Thursday 12th March 2015
caribtimes.com
17
Ed’s got no chance of winning a majority
LONDON - Former Cabinet minister, Lord Mandelson, has dismissed Labour’s
chances of winning a majority at the election. The Labour
peer said there was almost
certainly going to be a ‘stalemate hung Parliament’. Lord
Mandelson also stopped well
short of offering his enthusiastic endorsement of Ed
Miliband and once again attacked Labour’s proposed
‘mansion tax’ on expensive
homes. He said the tax on
properties worth over £2million would not ‘in a month of
Sundays’ raise the £1.2 billion a year predicted by the
Labour leader.
Asked if the party would
be doing better under another
leader, the peer said: ‘Do you
think your product would
be better if you changed the
wrapping? It depends what
you think people are voting
for.’ The Tories seized on the
former business secretary’s
comments as proof that Labour is relying on support
from the Scottish National
cont’d from pg 16
Party to propel Mr Miliband
into 10 Downing Street.
Looking ahead to the
election during a speech at
the Retail Week Live conference in London, Lord Mandelson said: ‘People basically are unhappy with what is
on offer. ‘They are therefore
shopping around in politics
in a way that the large parties are ill-equipped to deal
with and which will almost
certainly deliver us a stalemate hung Parliament in two
months’ time.’ Answering
questions after the speech,
Lord Mandelson was asked if
Labour would be doing better
in the polls ‘if it had a leader
the public liked better’. After
a long pause, the Labour peer
replied: ‘Do you think your
product would be better if
you changed the wrapping?
‘It depends what you
think people are voting for.
People are voting for more
than simply the personification of a party. ‘Of course
that is important, but they are
voting for the party’s values
his stories about government corruption,”
according to the paper. In 2013, López had
been publicly threatened by a public official
after the journalist published a story about
public works projects in the town, according to the Guatemalan press freedom group
CERIGUA. Marvin Robledo, director of
Radio Nuevo Mundo, told The Associated
Press that Salazar had not reported receiving
any threats and was not working on any sensitive stories when he was killed.
Jorge Ortega, a spokesman for Guatemalan President Otto Pérez Molina, told
reporters that the government was working
Lord Mandelson
and the party’s relevance, the
quality of that product and
whether they think that product - or in our case as politicians, that policy - will do for
them. ‘Of course, the leader
has a responsibility for being
the chief brand carrier of that
product or policy. ‘I think
you will see that, as the real
election campaign gets under
way, the leader of the Labour
Party will have the opportunities as well as the pressure
to explain, get his message
across and to draw others
more towards him and the
to apprehend all those responsible for the attack. Authorities arrested an individual suspected of being one of the attackers, news
accounts reported today.
Journalists at Prensa Libre marked the
murder on Wednesday afternoon by
observing a moment of silence in the
newsroom, according to the newspaper.
López is survived by his wife, who is pregnant, and five-year-old daughter. A special
report published by CPJ in September found
that amid pervasive violence and instability
caused by organized crime and corruption,
Guatemala experienced an alarming rise in
unsolved, anti-press violence. (CPJ).
party in order to shape their
voting decision.’
Speaking later at a Fabian conference in Westminster, Lord Mandelson said
he had been trying to make
the point that people should
not become ‘infatuated with
personality-driven media-obsessed politics’ which focus
entirely on the identity of
the leader. Discussing the
mansion tax, he said: ‘Not
in a month of Sundays will
it raise the amount of money
that is projected. Everyone
knows that it won’t.’
Conservative Party chairman Grant Shapps said:
‘Lord Mandelson is confirming what we now all know the only way Miliband will
get into Downing Street is if
he’s carried there in Alex Salmond’s pocket. ‘That would
mean more borrowing, higher taxes and weaker defences. Hard-working taxpayers
would pay the price for the
resulting economic chaos and
a weak leader who simply
isn’t up to the job of being
Prime Minister.’ (Adapted
from the Daily Mail).