I was emailed today by a well-wisher daring me to 'do my worst' regardng the news that Stella Creasy has won an award from The Spectator for being Parliamentary Campaigner of the Year. Oddly enough, the idea of our local MP scoffing her face with a bunch of journalists who want to slap her on the back at their bosses' expense for taking on Dr Evil does not seem to me to be so very very bad. I kind of agree with her that charging the very poorest people in our community many hundreds, even thousands of percent interest rates is wrong.

I and several other local campaigners have pointed out the inequities of firms like Oakam, on this blog and elsewhere, well before Stella Creasy was elected. The Archipelago of Truth named and slagged off the nasty Oakam even before Ms Creasy's attempts to get round anti-press-bias provisions in the run up to the election meant she crassly promoted herself as a 'community campaigner'. (This involved gaining name recognition by sending naive schoolkids to buy tins of baked beans at ASDA in the pretence of combatting homelessness and tilting at non-existent BNP windmills). Hopefully she has learned a bit more common sense since those silly days (though a glance at some other campaigns she's been involved in which waste valuable parliamentary time since her election does leave room to wonder).

No, I shall not begrudge her yet another scoff, and also some attention for her noble cause. This is especially so if the cakes and ale have been paid for by a private sector organisation that does not have as its aim in life the fleecing of the taxpayer. Stella should be allowed to digest her slap-up meal entirely free of guilt for a change and contemplate being feted in equal esteem by mirthful journalists as with the likes of Alex Salmond (Politician of the Year for breaking the Labour Party's strangehold on Scotland), Chris Huhne (Survivor of the Year - for not being arrested in circumstances the journalists can't actually go into fully for legal reasons) and Shirley Williams (Parliamentarian of the Year, despite being an unelected politician who'd have us all using the Euro and paying even more taxes to an ever more undemocratic and powerful EU by now if she'd had her way).

See also: http://www.financemarkets.co.uk/2011/11/22/government-fails-to-tackle-loan-sharks/