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Kitty Ussher MP is a deluded, scaremongering, brown-nosing, dangerous idiot who has no concept of her constituents' views

I'd never heard of her before, but this load of abject bollocks (though entirely expected) earns her a place on my Commons cunts list:

"I very much hope that we will never have another terrorist atrocity in Britain. But if we do, and if it happens because the police have not had sufficient time to accumulate enough evidence to charge the perpetrators, then the Tories, the Lib Dems and our own rebels will have blood on their hands."

And would you look at that? During the limited time she's been in parliament she's never rebelled, despite her protestations that "I started off sceptical about the proposal to detain people for up to 90 days without trial" (and please note that despite her claims that she "went into politics to sort out health and education, not to strengthen the long hand of the law", from her voting record she's voted only 3 times on education/welfare issues, as opposed to 42 on other subjects - mostly appearing to be backing Blair to the hilt on the Terrorism Bill and ID Cards, while only signing two Early Day Motions that could in any way be seen to be related to these two professed core obsessions - and even though on her website she claims her priorities instead to be "jobs and housing", though in parliament she's shown no interest in these at all).

Now this kind of blind loyalty would have made sense for a new, young, female Labour MP back in 1997. But how much of a political cretin must this woman be to continue sucking up to Blair in the twilight years of his premiership? The way to get noticed these days is not the unthinking, drone-like flocking to the correct lobby, but making a principled stand to secure a place at the forefront of Labour's next generation.

OK, yes - she's MP for Burnley, which has had a fair few problems with the likes of the BNP (who have won over 10% of the vote in the last two General Elections there). Voting in favour of whacking brown people in dingy cells for months on end is likely to go down fairly well with some of her constituents.

But you'd surely think that someone representing a constituency with a very recent history of violent racial problems would take a slightly more sensitive approach to legislation which could so easily stir up more race-based resentment.

How silly of me, though. No one in Burnley's interested: "there's a strong vocal Muslim population in my constituency of Burnley and not one of them felt strongly enough about this to bother contacting me on the subject. In fact, overall, we've only had one email before the vote from anyone at all." Perhaps it would help if she made more of an effort to build a dialogue with constituents or get up an active website (the link to the "news" section gives only a link to an index page, last updated at the start of August...)

So as a public service to Ms Ussher's Muslim constituents - and any others who wish to express their opinions on this or any other issue, one way or the other - here's her email addresses: kitty@burnleylabour.org.uk / ussherk@parliament.uk and you could always try the invaluable Write to Them or Fax Your MP. Don't expect a reply though...

At the end of her ill-considered comment piece, Ms Ussher repeats that "in the horrific event of a crisis that I hope will never happen, it'll be their fault, not mine." Fine. In the event of another series of race riots in Burnley caused by a local dark-skinned person being interred without trial, which I hope will never happen, it will be YOUR fault, Kitty, not that of those more sensible, principled MPs who you seek to blame for the actions of psychotic nutters.

Update: First, I thought I ought to make clear that "sensible" and "principled" for those MPs who voted against applies purely to their actions on this particular issue. After all, the list includes the likes of Ian Paisley and George Galloway, rabid maniacs both. Also, I'd forgotten the fall-out from the idiotic blog-world's similar claims of "blood on their hands" bullshit - amply ridiculed by Jarndyce and Jim Bliss.

Update 2: I'd forgotten D-Notice was based in Burnley... As one of Ussher's constituents he wrote in, and has had a response from an underling as follows:

"Kitty is your elected representative and will try to represent your views whenever she can. However given poll after poll after poll showed the public overwhelmingly supported the measure, which side of the argument would you have her take other than the one supported by the police, the public and the party under which she was elected?"

Erm... Perhaps that side supported by her constituents, the people she was elected to represent. The selfsame constituents she seemingly, by her own admission in that Guardian article, failed to consult on this issue. Failed to consult despite Tony Blair's call the weekend before the vote for MPs to go and speak to their constituents about it.

Update 3: Oooh! Talk Politics is rather good on Ms Ussher and all...

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