debate in West Worthing on 13th April. This was a great evening even
though one member of the audience, thanking the chairman, said that it
had convinced him not to vote for any of them.
(My report is not unbiased - beware of unbiased reports, they are seldom
what they seem!)
The questions from the audience were wide-ranging and the candidates had
time to answer all of them. That would make for a long report so I will
jump to the final question (it happened to be mine!)
"What use is Trident? Is there nothing else we could be spending public
money on?"
Sir Peter Bottomly clearly thought the issue was far too complicated for
us (dare I say "plebs"?) to understand but he went on to say that he
wanted a nuclear deterrent but it had to be "transparent". So far so honest.
Tim Cross of UKIP was disappointing on this question because he clearly
had not given it any thought. He just repeated the mantra that we needed
to spend billions on Trident "to defend ourselves." How we defend
ourselves against home-grown suicide bombers with Trident was beyond his
ken.
Ms Thorpe (now there is a Liberal name from the past!) fumbled over
whether a like-for-like Trident replacement was a good idea but opted
for a bargain basement nuclear deterrent. That does sound a little unsafe.
David Aherne had at least done his homework. He pointed out that use of
Trident would break the UN Charter and the 1996 ruling of the
International Court of Justice - both of which Britain is signed up to.
He was against it - it is not very green to have a nuclear war.
We got two for the price of one from Jimmy Deen. He admitted Miliband's
love for Trident is one of the romances of the decade but he himself was
opposed to it.
Two audience comments,
"It makes no sense for Hazel Thorpe to say how important education is
when her party famously supported tuition fees."
"Tim (Cross) is nasty but dim. To blame everything on immigrants makes
him look foolish."
I could also mention that Bottomley does come across as smug; David
Aherne isn't going to set the world on fire (that wouldn't be very
environmentally friendly anyhow) and if you vote for the nice Labour
Candidate will it be enough to stop the nasty consequences?
Nobody who voted for that nice young Tony Blair thought they were voting
for the Iraq war!
And I repeat my thanks to Worthing Skeptics in the Pub - a good time was
had by all.
If I had the chance I would vote Socialist! There are no Trade Unionist
and Socialist Coalition candidates in Worthing West. Not this time.
--
http://derekmcmillan.com
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