#independent mp

[secretagentsagainstwhatever]

Your least favourite mp's least favourite mp

[nando161mando]

Ladies and gentlemen, the Independent MP for Islington North!

[mybodyfails]

[bahoreal]

if yall dont know whats happening in British politics right now, the guy who is like 90% likely to become the next pm, who is the leader of the (previously) more left wing party labour has been systematically removing all the left-wing MPs (members of parliament) who are likely to get re-elected and telling them they cannot stand as a labour MP at the election in july. he has been replacing them with people who are more right wing, for example one of them has a day job as a ceo of a privatised healthcare company, and another is literally an israel lobbyist. labour is becoming a right wing, racist, and blatantly pro-israel party. if labour gets in, it will no longer be "ohhh we totally cant take a stand on israel :///" they are likely to become explicitly pro-israel. they have abandoned all their left wing policies. they will be the tories 2.0, but worse in many areas. it feels like this country is copying americas lead with one more """left wing""" party whos campaign line seems to be "we're not as bad as the other guys!" whos policies suck ass as they can freely become more right wing and not what the public wants because "there's no better option". it SUCKS. and its NOT TRUE.

if you're in the uk, please look at your constituency and try to vote green, or independent, or whoever isnt labour or tory. party politics are failing us, we are NOT a two party country, we can do better than labour.

[grace-the-ninth]

rosie duffield is an absolutely vile, transphobic shitstain and it is absolutely no loss to labour that she has left the party. it is however extremely funny to see some of my least favourite people ripping each other to shreds

[rpfisfine]

got accused of cheating on the C2 seminar test bc I copied One answer from my dumb as fuck neighbor that then turned out to be wrong so that’s what im dealing with currently

[bloodurged]

he’s not “the laugh police”, he’s a faggot ! jesus christ. 

[vordemtodgefeit]

my constituency is officially a labour hold, green second majority

[daughterofsarenrae]

Hate the dance i have to do to get one of my family members in georgia willing to vote blue instead of independent. Figuring out the correct amount of pushing to keep them from immediately shutting down and getting defensive is exhausting

[pumpumdemsugah]

For £10k a month you too can hire a Tory MP for 6 meetings a year. The extended video here

[redeyedroid]

In case anyone was wondering, I'm incandescently angry that the UK government would provoke a constitutional crisis over a piece of legislation passed in the Scottish Parliament that is essentially merely a streamlining of administrative processes to make the lives of trans people a little easier. A piece of legislation that has next to no effect on the day to day lives of anyone who lives here; that mirrors that in 33 other countries, notably Argentina; that has been debated and amended over the 6 years it made it's way through Parliament; that has been subject to multiple public consultations; that every serious feminist and women's rights organisation in Scotland supports; and that is a matter fully devolved to the Scottish Parliament and has fuck all to do with them.

This is being done because an unelected Prime Minister sees Conservative support melting away after 12 years of governance-by-asset-stripping. He realises he can maybe shear off some support for the SNP by attacking the most stigmatised and demonised people in our society because Nicola Sturgeon, First Minister of Scotland stands for trans rights.

The Tories have focus grouped this. They've strategised their culture war attacks and fascism. The Tory minister who blocked the legislation doesn't know what a Gender Recognition Certificate does, but he does know that they are protecting women and children. They will stand for the rights of women and children as long as they don't arrive on a beach here by getting off a boat from France. As long as they aren't poor, reliant on food banks and free school meals. As long as they aren't victims of the Metropolitan Police's endless lineup of sex offenders. As long as they aren't trans.

And Keir Starmer, leader of Her Majesty's Opposition, will stand with Sunak because he's a milquetoast fuck who'll throw the Labour Party In Scotland (who campaigned for GRA reform in their last manifesto!) under a bus for fear of upsetting the Daily 'Hurrah for the Blackshirts' Mail.

Fuck Sunak, fuck Starmer, fuck their supporters, and fuck their patriarchal fuckery. A plague on both their houses.

I don't support independence because it'll bring us riches. Chances are it'd be a economic supernova far, far worse than Brexit. I support it because it's the only chance I see of making in this country a progressive, equal society, away from the incessant othering and demonisation of anyone the tabloids take a disliking to, be it trans people, refugees, or whoever the next in line is. The truth is that no elected government in London will work for that. So independence is the only option. I'll welcome anyone from anywhere who wants the same thing for Scotland and oppose anyone who wants a Scotland that doesn't work for it's most vulnerable citizens.

[sszeemedia]

Jeremy Corbyn re-elected as Islington North MP as independent candidate

Jeremy Corbyn has been re-elected as the Member of Parliament for Islington North. He was running as an independent candidate. The former Labour leader secured victory with over 24,000 votes, surpassing Labour candidate Praful Nargund, who garnered more than 16,000 votes. This win marks a significant relief for Mr. Corbyn, who has represented the north London constituency for 40 years. At the…

[insidecroydon]

How the 'lifestyle choices' of Tory millionaires is taking the PIP

Is there no vulnerable section of society that this Conservative Government won’t try to undermine? In his latest column, ANDREW FISHER, right, looks into the latest attacks on disabled people Whenever Conservative governments are in trouble they reach not for solutions, but for scapegoats. For weeks, in the run-up to this month’s local elections, the Conservatives spoke of little else other than…

[mayasaura]

did you see te pati maori declared independence??

I DID NOT! Holy shit! Thanks for the news!

Okay, now reporting back from one research deep-dive, the recent context as I understand it is this:

Last November, a conservative right-wing Prime Minister, Christopher Luxon, assumed office. He's got a lot of less than stellar right-wing policies, and that includes making cuts to the Ministry of Social Development and opposing co-governance with the Waitangi Tribunal and other Māori leadership organisations over the administering of public services such as education, health, and infrastructure. He's been openly critical of Māori seats in Parliament, though he hasn't (yet) opposed them. Over the course of his administration, there's been an initiative to omit or cut mentions of the Treaty of Waitangi, the foundational document of New Zealand that forms the basis of arguments for Māori protections, from official language.

Which brings us to yesterday, May 30th. Budget Day. The day the new administration would announce their first budget and a day of mass action for supporters of te Pāti Māori protesting the treatment of Māori under the new government. I don't have any concrete numbers, but RNZ reports thousands of protestors, while the NZ Herald estimates "tens of thousands" turning out nation-wide, and a walking protest that delayed rush-hour traffic in Auckland for hours.

You may have already guessed that the budget was Bad. As I understand it, the budget effectively cut any kind of targeted funding for Māori health or education, and decreased funding for Māori cultural festivals and celebrations. And again, I cannot stress enough how much I am not an expert on this topic, so there's probably a lot more in there I don't know about.

In response to the new budget, Māori Party MP Rawiri Waititi issued a Declaration of Independence to the New Zealand Parliament, (video of his speech in link) with the support of his fellow te Pāti Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer.

There doesn't seem to be any concrete plan in place yet for the organisation of the new Māori parliament, but MPs Waititi and Ngarewa-Packer met with protestors to collect signatures for the Declaration, which they plan to bring to a hui taumata (meeting of congress) today, Friday, May 31st. The text of the Declaration can be found on te Pāti Māori website, in the form of a petition. You do not have to be Māori to sign, but I believe you do have to be kiwi.

[spidermartini]

Millenials and Gen Z, you guys have heart and drive and power. Use it.

Activate, band together and make sure Tr$mp doesn't come close to winning. Vote Blue

This is a strategic election. This isn't the moment for an independent candidate (I'm saying this as an Independent). This is a time for a massive blue wave to tale out the tyranny and racism and homophobia like a tsunami.

[reasonsforhope]

"“Always ask yourself: Why is this lying bastard lying to me?” Perhaps these blunt words of advice for journalists interviewing politicians, attributed to the late foreign correspondent Louis Heren, have endured because they are seen as self-evidently true. That politicians lie is viewed as established fact. 

Public confidence in lawmakers plunged to a record low last year in the wake of Partygate and other scandals: only 9% of British adults polled by Ipsos said that they trust politicians to tell the truth. Without trust, says Jennifer Nadel of the thinktank Compassion in Politics, faith in democracy is undermined. “If we can’t trust what politicians are saying, how can we decide who to vote for? We need to be able to rely on our politicians to tell the truth,” she explains. 

Compassion in Politics has long been campaigning to introduce criminal penalties for political lying, with a petition launched in 2019 attracting more than 200,000 signatures. In a surprise move two days before the UK’s general election, the Welsh government committed to passing legislation that would make lying illegal for Senedd members and candidates, having previously opposed the measure. Under the plans, those found guilty of deliberate deception by an independent judicial process would be disqualified from office. 

“We’re excited and optimistic,” Nadel says. “It’s unprecedented that the government has agreed to take this measure forward.” Although some countries have limited penalties for politicians who lie during election campaigning or when giving evidence to committees, Wales is the first in the world to propose legislation that would apply more broadly to lawmakers and candidates. 

Compassion in Politics’ next challenge is to persuade Westminster to follow suit by banning MPs and parliamentary candidates from lying.  

The campaign sprung from concern at the rapid normalisation of lies in politics. “We are slipping at an alarming speed into a post-truth era,” says Nadel. “We only have to look at what is happening in the United States.”

Fact-checkers at the Washington Post found that Donald Trump made 30,573 false or misleading claims during his presidency, averaging about 21 a day. “America is a warning of what can happen if this problem is allowed to go unchecked,” Nadel believes. “[Our proposals] are designed to stop [the UK] from getting to that stage.” 

Polling shows wide public approval for the measure, with 72% backing criminal penalties for politicians found guilty of deliberate lying in an Opinium survey conducted for Compassion in Politics in May. Though it is not yet clear whether Wales would make lying a criminal offence, Nadel says: “If the same goal of disqualifying politicians who deliberately misrepresent the facts can be achieved through using the civil law, then we’re happy.” 

A private member’s bill to ban lying in Westminster, introduced by Plaid Cymru MP Liz Saville Roberts in 2022, had cross-party support. “We will be looking to build [on that] and win the support of the Labour government to introduce the measure,” Nadel says... 

“I think it’s important to signal a different set of norms, and try to arrest a slide towards the acceptability of attempts to deceive in public life.” 

For Compassion in Politics, another challenge is persuading doubters that banning lying in politics is even possible. “There’s this belief that it’s too complex to stop,” says Nadel, who qualified as a barrister. “But the law prevents fraudulent misrepresentation in other walks of life. This is something that courts adjudicate on all the time. Why shouldn’t it apply to politicians?”"

-via Positive.News, July 26, 2024