Georges speech to parliament in the Iraq "debate".

[Brown Sauce]

When I was his warm-up act, I used to describe the right hon. Member for
Manchester, Gorton (Sir Gerald Kaufman) as the best Foreign Secretary we
never had, and his speech this evening showed why. Indeed, an alternative
Administration of all the talents became clear on the Labour Benches,
including the right hon. Gentleman's friends the right hon. Member for
Holborn and St. Pancras (Frank Dobson), and the hon. Members for Islington,
North (Jeremy Corbyn) and for Liverpool, Walton (Mr. Kilfoyle). How much
stronger the Labour party's position would be in the opinion polls today if
those were the men sitting around the Cabinet table, rather than the men and
women who are.

What a contrast there was between those shafts of light and the myopia
displayed by the Foreign Secretary. So rose-tinted were her glasses that she
had even spotted the first elections in Saudi Arabia. As one who follows
events in the Arab world closely, I must tell the House that I missed the
first elections in Saudi Arabia, probably

the un-freest, most undemocratic and most anti-democratic country on earth.
So keen was the Foreign Secretary to describe the success of Anglo-American
policy in the Arab world that she prayed in aid a grant to the youth
parliament in Bahrain.

But those were not the most foolish of the things that the Foreign Secretary
said in her long speech. She talked about supporting the Government and
people of Lebanon. Well, let us split that proposition. She was not much
help to the Government of Lebanon when its Prime Minister was weeping on
television and begging for a ceasefire, and when the British and American
Governments alone in the world were refusing, indeed blocking, any attempts
to demand an immediate cessation of the Israeli bombardment. Worse, she was
not much help to the Government or the people of Lebanon when British
airports were being used for the trans-shipment of American weapons to
Israel that were raining down death and destruction on the very people of
Lebanon whom she now claims to stand beside. But, of course, that was code
for saying that she does not support the 1 million demonstrators in the
square in Beirut who are demanding democracy.

The Foreign Secretary describes the Government of Lebanon as a democratic
Government. If the Minister will listen, I can educate him. There is no
democratic Government in Lebanon. The Minister should know that. If there
were a democracy in Lebanon, Hassan Nasrallah would be the President,
because he would get the most votes. But of course he cannot be the
President, because you have to be a Christian to be the President, and you
have to be a Sunni to be the Prime Minister, and you have to be a Shi'ite to
be the Speaker. What they have in Lebanon is precisely the opposite of
democracy. It is a sectarian building-block Government that they have in
Lebanon, and moreover one based on a census that is more than 50 years out
of date. If those 1 million demonstrators had been in Ukraine or Belarus or
Georgia, they would be described as the orange revolution, or given some
other epithet—perhaps even "the cedar revolution".

So myopic was the Foreign Secretary that she talked about the peace process
in Palestine and refused to condemn the theft, as the right hon. Member for
Manchester, Gorton put it—he used the word—of $900 million, stolen from the
Palestinian Authority. The right hon. Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Jane
Kennedy), without a hint of irony, advanced the extraordinary proposition
that we are fighting for democracy in Iraq, while we can steal the money of
the Palestinian Administration in the occupied territories because the
people voted for a Government whom Olmert, Bush and Blair did not like. So
myopic was the Foreign Secretary's view that she prayed in aid an opinion
poll from Basra which told us that the people had every confidence in the
police—we had to send the British in to blow up a police station and kill
umpteen Iraqi policemen because we said that they were about to massacre the
prisoners in their jails.

The Foreign Secretary prayed in aid the Iraqi Government—a virtual
Government—saying that, more importantly, the Iraqi Government do not
consider that they have a civil war. Of course they do not, because there is
no Iraqi Government. As the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton put it,
we have installed a gang of warlords in power in Baghdad, the heads of
competing militias, some of them at war with our own soldiers in the south
of Iraq. It is not a Government, but Martin Scorsese's "Gangs of New York"
that we have put in charge in Baghdad. That is not my concept. That is the
concept of the right hon. Member for Manchester, Gorton.

So myopic was the Foreign Secretary that she had her finger out and wagging
at Iran, warning it of what it must do, or must not do in terms of nuclear
weapons. She is the Foreign Secretary of a Government who are about to spend
�75 billion on our own nuclear weapons, who declare themselves the best
friend of Israel, which has hundreds of nuclear weapons and refuses to sign
the non-proliferation treaty, and who say nothing about Pakistan, a military
dictatorship acquiring nuclear weapons. It would make you laugh if it did
not make you cry.

Most serious of all was the extent to which the Foreign Secretary sought to
lull us to sleep walk into a coming conflict with Iran. Invited by one of
her colleagues to describe, as the former Foreign Secretary had, an attack
on Iran as inconceivable, she refused, preferring instead the formulation
that no one is contemplating it. But they are contemplating it. Israel has a
war plan carefully worked out to do it. As we know from the journalism of
Seymour Hersh, the greatest of all American journalists, who brought us the
stories from Vietnam, American generals have to the nth degree worked out an
attack upon Iran.

The Foreign Secretary says that we stand by our soldiers. We stand by them
so much that we pay them so little. We had to give them a Christmas bonus to
make up their wages. Their families are claiming means-tested benefits and
living in houses that you would not put a dangerous dog in. We send them,
ill clad, ill equipped, ill armed, without armour, on a pack of lies into
war after war after war.

Let me invite the House to contemplate this and see if I am as right about
this as I was about Iraq four years ago. If a finger is raised against Iran
by Israel or the United States, the first people to pay the price will be
the 7,000 young men and women of the British armed forces that we have
stationed in the south of Iraq, where Iran, thanks to us, is now top dog. If
Members want to know what that will look like, think about the film "Zulu",
but without the happy ending. That is how irresponsible our Government are.
They are part of an axis that is contemplating a war against a country that
we have made powerful in a place where we have our soldiers standing in a
thin red line in the sand.

For the moment, the trial of Tony Blair merely takes place on Channel 4
television. The day will come, and it is coming soon, when a real trial of
Tony Blair will take place in a real court.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And so say all of us, one reason why George must stand for parliament next time !!!

[popinjay]

Anybody got the video?

[Meta4]

Yup. Putting it on the gg website for download in about half hour or so.

[Brown Sauce]

thanks Meta4, I am quite surprised at the amount of MP's present, or rather lack of.

[Meta4]

You can bet that if the government had allowed a vote - which they didn't - then when the vote was called, you'd suddenly have seen hundreds of Labour MPs lining up to vote with Blair.

See, I'm with George on the whole Parliament thing. I've never seen someone work as hard for constituents ad him, but I believe you don't generally serve your constituents well by sitting in the commons chamber.

However, just to be glib, I think 655000 Iraqis deserved better than for the Commons to have been almost entirely empty during the debate. Thankfully, the real audience is out there, and they'll get the message.

[Brown Sauce]

the real audience will get the message, but doesn't the fact that he is a serving member lend weight to the delivery of that message ?

[faceless]

that was a fantastic speech - it's also available for download in the "downloads" thread.

[Meta4]

Brown Sauce - absolutely; the point I was making wasn't really on this issue. It's on the fact that for most votes, MPs are just lobby fodder, and as a constituent of George's I'd far rather he be doing stuff here than waiting for a vote the result of which is a foregone conclusion.

Saying that, there's no great principle at stake here; if Parliament was more effective, if the governments of the last few decades hadn't undermined it so much, I'd feel different.

[faceless]

I just found this blog entry about Galloway's speech and thought it was a great example of someone admitting they'd been wrong with grace... The blogger (Colcam) deserves a clap for this.

[faceless]

This link has the entire debate (not just Galloway's part) documented in an easily digestible form... I found Michael Meacher's comments interesting to read.

CLICK HERE