The ex minister for drug policy clearly took his job very seriously

If this was intentional, it's inspired. If not, oops.

May and Baker – A Tale of Drugs and Crime at Bonfire Time

The following poem was read to Norman Baker at the annual Lewes Liberal Democrat dinner on Nov 26th 2014. Notes at the end will help with appreciation of the poem's finer points.

May and Baker – A Tale of Drugs and Crime at Bonfire Time

In olden days did May & Baker
help the needy sick to take a
draught to treat that desperate fear:
Bismuth Salt for diarrhoea!

Chloroform & Anaesthetic,
Calomel (a diuretic),
drugs for all by M & B,
made in perfect harmony.

But now - a sorry tale to tell-
'twixt M & B all is not well.
Drugs became the source of friction
as Baker tried to cure addiction,

While all the time Theresa May
was locking troubled folk away.
But Baker said "the Portuguese
have come across this triffic wheeze:

Prison sentences are found
to cycle users round and round".
Baker said "by doing time
they learn about a life of crime."

With splutt’ring May now turning red
our Norman raised his voice and said
“Addiction can be cured the best
by going through the NHS (t)*”

He said “the scientific proof
is irrefutable, you goof.”
“We don’t want reason here,” said May,
“We’d rather throw the keys away.”


“What Nonsense,” Norman B replied,
“You have to see the other side.
The way to rid men of this vice
is through Restorative Justice.”

In Whitehall May ranked over Norm
and sticking to her previous form
she wouldn’t budge, so Norman B
waved his farewell to Ministry.

A perfect pair these two are not.
Theresa doesn’t know how hot
revenge will be. –The Final Story?
Norm’s a match for any Tory.


*the ‘t’ is silent as in cup.

Moral


The moral of the story’s clear
don’t give Theresa May your ear
before you go to meet your maker
Get out the vote for Norman Baker.

Presented to Norman Baker at the Lewes Liberal Democrats Annual Dinner November 2014 by the members of the Executive Committee of Lewes Constituency Liberal Democrats. Poem, if such it is, by Harvey Linehan and Peter Gardiner.

Notes

• Norman Baker is MP for Lewes where bonfires attended by 40,000 or more happen every November 5^th. Nov 5^th celebrates the failure of an attempt by Guy Fawkes and others to blow up Parliament in 1605, but the Lewes celebrations also memorialise 17 protestants martyred by the Catholic authorities during the Marian persecutions of 1555-57. Nov 5th is a country wide event, but the Lewes celebrations are spectacular.
• Effigies of topical public figures are burned on Lewes bonfires. These include Osama bin Laden in 2001, and Alec Salmond and Vladimir Putin this year. (Salmond seemed to take it quite well; we don't know what Putin thought.)
• Norman resigned from the Home Office on Nov 3^rd when Theresa May, the Home Secretary, refused to consider a paper setting out alternatives to imprisonment for drug users.
• 0n 5 November 2014, Adams, the Daily Telegraph's cartoonist, depicted Norman Baker lighting a bonfire on which sat an effigy of Theresa May. A copy of the cartoon was presented to Norman at the dinner.
• Between 1834 and 1984 a company aptly called May and Baker produced pharmaceutical drugs. This is one of their advertisements.

A government minister prepared to talk sensibly about drug policy

Truly times are a'changing. And we are getting full value for money from Norman Baker.

"The new Liberal Democrat minister responsible for drugs policy, Norman Baker, has refused to rule out a policy of legalising cannabis but said that it is not his prime objective in the job.

""I think it needs to be considered along with everything else. It is not my prime objective and I am not advocating it at the moment. We should be prepared to follow the evidence and see where it takes us," he said."

It goes on to say, "He is currently completing a year-long Home Office comparison of international drug policies and is due to visit the Czech republic and Switzerland next week as part of his research."  I was in Switzerland this weekend; missed an opportunity there, obviously....

The Reform Club

Not many serving government ministers get to release their own rock album.



Norman Baker and The Reform Club

A good week for Norman Baker

Norman Baker has had a good week. Two announcements about one of his first loves – sustainable transport. Technically, the one about trains wasn't his to make, but he supported the announcement by Simon Burns with his own enthusiasm. (There are respectable criticisms of the whole HS2 project from the sustainability point of view. In my view the whole idea became much better once it became clear that the line would run beyond Birmingham. And one of the most promoted ideas - that you can get bodies from London to Birmingham quicker - is, in my view, one of the weaker arguments in its favour, but that's for another post.) And then there was the announcement about funding to promote cycling - £62 million investment bringing the total announced over the last twelve months to £107 million. These are two of the most noticeable achievements of a steadily successful time at the Dept of Transport. I have to declare an interest – see below – but I believe that Norman can take quiet satisfaction from his time in office, putting Liberal Democrat principles and his personal priorities into action. These include improving local transport; expanding and improving the rail network; making transport more accessible; managing, improving and investing in the road network; and reducing greenhouse gases and other emissions from transport.

Promotion to office in government has deprived Parliament of one of its most effective practitioners at holding government to account. Labour has many fine performers but none, in my view, have the forensic tenacity that Norman displayed while in opposition. Arguably Parliament is the poorer for that. The compensation is a minister who is doing a good job at the complex art of governing.

My interest: I live in Norman's constituency, campaign for him and update his website. I do, however, continuously and forcefully make clear to him my dismay at the government's repugnant treatment of disabled people on benefits (see elsewhere in this blog), to the extent that the sight of an email from me sends a tremor down his spine. Not many people have that effect on him.

It's good being a Liberal Democrat

I was at Norman Baker's adoption meeting last night. He was introduced by Lord Oakeshott who told us what we knew already – that Norman has been a fantastic MP both in the constituency and in Parliament, and will continue to be a fantastic MP if he is re-elected. Lord Oakeshott had some words for us about not letting the Tories in on the back of dislike of Brown, replacing one bad lot with another. I particularly liked his line about not wanting to have a Chancellor on work experience (an original Oakeshott line, though one he's used before). To get Norman back in we have to overcome the standard Tory tactics of throwing money at a seat. Despite not having Lord Ashcroft's money, this not counting as a marginal, we are up against a very well funded Tory candidate with over £200,000 raised in the last two years. We compete with enthusiasm, good people, good policies and endless foot slogging.

It feels better than ever to be a Liberal Democrat at the moment. I have a wonderful MP, now candidate, to campaign for. I have an excellent set of policies to sell to voters on the doorstep. I can talk about genuine fairness, I can talk about properly thought through and funded tax proposals, I can talk about decent proposals for schools and hospitals.

I can talk about a great team. Nick Clegg as the leader, Vince Cable for Chancellor, Norman Baker himself on transport with many excellent ideas for getting Britain moving better, Chris Huhne's great common sense in the Home Secretary role, Ed Davey as Foreign Secretary, Simon Hughes on energy and climate change, where do I stop? Nick Clegg doesn't mind which of them gets photographed with him, unlike Gordon Brown who is photographed with his whole cabinet in the hope that he will sink into oblivion among them, and David Cameron who is photographed with none of his in case they remind people what they're really like.

And I can talk about a great record. Our consistency over the last few years is one of our strongest selling points. Consistent opposition to the Iraq War - fully justified by subsequent events ( and one that goes hand in hand with a realistic and hard headed defence policy for the future). Consistent opposition to the whole waste of money on ID cards. The fact that we heralded some of the problems brewing in the recession years before either Labour or Tories had a clue. A record on MPs expenses and other abuses that cannot be touched by Labour or Tories. Norman Baker began his campaign to reveal MPs' expenses with a Freedom of Information request in 2005, and his filibuster was crucial in 2007 in preventing Tories and Labour uniting to exempt Parliament from the Freedom of Information Act (reason alone to be proud of him). We proposed rules on lobbying in 2006 which were thrown out by the combined forces of the gravy train, Tory and Labour again.

So I can talk about a history of genuine honesty, fairness, consistency and principle. Yes, it's good to be a Liberal Democrat today.