Oona calls for population control on LBC

During a review of the papers Oona picked out a story in the Times about population. She started by saying;

OK –‘It is an important issue – how are we going to carry on doubling the size of our population – it won’t work’

KM – ‘I have three kids, does that make me a bad person?’

OK – ‘I think it might, not a bad person per se but in terms of saving the planet you haven’t done your bit...’


and later she said;


OK – ‘I think at a certain point we have to perhaps we are going to seriously – obviously we’re not going to go down the Chinese route... erm which is just disastrous... but on the other hand they did realise it would be disastrous for their country if they carried on down that route of population explosion’

OK – ‘but the serious point is that we have to recognise that the biggest pressure on the world’s resources is the population and is impacting everything and it will impact the quality of life our kids have, and given that there are so many children who don’t find a home, you would hope that people might look at how they can reduce their personal footprint by going beyond 2, 3, 4, 5 kids'

KM – 'So that’s Oona King’s big policy now is two kids and no more in London...'

OK - ‘Can I just say that this is going to be tweeted out it the worse possible way... I am just saying lets be responsible about the worlds resources...’

- It does beg the question, is there a good way to tweet that you think people should not go beyond 2,3,4,5 kids?

LBC RADIO - 28/08/2010, 11.54am

A mysterious tweet

This morning Oona King sent the following tweet from her twitter account:

Oona_King: RT @guardiannews: David Miliband wins backing of John Cruddas for leadership campaign http://bit.ly/cbjI67

 

How then to explain the absence of the tweet from her twitter account at 11.55am?

• Did Oona forget which Miliband she is backing?
• Was this a mistake by her campaign, soon rectified, which means her team tweets for her?
• Perhaps it was a mischievous hacker from David Miliband’s campaign angry at her decision to back Ed?

 

Who knows? Perhaps readers could shed light on this baffling development....

Lesson in political history and thought...

"It takes a while on the left to realise that if you want to redistribute wealth, you've got to generate it"

Oona King, Hornsey and Wood Green meeting, 24/08/2010

More questions for Oona King's campaign...

Previously we reported questions arising from how Oona King had been able to contact London Labour members using information not given to both candidates by the party. This story has now made it into the Evening Standard today.

Many party members have contacted Oona King’s campaign directly after receiving emails from Kevin McKeever of her campaign team, asking how Oona King’s campaign obtained their personal information. London Labour members have now started to receive replies from Mr McKeever.

He writes:
“The Oona King campaign has sourced email contact data from a range of legitimate sources, including affiliate organisations, campaigning groups and informal networks of Labour Party members.”

Many are not satisfied. But Mr McKeever’s reply raises a new question. He says that contact data has been sourced from affiliate organisations. Most affiliated organisations are trade unions. Two are backing Oona King – Usdaw and Community. The overwhelming majority are backing Ken Livingstone. Traditionally the unions do not pass their membership data to anyone else. That is because they are free-standing organisations with their own obligations to their members.

Other affiliates are generally not backing any candidate – the Fabian Society and the Co-operative party have made no recommendations for example.

Kevin McKeever’s reply begs the question – is he saying Community and Usdaw handed over their membership details to Oona King? And what other affiliates’ data is implied in the response from Kevin McKeever?

Contacting the members - one law for Oona King, another for Ken Livingstone?

What’s going on with membership lists in the London Mayoral selection? Several developments over the last few days suggest that Oona King’s campaign has access to London Labour party membership details beyond those given to the candidates by the Labour party. If so serious questions must be asked about how this has happened.

Like the leadership contenders the Mayoral candidates are entitled to five emails to party members. These are sent out by the party to those London members whose emails are held by the party. They are London-wide emails, not broken down by CLP or borough or any other segment of the party.

In addition the candidates are provided with the email addresses of CLP secretaries.

Earlier this month the candidates were provided with the names and phone numbers – but no other data – by the Labour party, following a decision to provide the same facility to leadership candidates nationally. The candidates are only allowed to use this information for the purpose of the mayoral selection.

If candidates wish to mail members they provide the artwork to the party’s appointed printer, who sends it out.

But in the last few days all the signs are that Oona King’s campaign has started to operate on the basis of membership data not available to both candidates.  

Towards the end of last week women members of the party received emails inviting them to an Oona King event in Westminster on September 3rd, chaired by Guardian journalist Polly Toynbee.  There are reports all over London that women who received the email include those who have not signed up to Oona King’s mailing list.

It does not seem that Oona King has simply compiled her own email list from publicly available emails. That would certainly apply to councillors’ email addresses, and she would be entitled to the CLP secretaries’ emails. But to compile a wider list she would have needed the permission of those who hold that information.

It is more likely that Oona King’s campaign is operating off membership Labour party membership data. Within the Westminster women’s meeting email, Oona King’s supporters – women MPs including an MP from outside London – promise to send the recipients a postal version of the invitation.  Women members of the party have started to receive these mailings today.

That means that Oona King’s campaign has the postal addresses of party members, despite this not being given to the candidates by the party, and has data broken down by gender.

That email alone points to the possibility that Oona King has access to London Labour party membership lists – despite this not being given to Ken Livingstone.

The weekend added evidence to the likelihood that Oona King’s campaign has use of membership information not available to her fellow mayoral candidate.

Oona King’s campaign is organising a number of meet-the-members events in London in August.  Party members in CLPs living near to these meetings have started to receive targeted emails from Oona King’s campaign inviting them to the events.

Members in Islington – including those not signed up to Oona King’s email lists - have received an email inviting them to an event on Sunday from Kevin McKeever, one of Oona King’s campaign team. This email has also been received by members in Haringey.  Oona King’s campaign has also sent an email from Mr McKeever to Haringey members about a meeting with Oona King moderated by the Times journalist David Aaronovitch taking place this week. Brent members have received an email from the King campaign in the name of Mr McKeever inviting them to a meet-the-members event on 28th August.  

I understand that individuals who are no longer members of the party have received the emails from the Oona King campaign.

In all of these cases the emails have been received by members not signed up to the Oona King email list. In no cases are these the bulk emails each candidate is entitled to send out via the party – they are targeted emails sent direct from the Oona King campaign.

There may be other examples of such mailings.

What this shows is that Oona King has London Labour party membership data broken down by CLP or borough. As stated previously, the Westminster event indicates they have it broken down by gender. All this shows a degree of data held that goes way beyond that officially given to the two candidates under the rules.

There are a number of routes that can have lead to Oona King being able to email and post members using this degree of localised data.

One is that someone in the party machinery has given her the London Labour party membership data. This would be a serious offence for a member of staff and would run counter to the approach so far taken. But hitherto the party has avoided any impression of stitching up Ken Livingstone in the manner of the 1999-2000 selection fiasco and there is nothing to suggest that this has happened here.

A second would be that Oona King’s campaigns have been given the membership lists of the CLPs concerned by officers or local members. That would mean that those officers would be favouring her campaign by handing data to one candidate but not the other. The fact that the women’s mailing went out across the whole of London means that can surely be ruled out.

A third would be that a London-wide list was given to Oona King’s campaign by party bodies or individuals entitled to hold them and authorised to use them as they wish. The only likely contender for that is London’s two Labour MEPs, who – as politician with London-wide constituencies - are both entitled to contact all London members. MEPs’ possession of the full London membership lists led to Frank Dobson having a huge advantage in contacting members in 2000, causing one of the worst abuses of that selection. London Labour’s two MEPs are surely not going to want to repeat that experience.

If it is not these three routes Oona King’s campaign must have obtained the membership data through some other mechanism. Perhaps someone who previously held the information has passed it to them.

Everything points to Oona King having a London-wide Labour party membership list. It raises the question – who gave it to them? And if the person or people who handed membership lists over to Oona King were not authorised to do so would this not be a serious breach of party rules?

The current leadership candidates are operating under similar constraints as Ken Livingstone. They must use the agreed routes to reach people or build up their own bank of information based on the phone data provided by the party.  It seems these rules do not apply to Oona King.

Healthy debate...

‘In terms of health inequalities – as you all know the mayor has no direct, or actually even indirect powers in the area of health and certainly no strategic powers in the area of health...’

Oona King in Brixton on Wednesday 18th August

Actually the Mayor does have powers over health; ‘The GLA Act 2007 extended the Mayor’s powers in relation to a number of key areas of public policy and decision-making, including housing, planning, health inequalities and climate change, and the Further Education and Training Act 2007 gave the Mayor new powers in relation to skills.3 Through these mechanisms the Mayor can exert significant power and influence over transport, policing, fire and emergency planning and economic development in London.’ 

Click here for more. 

And it may surprise Oona to know that the Mayors responsibilities include prepare a strategy to tackle London’s health inequalities and promote the reduction of health inequalities in London.

The Mayor even has a Health Adviser. Perhaps Oona should give her a call and find out a little more about this area of the Mayors office.
 

Oona's night with the bloggers

On 29th July Oona’s team invited bloggers to a special  briefing. Days later this was cancelled and a new invitation  was issued for the 16th August.

A number of reports have put the total attendance on the night at 2, possibly 3, bloggers who turned up to a hotel room in Battersea. And for the 2 or 3 people who did turn up it seems like the reception wasn’t exactly warm.

For a full report read Bad Conscience.

 

Know your history

Oona says she is Labour ‘through and through’ but thinks Labour was only in power for 12 years in the 20th century.

 

She recently said, ‘There is nothing that guarantees the Labour Party going forward in the future we will be one of the two big parties in government, just look at the last century - Labour was in power for just 12 years,’ at the Newham Mayoral hustings on the 21^st July.

 

But even excluding the pre-1945 period, Labour has been in power for over 19 years – 45-51, 64-70, 74-79 & 97-2000.

 

Oh dear that’s a third of Labour’s time in power airbrushed from history...

Is this a lack of policies...?

Oona says on MayorWatch: ‘When you to compare the ideas of Labour’s candidates you can see who’s taking London and Londoners more seriously: I’ve developed ideas that meet the challenges London faces, housing, crime, transport and more. Ken’s mentioned some ideas on Pubs and Music. Don’t get me wrong, our pubs and music industry provide jobs and entertainment; but not a single Londoner has said to me that these are their top issues – the challenges Londoners face deserve more thought, vision and energy to address them.’

Perhaps Oona has missed Ken’s policy launches and campaigns on:

London's economy, including key policies for transport eg fares

Making London the world’s first Smart City

Housing policy, and campaigning on housing benefit changes

Protecting safer neighbourhood policing and opposing Boris Johnson's police cuts

...and if Oona doesn’t see the importance of the music industry to London and the UK (the music industry is worth £3.6bn in 2008) her priorities are seriously misplaced...

Policy gaffe?

Oona set out her vision for London on Mayorwatch today. The article made puzzling references to the ‘new policies’ she has proposed.

 

She said ‘I’ve developed ideas that meet the challenges London faces, housing, crime, transport’ and went on in the article to refer to;

• 50% affordable housing target for new developments
• safer neighbourhood policing
• western extension to the Congestion Charge Zone
• reopen and renew London’s international offices

Actually Ken actually delivered all of these policies as Mayor of London. Perhaps Oona should do a little more homework before she outlines her ‘vision for London’.

Read the full article at: http://www.mayorwatch.co.uk/oona-king-my-vision-for-london/201012269

We'll need the trade unions to win in 2012 - guest blog by Louise Haigh, London Young Labour TULO officer

The row that erupted yesterday over Labour’s links with the unions following the Total Politics report of Oona King’s shindig at Canary Wharf is more revealing than just the comments of a person at a party.

Total Politics reported Oona supporters complaining about the selection system and timetable for choosing Labour’s candidate for mayor, including this: 

"The problem with the trade-union system is that it is rather outdated," replied one person on Oona's team. He continued: "Unions don't really do anything except give money... I shouldn't say that."

Oona King’s campaign team were in damage-limitation mode all day but Total Politics stood by its story. The reporter, Jess Freeman posted again:

“To just confirm my journalistic integrity and that of Total Politics, I will confront any criticisms right now. I have not misquoted a team member, I did not mishear and nor am I blatantly lying. And, to clarify, to assume that I can forget two brief lines about trade unions is a little bit rich. In fact, I held sustained conversations about unions all night.”

It is not at all a surprise that such a comment could be made by someone to a reporter at an Oona King party. It is consistent with the line of the campaign from the outset.

There is an old phrase the fish rots from the head down. In the case of the Oona King campaign, the rot started very early on, with the chair of the campaign Jim Fitzpatrick MP seriously proposing to remove the trade unions from the electoral college altogether, in a letter to the general secretary leaked to Labourlist.

The views reportedly expressed at Oona’s party flow naturally from that thinking.

Trade union members pay their subs to the Labour party and make it viable. That alone entitles them to a say. In a time of opposition, when most of the big private money will flow to the party of government, that is even more vital.

But more than that they are our link to millions of people giving us an invaluable connection to issues in the workplace and on those things that affect peoples’ lives directly, such as childcare or pensions. Trade union members have a democratic right to participate in this selection, just as in the leadership. We need to defend the union link, not concede to Tory arguments about it.

In London the trade union agenda directly contributed to policies under Ken as mayor like the living wage, the importance of protecting the pension rights of transport workers and the recognition of risks faced by construction workers.

The value of the unions’ contribution is equally in the campaigns that Ken Livingstone has taken up in this selection. His economic policy statement develops a number of points flowing from the work of the unions, such as the need to deepen the promotion of the living wage. Alongside the Unite union he recently met with Billingsgate fish porters whose licenses are under threat; and his campaign to promote and protect London’s valued pubs was launched with the GMB union.

It also meant that, unlike Oona King, when asked about the threat of Royal Mail privatisation he gave an unequivocal answer against this threat - rejecting rather than accepting the underlying arguments for privatisation.

It’s for these reasons that Ken is building up such big support.

Of the nine affiliated trade unions in London, seven are now recommending Ken Livingstone to their members. This is even more clearly the case when one looks at the relative weight of the trade union affiliates backing Ken: Unite has 120,000 affiliated members in London; Unison 63,000; the CWU 54,842; GMB London 47,142;  GMB Southern 21,000; UCATT 5,000; and TSSA 4,750.

Oona King will be recommended to the members of USDAW and Community with 25,021 affiliated members and 1,739 respectively. 

Oona King’s campaign has regularly briefed on issues of process in the selection.  Oona King’s problem is not the selection system but the significant support for Ken Livingstone in the London Labour party.

The differences on the unions are indicative of the choices more broadly in this campaign – between one that is seeking to unite the London labour movement as a whole in order to maximise the opposition to the cuts and higher fares of Boris Johnson’s administration and the ConDem government, and the other that would weaken our campaign between now and 2012 by conceding territory to the Tories, on Royal Mail privatisation, means testing and cuts.

We need the London trade unions if we are going to win in 2012 and remove Boris Johnson.

Louise tweets at @LouHaigh

Trouble with the unions

Oona King’s campaign is in trouble with London trade unions today after comments reportedly made to a Total Politics journalist by a team member at her party last night.

Total Politics’ Jess Freeman writes:

"The problem with the trade-union system is that it is rather outdated," replied one person on Oona's team. He continued: "Unions don't really do anything except give money... I shouldn't say that."

The story has been challenged on Twitter today by Team Oona, but Total Politics is standing firm. Jess Freeman has added this further post:

“To just confirm my journalistic integrity and that of Total Politics, I will confront any criticisms right now. I have not misquoted a team member, I did not mishear and nor am I blatantly lying. And, to clarify, to assume that I can forget two brief lines about trade unions is a little bit rich. In fact, I held sustained conversations about unions all night.”

 

Oona King’s campaign has previously raised the issue of the role of the trade unions in the selection for Labour’s candidate for mayor. Jim Fitzpatrick MP, who is chair of Oona’s campaign, proposed the removal of the trade union section in a letter to the general secretary Ray Collins, as one of two alternatives to the current selection system.

Against Big Society one day, in favour the next...

On July 28^th Oona tweeted; 'On my blog today - Cameron's big society con and community action that works’ and blogged: 'Have you ever heard such nonsense as David Cameron’s “Big Society?' 

Yet on July 26^th Oona said, ‘We can’t just reject the Big Society as a big con. It’d be a big mistake to just allow the Tories to claim it. We need to develop and foster our own innovative solutions to the problems of the future, you know, working in partnership with... groups, lots of community and third sector organisations.’ 

Ealing London Mayoral Hustings 26^th July 2010

Oona promises a 24-hour police station in every borough

Oona King has launched a crime policy document which pledges; ‘That there will be a 24-hour police station in every single borough’.

But according to the Metropolitan Police every borough already has a 24 hour police station, many have at least three or four stations open around the clock. 

‘Cutting crime, securing communities – changing London for good’ launched June 30^th 2010.