Matthew's Journal

I've just been listening to Andrew Walkingshaw interviewing Anne Campbell, David Howarth and Ian Lyham (sp?), the three main candidates for the Cambridge constituency on CUR1350. You can get the interviews there shortly.

Andrew was, I think, a little nervous, particularly when talking to Anne, and there seemed to me to be several obvious questions that could have been asked to make the process a little more critical. I found myself wanting some of the more obvious holes in the candidates' arguments to be probed at least a little bit.

Anne (Labour) was dissapointing - she said "err" rather more than Andrew did. She blustered rather on tuition fees, but avoided going on about terrorism (ID cards will, apparantly, solve identity theft models, and make homeless people's lives easier (how will they afford them?). We need biometric passports anyway. So why not have ID cards?)

David (LD) [OK I may be biased] was must stronger - a confident speaker (he's a University Lecturer), argued convincingly, and avoided being patronising about students. But then, I agree with most of his policies ;-) Particularly, he steered clear of telling students what they think, which both Anne and Ian were guilty of.

Ian (Conservative). Spoke slightly haltingly. He seemed rather to be trotting out the standard anti top-up fee arguments without really believing in them, or thinking about them much. Obviously aware he's an outside chance in Cambridge. Had good things to say about making vocational qualifications attractive again. Andrew was more aggresive to him, which was good to hear; I think it also got him to speak a little more personally (he certainly seemed to get more animated). He equivocated on ID cards, but seems against making them compulsorary; they would be voluntary for people who didn't have eg passports, and needed to prove their identity. He tried to link the tory's anti-immigration policy to trying to prevent people-trafficking.

They had a guy in the studio playing the interviews (err, except for the tory one, which he messed up somewhat), whose links, frankly, sucked. But definitely worth a listen, I think, particularly if you're in Cambridge.