18 January (Part 1) - Slumming it
David Cameron is a man who has difficulty foreseeing the consequences of his actions.
Five years ago, when Cameron looked like a sure fire election winner, he agreed to pre-election
TV debates without fully appreciating British sympathies for underdogs and we finished up with a
whipper snapper as deputy prime minister.
Then, despite it not being in his manifesto, Cameron decided to promote same sex
marriages without thinking it might upset many within his core vote and with close
to zero chance of it attracting a lot of new supporters.
DC also decided that a fixed five year term for his government was a good idea
without thinking through that it would cause a four month election campaign
instead of three weeks. Can anyone see a reason to vote for a man without any
foresight? Shouting “Ed Miliband” doesn’t count.
As a result of the last of these follies we already have politicians banging on
our doors. I am going to have a choice between two ladies and
a man from Plumstead.
The Conservative candidate was
selected for Erith and Thamesmead
last Sunday and Anna Firth from Sevenoaks has already been creating photo opportunities wherever she can. It
must be hard for her campaigning in Erith and Thamesmead and not just because of the freezing cold.
I would guess that the poshest houses in the E & T constituency might be in Woolwich or Charlton
Roads but the rest is for the most part either a concrete jungle or little terraced houses.
It’s not what Anna will be used to. Neither perhaps will she be used to the
political dishonesty that is the norm in Bexley. Last time I looked, a quarter of
Bexley’s Conservative councillors withheld their personal details from their
Register of Interests under Section 32 of the Localism Act. They can do that if
they certify they are at exceptional risk of terrorist outrages and the like. More
councillors are cowering behind Bexley’s front doors than in the whole of the
rest of London put together.
Anna Firth has no such inhibitions. There is no reason to suppose she is
anything but an honest woman who just happens to have been selected by the
shabby crew that rejected the man who masterminded the remarkably successful
Tory campaign in Erith and Thamesmead five years ago. They
increased their vote
by 50% above their previous best but Amandeep Bhogal is not flavour of the
month despite being the only local man who threw his hat into the ring.
Anna Firth’s
Register of Interests at Sevenoaks District Council
reveals that she has an attendance record at meetings that varies between 33% and 100% dependent on the
year - currently 77% - and lives in Halstead in a house called Colegates.
Colegates is not the sort of house you will stumble upon in Woolwich Road. It is
literally off the beaten track (click Photo 1 to see) and boasts both an indoor swimming pool
and a tennis court set in 5·2 acres.
I suspect Ms. Firth plans to sell up and move to downtown Belvedere when she is
elected. It would be a good way of escaping Ed Miliband’s idiotic £2 million pound mansion tax.