Barking and Dagenham Borough Liberal Democrats

Sarah's bulletin: 8 January 2010

As 2010 gets into gear, let me take this opportunity to wish you all a very happy new year. I hope the year to come brings you all you wish for, and that any well-intentioned resolutions are not broken too soon! My own is boringly banal - to lose that spare stone or so round the middle (I'm too old to use kilos!) that snacks and sandwiches from a life on the move - not gourmet banquets! - have accumulated.

The best way of doing that is of course lots of campaigning. We are set for an exciting year in politics with a general election campaign that seems to have already taken off, and prospects of real gains for the Liberal Democrats, both at Westminster and in London councils. In London Lib Dem party membership increased by more than 5% in 2009, a real tribute to Liberal Democrats' track record of fairness, reform, and hard work. We are the only party presenting a real, progressive alternative to a decayed Labour and vacuous Conservative party. We have an excellent, fully costed array of detailed policies setting out how we would make our political and economic system fairer for all - do check out our website to find out more.

Both Cameron and Brown are keenly trying to convince both Lib Dem voters and parliamentarians that Labour and the Tories "really are just like the Lib Dems" and that we "don't really disagree about anything". Well, I can give you plenty of things we disagree about - such as Blair's participation in illegal rendition and flagrant disrespect of international rule of law, or Tory moves in the European Parliament that have shown their disregard for fundamental civil liberties - whether it be those of gay people in Lithuania, or freedom of the press in Italy, or the upholding of rights in our relationship with the US. I can assure you, neither party is like us! Twenty-five years ago I remember campaigning on the slogan 'which twin is the Tory'? Plus ca change!

Nick Clegg has done a fantastic job of putting our message across in this first week of the year. His piece in the Times put it particularly well when he said that the Liberal Democrats are "up for real change, not up for sale". Lib Dems have been distinctive on a whole number of issues: Iraq, civil liberties, the environment and fairer taxes. He made this point again when he appeared on Radio 4's Today programme and on the BBC's Hardtalk. That said, however, the media establishment continues again and again - both on a national and London level - to fail to give the Liberal Democrats their due prominence in the media, and this only worsens during general election campaigns. If you witness a clear example of this bias then please help counter it by emailing the details to mediawatch@libdems.org.uk.

Snow, ice and chaos

Many of us have gone back to work this week only to find our journey barred by treacherous snow and ice. As much as nobody can change the weather, these delays and cancellations were also caused by a complete lack of preparation within local government. It has been reported that due to bad advice doled out by Whitehall, councils' stockpiles of grit were woefully inadequate and as a result many have only been gritting roads and leaving pavements dangerously icy. We need a transport system that does not just collapse at the first sign of a snowflake! London Liberal Democrats have also recently launched a campaign for better railway stations, do visit the website and petition here.

As I said in my letter to the FT regarding the pre-Christmas Eurostar chaos, Eurostar's lack of an effective emergency response plan is intensely worrying - this time it was snow, but next time it could be terrorist attack. Instead of inventing new ways to spy on our population, EU governments would do well to first ensure that our critical infrastructure is properly protected and that procedures for evacuation and rescue in case of an emergency are in place.

Andrew Symeou protest outside Greek embassy tomorrow

You may have heard of the case of a young Londoner, Andrew Symeou, who is being held in a maximum security Greek prison on a manslaughter charge after return under a European Arrest Warrant, where the evidence is worryingly flawed and police conduct the subject of a criminal complaint regarding brutality and fabrication of evidence. I will be joining Andrew's family, Jago Russell of Fair Trials International and many others tomorrow in a protest against his unjust treatment. The demonstration will be held outside the Greek embassy at 1A Holland Park W11 at 10.30am tomorrow (Saturday) morning. A letter will be handed over to the embassy calling for Andrew's release while he awaits trial. If you feel strongly about this issue, please do come and join us in raising awareness of his suffering at the hands of the Greek authorities.

LibDems strongly support the European Arrest Warrant system in general as it has speeded up the catching of major criminals, but that does not mean we are silent when major injustice is perpetrated under cover of that system.

Attempted Christmas Day bombing and naked body scanners

Christmas Day saw a young Nigerian with links to al-Qaeda, Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, attempt to blow up a plane over Detroit with explosives sown into his underwear. Luckily he was unsuccessful, but it was a very close shave. A lot of the subsequent media and government attention has been focused on so-called 'naked body' scanners that can reveal if packages have been concealed on a person's body. The Dutch government has announced that it was going to make such body scans compulsory in all its airports as soon as possible, and Gordon Brown has also announced British airports are going to start using them as soon as is practical.

However it is unclear - the evidence is mixed - as to whether these naked body scanners would have been able to pick up the type of powder explosives that Abdulmutallab hid in his underwear. The Home Secretary acknowledges that they are only 60% effective in detecting potential explosives and further research is needed for smarter machines. It is my view that, as we established in the European Parliament 15 months ago, there are some serious civil liberties and privacy issues with the scanners producing very detailed pictures of passengers' naked bodies. To me, as Barack Obama said, the real issue with the Christmas Day bombing is the intelligence failure. Due to a mixture of human and systemic error intelligence agencies failed to connect the dots and foil the plan. This - information sharing - is what we should be frantically working to improve, not even more intrusive mass surveillance.

You can read a TIME magazine on the subject with a quote from me here.

Akmal Shaikh

To my great sadness Akmal Shaikh, a Londoner on whose behalf I have campaigned for a long time, was executed by Chinese authorities on 29 December on a charge of drug smuggling, despite him being mentally ill. There is also evidence that he had been duped by drug smugglers into thinking that he would be made into a popstar upon his arrival in China. On Christmas Eve, in a last-ditch attempt to prevent this injustice, I sent the Chinese Ambassador in London and Brussels a letter pleading for clemency for Akmal Shaikh, but it was to no avail. I can only offer Mr. Shaikh's family my deepest condolences and join them in their calls for a coroner's inquiry into the manner of his death.

Extraordinary rendition: admissions and future revelations

A ruling in a court case bought by the Times under the Freedom of Information Act has decided that Scotland Yard must reveal whether there is any truth to the US claim that CIA information saved Britain from a 9/11 style plot. Was this claim just a bid by George Bush to justify the CIA's abusive secret detention and torture programme? If there was no such American warning, did they have real information they failed to tell the Met about? You can read my comment here.

New revelations and admissions keep trickling out about the 10-year old 'war on terror', eg the Lithuanian government was last month the first European government to admit that it indeed host a secret CIA prison. I can only reiterate the LibDem and others' calls for a full, independent public inquiry into British involvement in extraordinary rendition.

Best regards,

Sarah Ludford