Lib Dems "act shamelessly"

Local politics sometimes provides a few amusements, but none so much as the activities of the Lib Dems in Harlow.

I and my fellow councillors had an email this evening from a Lib Dem councillor calling for all councillors to avoid gutter politics, respect others and promoting decency in public life.

And that would be great if the Lib Dems actually believed that. We know that what their Association of Liberal Democrat Councillors schemes is something completely different.

As was recently reported in the Guardian, and raised in the House of Commons the Lib Dems advise their councillors to "Be wicked, act shamelessly, stir endlessly."

The Libs also advise "Don't be afraid to exaggerate." but worse than that it advises Lib Dem Councillors to deceive the public by saying different things to different people "you can secure support from voters who normally vote Tory by being effectively anti-Labour and similarly in a Tory area secure Labour votes by being anti-Tory."

I suppose a message to all of us in Harlow, as they fight a council By-election in Staple Tye and then the County Council Elections, is that we should be prepared for lots of nasty negative campaigning since they believe that "Positive campaigning will NOT be enough to win control of the council."

The ultimate insult to voters in Harlow though, is that the Liberals advise their councillors that "You are NOT running the council. It's NOT your problem."

Surely all councillors are elected to work for the best of their abilities for their public, not to "be wicked, act shamelessly, stir endlessly"!