Reading and Woodley

There, that got your attention. It is part of the strapline of the Reading Labour Party publication delivered in Reading East. At least now they are delivering (presumably) something different in the two constituencies, and are not delivering pictures of Martin Salter to Reading East residents, which was happening for eight years to my knowledge. The latest issue has pinged into my inbox, and it is in fact called "Reading and Woodley Banner", has no pictures of Martin Salter, and has no identifiable typos - not having been produced by former Cllr John Howarth (prop. Public Impact Ltd, remember "Your Better Off With Labour"?). The boys previously set their faces against any publication that was not called "Reading Banner" and against anything that mentioned Woodley, but seemingly have now changed their minds, about ten years too late. Although there do not appear to be any Howarthian typos, there are some interesting gaffes.

They are:

a picture with the caption "A Fair Deal For Woodley". That'll be a first then. From Reading Labour Party. Invites ridicule.

a picture of Anneliese Dodds with Marian Livingston in Church ward. I do not know Marian Livingston but she looks like a potential winning candidate to me. That is why they have taken her out of Church ward, which was safe Labour until its Labour MP was removed (hem hem), the Reading boys prohibited members from working the ward, and abused a Labour councillor for the ward into crossing the floor, and now they have put Marian Livingston into Reading West, where she does not live and where no-one has heard of her. Oh yes. And there is no picture of Malcolm Powers, who actually has been selected as the candidate for Church ward. Oh no.

a paragraph titled "Clean Up Our Politics" which says "Martin Salter, MP for Reading West, has been praised for his clean record" (on expenses). Indeed he has. But he does not of course have a clean record, and the piece is careful not to say he does. Because he took 40K fraudulently from the taxpayer over four years for a London property he did not have. I have turned up some interesting evidence on this, of which more later.

a paragraph which says "Labour has secured...hopefully in time, a terminus for Crossrail" - this is a lie. Crossrail is something the Labour council was lobbying on some years ago, but then stopped when Cllr Howarth got the transport brief, and something on which Martin Salter abstained in Parliament when it was voted on in 2005. Pants on fire, Zim One Lovelock.

a paragraph which says "Wokingham's Tory leadership is actively considering following Reading Labour's example, to organise a 'credit crunch summit'". Well, terrible grammar boys, but an improvement on the Howarth years, and it is of course a sentence which invites the question "sez who?"

oh and an item on the last general election result, in 2005, which says "Last time the Tories got in through the back door". Which back door would that be then? The back door of getting, er, more votes than Labour or anyone else? Yes, that back door. More people putting their crosses next to the Conservative candidate's name. That sort of back door. Looks more like an old-fashioned front door to me. Might have had something to do with not having the incumbent Labour MP the constituency had had for the previous eight years available to vote for. What do you reckon boys? Love to hear what you really meant by the "back door", especially given the number of helpful meetings between Reading Tories and the then Labour leader of Reading Borough Council, Dictatorship Dave "moronic members of the public" Sutton, and Martin Salter MP.