Blog
A Coalition that is Built to Last!
13th October 2010
Last night I popped over to a talk by Adam Boulton - Political Editor of Sky News - given at our school’s political society. It was a fascinating hour in the company of one of the most knowledgeable people around when it comes to the hidden wiring of British politics. Here is a collection of some of my tweets
Blair and IraQ: New Labour placed a lower premium on truthfulness than politicians normally do….eventually contributed to the Iraq debacle
News International and Profits: Sky News has only ever broken even once in twenty three years
The Labour leadership battle. A bloody and awful coup did for David Milliband….defeated because unions ensured a low turnout in their section of electoral college! Union membership turnout was 9 per cent!
A generational change has happened in British politics…this coalition will last for the fixed term. Cameron’s offer to the Lib Dems on the Friday after polls closed marked a transformative moment in British politics and it is consistent with his approach to politics. Labour had no meetings of PLP during the 5 days after election ... Small Brown cabal was desperately trying to keep him in power. Sky News was about 12 hours behind events when all of this was happening but the MPs were even further behind! At the time it seemed that Campbell, Adonis and Mandelson were attempting to circumvent the plans of the civil service for orderly transition of power
The immediate post election negotiations ...reinforced the primacy of rolling news ....the senior civil service had prepared the ground ahead of inconclusive result and this included telling the media of their responsibilities for how this unusual period ought to be reported. This moment reinforced a view that newspapers are dying as a source of primary info..they gave little coverage to the election…and failed to get interviews
The election debates: Sky decided to force the issue on televised debates ahead of election. Labour is convinced that the debates stopped Cameron from winning… the debate was first time all 3 parties discussed immigration in public ... May have doused the fire of the BNP? There were 3 months of negotiation ahead of the debates…Labour turned up with 300 pages of regs drawn from the US system - rebuffed!
Geoff Riley
Geoff Riley FRSA has been teaching Economics for over thirty years. He has over twenty years experience as Head of Economics at leading schools. He writes extensively and is a contributor and presenter on CPD conferences in the UK and overseas.