Salford Labour Party Website

Don’t forget the CLP dinner tonight at the Brown Cow in Winton!

See you all there!

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All the Labour candidates have worked hard to get our message across to the electorate.

Now it is in the hands of the voters.

As the webmaster of this site I wish you all the very best. You have done us proud.

See you at the count!

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The following article concerning a meeting between Peel Holdings and the Community Action Party appeared in the Salford Star March 2008 edition and is reproduced with permission

COME ‘DANCE WITH THE DEVIL’

We exclusively reveal how mega bucks company Peel Holdings is trying to influence this year’s local election.

“I’d like to explain our position” says Mike Butterworth, Peel Holdings’ Property Director “ and then you can consider to what extent you are prepared to dance with the devil”

Peel Holdings is certainly one beast of a company. With an estimated £6 billion worth of assets. It’s got massive interests in Salford and beyond, which include owning the Trafford Centre, Media City, Barton Airport, the Ship Canal, a slice of Salford Reds new stadium complex and huge chunks of Salford’s green belt which are about to be developed into a racecourse/hotel complex and a freight terminal.

Peel is going to extraordinary lengths to protect those interests in the run up to the local elections, trying to influence local media coverage and, in Butterworth’s words, “picking a fight” with elected councillors to stop a policy which might affect its obscene profits.

The policy is congestion charging – which aims to make motorists pay for having their cars on the road at certain times of the day, matched with major improvements to public transport – but the principles go much deeper than that.

Whether anyone’s for or against the congestion charge isn’t at stake here. This is about a huge company using its power and money to put its vested interests at the forefront of a local election, rather than issues that might be more directly important to the community, such as housing, education or let’s think…protection of Salford’s precious green belt.

Mike Butterworth, and his sidekick Gordon McKinnon, Peel’s Director of Operations, have been holding meetings with local political parties that are standing candidates in opposition to the Labour Party, offering to help unseat councillors who are in favour of the congestion charge.

“The forthcoming elections are a big opportunity” Butterworth said at one recent meeting “What can we do to help you guys?”

Butterworth explained just why Peel is so against congestion charging, which boiled down to protecting its real estate interests in Media City…”we don’t want to see anything done that will slow it down, hamper it or make it less attractive”….and the possibility of companies around the Trafford Centre having to increase wages to their workers….”I can’t say that a lot of them are particularly well paid and people won’t be able to afford this charge, so it will affect our ability to draw people to working here….”

Butterworth put to the meeting a number of ways in which the parties could “dance with the devil”. First he mentioned ‘colluding’ with a local newspaper to do a survey asking councillors who are due for election if they were in favour of the charge or not….then he offered the services of political lobbyists and a PR firm to do the survey. Finally he specifically targeted Roger Jones, the Labour councillor for Irlam and chairman of the GMPTE, which is attempting to bring in the charge.

“There is another way of partly skinning the same cat in Roger Jones is up for re-election – he’s bricking it over it, he’s rattled” Butterworth said “He has a majority of 200 or something like that it’s nothing. It’s almost inconceivable that with a bit of the right kind of publicity he can’t be turfed out…..”

Butterworth then revealed details of a survey of 300 people paid for by Peel and done through market research firm, Aspect, which showed 60% of people who voted for Jones at the last election won’t vote for him again if he introduces the congestion charge.

“He knows we’ve done the survey and is very upset about it, and I’ve had the chief exec of Salford Council asking what we’re up to but at some point we are going to release this information” he added, asking “What’s your relationship like with the Salford Advertiser?”

“My impression of the Salford Advertiser is that they didn’t particularly carry any weight of support for Roger Jones” he continued “But if at some point we worked it out between us and we release this information about the survey, and this was done before or after – depending on the tactics – some sort of release by you guys saying ‘This is wrong, and Roger Jones is wrong’…. You guys could have so much fun….”

Whether anything was actually put into practice will be seen in the run up the local election in May. But this does reveal how big business tries to influence and sway the media and political agenda towards its own interests.

“I think its an abuse of democracy” said Salford Council Leader John Merry, when we revealed details of Peel’s plan “From the point of view of trying to buy an election… the only way it would work is if you think the people of Salford are going to vote on something solely on the basis of congestion charging…Now I happen to think the people of Salford are more intelligent than that….”

Meanwhile, Peel aren’t the only ones trying to interfere with the media agenda. At a recent Salford Council offshoot meeting we understand that control of the Salford Advertiser was discussed.

“I think people – not me – were saying that the Advertiser is perceived by sections as being very negative and misleading in some coverage” explained John Merry “People were saying how we need to influence how the Advertiser was portraying Salford……”

Politics with a capital ‘P’ is a dirty business. Makes you want to have a bath at the thought of it….Meanwhile Peel continue to be involved in “skinning cats” and “dancing with devils”.

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On a lighter note, many have turned out to deliver leaflets and conduct canvasses all over the city.

Here is just one team, working the Eccles Ward.

Many thanks to you all!

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Shneur stood for the Conservatives in the May 2007 elections and will again this year. He is less than honourable on his website! He invites you and I quote including his misspellings “please do come back and leave your COMMENTS and SUGESTIONS.”
I would ignore this invitation, because, if you take up the offer, he will censor every comment that disagrees with his opinion. He is not interested in debate, he only wants your votes and then he can ignore you too!

He failed in Salford, he failed in Bury and have a look at what he did in Hackney!

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In 12 months, this site has only removed one comment, and that was because it was a little offensive. We take all comments even if we disagree with the content!

But in Kersal, if you comment on a Tory blog, they just suppress it! Now that’s a bit naughty!

I was alerted by a Labour member who asked me visit this site and read his comment. When I viewed it, there was nothing in the comments. So I added 3 comments myself. The same day a new article appeared and still no comments!

Seems like censorship to me!

It is comical in a way, so it inspired the little animation below. If the shoe fits, wear it!

The video can be found with uncensored comments on the IPod store, YouTube, Facebook, MySpace and Podcast ready!

Enjoy!

 

 The Kersal Blogger [1:22m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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