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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

In thinking that Andrew Mitchell needs to resign ASAP for his behaviour?

96 replies

ColouringIn · 21/09/2012 17:08

It's in AIBU.....

Go in then....tell me how an MP who represents a Govt falling over themselves to show their appreciation of police in the wake of this weeks events can justify staying in post.

Tell me why "Call me Dave" has not kicked his arse to kingdom come and told/advised him to resign.

Or is all the talk of "appreciation" for the police after this weeks horrific murders just lip service?

"plebs" and "know your place"..... spoken like a real old right wing "stuff the proles" Tory. Arsehole of the highest order.

He needs to resign.

OP posts:
raspberryroop · 22/09/2012 11:59

Wrong of me and sloppy, but you are also making assumptions about the Policemen and thier motives - when the simple explanation ie that they were sticking to the rules because thats what you do when its a security detail fits well enough.
I also know how they got the story wonder if version matches mine ?

OhDearNigel · 22/09/2012 12:10

I would imagine that when you are a firearms officer tasked with guarding the entrance to Downing Street you follow your guidelines and regulations to the letter.

lolaflores · 22/09/2012 14:20

Imagine the shit storm if Mitchell went through the wrong gate and got offed by some sharp shooter? Shall we for a minute imagine the enquiry and so on that would arrive on the back of it?
so, get orf yer fecking bike ya prick and walk

Nancy66 · 22/09/2012 14:38

....and he rides a lady bike complete with wicker basket.

TheOriginalSteamingNit · 22/09/2012 14:43

Firstly, if a policeman told me I couldn't ride through a certain gate, my response would be not to try. If he was being a real wazzock about it, I might mutter 'arsehole' under my breath after a safe distance.

It would not occur to me to call him a pleb, and that's the point. We can all have off-days and people can be jobsworths, but if when you're having an off-day and you're confronted by a jobsworth your instinct is to call him a pleb, then that says a lot about you.

I can swear here and now that if cameras followed me everywhere 24 hours a day for a year they would hear me referring to people as cunts twants wankers arseholes and shits, but never plebs, and never any racial slur, either.

Oh how I wish there would be a moment for Cameron like Gordon Brown's 'bigoted woman' one, or Mitt Romney's '47%' rants. I bet he comes out with some atrocious stuff when the mask's not on.

allthefun · 22/09/2012 14:53

Not understanding all the comments about policemen and "ordinary" people.

Very occasionally I watch that program about officers policing the street. They don't hold back with their contempt for they have for certain members of our society. So you allowed to call people plebs if they actually are then?

EnglishGirlApproximately · 22/09/2012 14:58

He should go but I don't think his being a tory is relevant tbh. Many politicians from all parties are arrogant and superior, it goes with the territory. As a student I interviewed Peter Mandleson and he was vile, rude, dismissive and patronising.

Unfortunately politics is a career rather than a calling now, its about ambition and power rather than public service.

CelstialNavigation · 22/09/2012 15:01

"Every so often the mask slips and we see the contempt that Conservative party really hold for ordinary people. It's happening more and more"

Yes. The actual problem is that deep down Mitchell holds these views at all. And that he's not the only one. As shown by the policy decisions taken by this government. The problem for Cameron is that Mitchell was "stupid" enough to express them aloud. No-one within the party leadership will be asking themselves if someone who holds such views is fit to represent the electorate at such a high level, they will be seeking to damage control the fact that he was caught expressing such views.

Much like with Mitt Romney.

Original poster
ColouringIn · 22/09/2012 15:14

I have to say that if I was a police officer and someone spoke like that to me I would bloody well record it word for word very carefully too....especially if the "someone" doing the insulting was an MP representing the party which professed to think very highly of serving police officers. And I would make sure the Press got it as well.

Fact is he was bloody rude...and moreso he showed his true colours.

Nasty bastard.

OP posts:
raspberryroop · 22/09/2012 15:35

He is also now calling at least two officers liars, and saying he did not swear and didn't use the word pleb

SauvignonBlanche · 22/09/2012 16:23

He should have been arrested.

SkippyYourFriendEverTrue · 22/09/2012 16:25

"....and he rides a lady bike complete with wicker basket. " Angry

lolaflores · 22/09/2012 16:35

I am a huge fan of those programmes where the police arrest the public in the course of their job. One of the reasons alot of the people get arrested is for swearing at the police. No one should have to try and do their job and get sworn at. Not on.
Hypocrisy of the highest order and he should be sacked, not resign. He should know fucking better and behave with a modicum of respect. There should be no frigging arguement about it. None. It is simply basic common manners.

Dominodonkey · 22/09/2012 16:35

"Every so often the mask slips and we see the contempt that Conservative party really hold for ordinary people. It's happening more and more"

Although I don't think this is entirely true it is much easier to say it now that so many of the top Tories are public school etc. Whether you liked people like Thatcher, Tebbit and Major or not they had come from normal backgrounds and knew what it was like to be in a 'normal' job. Please remember that many of the Labour party are privately educated and far more of them than the Tories have never had a normal (by normal I do include banking, medicine etc) job. Most going from unions or Labour party workers to parliament.

My dad used to be a Traffic Warden in Westminster and had some great stories about 'Do you know who I am?' types. He loved saying he didn't care who they were, the rules still applied.

lolaflores · 22/09/2012 16:38

You know what? I don't care if he was raised by Manny Shinwell in a coal mine whilst being breast fed by pit ponies! They are still citizens of a country where we share the common code of politeness....last time I fucking looked. I would not get away with it, why should that mardy arsed shit for brains think that he can?

SkippyYourFriendEverTrue · 22/09/2012 16:48

The policeman should have opened the gate. He was not a pedestrian.

That said, he shouldn't have been rude to him.

Not nice.

But not a resigning matter, not remotely, lots of perfectly nice people are rude sometimes.

Ridiculous nonsense.

coffeeinbed · 22/09/2012 16:59

This is not simply being rude.
"know your place" and "pleb" is miles beyond simple rudeness. It's contempt.
he has to go.

carabos · 22/09/2012 18:13

.

lolaflores · 22/09/2012 18:41

carabos many thanks. lovely bouquet. divine.

LydiasMiletus · 22/09/2012 18:49

love how this has become all about tories.
Its not about tories or labour. Its about twats and there are alot in all three main parties.
Lots of labour mps think they are above the commoners that vote for them and treat people like they are idiots, including my own (Ed Balls) who have no idea whats going on in the real world.
Andrew Mitchell acted like a dick. Acting like a dick (especially at a bad time) can cost you your job.

He should be sacked asap.

limitedperiodonly · 23/09/2012 07:57

It is about the Tories.

The Government has declared war on public sector workers and unions with the help of newspaper stories about cushy jobs, gold-plated pensions and greedy workers.

Normally the public can be relied upon to go along with it because life is bloody hard and everyone hates Bob Crow with his council flat and his 'greedy' members holding the rest of us to ransom.

Unfortunately for this stupid government this time they've picked on the wrong public sector workers and the wrong union. Police usually enjoy a lot of public sympathy but they especially do right now because of tragic events.

They are angry at job cuts and changes in pay and conditions and I don't blame them, just as I don't blame other public sector workers angry about the same thing.

A couple of months ago there was a huge march in Central London involving police from all over the country. It was an odd atmosphere - people didn't know whether to jeer or cheer. People were angry at the disruption to traffic and I certainly spoke to lots of ordinary people, not nasty criminals, who told me they were glad the police were getting a taste of their own medicine.

Their thoughts, not mine. I happen to think the Police might have come late to the party but I welcome them if they are finally realising most of us really are all in this together.

And the Police Federation is a union looking out for members' interests just like the RMT and a bloody effective one with lots of friends in the press.

Greythorne · 23/09/2012 13:01

What TheSteamingNit said.

I really feel like "pleb" is the nail in his coffin, not the rudeness.

It's like people who are racist. They can mask it or keep it to themselves, but as soon as they get cut up on the motorway and see the driver is black, they're straight out with "the effing black bastard".

This man clearly holds ordinary folk like policemen in quiet contempt and his true colours came shining through under pressure.

RattersReward · 23/09/2012 15:49

The Police Federation is in ABSOLUTELY NO WAY a union. The police have no industrial rights, that includes being forbidden from forming a union.

Limited your comments about the police getting a taste of their own medicine are odd and make no sense. The police service doesn't set the pay or conditions of other workers so how can a devastating attack on their own pay and conditions can't be a taste of their own medicine?
Your comments about the police being late to the party are equally strange and meaningless.

The police who work at Downing Street are from a department that was specifically formed to deal with governmental and diplomatic protection. They have to go through a selection process and role specific training. The chances of one of them starting the confrontation are pretty slender. In addition they are not the ones who set the protocols (there will be one regarding the gates) they just execute them.

mrsminerva · 23/09/2012 16:17

ColouringIn Mitchell should be fired with extreme prejudice. He is a carbuncle on the body politic, which to be honest is pretty ugly to start off with.

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