The man who claimed that New Labour had ’sexed up’ the dossier on the threat possed to the United Kingdom by Sadam Hussain’s Iraq is being quoted by Yasmin Qureshi on her most recent campaign material.

Andrew Gilligan was writing in Friday 29th Evening Standard. I picked up the most recent flyer – literally, there were some floating around the platform at Kilburn, Jubilee Line – in the early evening on Friday. I must congratulate Team:Yasmin on the quick turnaround of producing materials using this story.

The story in the Lack Of Standards describes the campaign in Brent East as an “ideological purity contest about who can reject Labour party policy most effectively.”

He continues… “Ms Qureshi has enlisted the help of a Labour politician called Tony. Tony Benn, that is, not Tony Blair. The first Tony was the star of a campaign event in Queen’s Park. The second Tony appears only on Lib-Dem leaflets, standing next to George Bush and looking shifty.”

When I spoke with someone who was at the Team:Yasmin ‘meet ‘n’ greet’ in Queen’s Park on Wednesday the soundbite they relayed to me was the same quoted by Andrew: Yasmin promises to be a “thorn in the side” of the government. On the campaign flyer ‘Brent East Labour News’ Yasmin states that she will ensure that the Labour Party carries on its investment in public services in Brent East. She goes as far as so say that only a Labour MP for Brent East is best placed, assuming a Labour Government, to do this. I’m not sure that these two positions can be taken simultanously: being a ‘thorn in the side’ as well as securing ‘even more money from a Labour government’. Will being a gadfly help Yasmin secure the investment she reports to be able of securing?

Will her ‘Queen’s Park Pledge’ come back to haunt her if elected? We can all monitor the official record of correspondance, comment and critism thanks to the people at TheyWorkForYou Dot Com. If she is elected we will all have access to the public record of the business of the Houses of Parliament. In the same way that Yasmin promises to hold the government to account, we shall be able to hold her to account.

I commented that there would be more on the Labour Party Brent East News ‘Delivering For You’.

One thing I noticed was that Tony (Blair not Benn) doesn’t feature on the campaign material. There are three photos of Ken ‘Red’ Livingstone – Labours prodigal son – and a photo of Tony Benn (Old ‘Old Labour’ – sorry Tony) in that upright but slightly reclined pose that he does so well. Another Old Labour party member, Diane Abbot, is quoted in support of Yasmin.

When you couple this with Yasmins anti-war, anti-terror legislation, pro-human rights stances, you get the picture of a Labour candidate in complete and full disagreement with the leadership of the party she is standing for. Is this a sign of Labour 2.0 (its like saying ‘New’) running out of steam when candidates are distancing themselves from the leadership of their party?

I mentioned a rumour that Team:Yasmin were to be in Queen’s Park cafe on Wednesday afternoon. Anyone have their lunchtime interputed by the campaign train pulling into the park? I hear Tony Benn was there supporting Labours candidate for Brent East. From the reports that I received it was a great ‘Audience with…’ with Tony and his anecdotes being well received by a cross-demographic audience.

More campaign materials from Sarah Teather.

And George ‘Rainbow’ Weiss’s Vote For Yourself Rainbow Dream Ticket Preferendum.

More photo analysis of Brent East News.

And a rumor of Team:Yasmin in Queen’s Park Café this lunch time…

later…

What else is there to notice about Brent East News ‘Delivering for YOU’…

I read the whole of the Ken Livingstone interview on the London Labour Party website. Campaigning in Brent East with Yasmin Qureshi Ken said:”I am delighted that my first election visit is in my old seat of Brent East, where human rights campaigner Yasmin Qureshi is in pole position to become Britain’s first ever Asian woman.”

The ’round robin’ makes four mentions of Yasmin’s ethnicity and gender. Today the Independent reports on analysis by the Fawcett Society of the proportion of women selected as candidates by the political parties. Looks like there is going to be an appeal to traditionally political inactive minorities in the final days of the campaign. Is this a competition between the Lib Dems and Labour? But pointing out gender and ethnicity and campaigning on it is a bit crass, no? I mean, I’ve got eyes…

Not scanned yet…. post later

I picked up a copy of Brent East News published by Yasmin and the BE Labour Party when in Queen’s Park on Monday. Under the headline ‘Delivering for You’ there is a photo of three police officers with a caption ‘Brent now has more than fifty extra police officers’.

Yasmin Qureshi's police, beating round the bush.

Fifty extra police officers! Shame that three of the fifty extra police officers in Brent East are on walkabout in Shepherds Bush. The photo of the three police officers clearly shows the Walkabout pub in Shepherds Bush in the background.

[4/5/2010 updated to remove dead link to image]

Brent Stop The War are holding a General Election Candidate Hustings…

‘…to answer your questions about where they stand on the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the withdrawal of troops and associated issues of Palestine, the “war on terror” and the attack on civil liberties.’

Here is the flyer.

It’ll be held at Dudden Hill Community Centre, TONIGHT 7.00 pm

From Brent Council’s email alert service:

Postal Vote Application Deadline:

The deadline to apply for a new postal vote is Tuesday 26th April at 5pm.
Please make sure all applications have arrived at the Town Hall by that time.
You can deliver them in person should you wish.

Telephone 020 8937 1372 or e-mail using the link below if you need any assitance.
E-mail Electoral Services mailto:electoral.services@brent.gov.uk
Brent’s General Election Pages http://www.brent.gov.uk/generalelection

Chris, a reader of this blog, writes:

Hi Rob,
Maybe you were there tonight. If so, I’m wasting your time. If not, highlights included: Kwasi (who, incidentally, and I appreciate this is always the luck of the draw, is the only candidate I have seen campaigning in the streets) being compared to Boris Johnson; a nice Irish chap pointing out that some Candidate for Kilburn’s Beleaguered Motorists (really? I have not been canvassed, but I am willing to believe) might cull the vital few hundred votes in a very tight campaign; Yasmin saying she’s one of those people who constantly gets parking tickets and forgets to pay and has to pay the extra (she must be made of money); and Yasmin saying she was all for the replanting of Brondesbury’s lost trees because the environment is vital, and oxygen is important (I do not think the questioner was envisaging a rainforest).

There was the the usual knickers in twists over tactical voting (Conservatives had 10% last time; Lib Dems had 10% the time before; we want PR anyway; you’re not voting for a local MP, so vote New Labour to keep the Tories out, because the margin’s really small, actually, promise it is). Got the usual feeling that many constituents are labour voters faced with extremely articulate and personable LibDem and Conservative candidates.

The Candidate for Kilburn’s Beleaguered Motorists… is that Michele Weininger? I’ve still not hearded anything about this candidate – any info readers?

The candidates from Labour, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats are all highlighting crime in their campaigns.

• But do we need ‘more police on patrol to make our area safer for all’? (Sarah Teather – Standing Up For You)

• Has the fear of crime ‘increased’ in Brent? (Kwasi Kwarteng – In Touch)
• Is ‘crime and the fear of crime and issue for every neighbourhood in London’? (Yasmin Qureshi – Mapesbury Labour News)

If you’d like to see the crime statistics for Brent, the Met have great interactive map, but data looks better as text only.

But do the stats tell the whole story? You’d kind of expect ‘incident count’ crime statistics to increase; I’m not saying that crime is impossible to reduce, just that there could be externalities to the data: a population increase in a borough for example. I’m looking for a crime rate per capita index and other data sets, and if I find any I’ll share them. We can find stastics for just about anything but I’m having trouble finding a dataset on ‘fear of crime’…

I’ve been reading up on the entitlement of a prospective parliamentary candidate to the use of Royal Mail delivery services.

In Brent East, a candidate is entitled to use Royal Mail to deliver 40907 items of campaign literature. What I’m not sure about is if that is in total (i.e. to all the households) or per ‘drop’.

There is further information on the Roayl Mail service to candidiate here. Or you could check out the Department of Consitiutional Affairs ‘guidance for electoral administrators and information on electoral legislation‘.

If you have the knowledge perhaps you will share it here?