Your questions for Theresa May
Peter Hoskin 6:24pm
It's been a few days now since we asked CoffeeHousers to put forward their questions for Theresa May. We've since picked out the best, which have now been put to the shadow leader of the Commmons. She'll get back to us at the start of next week.
Anyway, here are the questions:
john miller
"Why have Government ministers been able to spout the most outrageous lies over the last few months, effectively unopposed by the Conservatives? The Tories seem to lack a short succinct rebuttal that gives a voice to the feelings of the public."
Rajesh
"There has been a lot of comment about the Damien Green case and how this relates to MP's specific rights as the opposition. I'm concerned that MP's are considering themselves a special case instead of considering the overall civil liberties perspective of such an overbroad law. Do you have any thoughts as to whether the law in general should be modified instead of MP's rights being clarified?"
Sebastian Friedman
"Where do you stand on affirmative action?"
Jack R
"Will the Tories reject Labour's Equalities Bill?"
Nicholas
"Do you agree with David Starkey that this Labour government has overwhelmed the democratic and independent traditions of parliament (traditions that should facilitate holding the government to account and protecting our freedoms) and transformed it into a legislative rubber stamp for its own political agenda? If so, what are the Conservatives going to do about it?"
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richard bond
December 11th, 2008 10:26pm Report this commentThis Labour government has a bevy of females in senior government posts of questionable intelligence. Is there any one of them that has displayed any particular merit in your opinion?
PLUS do you agree that men are from Mars and women from Venus?
THX1138
December 11th, 2008 11:21pm Report this commentWhy Didn't you sack the nanny woman Caroline Spelman?
TrevorsDen
December 11th, 2008 11:33pm Report this commentRe Mr Miller's question -
- take Brown's 'if I ruled the world ..' gaffe.
The press were full of it - quite right you will say. Well maybe.
The point is what forced the gaffe from Brown - it was Cameron's QUESTION which Brown was totally unable to answer (his '£1billion' figure was exposed as useless).
Nor could he answer Cameron's follow up questions. The key issue here was that Browns recapitalisation is failing and the Tories have an alternative proposal which Brown does not want to admit might be better.
None of this was covered by the media. Cameron pasted Brown at PMQs. The failure of the recapitalisation and what should happen is lost.
This lies at the heart of the endless complaints by the feeble minded about alleged failures of Tory action. No one, NO ONE, who makes these claims suggests any alternative ('make a speech' they say - oh come on!) and EVERYONE fails to point out that Labour have a massive govt machine doing a party political job for them. Mandelson is a taxpayer funded labour spin doctor.
A huge paradigm shift is needed in the way the opposition operates to get over this [may be Ashcroft's marginals push is it (?)]. I want to see it but I am not surprised its not happened.
The rules of the parliamentary game are stacked against them (Labour have been moving the goal posts for 11.5 years) and quite frankly NO ONE has come up with any realistic options.
So unless you have any keep your mouths shut.
I think the Tories have done well considering.
Nicholas
December 12th, 2008 11:20am Report this comment"Labour have a massive govt machine doing a party political job for them" & "Labour have been moving the goal posts for 11.5 years".
Indeed. TrevorsDen has very accurately sums up the problem for the Tories. The use of government power and pennies for party political purposes has been outrageous. There was even a post on Guido from an ex-Treasury official who admitted large teams of civil servants had been misused at public expense to analyse, rebut and/or undermine Tory economic proposals before the 2005 election.
Tarquin
December 12th, 2008 11:35am Report this commentI thought the original blog said that ten questions would be chosen? There were more than ten posts. Did you not like the questions you received? Or do you only choose those that can be answered along the party line?
Gordon Musgo
December 12th, 2008 11:53am Report this commentOh Trevorsden, who was supposed to be opposing when Labour brought in all those little things which emasculated and by-passed parliament? After 11 years, if the goalposts have been moved it's no use complaining now.
In fact there's a very good case that the Tories have been extemely successful in opposition...the electorate keeps selecting them to be opposition again!
Gordon Musgo
December 12th, 2008 12:31pm Report this commentOh, and just to add a constructive suggestion lest it be said that I have no solution..boycott PMQs until further notice, and let it be known that it's because the questions don't get properly answered. Prepare a script for Today/Newsnight bringing out all the abuses of parliament. Say nothing else to them in order to (hopefully) compel them to run this story.
Second, be prepared to use non-parliamentary language and tactics to fight Labour. If GB is lying, say so.
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