Wednesday 13 October 2010

What the Woolas?

When Phil Woolas went up against Joanna Lumley on live national television over Labour's refusal to recognise Gurkha rights I knew damn well whose side I was on. Even if the man had never surfaced in the public eye again I would stand by my choice.

Woolas was Labour candidate in what commentators at the time called "the dirtiest by-election in history" and has been MP for Oldham East since 1997. In that time he and his divisive political tactics have contributed to the 2001 Oldham race riots, the borough becoming for a time one of the BNP's strongest areas in the country and a legacy of ethnic tension and segregation that is still being carefully unravelled by Oldham's now-Lib Dem administration. His 2010 election campaign in which he suggested his Liberal Democrat opponent was in the pay of extremist Islam and which had an intended strategy of "making white folks angry" has now landed him in court and could well result in him being thrown out of office next month. 

So what on earth is this man doing back on the Labour front bench - and in a role shadowing the Home Office to boot?
As if it wasn't enough that Labour's new shadow Home Secretary is Ed Balls, one of the most right-wing ministers in the last government, we now have a man who might as well be campaigning for the BNP as his wingman. 

If Ed Miliband is really serious about the mood music he used in his conference speech, that seemed to be aimed squarely at winning back voters who have switched to the Lib Dems over issues like Iraq or civil liberties, he'll have to do better than this.

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