Gordon Brown has written a note of condolence to the family of soldier killed in Afghanistan.
It is full of spelling mistakes and other errors including getting the dead mans’ surname wrong.
People have been defending the PM about this…
Lest we forget, the man is all but blind, and the idea that he – even he – would deliberately set out to insult a grieving mother is just stupid. If he really didn’t give a shit, he’d get his secretary to type the letters and then sign them at the bottom, and none of this would ever have been a story in the first place.
but FFS…
I completely agree but it’s a note of condolence not a shopping list. You get these things right not go ‘fuck it that’ll do’.
The arguement that Gordon is nearly blind and that if someone else had written it or he’d knocked it up on a computer means he doesn’t care just doesn’t stand up.
- As Justin says, It’s a letter of condolence, even if your writing is scruffy, you at least get the name correct. Nothing says you don’t care more than getting the name wrong, especially when you’re the prime minister with all those people around that are supposed to help and advise you.
- If Gordons’ eye sight is that bad, why are we expecting him to hand write letters? Did Blunkett get it in the neck every time someone else wrote a letter for him?
What’s worse? A load of unintelligable scrawl or a typed letter with a real signature at the bottom?
At least Gordon doesn’t have rubber stamp to sign with.
I didn’t get to hear or see Gordons’ speech today and being a lazy sod I haven’t really gone looking for it, but from what I have picked up is from here…
• Provide 250,000 free childcare places for two-year-olds.
• Delay the introduction of compulsory ID cards for British citizens.
• Provide a network of supervised homes for 16- and 17-year-old parents.
• Create up to 10,000 green job placements.
• Protect the schools budget.
• Hold a referendum on the alternative vote electoral system after the election.
• Remove hereditary peers in the House of Lords “once and for all”, in the next parliament.
• Give constituents the right to remove corrupt MPs.
• Increase the role of post offices in providing financial services.
So, 250k free childcare places for two year olds. Very good that will help a great deal for some people, but surely wouldn’t it be better to make it so people didn’t need free nursery places, either by working towards a situation where couples do not need have both of them working or by making it so people can afford to pay for their own childcare.
Delay the introduction of compulsory ID cards. Not abandon the idea but delay. It’s still on the cards, as it were. It’ll still gonna happen. It’s just not so subtle as in 1997* when Blair said Labour wouldn’t introduce university top-up/tuition fees and then in 2001* said that that promise was just for the previous parliament.
(*I might be 4 years early with this and it happened in 2001 and 2005)
Supervised home for young parents. ‘Nuff said here.
10,000 green job placements. The word ‘placements’ bothers me. If it was just jobs, fine, but ‘placements’ doesn’t sound very permanent. You used to get a work experience placement at school and then when you left school it was a YTS £40-a-week placement. Neither lasted long.
Protecting schools budgets. Everything else is going then.
Referendum on an alternative voting system. Good.
Remove hereditary peers. Wasn’t that in the 1997 election manifesto?
Recalling MPs. Another good one.
Same for Post Offices.
What is this about (also mentioned here)?
Brown promises 10,000 skilled internships. He wants young people ‘to embrace ambition and British enterprise’
Don’t interns work for nothing but expenses? Is that what Gordon’s promising? If it is, it’s setting the bar a bit low, isn’t it? He wants young people to embrace the ambition of getting a job that pays? Is that it?
I gather ‘change’ appeared a lot* in Gordons’ speech, but surely after twelve years of a government we should be at least on the right track (for the government) and not needing to change too much, otherwise what’s the last twelve years been spent doing?
(*link via qwghlm.co.uk)
Anyway, that’s it. Gordon’s on his way out whatever. Is it time for a proper revolution yet?
Not arragant? Not unwilling to listen? Doesn’t sound it to me…
“I’m the best person to clean up the political system,” he added.
Mr Brown said: “I think the cleaning up of the political system is best done by someone who has got a clear idea of what needs to be done – and I have.”
The complete interview.
Come on, Gordon. Do us all a favour, shut up and fuck off. Stop pissing in our ears with all this contradiction you come out with, as Evan points out in the interview, members of your cabinet have been voting against your ideas of transparency in the last year. If you were that commited to refrom you could’ve done so much more. But you didn’t.
Come on, do the decend thing. Call an election, then stand down and disappear into obscurity.
Also see Chicken Yoghurt: Gordon Brown: Of compasses and consciences (especially the last paragraph).
