Vote Blue, Go Pink!
It would seem that a certain blogger we first spoke to this time last week has had a little watch of Greenwich himself. A reader emailed us to point out that Iain Dale had posted an entry about Greenwich Conservatives. Apparently, as a play on the "Vote Blue, Go Green" slogan the Tories had at the local elections, three of their councillors have decided to change it to "Vote Blue, Go Pink", as they plan to hold regular monthly surgeries for the gay and lesbian community of Greenwich. We've been told there was a graphic as well although we cannot see it on the site.
It's rather clear that the readership of Iain Dale's blog don't particulary like the concept and we can't deny we have a bit of sympathy with their views. We're a bit confused as to why the gay community needs their own surgeries. What next? Disabled only surgeries?
According to Cllr Chris Taylor (see his comments here), the surgeries have come about after extensive surveying in the borough. Interestingly he says that there is a large gay community in the "North of the Borough" so they've decided to hold the surgeries in the south of the borough in Eltham. Now that's joined-up thinking!
posted by greenwich.watch at 8:53 pm
5 Comments:
I was not aware that members of the gay and lesbian community could not attend the surgeries along with the rest of us, or are the worthy persons trying to say that these people are different from the rest of us. I think they would be better employed trying to solve some of the boroughs problems than wasting time on silly ideas like this, I am not gay but if I was I would think this an insult, why should it mean that they are not able to join with the rest of us, or conversely us with them, I think it is time for me to look at my membership of the party.
As Cllr Taylor says in his comments:
"whether we like it or not, we are unfairly perceived as being ignorant of gay issues."
You could naturally go beyond this and point out Section 28 etc, though what relevance this has for politics in Greenwich in 2006 is beyond me.
There's some juicy gossip on the state of factional politics within Greenwich Conservatives in another of the comments there:
All of these Councillors represent wards in the (new) Eltham parliamentary constituency. They are all gay, as is the PPC, David Gold.
People aren't bothered by this in itself (and individually all of these 4 are engaging company and hard-working), but the fact that they are collectively making such an issue of their sexuality, and that they represent such a large proportion of the local Conservative Party association (far greater than the gay share of the local population as a whole) is in danger of stereotyping the whole of the Conservatives in Eltham as being branded as pro-gay fanatics.
Not true, but this behaviour is pushing the tolerance of some of the people who elected them. There are plenty of other issues in Eltham (crime, poor schools, poor transport, state of the High Street, housing issues) that affect many more members of the local population - perhaps they should concentrate on these matters if they are not to be seen as a fringe irrelevance by the majority of the local population.
Or alternatively... "some of my best friends are gay but this sort of thing really won't go down well on housing estates in Eltham."
That said, at least Greenwich Tories now have what approaches a half representative group on the council these days. Where are Labour's gay councillors? Young councillors? Ethnic councillors outside of the usual suspects?
After the recent "primary" selection, many attending Tories went to an after party at the George and Dragon pub in Greenwich. It's a gay pub. Maybe that's where the idea came from.
While gay Tory councillors create a pink ghetto, Dome owners advertise for casino croupiers. Is there anyone in charge at Greenwich Council at all? Read my lips - on present information, you do not have a mandate to apply for this supercasino licence. You should withdraw your application.
Nobody's heard much about the 'Pink' surgeries since the initial fuss and David Gold et al seem to be concentrating their fire on all the bread and butter issues such as crime, playing fields, education, even saving post offices. Maybe David and his fellow gay eltham politicians read Greenwich Watch after all. Well done for getting things back on track!
Post a Comment
<< Home