The Leaders Debate - Live From Spin Alley

TB is reporting for

Guy News

live from the Spin Room. He will be busy doing some camera handy-work but you can follow his tweet directly here or, along with a few others here:

Live By The Tweet...

The first case of electoral Twitter law breaking in the land and who do you think it could possibly have been... drum roll please... of course. Labour's very own Twitter Tsar Kerry McCarthy. As a lawyer and a whip you would hope she would have just taken a moment to think, "hang on...maybe I shouldn't broadcast this sensitive infomation to the world". She has tried to laugh it off to

Sky

but suddenly it gets serious. Her opponents have a very good case against her in terms of election rules and it seems the

Sunlight Centre

have a very good case against her in terms of the law.

Chief Constable
Avon and Somerset Constabulary
Police Headquarters
PO Box 37
Valley Road, Portishead
Bristol
BS20 8QJ

29th April 2010

By fax to 01275 816 040

COMPLAINT REGARDING KERRY MCCARTHY'S
PUBLICATION OF POSTAL VOTE DATA

To the Chief Constable,

I am writing to ask you to investigate a possible breach of electoral law by Kerry McCarthy, the Labour Party candidate in Bristol East.

On Thursday, April 29th 2010 at 14:36, it appears Ms. McCarthy posted the following information on her Twitter account:

“First PVs opened in east Bristol, our sample: Eng Dems █; Greens █; UKIP █; TUSC █; BNP █; Lib Dem █; Tory █; Labour █. #

gameON

!”

When the information was "retweeted" (re-posted) by other users of the site with queries as to whether her knowing and publishing the information was legal, she apparently deleted the tweet. It seems did this too quickly for it to appear in the Google cache record. It does, however, appear in the records of Tweetminster, an online aggregator of political tweets. The relevant Tweetminster record is appended for your convenience and is available at the following web address: 

https://search.tweetminster.co.uk/statuses/?q=first+pvs+opened+in+east+bristol

Upon phoning Bristol Electoral Services, we were told that all the candidates' agents were present at the opening of around two hundred postal votes this week. They are not meant to see the results, however, and if they do are under strict confidentiality rules, not least because they risk prejudicing the results of the election. There are further laws against publishing the information in written form.

We ask you to investigate whether Ms. McCarthy did, indeed, have access to and publish confidential information about postal votes, and whether her agent could have passed her the information.

Yours faithfully

The letter is with the police.

Callous Smears from Tom Callow

Labour and their supporters really are getting desperate. Take Tom Callow for example:

Apart from bearing an uncanny resemblance to a Swan Vesta, the only other amusing thing about this chap is his Prescott levels of delusion as he attempts to attack any opponent to Gordo.

Yesterday this PR bod and Labour activist was violently off message and spent the afternoon smearing Mrs Duffy as a racist and xenophobe, the evidence of which is plastered across his

Twitter page

. Ouch, such outspoken activists are hardly doing well to help the desperate crisis management team flapping at the top of his Party.

Now Callow has decided it would be a good idea to create some fake Twitter accounts and begin Tweeting attacks as a fake Tory member. "Con Chris" and "Tory Boy 10" have appeared out of nowhere. They have only ever been mentioned by our matchstick man. A laughable attempt for someone who claims to be an PR expert.

TB wonders what if perhaps there was a more productive use of his working hours for

Automotive PR

and their clients...



UPDATE: Seems Callow has already protected his Twitter page on the back of his story. Don't worry, the whole thing has been saved at this end. Nothing to hide, nothing to fear...

Guy News: You Were Always On My Mic

Tweet of the Century

Moments before the story hit the airwaves. Labour's fallen star

said

:

How's that word of mouth thing going today?

The Day Gordon was Destroyed

What a day. The irony is it started well for the Prime Minister. He was finally out there meeting a greeting a real life person rather than a party hack or screened activists. But how soon we saw his true colours and his utter contempt of not only his own party but the whole electorate.

Gordon has finally been forced to beg for forgiveness after a cockup. Before he could blame someone else, be it America or McBride, but not this time. He tried to blame Sue Nye, his long term loyal aide, but frankly there is no one to blame for this huge mess other than himself. His broke campaign is a shambles and he is the Master of Ceremonies sitting on the shore like a wannabe King Cnut.

A total wipeout for Gordon, and no amount of

begging emails

will fix the damage done as this is chewed over across the land. The teatime news, evening shows and tomorrow's papers will be brutal reading for Labour but frankly they deserve it. Gordon has been caught red handed playing the classic left tactic of dismissing anyone you don't agree with as a racist or a sexist or homophobic. See MacShane, McCarthy and Gellard, Hundal etc for this tactic employed daily. No wonder they can't see what he has done wrong.

Though the sound is a bit shakey TB did a Skype interview for

ITV News

. Seems he needs to get one of Dale's headsets:

Sadly his little ad dig at Balls got flipped over as well. But the media whoring doesn't stop there. TB will be on

LBC Radio

at 8pm tonight with Will Straw and Mark Pack - Can't think what we will have to talk about.

Jim Knight's Leaflet Shame

Employment Minister Jim Knight has left residents in his constituency sharpening their pitchforks after he posed smiling his leaflet with a convicted drink driver. Daniel Skelton who was given an

extremely lenient sentence

e is features prominently in Knights literature:

A motorcyclist Pete Bower, who was left seriously injured when he was knocked over by Skelton is fuming.

Gordan Brown?

So looks like it's a straight fight between the Lib Dems and Labour. Poor Gordon, the first time he trends on Twitter it's for hugely damaging reasons. And to add insult to injury it seems that the UKs voting public don't even know how to spell his name:

Who are ya... who are ya...

Crick Nails It

Michael Crick

is spot on re Gordon's comments:

First, of course, they will anger the many millions of voters, many of them Labour, who are also worried about immigration. Many of these people are not racists. They suggest that the PM doesn't understand their concerns, let alone share them.

Second, they reveal the darker side of Gordon Brown, and confirm what many of his critics have long said. He doesn't like criticism, and tried to avoid it. He expects his staff to keep critics well away from him.

Third, they show that Labour's claims since the weekend that Mr Brown was now meeting "real people" are pretty bogus. It's clear from his comments, and criticism of his long-standing aide Sue Nye, that Mr Brown still expected to be presented on the campaign only with loyal Labour voters. We now know the party was hoodwinking us.

It all unravels yet again.

I've Never Voted Conservative...

Boom boom.

Via email.

Bigoted?

Mrs Duffy said:

"You can't say anything about the immigrants because you're saying that you're... all these Eastern Europeans - where are they flocking from"

Doesn't sound very bigoted. More confused. She was asking her leader a question to which he says he couldn't respond. Why not? Instead he smeared her to his staff and the world.

GordonON/GordOFF

Tory Rascal

is quick off the mark:

Are there any Labour attacks left that haven't backfired so spectacularly?

Gordon's Last Gasp Gaffe

And this is the conversation we heard. Imagine all those chats the microphones have missed.

Brand Extension

Loved this picture that was sent in by a reader:

Sadly those limited edition bags are sold out now...

Where Will You Be Next Thursday?

A message from

The Big Election Night Party

:

This election is the closest in living memory

It could go either way...

Where will you watch all the action unfold?


THE BIG ELECTION NIGHT PARTY

The Sports Cafe - Haymarket

May 6th from 9pm

Why not join hundreds of people, 60 big screens, WiFI, projectors and all the channels.

Don't miss a moment of the election night action through the night with food offers and drinks deals while you cheer on your team.

Not only will there be a party but the BBC and Sky will be there, some of the UKs top bloggers and pundits as well as constant updates on what the betting markets are doing. The iBank will have charging facilities for iPhones and Blackberries. The first drink is even on the house...

Tickets to this all night event are just £25, and food and drink served all night, literally all night. Just off Trafalgar Square so there are great transport connections. Sadly we are only able to invite over 18s only. 

*** TICKETS MUST BE BOUGHT ONLINE BEFORE THE NIGHT***

BUY HERE

 

The Hung Parliament Party

Fake Change

The Lib Dems have faked up photos of three public sector workers in the last week:

It's a joke.

The Wheels to Come Off the Clegg Bus?

Not a smear, but not exactly a game changer either. This

story

is rather telling none the less. In 2003 Nick Clegg MEP smuggled a 17 year old girls out of the country by hiding her in the loo on a coach chartered for a Liberal Democrat funded trip. How is someone with such a flagrant disregard for border laws meant to be taken seriously while asking to be put in charge of the country? Makes you wonder what is going on aboard the

magical mystery tour

.

Might have taken a hit at his chances of becoming Cameron's Home Secretary...

Labour PPC in Second Internet Scandal

As TB reported last week, Labour PPC John Cowan was selected despite being kicked out of the Lib Dems for being a sex pest. Despite being the one to complain to the Lib Dems, Kerry McCarthy MP turned a blind eye when Cowan was embraced with open arms by Labour and selected as a candidate. Well it looks tonight as if his career in the Labour Party is over as his website has disappeared. TB is hearing rumours that he has been sacked. This is also a big embarrassment for

LabourList

given Cowan was one of their regular contributors. His Twitter

account

seems unusually quiet.

The Telegraph, with a little help it must be said, have landed what must surely be the knock out blow on Cowan by revealing his anti Muslim, sexually explicit and offensive online comments under a veil of attempted annoymity on various chat room forums. You can read the whole story

here

.

This story seems far darker and deeper than the Stuart MacLennan Twitter

news

that disrupted Labour's first week of the campaign. The same rules must apply here. Why did he even get past the selection process? The Tories didn't touch him with a barge pole when he tried to come their way. Kerry McCarthy has a lot to answer for here.

Goodbye Cowan, or was it Racingdude009?

A New Poll Method

A busy day on the stump in Perth and North Perthshire. According this extremely sophisticated poll there is still work to be done to make sure it is a Tory gain, but the reaction right across this vast constituency has been extremely positive. It's look good. TB, and his epically over the top t-shirt, even got the chance to meet the SNP's incumbent Pete Wishart who it seems is a reader..."Mr Bear I believe..." 

Seems it was a strange day elsewhere. What exactly was with the Elvis impersonator? Good news that Labour saw sense and have

withdrawn

their offensive poster. Great news that Morely and Outwood has been made an official target seat after Antony Calvert's epic fund-raising drive against Balls.


Polls looking good tonight, back to stuffing envelopes.