Shades of ’79

Talk of rebellion is not far from the ears of us political bloggers today. In a year of unfortunate press articles, the past two weeks has to have been perhaps the worst two weeks of Gordon Brown’s miserable premiership. Backbench Labour MPs convinced the party is doomed, their seats in dire trouble, and the future of the Country almost guaranteed to cross to Tory hands for the next half a decade at least, is enough to suggest that the Brown era may be over quicker than Number.10 might have wished. Labour’s 1997, appears to be the Conservative’s 2009.

If we take our political time machine back two weeks we would find ourselves amidst yet more Labour scandal. Ex-Labour advisor to Brown, and spin doctor Damien McBride sends smeer emails against several Tory backbenchers, to Labour Party Blogger Derek Draper, all of which were fabricated by McBride, and sent directly from McBride’s No.10 Email account. It is thought the blog would act as a place that McBride could post rumours he had invented, about the private lives of senior Tories including the Cameron family and the Osbourne family.

Shortly after that, as reported on a previous blog entry, the Government decide not to allow the majority of Gurkha’s who have fought for this Country, the right to live in this Country. They introduced a motion which would allow, according to GurkhaJustice, only 100 or so Gurkha’s to live in the UK, and only those who served over twenty years. Deciding to ignore the fact that most Gurkha’s only sign up for fifteen years service. The motion angered the British Public who feel a moral debt toward the Gurkha’s.
The Liberal Democrats managed to convince backbench Labour MPs to vote against the Government, and so in the form of extreme embarrassment to an ever weakening Government, the Government lost the vote . The willingness of backbenchers to vote against their Government, and in line with the third party of British Politics, the Lib Dems, is of intense importance to the continuing downfall of the Labour Government.

Gordon Brown, then hastily, and without scrupulous attention to the media fall out, posted a frankly bizarre video on Youtube outlining plans to scrap the controversial MPs Second Home Allowance, that allows those MPs with Constituency Seats outside of London to claim up to £20,000 on furnishings, a mortgage and other expenses; by replacing it with a clocking in system, in which MPs get paid extra…. for turning up to work. A daily payment, for clocking in to the Commons. Of course, he didn’t think this plan up himself. MEPs in the European Parliament have a similar clocking in system, which it turns out, is more open to abuse than the current Second Homes Allowance. In fact, MEPs actually refer to the process as “SOSO”, or “Sign on Sod Off“. Given that the system doesn’t work in Brussels, i’m not entirely sure why Gordon thought it’d prevail here. Brown was forced to scrap those plans he so gleefully put forward on Youtube, adding insult to an already dreadfully embarrassed government.

In a fortnight of majestic failure after failure on the part of the Government, it was inevitable that talk of dissent among back benchers and former Labour front benchers was going to grab the headlines. Former Home Secretary Charles Clarke is quoted as saying “I’m ashamed to be a Labour MP”, he added that he had “worked half my life to get Labour into a position where it could be a good government and I do see that fading away.”
According to former Liberal Democrat Leader Paddy Ashdown, several senior MPs have become so intensely disillusioned with the malignant Labour front Bench, that they have considered defecting to the Liberal Democrat benches if Labour were to lose the next election.
To top it off, Downing Street attempted to show just how connected they are with the general public, by offering an online petition program, in which the public could start an official petition regarding anything they so wish, straight on the Downing Street website. Today, the most popular petition, gaining over 40,000 signatures is simply entitled “Resign”.

In my humble opinion, these past two weeks could indeed be the beginning of a storm that threatens to destroy the Government before they themselves choose to call an election in 2010. They could indeed be forced to call an election much earlier than they had planned, if 1979 is invoked, and a Conservative driven vote of no confidence placed on the heads of the current administration. If that were to happen, I cannot imagine the Government would win the vote in their favour. It could indeed get that serious.
The only possible way I can see Labour clawing back the 19 point lead the Conservatives have over them, is a change in leadership, a complete Cabinet reshuffle. Some new blood. The Party looks old, out of touch, with largely fatuous Department heads. That needs to change. There needs to be a burst of energy thrust into the Government and into Whitehall, otherwise the ghost of Callaghan will continue to strangle the Party and the Government.
Shades of 1979, exactly 30 years on.

The Labour Leadership

When President Sarkozy of France indicated that the VAT cut over here in Britain, had not worked, Downing Street released the statement…

“It is important to remember the context in which he was making the comments, which as I understand it, was a domestic debate on television about the way forward for the French economy and French proposals for an economic stimulus.”

I think they missed the point. They always appear to miss the point. I’m not quite sure that the context matters at all. If Sarkozy had said “The VAT cut didn’t work” during a domestic debate about the French economy, or if he’d have said “The VAT cut didn’t work” during a sensual bath with Gordon Brown himself, it means the same thing. Not only that, but he’s right. The VAT cut didn’t work. It didn’t go far enough. Especially given that most retailers had cut prices distinctively more than ever before anyway.

The German Chancellor has accused Britain and America of failing to understand and control under-regulated areas of the economy, which in turn has lead to this whole disaster. Like Sarkosy, the German Chancellor is right. It doesn’t matter how many times Brown refuses to acknowledge his role in this crises, nor does it matter how many times he says “It’s a global problem“, the recent poll numbers, putting the Tories at a 20 point lead suggest that the public just doesn’t buy into what he says.

So why then, is it being suggested that Brown may step down as Prime Minister, to head up a Global Financial Regulator body? Although he’s denied his interest in such an appointment, it must be tempting for him. He has endured 10 years as Britain’s Chancellor before taking over from Blair as Prime Minister in 1997. But that begs the question, if Brown has been in charge of the Economy for the ten years leading up to the biggest economic disaster in generations, in which a lot of blame can be placed directly at the door of the new Prime Minister, why does anyone think, of the billions of people that live on our wonderful planet, that he, above all others, is the right man for the job? Surely along with people like Alan Greenspan and George Bush, he’d be kept well away from any kind of financial responsibility? We do not need failed Brownomics. We do not need failed Thatcherite economic policies. We need something new; something that preaches social morality within the confines of the free market model.

Labour After Brown.

I do not ever want to see a Conservative Government in this Country again. The roots of the economic crises today, can be traced in an almost perfect line back to the years in which Thatcher beat it into an entire generation, that the free market could solve everything. It didn’t work, clearly.

However, the Tories will win the next general election. That’s now a given. And they wont win by a small majority either, they will command a significant majority. So the worry is, who is to lead the Labour Party if Gordon Brown were to step down to take on a Global Regulatory role, or when Labour lose the next general election?

The talk of Journalist town appears to suggest that Deputy Leader of the Labour Party, Harriet Harman is gearing up for a leadership bid. Does Labour really lack the talent? This is a woman who once said “Yep “ when asked if Labour should apologise for the false intelligence of the Iraq war, and then a few nights later claimed she’d never said that and demanded evidence.
The same Harriet Harman who once said that she would happily go out at night in her town of Peckham and not fear for her safety, but then went out in a stab proof vest.
The same Harriet Harman, who quite disgustingly, tried to nullify the high court ruling that all MPs receipts should be published, by trying to exempt MPs from the Freedom of Information act.
I would rather not vote at all, than be given a choice between Harriet Harman and David Cameron.

She certainly appears to be stepping up her profile recently, agreeing to speak at a ‘Womens Conference’ at the exact same time as the G20 meetings take place. She also started pushing for bank bonus caps recently, having kept relatively quiet for months. Is she trying to win over the support of the Labour left? According to politicalbetting.com, Harman is doing what Labour leaders do prior to an election and sucking up to the Unions. Politicalbetting asks if Harman is becoming our version of Palin…. I can safely say, yes she is, because she’s ridiculous, and useless all at the same time.

Harman certainly seems to be positioning herself one step above the competition, which would include David Miliband (my favourite as successor to Brown) and Alan Johnson, who really aren’t making any effort or publicity. In 2008, Miliband wrote an article in the Guardian about his vision for the future of the Labour Party. He doesn’t mention Gordon Brown’s involvement in that future once. He also suggests here… “The odds are against us, no question. But I still believe we can win the next election.”… That Labour has issues and must over come those odds. That issue, at that time, was Gordon Brown. Miliband looked set to offer an alternative to Brown. He ended up backing down. Perhaps that’s a weakness that should not be brought to the Prime Minister’s chair. He does however, attack the Tories, and David Cameron in particular. That isn’t what a Foreign Secretary does. It is however, what a man with big ambitions does. So perhaps the subtle hint at an ambitious future, was enough to start the ball rolling in 2008. He seems however, to have stayed quiet so far this time around, allowing Harman to get the publicity over a possible leadership contest.

For the sake of the Labour Party, let’s inject new blood into the system. Harman is not leadership material. She’s a typical Politician who cannot answer questions straight, and repeatedly contradicts herself, whether it be on her comments over a much needed apology for flawed intelligence leading up to the Iraq war, or preaching how wonderfully safe the streets of London are, whilst herself strolling around in a stab proof vest; just stands to show she is in fact a disaster of a Leader-in-waiting.

The public do not like Harman. She has made too many PR mistakes to claw back any ounce of respect. And whilst I’d push for The Foreign Secretary, David Miliband as next Labour leader simply because he reflects my own Blairite tendencies whilst looking young and fresh enough to pose an adequate threat to Cameron’s Tories; why should we leave it to the Party itself to decide? Why can’t we have a real democratically elected leader through perhaps a Primary system as in America?

Because if Harman is given the top job, she doesn’t stand a chance against the fresh looking, but lacking fresh ideas; Cameron’s Tories.

Heathrow

As you walk down toward Parliament, from Trafalgar Square, whilst Lord Nelson looms proudly overhead, you enter Whitehall; Civil Service Paradise. On the right hand side of the street you can expect to be greeted by miserable police men standing guard over a huge cast iron fence; the entrance to Downing Street. Time ago, the public could freely walk down Downing Street, but now it’s blocked off. What do they fear? An unhappy British public backlash against broken promises and devious lies?

Perhaps blocking off Downing Street should be extended to the small town of Sipson in West London, the site of the proposed Third Runway at Heathrow. The entire village is being knocked down. The residents who live there have no say. The Government hasn’t apologised. The residents have to move. And yet, this hardly gets a mention. The focus of the Nations attention both in opposition to the plans and in support of the plans, revolve around the Environment, no one appears to want to mention the 700 people displaced by this announcement. One lady living in the village talked of how horrible she felt, telling her young daughter that their school was to be demolished and that they’d have to move away from her friends. No doubt she’s wondering why a Labour Government could be so much of a suck up to Big Business. What do I think of the situation?

The Environment?
It’s disastrously rich of the government to be asking the public to cut down on Carbon Emissions, to tell us that higher taxes on bigger cars is tough but needed, that we’re all guilty, and then decide to build the third runway at Heathrow. According to BBC News last week, emissions on the third runway at Heathrow, in a year, would be twice as high as the entire nation of Kenya. Surely a third runway is encouraging Air Travel? Thus increasing emissions? Thus encouraging Global Warming?
The Government has pledged to only allow new technology with low emission rating aircraft to be using the Third Runway come 2020. The only flaw in this ingenious plan is that we don’t have any low emission rating aircraft, nor have any been designed. The entire fate of 700 villagers in Sipson, rests on the concept that by 2020 we might have better aircraft. In 2020, we might have flying cars, so i’d quite like to build a landing pad where Number 10 Downing Street is.
The Gov said that by 2050, they want carbon emissions from Heathrow to have dropped by 80% to below 2005 levels. Which in laymans terms means that for the next 21 years at least, emissions will rise over 80% from 2005. What about the 700 homes?

The Economy:
This week the widening of the M1 between Junction 21 and Junction 31 was cancelled, putting hundreds out of work, South West Trains cut 480 jobs earlier this week. Woolworths bust, MFI bust, B&Q look close to failure, banks not lending but sucking up public funds, all this despite a huge injection of the wealth of the nation into the private sector to save the economy and jobs. A better financial infrastructure complete with an overhaul of the entirely useless FSA, better public transport including a better bus system, cheaper train pricing (It cost for £42 today to travel from London to Leicester…… it’d cost £10 petrol to drive it….. where’s the incentive to catch the train?) and investment in new, clean public transport… perhaps a ‘greener’ tram system like the one running Nottingham. Stop taxing drivers heavily! We need incentive to ditch our cars. The answer is not building a new runway. Those jobs at the new Heathrow runway do not exist, they aren’t affecting anyone’s lives like the jobs lost at Woolworths or the road building scheme. No jobs would be lost if this project was cancelled because none have been created so far. But still……What about the 700 homes?

The Expansion?
The expansion of Heathrow is supposedly going to deal with the fact that Heathrow is jam packed already. Even though, Heathrow is not jam packed. The only people i’ve heard say that Heathrow is struggling to keep up with growing demand, are the Chief Exec. of BAA, the Financial Director of Virgin and Geoff Hoon. As if that’s a surprise. Most people see Heathrow, notice that prices are falling rapidly, and we wonder, if demand was that high, surely prices would soar? Isn’t that the backbone and fundamental idea of the free market system?
What happens when Heathrow’s third runway reaches full capacity (assuming of course these new low emission aircraft save the day)? Will we need to build a fourth runway to keep up with Rome and Paris too? Or will the Government of that future date say “Woah woah woah, we have five fucking airports in London already!!! Heathrow, Luton, Kent, Gatwick and Stanstead, let’s improve facilities first!” I hope so. And still, What about the 700 homes?

Sipson?
Ah onto the 700 homes that the Government does not care for.
As well as the obscene notion that a Government has the right to decide the fate of the lives of 700 residents, by having no second thought in planning the demolition of their homes, there are also those to be taken into consideration who will live next to the new runway. The Gov appears to be of the opinion that people who live north of Sipson will be more than happy to allow a new runway to disrupt their lives with noise pollution, and carbon emissions. If we take those people into consideration, along with the 700 residents of Sipson, we have a total of over 2000 residents affected by this.
Heathrow Primary school, one of the best in the region will be gone, William Byrd Primary School would be just past the runway, meaning low flying aircraft every few minutes taking off and landing. Harmondsworth Primary school would sit in between Runway two and the new Runway three. Perfect place for a Primary School i’m sure you’d agree.

Labour?
It is not the policy of a left of centre Government to be so heavily influenced by the demands of big Business. As the Guardian pointed out yesterday, many of New Labour’s senior members have strong connections to the Aviation industry.
How does a Labour government allow big bankers to “speculate” so much so that millions of people lose their jobs and their savings to these crooks who inevitably get away with it, yet 700 innocent lives are destroyed by the introduction of runway at an airport, designed to ease the travel woes of such cretinous bankers.
Labour, are born out of Socialist ideals. A socialist ideal does not involve the destruction of 700 homes and the lies that try to justify it. Nor does it involve blatant disregard of their past, to concentrate on business ties. It appears to be another stab in the back of Humanitarian beliefs and fuel in the furnaces of the speeding money money money train.
I’d agree that the difference between a left wing government and a right winged Conservative counterpart, is the left wing’s appetite for progression, both socially and economically, but the proposed expansion of Heathrow is beyond wrong. It cannot be allowed to go ahead.
Labour MP John McDonnell was suspended by Labour this week for his strong opposition to the Heathrow proposal. Punishing those who disagree with you? We’re not Zimbabwe for Christ’s sake. We’re a leading Democratic Nation. And yet, our MPs are not allowed to disagree with the destructive nature of this current Government without fear of suspension. They appear scared to put it to a House of Commons vote too. Because, they’d lose. Much like the EU “Treaty”.

The plans need to be scrapped, but here exists the problem. For the plans to be scrapped, the Tories would have to win the next election for the plans to be abolished, and that’s a risk not worth taking.

Perhaps we could build a third runway over Downing Street.

British “Democracy”

It’s difficult to deduce why exactly we in Britain can consider our system of governance to be “Democratic” by nature. There are many reasons, the will of the people just isn’t in place. It’s almost as if we’re told we’re in a democracy, given a relatively pointless vote as if we have some power, only to be shafted vigorously by whichever government happens to have manipulated us into believing they’re right for the Country.
Too many faults to name, but I shall put just a select few of my concerns down on here now.Everytime I hear that we’re ‘spreading democracy’, as if we’re the centre piece of a great democracy ourselves, I get frustrated for a couple of reasons 1) We’re not democratic ourselves and 2) It’s defeats the point of democracy, when you force it on people without the people voting if they actually want it or not. By definition, it isn’t democracy.

Here are my problems with British Democracy…

The Head of State, gains that priviledge through inheritance. We never elected the Queen. Fundamentally, that is totally the opposite of democracy, regardless of how powerful she actually is.

My family are working class, we’ve always supported Labour. But for Labour to gain power with only 36% of the vote, means that 64% of the votes were cast against Labour. 64% of people in the UK did not want Labour in power. The majority of people in this country voted for a party other than the one in charge. So, the minority are ruled as they’d like, the majority, ignored.

Some would argue we live in a multi-party system, which allows parties to pop up everywhere, from Labour to the BNP to the Monster Raving Looney Party. Others would argue that we live in a two party system, because realistically only Labour and the Tories gain control of Parliament. I would argue quite controversially that we live in a one party system. My reasoning for this is that the two main parties, Labour and the Conservatives have spent the past ten years fighting for the Centre ground. There is no mainstream left wing or mainstream right wing party anymore. It’s two parties, fighting for the same voters on the centre ground, which means it’s one big party, split into two. This, although good for the majority of Middle England, is still in essence, undemocratic.

When Labour in their manifesto said “We will not introduce university top up fees” and then the moment we vote them in power, some would say, because of their stance on top up fees, they totally do the opposite of what they promise. We have been lied to on that one, and yet, we can’t do a thing about it. How democratic is that?

Labour also promised a referendum on the E.U Constitution, in their manifesto. Now they’re saying we don’t need a referendum. I’m guessing that’s because they know for certain the vote will come back a ‘No’ by quite a huge majority, which would be embarrasing for Labour. But what gets me is that they wont even ask Parliament to vote on if we should be given a referendum. Brown hinted a while back on a vote in Parliament, but not a free vote. It would have been a three line whipped vote, which is undemocratic in principle.

Speaking of the whip, what happens when the concerns of your constituents clash with the plans of your Party? You’re expected to go with what your party tells you to do, not the people who voted for you. Undemocratic.

Instead of covering it up, why doesn’t Labour tell us what really happened with the whole Dr David Kelly episode? We know they’re lying on this one. Rule by the people, for the people.

When two million people signed a petition on the Downing Street Website in early 2007 against Government plans to introduce a road mileage tax, the response from the Government was “A petition doesn’t change anything”………… when you totally ignore 2,000,000 people, not only is that so undemocratic, it’s bordering on a Dictatorship. When 80’000 police officers marched on downing street because the Government refused to pay them what they promised to pay them, the meeting in the house of commons totally ignored it. Not one MP brought up the subject at PMQs. Yet all MPs had their say when agreeing a pay increase for themselves.

When both main parties are funded by rich businessmen, they are then in the debt of the businessmen, and so the entire point of the Labour Party is distroyed. If one party is going to support the CBI, then for democracy to work, the other HAS to be supportive of the TUC, otherwise again, it’s just one big party, with the same principles fighting for the same rich tycoons.

Who voted Gordon Brown in as Prime Minister?

An entire wing of the British Government existing in the House of Lords, are unelected. I never voted on whether Thatcher should be in the Lords. She should be in prison, not dressing like a twat in a pointless chamber of government.

At the last election, the tories got almost as many votes as the Lib Dems, and yet the allocation of seats, due to the fact that Lib Dem supporters are not concentrated in particular areas and instead spread around the country, was so disproportionate to the actual votes, it couldn’t be any less democratic if it tried.

The point is, we are not democratic. We are under the impression that we’re democratic because we’re given a vote. There is something massively wrong with the system when less than 45% of people actually vote, and of that 45%, it only takes 36% of the vote to secure a majority. That amasses to such a small amount of people chosing who the next government should be.

I read a piece in the Daily Mail the other day (And I absolutely hate the right winged bullshit within the Daily Mail) that said “If we don’t act now, our privacy will be invaded further in the future”……… if we don’t act now? 2,000,000 of us signed a Downing Street petition and were ignored. How do we ‘act now’? Short of striking up a guerilla army and storming Westminster, there’s really fuck all any of us can do.

Britain is not a democracy. Infact, we’re only a Democracy, when you compare us to Zimbabwe. Other than that, we’re a failed democracy.