Hypocrite and Chancer: Vehement John Leech MP Has Postbag Rant

In the inevitable rebuttal letter to the EDL supporting clown who wrongly promoted Mr John "Hospital Hoax" Leech (right) to the Labour Party but correctly identified him as a hypocrite and a chancer Mr Leech claims:

"I can assure Mr O’Neill and others that along with my Lib-Dem party colleagues I was vehemently opposed to the illegal war in Iraq from the start – a position that has surely been vindicated by the groundswell in public opinion against the invasion in recent years."

Now, I don't doubt that Mr Leech was somethingly against the war in Iraq, on the quiet, but I think to say vehemently is rather taking the piss actually.

Mr Leech's leaflets as a Councillor in Barlow Moor Ward as was and the rechristened Chorlton Park as it is now scarcely betrayed this "vehemence";

No-one I know can recall ever seeing Mr Leech at an anti-war vigil that carried on for well over two years in Whalley Range ward, where he actually lives, just an hour or so every Friday, where was he hiding his "vehemence"?;

No-one I know can recall ever seeing Mr Leech - before his election as MP, or since - at the similar vigil at Chorlton Four Banks - Chorlton being where he likes to say he lives. Vehement, not;

No-one I know saw the vehement fibster Mr Leech at either the big London demonstration in February 2003 or indeed even those in Manchester;

There is no trace I can find of any anti-war letter or comment or press release from Mr Leech in 2001, 2002, 2003, or 2004 about Afghanistan or Iraq;

In the last couple of months of the 2005 campaign the vehemence did show by way of vehement fibbing about Keith Bradley MP's anti-war voting which, in the last two votes, the ones that particularly counted was (a) anti-war and (b) exactly the same as Lib Dems, many of whom had ducked earlier votes; and

As well as the low- or no- profile of the Iraq war or Afghanistan on Mr Leech's councillor propaganda in 2001-2004 there was little of it - apart from defaming Bradley - on his 2005 campaign literature;

And why not? Because this was largely taken up by a smirking John Leech and his smirking Lib Dem friends holding up Save Our Hospital banners and the like as they pretended that Christie Hospital faced an existential threat;

John Leech's vehemence on this matter led two of his big fat expensive glossy leaflets, and possibly a third which was burnt smokily rather than distributed, and one of these was disgracefully distributed to vulnerable cancer patients and their friends and relatives as they waited for chemo- and radio- therapy.

Now that's what I call vehemence. Mr Leech's position and that of his Manchester co-franchisees on the EDL and the BNP and the far-right down the years could also be de-constructed and queried. We'll save that. Perhaps for another day.

MEANWHILE: Mr Leech appears to have arranged for Thursday's letter, critical of him, to be removed from the Postbag archive. It is supposed to be just here. This trick has also been applied it seems to much of the press coverage of his Christie campaign of 2005. Although the letter was dead wrong removing it, the context for today's effort, is a great disservice, but the full text is available right here. Pleased to be of service. MEN - have a word with yourself.