Following on from earlier pieces by Jon Harris (in The Guardian) and Simon Chapman and Greg Hands MP (on CentreRight.com), Peter Oborne has today used his Saturday Mail column to wonder if Labour is the new nasty party. He offers five main proofs:
- The greed of New Labour: "Thanks to the recent publication of memoirs by John Prescott, Cherie Blair and Lord Levy, it is becoming obvious to everyone the extent to which New Labour has been driven by private greed and personal vendetta, rather than decency and public duty. To underline this point, it was revealed last week that the Blairs have purchased their seventh home - a £4million mansion in Buckinghamshire. The truth is that Tony and Cherie Blair can afford their growing property portfolio purely because they have both ruthlessly exploited the office of prime minister for purposes of self-enrichment."
- The mudthrowing Ken Livingstone: "The campaign to keep Ken Livingstone in office as London mayor, as I have repeatedly highlighted in this column, was dominated by systematic lying and blatant corruption, as well as by the use of unfair personal attacks on his Conservative rival Boris Johnson".
- Class war in Crewe and Nantwich: "Labour has cynically decided not to fight on policy issues. Instead, party bosses have ordered a series of cheap and shoddy attacks on the Conservative candidate Edward Timpson. For example, fake photographs are being distributed of him wearing a top hat. Labour campaign literature also contains pictures of what is described as his 'big mansion house' just outside the constituency. This is nothing more than malicious class war."
- Labour's race-based campaign in Crewe: "Dunwoody is circulating a 'Tory candidate application form' around Nantwich. It asks: "Do you oppose making foreign nationals carry an ID card?" Actually, as Dunwoody well knows, the Tories are opposed to ID cards for all citizens, and not just for foreigners. As such, Labour is spotlighting this one very narrow aspect about foreigners in order to press the racist button with voters."
- Brown is responsible for this: "All the evidence shows that Labour's disgusting electioneering methods come from the very top. Last September, I listened in shock as Gordon Brown utilised the language of the British National Party to promise 'British jobs for British workers' in his first speech as Labour leader at his party conference."
In other news from Crewe and Nantwich...
David Cameron was overheard promising to go canvassing in Nuneaton. He meant to say, of course, that he was about to go canvassing in Nantwich. The Guardian's Michael White was there to record the Conservative leader's slip but also, more importantly, his reaction:
"All public figures make such slips. It matters more when a visiting dignitary - preferably a US president - gets the name of a small country wrong live on national TV. No chance of a retake there.
What was interesting was Cameron's own response. As I recall it he raised his hands in mock-horror, turned around without pausing and stuck his head in the nearest bush. I thought it was funny, both self-deprecating and self-confident, a Monty Python-inspired moment.
We like our politicians to be human (not too human, mind you), and most try to be, albeit with varying success. I thought this was a glimpse of how Dave must be with his kids and thought the better of him for it."
So, even if we don't win C&N, the Pythonesque-Cameron has at least won the affection of a Guardian journalist.
PS Iain Dale is just back from Crewe and has written a list of observations including "I didn't see a single LibDem or Labour campaigner on the streets in the entire time I was there."