The British Weekly October 3, 2009 : Page 1
MOVING BACK HOME? Schumacher Cargo Logistic, Inc • European Owned and Operated • Competitive Rates • On Line tracking system • Free storage offered in LA PITCH PERFECT: - The Damned United (Page 10) California’s British Accent™ - Since 1984 • Saturday, October 3, 2009 • Number 1281 (562) 408 6677 Always Free See our ad on Page 5! BROWN’S FINAL THROW OF THE DICE s “The election...will not be about my future,” embattled PM tells party faithful in defiant Brighton address A combative and passionate Gordon Brown urged Labour’s faithful “not to give up but fight to win” as he unveiled his policy blueprint for the next General Election. In his last conference speech before the nation decides, the Prime Minister appealed to voters not to turn the next poll into a referendum on his leadership, acknow- ledging his continuing unpopularity in opinion surveys. “The election to come will not be about my futu- re. It’s about your future, your job, your home, your children’s school, your hospital, your commu- nity. It’s about the future of your country.” For the second year running, he was introdu- ced to the conference by his wife Sarah, who des- cribed him as “my hus- band, my hero”. Aligning his govern- Exchange Rate Update £1 = $1.596 (updated 6pm 10/01/09 ment with the “hard-wor- king majority, not the pri- vileged few”, Mr Brown urged his party to “never stop believing” and in a defiant message declared: “Since 1997, Labour has given this country back its future. And we are not done yet.” He unveiled a raft of proposals in an attempt to show his party had not run out of political steam. The PM responded to the furore over Westminster expenses with plans to shake up the democratic system, inclu- ding a new power for constituents to recall mis- behaving MPs, a referen- dum on introducing the Alternative Vote for gene- ral elections, whereby can- didates have to get 50% of the ballot to win a seat, and a commitment to a “democratic and accoun- table” House of Lords. He vowed that during the next Parliament ID cards would not become compulsory and that the minimum wage, child benefit and child tax credit would be increased every year. These included a crack- down on antisocial beha- viour, new powers for councils to ban 24-hour drinking in their areas, “tough love” intervention for the 50,000 most diffi- cult families, police action squads to tackle disorder in the run-up to Christmas and swifter cancer diag- noses. However, all of these would apply to England and not to Scotland. Indeed, Mr Brown men- tioned Scotland only once during his hour-long address, attacking the “narrow nationalists” of the SNP; he spent most of his fire power on David “Since 1997, Labour has given this country back its future.And we are not done yet.” - Gordon Brown at the Labour Party Conference this week Cameron’s Tories. He said: “The Conservative Party want people to believe that the ballot paper has an option marked change without consequence; that’s it’s only a change of the team at the top. “They’ve done their best to conceal their policies and their instincts but the financial crisis forced them to show their hand and they showed they had no hearts.” The Prime Minister’s speech left the conference delegates buoyed, but opponents were unim- pressed. Eric Pickles, the Tory Chairman, denounced it as “just a long shopping list with no price tag”, while Angus Robertson, the SNP’s Westminster leader, branded it “a des- perate last throw of the dice”. But if the Labour dele- gates gave Brown a warm reception, he had no such luck with the British news networks. Later in the day he was visibly shaken after being asked by a BBC correspondent about rumors that he is taking anti-depressants, and on Wednesday Brown attempted to storm out of a hostile Sky News inter- view – only to be pegged back by his microphone lead, which tethered him firmly into his chair. Sun no longer shining for Labour - See page 3
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