Tom Miller is Labour's Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Woking, the South East Representative on the Young Labour National Committee and a former editorial assistant at LabourList.org.
Tom Miller is Labour's Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Woking, the South East Representative on the Young Labour National Committee and a former editorial assistant at LabourList.org.
Posted on Jan 08, 2009 at 06:06pm
By Tom Miller / @TomMillerUK ToryDiary and The Telegraph reported yesterday that the Tories are planning a now not-so-secret raft of tax cuts for the wealthy, in full George W. Bush style. In order to avoid correctly placed charges from the Labour Party (that immediate cuts in spending would damage the demand cycle and wider recovery), the Tories are now seeking to appear more moderate in advance by briefing to the media that they would wait 3 years before they launched such a policy. This in itself is typically cynical. They are leaking to the effect that this will...
By Tom Miller / @tommilleruk A couple of days back a fellow member of the Labour movement, albeit not from the same strain of it, spoke to myself and a few others. The person concerned was responding to this piece by the New Statesman’s Mehdi Hasan. The liberal media (i.e. the likes of the NS and the Guardian, and in America organs such as the New York Times), frequently criticises ‘centre-left’ governments, or in Obama’s case, centre-left branches of government. The point my friend makes against this admittedly oft rehearsed criticism got me thinking about what it means to pressure...
By Tom Miller / @tom_miller85 The government continues to maintain that Royal Mail is not financially viable (despite it now beginning to turn a pretty big profit thanks to reforms which have already taken place). Perversely, this is blamed on the state of the pension fund, which was devastated by the Conservatives...so it is a nasty coincidence that over the past decade Labour have failed to fix it. In any event, a whole load of methods of reform have been suggested by others such as Compass and the CWU, but these proposals have been roundly ignored. Does the Government propose...
By Tom Miller / @Tom_Miller85 It was interesting to read and juxtapose "A Supporter"s piece with that written in response by Kezia Dugdale. In a strange way I think they both miss the point. One of the silliest accusations one sees thrown around in our movement, but also in youth politics more widely, is that of 'careerism'. For a decent chunk of my post-university career I have worked in politics, and having seen the amount of time many in the apparent private sector spend meeting with councillors, ministers, civil servants and other personnel who have a direct reliance on the...
By Tom Miller By its nature, Government is something that requires compromise, yet political activists, in contrast, tend to be people with developed and specific opinions about how things should go. I'm afraid I happen to be one of those people, so it is not often that, upon reciept of an email/press release from the Labour Party I feel bound to republish it in full. But the Equalities Bill is one which simply looks so good that I feel bound to join the choir and sing its praises. The email below was sent (OK, I doubt she pressed the button,...
By Tom Miller I don't seek to play down what has come to light over the past couple of days, not that I was involved in it myself. Nor ideed did I have any knowledge of it. I've made my comments elsewhere. People are, understandably in my view, very angry. But in reading our comments at LabourList, you'd get the impression that Labour was alone in having people with dubious jounalistic/blogging ethics among its ranks. If you think this, you should read the Stirrer. Iain has (rather crudely, I think) tried to turn what was clearly a big mistake on...
By Tom Miller For me, what New Labour turned out to be is a fundamental break with the past, so I guess I come from a fundamentally different place to Progress's editorial here. I think this for a number of reasons, but the first I want to talk about is Progress's response to claims of market fundamentalism. I believe that New Labour is a market fundamentalist conception. While I'm quite happy to admit that the rhetoric it uses is state-neutral, I think it is beyond dispute for most people, not least party activists, that the content is usually different to...
By Tom Miller We have a lot of people who frequent our site, continuously asking us why we have no criticism of the Government, figures within the Labour Party, or figures within the wider labour movement. The truth is that we tend to publish what people give us. If people don’t give us critical pieces, we can’t publish them. On occasion, we’ve felt that the debate within the party, or at least the media, has been balanced towards a Government which is eager to make its arguments, but absent of spontaneous critical content; so we’ve actually solicited critical pieces,...
By Tom Miller I don't suppose any of you will be surprised to see a Compass supporter writing in favour of PR. But I'm going to anyway, because I'm predictable like that. PR is one of those issues which cuts across the party. Luke Akehurst, who I'm sure would be the first to admit that he stands firmly on the right of the party, is, if I remember correctly, in favour. I can point to a few who are on my wing, or to the left of me, who are squarely opposed. Denis MacShane is one of those declared opposed....
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