My evening at the Orwell Prize and Electoral Reform

To Church House http://www.churchhouseconf.co.uk/ for the Orwell Prize award. I did not even make the longlist but it was very kind of Gavin Freeguard to invite me.

It was held in the Assembly Room http://www.churchhouseconf.co.uk/rooms/assembly_hall - resplendently round.

The Director of the Orwell Prize - the very charming and enthusiastic Jean Seaton spotted me and dragged me by the arm to meet Richard Blair - Orwell's son - who was surrounded by a gaggle of young and pretty Oriental girlies. Jean introduced me as Madam Miaow, an egregious leftist blogger http://madammiaow.blogspot.com/ who actually made it to the shortlist, who has a very depraved-looking male companion whom I know has denounced me on Suzanne Moore's walls.

I did eventually correct this case of mistaken identity, and proceeded to discuss self-censorship in China with one of the brighter and prettier Chinese girls with whom Richard was surrounded. It turned out she was studying journalism and she said self-censorship was the order of the day. I said there was much self-censorship here too but did not have a chance to launch into a lecture about the evils of single mummery which even the Mail now does not quite dare to condemn - probably because they make up half its readership?

We did however discuss the duties of being a literary executor and the fact that the EU harmonised copyright laws upwards to 70 years, which gave him an extra 20 years of value from the Orwell Estate. Richard also mentioned that he was adopted and told the story of how his father was shot in the throat when I started talking about putting one's head above the parapet ....

http://www.rjgeib.com/thoughts/soldiers/george-orwell-shot.html

I then spoke to Peter Kellner the psephologist who founded YouGov. (I took him to task for not automatically sending out cheques for £50 when those polled have answered enough questions to earn this.) John Tusa joined us later but I cannot remember what was said between us. Saw Jonathan Dimbleby nearby but did not speak to him.

Oona King was there looking improbably young and pretty in jeans and a denim jacket. She was one of the blog judges who did not put me on the longlist, but I smiled at her anyway. She either blanked me or did not notice me. In any case she is not accepting any of my Facebook friendship requests on Facebook and neither is Rushanara Ali (now MP for Bethnal Green & Bow), though she has seen fit to accept Jeffrey Marshall's.

Although Jeffrey and I are not an item, I do feel rather left out in the cold, as if my spouse had been invited to the neighbour's barbecue but not me.

It is a bit of a blow sometimes to realise that one is perhaps less popular than a BNP activist, and then to realise that one has in fact become a BNP activist and that such comparisons are now redundant.

The Prizes were then announced.

Low groans could be heard amidst the applause but I hoped I made up for it by whooping and cheering as loudly as I could when Peter Hitchens was announced as winner of the Journalism Prize. I managed to locate him in order to congratulate him only to see him bent forward and Tweeting, I initially supposed, but it turned out that he was only sending a text to the missus back home that he had won.

There I also saw Francis Wheen, my Facebook friend, whom I had also met many years ago at the Academy Club when it was in a Beak Street basement, in the good old days when Auberon Waugh ran it as Editor of the Literary Review.  We even travelled back on the same train after attending his funeral. 

Francis identified me as "the BNP person", which was quite gratifying, I suppose. Apparently, his status updates were going mad when I announced my membership of the party and the fact that I was Election Agent to Jeffrey Marshall, the BNP candidate for Bethnal Green & Bow.

John E Strafford the Angry Old Conservative who campaigns for Conservative Democracy at http://www.btinternet.com/~johnstrafford/ was also there. Unfortunately, I did not get a chance to speak to him. It would have been good to propose a campaign on party democracy, which is tragically absent from the Conservative Party. (This may even explain why so many of its leaders after the Iron Lady have been so rubbish. The leader I have in mind for this one-party state is Lord Mandelson - the man I hope will one day be my lord and master. Lady Mandelson has such a ring to it, does it not, Dear Reader? I have consulted the stars and they say "You might as well give it a go if you're so set on him. You'll only ignore us anyway if we tell you you're not really his type.")

On the subject of Conservative Democracy, John says:

"The Conservative Party does not have One Person, One Vote. The constitution can only be changed by an electoral college whch consists of MPs in one part and members of the National Convention (mainly constituency chairmen) in the other. It is wholly undemocratic."

The new BNP constitution is now even more undemocratic than the previous one, but much much longer at http://www.bnp.org.uk/?q=constitution-british-national-party

Indeed, if the present Chairman were to be in the peculiar position of wishing to challenge himself for the leadership, I can imagine that he would be hard put to jump through all the hoops that the constitution requires any challenger to do.

As for changing the constitution itself, anyone who wishes to do this would have to submit this proposal to the Chairman who would at his discretion allow it to be put forward, or not.

In other words, it is sewn up and stitched up to favour the incumbent.

I am pretty sure the constitution of the Chinese Communist Party was a lot more democratic than this, even in Mao's time. The trouble for them was that no one enforced the rules (which were apparently quite fair) when dissidents were being beaten, exiled or imprisoned.

It is quite telling that the Chinese are very proud of their constitution and have it displayed online, in English, for the world to see, while the Conservative Party locks theirs away the way Mr Rochester locked up his mad wife. (I had to ask CCHQ six times before they would send the Tory Party constitution to me.)

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2007-10/25/content_6944738.htm

Mutinous murmurs from BNP activists are being heard everywhere online, it seems. There is even a conspiracy theory that the Chairman wants the party small and unsuccessful because that would make the membership easier to control. While middle class support and talent is being sought, there are certain elements in the party in senior positions who do not want competition from talented newcomers, it has been suggested.

http://www.democracyforum.co.uk/bnp/76710-challenge-bnp-leadership-virtually-impossible.html

My hope is that the finest legal minds in the country will examine the fairness of the rules of both the Conservative Party and BNP constitution. When the model constitution for a party is finally ready we can then proceed to an official one-party state, which is to my mind the most rational form of government. We can see that it has done the Chinese no harm at all, apart from a few moaners and whingers, for whom there can be no pleasing.

Electoral reform is nothing if individual party constitutions make members the mere instruments and creatures of the party leader.

It would in fact serve the present incumbents and those they govern better than the mess we have now if there was only one political party to join and that differences are always resolved intra-party rather than inter-party.

I would be happy to explain further if people would just ask me intelligent questions instead of running away at the mention of a one-party state.

I should also mention the lovely Italian meal I had with the Mail's dark and mysterious Moscow correspondent at Il Posto near Victoria Station. http://www.viewlondon.co.uk/restaurants/il-posto-info-8473.html The seafood risotto was absolutely delicious and is just as good now if not better. I am so glad I got the waiter to doggy bag it!