Saturday, 23 January 2010

Tim Montgomerie Argues A Lost Cause

Tim Montgomerie, on Conservative Home, posts on Malcolm Pearsons implied threat that Ukip will stand against most Better Off Our signatories, but then states:

All the same, I would argue that for anyone who agrees with UKIP's principle aim of getting out of the European Union, their preferred direction of travel will be infinitely better represented by a Conservative Government than by a Labour one, and that voting UKIP is merely aiding and abetting the europhiles in Labour and the Lib Dems."

One has to argue with the 'logic' of Tim Montgomerie when it is obvious that if one follows the view of Ukip - that we need to get out of the EU - how is that better served by deciding their preferred direction of travel is better represented by a Conservative government, when that party is going to campaign on retaining membership of the EU? Yes, it may well occur that a Labour or LibDem candidate defeats their Conservative opponent by a few votes due to potential Conservative voters having decided to put their X against the Ukip candidate. The answer Tim is very simple - get your party to change its non-policy on the EU!

On the basis that a candidate has signed up to the Better Off Out campaign means 'squat diddly'. To sign up means zilch - what does count is action, as signing-up entails nothing, 'actionwise'. If such a singatory fails to deliver, voters have no recourse to hold them to account. The Better Off Campaign highlights one of the faults inherent in campaigns - failure to deliver the aims of a campaign carries no penalty to the signatory, hence no compulsion on the signatory to deliver. Whereas the pledge requested by the Albion Alliance is a legally binding agreement that they will actually do what they promise - break a voluntary agreement and the result is 'suffer  the consequences'.

As with any Conservative 'idea', or policy, today - it does not stand up to scrutiny!

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