Anti-war candidate is PM's best bet

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In a key London target seat, a high-profile challenger is running a vigorous campaign against the Labour Party's stance on the Iraq war, terror laws, tuition fees, the privatisation of public services and the PPP for the Tube. Nothing wrong with any of that, of course - except that she's the official Labour Party candidate.

In line with age-old traditions in this part of north London, the battle of Brent East has developed into an ideological purity contest about who can reject Labour party policy most effectively.

You might think the Labour candidate would be at a disadvantage in this. You haven't met Yasmin Qureshi.

As the publication of the Attorney General's legal advice turns new heat on the Iraq issue, Ms Qureshi insists: "I'm the most effective anti-war vote here. If you want a peace campaigner, I'm that person."

The contest is so hard-fought it has even led to the development of new verbs. "She can't outantiwar me, she can't out-civil liberty me," says the Liberal Democrat Sarah Teather, who won Brent East in a by-election at the height of the Hutton Inquiry.

Ms Qureshi has enlisted the help of a Labour politician called Tony. Tony Benn, that is, not Tony Blair. The first Tony was the star of a campaign event in Queen's Park. The second Tony appears only on Lib-Dem leaflets, standing next to George Bush and looking shifty.

This is an ethnic majority constituency: fifty-two per cent of voters are not white. Qureshi's stand is partly a matter of longheld conviction. But it's also a matter of political survival.

She is a first-generation immigrant and a former human rights lawyer for the UN in postwar Kosovo. She wears a pashmina, not a headscarf. If elected, she will be Britain's first Muslim woman MP. She condemns the Home Office minister Hazel Blears for saying Muslims would be singled out for police attention. "It reminds me

of how the Irish were treated 20 years ago. Nobody should be subjected to those kinds of things."

Ms Qureshi's campaign could be seen as an example of the extent to which New Labour control freaks have lost control. At the event in Queen's Park, she promises to be a "thorn in the side" of the Government.

Yet to her opponents it is nothing more than New Labour slipperiness. "It's an extraordinary way to campaign," says Ms Teather. "People already have an MP who stands up against Blair - me."

It seems an entirely reasonable point. Surely, I put it to Ms Qureshi, a Lib-Dem MP will always be a more effective "thorn in the side" of New Labour? "There are aspects of Labour policy I disagree with but there are others I agree with," she replies. "The investment in public services, the anti-poverty agenda. The only party committed to benefiting the disadvantaged is the Labour Party."

And do you support Tony Blair as leader? "He is the leader of the party at the moment," she says. Yes, but will you tell me you personally support Tony Blair as leader? There is a very, very long pause. Ms Qureshi is clearly calculating what an on-the-record endorsement of Downing Street's great warrior-statesman will look like when lovingly reproduced on her opponent's campaign literature. Eight cars, a bus and a lorry pass on the Kilburn High Road outside the café ·here we are sitting. "Well, in some respects, it's a rhetorical question. I come very much from the CND school," she says. Yes, but can I quote you as

Blair? It is fair to ask your position on this, surely? "He is the leader."

Ms Qureshi is on stronger ground when talking about her opponents' tactics. "The Lib-Dems have got this nice-people image at national level but they fight very dirty on the ground," she says.

One of the Lib-Dems' themes is that she is from Hertfordshire, although she now lives in Brent. "I'm not from Hertfordshire," she says defiantly. "I'm from Pakistan."

Ms Teather's problem is that she is defending a seat which is, in essence, heavily Labour. The Labour majority here in 2001 was 13,000. She has had only 18 months to embed herself in a constituency which before the by-election had only 60 party members (200 now).

Maybe Ms Teather's record can save her. She's acknowledged as an effective, hard-working MP and has a high profile.

Out canvassing in Dollis Hill, we find Lib-Dem after Lib-Dem. "If you looked at this, you'd think we were going to romp home, and actually the figures say it's really close," says Ms Teather. "I'm obviously hoping it's the right side of close."

Lib-Dem leaflets are targeting the "no chance" Tories, aware that with some votes going back to Labour they have to pick up Tory supporters to win.

An hour later, off Kilburn High Road, the canvassing seems to be going almost equally well for Ms Qureshi. There's a fair amount of Labour support, even in this middle-class enclave, plus signs that some anti-war waverers are coming back.

Not all are reconciled, though. "Your position doesn't make any sense at all," says resident Duncan Linfoot. "You're against the war but your party is engaged in a war in Iraq."

But the legal advice story, which is breaking as we canvass, is not mentioned by anybody.

One thing is clear: the voters in Brent East are interested in this election. Not for the first time the campaign as seen by the national media, with a disillusioned, disengaged electorate, seems very different from the campaign on this part of the ground.

 

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