Gove: the Tories need to clarify what they're all about

Alf Tupper C.R.O.F.

This erm...Spandau Ballet incident: some...questions.

Could one of our newshounds verify that this was just tongue in cheek, yes?

Steve.W

Gove, the man of the moment or trouble maker? I see he is also saying nice things about David Davis, what next!

Publius

It's all very well for Mr Gove to say that he wants to "turn every comprehensive into a grammar, but without the selection." But then he needs to explain what he will do with all those pupils who cannot manage an academic grammar-school curriculum, and he needs to explain how he will find a place for such minority "useless" subjects as Latin or Classical Greek in a school where the vast majority favour woodwork, metalwork or media studies.

There is no justice, and no use, in forcing unacademic pupils onto an academic curriculum. So what does he mean by "turn every comprehensive into a grammar"?

Jon

I'm not sure I want to know if David Cameron snogging to Spandau Ballet is tongue in cheek or not!

Also, can we clarify whether Gove is saying that HE could imagine snogging Cameron to True by Spandau Ballet, or whether one could imagine Cameron snogging anyone to said song? Is the verb being used transitively or intransitively, as Dot Wordsworth would put it?

I think we should be told.

Verity

"We do need to clarify in the public mind and the minds of our supporters what it is all about." Yes, Mr Gove. You need to clarify what you would do, if you won the election, which you won't, about halting, and hugely reversing, mass immigration. And you need to say how long after you get in, which you won't, you would hold a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty and the whole grotesque European projekt. Two weeks? A month? Do you understand that the fate of our country as an ancient, independent nation is somewhat more urgent than David Camerons puerile "green" issues?

John Page

What an embarrassing picture that was ... a failed attempt to be casual.

JONNY

'David Camerons puerile "green" issues'

I love your spirit Verity.
Let it all go hang.

Hawkeye

Jon said: "I'm not sure I want to know if David Cameron snogging to Spandau Ballet is tongue in cheek or not!"

Whose tongue? Whose cheek?

(I wonder if that will get passed by the mod.s?)

Seriously, it seems like an odd comment to make. What's up with "team cameron" these days? Are they out to be "more like" the rest of us? There was Dave's "P*ssed off" and "Tw*t" comment and now this.

To be honest, I do not think that Cameron's comments deserved any fuss, but on the plus side they did show that he can react to questions, rather than ignoring them, can think on his feet and can talk like the rest of us. Compared to Gordon, .... well.... it's not much of a comparison is it?

Mirtha Tidville

Well said Verity. I agree totally...as a by the by I think UKIP will be breathing closer to the Tories necks than they like to admit by the time of the next election

Peter

Yup. I want the Tories to tell me very clearly that they understand that government spends our damned hard-earned money and they should spend as little as is consistent with a civilized society.

DC is dancing around it: I want him to state it clearly that he knows the Government's money and its borrowing is our damn taxes. Don't make it abstract, everyone in Britain wants to hear it. Except maybe the Clientariat.

When I hear that stated clearly, along with them keeping their noses out of my private business, the deal is sealed for me.

Raffles

Haha, i do enjoy some of the regular contributors. So, Verity you dont think the Tories will win the next election? Best you get down the bookies sharpish, you can make a few bob out of that conviction or is it just wishful thinking? I share many of your reservations about "Dave" if not quite your antipathy but i do think many of you are extremely naive and unrealistic. Cameron has to get elected and he will do whatever he needs to do. Great policy ideas without power are irrelevant. Take a look back at Mrs Thatcher in opposition and show me her radical policy ideas. Even she played the game, until she was elected and then showed her convictions although she never made much progress on the Wefare State or Public Spending if truth be told. I fear that, much as i have sympathy with much of your criticism on policy, a Tory Party led as you would like it to be, would never be elected. End of story. A PM cannot be as utterly contemptuous of the general public as many of us are. Democracy is not a meritocracy but to paraphrase Winston, its the worst choice except for all the alternatives.

Denis Cooper

A poor interview, and hopeless "policies".

Verity

Oh, Raffles, you are so suave! So knowing! So debonair!

Yes, I do not think the next government will be formed by the Tories; although it may be a hung Parliament. All Cameron has to say to win for the Tories is, he will repatriate large swathes of the Third World to the Third World, and that he will hold a referendum on the EU Projekt. He doesn't, but he does assure us, however, that the new candidates' list involves lots of social workers and teachers.

Why should I go down to the bookie's, even if I had one, when I can check the odds on the internet?

JohnAnt

"There is nothing he said that David does not think or worry about."
But that's not 'worry' as in 'be concerned enough to hammer out an answer.'
More like 'worry' as in 'chew a bone playfully'.

DSR

Verity and M Tidville - If the Tories "won't" win the election, when it comes - who will? Or will it be a hung parliament (with who in the majority seat)? Or are you forecasting an unlikely rejuvenation for Labour or a Phoenix from ashes for LibDem's. What exactly are you forecasting?

And yes, we know you don't like/rate Dave.

Rhoda Klapp

" the Tories need to clarify what they're all about"

Well, you could have read that here in the comments any time this last, oh, I don't know how long.

None of the CHers who commented ever hinted that it involved snogging and Spandau Ballet. But now I know it must be true.

If we get the politicians we deserve, what the hell did we do to deserve this?

Jeremy

'...David Cameron (who is, apparently, someone "you could imagine snogging like we did to True by Spandau Ballet")'

I'm sorry....does he mean that he was he snogging David Cameron? In a nightclub? In the eighties? To the sound of "True" by Spandau Ballet? I'm really not convinced that you should be putting images of that sort into the minds of young people today...

Fergus Pickering

He wants to turn every comprehensive into a grammar school but without the selection. But doesn't the silly little man see that it is precisely the selection that makes the thing a grammar school in the first place. Alas, Gove is a fool.

Carly

Gove meant that you could imagine Cameron snogging someone to True NOT that he could imagine himself snogging Cameron to True. Brogan has mis understood.

Publius

Take a look at how the swimmer Tom Daley was driven out of his comprehensive school by the excellence-hating scum for a sense of what's it's really like in such places, and why it's almost impossible to excel. It's not just academic excellence that is sneered at. Any excellence is hated.

Minnie Ovens

There is nothing he said that David does not think or worry about.'"

And that's the problem with Mr Cameron.
He's got some pretty simple decisions to make (or, at least, simple to most Conservatives), and there he is, existentially agonizing over focus groups and what the last person in his oligarchy said.
Pleae read up the OED definition of leadership.

Binky

You are so right and top of the agenda should be the sacking of any of the Shadow Cabinet found out to have looted the public purse through expense claims.
Bye Bye Mr Gove

Minnie Ovens

Raffles, thank you so much for your lesson on Politics 101.
I'm voting for Mr Cameron because of his vision??
I've noticed a lot of Labour supporters not voting for a Labour candidate in preceding elections.
We have had disaster after disaster under Labour, and specifically under Brown, yet I have seen very little enthusiasm, or votes, for a man who seems to have no real beliefs and even fewer policies.
The perception is that he is scared of having any in case Labour tear them to shreds.
One thing that gets an electorate going is a Leader with a belief in specific and clear policies, especially at this critical time.
I see none of both in Westminster.