Goodbye and good riddance
Wednesday, June 3, 2009 Patricia Hewitt, the former Health Secretary, is to stand down as an MP at the next general election. Apparently it has nothing to do with the expenses scandal. She just feels "the time is right".
What a pity she didn't stand down before the last election. Instead, she got re-elected, replaced John Reid as Secretary of State for Health, and introduced a comprehensive ban on smoking in public places. In doing so she abandoned Labour's manifesto pledge to exempt private members' clubs and pubs that don't serve food.
For that alone, Patricia Hewitt deserves our undying contempt. After all, it's not just the expenses' scandal that has turned people against MPs. Reneging on election promises for no good reason is just as serious. And NOTHING is worse than listening to some smug, sanctimonious politician telling us how to live our lives and run our businesses.
Sadly, the MP for Leicester West has done a runner before the electorate can pass judgement via the ballot box.
The Telegraph has the story HERE.
Simon Clark
The Daily Mail reports that:
In retirement the Leicester West MP will ... cash in by working with firms closely linked to her former ministerial responsibilities. She is already paid between £45,000 and £50,000 a year as a consultant to the Boots chain of pharmacies, according to the House of Commons Register of Members' Interests. She also pockets between £55,000 and £60,000 as an adviser to Cinven, which paid £1.4billion for Bupa's UK hospitals and runs 25 private care facilities in Britain.
Full story HERE.
Reader Comments (18)
Yes that smug, patronising haridan "who knows best" for us smokers. It is a day ago but you can comment on LabourList too.
I would be interested in people's comments, but as someone pointed out to me recently ASH appear to of gone deathly quiet. Has the pro choice movement mobilised and can easily debunk their rhetoric, their "fake charity" status exposed, shame that the smoking ban has closed 4,000 pubs and made 50,000 people unemployed and the smoking ban now, I believe is considered by most to be the main reason for closures? I am convinced that the Tories have done their own research into ASH's claims and found them wanting. I was astonished when LabourList, the Labour Party's blogosphere's mouthpiece allowed a writer to blaim the smoking ban for the closures and most contributors agreed.
I have also been invited to a hospitality symposium to discuss the effect on the smoking ban and there not only a presumtion that it has but also it should it be amended.
Like the England football team there have been many false dawns about its ascendancy, but I do feel we are beating the metaphorical Germans 5-1, with a hattrick from Simon Clark and team mates.
http://www.labourlist.org/patricia_hewitt_to_step_down
So she's been feeding at the trough of pharma companies as well as fiddling her expenses? Isn't that a clear conflict of interest? What are the rules for government ministers in this respect? Would it be OK for, say, a Defence Secretary to be doing work for an arms company?
It reminds me how in 2004 the president of the BMA (and also director of the British Heart Foundation), Sir Charles George, called upon the government to ban smoking in all public places, and almost a year to the day later joined the board of Bioaccelerate Holdings Inc, a pharma company.
Follow the money?
This sounds just about right and typical, Idlex. They are raking in money left, right and centre and one way or another it is all at the expense of Joe Public, be it acutaully in cash for themselves, doing people out of jobs and ruining peoples' lives, to list just a few!
I cannot imagine for one moment that many, if any of this load of corrupt politicians would know the truth if it got up and smacked them very soundly in the face. They live the lie to such an extent they cannot possibly know what the truth is anymore.
I think you are being over optimistic Dave. It seems that no senior politician ever believed that the smoking ban was to protect non-smoking employees. It was about lowering the number of non-smokers. As usual the EU has a big input into the politics of this and smoking bans are being introduced in the most unlikely places in continental Europe. Granted that they have been effectively halted in Holland, Spain and Germany but that's a big step away from weakening a two year old anti-smoking law. ASHuk seems to be concentrating on smuggling and plain packaging etc at the moment. I predict that when the recession ends it will turn its attention to smoking areas outside cafes and restaurants and smoking in cars. I notice that the UKIP petition still has fewer than 400 signatures - fewer than the Forest facebook friends page. Conservatives looking at it might judge that there aren't many votes to be got from rocking the boat smoke-wise. The current emphasis seems to be on families and I think any government is happier with pub-restaurants than adult drinking places, I readily admit I don't understand politics - I just get angry - so people in the know, let's hear your opinions.
Jon wrote: It seems that no senior politician ever believed that the smoking ban was to protect non-smoking employees. It was about lowering the number of non-smokers.
If so, they've been very effective. I believe the incidence of smoking is now increasing.
ASHuk seems to be concentrating on smuggling and plain packaging etc at the moment. I predict that when the recession ends it will turn its attention to smoking areas outside cafes and restaurants and smoking in cars.
My own guess is that when (rather than if) Labour gets kicked out of office, and the Tories take the helm, they won't continue running the Labour nanny state at full throttle.
As I see it, we've really only had the interfering nanny state since Blair was eased out by Brown. These days I think Blair was a strong moderating influence at the top, who kept the lid on an ingrained Labour impulse to nanny and control and interfere. Once Blair was gone, it was party time for the nannies. And, boy, have the little hitlers been indulging their wish to order everyone around to the hilt ever since! It's been an orgy.
But I can't see the Tories continuing with the Brown nanny state. Tories aren't nannies. They're all about getting people to stand on their own feet. Which is the complete opposite to nannying. Furthermore ASH mostly lives off government money, as do all the other fake charities, and there's not going to be much money available to support their antics. So I would expect them to return to the obscurity they enjoyed up until 3 or 4 years ago.
The Tories are going to get in because everybody hates Labour, not because they love Tories. And one of the main reasons that people hate Labour so much is because of the nanny state it created, which is still wreaking amazing havoc. Cameron has really just had to wait and watch droves of people come looking for something to vote for other than the detested Labour party. He's hardly going to make the same mistake himself as they did.
As for the smoking ban, it now seems to have become - two years late - the conventional wisdom that it is this more than anything which has been destroying British pubs. If, furthermore, it's true that smoking has actually increased, a new Tory government will be able to say, reviewing the carnage 2-3 years on, that the ban didn't work, and call time on the mad experiment. Probably there'll be no fanfare. The ban will be quietly relaxed.
That's what I expect. But I could be wrong, of course.
Idlex, I meant to write "lowering the number of smokers", which I agree doesn't seem to be happening. Good point about ASHuk being completely dependent on Gov funding. I hope I'm wrong but I can't see the whole of the nanny state dissolving with a change of government. In fact the nanny state is a big part of how Public Health sees itself - curing people in advance by stopping them doing anything which might have the tiniest risk associated with it. They don't even try and pretend otherwise. It is too widespread and too many influential people make a living from it: not just in anti-smoking but salt, obesity, alcohol; and a significant proportion of the population go along with it.
Jon.
The UKIP "Save our Pubs" petition has 1351 signatures to date. See this section on their website and also the very good video Nigel Farage has made. The UKIP policy is straightforward. It is up to landlords to decide whether they want smoking in their establishments, and up to the public to decide which establishments they wish to go to. No government interference is necessary.
With respect, there are also many other important matters at present for UKIP to attend to and they are doing a brilliant job.
I agree that ASH seems to have gone very quiet. I was shown his cigarette packet by my son this morning. The disgusting porno photos were gone and replaced by brief words that help to stop smoking is available.
The vested commercial interest of Patricia Hewitt and her ilk must surely start to come to the attention of the public now and, with this, the lies which the ban has been based on.
All strength to UKIP tomorrow. Never has our vote been more important than now. This is the first vote we have had since this whole sorry mess began.
Idlex, I meant to write "lowering the number of smokers",
I thought you might.
I hope I'm wrong but I can't see the whole of the nanny state dissolving with a change of government.
It won't vanish overnight. It'll just get smaller. But the fact of the matter is that Tories aren't natural nannies. They never have been, and never will be. During the Thatcher era, a lot of people were worried that they'd even get rid of the NHS (which they didn't).
By contrast, Labour always wants big government, higher taxes, government-owned industry, etc, etc. The state always gets bigger under Labour. And ASH and co a quasi-state organisations.
Of course, maybe Cameron isn't really a Tory. We'll find out in due course.
Hewitt, Smith and Blears represent the worst that positive discrimination provides over choosing prospective MPs through the process of meritocracy. They have sadly proved that if you apply positive discrimination in any walk of life, you end up with second rate and hopelessly inadequate people holding positions of power.
However, it is a sad relection on life in Britain, when over 400 MPs voted for a total smoking ban and based their decision on lies, junk science and vested interests. They did not have the intelligence to judge the evidence and apply some sense of proportionality to the legislation. As a former Labour supporter (at least in 1997), I can hoenestly say they will never receive my vote again until the day I die. Labour and Gordie Brown are currently entering the terminal phase of their reign and their demise cannot come soon enough.
There was an article on the local news last night (BBC South East) where they had a group of school children being taught songs and mantras designed to teach them how to get their parents to stop smoking. It was like something you'd imaginge the Political Officers in East Germany doing.
There is really no chance of putting an end to this sort of thing with any of the main three parties in power. They all have the same basic authoritarian view when it comes to telling us what to do. I dread to think of what they will do after the General Election with five years of unhindered lawmaking in front of them and the EU egging them on. The outlook for life in this country is distinctly unpleasant.
I will not vote for any of the main three parties again until I see some firm commitment from one of them to stop this draconian suppression of our liberties.
Yes they know what the public anger is about.
The erosion of civil liberty and the criminalisation of the UK populus.
I mean what kind of a nutter thinks that finger printing, Dna testing of innocent school children (compulsery) is a good idea?
The DNS database is a good idea ?
Well Joseph Mengler probably thought so or Joseph Stalin.
.
They just do not want to admit in public how thick they are.
No sorry how, corrupt and thick they are.
What the f**k where you thinking ?
ps don't count on getting away with it.
After all, you where the ones who "stated", Fred the shred should hand over his cash.
Hypocracy !
Yes .
Intelligence ,
No.
Hand over all the stolen cash.
The directorships you think you are going to get and the fat pension... ,you think,.
Wrong.
Your poison.
No ones going to touch you with a barge pole.
You see your all to thick to see what's happening.'
Interesting times we live in.
Maybe you might get a job on the checkouts in Tescos .
Thats if they'l put up with you.
People do not like liars.
Welcome to the human race!
But you going to have to work at it and learn some social skills.
ps
It takes seven years to rebuild your soul.
McGraw said they might get jobs on the checkouts at Tesco's - i don't think Tesco's would trust proven thieves to work on their checkouts - not if they have any sense, anyway.
Bill and Simon, I totally agree with you.
Alan Johnson is favourite to take over from Gordon Brown and look what he's done with the Health Service. 'Things can only get better'? Not with Johnson.
There are 2 petitions active at the moment. I was referring to the number 10 epetition started by Derek Bennett of UKIP, which has 371 signatures. Perhaps the one on the UKIP website will gather more momentum.
Good riddance to the smoking ban bitch, while we all wait with bated breath for Gordy to follow her ass out of govt.
Fingers crossed that if the Conservatives get in they will overturn this Hitler smoking ban!
Up UKIP!
Our favourite anti-democratic purse-lipped finger-wagging venal troughing parasite will be staying in her seat until the GE; thus wringing a further £60,000 from us ungrateful proles.
I suggest any Leicester West readers here put up some local pressure for her to just get the hell out now, thus forcing a by-election. Whereupon dear Patsy will have to just make do with her pharma directorships.
And Margot J... you'll be pleased to hear I've just been in and swelled your party's Euro-vote by one. Took a while to find UKIP on the ballot-paper, as they were hidden in a special fold at the bottom of the sheet.
Folks. Remember it was NuLabour in December 1996 that criticized the Tories use of a Nanny State. Yet, continued tp follow the same line with increased venom or abandonment which has got us in this mess. Forget Labour, Tory or LibDem/ None of these parties have any intention of saving this Once Great Nation.
Gavin, sadly I am inclined to agree with you. If they weren't so arrogant they would have dropped the Great from Great Britain years ago, as it no longer applies!