Thursday, February 21, 2008

Labour MP concerned for the thickies in the Commons?

When it comes to insulting people there are two ways you can do it right? You can either just call them a name, which is satisfying, or you can say something that, if thought about for a moment is actually an attack. For some reason I;m thinking the latter is contained within a written question by the Labour MP, Dr Ian Gibson, a geneticist and all round scientific smartypants* by the looks of things.

Yesterday you see he asked the Leader of the Common if "she will make it her policy to make available to hon. Members training in correlation, significance and statistical analysis." Clearly Dr Gibson has concerns about the thickies around him methinks. Concerns well placed as well I imagine.

The answer, should anyone be interested, was that as far as Harriet Harman is concerned if any members want to learn how to number crunch they can claim it on expenses.
* The was a compliment not an insult.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

Interesting to see on Dr Gibson's website, the result of a questionnaire for Norwich residents.
To the question:
"Can we trust civil servants to responsibly handle the sort of personal information that would go on an ID card?"
92% said "No".

Chris Paul said...

Was Gibson looking up at Dale and Fawkes in the public gallery or across at GOOey Osborne when he made these remarks?

Stats traininf for Tory bloggers and baronets I say.

dizzy said...

I would imagine his researcher was looking at the keyboard when he submitted the _written_ question Chris.

Anonymous said...

Could this be the same Dr Ian Gibson MP who caused outrage in Norfolk by describing his constituents as 'inbred'?

Fortunately, he moved quickly to quell the storm by appearing on local TV the next day. During his interview, he explained that he had a PhD in genetics and his constituents were only offended because they didn't really understand what 'inbred' meant.

Add one more Labour MP to the list of those who'll be losing their seats at the next election.

Anonymous said...

If he tabled the written question *yesterday*, Dizzy, it is hardly likely he wouild have had an instantaneous answer from harman.

[shakes head]

dizzy said...

Only minor problems with your comment.

1. I didn't say he tabled it yesterday
2. It was answered
3. I wrote what the answer was
4. You can't read
5. Are you a Parliamentary researcher that has never had a proper job?