Question Time 19th September 2024
The Panel:
Lucy Powell (Labour)
Graham Stewart (Conservative)
Tim Farron (LibDem)
Mariana Mazzucato (Economist)
Jill Kirby (Journalist)
Venue: Ashton-Under-Lyne
The programme began with Fiona Bruce saying a very strange thing. The studio audience has been altered to reflect voting at the recent general election. As if it wasn’t Left-wing enough. However, she continued, and I quote, ‘More people in our audience voted Labour than any other single party, then followed, of course, by the Conservatives and the LibDems and a proportionate number of other parties as it were in July.’
Hold on a minute, Reform got more votes than the LibDems (4 million to 3.5 million). Surely that should have read ‘followed by the Conservatives and Reform’? The suspicion being the audience is chosen from the outcome of a first-past-the-post system rather than from the number of votes cast for each party. Hence, an audience of a couple of hundred will provide one, or more likely no, Reform voters. Well over half the audience will be Labour voters even though they only got 32% of the vote on a low turnout. It’s a con. Speaking of which…
Tim Farron is the LibDem MP for the Cumbrian constituency of Westmorland and Lonsdale. The 54-year-old attended Runshaw College and later studied politics at Newcastle University, beginning his political career as a local councillor in Lancashire before winning his parliamentary seat in 2005.
From 2015 to 2017, Tim led the Liberal Democrats and now serves as their spokesman for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Married to Rosie, the Farrons have two daughters and two sons; Isabella, Gracie, Jude and Laurie. As fellow Cumbrians I have the inside edge and can tell you this, Gracie worked in the cafe at Levens Hall and Laurie was at Booths supermarket in Kendal.
During the summer’s White Lives Matter anti-immigration protests, Tim put out the following odd tweet:
I’m white and a Christian. No one is chucking bricks at my church or telling me to go back to where I come from. I’m concerned about attacks on the communities that are actually *being* attacked.
Odd because in 2017 Mr Farron was attacked for being Christian and told to go back to the back benches when he lost the leadership of his party for, in keeping with his faith, being unenthusiastic about same-sex marriage.
Continuing the Cumbrian connection Graham Stuart is the Carlisle-born Conservative MP for Beverley and Holderness and has been since 2005. The 62-year-old was educated at Perth and Kinross’s £47,000 per year (ex-VAT) Glenalmond College and later attended Selwyn College, Cambridge, where he studied philosophy and law. Prior to entering politics, he was in business, including the running of a publishing company.
Lucy Powell has served as the Labour MP for Manchester Central since 2012 and is the Leader of the House of Commons and Lord President of the Council in the new Labour government. The posh Didsbury-born 49-year-old graduated from Oxford University, where she took Chemistry, before completing further studies at Kings College London.
Lucy has never had a job but has been a PR/pubic affairs wallah for a series of quangos and pressure groups. Moving sideways into Left-wing Westminster politics, Ms Powell managed Ed Milliband’s party leadership campaign in 2010. Subsequently, she became his deputy chief of staff for two years, at the end of which she was elected to parliament in her own right via a by-election. Lucy is pictured here with Puffin’s favourite Mrs Eddie Izzard, a spinster not of this parish.
Powell is married to James Williamson, a Warrington A&E doctor, and is a mother to a stepson, daughter and another son. Another brain-dead leftie, Dr James sits on the Central Council of the Socialist Health Association. This campaigning membership organisation promotes ‘health and well-being and the eradication of inequalities through the application of socialist principles to society and government’. In his profile, the good doctor mentions he lives in Manchester with his three children but omits to say his wife is the local MP.
Dr Powell-William’s commitment to equality includes his massive pension (that you pay for) and his wife’s government giving him a giant pay rise (that you pay for). From his rich doctor’s millionaire’s mansion, or perhaps from his wife’s millionaire’s apartment closer to the House of Commons (that you pay for), James wails about ‘Tory austerity; inadequate housing and homelessness’.
Physician heal thyself.
Mariana Mazzucato is an economist, notable for her work on public policy and a difficult-to-share enthusiasm for the big state. Born in Italy, the 56-year-old grew up in the United States where she studied history and international relations at Tufts University. A PhD in economics from New York’s New School for Social Research followed. At the moment, Mariana is a Professor of Economics of Innovation and Public Value at University College London, where she founded and directs the Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose. Oh.
Is she in league with the United Nations, the European Union and is she muckers with George Soros? You bet she is! Mazzucato has served on high-profile economic commissions and panels with the EU and the UN where her conclusions emphasise the need for active tax-payer investment in the kind of things her sponsors at the EU and UN obsess about.
Mazzucato’s connection with George Soros is through her involvement with the Open Society Foundation (OSF), an organization founded by Soros. In 2019, the 94-year-old Hungarian billionaire awarded Mariana the inaugural “Open Society Prize” for her work on ‘rethinking the role of government in economic innovation’.
Soros praised her for challenging orthodox economic thinking and for her research advocating a stronger, mission-oriented public sector. Mazzucato’s work aligns with Soros’ ambitions, making her a prominent figure in the OSF’s intellectual and policy-driven conspiracies even to the point of her books being launched at Open Society events. Boooooo!
Born Jill Christine Fernie, Jill Kirby hails from Bedford. A grammar school girl, Mrs Kirby attended Rugby High School for Girls before studying Law at Bristol University. Jill qualified as a solicitor in 1981 and embarked upon a career in commercial litigation and employment law in the City of London.
A freelance writer, broadcaster and frequent guest columnist for the Daily Telegraph, between 2007 and 2011 Jill was director of the Centre for Policy Studies, an ‘independent’ think tank where she was responsible for publishing a number of reports. Her mighty work, ‘The Nationalisation of Childhood’ is available on Amazon but at £25 for 52 pages fails to appear on the Amazon best sellers list.
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The first question wondered if a sitting MP should ever accept a gift. La Bruce referenced Keir Starmer’s £100,000 of recent freebees which Fiona informed us was far more than any other MP. I wonder…
Lucy ‘Freebee’ Powell thought it was acceptable as long as transparent. Lucy then interrupted herself to say, err I think I’m second on the list. You are, replied La Bruce, with £40,000 of gifts. Lucy brushed this off as attending events when she was a Shadow Culture Minister. This was an anomaly as shadows have to declare these things but ministers don’t.
Lucy had been briefed by party managers and regurgitated her briefing. She suggested lobbyists had wasted their money as she wasn’t going to do anything she’d been lobbied for. In her constituency, she represents Manchester City and feels obliged to accept free tickets to the matches. God makes them and pairs them, City presently face 115 charges relating to financial irregularities.
The questioner mentioned the ‘C’ word – corruption. Lucy retaliated with the ‘T’ word. It doesn’t matter as long as these things are transparent. Jill Kirby contradicted her, saying Starmer’s declarations weren’t transparent and were originally put through the system as being items necessary for office. La Bruce pointed out Graham ‘Freebee’ Stewart had filled his pockets too but he responded that he wasn’t responsible for accepting them even though he had.
Fiona and Tim agreed that Mr Farron had only ever been invited to one thing, had accepted but then didn’t go. The Whiskey Association, chipped in Tim. He continued that his default position for the past 19 years had been that if someone on Kendal market asked him what he did that week and he couldn’t answer without any sense of shame then, ‘Don’t do it in the first place.’ The audience applauded, as well they might, but is it an accurate reflection of Mr Farron’s behaviour? Let’s have a look at some dates in Mr Farron’s diary via his submissions to the parliamentary members’ list of interests.
During the week containing 1st March 2023, Mr Farron accepted £15,264 from Faith in Public Limited as, in the jargon, ‘a donation or donation in kind’. On the week that contained 1st April 2023, he accepted £17,550 from the Refugee, Asylum & Migration Policy Project (RAMP). On the same day, he accepted a further £27,940 from Faith in Public Ltd. On the 4th of September 2023, he accepted £13,914 from Faith in Public. On the 1st of January 2024, he accepted £5,850 from RAMP, on the 1st of March 2024, £15,264 from Faith in Public. On 1st April 2024, £18,720 from RAMP. Also on April 1st 2024, £30,744 from Faith in Public.
If the good stallholders and bargain hunters of Kendal market are expert at maths, they will have calculated that in the 18 months preceding the general election, Mr Farron, rather than accepting nothing, accepted £145,246 – more than the sum presently embarrassing ‘biggest recipient’ Mr Starmer. Why do Farron and Bruce pretend otherwise? Likewise, when Mr Farron regularly speaks out in favour of such things as ‘refugees, asylum and [mass] migration policy’ how do we know he isn’t just doing it for the money?
As for Faith in Public Limited, looking down their website’s list of links to published articles, their credo appears to be open borders and mass, uncontrolled, unlimited immigration. They even state in their masthead, ‘We support Tim Farron’s parliamentary contributions on issues such as refugees, asylum and immigration, homelessness and social justice’ but omit to mention they pay him tens of thousands of pounds to make them. The ‘C’ word indeed.
© Always Worth Saying 2024
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