. It's amazing the impact this has had. Yesterday I found it so frustrating that I drove 20 miles to our office in Cambridge so I could spend some time catching up.

On the other hand it was quite liberating. The problem with taking your work home with you - as I do - is that you never really switch off. There is some inescapable force that draws me to my computer, whether it be six o'clock in the morning or eleven at night. Other people make a cup of tea or go to the loo during the TV ad breaks. I check my emails or surf the Internet for work-related news and gossip. It drives my family mad. Denied access to this ocean of information temporarily forced me to compartmentalise my day. Work. Home.

Anyway, the good (or bad) news is that BT has fixed the problem (ten days ahead of schedule!). Needless to say I'm back in the old routine, but it has made me think.

PM bursts election bubble

Gordon has bottled it. I suspect that no-one is more relieved than the Conservatives (see below), who are clearly not yet ready for government, or the Lib Dems (Ming Campbell especially) who are trailing so badly in the polls. Full story HERE.

Fun, fun, fun

Back home, I have one final reflection on this week's conference: to win a general election a party has to be hungry for power. The Conservatives may have been united - thanks to Gordon Brown - by talk of an election, but hungry for power? I think not.

What struck me - and others - as we sat drinking late into the night, was how comfortable the Tories seem to be in opposition. Nothing, it seemed, could disrupt their general good humour. In the bars and restaurants (the best litmus test), I don't recall a single person expressing anger or even resentment towards the present government.

The good news, for the Conservatives, is that there is a younger generation of twentysomethings coming through (many of whom were at the Forest/Free Society reception), but they're not yet ready for government. At present, they're far too busy having fun.

Personally, if I was the prime minister, I'd call an election now. Why wait? The Tories are once again enjoying themselves, but either they don't believe they can win the next election, or they don't want to - not really, not yet. Govern the country? Who wants the responsibility?

How liberal is David Cameron?

I don't want to rain on David Cameron's parade, but let's get things in perspective. Yes, it was a good speech but it wasn't a great speech. It certainly wasn't a speech that will convince millions of people to vote Conservative.

I still don't know what DC stands for or why I should vote for him. Is he a social liberal? An economic liberal? A mixture of the two? What, exactly, does he represent? I'm damned if I know.

I began the week vowing not to vote for any party, should there be an election this year. Nothing has changed. C'mon, David. If you really want people like me to vote for your party, come off the fence and stand up for individual liberties, the sort that have been increasingly eroded in recent years.

Unfortunately, given your background, I suspect you are a patrician politician who means well but is essentially paternalistic, so I'm not holding my breath - which is a pity, because this is one area where you could really put clear water between the Tories and obsessive, nanny state tendencies of the present government.

Morning after the night before

Conservative party conference, Blackpool
Last night's Forest/Free Society reception was a great success. Difficult to estimate numbers but the room was full - both inside and outside on the smoker-friendly balcony - so there must have been at least 200 people. Better event (I think) than Bournemouth although we probably had a higher profile at the Labour conference where we had two days to sell the event.

Last night's event was certainly the livelier of the two - more of a party than a reception. Great atmosphere and a very supportive crowd who cheered all the speakers and stayed long after the event had officially finished. We abandoned the more sophisticated, laidback jazz of Bournemouth and really went for it, pianist Matt Black pounding out a string of uptempo rock classics. ('Bat Out Of Hell' went down particularly well.)

This time we had three speakers - Roger Helmer MEP, rebel publican Hamish Howitt, and former MSP Brian Monteith (above, with Yours Truly on the left). All three spoke really well and provoked loud applause. On a less serious note, we then challenged guests to beat the 80 bottles of champagne consumed by guests at the Forest/Free Society event in Bournemouth - which I think they did. Thankfully I haven't seen the bill (yet).

Blackpool beached

To Blackpool for the Conservative party conference where, tomorrow night, we're hosting the second of our party conference receptions.

By all accounts, this is the last time any of the major parties will hold their conference in this part of Lancashire. The only surprise is that the Tories have come back for one last hurrah.

My first experience of Blackpool was as a wide-eyed teenager. I'll never forget my first sight of the colourful trams, the famous Illuminations, and - the most vivid memory of all - the Pleasure Beach with its terrifying rollercoasters!

Today, Blackpool has far less appeal. Much has been written about the hotels, the crumbling buildings and concrete promenade that hark back to a different age - and, sadly, it's all true. No-one in their right mind would come here for a holiday, far less a 21st century party political conference. What were the Conservatives thinking?!!

Retail therapy

To the Grosvenor House Hotel in London for the 2007 Retail Industry Awards sponsored by Mars, Seafish, GlaxoSmithKline, Cadbury Trebor Bassett, and others too numerous to mention. I am here as a guest of one of the companies (none of the aforementioned) and from the moment we sit down in the Great Room (Europe's largest ballroom), we are bombarded by a wall of noise from Blayz, a high energy string quartet. After dinner - and a brief interlude that includes an unexplained appearance by a pair of Laurel and Hardy lookalikes - it's time for the awards, compered by Frankie Boyle, star of BBC2's Mock The Week.

As an impartial observer it's hard to get excited by categories such as Supermarket Store Manager of the Year, Multiple Convenience Community Retailer of the Year, Independent Training Initiative of the Year, Global Convenience Format of the Year, and Independent Company Owned Forecourt Retailer of the Year, but I do my best, whooping and hollering as representatives from Morrisons, Sainsbury, Asda, Spar and M&S make their way to the stage to receive their awards.

Eventually, we're allowed a 15-minute "comfort break". For many guests that means a smoking break which is why, had you been driving down Park Lane at approximately ten o'clock, you would have seen scores of people, in evening dress, lighting up outside. Welcome to Blair's Brown's Britain.

Another dose of hard Labour

Last night's reception in the main lounge of the Royal Bath Hotel (left) went pretty well. Numbers were OK (ie we weren't embarrassed) even though the Foreign Secretary was being interviewed by the Observer in the room next door (to a full house) and Alastair Campbell was conducting his own meeting in the main ballroom 50 yards down the corridor.

A torrential downpour in the afternoon could have spelled disaster but come the evening the sun was shining again so - for those who chose to eat, drink and smoke outside in the garden - it was quite pleasant. On the other hand, it meant that there were - in effect - two parties taking place, which doesn't help. Still, it didn't stop people drinking. We ordered 40 bottles of champagne. Thanks to our guests (champagne socialists?) we eventually got through 80.

The theme of the evening was how the nanny state is being replaced by the bully state. I said a few words along these lines, and then introduced special guest Paul Toole. Paul and his partner Chris Elliott have - bravely, in my opinion - stuck their heads above the parapet and organised two marches in protest against the smoking ban. The first was in Wells, Somerset, where they live; the second was in Glastonbury. Next month they are taking to the streets again, this time in Bristol.

I was struck, recently, by something Paul had written. Essentially, he pointed out that, as a gay man, he had experienced discrimination and intolerance. Now, just as society is becoming more tolerant of the gay community, he is experiencing similar discrimination and intolerance because he's a smoker. I asked him to make this point and he did so with some passion. We need more people like Chris and Paul to stand up and be counted. I am delighted they were able to come.

The nanny state we're in

Unless you're Alastair Campbell or the Foreign Secretary, fringe events don't sell themselves. Today is D-Day for the Forest/Free Society reception at the Labour party conference so as well as handing out flyers to delegates, we have recruited three local thespians to dress up as nannies (nanny state - geddit?) and strut their stuff outside the conference centre. Like The Sun's double-decker bus (see below), the gag seems work. It attracts attention and makes people smile.

Adding to the surreal nature of the day, my colleague Sarah and I spend much of the day wrestling with a large bunch of balloons (featuring our 'nanny state' logo, obviously) which we drag from one location to another. Every so often a balloon snags on something - and bursts, making a noise that sounds alarmingly like a shotgun.

With armed policemen on every corner, this is not perhaps the cleverest PR stunt we've ever pulled. But it works. A combination of flyers, men dressed as Mary Poppins, and helium-filled balloons seems to have done the trick. After two days there seem to be very few delegates - including government ministers - who are not aware that Forest is in town. We've got to be happy with that.

The Sun? We love it.

Labour party conference, Bournemouth
Spent the day handing out invitations for tomorrow's 'Politics and Prohibition' event. Our small team included three conference virgins - Samantha, Luke and Kim - who were surprised by some of the (less than positive) comments directed at them by some delegates. We did warn them in advance!

The Sun took the honours for today's best conference stunt. The paper hired an open-top double-decker bus (left), covered it in images of Gordon Brown waving two fingers (at the British electorate), then blasted out  'Jerusalem', 'Rule Britannia' etc for two hours as the bus drove slowly, and repeatedly, past the conference centre. Simple but effective. They made their point and brought a smile to many people's faces.

Conference calls

The 2007 party conference season is in full swing. This week the LibDems are in Brighton, the circus then moves on to Bournemouth for the Labour conference, and the following week the Tories are in Blackpool.

Like many people, I have a love-hate relationship with party conferences. Drab hotel rooms (the best have been snapped up months if not years in advance), too many boring meetings, and - these days - one security check after another. No wonder so many MPs make their excuses and find something better to do.

On the other hand .... party conferences can be quite fun socially and if you organise a successful event it's a great feeling (tinged with relief). In 2005, at the Labour conference in Brighton, we had one of our best days ever (which I have already described HERE).

Last year, at the Conservative conference in Bournemouth, we went one better and organised what was - by common consent - the best fringe event of the year. We hired an events company, booked the ballroom at the Royal Bath Hotel, and staged a Prohibition-era reception with a live jazz band and mock police raid (above). Four hundred guests made it an evening to remember and hotel staff had to turn people away for reasons of "health 'n' safety"!!

This year we are organising two rather more modest events (receptions), one in Bournemouth, the other in Blackpool. The challenge, as you might expect, has been to find smoker-friendly venues. In practise, that means a room where people have direct access to a pleasant outdoor area where they can light up and still feel part of the event. 

In Bournemouth we have booked the main lounge of the Royal Bath Hotel which has direct access to the garden which overlooks the sea. Into the mix we are throwing a jazz pianist, a song and dance act, more balloons than you can throw a stick at - and a barbecue.

Why? Well, it's all very well having a message, but you have to an audience for that message - and we're up against stiff competition. In the adjacent room, at exactly the same time as our event, Andrew Rawnsley of the Observer is interviewing Foreign Secretary David Miliband. A few yards down the corridor Alastair Campbell will be talking about the Blair years (and flogging copies of his book). And that's in just one hotel!

According to the conference brochure, the Forest/Free Society reception is competing for guests with at least 30 other events. Wish us luck!

Minority report Down Under

Breath of fresh air (no, I'm not being ironic) in today's Times where columnist Ross Anderson writes:

Interesting news from Australia (and there’s a phrase you don’t often read), where 200 years of unremitting sunshine appear finally to have resulted in paranoia and psychosis. Peter Macdonald, Mayor of Manly in Sydney – where they already prohibit smoking on the beach – has proposed that the ban be extended to all outdoor areas controlled by New South Wales’s local authorities: which means pretty much everywhere, including open-air bar and restaurant tables.

If I may be permitted to quote the Mayor, his reasoning is: “The vast majority of people don’t smoke. It’s only the minority who will be disadvantaged.” Well, that’s all right then: although if you were black, left-handed, red-haired or Jewish you might feel that Mr Macdonald’s cavalier dismissal of the rights of minorities owed much to the philosophy of the 20th century’s leading antismoker, whose first name was Adolf.

In the words of musician Joe Jackson (featured in a Forest advertisement, above, that will appear in the 2008 edition of Blakes Parliamentary Yearbook), "Smokers are now the only minority whose minority status is quoted as justification for abuse."

Behind closed doors

I don't know about you, but I like to spend Saturday mornings drinking coffee, reading the newspapers, listening to Jonathan Ross, catching up on other blogs ... Iain Dale's Diary is consistently good, not just for the political content, but also as a portal to blogs I would never otherwise have heard of.

This morning, for example, I discovered Liberty's Requiem. On Thursday, in a post entitled 'What the jobsworths don't know', blogger DuSanne wrote:

It was a pleasant night in the Village yesterday. It was rounded of in fine style in a local pub that is a bit off my usual well-beaten path and I shall not name it, or even pseudoname it for reasons that will soon become apparent.

Not only was the drink sensibly priced by local standards, but once the crowd had dwindled to a half a dozen and three staff, the doors were locked and curtains closed. Not because it had reached the end of it's licensed hours, but it was about to become 'no longer a public space'. Ashtrays appeared and everyone, including the staff lit up.

I'm not entirely sure if the manager's interpretation of the law was correct, but nobody was going to complain and it was a strange delight to enjoy a cigarette in the time-honoured manner, knowing that what you were doing would drive some small minded jobsworth at the local council offices in to a fit of apoplexy if they knew.

Warmly recommended. See HERE.

Controlling influence

My Forest colleague Neil Rafferty (left) - who formerly worked for the Press Association, Business AM and the Sunday Times and is co-founder of the satirical Daily Mash - has written an excellent article for the party conference issue of Freedom Today, the in-house magazine of the Freedom Association. Here's a taster:

During a recent on-air joust with the good people at ASH, the government-sponsored anti-smoking group, I uttered a 21st century heresy. I declared that I and thousands of others across the UK enjoy tobacco. And I really do. I have particular fondness for compact, tightly rolled and ever so smooth Dominican cigars. Of course, I expected to be scolded by my adversary, but instead the ASH foot soldier went further and informed me that what I was experiencing was not in fact enjoyment, but simply a chemical response to the noxious ingredients of my delightful Vega Finas. At Forest we have become conditioned to ASH's more spurious positions, but this was uncharted territory. Now, it seems, they are able to define and then decree what is and is not enjoyable.

If ASH was just a rag-bag collection of wide-eyed zealots confined to the fringe it would almost be amusing. But instead they are an ever-growing, highly organised and professional lobby group backed by millions of pounds of taxpayers’ money with a direct line to the Department of Health. ASH and other self-appointed public health guardians like the British Medical Association are enjoying greater influence over the direction of public policy, and the distribution of public funds, than at any time in their history.

As well as appearing in Freedom Today, the full article will be available as a downloadable pdf on the new Forest website, to be launched next month.