It’s Just One Depressing Scandal After Another

July 3, 2012 Leave a comment

There seems to have been an incredible amount going on in the news, politics especially, in the last few months, which has made it difficult for me to keep up blogging wise. Usually because I see a story that I’m interested in, think ‘oh I’ll write about that when I get time’ and by the time I actually have the time another scandal has erupted gloriously across the online media world.

Just recently we have gone from celebrities avoiding tax, to potential O-level re-introduction, children abandoned in pubs, EU referendum talk, Libor scandal, police cuts, people setting themselves on fire outside the Job Centre, the Queen meeting Martin McGuinness, Lords reform, Chloe Smith getting offered up as a human sacrifice, ongoing Leveson enquiry et al

In simple terms, ‘it’s all kicking off’. I can’t help that remember when Brown was PM the lead story for days was that he called a woman a ‘bit bigoted’, actually Gillian Duffy seems to have cropped up in the news too recently, add immigration to the list of recent stories. Whilst we’re on that subject can we just get over that remark? I noted that as Gillian Duffy’s name began trending on Twitter recently several people furiously took to their keyboards to express how the incident was a perfect reminder of how much contempt Brown had for ordinary people and his supporters. Umm.. musing that you think somebody seemed a tad bigoted isn’t that bad, nor is it contemptuous, it’s not like he got in the car and ranted that she was a ‘fucking bitch’ or anything really offensive. He apologised, job done.

What was probably the most entertaining moment, in a depressing batch of news stories and example after example of government incompetence, was when David Cameron went to town on Jimmy Carr over his tax avoidance, practically falling over himself to have a go at the comedian and denounce his actions as ‘morally wrong’. Then promptly shutting up when it emerged that Tory-supporting chums like Gary (Fat Boy) Barlow, Tory-donor Lord Ashcroft and the PM’s own father-in-law Lord Astor had used tax havens. Presumable tax-avoidance is only immoral if you’re not a fully devoted member, supporter or donor of the Conservative Party. Glad we cleared that up. The exceptional mismanagement of the situation only served to make Carr, who apologised and came out to take the flak, look sympathetic and Cameron to look incredibly stupid. He must be paying his PR chaps a fortune…

Right now I’m looking at the political headlines and we’re still on the Libor scandal and Bob Diamond’s resignation, as if we needed reassuring that the bankers were a bad lot, they’ve not exactly done themselves a lot of favours in the last few years. Maybe they’re using the same PR people as Cameron? Good old Tony Robinson has come to the conclusion that bankers are not human, which might explain something, worth a watch here, the best rant I’ve seen in recent times.

Back to the headlines and Ken Clarke seems to be banging on about how we’re ‘losing the war on drugs’. I wasn’t aware that we had declared a war, nor am I really convinced that Ken Clarke has any idea what he is saying on this issue.

Other headlines seem to concern what has become the standard of late: cuts, ‘reforms’, cuts, EU, cuts, banks. All rather depressing really and by the time I hit publish no doubt a new demoralising scandal will have emerged.

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Broken Britain = Redundant Rhetoric

August 15, 2011 1 Comment

In the wake of the UK riots, Prime Minister David Cameron has declared that the “Broken Society” is once again back at the top of his agenda and he is on a mission to fix “Broken Britain”.

Reassured, I am not. Cameron has been banging on about this supposed “Broken Britain” for quite some time now, I believe this shiny new catchphrase popped up around 2008 thanks to that respectable organ of the tabloid press, The Sun. In fact, here’s an article published by The Sun in 2008 entitled ‘Cam: I’ll mend Broken Britain’ , with Cameron pledging to introduce tough new stop and search powers and consult communities to get their views on policing. A couple of interesting quotes:

“We now plan to fully engage with the local communities to start that debate. We want their views. We have to change the way we police our streets and the way we bring up our children.”

Well, slashing 20% from the police budget will certainly change the way our streets are policed as up to 12,000 police officers and 16,000 support staff will have to be cut, not to mention around 2,000 who will be forced to take early retirement.

“If you want to take back control of the streets you have to have police who feel they can intervene, gather information and actively police the streets.”

Hmm, may be difficult to actively police the streets when there are no police to do so, but what do I know.

In January 2010 I was clearly annoyed enough by Cameron’s “Broken Britain” rhetoric to write this post, ‘Britain is not Broken, actually I think we’re pretty great’ and I stand by that sentiment. Interestingly, at the time, it was going to be marriage tax breaks that saved us all from “Broken Britain”, as single mothers are always to blame for this sort of thing, don’t-you-know?

So the question that springs to mind, at least to my mind, is what has David Cameron actually done to fix “Broken Britain” since coming to power? Apart from ‘change the way we police our streets’ although not in the way he led readers of The Sun to believe. He’s had 15 months in power to mend “Broken Britain” as promised and yet, if anything, you could argue that his “Broken Britain” has broken further, what with rioting, arson and looting rife on the streets.

I’ll assume that “Broken Britain” simply slipped off Dave’s agenda for a while but I am sure we can all breathe a sigh of relief that it is now back at the top and the BBC reports:

The PM said he would review government policies and speed up plans to deal with “problem” families, improve parenting and education.

As part of plans to tackle what he called a “moral collapse”, he also pledged an “all out war” on gangs.

Good stuff, although what are the details of these plans to deal with “problem” families does an “all out war” on gangs actually mean. Are the government going to start strafing groups of youths at random? Whatever happened to “hugging a hoodie”? I thought he wanted to empathise with the young? Surely that wasn’t just a desperate gimmick?

Despite Cameron constantly repeating the phrase “Broken Britain” I am never quite sure what is meant by it, nor by “Broken Society” and I don’t particularly believe in either phrase. The nearest we got to a definition was when the Tories spent much of early 2010 telling us that it was caused by the breakdown of marriage and the “traditional” family unit.  The entire nation is not broken, there’s no huge fission running between John O’Groats and Lands End. As for the “Broken Society” how do you accurately judge that? It seems something of a disservice to all the people in Britain who go about their business without committing crimes to talk about “Britain’s Broken Society”. Also, it’s hardly a great advert to the rest of the world to hear our own Prime Minister talking about “Broken Britain”, doesn’t exactly look good in the tourist brochures… (not like, “Cool Brittania”, remember that?) Terrifying people is usually a good vote winner though.

There was a wonderful incident during the course of the riots where Cameron described parts of Britain as not just broken but “sick“. I doubt “Sick Britain” will catch on though, it’s just not a good catchphrase, no alliteration for a start. Not like “Broken Britain” or “Hug a Hoodie”, maybe “Sick Society” would do it? I can’t help but feel that this is what it all boils down to, a good hearty catchphrase that the press latch onto. Who needs a thought-provoking, in-depth analysis on what may have caused these riots when you can just blame “Broken Britain” and generate headline after headline, throwing in nice sound-bites like  ”moral collapse” and  ”major criminal disease that has infected streets and estates across our country”, with gives me fond thoughts of the plague, or typhoid. Perhaps he should take advice from former Conservative Prime Minister John Major who once remarked “a soundbite never buttered any parsnips”… yes quite John, I’m sure you get the point though. A plethora of catchy slogans and soundbites isn’t going to “mend” the “Broken Society” either, if they had that potential then Cameron would have had it under control by now.

 Ed Miliband has warned Cameron against “knee-jerk gimmicks”, another little sound-bite but a fairly sound, sound-bite, as it were… “Broken Britain” was and is just a gimmick, just like the “hug a hoodie” debacle. Blaming a supposed “Broken Society” is not an answer or an explanation, it’s just empty words.

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Recalling Parliament is a Pointless Response to Riots

August 9, 2011 1 Comment

I am in complete agreement with Rob Marchant who in his article for LabourList today describes David Cameron recalling Parliament for a day in the wake of riots across London and other parts of the country ‘the return of gesture politics’. What are Parliament supposed to achieve by sitting for a day? All I can see happening is a long debate where it is likely that MPs will fight to win the award for ‘best sound bite’, achieving nothing of practical use. No new laws need to be passed to deal with this situation, as far as I can tell, and rushing through legislation is never a wise decision anyway. The only reasons I can think of to recall Parliament at this stage are a) David Cameron is annoyed at cutting his own holiday short and is now retaliating by making other MPs do the same b) he wants to make a grand gesture of ‘look I am doing something’, especially after coming under fire for not returning home earlier.

I wasn’t particularly interested in getting involved in some of the virulent political point scoring that emerged as the riots began and continued over the weekend. I don’t believe that the arson and looting taking place is simply a result of the current government’s cuts, as many have claimed. In my opinion the causes of these continued riots, the ones that clearly no longer have anything to do with the shooting of Mark Duggan, lie in deep-rooted social issues, inequality and poverty of aspiration. Of course, this government making cuts in areas such as youth services and EMA is hardly going to help these issues but I think it is wrong to simply blame 14 months of Tory-led government policy for these riots, even if they haven’t helped matters, and doing so isn’t going to help find or attempt to solve the social problems that lie behind this unrest.

It wasn’t until Monday, with rioting spreading, that I got involved with the political commentary. After three days of watching people’s homes and businesses burning and masked individuals smashing in shop fronts to loot whatever they could I was wondering where the political leadership was. Surely the situation called for the Mayor of London to be in his burning city and for the leader of the country to come home and, well, lead. Myself and many others on twitter were asking why David Cameron was still in Italy, presumably too busy sipping cappuccino and staging tipping related press opportunities, and not back at home, where the capitol city of the country he leads was in a state of advanced disorder, and calling a meeting of COBRA, as this was clearly a state of crisis that needed a governmental response.

Eventually, on Monday night as scenes of fire filled the news channels, Boris Johnson announced that he would be returning followed (I’d presume reluctantly) by David Cameron, at least two days later than I would have hoped or expected that either of them would return.

Now, after a meeting of COBRA has finally taken place, David Cameron has recalled Parliament. Why? Why does every MP have to return from their holiday and to the Commons? In Rob Marchant’s words:

The right people should be brought back from holiday, not any old people. Is there any possible reason to recall our politicians for a debate which, we can confidently predict, will earnestly condemn, loudly froth and will achieve precisely nothing?

I know that many people seem to believe that MPs should be on demand 24/7, 365 days of the year but these are real people who, hopefully in most cases, work hard, long hours at a very demanding job. They need a break to spend time with their family and friends just like everybody else. Forcing MPs to return to Parliament isn’t likely to achieve anything other than pissing several MPs off who have no reason to be there and can do nothing of use anyway. I really think the PM needs to try a little harder…

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Since it’s National Poetry Day…

October 7, 2010 1 Comment

There was a PM called Cameron

Who cut welfare with gay abandon

The rich/poor divide

Grew ever so wide

And his Party didn’t think it at all wrong.

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The so-called scandal of civil service pay.

June 1, 2010 10 Comments

The great underpaid...

The argument of the day seems to be revolving around public vs. private sector pay after the completely pointless headlines about how various top civil servants earn more, salary-wise, than the Prime Minister – that big issue we were all highly concerned about before the election… Dave felt the need to ‘expose’ the pay of these civil servants, presumably all in the public interest (apparently we were all just dying to know, although I don’t remember a single of the hundreds of voters I met pre-election expressing concerns about this).

Firstly, I don’t know why this story is presented as some massive injustice against Call Me Prime Minister. This poor man selflessly took a pay cut when he took office and now has to survive on a measly £142,500 a year salary *sob*, plus all those nice Prime Ministerial perks. The poor Cameron’s, only something like a £30m fortune to fall back on. The age of austerity indeed. Excuse me if I don’t reach for a violin right away because the PM gets paid less than the Chief Executive of the National Health Service – one of the world’s biggest employers; that important organisation which provides free healthcare to all regardless of wealth and saves thousands of lives every day.

I’m also fairly sure if you took the value of all the perks afforded to the PM, the things people generally pay for out of their salaries; property, travel, phone, internet, nice Sky TV package etc etc plus his MP’s salary of £65,000 the PM doesn’t really earn any less than any of these people at all. The highest salary reported with regards to this story is John Fingleton chief executive, Office of Fair Trading, £275,000 – £279,999. If you combine Dave’s PM salary with his MPs salary it is £207,500 and I sincerely doubt that all his freebies add up to a combined total of the £72,499 difference pa. The screaming ‘Civil Servants earn more than PM’ headlines are a complete misnomer and a total waste of column inches. In the interests of ‘transparency’ Dave I’d quite like to see a nice full and clear list of all your PM perks and the value they add up to. After all ‘transparency’ is the word of the day.

The argument regarding public vs. private sector pay seems to be as follows: one side is arguing that these £200,000-£300,000 salaries are hardly large when compared to the salaries given out in so many other professions in the private sector. Others argue back that the point is that those salaries are paid by private companies that are perfectly entitled to pay whatever ridiculously large and disproportionate salaries they like and the issue is that public sector salaries come out of public funds and therefore we should be outraged that a) they get “paid more” than the PM (see above) and b) they have what is widely considered to be a very large salary coming out of public funds – widely considered by us ordinary people anyway, not the people in the private sector who earn millions a year or the ‘financial elite’ that makes up the Cabinet
£279,999 is probably chick feed to them, after all most of them were born worth considerably more than that. There’s a definite scent of irony in the air.

The personal wealth of any individual aside, either the argument is that these civil servants are paid too much more in salary than the PM, or they are simply just paid too much full stop. This leads to two solutions 1) Increase the PMs pay, something I can’t see happening when Dave is so focused on his ‘austerity’ agenda, bravely taking a pay cut and such. The only other option therefore would be to significantly reduce the salaries of people like the Chief Executive of the National Health Service or the Chief of Defence Staff. To which I am sure some people would say ‘hurrah, let’s’. It’s really not that simple. The high salaries in these roles reflect the importance of the role, the skills and experience necessary, the amount of work involved etc. You are dealing with highly qualified, experienced and skilled individuals. Salaries need to be competitive compared to the private sector to attract those people into public sector roles. Unless somebody is deeply committed to their line of work it is probably unlikely that they would choose a public sector job over a private sector job with a much, much higher salary when they are more than qualified to do either. A sad but undeniable fact of life. Compared to the salary of a journalist, footballer, broadcaster etc these published civil service salaries are actually very low. Again I know people will argue ‘but that’s the private sector, they can give bigger salaries’, true, but who do you really believe deserves the highest salary? The man who oversees the entire NHS or some pillock with a chat show? Maybe the private companies should pay fairer salaries, not millions to those at the top and minimum wage to those at the bottom who are often working just as hard and as many hours a week as those way above them – just a thought.

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RIP Liberal Democrats 1988 – 2010 & A New Dawn for Labour

May 11, 2010 8 Comments

Today signaled the end to Nick Clegg’s Leaders Debates presentation of the Liberal Democrats as a fresh, new political party, set apart and above old politics and the “two old parties”, the Conservatives and Labour, as the Tories and Liberals compromised their ideals and manifesto promises to form a coalition government.

Really this signals the end of the real Liberal Democrats in general, all in the name of power, a centrist – centre-left party now doing deals with the right-wing Conservatives. Liberal Democrat ideology must have changed profoundly in the last few days, as must have some Conservative ideology. Obviously ideals, ideology, credibility, promises and principles do not matter much to Clegg and Cameron when it comes to the pursuit of power.

Clegg is the real hypocrite in this. He stood on a platform of change, of a ‘new politics’, distanced from the Conservatives and Labour. It was basically “vote for us because we’re not them” but literally it was “vote for us and get them”. Well we did say “vote Lib Dem, get Tory”. True both at a constituency level and now at national level. You have to wonder how many people who put an X in the Lib Dem candidates box last Thursday would have felt compelled to do the same if they were aware that Clegg would soon be happily entering a coalition with the Tories.

The Lib Dem’s I have spoken to and read and heard the views of seem to be split. Some take the Simon Hughs, “better to be in government than not” view, presumably not matter how many principles are lost along the way. Others I know feel betrayed. They didn’t vote for a Tory government, they thought they were voting for the change and fresh politics they were promised.

It will be interesting to see how this coalition will work. Cameron has had to offer the referendum on electoral reform, which Labour had already committed to in our manifesto, something I can’t see too many Tories celebrating. In reality it is likely that the Tories will turn around and campaign against any change in the voting system. Public spending cuts are likely, as the emergency Tory budget will more than certainly go ahead, which rather tramples all over the Liberal Democrats ideological commitments to the welfare state and higher public spending. On immigration and Europe the parties are still widely apart in their views – creating further possibility of compromises on policy and promises from either party in the future.

If this coalition survives for long I will be surprised. I would doubt that the two other options available after the election result would have lasted long either. I am glad Labour did not compromise their manifesto promises to form the so-called “progressive” or “rainbow” alliance, which would have involved concessions to the minor nationalist parties and would have probably been unpopular with Labour and Lib Dem members alike, caused the Tory media to go into attack overdrive (Adam Boulton style) and angered a good portion of the electorate. When it comes to ideology and principles I don’t think we should be quick to compromise, especially when the result is unlikely to be a particularly stable government and would probably do much to damage politics and the Labour Party in the long term.

The other option Nick Clegg could have allowed to happen would be a minority Tory government – in my eyes the best option. A minority government would be unlikely to last for very long and the Tories would have had a great deal of trouble in passing any legislation they wanted to get through, which would have protected the country to some extent. With the Liberal Democrats and Tories together I fear what could happen to many sections of British society, the economy, children’s services, public spending. We are definitely heading into ‘the age of austerity’ Cameron is so fond of mentioning. What he doesn’t mention is that he means austerity for the ordinary working families and people of Britain and not for the wealthy like himself and his chums.

With any luck the best thing to come out of this will be a fast re-election hopefully on the few months and not the couple of years timeline and by that time voters will be able to see and judge for themselves what a Tory-Lib Dem coalition really means. I think we are entering a difficult era that will destroy much of what Labour have fought for and achieved in the past 13 years. I can only hope that we can repair the short term damage quickly and build the foundations for a stable and prosperous long-term – with a return to a refreshed and progressive new Labour government in the near future. We will carry on fighting for what is right and we will be ready when the next election is called to win back the seats we have lost. Not simply for power or self serving purposes but for the good of the ordinary people of this country, for a progressive government with progressive and tolerant values, for a stable economy and a bright future. That is why I am a Labour Party member and I will not stop fighting.

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Leaders Debate Round 2: Why attacking Nick Clegg could backfire.

April 20, 2010 1 Comment

Emma Jones puts across many great points that Brown should bring up in the next Leaders Debate in her article ‘Memo to Gordon Brown from a Labour supporter’ on Progress Online and I completely agree with her point ‘it is now time also to highlight the differences between us and the Lib Dems – albeit very carefully, due to Clegg’s newfound popularity.’

This is something I was pondering this morning. It seems that everybody is expecting a great attack on Clegg during the next Leaders Debate, with Gordon Brown and Call Me Dave switching from attacking each other to attacking the Liberal Democrats. This has the potential to spectacularly backfire.

The Leaders Debate turned out to be not so much a political debate to the audience but more like ‘Britain’s Got Politics’, the latest in reality TV, with style counting for much more than substance. Clegg had style, he stared down the camera lens with his puppy dog eyes sending out the message ‘like me please, I’m not like these big, bad, tired politicians you’re used to seeing having the argument over there. I’m fresh and young and pretty’ (if you like that sort of thing, I suspect a few do). Clegg transformed from the little man in the yellow tie that, nobody really knew much about, into the political equivalent of Susan Boyle - although it is worth remembering that SuBo lost in the end.

Nick Clegg: Before and After Leaders Debate

The problem form Gordon Brown, therefore, is that overly attacking Clegg this Thursday could serve to further raise his support amongst those who joined the Clegg-fandom-bandwagon after the first debate. A joint assault by Gordon and Dave would just further reinforce the ‘those two are the same, I’m the only nice one and they’re picking on me’ campaign tactics, yet Clegg and the Lib Dem policies need attacking and exposing, the policies they are keeping quiet as they ride the Negg (that’s Nick Clegg in SuBo talk) wave, enjoying their poll jump – even if they did gain it through style not substance, a hollow victory if ever I saw one.

So what would I advise Gordon to do? Emma Jones has raised the points to bring up but how do you present them without looking like you’re attacking dear, sweet, popular Negg and risk strengthening his support? I suppose my advice to Gordon would be; make the points carefully and calmly, defend Labours record and achievements and stay above the fray. From what I see Call Me Dave is panicking and is likely to go out guns blazing, red faced for Negg. Let the Libs and Tories argue it out, make the important points, defend our record, expose their weaknesses and remember to smile and look into the camera.

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Budget 2010 – My reaction to the reaction.

March 24, 2010 Leave a comment

Today Chancellor Alistair Darling cooly and expertly delivered a strong, sensible budget for the future – a budget designed to aid economic recovery and ensure that we don’t face the dreaded double-dip recession. Announcements included:

- Stamp Duty scrapped for homes below £250,000 for first-time buyers, but only for two years

- Stamp duty on residential property sales over £1m to increase to 5% from April 2011

A good Robin Hood-esque plan. Tax the rich more to aid the poor. A true Labour ‘the many not the few measure’. I can’t see anybody but a few millionaires getting red in the face about this one.


- £2.5bn package for small business to boost skills and innovation

- One year business rate cut from October to help 500,000 companies

- Investment allowance for small firms doubled to £100,000

- Doubling relief on capital gains tax for entrepreneurs

- No change to capital gains tax rates

- £385m to maintain road network

All great news for UK industry and innovation, helping to promote stable economic recovery. I can’t see any reasons why anybody could possible complain over these measures.


- Six month work or training guarantee for under 24s extended to 2012

- Amount of time over-65s must work to receive work credits reduced

Good news for young and old alike. The young persons guarantee ensures that the young generation will not be left behind due to the recession, as a generation without work.


- Tax allowances for those on over £100,000 gradually removed. No changes to allowances for everyone else.

- Annual limits on Individual Savings Acounts (ISAs) will rise from £7,200 to £10,200 next month.

- No changes to VAT or income tax planned

- Inheritance tax threshold frozen for four years

- Clampdown on tax avoidance to raise £500m

- New tax agreements with Belize, Grenada and Dominica

Poor Ashcroft.


- £2bn investment bank to back low-carbon industries such as offshore wind. Government to provide £1bn through asset sales

A great step forward for the environment and new green technologies.


- Funding for 20,000 new university places in science and maths but institutions must make savings elsewhere

- £35m enterprise fund to help university-launched businesses

Again, investment that will help future green technologies and keep the UK competitive in terms of new and green technologies. Also a boost for entrepreneurs, innovation and industry.


- Winter fuel allowance rates extended for further year

- £4 rise in child tax credit for parents with young children from 2012

More help for the elderly and real help for families that benefits all children (as opposed to slinging money at married couples).


- Wine, beer and spirit duties to rise by 2% from midnight on Sunday and further 2% rise planned for two years from 2013

- Tobacco duty up 1% from midnight on Sunday and by 2% in real terms each year until 2014

- 3p fuel duty rise to be phased in in three stages between April and January 2011 rather than in one go next month

The usual. Anybody expecting anything else would have to be living in a dreamworld. The increases on alcohol and tobacco are fairly minimal, whilst the staggering of raising fuel duty means less complaining from motorists and an easier rise for consumers to deal with.


Other good points to come out of the Budget speech were:

- Borrowing this year forecast to be £167bn – £11bn lower than predicted in December

- Borrowing to fall from £163bn in 2010-11 to £74bn by 2014-15

- One-off bank bonus tax has raised £2bn, double the amount forecast

- Basic bank account guarantee for a million extra people

- RBS and Lloyds Bank Group to provide £94bn in small business loans

- Backs tax on bank transactions but on global basis

- New service to adjudicate credit disputes

This was always going to a be a good Budget. You’d have to be incredibly stupid or insane to present a highly negative Budget just 6 weeks before a General Election, however it does seem that the voting public have found one issue to complain vehemently about. Nothing to do with the economy, education, pensioners or business… cider.

Cider. The big issue.


- Cider duty to rise by 10% above inflation from midnight on Sunday

This is what people seem to be most angry about, so much so that it became a trending topic on twitter and my news feed has scrolled all afternoon with messages of anger and disgust. On cue a protest group has sprung up on Facebook. From this I have deduced that we either have a massive problem with secret cider addiction in this country or that people simply cannot find anything else in the Budget that they can form a legitimate argument against so they have gone for the easy option. Maybe it’s a mixture of the two…? Maybe it’s just that some people care more about how much a drink they like costs than the future of the UK economy?

Here are a few of the types of the measured and intellectual comments knocking around:

Hmm, maybe we should just forget about heating pensioners homes or extra investment in green technologies and let the cider drinkers carry on getting drunk on the cheap… it obviously means a lot to them.

I can understand why cider has been singled out – although it seems that other’s don’t (or maybe they do but are pretending not to because it aids their massive outrage). A lot of ciders are sold very, very cheaply even though they can be quite strong. Especially in supermarkets, corner-shops and markets, which makes it a very popular drink with under-age drinkers. To be honest myself included – you could get a bottle of White Lightning from Leeds Market for a £1 when I was 15 and many of us did, although I’d usually give mine away after a few mouthfuls because it’s bloody awful stuff. Other’s seemed immune to the taste and downed the huge bottles in one, often throwing up not long after. Groups of teenagers still surreptitiously hand round cheap bottles of White Lightning, Strongbow etc to each other, as their cheapest most effective way of achieving the drunken state they desire. Alcoholism, teen alcoholism and binge drinking are massive problems. They are a massive burden on the NHS and society – not to mention the problems they cause for individuals and families. Maybe people could look at this as a measure that may go some way, however small, to alleviating those problems and worry less about how much they are going to pay for a refreshing alcoholic (oxymoron) beverage during the summer (let’s face it Pimms is the better summer drink anyway).

Before anybody points it out I am well aware that cider is also sometimes consumed in moderation by sensible adults, some of whom are obviously outraged by this and seem to feel personally victimized. I think people are missing the big picture. This is alcohol, it is bad for you, it is a drug, this country drinks too much of it anyway. If you really just like the taste of cider and not the fact that it gets you intoxicated quickly and cheaply then you can buy sparkling apple juices and non-alcoholic ciders. It’s not like they’re increasing tax on orange juice or something good for you. A lot of ciders were dirt cheap, those are the ciders that this increase is designed to target, now the price will be more in-line with other alcoholic drinks. I think it is only small cider manufacturers who have the right to complain on this one.

Apart from the debacle over cider I’ve had a good Budget day and I think I’ve seen a mainly positive reaction to the main, important (non-booze) related points.

Just a note about presentation. I thought Darling delivered his Budget speech with aplomb. He was cool, collected and statesmanlike throughout. I thought Cameron responded like somebody who had just drunk a bottle of White Lightning and had fallen out with his best mate. He reddened, he shouted, he stomped and tantrumed. This is not the first time I have noted Cameron’s undignified responses and quick loss of composure. He is often quick to change his attitude and tone if he is faced with a question or situation he does not like and becomes very unpleasant. I would like to think that somebody who aspires to be Prime Minister could handle interviews and debates in a calm, dignified and diplomatic fashion. Not by going red faced, shouting and putting an ugly, intimidating tone into his voice. Losing your temper is not flattering at all.

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The Tories – Wrong on British society, wrong on helping families.

January 29, 2010 5 Comments

A rather interesting article caught my attention today – this story on the BBC website states that the divorce rate in England and Wales is at it’s lowest point in 29 years, since 1981. The facts are:

In 2008, the divorce rate in England and Wales decreased by 2.5% to 11.5 divorcing people per 1,000 married people, compared with 11.8 in 2007.

Divorces in Scotland fell by 10% from 2007 to 2008, while divorces in Northern Ireland decreased by 4.8%.

The report, by the Office for National Statistics, did not offer any reasons why divorce rates had fallen.

The 2008 divorce rate in England and Wales was the lowest since 1979, when there were 11.2 divorces per 1,000 married people.

Yet, the Conservatives are wanting to throw money, in the form of tax breaks, at married couples because it is oh-so-very important that people are married because it’s the breakdown of marriage and the “traditional” family that has cause “broken Britain” – the crime-ridden nation that the Tories and Daily Mail are anxious to convince us that we live in but it seems from this report that we don’t have couples divorcing en masse anyway.

In fairness, the report findings do say that the figures don’t show a full picture as it may be that divorce rates are lower simply because marriage rates are lower – there is also talk of “family disintegration” and what can be done to prevent it but this is in relation to co-habiting couples and those “non-traditional” families that the Tories aren’t interested in helping anyway – apart from encouraging them to get married so they can have extra tax breaks. Yeah, that’s sure to solve all relationship problems.

A good quote in the article comes from Claire Tyler, chief executive of Relate the relationship counseling service, who says:

“Politicians have recently been hotly discussing what makes people get married. These figures show that it isn’t just about getting couples up the aisle – what’s really important is that relationships last.”

I’d be confident to bet that Relate don’t think that the way to make relationships last and for families to work is to simply encourage/bribe people into marriage by offering them tax break rewards. Claire Tyler endorses relationship counseling, for all couples not just the married ones. Maybe if Cameron really wants to help the breakdown of the family – and fix his (fictional) “broken Britain” he should perhaps be suggesting something like vouchers so couples and families in trouble can attend counseling or maybe giving money to services like Relate enabling them to offer free or discounted services to those on lower incomes, how about more money into services that assist families and children – like the Sure Start Centres that they have not pledged to continue funding, how about a whole load of other things that would help families that the money used to fund marriage tax breaks could be spent on and make a real difference.

Wrong on recession, wrong on recovery – Wrong on British society, wrong on helping families…

There’s not much they’re getting right really.

For my previous posts on this issue see:

Pulling Nadine Dorries to Pieces: why the Conservatives views on marriage and the family are wrong. – 01/12/09

Cash for marriage…a Cameron incentive. – 01/12/09

Do you fit the Tory perfect family mould – 13/07/09

Filed under Current Affairs: News, Politics, Issues. Tagged with , , , , ,

Britain is not Broken, actually I think we’re pretty great.

January 25, 2010 6 Comments

As the horrific details of the case of 10 and 11-year-old brothers torturing two other youngsters, almost to the point of death, in South Yorkshire emerged David Cameron couldn’t resist the urge to start banging back on about his “Broken Britain”  – despite the fact that the more he bangs on about this and tries to use examples to prove his point then more and more flaws occur in his argument.

If we take the case of the boys in South Yorkshire a great deal was made about their “toxic upbringing” – with their mother and father. I thought the whole “Broken Britain” extravaganza focussed around the fact that so many children grow up in “broken” single parent households without two parents, hence the marriage tax breaks (ridiculous) proposal? If we are in some way attributing the actions of these children to their chaotic upbringing at home, with their mother and father, then how exactly does this fit in with our broken, single poor parents, lacking in family values society?

The other cases Cameron seems to be bringing up to highlight his point are the death of Baby Peter, which is a very different type of case, and that of the murder of James Bulger, again by children. The James Bulger case, although similar to that in South Yorkshire,  was in 1993 – a large 17 years ago – I find it odd that Cameron is using this as an example of today’s “broken” society.

In fact I find the whole thing odd. I don’t feel that isolated, rare instances of extreme violence by children, 17 years apart, constitute a broken society – brought on by the breakdown of the family (apparently). I think they are, as I have said, isolated incidents which provoke an extreme reaction because such severe cases are so rare. They may reflect problems in one area, one social services department, one family but I think it is incredibly wrong to use them as examples of Britain as a whole. Many people, families and communities in this country do great and wonderful things every day – why aren’t they celebrated as the unbroken, great, Britain that as a whole nation and a whole population I believe we are? On the web today I was heartened to read the story of a 7-year-old boy who has raised thousands for the relief effort in Haiti, nobody is using him as an example to say ‘look we’re great, what this kid has done is great, there can’t be that much wrong with the whole country because people do great things like this everyday here’, but we ignore all the positives and highlight the negatives. This is just another case of Cameron talking down Britain and making us all think that it is terrible out there, aided and abetted by the right-wing press who seem to exist to create mistrust and fear – no wonder people seem to think crime has risen when it is actually falling, they are constantly getting the message that we are in some terrible crime ridden state.

If these cases of extreme child on child violence reflect a broken society then I am afraid we were broken long ago – Mary Bell, 1968, Peter Barratt and James Bradley, 1861 etc etc. I’m sure we could carry on back for years finding these very similar cases. Certain people and families may be ”broken” and that is what leads to these shocking crimes but I don’t think it is fair to lay the blame at the entire nation’s door and say as a whole we are broken.

I would also like to know how Cameron intends to fix his “broken” society, apart from the marriage tax breaks, which I highly doubt would have done anything to prevent these cases. Unfortunately I think this is just a rather appalling instance of David Cameron attempting to use dead children to make a political point, on the back of peoples shock, anger and fear.

Filed under Current Affairs: News, Politics, Issues. Tagged with , ,

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