old holborn | House of Comments

Mar

2010

18: Unite Against Ashcroft

Labour blogger Emma Burnell and libertarian Old Holborn join regulars Mark Thompson and Stuart Sharpe to talk about the political news of the week.

In this episode, we chatted about:

Unite, the UK’s largest public sector union, have donated some £11m to the Labour party, and the Conservatives have said this gives them undue influence over the government – is this equivalent to accusations Labour made over Lord Ashcroft’s donations to the Conservative Party?
With British Airways workers represented by Unite threatening to strike, could there be a political motivation behind the action? Some bloggers have suggested there may be a conspiracy in the works.
Nick Hogan, a landlord who was imprisoned after failing to pay fines for allowing allowed people to smoke in his pub, has been released after the fines were paid by bloggers and readers from all around the world. Old Holborn organised this campaign, and told us a little about what happened.
A number of deaths have been linked to mephadrome, a legal substitute for amphetamines. This has lead to calls for the drug to be banned – but how effective is drug prohibition?
Lastly, Gordon Brown has stated that even if Labour were to lose the next election, he intends to go on as the party leader. Is this likely to happen, and is it the message the electorate want to hear?