Always win when you’re singing

Disgraced Conservative Parliamentary candidate Ian Oakley was today sentenced to 18 weeks in custody, suspended for 12 months at St. Albans Magistrates Court. He was also ordered to pay compensation to those whose property had been damaged. His solicitor had asked for the fact that he had had episodes of mental illness dating back to 2003 and was on medication at the time of the offences to be taken into account as mitigation. The Chair of Magistrates said that the sentence reflected Oakley’s clear culpability and the fact that he had sought to subvert the democratic process.

Oakley, you may remember, admitted to a three year hate campaign against Watford’s Liberal Democrats including:

• anonymous leaflets, alleging that LibDem councillors and candidates were convicted child sex offenders;
• fake leaflets purporting to be from the LibDems, alleging that another mosque was to be built on public land, close to where the town’s second mosque had recently been erected. Another leaflet issued a ‘denial’ that a candidate was a convicted fraudster or that he had been convicted  for assaulting his ex-wife (he is happily married);
• repeated late-night silent phone calls;
• sexual and racist graffiti being sprayed on cars, walls, doors, fences and hedges (including the word ‘pedo’ - he can’t spell either!);
• damage to cars, including slashed tyres, smashed lights and offensive graffiti;
• anonymous letters distributed to councillors, suggesting that the parliamentary candidate should be dropped;
• hard-core pornography sent to activists;
• poster boards broken and/or daubed with the words ‘f**k the LibDems’ or ‘c**ts’.

Oakley admitted that he did all this to improve the electoral standing of the Conservatives and to subvert democracy. During this time, the Conservatives won only three election in the constituency - by 2,3 and 37 votes respectively.

Yet again, there seems to be a deafening silence from Cameron’s Compassionate Conservatives. Still no apology. The whitewash continues. As my colleague Cllr Iain Sharpe has previously commented, the Conservatives cannot be allowed to simply wash their hands of the man. He was a Conservative candidate when he carried out the offences and when he was arrested. Still the reaction from the Nasty Party is ‘Well, you were asking for it‘. At first I assumed that the Watford Conservatives must have been mortified, embarrassed beyond belief by the behaviour of their candidate. Now, 10 weeks after Oakley pleaded guilty, I realise that they just don’t care. Maybe they can’t bring themselves to apologise, realising that the three councillors that they have in the constituency almost certainly owe their majorities to Oakley’s hate campaigns against the LibDem opponents (although I am not alleging that they knew anything about the campaign).

At Oakley’s first court appearance in August, where he pleaded guilty to seven specimen offences and asked for a further sixty eight to be taken into consideration, I watched the sickening scenes of him being welcomed and feted by current councillors and activists, including the constituency Chairman. If that had been one of ours, I certainly wouldn’t have been holding a love-in with them.

A year ago, David Cameron made his now famous speech about Britain’s “broken society”. The following day on the GMTV sofa, Cameron said:

“The problem is the Government’s response is one dimensional. They have just looked at the criminal justice system.  What we need is a three-dimensional approach - looking at criminal justice, yes, but also looking at policing and thirdly looking at society and how to strengthen society and strengthen communities. It’s only through that three-dimensional approach that we can get to grips with the problems on our streets and the fear in our society. In the end it is stable homes - good values taught in the home - that is the best way to tackle crime in the long term.”

So why not use a three-dimensional approach for the Watford Conservatives, Mr Cameron? Is it a stable home? Is the local party teaching good values? The truth is that Cameron has no idea, and no wish to find out.  Maybe the attitude of the local party could be discerned from its chairman, failed Mayoral candidate Steve O’Brien, who dismissed the entire issue in the Watford Observer as ‘a little hiccup’ or from the previous failed Mayoral candidate Gary Ling, who describedthe LibDems reaction to Oakley’s confession and conviction as ‘a concerted form of collective retribution’, ‘truly disgusting‘, a ‘smear‘, a ‘spectacular own-goal‘ and ‘low-blow tactics‘.

So whilst the Tories try to pretend that it was all a bad dream, the Watford LibDems are seeking to make the Tories nightmare continue. We have a by-election on Thursday in the Watford Borough ward of Tudor. Please contact our office on 01923 238552 or the local party Chairman, Stephen Giles-Medhurst on 01923 893661 if you can help us say goodbye to Mr. Oakley in style!