Kilfoyle vs Robinson

The war of words about the Speaker has taken a new twist with an interesting spat between Peter Kilfoyle MP and BBC political editor Nick Robinson. Yesterday Nick Robinson posted Theories on the Speaker which provoked Kilfoyle to table Early Day Motion 1037 which reads:

That this House deplores the innuendo of the blog of Nick Robinson, the BBC's lobby correspondent; calls upon him to substantiate the imputations he makes in his blog concerning the Speaker and hon. Members; and also calls upon the BBC to publish a full, itemised account of the expenses of Mr Robinson, in the name of transparency and accountability of public funds.

Now I agree that BBC journalists should be willing to publish their expenses, as ultimately the licence fee payer has a right to know how their money is spent, but it's interesting that MPs - so far 51 Labour and 1 Liberal Democrat have signed - are fast to react in an attack on the media and rather slower to take action about the Speaker. It is rapidly becoming the case that even the rats in Parliament know that Michael Martin is a dead man walking, yet no-one wants to do anything about it.

Nick Robinson's counter to the salvo is at I've caused a stir. Personally I think Nick Robinson will come out for the best in this. For the Early Day Motion has received the support of none other than The Backing Of Death himself, Lembit Öpik.

No to state funding of hairdos

The row about Cherie Blair's hair has caught the imagination of the blogosphere. Amongst the many points discussed, perhaps the most concerning are the continuing poor quality of the Labour Party's spokespersons and the current proposals for state funding of political parties.

The official Labour reaction to the story has been "So what? Mrs Blair worked fantastically hard during the election and visited more than 50 constituencies during the campaign. She is enormously popular with the party and, don't forget, we won the election." Does anyone honestly believe Labour was returned to power because of Cherie Blair's hair?!?! And is she really so popular with the Labour Party? Especially now?

Far more concerning are the proposals in current circulation for state funding of political parties. Is this really the sort of thing that tax payers' money should ultimately be spent? It's twice as much as Peter Kilfoyle (who nominated Tony Blair to be Labour leader in the first place) spent on his local election campaign. He also made the following comment:

This is the problem. We are almost accepting by stealth a First Lady.

There is only one First Lady in this country and today she is 80 years old. The way the Blair behave like a President and First Lady is a total embarrassment for the country. For the sake of us all they must go now.

Amongst the blogs discussing this story are Tom's Little Thoughts, alastair's heart monitor, A Big Stick and a Small Carrot, Ian Plumbley's Thoughts Blog, The Nether-World, On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing, old enough..., An Englishman's Castle, Earlsdon Greens 2006, A Tangled Web, »-(¯`v´¯)-».: Kita's Blog :.»-(¯`v´¯)-», The Officially Original Loch Ness Monster Blog, Charlton Hofie, Conan Vancy - The Voice Of Treason, donbert, Anorak: Voting Booth, Choice Cuts, Isabel and Ryan Klint and itisi.