pigs in lipstick

What’s all this about “pigs in lipstick”? It seems a little ungallant of Douglas Alexander to be speaking in such terms about the Tories, but he seems to be making a valid point about a party whose leader talks about change as if it has already happened, when in fact his party is still the same old raddled right wing rag bag.

I shall be gallant. In Lambeth, the Tories seem to be far from being pigs in lipstick. Sheep would be nearer the mark. The new intake have yet to make much impression, so we don’t know if in their spare time they are hugging hoodies and visiting glaciers and weeping for the planet at dinner parties in Notting Hill, or even Gipsy Hill.

One of them looks uncannily like my neighbour upstairs, but he isn’t. Whenever he speaks in the council chamber, my eyes tend to wander up to the plaster cherubs above, my mind wandering far away too. When I look back at him, after moments in contemplation of Edwardian music hall baroque, I always feel a momentary confusion that my neighbour from upstairs is addressing council. It keeps happening and it can be quite unnerving.

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Cllr Mark Bennett said,
Streatham

Wed, 2 Aug 2006 - 9:05 AM

Jason and Martin

Thanks for the comments. On Cameron's hugging of hoodies, let's just say I doubt the Tories will be bothering to embrace the hoodies of Streatham. Let's face it, it's a transparent ploy to win votes over from the Lib Dems, who are soft on thugs and soft on drugs. There must come a tipping point when the reactionaries in the Tory party, who have mostly stayed silent up to now, will start to ask what's going on. Cue the dismantling of the facade and out roll the Daily Mail Daleks.

On the comments of the Tory councillor in Brighton, I'm saddened but not surprised. In Lambeth, around this time last year, a Tory councillor wrote a letter to the South London Press comparing gay men to "sex offenders and other criminals".

The Tories do equality when they think it will win votes, not because it's a matter of principle; when they think it will lose votes, it doesn't take Mystic Meg to predict howls of "political correctness gone mad" and calls for the reintroduction of Section 28.

Which is why it's so important that Labour wins the next election.

Martin said,
Fri, 28 Jul 2006 - 4:01 PM

The Tories havn't changed a bit, Cameron might like to try and be something different from previous Tory leaders but the rest of the party is still the same old nasty party it always was. A Tory councillor in Brighton was recently overheard saying he believed homosexuals were paedophiles, nasty right wing bigot. That sadly is the true face of the Tory party. Be warned, Cameron may like to be different but the Tory party is still full of these idiots. Imagine if they were allowed back in to govern with people like that representing them.

Jason said,
London

Fri, 28 Jul 2006 - 3:54 PM

Hi, I was wondering how Cameron's 'Hug a Hoodie' campaign was going down on the streets of Streatham!?