Who Will You Vote For In May?

[Cisco_Singh]

Paul Uppal was the only Sikh MP he lost his seat, there was also an active smear campaign against him, some of it valid. He was alarmingly inactive on big Sikh issues including the British involvement in 1984 whitewashed enquiry. Which contributed to his down fall.

[kamc]

Paul Uppal was the only Sikh MP he lost his seat, there was also an active smear campaign against him, some of it valid. He was alarmingly inactive on big Sikh issues including the British involvement in 1984 whitewashed enquiry. Which contributed to his down fall.

What's more embarrassing for people like him is that it took a non Asian MP (Tom Watson) to bring it to the forefront and even then Uppal was less than enthusiastic about doing anything about it.

[singh598]

with a name like Paul I cant imagine him thinking about Sikh issues

[DTF]

Does anyone have any idea how many Sikh MPs we now have in parliament?

None

As far as I'm aware, as of this morning, we have no Sikh mp's left in parliament, first time since 1992, so much for progress

Exactly Paji and the UK is the second main bastion of the Sikh Diaspora with almost 1% of the English population being Sikh. So for the Sikh community to be represented by zero MP's whilst the Pakistani's (with double our population) have eleven MP's and even the Bangladeshi's (whose population is broadly comparable to our own) have three female MP's now should be a huge wake up call.

Instead of fighting amongst ourselves over pathetic minor theological differences or biraderi issues we need to unite and use this moment to push the agenda for united Sangat single Gurdwara's in every town and an end of biraderi and matrimonial apartheid. Only when we are cohesive and united community will we be able to get the at least six MP's in 650 our population merits.

[StarStriker]

Have u seen half of our mp's tho? Half of them cant even speak english properly, bellies hangin out....i mean BULBURHAMPTON?...For cryin out loud.

[StarStriker]

What's more embarrassing for people like him is that it took a non Asian MP (Tom Watson) to bring it to the forefront and even then Uppal was less than enthusiastic about doing anything about it.

Also along with tom watson, u have pat mcfadden, who has done so much service for sikhs in his constituency, yet apnay didnt vote him in in last elections afta yrs of fightin r causes, they voted for paul uppal if im not mistaken. I bet u pat mcfadden has been to harmandar sahib more times than paul uppaulling.

[eduardo]

I was looking at the map this morning at breakfast and what struck me most was Cornwall and those south western areas that used to be Labour strongholds all now blue.

The country is really saying something and I haven't figured out what it is yet.

Maybe it's because so many people own property now and their main asset is their house, the low interest rate and soaring property prices may have something to do with the Tories winning so decisively. I mean loads of people are debted up to the eyeballs with credit cards and mortgages and a few interest rate points up would probably ruin a lot of people.

Perhaps the uncertainty of labours economic model and what they would do with interest rates led a lot of people to vote Tory.

The other thing is immigration and a lot of people are quite rightly shocked at the shere numbers of bodies arriving on our shores each day.

UKip are a wild card but the Tories have a harder stance on immigration than Labour and the Tories are an established party so most people would rather trust the Tories

than Ukip.

The strength of feeling in Scotland is also a bit of a shock, I can see another big push for independance coming.

Wales is another shock, it was traditionally a strong labour area, not any more, I guess a lot of Welsh are now property owners or a lot of property in Wales has been sold

to non Welsh people.

TBH I don't know why so many people voted Tory, especially normal working people, maybe the Tory right wing press had a lot to do with it.

But at the end of the day most people vote not for foreign policy or immigration but for their wallets and their own personal finances and I think the fact that property

has been going up so much in this present Tory government is what clinched the deal for them to reign again.

Here's a good quote:

"One thing it seems to me is clear: liberalism here, as well as across Europe, is not faring well against the politics of fear. Years of remorseless economic and social hardship following the crash in 2008 and the grinding insecurities of globalisation have led people to reach for new certainties - the politics of identity, of nationalism, of us versus them, is now on the rise.

"It is clear that in constituency after constituency north of the border, the beguiling appeal of Scottish nationalism has swept all before it, and south of the border a fear of what that means for the United Kingdom has strengthened English conservatism too.”

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/generalelection/election-results-triumphant-tories-leave-britains-liberal-left-in-shock-10237638.html

The politics of fear.

[lsingh]

No Sikh MP has been elected. Southall and Hounslow have chosen Hindus to stand for them. Virendra Sharma Southall MP is an Overseas Congress representative with close links to Indian politicians. Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi lost in Gravesend after the Gurdwara Committee opposed him and supported the Conservatives due to personal issues.

[lsingh]

There are 10 Pakistani Muslim origin MP's and 10 Indian Hindu origin MP's in the new Parliament. There are Zero Sikh MP's.

Pakistani-origin MPs draw level with Indians in UK polls

PTI, London

| Updated: May 09, 2015 08:28 IST

Pakistani-origin MPs have improved their tally in Britain's House of Commons after the just-concluded general election with a total of 10 elected candidates, drawing level with their Indian colleagues.

The Commons' charge was led by British-Pakistani Sajid Javid, the Conservative party's first Muslim cabinet minister, who served as culture, media and sports secretary in Prime Minister David Cameron's first Cabinet.

Javid, whose father arrived from rural Pakistan in the 1960s and worked as a bus conductor and driver in the UK, was re-elected as Bromsgrove MP with huge 28,133 votes.

"Voters have supported the Conservatives as they did not want to see the economic recovery put at risk," he said after his win.

Other Conservatives from Pakistan to make a mark include Rehman Chisti from Gillingham & Rainham and Nurat Ghani from Wealden.

However, it is the Opposition Labour which has scored the most wins – Yasmin Qureshi from Bolton South East, Shabana Mahmood from Birmingham Ladywood, Khalid Mahmood from Birmingham Perry Bar, Imran Hussain from Bradford East, Sadiq Khan from Tooting and Naseem Shah who caused one of the biggest upsets of election night by defeating favourite-to-win Respect Party MP George Galloway in Bradford West.

There was also a Scottish Pakistani who joined in the Scottish National Party's overall success, Tasmina Ahmed-Sheikh from Ochil & South Perthshire in Scotland.

Indian-origin candidates included Rishi Sunak, the son-in-law of Infosys co-founder Narayana Murthy, and other first-timers like Suella Fernandes (Conservative) from Fareham and Lisa Nandy from Wigan from the Labour party.

"I have impossible boots to fill," said Sunak, in reference to taking over from UK foreign secretary William Hague in his old Richmond Yorks stronghold.

Labour's brother-sister duo of Keith and Valerie Vaz returned as MPs with strong majorities and other Labour winners included Virendra Sharma and Seema Malhotra.

"I must thank the people of Leicester East. I have served them for 27 years and they have given me the huge privilege of an extension of another five," said Keith Vaz, among the longest-serving Indian-origin MPs in Britain.

For the Tories, Priti Patel, Alok Sharma and Shailesh Vara held firm in their respective constituencies of Witham, Reading West and North West Cambridgeshire.

The surprise loser was Paul Uppal for the Conservatives from Wolverhampton and the not-so-surprising defeat was that of Northern Ireland's first Sikh candidate Amandeep Singh Bhogal.

For British-Bangladeshis, it was mostly a Labour party sweep with Rushanara Ali holding on to her Bethnal Green & Bow seat and first-timer Rupa Huq won by a close margin in Ealing Central & Acton.

Another first-time MP, Tulip Siddiq, who is the granddaughter of Bangladesh's founder Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, made history in Hampstead & Kilburn.

To complete the picture for MPs with origins in the subcontinent, Sri Lankan-born Ranil Jayawardena won for the Conservatives from Hampshire North East.

[MisterrSingh]

True liberalism is nothing to be sniffed at. Fairness, compassion, etc, are something as Sikhs we should aspire to. But the liberalism of recent times is nothing I identify with at all. It's on the opposite end of the same spectrum of the nastiness espoused by some elements of the Right. Yet the Left is unable or unwilling to see this.