British Meat For British Bellies

Tesco knows which side its bread is buttered. The supermarket giant is scrapping 'misleading' meat labelling but only after a nudge from the Tories Honest Food campaign. Every little helps in the battle of 'bad food Britain'.

The sham of mislabelled meat to dupe shoppers into thinking they're buying into the Great British brand leaves a nasty taste in the mouth.

How can you trust something that's got a Union Flag plastered on it when the tiny print tells you it is only produced and packed in Britain, not British born and bred.

Labelling meals as "produced in Britain" when the meat has come from abroad is a shameful but entirely legal, dodgy practice.

Selling a chicken dinner "produced in the UK" with poor poultry from Thailand always stuck in the throat. The last thing confused consumers want is a chicken calling itself British because that's the last place the last 'substantial change' was made.

Now Tesco Town has promised to end 'misleading' labelling on its meat products, and declare where it comes from and where so-called 'meat' in ready meals, pizza, pie and sausages is reared.

Spelling out the country of origin comes after pressure from farming groups and the Tories Honest Food campaign.

Every little helps. The Orange Party liked the way the Tories took a few populist issues and worked them up into campaigns back in February. A bit local LibDem 'cracked pavements and dog shit' issues politics but hey, why not, if consumers get a bit of benefit.

Tesco reckoned its Dutch pork or Thai chicken was up to scratch, with animal welfare standards just as high as UK farms. That's not the point. If you put something in your mouth you have a right to know where it's been.

Besides, as the Telegraph points out, evidence submitted to foodie MPs suggested two thirds of all pork imports into the UK, "has not been reared to UK statutory welfare standards and would be illegal if produced in this country".

Politicians occasionally fall over themselves to get a slice of the bacon and bang the drum for Britain. But getting them to do something about bad food Britain and the ravaged farming and fishing industries is a different kettle of fish.

Farmers are bogged down by Brussels red tape, a supermarket stranglehold on prices, a government which doesn't give a fig about the industry and competition from imported crap food dressed up and processed by slave labour in the food processing camps. All served up and forced down the nation's throats to make them fat.

The New Labour sandwich of all style and no substance has been around long before Joanna Blythmam launched her gastronomic polemic and showed how a nation has ruined its appetite in Bad Food Britain.

Tories spotted a gap in the market, outflanking a wishy-washy government. The cute video released to coincide with the Honest Food campaign was a little gem.

All supermarkets have a confusing mix of meat labelling. Consumers have a right to clear, accurate information about where their food comes from. Cheap food is one thing but cheap tricks quite another.

Read More...

Can Cameron Convince He's The Man Who Can?

Ahead of the curve, Mr Fix-It is turning his sights on some serious people politics to break the stranglehold of government and Downing Street in the wake of MPs' scandalous expenses. Will this herald a new era of politics or is Mr Ambition doing a Blair and Obama, making election promises for the sake of the sound bites, peddling his personality disguised as people power? 

Voters disgust over MPs' expenses has left a bitter taste. Parliament has prostituted itself to a New Labour ruling class. A bunch of crooks and spivs in a fag-end government have been exposed clutching at straws and in denial in a desperate bid to cling on to power to the bitter end. 

All parties are falling over themselves to be the big reformer and Cameron is setting the pace. 

The Tory leader has been way ahead leading the way, dealing with the rotting mess, dealing with the scandal, tapping into the public mood with measures which chime with voters and grasping the agenda back from the grubby paws of Downing Street.

Dave is billed as 'the man who can' but at heart he remains Mr Ambition. The public was disgusted by the moat and duck house but clearing out Tory grandees and Thatcher old guard from Cameron's conservatives suits him down to the ground. 

This is one smart kid on the block sure but we've been there before. Is the heir to Blair showing his true colours? 

No one can hold a candle to past master Blair. But Cameron is proving to be every inch a smart apprentice. 

Flying high on the back of scandal and sleaze, the device, used so effectively by Blair and Obama, is simple. Contact and convince. Capture the public mood. Say what the public want to hear. He who wins over the hearts and minds wins the votes. 

In the US, Obama's election promises have been blown out of the water because they were just that - electioneering promises. Now Americans are getting an uneasy, queasy feeling of being betrayed by a man they put the hopes and dreams and trust in with blind faith.

Cameron can work the crowds but the Orange Party would not tar Dave with the same broad brush as Blair and his new US counterpart. Cameron is in it for the pleasure and the passion of the politics. Both Blair and Obama were in it to win it for themselves. 

Today in the Guardian the Tory leader promises to deliver a "radical redistribution of power from Westminster" in response to voter disgust over MPs' expenses. From "the political elite to the man and woman in the street". Few would disagree with such fine words but actions speak louder. 

At the heart of the rhetoric though is the one issue which New Labour has either failed to grasp or it is not in its interest to do so. 

And that is the power and influence of the government in general and Downing Street in particular on the working of parliament and the State. 

For New Labour, its government is the State, with parliament playing second fiddle to a premiership turning into a presidency. 

Among Cameron's proposals is a plan to curb the powers of Number 10. A strange position for any future prime minister to crave for less power rather than more. 

Introducing fixed-term parliaments, ending the right of Downing Street to control the timing of general elections is welcome. That gets to the heart of the Supreme Leader’s stubborn refusal to bow to the will of the people and go to the country.

But of all the measures, the Orange Party would single out the limiting of the royal prerogative which allows a prime minister, in the name of the monarch, to make major decisions without the backing of parliament.

That device was used by Blair with full, devastating and scandalous effect as he moved towards his president style of government - from keeping it in his back-pocket to satisfy his taste for war, to throwing out displaced islanders of Diego Garcia to create a secret Gitmo, to using it to promote his spin doctor Campbell and side step and override the civil service. 

Publishing the expenses claims of all public servants earning more than £150,000 is another thorny issue which has to be addressed. Why must it be  left to the dogged determination of Private Eye to expose the expenses scandals of Sir John Bourn at the National Audit Office?

In one fell swoop Cameron has managed to switch the agenda away from the airy fairy PR referendum electoral reform mumbo jumbo revealed by New Labour leader-in-waiting Johnson, in Murdoch's  The Times. That not only fell on voters deaf ears but hasn't a cat in hells chance of being implemented in the next generation parliament. 

The Orange Party wants to believe Cameron won't just turn into another Blair or Obama promising the earth and delivering nothing. Mr Ambition sure but he is finding that golden bullet of trust and leadership and has honest anger and a passion for politics on his side. 

Moreover Cameron seems to be protecting himself from the temptation of using the Downing Street machine to tighten a grip on power even before he's elected. That iron grip has been the hallmark of a discredited New Labour brand and that's a healthy start. 

But Dave should play down the "people power" bit. Don't start down the path of the People's this and the People's that. The people have seen through that sham. They've been there before with Blair and now Obama. You cannot fool even some of the people some of the time with all that the Man of the People hype. 

The general election when it finally comes will herald a new dawn in politics. It has to for the sake of democracy.  A trusted straight politician who for once actually delivers on their promises, a pretty straight kinda guy who is just that would make a refreshing change.

 

Read More...

Will Cameron Come Back All Statesman-Like?

Cameron is set to return to Westminster tomorrow a New Man. First blue turned into green then Mr Angry. But now the rebranded Tory leader is set to be the new statesman, positioning himself for the prize of the premiership. No wonder New Labour is running scared. 

For Cameron's Conservatives it has been a game of two halves but the trick has always been whether he could pull it off with the voters. 

The uphill task was to first turn round the Tories into a Party that could be 'elected' . And that was no mean feat as taunts that he was just another heir-to-Blair and a Thatcher's boy haunted him. 

After the 2005 election defeat, the Orange Party, believed it would take a decade and a couple of general elections for the Tories to begin to gain ground. 

But even with no general election on the horizon, Cameron had it easy, as he rebranded the Party in the eyes of the electorate. 

Misguided PR stunts made Cameron look a fool but Brown made his fatal mistake, bottling a general election in 2007. Cameron would have been out on his ears. But Brown didn't and the rest will be history. 

To Cameron's credit and relief of the Tory big guns, what emerged was a 'government-in-waiting'. And after half-time the second half could now begin.

A new Tory Cameron came out fighting but time and again opinion polls and local election results showed a vote against New Labour rather than a vote for the Tories. A true Labour revolt was no match for the powerful New Labour elite.  

It was a collapse of New Labour rather any great new enthusiasm for Cameron's new kids on the block.

Peter Oborne writing in yesterday's Mail believes this second stage of Cameron's leadership has now run its course:  

"The truth is that Cameron was always destined to reinvigorate his job - his family tragedy coincidentally placing a sad punctuation mark at the end of the second phase of his leadership. 

"The other Cameron was simply leader of the Opposition. But the new Cameron will present himself as a prospective prime minister - a more mature, sombre and tough individual than the plausible charmer of the past few years."

The Orange Party will miss Mr Angry coming over all hot and bothered as he squared up to Brown and the mess of a festering New Labour government. 

But Cameron, the new statesman, capable of dealing with a monumental economic crisis, will require a change of substance as well as style. 

Backing Brown's disastrous economic bullshit that the economy was in good shape, despite the warnings, wasn't fatal for the Tories but it did teach Cameron some harsh lessons. Being honest with voters is always the best policy in the long-run, as long that captures public mood. 

Even now, the Tories seem to be backing the government, matching spending on health, welfare, education and defence, when the economy is so bad some of these grand commitments will have to go by the board. Voters need to know where they stand.

Brown's government is set for another pre-election spending spree in next month's delayed budget on the back of reckless borrowing and the short-term 'printing money' fix. 

Cameron cannot ignore the fact that he will, very soon, take over a country on its beam ends. 

The deluded prime minister and his hapless chancellor remain in denial about the severity of the situation. That would force them to own up to their part in the downfall, as they carrying on spending like there's no tomorrow. For them, there is no tomorrow. 

But Cameron is on the horns of a dilemma. Does he come clean and admit the true devastating scale of the crisis and risk being  accused of talking down the sorry state of the economy and the country to make political capital?

A different kind of country will no doubt emerge once the recession depression finally lifts and voters have a right to know exactly what kind of public services and lavish overseas spending commitments will have to go.

Brown is passing on a disaster waiting to happen but Cameron still has to give voters a strong and positive reason to vote Conservative. 

Cameron cannot just wander into office, do a Brown and Darling and  bury his head in the sand, pretending that he will not have to carry out brutal cuts to state spending. 

He has to spell out  the sheer magnitude of the problem without appearing to gloat in all the misery. 

But it is essential that he does spell out the stark truth. Voters are wised up to the economy and can see through the lies, spin and deceit which has built up over the years. 

The brutal fact for the dying New Labour brand is that the Tories really don't have to do all that much at all.

Clegg's fine words to conference reveal the Blair-boy he really is underneath and, for the LibDems, only the economic oracle Cable is propping up the Party and saving it from oblivion. 

The Bearded One reported in today's Sunday Times has once again delivered a sermon from the pulpit, slating Brown and the government. Attacking New Labour rather than individual greed, the Archbishop of Canterbury blamed the financial crisis on a "spectacular failure of responsibility by the government." 

When even God deserts New Labour you know it's time to call it a day. 

And Cameron may not have much time to convince voters, with ITN's Tom Bradbury blowing the gaffe on Brown's air-rage, revealing a man who has lost the plot.

The men in grey cloth-caps may have to finally force Brown to make that call for the good of his health, their seats and country. 

Read More...

Brown's Bullshit Way Of Saying Sorry

The deluded Supreme Leader is all over the BBC and Observer like a rash, promising a new era of prudence in the banks. Bolting horses and stable doors spring to mind. Maybe it's the only way Brown can bring himself to say sorry for the mess he's caused? But the hair-shirt smells of bullshit. This is the last throw of the dice. 

What a coincidence. Obama suddenly found time in his busy diary to fit in a quick meeting with Brown in Washington next week, which managed to capture some of last night's headlines. 

Today it's calls for a return of "prudent", old-fashioned high street banks and the end of 100% mortgages, which has set the weekend political agenda. Notice how "prudent" is carefully weaved into the hype. 

But the Brown and Obama meeting that put the BBC in such a tizz is nothing new and was hinted at here by the Orange Party on February 6. 

Beleaguered Brown is pinning his hopes some of the Obama magic will rub off on him so he can steal a march on his rivals and a few votes back home. 

Both Downing Street and Brown are obsessed with the April 2 G20 London summit. But in the US, the Obama star is fading and he has enough on his plate with the domestic economy. The Chosen One may chose to drop by but only out of common courtesy.

With the credibility of the prime minister in ruins both at home and abroad, best to get in quick. April 2 is a very long way off.   

It's all part of a frenzied final push at economic spin and vote-catching as Brown and his ministers try to look busy, as they flannel and flounder around in the "fag-end of a government in collapse." 

Brown's calls for a more responsible banking system, in which banks are the "servants of the economy and society and never its master" (ad nauseam), according to the BBC, caused howls of derision and disbelief. 

How he has the bare-faced cheek now to ask people to forget all those years of allowing his banking buddies to cream off the cash and do what they fancy, beggars belief. 

A new era in banking certainly is welcome but how on earth can people be expected to buy into the idea of turning back the clock to Brown's golden years when they are riddled with debt up their eye balls. 

Thanks to the glorious false boom years, loans were packaged up like soap powder and everyone was taken in by the sham of the shiny new dream, before harsh reality kicked in. 

The Orange Party expects much more heady spin in the run up to the June elections and beyond. And that could include pulling a rabbit out of the hat in the oldest accounting magic trick in the book.

Pseudo-liberals in the US have been sent into a spin with Obama and Clinton sliming up to their new best friend China while ignoring the country's appalling record on human rights. It's a high price to pay when you sell your soul to the highest bidder. 

That is set to happen over here as long as China is prepared to risk taking on the debt of bankrupt Britain.  

China's vast wealth is the key. Cheap imported goods which have wrecked UK manufacturing flow in through the front door and wads of cash flow out through the back to China, only to be recycled as investment loans to prop up the wretched economy. 

Add that to the government's abhorrent and disreputable plans to print money and, hey presto, with smoke and mirrors accounting, the white rabbit is pulled out of the hat. Living on borrowed time for decades to come but no massive cuts in public spending. Everything in the very short term suddenly starts to look hunky-dory. 

Throw into the mix the new Banking Act, which gives greater powers to the Bank of England shrouded in a cloak of secrecy and the stage is set for a well-managed turnaround in fortunes.

Pictures with Obama for the BBC and Downing Street album, the bad old Brown days air-brushed out of history, the return of a new Prudence and the country hopelessly in debt propped up by China's billions.  All the ingredients are there for an election spinning turmoil of lies and deceit with a magical final throw of that dice in the run up to the general election. 

But there'll be no gasps of amazement from the audience when the rabbit appears. This time, the public have seen through the sham and the Tories and LibDems are constantly on their guard to square up to the bullshit.

Read More...

Tory Campaign Gimmicks Might Just Work

The Tories have announced the latest populist gimmick to latch onto the public mood, with a campaign to save our pubs. The leftish Orange Party has signed up to all of them!

'Save The Great British Pub' is part of a whole raft of campaigns tapping into public issues. Scratch away the cynicism and these campaigns are a stroke of genius.

A campaign to Save the Great British Pub is just the latest mini campaign to feature on conservatives.com now with a round-up of campaigns in a convenient portal to sign up and have a rant about saving post offices, scrapping ID cards, honest food labelling. All the old favourites are there. Indeed the portal box even has space for a couple more. 

Save the Great British Pub. What sensible person wouldn't agree with that?  But joining a campaign and feeling part of a movement is one thing. Having hard realistic policies to back up the fine words is quite another. 

Dig deeper and each campaign is linked to a reasoned background argument and more importantly with what the Tories would do about it. 

That's the really clever bit. They are drawing attention to the problems. Bringing them all together in one campaign portal is a stroke of genius. This is the key - it's part of an election manifesto and of course your email address can be used for future political marketing. Remember it's all in the database. 

There is a danger this could degenerate into a LibDem local government issues-style politics of cracked pavements and dog shit. But what and where is the alternative? 

Only the death throes of a discredited New Labour government riddled with sleaze and in-fighting in what Oborne today acidly and accuracy describes as the fag-end of a government in collapse. 

The crisis facing the British pub is indeed serious with pubs closing at a rate of knots. But the Tory campaign is dead in the water unless someone has the guts to tackle the real reason why pubs are falling by the wayside - the blanket smoking ban. Fat chance the Tories will raise their heads above the parapet on that issue so close to elections.   

What's needed is a political heavyweight to champion the cause, someone with a penchant for the occasional cigar and Real Ale. 

Whatever happened to the politically-correct misleading bleatings  about a massive increase in the pub trade as a result of the smoking ban? 

The smoking ban, supermarkets selling cheep beer and wine, high rents and price increase from suppliers, greedy shareholders in the breweries, 24 hour opening. It's all part of the pub shambles as the glorious vices of pint, a fag and packet of crisps are eroded away. 


A hell of a lot of radial policies are needed if the Tories are serious about saving pubs. 

The right way forward on any of the issues chosen by the Conservatives, from saving GPs' surgeries to pubs and Post Offices can be argued until you are blue or red in the face. 

But isn't that what politics should be all about, rather than the arrogant top down diktat imposed without a popular mandate which voters have to suffer at the moment? 

What the Tories are doing is singling out some of  the national issues that capture a public mood and at one time would be chewed over in the pub. 

How ironic then that the very place for a relaxing pint and a fag, to have a moan and put the world to right is now under threat. It's almost as if an Orwellian nanny knows best State has crept up by stealth to keep us all in our box. The Orange Party feels another issues campaign coming on. 

Read More...

Bankers Say Sorry So What's The Big Deal?

They came, they got grilled, they mumbled the S-word through clenched teeth, in a pointless PR exercise in double standards, wallowing in self-pity and remorse. Greedy bankers have been exposed as a bunch of greedy bankers. It's all a bit too little to late.  

The BBC's Common Purpose business guru, Robert Peston and political pundit, Nick Robinson, are both on hand to explain it all to the nation. The media and politicians are having a field day, forcing the former bankers onto their knees in a day of shame.

Sure it's good to watch the bankers get a roasting, though it's a pity Vince Cable's guillotine was meant as a joke.  

Former RBS bosses Sir Fred Goodwin and Sir Tom McKillop, closely followed by Andy Hornby and Lord Stevenson of HBOS - all bar one rewarded with a K or a P thanks to their pals in government. 

Now it seems all quite happy to face the music, as the banks play musical chairs while the country slides into a deep downturn, recession,  depression depending on who you want to believe.

It seems the government is taking its own blame culture just a tad too far, treating the ex-bankers like naughty children. Shame on you, a slap on the wrists, say your sorry. That's it. After a spell on the naughty step, off they sail into the wild blue yonder with their fancy titles and a wad of pocket money. 

How they must be laughing all the way to their banks. A quick apology to Parliament and a lesson in damage limitation for the next time someone screws up big time. 

It all must serve a purpose, apart from watching them squirm but the Orange Party cannot think what. Everyone knows the lessons to be learnt. It's called greed. 

The charade is certainly not for ordinary folk who're scared stiff about losing their jobs and making ends meet while the debt-fuelled boom takes its toll on every aspect of their lives. 

Meanwhile two homes secretary, Jacqui Smith, is doing the rounds of the media, wriggling around her homes scam using the pathetic excuse that she's done nothing wrong and was only following the rules. Isn't that just the same old corrupt excuse the bankers have been making? 

And back in the other big boy's world, Brown is trying to upstage Cameron as the new Mr Angry. Cameron is blaming borrowing Brown for the economic mess and quite right too but the Tories were not exactly shouting warning from the rooftops during those bloomin' booming years. 

Now if this was Brown and his bunch of economic morons who were being brought to book and made to apologise to the nation, people would sit up and take notice. 

But it's not. It's this month's Mr Nasties, the bankers, who're in the firing line. Not the home secretary, not the deluded prime minister, not the rest of the parliamentary elite who can hide behind the rules when it suits them and milk the system and bleed the nation for all it's worth.

Read More...