Fieldwatch 3: ‘Everyone has their price…’

We are really,really sorry we started this ‘Fieldwatch’ mullarkey .We promised we’d keep you posted on the media appearances of the political anomaly that is Frank Field. He’s the MP for Birkenhead but he’s not a Labour MP and not an independent MP either. What exactly is he? – all a bit unsatisfactory but as far as we’re concerned Frankenfield has been more than unsatisfactory for many a year.

However the alerts we get at Leaky Towers about Field are absolutely,bloody relentless . Media whore doesn’t come close to describing the media coverage this man craves from predictably, Wirral Globe and Liverpool Echo , inevitably The S*n, The Daily Mail, The Daily Telegraph , The Guardian and surprisingly to Horticulture Week (!) to The Sydney Morning Herald… on and on and on it goes.

We’ll just concentrate on a couple of stories and taking a leaf out of Field’s playbook we admit that we’ve chosen them for our own purposes. If you want further details you’ll have to take us on trust and Google the stories yourself.

First – let us consider Frank and prostitution. He’s certainly got his money worth out of this particular ‘story’. There have been a number of press stories where he claims that women have been forced into walking the mean streets of Birkenhead directly because of the implementation of Universal Credit. It may be false,it may be true but nothing stops a Fieldian anecdote from becoming a press-worthy fact . What’s more surely he’s been well acquainted for a long time with people at Wirral Council getting big money for screwing over the people of Wirral (and sometimes each other)?

Second – and again inevitably – Field gegs in on the ‘Sir’ Philip Green being identified being ‘not a very nice person’ by Lord Hain using – some might say abusing – parliamentary privilege in the House of Lords . Who knew Green could be such a serious baddun’ ? We all bloody did!

Field’s press comments haven’t deviated from his own belief that Green is a baddun’ but skirts around the more problematic areas of NDAs (Non Disclosure Agreements) where money is exchanged in return for silence, or bullying or allegations of racism. Might we suggest this could have something to do with such matters being a bit too close to home when it comes to his local political allies…

 

Who are the real ‘Red Menace’ ?

Thanks to those who have got in touch with reactions to some rabid stories which have appeared in both the local and national press concerning the ongoing melodrama within the local Labour Party (and specifically Birkenhead Constituency Labour Party).

First there was the Wirral Globe front page story which was headlined : ‘Death Threats made to to Birkenhead MP Frank Field‘ although the article provides no examples of such threats being made on social media. Tweets wishing someone is dead may not be very nice but they still doesn’t constitute a death threat. Consequently the article just provides Frankenfield the opportunity to resurrect memories of Militant Tendency that resemble nothing more than McCarthyite-era fears of reds under the bed .

This ‘Red Menace’ theme was expanded on yesterday at great length in what can only be described as another piss-poor piece of scaremongering even by The Daily Mail’s risible standards under the headline :

How the hard left is reclaiming Merseyside: Three decades after Derek Hatton made them unelectable, Corbynistas are forcing Labour moderates from their heartlands

This week local Labour Party Secretary  John Maher and Labour councillor Tony Norbury are featured after last week’s Frank Field inspired press tsunami which starred his superannuated political groupie Cllr Moira ‘Matron’ McLaughlin playing a supporting role as a ‘witness’ to a bullying incident that she heard about secondhand on Twitter.  It didn’t stop The Sunday Times  publishing the story as ‘fact’. Whereas the sad fact in all this is the press attention that is being given to these no-marks for the former’s political ends and the latter’s personal ends.

Read it for yourself and make up your own mind: here

Having said that we’re inclined to believe some of what is written about Maher as needless to say we’ve featured him on Wirral Leaks before . Once again how prescient of us to write in 2016 about this Labour -turned Green-turned Red again political chameleon :

From what we can gather about his behaviour within the Green Party is that if he’s true to his “principles” it won’t be long before he falls out with his suddenly rekindled allegiances within the local  Labour Party  – as it’s a case of Maher-way or the highway.

Read more here :   A Maher-vellous Result for Labour 

However much of what is claimed in the Daily Mail shock horror probe about Maher is all a bit ‘meh’ .  Among the anonymous reports about him making people feel ‘incredibly uncomfortable’ there is this hilarious quote :

I was a police officer prior to re-joining the Labour Party and have been trained in reading body language when in confrontational situations. To me it was clear that the body language displayed by both John Maher and [a friend] was clearly threatening…

Meanwhile regurgitated from last week’s scare stories published elsewhere there’s patronising tales of Maher and Norbury upsetting the Labour ‘laydeez’ with their belligerent ways. All of the above conduct has apparently been reported to Andy Smith the Labour Party’s top official in the North-West by a group of six Labour politicians who plotted, sorry, met with Smith one Saturday at Birkenhead Town Hall (somebody needs to tell Daily Mail it’s not the Wirral Council HQ but again why let a lack of local knowledge get in the way of cutting edge investigative journalism?)

Who are the unnamed ‘Gang of Six’ we ask ourselves? We’d go for  Birkenhead MP  Frank Field , Cllr George Davies (of course), Cllr Phil Davies , Cllr Moira McLaughlin,  Cllr Steve Foulkes , Cllr Brian Kenny  or Cllr Jean Stapleton  (you may have your own pick of the politicians – let us know) .

Whoever they were they were complaining about an ‘an orchestrated campaign to remove long-standing and hard-working’ Labour officials in which ‘suggestions have been made that people are corrupt and ineffective’

We have to say that this is something we can wholeheartedly get with. What’s more we think that knowing what he knows about the local Labour cabal Maher has been rather restrained – and yes, Mr Maher we have seen the emails which contain similar information to that which was sent to Anna Hutchinson – Regional Director of Labour North West.

Under the circumstances is there a more sickening, hypocritical spectacle than Wirral Council ‘leader’ Cllr Phil ‘Power Boy Pip’ Davies whinging that ‘Bullying is a serious issue, and to have it ignored like this just beggars belief.  Isn’t this someone who was part of a small gang of Labour politicians who tried (and failed) to suppress allegations of a bullying culture at Wirral Council which we maintain persists to this day? And could this be the same ‘gang’ who are now feigning victimhood about being ‘bullied’ themselves? We think the people of Wirral should be told – and fear not Wirral Leaks will be telling ALL very soon…

… and finally in light of the information contained in the Daily Mail  article can we say the most offensive thing we could identify was the sight of Derek Hatton’s mullet!