Should Harriet Harman apologise?

www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/mar/04/cameron-patrick-rock-tip-off
Thought this thread might be an appropriate place to mention this, unless it's on another thread I cannot find.

Goodnight all

"It is now well beyond the time any apology from HH would have any meaning"

Makes one wonder why people carry on nagging, especially as on current showing she wouldn't be believed and whatever she said would be distorted and misinpterpreted.

It is now well beyond the time any apology from HH would have any meaning which is a shame but not surprising.
HH was nowhere to be seen when husband Jack Dromey was handed his Labour safe seat. This is the same HH who is in favour of women only short lists but she missed a crucial meeting which decided not to use the women only policy. She has used the nothing to do with her strategy often throughout her career.

Also, why can't you accept that it was not the same for HH as it was for Hewitt and Chakrabarti? Three different people are going to have three different viewpoints, to have had three different jobs to do within NCCL, and three different memories and interpretations of what was going on.

I have looked at the links and I've read other things too. It is not at all clear to me what exactly is true and what isn't, so I'm surprised you seem so confident that you know the exact truth. If you do you ought to be able to post it here succinctly and clarify things for the rest of us.

There are a number of links people have posted to a variety of sources on this thread. I suggest you have a look at some of them. HH hasn't said the DM story isn't true. What she has said (unlike Shami Chakrabarti and Patricia Hewitt) is that it wasn't significant and was nothing to do with her.

lily, please could you tell us what exactly is true that the DM has said and how you know it's true when HH says it isn't? Thank you in anticipation.

I have said elsewhere on this thread that my views on HH's performance have nothing to do with liking the DM or disliking her. Of course the DM is playing political games. But HH has not helped matters by trying to dismiss what it said, though true, because she and the Labour Party don't like the Mail. The Mail represents a particular package of right wing views. HH represents a particular package of left wing views. Both are equally blinkered and intransigent.

Quite.

Good points there.

I think that just as those who dislike the Daily Mail have been accused of rushing to dismiss anything it says equally those that admire the Daily Mail are unwilling to consider this may be an orchestrated political campaign.

HH is damned if she does apologise (Shock, horror HH supported paedophiles) and damned if she does not (Shock horror HH fails to apologise for being loosely associated with a paedophile organisation)

I cannot imagine anyone supports child abuse other than paedophiles. What I can imagine is that there is /was support for the rule of law to apply equally to all those accused of a crime, including paedophilia. I thought it was under that guise that PIE got itself affiliated to NCCL but do not know that.

I think that when Liberty and Shami Chakrobarti made the public apology statement it should have invited signatures from all those who were part of NCCL at the time to associate themselves with the apology.

If HH joined NCCL 2 yrs after the PIE affiliation and as a junior legal person presumably her only 'crime' is not being assertive enough at the time to speak out. It would have been better for her if she had said sooner that she regretted that NCCL did not end the PIE affiliation.

Hands up those of us who did not always speak up at work when we saw something we did not think was quite right??

We are all guilty by association of something awful I am sure... even if it is just buying something that you suspect has been produced by child labour or in dangerous conditions........

HH's response seems be saying it's all the DM's fault, they've always hated her and she's been unfairly accused. At least Pat Hewitt has had the grace to acknowledge the kernel of truth in the DM's report.

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.

From what I've been reading, Hewitt seems more suspect.

The Sun is claiming to have seen a press release by the NCCL backing the lowering of the age of consent to ten in some cases, and calling for legalisation of incest, which has Hewitt' s name, solely, on it.

Patricia Hewitt is one person who has always seemed a bit "eurgh!" to me. But I know that is just my feeling.

X posts, pogs. I share your concerns but I still don't think Harman is guilty of supporting paedophiles.

Good post again POGS

Here is HH's statement in response to the DM allegations. It answers some of my questions and it shows her in a good light as a decent woman, not guilty as charged.

Thatbags

Isn't there clear evidence that PIE had not been marginalised in 1976.

What does that mean anyway. It should not have been marginalised it simply should have never been given affiliated status which in turn meant that it was able to lobby parliament and be presumably allowed to have use of or contact with the legal team of the NCCL.

Harman was not a clerk or tea lady she was a legal officer. PIE was a member of the NCCL during her time with the NCCL.

This sorry story is not only about the judgement of Harman and co it is about more than that. The police are looking at historic evidence relating to PIE and it's associates underthe Operation Fernbridge child sex inquiry. This has obviously got to look at the NCCL and it's contact with PIE.

The Home Office is also reported to be looking at possible finances given to PIE from the Labour Party. 'IF and I am careful to say 'IF'' it has received any funding then I would presume it did so through it's association with the NCCL and those closely connected to Labour by being given the outward appearance of being part of the establishment.

At the end of the day whether you were a paedophile in the 70's or a paedophile today there is absolutely no way any person nor 'organisation' should give you the light of day to promote, condone or gain any legal status for having sex with children. It is abhorrent.

What I find astounding are comments such as Patricia Hewitt has made. 'Although the evil of child sexual abuse is 'NOW' properly recognised' WHAT I am sorry but I have always known sex with children was wrong, wrong, wrong.

It sickens me that there is any defence of such behaviour just because it was 'in the past'. Tell that to those who are still suffering from child abuse today, I am sure they will take great comfort from knowing that. Tell that to those who have suffered life long problems because of paedophiles who the likes of the NCCL thought at the time had a right to liberal thought.

Sorry I sound so cross but this is dear to my heart.

I'm puzzled as to why so much is made of the affiliation. My local archery club is affiliated to ArcheryGB and to the Scottish Archery Association. This doesn't give us any power in those organisations.

The Scottish country dancing clubs I belonged to in Oxford were affiliated to the global Royal Scottish Country Dance Society. This gave us one delegate at AGMs and so forth.

I'm wondering now if people are thinking affiliation means more than it does.

But, according to Dromey and Hewitt (and Harman too, I think), had been pushed into the background from 1976. Does anyone know how the affiliation system worked at NCCL? Was it renewed annually or was it that if you affiliated you remained affiliated until further notice?

When was PIE disbanded?

Additionally, lily, so what? Was it Harman's fault that the affiliation remained in place?

What happened to innocent until proved guilty?

PIE remained affiliated to the NCCL until around 1983.

From today's Telegragh, this time quoting Hewitt "defending" Harman and Dromey:

Miss Harman, who joined NCCL as its legal officer in 1978, has insisted that PIE had been marginalised by the NCCL in 1976, when it “took them on and pushed them to the margins”. Her husband Jack Dromey, an NCCL executive committee member from 1970 to 1979 and now a Labour MP, has said he took on PIE and helped drive them out.
Miss Hewitt defended the couple, saying: "When Jack Dromey, as NCCL chairman in 1976, vigorously opposed PIE at the NCCL AGM, he did so with the full support of the executive committee and myself as general secretary.
"Harriet did not join the NCCL staff until 1978. She was one of two legal officers, neither of whom was a member of the executive committee."

I'm still not seeing the straightforward "guilt" on HH's part that some other posters are seeing.

Good post POGS.

At least Pat Hewitt has surfaced and given an apology for asking for the age of consent to be lowered to 10. I have more respect for her now for admitting she was wrong.
The other two have got a way to go yet. Jack Dromey in denial and HH wriggling as usual.
They just make it look as if they are hiding things, even if they are not.

Cannot understand some of the posts on here considering it is supposed to be a site for parents and grandparents.

I did read the article. The DM's motives are quite suspect, as I said before, but that doesn't exonerate HH from hitching her wagon of political ambition to some very dubious causes.