Friday, May 2, 2008

Medway Messenger

Hardly a champion on democracy

I READ with anger the hypocritical comments made by Labour Cllr Paul Godwin, comparing Medway Conservatives to Robert Mugabe.

Perhaps Cllr Godwin can tell me when Gordon Brown attended the Robert Mugabe School of Democracy, having failed to hold an election when he was appointed Prime Minister, a referendum on the EU Constitution (sorry, should that have read Lisbon Treaty? It’s so easy to get confused between the two) and giving all Cabinet appointments and chairs of all Parliamentary Committees to members of the ruling party.

I am sure Cllr Godwin would like to make out that he is some kind of champion for democracy, but his party has hardly been a shining example of democracy in action in recent years and he certainly has no right to lecture other parties on how to conduct democracy.

Perhaps Cllr Godwin would also like to write to Gordon Brown and ask him to invite Tory Treasury spokesman Justine Greening to be the chairman of the Treasury Committee. Either that or accept that they lost the election in Medway for good reason, and that the present system works perfectly well in both ensuring proper scrutiny is undertaken and negative bitterness from Labour and Liberal councillors doesn’t adversely affect the people of Medway.

Alan Collins
Goudhurst Road,
Twydall, Gillingham