Yesterday all three party leaders attended the Citizens UK May Day assembly. The biggest meeting of the General Election campaign, it is testament to the power of community organising to influence the decision making process. The meeting was attended by 2,500 people from 160 community organisations including churches, mosques, synagogues and trade unions. I was [...]
About James Green
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In his third year on the executive James became editor of Anticipations.
James is active in the Labour movement. He is the Labour Party’s Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Cheltenham and is Secretary of Hampstead and Kilburn Constituency Labour Party. He currently works for an education charity, developing and implementing a new type of state school model, the first of which will open in September this year. He formerly ran a youth organisation and headed up the Westminster Office of a Labour MP. James blogs at www.jamesgreen.org.uk.
Posts by James Green:
A reminder of what this election is all about
Tuesday, May 4th, 2010The Leaders’ Debates: My Verdict
Friday, April 30th, 2010The impact of the Leader’s Debates has been far greater than most people had predicted. I always thought they were going to be important. I just didn’t realise that they would become the backbone of the General Election campaign. For the last three weeks the debates have dominated the headlines. From the build up, to [...]
Vote for substance. Vote Labour.
Sunday, April 25th, 2010As we enter the final two weeks of the General Election campaign all is still to play for. Labour were the underdogs at the start. Now, following the Leader’s Debates, all bets are off. We are in unchartered waters. The only thing that’s certain is that this will be a transformative General Election. Labour have [...]
My concerns about the Tories’ new European friends
Thursday, April 22nd, 2010Today’s Leader’s Debate, taking place here in the South West, will focus on foreign policy. I hope Gordon Brown will take Cameron to task about his friends in Europe. Cameron’s decision to leave the mainstream centre right grouping in favour of a fringe group including homophobes and far right nationalists shows a serious lack of [...]
Cameron overstepped the mark today
Thursday, April 8th, 2010Day three and the election campaign has taken a concerning turn. David Cameron has told a Catholic magazine that there should be a review of the abortion time limit and that he backs a reduction to as little as 20 weeks. There is a strong tradition of free votes on issues of conscience like this. [...]
My first hustings…
Friday, March 26th, 2010The starting gun has been fired for the General Election campaign in Cheltenham. We may not know the date of the election yet. But as the students who attended the recent hustings at Gloucestershire University saw, the parties are very much in campaign mode. There were the party political sideswipes and top lines clear to [...]
Michael Foot: A reminder of Labour’s idealism
Wednesday, March 3rd, 2010Throughout the day the blogs and Twitter feeds have been inundated with tributes to Michael Foot, the former Labour leader who died today. I found Alistair Campbell’s post particularly poignant. A reminder that despite all the internal battles that Labour has faced, Foot remained committed to the Party’s mission. Foot famously said of Blair in 1995, [...]
Politics is about more than promises. But if that’s all you’re offering. My advice is, don’t break them.
Tuesday, March 2nd, 2010Yesterday’s announcement about Lord Ashcroft confirmed my suspicions in more ways than one. That one of the Tories’ chief donors and strategists is a non dom is hardly surprising. For a decade Tory leader after Tory leader has tied himself in knots trying to protect him. Yet the real indictment of the Tories is not [...]
Politics is power. The rest is commentary.
Wednesday, February 24th, 2010There’s nothing like a General Election to focus political minds. As Labour braces itself for the toughest election since 1992, all of us are digging deep, fiercely debating what it means to be Labour today. We know that the next election needs to be about more than our record. It needs to reflect the realities [...]
A very Tory wobble
Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010I was pleased but not surprised to read about the new Guardian ICM poll this morning. Seven points behind the Tories before the short campaign isn’t ideal. But it’s a far cry from the 1997 moment that the Tories have been hoping for. The fact that the Tories have yet to seal the deal, loses none [...]