General Election
Tories Target Whelan in New Facebook Campaign
The Conservatives have today launched a new online campaign using Facebook Connect.
The campaign, called Cash Gordon, is designed to raise awareness of the control Charlie Whelan’s Unite has on Gordon Brown’s Labour Party beyond the Westminster village.
The most innovative aspect of the initiative is its integration of “competitive campaigning.” Users will accrue “action points” for reading briefings on the issue, getting their friends involved, and for directly tweeting Charlie Whelan.
Commenting on the launch, Conservative Party Chairman Eric Pickles said:
“By making it easy for people to spread the word out to their non-political friends, this groundbreaking campaign is designed to bring a new wave of pressure on to Gordon Brown’s complete reliance on cash from Charlie Whelan and Unite.
“Facebook often gets forgotten about in Westminster. But with twelve million of us using it every day to connect to our friends and interests, we still see it as a key online battleground for peer-to-peer campaigning.
Once again the Conservatives push online show just how behind Labour is when it comes to leveraging online communities as part of wider campaigns.
Pickles added: “I’m proud that the Conservatives have consistently been leading the way in its use of the internet. In the last few weeks independent research has shown us way ahead in our use of email, and we’ve become the first party to launch apps on both the iPhone and the Blackberry.”
Gordon Brown’s Doing Sweet BA
The Conservatives have today released a new advert highlighting Gordon Brown’s failure to get his union paymasters to call off the British Airways strike.
Ahead of the election Government advertising hits record level
A new row involving the governments advertising arm, the Central Office of Information, is brewing after it emerged pre-election spending hit a record high.
Unpublished figures reveal that central Government advertising in January 2010 was the highest ever January on record, burning through a massive £30 million of taxpayers’ cash in that month alone.
Ministers have refused to publish details of the advertising and marketing campaigns that are being run at taxpayers’ expense in the run up to the General Election – pledging only to release the data in annual accounts in August 2010.
Defending it decision not to disclose the cost of current campaigns the head of COI, Mark Lund, said it would incur “disproportionate cost” to release the details.
Tories win endorsement from former SAS hero Andy McNab
Former SAS hero turned author Andy McNab as strongly endorsed David Cameron and the Conservatives, and accused Gordon Brown of ‘betraying’ the Armed Forces.
Speaking to The Sun the special forces commander, who led the failed Bravo Two Zero raid deep into Iraq during Operation Desert Storm said:
“I’m impressed. The Tories are the future,’ he said, adding “Cameron’s got the SAS vote – that’s for sure.”
Clearly Brown doesn’t understand elections
This morning Gordon Brown gave a rather poor interview, even by his standards, to Woman’s Hour. Asked whether he would resign if he did not get a majority at the election he replied: “I’ll keep going because I want a majority, I’ll keep going.”
How arrogant and or deluded is Brown to think that he can stay on as leader when the country has rejecting him at the ballot box.
Brown may have survived plots and attempted coups in the past, but for him to think that his party and, more importantly, his Cabinet colleagues will tolerate this following electoral defeat is outrageous. They will clearly be baying for his head.
Straw to scrap House of Lords
Labour’s assault on the historic institutions of the United Kingdom continues apace.
This morning the Sunday Telegraph splashed with the news Justice Secretary Jack Straw is on the brink of announcing plans to replace the House of Lords with a 300-member fully elected second chamber. The paper’s Political Editor Patrick Hennessy reports:
“Ministers are ready to announce their plans, which follow years of fruitless cross-party discussions and several votes in the House of Commons, in a bid to wrong-foot the Tories with polling day less than two months away. Labour’s plan is to provoke elements inside the Conservative Party to object to the reforms – which would allow it to paint David Cameron as wedded to old ideas of privilege.”
“Under the government’s proposals, members of the new chamber would be able to be subject to a US-style “recall ballot” which would disqualify them for incompetence.
The plans would see all members of the new-look assembly being directly elected – ending the system of party patronage- with polling under some form of proportional representation system taking place at the same time as general elections.
Tories launch new poster attacking Labour’s dangerous dog’s policy
The Conservatives have today launched a new poster campaign aimed at drawing attention to Labour’s plans for a dog tax, a tax which would penalise millions of law-abiding dog owners and do nothing to target irresponsible dog owners.
Last Tuesday the Government announced a consultation which included proposals to compel all dog owners to pay for compulsory third party insurance. Families would face “penalties” – fines or criminal sanctions – for breaching this requirement.
Unite’s stranglehold on Labour
If there were any doubts about how much power the trade unions wields over Gordon Brown’s Labour party, today the truth is becoming clear.
This morning The Sun splashed with some interesting statistics about Labour’s dependence on the unions.
While Labour is dependent on most unions for its continued survival, the Unite Union is rapidly emerging as the power behind Labour and its election campaign.
Not only are they bankrolling the party and undertaking its outsourced election campaign, but their political director, Charlie Whelan, is now back working as a key adviser to Gordon Brown.
