A blog by Luke Akehurst about politics, elections, and the Labour Party - With subtitles for the Hard of Left. Just for the record: all the views expressed here are entirely personal and do not necessarily represent the positions of any organisations I am a member of.

Monday, July 10, 2006

Hoodies for Cameron

"Dave" Cameron seems to be turning out not to be the genius political strategist some feared. He seems to have missed the point that the idea behind triangulation as practised by Blair and Clinton was to take the policies where you were previously weakest and most out of tune with public opinion (defence, tax, crime in Labour's case in the '90s) and pitch your tent firmly on the centre ground. Cameron in contrast with his "let's be understanding to hoodies" gaff has positioned the Tories as at odds with Labour policy on ASBOs that resonates not just with the core Labour vote but with the core Tory one as well. It's easy for him to say "let's be understanding" when he represents a leafy bit of Oxfordshire where the height of ASB is probably some under-age cider drinking in the village bus shelter. For the people in my council ward, particularly the elderly and young families on estates who are terrorised by crime, vandalism, and "neighbours from hell" the problem with the Government's respect agenda is not that it shows insufficient "understanding" of the causes of bad behaviour but that it isn't being rolled out fast enough.

3 Comments:

Blogger kris said...

He really shot himself in the head with that one. Hoodies just need a YOT pooltable and a hug?! How very 70's...

BTW, whoever organised the PCSOs hanging out by the "Millenium Kebab" struck gold. All of the misunderstood little hoddie lambs that used to hang on the corner (20 plus of them after school) have moved on. Please pass on my genuine thank you and hope the PCSOs continue their visible patrols

6:04 pm, July 10, 2006

 
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Having spent a good deal of time in Abingdon recently I can confirm that the teens there are as bad if not worse than any I have encountered in my 6 years living in deptford. It's not in Cameron's constituency, but I'd imagine the violent and rude little scamps that infest the town aren't doing it purely because a Lib Dem happens to be their local MP.

2:27 pm, July 17, 2006

 
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ooh, I don't know Luke. Seems to me Boy Dave hit a big chord with the hoodie thing...

http://davehill.typepad.com/temperama/huggable_hoodies/index.html

See? Huggable hoodies everywhere!

10:44 pm, July 17, 2006

 

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