On Friday the Tory Shadow home secretary Ann Widdecombe came to Sheffield. As she famous for the reactionary racist crap she spouts about asylum seekers, several protest groups decided they would like to give her a heart felt send off.
About thirty of us met up on Eccelsall Road. This was a pre arranged meeting place, but we had a good tip of that she would be visiting 'Simply Carriages', a posh pub on Eccelsall Road South. By about an hour later we had all assembled in the car park up there. The chef (owner?) tried to have us thrown of, obviously worried about loosing the good publicity of having Tory scum eat at your restaurant. He failed in this attempt as there weren't enough police there.
Unfortunately we had turned up to early and rather than having Ann inside the building it was obvious she would not turn up and have a debate with real people. We spotted John Harthman the ex Tory MP for Hallam try and sneak off, so a few of us tried to follow on bikes. Unfortunately they took the cunning route of escaping up hill, so we lost him.
And that was that. We all went home having been filmed by the police. Hardly that radical. SO imagine my surprise when I opened Saturdays Star to see the following article. It is worth noting that the space taken up by the four words of the headline was larger than that taken up by the rest of the article.
A protest by students and left wing groups interrupted a visit to Sheffield by shadow home secretary Ann Widdecombe.
She abandoned her schedule involving a pavement chat to shoppers and a meeting with the Chamber of Trade after police advice.
About 50 students and members of left wing groups including the socialist alliance, gathered outside a Bents Green pub where she was due to meet Chamber of Trade's chief executive John Taylor.
But Ms. Widdecombe completed most of her engagements before a helicopter departed from lodge Moor.
"The Visit was rescheduled on police advice," she said. "The police already have enough to do without diverting their attention. It takes an awful lot to keep a small mob under control."
Ms Widdecombe was in town to support Hallam Conservative John Harthman in his bid to win back the seat lost by the Tories for the first time in 1997 to the Lib Dems' Richard Allan.
The Tory front bencher was due to talk on crime and disorder, but it was her forthright views on asylum that sparked the protest..
Among demonstrators was Sheffield Students' Union President Andrzej Nowakowski. He said "My grandparents were asylum seekers from Poland. We don't agree with scapegoating today's asylum seekers."
Earlier Ms Widdecombe met shopkeepers and the public in Banner Cross and said Hallam people were concerned about law and order, asylum seekers, Europe, education and the health service.
Before leaving Sheffield she was met by students of Sheffield Hallam University, who had been victims of crime. They presented her with their rugby club calendar showing the team in various stages of undress.
Sheffield Star - Saturday 26th May 2001
While a lot of the article might not seem that bad really, I will again point out that the headline with its tabloid style of sensationalist wording was larger, in terms of space on the page than the text of the article. This seriously alters the tone for the skim reader. Indeed the closest link in terms of language in the rest of the article is Ann's description of us as a 'mob'. Yep that's fascist loonies all round then.
Perhaps the most worrying thing is that the newspaper, supposedly part of a great tradition in upholding the traditions of democracy does not even question why she was too afraid to talk to people that did not have the same view as her. Is this because she believes her policies to be irrefutable or because she is afraid that in debate people will see them for the right wing rant that they are.
The only people she would go any where near were rugger buggers, world renowned for their high levels of racial tolerance and support of fair socialist issues, I don't think. Yep that's right she went to meet the Tory MP of the future. Ignore the part about them being victims of crime as I know plenty of people at Hallam University who have been burgled and she did not come to see any of them.
Indeed this shows just how stage managed meet and greets for the political hierarchy are. They don't dare set foot out of party supporter circles. Indeed anybody who saw last nights show on Channel Four, about people who infiltrated party central offices during the run up to the election will see, how the Tories have a hit squad who visit areas with Hague to make it look like locals are out in support, waving blue banners. The same hit squad then try and disrupt Labour events.
What I am trying to highlight is a small reason why the real people are not included in parliamentary democracy as it stands. We are ignored and avoided at all costs, by people who quite frankly couldn't give a dam.
When there is nobody to vote for, vote for nobody!
Or vote: Dennis the Menace, the Electronic Politician!!!! Visit www.nospin.org.uk - go tick his cyberbox