Tear up the sun!!!

[Peikko 1,575]

Tony Woodley rips up the Sun as Labour reacts badly against the tabloid's defection to the Tories.

A copy of the Sun was torn in half on the platform of the Labour conference today as a succession of senior party figures condemned the paper after it declared that it was backing the Tories.

Tony Woodley, the joint general secretary of Unite, received a standing ovation from the conference as he attacked the paper's owner, Rupert Murdoch, and said the Sun had never supported progressive values.

Harriet Harman, Labour's deputy leader, and other cabinet ministers also hit out at Britain's best-selling daily following its decision to publish a frontpage leader declaring that Labour has "lost it" only hours after Gordon Brown finished his conference speech.

But Woodley, a Liverpudlian, caught the mood of delegates at Labour's Brighton conference when he said the rest of Britain should follow the example of Liverpool, where readers have been boycotting the paper ever since it blamed fans for the Hillsborough football stadium disaster.

"We do not need an Australian/American coming to our country with a paper that has never supported one progressive policy and telling us how politics should be run in this country," he told the conference in Brighton.

As he tore up a copy of today's Sun, Woodley said: "In Liverpool we learnt a long time ago what to do. I just wish the rest of the country would do the same thing."

The prime minister, Gordon Brown, earlier said that newspapers should be for news, "not propaganda". In a round of interviews, in which he often appeared tetchy, he said that the British people, not the Sun, would decide the election.

Brown categorically ruled out standing down as prime minister and Labour leader before the general election, which must be held before 3 June 2010.

The Sun announced its move in a frontpage editorial that hit the streets hours after Brown made an attempt in his conference speech to inject self-belief back into his party, vowing to fight the election on the side of the "squeezed middle classes".

Speaking at the conference, Harman said: "I am speaking to you this morning about something the Sun knows absolutely nothing about: equality," she told the party conference. "The nearest their political analysis gets to women's rights is Page 3's News in Briefs.

"We are all angry about the Sun this morning, but I say to you: don't get bitter, get better. Don't get outraged, get out there. Don't get mad, get mobilised.

"Yes, we may be the underdog, but we will not be bullied. This underdog is biting back."

In an interview on GMTV, one of five broadcast interviews he did this morning, the prime minister sought to play down the move by the paper that demonised Labour in the 1980s but switched allegiance before the 1997 election.

"It's the British people that decide elections. It's the British people that I'm interested in and it's the British people that I was talking about yesterday," he said.

"I think that Sun readers actually, when they look at what I said, will agree with what I said.

"Newspapers are entitled to their opinions. Obviously you want newspapers to be for you. But I've got an old-fashioned view. You look to newspapers for news, not propaganda. I don't think editorials will decide elections."

The Guardian understands that the newspaper waited until after Brown's speech to conference yesterday afternoon before making its final decision to ditch Labour. Trevor Kavanagh, the Sun's associate editor, acknowledged that the proprietor, Rupert Murdoch, had played a part in the move by his flagship British paper.

Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair's communications chief when the Sun switched to Labour in 1997, said that the move was "far from devastating" because the media was far more diffuse than 12 years ago.

Lord Mandelson backed Brown at a breakfast meeting in Brighton with the Unite union, warning the Sun that its readers would not want it to become "a Tory party fanzine".

The business secretary said: "The proprietor may have changed his mind, but I don't think the readers want the sun to set on New Labour. When the readers read back what the party did for them in the 1980s and 90s they will see pretty quickly that a return for the Tories is not in the interests of them or their families.

"The last thing the readers want is to see the newspaper being turned into a Tory party fanzine. They want a newspaper, not a propaganda sheet."

Later, at another fringe meeting, Mandelson appeared to describe Sun readers as losers. Asked about the Sun, he said: "I think just as they may think they are picking winners, I think losers are picking them." An aide later said that the "losers" remark was a reference to the Tories, not to the tabloid's readership.

Cameron told LBC radio in London he was delighted that the paper was backing the Tories. "Obviously I want the support of as many people in the country as we can win over and as many newspapers and radios and everyone.

"Obviously I want to get the biggest possible coalition for change in Britain and I'm delighted the Sun have come out and supported the Conservative party. I think they see the government is exhausted and out of ideas and they see a regenerated, refreshed Conservative party, ready to serve. But it is people that win elections and I want to say that."

Although the electoral impact of the Sun's decision may turn out to be marginal, the paper's declaration will damage Labour's morale because it undermines efforts by Brown and his team to persuade the party it has a chance of winning.

In the conference hall, an NHS worker rounded on the newspaper's claims that Labour had "failed the NHS".

"Shame on you," said Norma Stephenson in the health debate. "When you say this Labour government has failed the NHS, you are telling all those who work for the NHS that they have failed, too. You are wrong, wrong, and even more wrong."

Asked in a Sky News interview whether he could give an assurance that he would be leading the party at the election "in all circumstances", Brown replied: "Of course."

The prime minister, who appeared angered by the line of questioning in some of the exchanges, also said that he had made up his mind about taking part in a television debate with Cameron, but that he did not want to make an announcement now.

Sky has been campaigning for a televised leaders' debate and, in two of his interviews, Brown said that he had made up his mind on this issue but that he did not want to make an announcement now because "this is not the time to talk about a debate".

Brown accused Adam Boulton, Sky News's political editor, of "sounding a bit like a political propagandist yourself" and tried to walk off the set at the end not realising that he still had a microphone attached.

When Nicky Campbell on BBC Radio 5 Live asked if he was unable to say what he would do about the debate because he was "dithering", Brown replied angrily: "I'm not. I never do, by the way."

On BBC Radio 4's Today programme, Brown said that his plan to offer free social care to the elderly in their homes would come into force next year and that it would cost £350m in the first year and £670m in the second year. He said that it would benefit 300,000 people.

On Radio 5 Live, Campbell asked Brown if he believed in God. Brown replied: "I'm a member of the Church of Scotland. My father was a minister. My personal views about religion are my own but clearly I'm a member of the church."

When Campbell asked him a second time if he believed in God, he said: "I do. Indeed I do."

Campbell also asked Brown if he believed that teenagers ought to stop having sex. Brown said that he wanted to cut the number of unwanted pregnancies, but he would not urge teenagers not to have sex.

"I'm not here to lecture individuals about their private lives," he said.

Brown also claimed that he did know his wife, Sarah, was going to speak about him at the conference until Monday and that he had not heard her speech until she delivered it.

"I don't think it was a plea to the country. I think it was her expressing her views. But that's for her to explain because she made the decision to make the speech and she also made the decision to say the things she did.

"She's just a wonderful person and I am very happy and privileged to have her as my wife."

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Excellent conference antics!

[w¡n9Nµ7 §£@¥€r 123]

Papers don't tell anyone how to run a country, voters do.

[Peikko 1,575]

Now, now A.J, this is no time to stop the fun. More paper tearing on stage, that's what the people want!

[Heracles 417]

well I do have to say Labor has hardly delivered the country or its citizens any prosperity. Unfortunately we now have the same party in office in Aus. My guess is that they too will fall down the ranks because of this.

UK and AUS are a prime example of what happens when you give too much to people and basically give people an incentive to stay poor.

Edited September 30, 2009 by Booyah!

[Peikko 1,575]

It's the political cycle BY. Neither party is that much different from the other, an emphasis here, a policy there, but the general direction is exactly the same. No one in either country is going to change the fundamentals, like health care.

[Peikko 1,575]

If you don't believe me, just look at what Cameron is offering the voter come the election. No privatizations or dismantling of the social services. Cuts yes, but dismantling, not a chance in hell.

[Heracles 417]

It's the political cycle BY. Neither party is that much different from the other, an emphasis here, a policy there, but the general direction is exactly the same. No one in either country is going to change the fundamentals, like health care.

Well the liberals did a fine job propelling Australia over the last 12 years. Whereas, all the labor party wants to do over there is pay union works a salary they are simply not worth and punish the wealthy. I guarantee you that now the labor party is in office, in the coming years Australia will fall down the ranks and it's economy will end up like the UK. They will also promote immigration of people from 3rd world countries, only dragging down the system even more.

Edited September 30, 2009 by Booyah!

[Peikko 1,575]

Taxes up? That is the most that happens, tax goes up or down, funding goes up or down but the essential direction is the same. Nothing will change very drastically though. Not really.

[Niels Bohr 72]

OMG!

So everything in the SUN's post must been true if he tored up the newspapers. Thank you for admitting it to the public.

[Ban Hammer 13,342]

can we tape together the page 3 girl?