will the real John Howarth...

he's in the USA, he tells us, so it's not easy to write a post on his blog. What, don't they have teh internetz over there? Srsly? He's going to have to do better if he wants to travel between the South-East of England, Brussels and Strasbourg on a regular basis. They talk foreign in some of those places too. You can't feed coins into a call-box to file your copy any more. Did you know the 1980s were over, John? Ah.

Apparently things are very bad in Syria, he tells us. But he's with Ed Miliband. Who said he'd back the Government today and then changed his mind. So which position does Mr H back? Air strikes are a bad thing, he says. But the Syrian people need peace. Sometimes when bombs fall civilians get killed, he informs us illuminatingly. Hmm, with insights like these, let's stand down the whole cohort of advisers to the leaders of the free world. Running with the hare and hunting with the hounds, positively Salteresque. That got Salter sacked from the only quasi-government position he held in 13 years as an MP despite 13 years of grovelling and toadying for one. Not an example for you to follow, John.

This is pitiful stuff. How would you vote if you were in the Commons John? Like Salter did on Iraq in 2003, trumpeting that he was against the war and then abstaining? A rebel in Reading and a weasel in Westminster? We expect better from our MEPs. Some of them are quite sophisticated politicians who, you know, know stuff about stuff and talk foreign lingos and read books with no pictures in them and everything. Press releases copied out by the Reading Evening Post - this is not the politics of Europe, Mr Howarth.

Could do better. Must try harder. Pitiful.

campaigning in between

stolen from John Howarth's Facebook page

here Mr Howarth puffs himself campaigning in Woodley, a suburb of Reading which would never describe itself as such. He mentions in passing Matt Rodda, the Labour parliamentary candidate for Reading East, and Rodda may be in this picture somewhere. Good to see the excellent and indefatigable Woodley Labour campaigner Roger Hayes in the picture though. Campaigning in the suburbs brings its own issues with it. Most important is identity. Woodley of course had a Labour MP for eight years, and in that time Reading Labour refused to go near the place, sneering at it at meetings. We had great fun once stitching up the Reading Labour boys with a motion on local authority boundaries, promoting bringing Woodley into Reading. We marched them up the hill to cries of outrage, then we withdrew the motion, which we had planned to do all along. Martin Salter clapped Roger Hayes on the shoulder patronisingly and said "Well done Roger". That Roger (a) kept a straight face (b) didn't punch Salter is a measure of the qualities of the man. Now Mr Howarth has set foot in Woodley, and I hope he treats the place with respect, as he should any place he is seeking to represent. If he does get elected his time in Strasbourg will be a living hell. I can promise him that.

cherchez la femme

among the Labour South-East Region candidates for the European elections, and you'll have a job to find the top one on the list, one Anneliese Dodds. Here is the erstwhile Honourable Member for Reading East West, Mr Salter, extolling the virtues of - you guessed it - No. 2 on the list, one J. Howarth, prop. Public Impact Ltd (remember "Your Better Off With Labour"?). Does he mention the candidate chosen by Party members to be at the head of the team, namely Anneliese Dodds? He does not.

Oh and editorial-type peeps, don't bother making any more late-night well-refreshed threats to me for using your material. I don't give a stuff. It's the public prints.

In further delights, Mr Salter is billed as keynote speaker at a fund-raising fish'n'chip supper. It's actually in Reading West, so we hope he can find his way there from his usual haunts in the East. It's meant as a fund-raiser. Andrew Smith MP is also to be a speaker, but apparently he is the support act for Mr S. Why? The mystery deepens... Fish'n'chips provided by the Deep Blue emporium of that ilk in Whitley, south Reading. Fine, but... the event billing calls it "Blue Deep". In details of how to pay for admission it says or alternatively you can via cheque.Do we detect the hand of Mr Howarth? I think we do.

where's the dagger?

this picture shows the top two candidates on the Labour list for the Euro elections 2014. Notice the slightly odd angle of the shoulder of Mr Howarth and the unrealistically manicured hand draped on Anneliese Dodds' shoulder, It's a fake, peeps, and what house are they outside? The home of - who? Wherever the dagger is now it will

be quivering between the shoulder blades of Ms Dodds the moment she looks like winning the election. They managed to stop her in 2010 by chaining her to the bedpost in Singleton-White's attic. But now?

some progress being made

he (John Howarth that is) has made a few corrections, you can see his "corrected" post here. Not bad so far John, but could do better. Thanks for paying attention and incorporating my corrections. I notice that as well as doing a a proper translation from Klingon instead of relying on Google Translate he has decided to name the others on the candidate list. Who advised him to do so, I wonder? Is this the new inclusive Howarth? I'd be surprised. Sort yourselves out boys, you'll never get elected this way.

call him number - what?

a little light fisking, mine in red as always.
Labour members in South East England have - the present perfect is the correct tense here backed former Reading and Berkshire Councillor, John Howarth who is barely literate, as their number one choice from the shortlist of five male candidates the only kind of shortlist that matters, eh John? for the European Parliament Elections in 2014. Anneliese Dodds, who is based in Oxford and fought Reading East at the last General Election, came out top in the separate female ballot the ballot isn't female, you barely literate arse, the candidates on it are. Under Labour’s selection rules Anneliese has been placed at Number 1 undermining her as you did when she was parliamentary candidate in 2010 on the South East Labour List and John will be Number 2 no, he already is. With Labour winning back voters in South East England, John has a very good chance of becoming an MEP.
John says, “It is always a great honour to be chosen by fellow Labour Party members for any role not that you have been, very often - when you were a county councillor you ran away rather than face reselection. I hope to win the confidence of the electorate and to be able you should be telling them you are able to provide it, not that you hope to work out how to do it some day - though that is true to provide the kind of effective representation we badly need here in South East England where our economic future depends on our relationship with Europe the South East of England is in Europe, you deluded fool - where did you think it was? Africa? Antarctica? . I am absolutely thrilled and look forward very much to the next nine of months what is this? Google translated from Klingon? making Labour’s case for a better, reformed European Union with Britain as a strong voice within it. shouldn't there be a close quote here?
“Thank you to all those who supported my campaign, endorsed me as their first choice or gave me practical help stuffing envelopes and who everything else that was necessary does no-one even proof-read this stuff? "and who everything else that was necessary"?, to my colleagues on the short-list for the excellent spirit in which they fought the campaign and a huge thank you to everyone who voted in the ballot – especially the very lovely people who voted for me.
“The biggest thank you goes to my wife Jane He marries women called Jane on a regular basis. Quite surprised I never got an offer. (No you're not. Ed.)who was a rock throughout and to whom I owe so much. I also nned there are newfangled things called spellcheckers, John - if you got your head out of the 1980s for five minutes you'd know that to thank Alex, Jessie and Jamie who have put up with having to see rather less of me lately. It’s great to be chosen but my feet are firmly on the ground – we’ve won nothing yet.” You're right there John. If you get elected you'll be in Strasbourg one week a month. I'll be waiting.

John Howarth

I just thought I'd reproduce below, with a little light fisking of my own in my usual red, something from the Barely Literate Geordie Loser's website (how quaint of him to have one! Especially with no YouTube or, you know, anything!). He wants to be an MEP in the South-East of England. He's not from there, ran away from a contest whenever he held elected office (Redlands ward for Berkshire County Council and Park ward for Reading Borough Council) was misguided enough to allow himself to be written into history as the architect of the disastrous one-way IDR plan for Reading, was part of the corrupt deal on the Reading mosque, and refused to face his Park ward constituents on that issue, was instrumental in the election of a Conservative MP in Reading East in 2005 - and presents himself as a campaigner for Labour? Labour? 

Labour Party

One of many campaign launches, this one with Labour on a roll in 1996.

They're in Reading East. But Martin Salter is the candidate for Reading West. Read a map, John.

Summary

• 1974 February: joined aged 15
• 1977 Essex University Labour Club
• 1979 Intern/Campaign Aid, Harry Cowans MP
• 1979 Worked in first European Elections
• 1980 Colchester GC (Party Branch Delegate)
• 1981 Labour Students National Secretary
• 1982 Labour Full Time Organiser (Basingstoke)
• 1983 General/Local Election Agent
• 1984 Secretary, Hampshire County Labour Party
• 1985 European Election Agent
• 1985-89 South East Regional Organiser
• 1990-95 Chair, Reading (East/West) Labour Part
• 1993-95 Vice Chair, Berkshire County LP
• 1995-2003 Press Officer, Reading Labour Party
• 1990-2012 TGWU/Unite EC Member, Reading

1974 February: joined aged 15

My Dad was on strike – he didn’t want to be but he was loyal to the NUM. Ted Heath called an election and it seemed like a good idea to get rid of him, so when I was asked to help I did. Labour won, sort of. Ironically  Who are we, Alanis Morissette? Nothing ironic going on here the first candidate I worked for was John Horam – then Labour MP for Gateshead West who subsequently defected to the SDP and finally to the Tories. In October I wangled time off school to work in the second election telling them it would help my Social Studies project. They agreed. The buses were on strike. I had to walk six miles to hear Harold Wilson speak at the People’s Theatre in Jesmond, then six miles home again! The PA was dreadful – much of what Harold said was inaudible, but he was a great platform entertainer.

1977 Essex University Labour Club

When I went to University I though You mean "I thought", I fancy. In the European Parliament you will find the need to pay attention to the accuracy of text matters. I was quite left wing. By Essex standards I clearly wasn’t. For one thing I was already a member of the Labour Party and rather unfashionably I believed that winning elections mattered rather a lot. It was all quite mad, but I met some great people many and I learned a lot.

1979 Intern/Campaign Aid, Harry Cowans MP

My first by-election had been in Newcastle Central in  1976. Harry Cowans, a Gateshead councillor and agent in Gateshead West, held the seat comfortably on the night Labour lost its overall majority. The Liberals did well. They produced scrappy leaflets talking about pavements and grass verges. We talked BIG politics. An early lesson I’ve never forgotten.

1979 Worked in first European Elections

I got a leaflet through my door that explained the Parliament which till then had been appointed nationally. What a great idea for a continent with a history of war to elect a multi-national assembly! I think I might have been the only person You weren't. Plenty of people wanted a result from that election for Labour, and worked for it. John Howarth, Dissing his colleagues for decades. who really wanted to work in that election only months after we had lost the General Election. Labour was hammered, but we elected Joyce Quin in Tyne and Wear who was a credit to the job and became MP for Gateshead West in 1987.

1980 Colchester GC (Party Branch Delegate)

Labour was fractious and bitterly divided. I was in the branch where Bob Russell, the candidate at the ’79 election, was a Labour councillor (Central). It was an interesting experience. Looking back it told me everything I needed to know about why we would be in opposition for the next 17 years. Bob Russell has been Liberal Democrat MP for Colchester since 1997.

1981 Labour Students National Secretary

When I became involved Labour played a secondary role in student politics. Most student leaders were elected on ‘broad left’ tickets. The time had come for this to change. In 1981 we elected the first NUS president on a Labour Students platform, Neil Stewart. I ran the communications for the campaign and I changed the ‘brand’ from NOLS (what exactly is a ‘nol’) to Labour Students. That one got me started and I’ve been doing communications and brand ever since.

1982 Labour Full Time Organiser (Basingstoke)
1983 General/Local Election Agent
1984 Secretary, Hampshire County Labour Party
1985 European Election Agent

I took a job working as a Labour constituency organiser in a part of the world with which I was unfamiliar but quickly learned was typical of the social and economic trends that helped keep the Conservatives in power through the 1980s. We did reasonably well in local elections, established some good community campaigning roots that hold to this day. Expanding towns like Basingstoke are good barometers of British politics – in 2001 Labour nearly won the seat.  But didn't, because the Labour candidate, the overweight and lazy Jon Hartley, did very little work, managed to get fined for not taxing his car at the same time, and because Martin Salter put his name to a defamatory leaflet, written by John Howarth, which brought out loyal Tories. Who voted. Great success. Not. Maria Miller MP. John Howarth's part in her victory.

1985-89 South East Regional Organiser

Actually, back then the South East region was the Southern Region. I had visited every constituency long before I put myself forward for this campaign. The role of organiser has changed radically – it needed to – and I was perhaps able to influence that change a little, though it didn’t make me popular at the time.  Many of the battles in the South East were similar to those the Party faces today. We were rebuilding after a serious defeat. We had to ensure that the Party had life and relevance, not just in its UK Parliamentary targets, but throughout the Region. It was all very well asking members in rural villages to decamp to the nearest marginal, but I’ve always remembered a member in Hampshire saying to me, “Of course we’ll drive to Southampton at the election, but I need my politics to matter to me here, where I live my life”. He was right – engaging in local communities is what makes Labour relevant.   

1990-95 Chair, Reading (East/West) Labour Party
1993-95 Vice Chair, Berkshire County LP

While I was an South East Region official (in 1995) that would be 1985 I imagine. Who proofreads this stuff?

I  haired the  first meeting of Reading Labour Party combining the Reading East and Reading West constituencies. It was a great honour four years later in 2001? I think not to be elected Chair. Going to vote for this man who can't tell the truth? *8During my time as Chair we were one of the first parties in the UK to formalise a campaign focused group, which we had been operating informally, into our rulebook. The Campaign Unit was the focus of Reading’s election success, providing the right forum to develop organisation, disseminate tactics and focus resources. Later it became the adopted model of the Party nationally. I was also able to set up policy structures that gave the Labour Group and the Party practical ways of working together. Local success was built both on or strong organisation and getting the local politics right. One without the other will never last.  

1995-2003 Press Officer, Reading Labour Party
2003-2007 and 2010-2012, Publicity Co-ordinator, Reading Labour Party

In Reading the Chair and Press Officer ran the Party’s media output. So in one role or another I was involved in the strategic messages for more than two decades. Working closely with Martin Salter was a privilege and a challenge. Martin’s work rate is legendary and we are the sort of personalities that drive each other on. Nobody ever really knew who exactly had written what; we were a team. The template for campaign from imcumbancy and from power in local Government developed in Reading we were able to export to many parties and MPs elsewhere. 

So the victory of Labour in Reading East and the re-election of the Labour MP in 2001 with an increased majority had nothing to do with you then John? If it had you would surely have mentioned it. Hmmm?
1990-2012 TGWU/Unite EC Member, Reading

I have always been a member of the T&GWU. It was my affiliated union when I went to work full time. My parents and grandparents had been loyal members of their unions in the mining industry and I was brought up to understand the importance of working people being organised for all sort of reasons. Find out more about my work with the Trades Unions here.

- See more at: http://www.johnhowarth.com/index.php/johns-record/labour-party/#sthash.yLXXr59A.dpuf

we'll all be killed in our beds, tra-la

the splendid Mr Howarth, the gift that just keeps on giving, has treated us to this. For those who can't be bothered to click through to His Master's Voice, that apology for journalism that spends its time and its advertisers' money copying out Reading Labour press releases - he tells us that UKIP would like to opt out of the European Arrest Warrant. This is a Euro-thing, which came to the UK Parliament in 2001 (I was on the committee which saw it into UK legislation) - and which was massively watered down in 2004 by the UK, which demanded, and  secured, various opt-outs from it. Which I don't remember Mr H campaigning against at the time. Mr Howarth, proprietor Public Impact Ltd (remember "Your Better Off With Labour"?) says that if UKIP get their way terrorists will blow everyone in the UK to pieces. I am reminded of the Daily Mash headline "Everyone Dead By Teatime".

What I wonder is why Mr H is attacking UKIP. Especially on the European Arrest Warrant. I remember that at the time of its passage through Parliament (I used to be a member of a delightful committee called "European Standing Committee B" which sent you a wheelbarrow-load of papers every few weeks so that European directives could be enshrined in UK law) the late Gwyneth Dunwoody, who had some fun joining in the deselection campaign in Reading East on account of her close personal friendship with one T. Page, stormed into the committee and demanded to speak in opposition to the Warrant, which she did, at length.  Unsuccessfully. Like all the other right-wing Euro-phobes. Given Mr Howarth's total support for Ms Dunwoody's position at the time, perhaps he could inform us why he has now converted to Euro-Arrest-Warrant-Fan-Boy-dom? Oh, please yourselves.

Where was I? Ah yes. Mr Howarth is attacking UKIP, and we ask why? His current campaign is not for election, but for the top position on the the list of Labour Euro-candidates. UKIP are not his enemy. Certainly not there, but not generally either. But hey, we're all going to be killed in our beds by terrorists. Oh yes, John, We certainly are. Because there have been no terrorist attacks, and no terrorist suspects arrested, in the UK since 2001, have there? And if there have been there would have been more were it not for the European Arrest Warrant, hein? Say that to the families and loved ones of the 50-plus victims in London  7/7 2005, why don't you Mr Howarth? No, I don't think you will. Better to have a pop at the bunch of lunatics in UKIP.

Couldn't resist actually posting this nonsense. I think he is holding up an actual printed piece of paper. How very quaint and 1990s of him.

pic: His Master's Voice. Inspiration: no clue 

call him number one? I don't think so

Was had this to say as a comment on the previous post:

I don't know about "debts paid" but I did notice when going through the 2010 General Election expenses that Public Impact charged the local Labour Party a higher amount for producing an election tabloid than I was charged at commercial rates.

However, it is a fact that Mr Howarth used to inform Reading Labour Party that he was giving us a discount as a donation to party funds. So that was a lie.

Have a look here at the endorsements (gif) Mr Howarth has published. Now I know the electorate for this is Labour Party members, and he wants to be first on the list, but the individuals are hardly diverse, are they? A bunch of Reading councillors for the most part, and a Sheffield MP with very little brain. No citizen activists, of whom the South-East has many, no-one from an ethnic minority. Instead, there is the dog-whistle girl.

dog-whistle girl
 

 Word is that Mr Howarth and Mr Salter are no longer bessie mates, and this may be why the photograph of Salter is at least 20 years old. Oh and the Natalie O'Toole who offers an endorsement is Salter's wife. She was for a long time, may even still be, a director of Howarth's company, Public Impact.

But hilariously, the endorsement from Salter says "We need someone who knows how communicate". Quite, and that someone is clearly not the barely literate Mr Howarth.

Pity. It was all going so well. But if the Labour Party do put him first, and he gets elected, none of which is impossible if he lies loud and long enough, I'll try and offer the hand of friendship, which all newly elected members can benefit from. Perhaps we can show him round Strasbourg. There are plenty of good things to see here. OK John?

dodgy as ....

Mark Ferguson, writing on LabourList, has this to say about the selection of Labour candidates for next year's European elections. Do read it, you won't be disappointed. But anyway, he points out that the selection of candidates (who are then placed in order by party members) is hardly transparent, and that there is evidence that there is nepotism, conflict of interest and outright corruption in the process. Actually, I used most of those words, not him. But he does point out the existence of these murky factors. And this is the dodgy process that Mr Howarth (prop. Public Impact Ltd, remember "Your Better Off With Labour"?) has now become part of. So, what favours did he call in to get on the list? What debts were paid? Party members certainly don't know how to get on that list. You have to have other connections. Howarth it was whose commercial services were touted around Parliament by then Reading West MP Martin Salter, who had been a director of Howarth's company, and whose wife at the time still was. Parliamentary premises were booked, free of charge, and a commercial platform was provided, courtesy of the taxpayer. Mr Howarth, the architect of the one-way IDR when a councillor in Reading, who ran away from the electorate when that got controversial. Mr Howarth, sacked by a number of reputable companies as their PR agent for pissing off their clients. Mr Howarth, who as lead transport councillor in Reading ordered the council to stop lobbying for Crossrail, because that did not suit his purposes, as the then Reading East Labour MP (me) was campaigning for it rather successfully with ministers. Bloke who has aligned himself with a process which makes Tammany Hall look like a Quaker meeting. Yep, vote for him next year. You'll be voting for a candidate who manages to be spineless, conniving and dishonest all at once.