Labour to use beermats to mobilise 'gay vote'

Even for me, whom to vote for is not mono-issue. I do feel very strongly about gay issues and this was the principal reason why I resigned from the Conservative Party a few years ago, soon after the last General Election, and why I have not voted for that Party in any election since then. However, I don't think that Labour's latest scare tactic directed at the gay community and announced by Labour [gay] Peer Waheed Ali that if we were to vote Liberal Democrat we will "go to bed with Charlie, wake up with Howard" is entirely convincing either.

It is perfectly true that, as Lord Ali says:"Let's make no mistake about the Tories in government, Tory hate led to Section 28, a refusal to equalise the age of consent and the introduction of many other anti-gay laws". On the other hand, what is equally true is that it is the economic policies of the last Conservative government, despite some of their fundamental errors along the way, that laid the foundation for the relative economic stability that Labour were heir to in 1997. The stability we now enjoy (according to some) did not come into being in May 1997 and even if, if you forget such minor details as the pensions crisis which is largely of Labour's creation and the significant increase in the government tax take since 1997 (which is all Labour's doing!), Labour may be said not to have reverted to some of the worst excesses of previous Labour administrations, their stewardship of our economy has created structural changes which, I think, will in the long term prove pretty disastrous for our economic well-being.

So whom to vote for, if at all, at the coming General Election is not an easy matter for me. By instinct I am 'Conservative' in most things other than their traditional social policy - in other words I tend toward 'libertarianism'. Nor do I think that most gay people think and act as one when deciding where to place their 'x', any more than other segments of the population such as 'pensioners' or 'students' do. People are individuals - something that Labour statists very often try to forget or gloss over.