first of all don't give me that crap about keith bradley not pandering to the press. his face was forever in the local press, and he rent-a-quoted with the best of them. It was a running joke in this house as to what photo her'd been in this week in the reporter.
And why not? Let's be honest - it's part of a politician's job to do that. All of them do it, and theyre fools not to do it. KB and JL no doubt both do it equally well.
Secondly, although I am not a political activist, I've been a labour supporter for over 40 years.
I'm from a bloody mining village. We were over the moon in 97 when a viable labour government finally came to power, and stayed that way for a couple of years till we began to realise the true colours of Tony Blair, culminating in the betrayal which is Iraq.
I stopped supporting labour with huge regret.
So if I spew out venom, it is not as a lib dem - I don't even KNOW what their national policies are, but as a socialist who feels betrayed by the slime that has infected Labour.
And if you believe in clause 4 Thomas, how on earth can you support Tony Blair trying to run every government department on business lines, PFIs, selling off state assets and s forth?
Our water sources owned by the French, the coast guard about to be sold to canada, British Gas to Russia! Public transport owned by the biggest bunch of tossers this side of pancake tuesday.
I voted Lib Dem against the blairites, not for Lib Dems.
Having said all that, my impression of John Leech is that he's still finding his feet, it will take him time to do so, and that he will make a bloody good local MP.
And I can completely understand him turning against Thomas. Thomas is attempting to undermine him and he reacts accordingly.
As for my "evidence", Steve, this family has contacted him on 3 separate issues and he has reacted each time - twice by phoning us to discuss things.
You can believe that or not believe it. But I have no reason to lie.
And, I repeat, based on his vigorous activity as a councillor, I'm sure he'll apply the same approach as an MP.
Finally, I completely agree that Manchester is a bloody good city and in many ways really well run, far better run than most cities in this country.
But you must equally accept some things are not well run - education , police, parts of the local NHS, for instance.
And when that happens, the fact that one party dominates the council chamber is a bad thing because it allows the ruling party to avoid proper scrutiny.
We badly need PR in this country to counterbalance that sort of situation. In Manchester, Labour would still be the biggest single party, but it would have to pay more attention to opposing views.
By the way ,Steve, Manchester isn't a great city because of it'd council. It's a great city because of its people. It's a pretty unique, vibrant city in all sorts of ways, very few of them anything to do with its local councillors.
