How is it acceptable for Diane Abbott MP, two weeks ago, to say: “White people love to divide and rule, we should not play their game” and keep her frontbench post!

But when Tom Harris MP used a spoofed Hitler clip it cost him his job!?

Putting to one side the taste, political correctness and everything about the contents of either incident, the method the Labour party handled the two situations raises serious concerns about their judgment and thoroughness and the message that sends.

As a black/African/nonwhite mother of two, I am concerned that Ms. Abbott only escaped punishment either because of her gender, her skin colour or both – and very troubled of the message that discrimination sends to young people across the country. Especially when we are constantly told that we are equals, and share equal opportunities with equal responsibilities!

Will any Labour official care to explain why there is one rule for Abbott and another for Harris?

Tom Harris might not be blogging, but I am happy to see that he is still giving us lively and interesting debates. This tweet yesterday has caused an avalanche of retweets and replays on Twitter. As expected there are those who feel good grammar and correct spelling, me included, are very important. Although my spelling is not that great and my grammar is hit and miss sometimes – that’s why I make it a point any important work is looked over by someone else – because the only time I braved it alone, the results were dire, but this in not about me.

Those attacking Tom are saying “what if I am dyslexic”, what if; dyslexia is either a word or numbers dyslexia. If its words dyslexia then obviously a job were writing letters, reports and press releases in nanoseconds all day long is not appropriate, the same applies to a person who has trouble with numbers, they will not enjoy accounting or have fun crunching figures all day!

This attitude, brought in by the last government, Tom’s government I would like to add, where equality and political correctness are rife, is the reason those who clearly are incapable of doing a job feel discriminated against when common sense simply says there are other jobs they’ll be happier and more fulfilled doing because they will finish the day with a sense of achievement, not frustration because the boss corrected them six times before lunch and asked them to finish the day tidying the stock cupboard.

Tom is right, so please lay off him, if for nothing else just because he was honest. Many employers bin CVs with bad grammar and spelling and never even admit it!

Like a lot of Tom Harris’ friends, followers and blog readers, I was sad to read that Tom will stop blogging. His blog posts will be hugely missed but I hope for only a shot while. As one of the best political bloggers and in my opinion the best Labour blogger, his departure will be a great lose to the blogosphere. Specially, as he said: “I love blogging because I love writing. I love politics, I love the Labour Party, I love writing about Labour Party politics”. It will be a crime to let all that love go to waste, this much passion should be shared.

Reading what would be Tom’s penultimate blogpost, a paragraph caught my eye, it’s where he explained – “But the blog has become a burden. It’s taking up too much time (though not as much as some might think – I am a very fast writer), it’s getting me into too many squabbles with people I have never met and are likely never to meet. And increasingly I’ve felt like I’m adopting stances simply for the sake of being confrontational and provoking a row”. To me that read, I’m a fast writer and can transcript my thoughts into words in a flash (I so envy that by the way) I’m an open minded passionate person, and sometime because of that I get in trouble talking to close minded idiots!

Hate to break it to you Tom but that’s life and you know it. And although I’m sad to hear that these things had negative effects on your personal and family life, but that too can be managed and fixed without you having to give up something you love, and are very, very good at.

Like many other public endeavors bloggers need to draw their own parameters and know before hand what they will and will not enter into with their readers and the same applies to twitter by the way. I am neither saying nor advocating a “no comments” policy – because that just defeats the purpose and if I may say, is a little narcissistic – however, a blogger can decide in advance the type of comment posters not to engage with. I know it’s rich coming form someone like me (my blog is barely a year old and I don’t hold any political office). But life has taught me trouble makers feed on attention, and if the blogger/tweeter doesn’t give it to them they’ll soon move on to someone who will. The same goes for explaining and re-explaining ones’ position and stance – ones it’s clear for all to understand and is out there, be careful about re-explaining it over and over again – because nine times out of ten it’s a ploy to drag the whole thing it into a confrontation.

One of the reasons I started blogging was to see my Party get elected, helping in whatever small increment was and is always important for me. I see Tom has the same goal. It was sometime at the beginning of this year that Tom had blogged a series of tips for good blogging practices – those tips are today the foundation of my daily blogging regiment. When my blog, this Summer, ranked on the Total Politics Bloggers awards I felt very proud and honored but knew my blogging discipline and the tips I followed from Tom’s series has played a great part in that success. ‘And Another Thing’ has made a positive difference to me and I am sure to many others too, it will be a shame to see it end so prematurely. That’s why I am still hopeful this is just a well deserved break – and instead of Adios I’ll say see you late mate!