Showing posts with label Conservative Party disappoints. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Conservative Party disappoints. Show all posts

30 November 2012

What you need to know about Leveson

  1. Phone hacking is already illegal in the UK.
  2. Attempting to corrupt a public official is illegal.
  3. Stalking was made a crime in the UK a week ago.
  4. Breaking and entering private property in the UK is already illegal.
  5. The UK has one of the world's toughest defamation laws, which are already blamed for suppressing people speaking up about allegations of sexual abuse by public figures.
  6. In short, the vile events presented in evidence were, in most instances, already illegal.
So consider, for a moment, why new laws and a new regulator is needed to enforce that which the Police have been lax to enforce now.
  1. News International is not dominant in the newspaper market in the UK.  It owns the second most popular out of the five serious national Monday-Saturday papers, and the most popular of the five tabloid/populist papers.  Only 34% of national newspapers read in the UK are News Corp papers.  Around 8 million national newspapers are sold every day in the UK.
  2. News International is not dominant in the television market in the UK.    It owns one free to air TV channel (Sky News) compared with the state which owns ten through the BBC and five through Channel 4 (excluding another five "+1" timeshifted channels). It owns the largest pay TV provider (BSkyB in 17% of UK/Irish households), with two major competitors (Virgin Media, BT Vision). The BBC is funded predominantly through a TV licence payable by threat of criminal prosecution.  BSkyB is funded voluntarily through subscription.  BSkyB is forced by the state to onsell its premium sports content to its competitors.  About 9 million people watch the BBC's two nightly TV bulletins every day.  Another 2.2 million watch the BBC News channel daily, while 1.5 million watch Sky News.
  3. News Corporation has no radio stations in the UK.  By contrast, the state owns 11 national radio stations and 48 regional/local radio stations through the BBC.
  4. Any form of legislation to regulate the press will require the licensing of newspapers, which was last abolished in 1644.   By definition, a regulator will be led by people appointed by politicians, by definition it will be a creature of politics.
Look at those asking for a regulator.  What's their motive?  Ask why a publisher should require permission from the state to publish?  Ask if you think the Labour Party would be so keen on regulating the press if the Times and the Sun hadn't decided to stop supporting it after the 2005 election and Gordon ("I've abolished boom and bust") Brown became Prime Minister?  Ask why the BBC, which has been at the forefront of supporting press regulation, isn't regulated by OfCom and itself failed to report on its own former stars committing criminal sexual acts, yet press regulation enthusiasts regard it to be a bastion of ethics?

Can you imagine the resistance by the pro-press regulation left against anyone daring to suggest that the behemoth of a state broadcaster (the world's largest state broadcaster) be independently investigated and broken up because of the dominance of its influence?

Leveson has recommended legislation, to "protect press freedom", although he doesn't identify what threatens it.  Typically the number one to press freedom, is legislation.

He wants OfCom - the regulator of broadcasting (except the BBC, because it wouldn't do to have the BBC regulated by the organisation regulating the private sector), to supervise the newspaper regulator.

What's a newspaper?  Who knows.

This is from a man who has said that newspapers are "uniquely powerful" compared to the internet and social media, which probably reflects he is 63 years old, than any real insights into the media.

The Leveson Report is a doorstop.  Nothing more.  It claims that regulation is needed to protect a free press - freedom is slavery, peace is war, and all that.  It is so absurd that no one should take that seriously.  Hugh Grant will, but then who really wants to turn to him for public policy (he ranted on a state owned TV channel a few days ago about how all policy was written by big corporations who control us through their ownership of the media).

The Labour Party will embrace press regulation now because it suits its interests and its newly embraced "class-warfare" attitude against privately owned media that don't give it the fawning subservience to which it feels entitled.  There is next to no evidence of the Labour Party having the slightest respect for individual freedom anymore.

The "Liberal" Democrats will once again demonstrate that the word "Liberal" in the party name is closer to the American misuse of the word to mean "socialist".  The reaction will be the next pile of dirt poured on the coffin of the once proud Liberal Party.

What matters is what the Conservative Party says and does, which will determine whether "small government conservatism", already dying under minimum priced alcohol, caps on interest rates for payday loans and new laws on internet surveillance, is comatose.

29 November 2012

Minimum alcohol pricing is empirically and philosophically wrong

If you want to see the "conservative" in the Conservative Party and see how little "liberal" there is in the Liberal Democrats then you only need consider that the UK Government is about to announce plans to introduce minimum unit pricing for alcohol in England and Wales (the Nationalist Socialist People's republic of Scotland has already announced similar plans, but half of the population there is probably so sloshed it hasn't noticed yet).


- 45p per unit of alcohol will be the minimum price set;
- BOGOF (Buy One Get One Free) offers with alcohol will be banned.

Of course the plan is motivated (isn't it always) by a desire to do good.  It is to save alcoholics from themselves, to save binge drinkers from themselves, to put a price barrier upon behaviour that politicians and bureaucrats have deemed to be bad for people (and of course, drinking to excess your entire life can kill you).  It is also being sold, absurdly, as an antidote to anti-social behaviour in evenings, because it is believed that people wont be drunk and obnoxious in any serious number any more.

Few policies can show such a direct distinct gap between the general public and what they perceive as a ruling elite of politicians and health do-gooders who believe they know what is good for others.

Of course, it punishes everyone who drinks alcohol, particularly the poor.  Of course retailers agree, because it will obvious reduce sales, even though minimum pricing raising their revenue per product, they obviously know that this isn't market pricing, so wont be revenue maximising.   Those on the left and health do-gooders  of course have no time for the retailers, as they profit from high levels of consumption, but unlike them the retailers are actually making two sets of people happy - themselves and their employees, and the people buying the products, who health do-gooders want to treat like children.

It is easy to picture the average pensioner who likes a wee dram in the evenings, now having to pay more, because highly paid health do-gooders want her treated no differently than a lager lout.

How dare they?

The two public policy problems identified are:
- Criminal behaviour whilst drunk; and
- Diseases due to excessive alcohol consumption.

In both cases it is grossly unfair to target all those who drink alcohol.  Only a small minority of people who drink alcohol get drunk and assault, vandalise or threaten others.   That is where the state has a role.  At the places and times where such behaviour becomes an issue, the Police should be present as a deterrent and to take away those creating danger to others and their property.   More could be done if the public areas where this happens were privatised, and placed under the control of adjoining property owners - who could then choose to ban drinking outside, they could choose to hire their own security staff who could order people to leave if they are causing trouble.   Bear in mind that shopping malls don't tend to have this behaviour, because of that reason.   

On the health concerns, there is already taxation on alcohol that is meant to reflect this, but the bigger issue is that the vast bulk of people in the UK (and in most Western countries) have decided that the costs of health care are to be socialised, and so everyone pays in proportion to the taxes collected from them.  If you accept this then part of accepting it is that some people will not look after their own health, others will do so, and it will seem very unfair that some impose enormous costs upon taxpayers and others do not.   Yet if you want to fix this, the only fair way to do so is to have people pay either directly or to an insurer that assesses risk.  Fiddling with alcohol pricing becomes the thin end of a wedge that already includes tobacco, and should also target foods high in saturated fat, salty foods, foods high in sugar, adventure sports and contact sports (for injuries), sunbeds, holidays in the sun, sedentary jobs, driving or riding buses short distances, etc. 

The potential scope for health do-gooders to tax and regulate everyone's lives to protect a few is substantial, and it is philosophically ground in the view that some adults not only know best what is good for other adults (which objectively may be true in some circumstances), but that they have the right to force them to do what we want or force others to penalise or reward them, whether by regulation, taxation or subsidy.

Furthermore, the Adam Smith Institute has released a study that demonstrates that the empirical evidence for the value of minimum alcohol pricing is flawed.  It argues that "the estimates of how minimum pricing will affect health outcomes have overwhelmingly come from a single computer model—the Sheffield Alcohol Policy Model." the study "argues that the model is based on unreasonable assumptions which render its figures meaningless."

The executive summary states it as follows:

"Amongst the problems with the Sheffield model is its false assumption that heavy drinkers are more likely to reduce their consumption of alcohol as a result of a price rise. Its calculations are based on controversial beliefs about the relationship between per capita alcohol consumption and rates of alcohol related harm. Its assumptions about the relationship between price and consumption have frequently been refuted by real world evidence."


The Sheffield model provides figures without estimates of error and ignores statistical error in the alcohol-harm relationship. Data is drawn from different populations and applied to England and Scotland as if patterns of consumption and harm are the same in all countries. When data is not available, the model resorts to what is essentially numerology. Insufficient data is provided for the model to be recreated and tested by third parties.

The model ignores the likely effects of minimum pricing on the illicit alcohol trade, it disregards the health benefits of moderate drinking and fails to take account of the secondary poverty created by regressive price rises. The decline in alcohol consumption seen in Britain in recent years has not led to the outcomes predicted by the model.

We conclude that predictions based on the Sheffield Alcohol Policy Model are entirely speculative and do not deserve the exalted status they have been afforded in the policy debate.


Minimum alcohol pricing may have a modest effect on alcohol consumption, but it will have that effect disproportionately on the poor, and disproportionately on people who do no harm to others.   As such it is a grotesquely regressive measure that should be opposed not just by libertarians, but those on the left who purport to care for the poor.

It will have a negligible effect on alcohol abuse, and a negligible effect on health, but will look as if "something has been done", which is the pressure that the predominantly statist media puts on politicians.

It should not be implemented.  If the concern of government is about behaviour, then it should undertake its core function and police the streets, and change welfare from being a handout of cash to being another form of payment that can't be used for alcohol, at least directly.   If its concern is about health, it should challenge the state religion of the NHS.  

Of course what it really cares about are small groups of feral welfare dependent chavs being drunk and obnoxious to middle class restaurant and theatre goers on Friday and Saturday nights.   That's a matter for the Police, but also to note that the welfare state is funding many of those people to drink.   The left wont tackle that, because it will see the idea that welfare recipients drink away their benefits as being a generalisation and unfair on those who don't - which is correct - yet the fact remains that taxpayers do pay for the alcohol consumed by those on welfare.

Meanwhile, it should emphasise that alcohol consumption is a matter for adults to decide for themselves, and get off their backs.

25 November 2012

UKIP membership makes you unfit to raise children?

Think of where in the world belonging to a political party is enough reason for a government official to take children off of you.  That place is Rotherham in the UK.

The story goes like this:
- A couple, who have fostered over a dozen children successfully over seven years with no controversy, get to foster three others from a troubled family;
- The report appears yesterday that after a tip off to the Council that the couple are members of UKIP (UK Independence Party), that the Council decided it was better for the children to remove them.  The report in the Daily Telegraph, which broke the story, said that the parents were told that UKIP is a "racist party"

The civil servant responsible is one Joyce Thacker, the six figure sum earning Head of Childrens' Services from Rotherham Council, who has had a disastrous day with several shocking interviews, including this one on the BBC, where she claims she was protecting the children from "strong views".  She backed off from claiming they got legal advice to do this, but implied that the children's "cultural needs" wont be met by parents with such political views.

The couple were told by the person removing the children that UKIP is "racist".  They have since claimed that not only did they let the children speak their own language, but they encouraged them to teach the couple the language (the children range from a baby to a girl of adolescent age).

In other words, the Council decided it was in the best interest of the children's "cultural needs" to not be fostered by people who belong to a political party.

So what is UKIP's policy on multiculturalism?  The website says this:

End the active promotion of the doctrine of multiculturalism by local and national government and all publicly funded bodies



UKIP believes in civic nationalism, which is open and inclusive to anyone who wishes to identify with Britain, regardless of ethnic or religious background. We reject the “blood and soil” ethnic nationalism of extremist parties. UKIP opposes multiculturalism and political correctness, and promotes uniculturalism - aiming to create a single British culture embracing all races and religions. UKIP will: 


· Recognise the numerous threats to British identity and culture · Restore British values, scrap quotas and political correctness and return to meritocratic principles

Essentially it is a view of integration, that those who migrate to Britain can bring whatever culture they wish, but should be loyal to Britain.

But so bloody what?

Does it mean that people who are members of UKIP will treat children of a non-British ethnic background differently?  What is more important?  That children needing fostering are part of a loving family or are in care, but "culturally safe"?

The response from politicians has been predictable with UKIP leader Nigel Farage understandably "appalled", Education Secretary Michael Gove saying this is "indefensible" and Labour Leader Ed Miliband wanting a review - of course he's concerned because there is a by-election in Rotherham next Thursday.  Rotherham is a safe Labour seat, with the by-election triggered by the resignation of MP Denis McShane because of the scandal of him falsifying receipts to claim expenses fraudulently (just another piggy in the trough).

It isn't a coincidence that the local authority (Rotherham) is strongly Labour holding 50 of the 63 seats on Council.  Why?  Because this scandal is a direct result of the embrace of the philosophy of cultural relativism, the post-modernist worshipping of neo-Marxist identity politics which has been propagated through the far from liberal (so-called progressive) mainstream left for decades.

It takes the view that whilst avowedly anti-racist and ultra-sensitive to being accused of racism, that people who do not belong to the dominant culture/ethnicity (i.e. white British) are automatically at a disadvantage, and that society must accommodate all other identities equally, and that there should be a positive discouragement of claims of achievement or pride of the dominant culture.  In other words, pure cultural relativism.

There is a lot that can be said about that view, but in essence it doesn't treat people as individuals, but as ethnicities.  That makes identifying those who are victims and who are with power easy.  White British = powerful,  Black = victim, Pakistani Muslim = victim, indeed even white European non-British are victims.

However, it is more than that.  In this case it is a Maoist view of those who don't share this mindset.  Consider for a moment the political and philosophical structure of the people who work for Rotherham Council and especially social workers.  Do you really think that it is a place where people who think that Britain should leave the EU, that immigration should be constrained will be working or welcome?  

You see that is behind Joyce Thacker's belief that it is actually ok to discriminate against people because they belong to the "wrong" political party with the "wrong" beliefs.  It is a world whereby she grudgingly accepts that not everyone votes Labour, but treats with utter disdain those who express views she and her ilk find wrong.

In other words, she and the management of Childrens' Services at Rotherham neither believe in liberal democracy nor believe that people can hold views on immigration that differ from them.  It is not far removed from the attitude of Chairman Mao's Red Guards who defined political correctness.  Being a member of UKIP is not Politically Correct.

They cannot even tell that what they have done is akin to actions of a totalitarian state, to remove children because the parents have implied political views deemed to be contrary to their interests.  

Who cares if UKIP wants an end to open immigration from the EU?  Who cares if UKIP believes in celebrating British culture in Britain?  It doesn't want to deny children from other ancestries their cultures or language or would even remotely advocate foster parents telling children from say Poland, that they can't speak their language or they are unwelcome.  At best such a view would be a parody of reality.  At worst it reflects the kind of gutter politics and malignant attitude to those with other political views that is exactly parallel to the Maoist absolutist view of political correctness.

It has been exacerbated by an official from Rotherham Council saying that the couple concerned can foster other children, as they are otherwise good foster parents, but only white British children.

Why, by any objective measure, it is better tonight for these children to be in care with the state in preference to a couple who would foster them, just because the parents hold the wrong political affiliation?  Why are the children at less risk being in care with the state than they would be with successful and well loved foster parents?

Only in the twisted subjectivist world of neo-Marxist identity politics based cultural relativists, who think it is more important that children have people of similar ancestry look after them, or with the right political views,  or to be looked after the state, than to be loved and appreciated as individuals.  

The right response by government should be clear.

Joyce Thacker should go, her views and philosophy are contrary to the interests of children she purports to care about, and her and her team "who thought carefully about the issues" are more closely aligned to the former Stasi, than people who should have any power over others.

Rotherham Council should be put under administration and be declared unfit for purpose.

This very council has already been found wanting by being aware of, and with the Police not acting against gangs of Pakistani and other ethnic minority men enslaving and sexually exploiting underage girls - because it didn't want to "cause offence".  A failing even admitted by Labour.   It refused to act on criminality because it didn't want to be seen to be targeting offenders who happen to not be of backgrounds they, no doubt see, as being "powerless" and "victims" in the identity politics the men who raped young girls.

Well offence has been caused.  This Council has harmed children, it has harmed adults and has been negligent in fulfilling its responsibilities towards those in its care.   It is infected by its own racism, so that it sees racism everywhere and lazily treats those who don't fit its narrow view of the world as being racist.

It should go, and the people of Rotherham should wake up and vote UKIP next Thursday, to give Labour a shock (for it has been the party that, despite Ed Miliband's protestations today, has been the conduit for such views), and to declare that it IS ok to hold views contrary to the establishment.

It isn't just UKIP supporters who should be appalled, but everyone who believes that government should not judge individuals on the basis of their political party affiliations, but on their actions and deeds.

Meanwhile, there isn't a profanity I know of that is sufficiently critical of Joyce Thacker that I can think of, but I hope her next job involves clearing tables at a UKIP conference.

oh and David Cameron can carry his small share of the blame, having called UKIP a party of closet racists... so really, how much better is he?

Guido Fawkes says it is the "progressive agenda" of Common Purpose (a leftwing charity) that Joyce Thacker is expressing.

10 October 2012

Sick jokes are a crime in the UK

Today, the Home Secretary, Theresa May, spoke at the Conservative Party conference and said:

Do we want to see the internet become an unpoliced space? No. Do we want to see terrorists, criminals and paedophiles get away scot-free? No. We are the Conservative Party, not the Libertarian Party. As Conservatives, we believe the first duty of government is to protect the public. That is why the Conservative Party will always be the party of law and order.

She's right of course.  Law and order is about protecting people's freedoms, but she mentioned the word "freedom" once by saying We need to give the police the freedom to use their judgement.

Yes, well if you want the difference between conservatives and libertarians then this case is one of them.

Matthew Woods is a rather vile young man.  He posted a joke that the Police deemed to be grossly offensive, on the website Sickipedia.  The joke was about April Jones, the 5 year old girl who went missing 11 days, and now presumed murdered.  I don't care what the joke was, because it is likely to be grossly offensive to me.  However, that's not the point.

The Guardian reported:

He pleaded guilty at Chorley magistrates court to sending by means of a public electronic communications network a message or other matter that is grossly offensive. The chairman of the bench, Bill Hudson, said Woods's comments were so "abhorrent" he deserved the longest sentence the court could hand down.

He is getting 12 weeks in prison.  

Is this really a matter for the criminal law?  Would he have faced a conviction if he had simply said it to another person?  How about if he wrote it on a piece of paper?  If not, why is an electronic communication so bad that it is time to be precious about vile jokes?

The Guardian also notes there is a long list of similar cases:
- A 56 day sentence for a racist comment about a footballer who collapsed;
- A teenager visited by the Police for being disgustingly rude to Olympic diver Tom Daley on Twitter;

Now the last case probably justified a query, given fear of terrorism, but the rest?  Has British society become so precious that people who offend others deserve a criminal record?  Or is there genuine fear that if there isn't a criminal law against it, that people will throw ever more disgusting insults around in a snowball of nihilism and vileness?  If so, is the right response to offensive speech not simply to insult the person saying it, or to ignore it?


Direct incitement to violence is one thing. But we cannot and should not sentence people for bad jokes, poor taste and terrible manners. That is an issue for parents, teachers and, most importantly, peer groups.

Quite.

Most people in their lives will encounter bores, bullies and a range of rude pricks who will call you names, who will be offensive to you and seek to upset you.  It isn't a crime to insult someone, except it is, now.

I don't blame the Conservatives any more than the other parties.  Labour introduced this law, and both the Liberal Democrats and Conservatives have happily let it be.  However it is wrong.

Free speech is for those who offend as well as those who inspire.  The state should not be policing what offends people, for when will it stop?  Will you be able to call the Police if someone calls you a name?  Will books and songs be banned for offending Christians or Muslims?  Will politicians get people arrested for calling them lying corrupt pricks?

I don't doubt that the latest example of using this law is about someone who has been vile, but then comedian Frankie Boyle is vile, the lowlifes who sell t-shirts to celebrate dancing on Margaret Thatcher's grave are vile, but I don't want the state arresting them.  I don't want the state arresting me because I blaspheme against Islam, or call Russel Norman a prick, or call Sue Kedgley a hysterical control freak, etc etc.

It is time to speak up for free speech, including the free speech of that which offends, for no one should have a conviction because they said or wrote something that upset someone else.

UPDATE:  Peter Cresswell has written about people getting offended by what some politicians say.  He uses a quote I nearly used, which is Stephen Fry's about people thinking that when they are offended, they gain some sort of new right to "something".  No you don't.

02 August 2012

Don't come to London - it will be too busy

They didn't, so it isn't.

The economic story of the Olympics is increasingly damning as it has become abundantly clear to many businesses in London that the net effect has been to scare off tourists from the city and to scare away the locals. The first thing that is noticed is that the public transport system and the roads are quieter than usual. The expected huge delays and overcrowding haven’t happened, in fact it is the other way round. On Monday I retimed my own commute to deal with the expected chaos, but on Tuesday found it quiet. It’s busy around Olympic venues yes, and there was awful weekend traffic in no small order because of the cycling road race both closing a whole series of roads and encouraging hundreds of thousands to head that way to watch.  Otherwise it’s grim for businesses (but a delight to walk around).

 Look at these figures

- 50% reduction in foreign visitors to London in July 2012 compared to July 2011 (European Tour Operators’ Association) 
- 4.5% reduction in retail footfall in the West End in July 2012 compared to July 2011
 - 2.6% reduction in retail footfall in the East End (where the games are) in the first few days of the Olympics compared to last year 
- 25% reduction in visitors to the British Museum in July 2012 compared to July 2011 
- Traffic counts in central London are down 17% on previous weeks 
- Major retailer NeXT estimates sales are down 10% in its central London shops.
-  The Licensed Taxi Drivers' Association estimates business is down 20-40%.

In short, it has been pretty much what I and others predicted. The Olympics deters as many as it attracts, as many presume prices will be inflated (and they were) and everything will be too busy. However, given that government agencies such as Transport for London have been constantly telling Londoners to make different plans and businesses were told to encourage people to work from home, take leave or avoid unnecessary travel, it shouldn’t be a surprise. People have done what they were told. 

However, politicians are in denial. Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt said that such figures were nonsense saying that “restaurants, theatres and even cabbies who are out of pocket today will reap benefits for years to come.” according to the Evening Standard.  Yet how come the media can't find businesses outside the mall adjacent to the site that are doing well?  He's touting the obvious manufactured claim of his bureaucrats that "businesses who marketed well are doing well", yet how does he realistically think this can make up for the reduced visitor numbers?  Having taken taxes from all of these businesses to pay for these games and told many businesses to effectively cut travel to London or staff commuting in London, how dare he tell off the people who are paying for the games without the credit for it.

In a parallel story, traders at Greenwich market reported a 60% decline in trading, even though the market is located between the nearest Docklands Light Railway station and the Olympics venue, because of a huge barrier placed on the road to shepherd people from public transport to the venue. It has since been removed.
Of course a small business that takes risks based on a government funded project is always going to be taking a gamble, it doesn't help that Transport for London is still telling motorists to avoid Greenwich altogether and warning people of overcrowding stations in the area.

This follows rude prick and Sports Minister Hugh Robertson saying that businesses had “years” to plan, as if a restaurant in the West End can somehow woo hundreds of thousands of people that have been put off by constant taxpayer funded warnings to stay away. The Prime Minister continues to spout the empty delusion that the Games will generate £13 billion of benefits for the economy. 

Of course not one politician will come out and say the obvious. Hosting the Olympics never made economic sense. The Blair Government had advice at the time that said this. However Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, Ken Livingstone and their minions, and since then David Cameron, Nick Clegg, George Osborne and Boris Johnson, have all gone along with this delusion. The money for the games came from taxpayers. The majority of whom don’t live in London so will have seen no net benefit at all. If the businesses that were meant to benefit, by and large don’t, then you’ve been wrong. You’ve all gambled away £9 billion of other people’s money on a fun party. 

Yes the Olympic Games are a great time, and offer fantastic spectacles of people truly achieving their best through effort and training. Yes it’s nice for Team GB athletes to compete on home soil, but if you asked them if it was worth £9 billion of other people’s money for just that, I doubt they would agree. 

However, don’t bother pretending they are an “investment”. Don’t pretend that there are real economic benefits for anyone, beyond the construction companies for the facilities you paid for with other people’s money. London is already one of the world’s most popular tourist destination, it has no shortage of visitors. It was inevitable that a city as crowded and congested as London would need to chase some people away to allow others to come in.   The same thing happened in Sydney.   A study by James Giesecke and John Madden of Monash University indicated that the Sydney games generated a net loss of A$2.1 billion in economic activity.

Well done. 

Now first prize for the UK politician who stands up, after the OIympics I expect, and says “it wasn’t worth it”. 

and no, unlike the grumpy failed politician Gore Vidal, I don't get that much pleasure from "I told you so" when so much money has been wasted.

Second prize if someone simply pointed out that if London wants more visitors, allowing its busiest airport and only hub airport to build a third runway, a project the airport's Spanish owner is able to fully finance itself, would have been a far more effective and enduring way of attracting visitors that building a stadium that still doesn’t have a long term user. 

However, Olympics are a bigger spectacle and far more exciting than a permanent piece of infrastructure, especially when the latter is opposed by hoards of angry environmentalists (the ones who can't and wont protest the extra runway a month being built in China for new airports) and NIMBYs (who wish that 60 year old airport would go away so their property values would go up).

Which is why the government shouldn't be involved with either!

Meanwhile, DO come to London.  There are massive discounts at hotels, flights are cheap and it's easy to get around, and there are sales on if you avoid the crowded Stratford Westfield Mall (and why would you come to London to go to a mall full of eastenders on school holidays?).

06 July 2012

Conservative MP admits to having used drugs, so shouldn't she be in prison?

On  BBC Question Time last night, Conservative MP Louise Mensch, admitted she had used Class A drugs (she didn't specify what they were, and "A" is the "most dangerous" category including cocaine, MDMA, etc) and that they had had a "lasting effect" on her brain.   I'm not one to deny that, and I'm certainly not condemning her for it.

Yet I will criticise her hypocrisy.

See she thinks drugs should remain illegal and criminal, and supports the "war on drugs".

In which case should she now not hand herself into the Police and face charges, trial, conviction and sentencing?  Should she not also forward names of all of her family and friends who have done the same?

After all - if it's so bad, and criminalising drug users is the "right thing to do" by implication, why shouldn't upper class English catholic Tory MPs and their associates face the same legal sanction as young poor Afro-Caribbean or white working class boys?

You see it is very easy for those living in relatively cozy middle and upper class communities to support a "war on drugs", until you confront them with "how many people do you know have taken drugs" and then "shouldn't they be in prison too"?

Because of course it isn't those people that are allowed to "make a mistake".  Louise Mensch is smart, successful, married to a wealthy husband, herself a successful writer. She "knows better".  She wants to protect the ignorant, stupid, vulnerable poor folk who aren't capable of making such decisions.

She wants the war on drugs fought in Tottenham, Newham, Mossside, Brixton, Toxteth etc, not Kensington, Highgate, Hampstead and Tunbridge Wells.

So why don't the Conservative, Labour and "Liberal" Democrat MPs who believe in this simply say that the "war on drugs" is about poor people having drugs.  Rich people, the middle classes and the like often "make mistakes" when young but they shouldn't be condemned for it, because it only hurts themselves.   Louise Mensch has been allowed to get away with ingesting what she chose without prosecution, why does she deny that right to others, or why doesn't she insist the law she supports gets applied equally?

Just to be clear.  I wouldn't throw her in prison.  I think it would be absurd and unjust for her to be in prison for possession and ingestion of Class A drugs.  However, unlike her, I also think that everyone else in prison for such offences should also be set free and have their convictions expunged.  Had she been convicted, she could not have pursued the career choice she now has.  Why subject others to the same because the Police happen to more readily patrol their neighbourhoods and communities?

18 February 2012

Militant secularism? Much of the world could do with it

Baroness Warsi is a Conservative peer, a Minister and co-Chairman (yes!) of the Conservative Party.  She is a failed Parliamentary candidate and undoubtedly was selected to be a peer because of David Cameron's desire to make the Conservative Party look more inclusive and diverse, even though voters didn't want her to represent them.  So, in the peculiarly British tradition of shouting loudly about democracy, but ignoring it when one wants to promote people to power based on who they are not whether they have a mandate, she is in the House of Lords, as a Minister without portfolio, because she is a female British born Muslim of Pakistani descent.  Without a doubt her religion helped her gain power.   However, that isn't the current issue (Labour, after all, promoted Peter Mandelson to be a senior Cabinet Minister after he had lost his parliamentary seat.  All of the parties happily use peers to grant jobs for cronies that the public don't give mandates to).

She has recently visited the Vatican representing the Government, which itself is remarkable.  However, the big controversy is that she gave a speech, published as an article by the Daily Telegraph, expressing concern about "a militant secularisation" of society.  By that, of course, she means assertive atheism.  This comes from a background of a number of events, the most recent being a court case that prohibits local authorities from starting their council meetings with a prayer.  Others include cases involving private companies setting rules around wearing religious icons etc.

So what did Baroness Warsi say?

She says "we stand side by side with the Pope in fighting for faith".  Really? Who is this "we"?  Is it the Government?  In which case, to hell with the lot of you (so to speak).  The Liberal Democrats should pull out of the coalition immediately and there ought to be a few Conservative MPs who didn't realise they were fighting for religion, not for their constituents.  Is this "we" the Conservative Party?  Who does she think she represents?

What she is calling for is at best inappropriate.  The state should not be "fighting for faith", it should be neutral.  Religious belief is like political and philosophical belief.  It is personal, people use it to inform their own behaviour and to provide some comfort and fulfillment emotionally, particularly when dealing with difficult issues of life around grief, relationships, tragedy and events outside their control.  

She claims that "to create a more just society, people need to feel stronger in their religious identities and more confident in their creeds. In practice this means individuals not diluting their faiths and nations not denying their religious heritages.   This begs so many questions, as to what she means by a "just society"?  What evidence is there that if people "feel stronger" in their religious identities that this will result in things being more just?  Every country where Islam has the state fighting for it, literally by assaulting, torturing and executing those who reject it, there is not "justice".  There are countless examples of Christians, Jews, Buddhists, Shintoists and others who "felt strong" in their religious identities and confident, who didn't "dilute their faith", but were fundamentalists, and happily spilt rivers of blood in the name of their religious faith.  

History is awash with people who took their religious identity and killed for it.  The UK itself has much recent blood spilt in this regard, with Northern Ireland crawling slowly out from the pernicious weight of Catholic/Protestant fundamentalism, "strong identities" that saw adults bullying children as they walk to school, if they weren't blowing people up or shooting them.   London of course has been a victim to Islamists murdering in the name of their religious identities.

Yet she goes on to say that Europe should be more confident and comfortable in its Christianity.  The reason being " the societies we live in, the cultures we have created, the values we hold and the things we fight for all stem from centuries of discussion, dissent and belief in Christianity."  That claim needs some closer scutiny.  She is quite right that Christianity, in its various sectarian versions, had has a profound influence on Europe.  Indeed, it is worth noting the various effects the three main strands have had on different parts of Europe.  Orthodox and Catholic Europe both demonstrate significantly less success, economically, than Protestant Europe.  Yet to pretend that the Enlightenment, a secular movement of reason, was not also a profound part of this, is to be wholly ignorant.  Before that, Christianity's influence had been predominantly authoritarian and had held back progress in science and technology, let alone justice for centuries.  Whilst Christians led the movement to emancipate slaves, there were many also who resisted granting women equal rights before the law and who embraced discrimination against Jews and others of different Christian denominations. 

It is difficult to argue that the significant leaps forward in confronting state sanctioned sexism, racism and criminal persecution of homosexuals were done, in many cases, with people of religion in strong opposition.  I don't doubt there is a significant strand of Christianity that actually does represent values that are universal and consistent with individual freedom, individual rights and property rights, and indeed ethical behaviour to others, but it has been extensively tarnished, blackened and corrupted by so much else that has been used to oppress millions.

It was the willingness to oppress people for religion that saw the Founding Fathers of the United States create a new land, independent, that was secular, founded by deists who did not want to bring the sectarianism of Europe into that land.  The Declaration of Independence was written by men of the Enlightenment, who whilst Christians, were not quoting the Bible, but were leaping forward humanity in a revolutionary manner by creating a state that existed to protect the rights and liberties of its citizens, not having them as subjects.

She claims the militant secularism is seen "in any number of things: when signs of religion cannot be displayed or worn in government buildings; when states won’t fund faith schools; and where religion is sidelined, marginalised and downgraded in the public sphere.".  I think if people want to wear religious symbols to work it should be up to their employers.  Signs of religion displayed in government buildings may exist for historical reasons, and nobody should get too worked up about that.  However, to purposely add them for "balance" is quite wrong. Similarly, if people want faith schools, let them fund them, but don't force people of other faiths or no faiths to fund schools, of any kind.  The problem would be resolved simply if parents got back their taxes that pay for schools so they could buy the education they want, rather than support schools that people may find objectionable.  

The wider claim that religion is "downgraded" in the public sphere is misleading.  It is entirely appropriate to have a secular state which is blind to religion.  However, if people want to embrace religion themselves using their own time, money and property, then they should feel free to do so. 

What she neglects is the fear Christians have in their private sphere in how the state appears to treat them relative to Muslims.  Many see Muslims happily preaching, as part of their religion, hatred of homosexuals, but when a Christian couple want to run a Bed & Breakfast and not allow homosexuals to share a room, they are pilloried even though it is their home.  Would an openly gay Muslim man be admitted to a British mosque?  Hardly and quite rightly that should be up to the mosque.   Christians should have the same rights to discriminate in their own properties as others.

Baroness Warsi says she is "astonished" that the "European Constitution" has no mention of Christianity.  I'm not.  It's entirely appropriate for an institution that encompasses 27 countries all with rather different heritages, and which one day is likely to embrace some that are not predominantly Christian at all.  However, it it questionable surely whether many of these "Christian" countries are so today.  France, the Czech Republic and Estonia all have significant atheist minorities.  How would Jews in Europe react to a "Christian" EU?  

However then she simply goes off the rails altogether putting up a strawman when there is an enormous elephant in the room that she ignores.  She says:

"one of the most worrying aspects about this militant secularisation is that at its core and in its instincts it is deeply intolerant. It demonstrates similar traits to totalitarian regimes – denying people the right to a religious identity because they were frightened of the concept of multiple identities."

"That’s why in the 20th century, one of the first acts of totalitarian regimes was the targeting of organised religion."

To claim, in effect, the likes of Richard Dawkins "displays similar traits to totalitarian regimes" is quite vile. Even more vile when she ought to know that the religion with the worst record for totalitarianism, is her own.  With the exceptions of Turkey, and the former Soviet and Yugoslav republics that are predominantly Muslim, every other Muslim dominant state in the world prohibits apostasy.   What can be more totalitarian than criminalising people leaving a religion that most were "born with"?  I reject any atheists who seek to close down places of worship or shut down peaceful religious expression.  However, I don't know of any who actually do seek this.  Who denies people a religious identity?  

In fact the law demands people "respect" religious identity, when it is no more deserving of respect that any other belief system whether it political, philosophical or scientific.  People in the UK are increasingly fearful of making jokes about Islam, or criticising it, because there are Muslims, and more than a few leftwing activists ready to throw "Islamophobia" labels at those who do so.  Yet the very same people will happily pillory Christians.  The fact that Baroness Warsi is a Muslim and can't identify this double standard is astonishing. 

Yet to make the claim that "one of the first acts of totalitarian regimes was the targeting of organised religion" ignores some truths.  Organised religion has been hand in hand with more than a few totalitarian regimes, albeit with some brave exceptions.  The Nazis were not without blessing from Catholic and Protestant clerics.  The Croatian Ustashe thugs had express endorsement from the Catholic Church, as the Serbian Chetniks did from the Serb Orthodox church.  Again, Baroness Warsi ignores the role Islam has had in being central to totalitarian regimes from Afghanistan to Iran, to Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, to Syria and Sudan.  The Japanese militarist regime was hand in glove with Shintoism.  Yes, the communists suppressed religion, but beyond the USSR and Albania, religion was not the first target, but part of an orchestrated campaign to eliminate ANY private non-state sphere.   Her cheap shot that seems to equate secularists and atheists with Nazis and Communists is vile and uncalled for, and is one of the lazy arguments by some Christians against atheism.

For the mere claim of an absence of a belief in something does not imply embracing the belief in something else.  A lack of belief in ghosts does not mean a belief in vampires.

Yet she then claims that she doesn't want to reject secularism, but that religion "should have a seat at the table" and that the UK shouldn't be a theocracy.  Let's be grateful for that, but why should "religion" have this?  What religion?  Whose interpretation of it?  What does this mean? 

Why should faith, not reason and argument, drive public policy?  Why should something be a law becomes someone says that the deity he believes in says so? 
I am an atheist. I believe in secularism for all states.  I don't believe the power of government should be coloured by any religious beliefs nor should governments treat citizens on the basis of religion.  The fact that the UK is, in fact, a state with a state religion (with the head of state leading the state church) is almost irrelevant in terms of public policy and lawmaking, although not entirely. 

However, as an atheist I do see leftwing atheists pursue religion, by which I mean Christianity (they seem scared to pursue Islam so vehemently, with no need to guess why), with a vengeance that I think goes too far.  In a capitalist free society people should feel free to pursue their own lives according to whatever belief system they have, as long as they respect the rights of others to do the same and respect the individual sovereignty of adults over themselves, their personal relations and their property.   Whether or not those beliefs are based on the supernatural or whatever, is irrelevant.   This includes being able to discriminate against people you hire or trade with based on those beliefs.   

After all, despite the best efforts of the left to equate Islam with a race (and to be fair the fascist right using hatred of Islam to justify its own racism), religion is and should always be a personal choice.  

Baroness Warsi would be far better placed embracing the secularism that is at the heart of most European states, and telling the Muslim world that it should do the same.  The utter disgusting vileness of the "crime" of apostasy outranks anything experienced by people due to their religion in the UK.  It is telling that whilst politicians run round in circles expressing outrage for the totalitarian regime in Syria embarking on its latest killing spree (it's being doing it on and off for decades after all), none raise this issue with the legion of Muslim states running from the Maghreb to New Guinea.

If militant secularism took over the Muslim dominated world there would be an quantum leap forward in the rights and lives of millions of people, particularly women and girls in these profoundly patriarchal and sexist societies.  People would not longer be brutally imprisoned, tortured and executed for "insulting" a religion they don't believe in.  It would be far easier to confront the treatment of women as property, the genital mutilation of girls, the treatment of rape as a crime rarely prosecuted unless the father of the girl is a witness, the rampant domestic violence of these societies.   In addition, the senseless sectarian and racist bigotry that is seen most clearly in the mindless Shi'a/Sunni divide, but also in how some Muslims treat others who they think are beneath them (see how Dubai treats Pakistani labour for a clue on this).

So in conclusion, Baroness Warsi's only, small, valid point is the way that some in the West have been hectoring Christians going about their private lives.   However, secularism should not be fought, it should be embraced, and most particularly in the theocratic dictatorships she has seen fit to ignore.  Some of the very ones who take aid from her government (Pakistan) and who shelter those who are out to destroy our secularism and kill us, and impose their own theocratic patriarchal death cult.  The world would be a lot better off if more states were theocracies.

There is a gap in Western society in relation to ethics and morals, which is seen most profoundly in the feral underclass that feeds ungraciously off of the taxes taken to keep them fed, clothed and housed, who have been corrupted by the moral relativism and entitlement culture propagated by the left in the past fifty years.   Baroness Warsi would be better placed attacking that culture, one that the Conservatives have barely touched upon, that the Labour Party has successfully nurtured for decades.  Combined with the identity politics that rates ethnic minorities as inherently disadvantaged, and so lowers expectations of their performance and heightens expectations of state help, it has perpetuated for Labour an ongoing constituency of dependency that provides a ready made group of people forever reliant on government giving them money (and voting Labour to make sure of it).

However, that would rely on her actually having some real courage, and given she is a politician appointed by fiat, not by election, one wonders why she can't have it?

15 April 2010

Conservative manifesto - less worse than Labour but where is the freedom?

Given the electoral system in the UK, the big choice for most voters is whether to support the incumbent Labour Party, and its "we'll look after you, give us your money and promise us your kids' money too" approach or the Conservatives.

Labour, naturally, wants to portray the Conservatives as the "nasty party" proclaiming that it would make "brutal" cuts like Margaret Thatcher did, and claim that the radicalism of that government is where the Tories REALLY have their hearts and minds.

A little odd given the Chancellor of the Exchequer admitted on the BBC that LABOUR would have to make cuts worse better than Thatcher.

Nevertheless, on the face of it, given how the Tories have abandoned the closeted xenophobia, anti-homosexual, social intolerance of the past, is there really hope that the Tories are now socially liberal AND the great inheritors of Thatcher's culling of the state?

After all, I would LOVE to be able to give the Conservatives my moral authority to earn my vote. Britain needs to consign the pseudo-Keynesian spendthrift promise breaker Gordon Brown and his tribe of envy peddling control freaks to history. So is there something to hope for in the Opposition? A belief in capitalism, individual freedom, commitment to addressing real crimes and to a state that weans the public from dependency on it for pensions, healthcare and their kids' education?

Not if you read the Conservative Manifesto. No. In fact, the Conservative Party continues to be suspicious of capitalism, embraces wholeheartedly the religion of unquestioned environmentalism. Moreover, you'll be spending a lot of time searching for the freedom in it, because it largely isn't there.

Its first policy is called "Big Society". Remember when Margaret Thatcher correctly said (and was subsequently quoted only in part) that there is "no such thing as society"? She meant that when people say "society" thinks this, or is to "blame" for that, that it is a nonsense as there is no collective brain. Society is simply a group of individuals who interact with their own consciousness, own opinions and diverse views, lives and attitudes.

The "Big Society" policy says "We have set out an ambitious agenda to build a Big Society based around social responsibility and community action." In capital letters? Quite simply, fuck that.

Allister Heath in City AM put it so very well:

their “big society” agenda, which looks suspiciously like a rebranded big state. “Our ambition is for every adult in the country to be a member of an active neighbourhood group.” Really? What about those so busy trying to make ends meet that they have taken on two jobs, or who are too ill or too old or who have to care for young children or elderly relatives? And what about the barmy proposal for vast numbers of state-funded community organisers? It’s nonsense – slightly sinister nonsense, even, with authoritarian undertones and entirely unaffordable in an age of drastic austerity. One can’t chide the state for its bossiness and all-controlling bureaucratic officialdom – and simultaneously try and make volunteering compulsory. There is such a thing as freedom and being allowed to do whatever one wants with one’s life, rather than being bossed about by do-gooders. It is worrying how, for all their empowering rhetoric (and in some cases proposed actions, such as on civil liberties) the Tories have forgotten about this.

He's right you know. It is the classic conservative agenda, not of letting free individuals live as they want as long as they don't hurt others, but putting obligations on your life to "participate" in ways the government approves of. Most people much of the time help and contribute to the lives of others, like parents, family, friends, colleagues. They don't need Uncle David Cameron telling them to volunteer on top of that.

The Tories have made a big deal of not increasing national insurance tax like Labour will, but they will STILL increase it for those earning over £35,000.

Frankly the most positive policy is on education, by allowing anyone to set up a school in competition with the state and have state funding follow students to that school. A form of semi-deregulation of the compulsory education sector.

Beyond that there are some positives:
- Reducing corporation tax and an agenda to reduce regulation on business;
- Resolving the West Lothian question, by requiring issues that only involve England or England and Wales need to be passed by a majority of MPs from those constituent countries;
- Allowing council tax payers to veto increases in council tax by petition;
- Retain and replace Britain's nuclear deterrent;
- Ensure that UK has final sovereignty over its laws (which wont happen as it means leaving the EU in effect);
- Reduce (but not eliminate) powers to enter homes by councils;
- Scrap compulsory ID cards;
- Allow DNA from innocent people to removed from databases;
- Remove consensual gay sex convictions from criminal records;
- Freeze council tax for two years.

Then some negatives:
- Giving other people's money to households to pay for energy efficiency measures;
- Stop the privately owned and funded third runway at Heathrow on spurious environmental grounds, and no more runways at Gatwick or Stansted either;
- Interfering in energy markets because of climate change;
- Introduce voluntary "National Service";
- Create a new bureaucracy to look to prop up food prices for farmers;
- Destroy remaining property rights of BT and other telcos by forcing them to sell broadband capacity to others;
- Force everyone to pay for universal broadband access below cost in rural areas;
- Increase state health spending and foreign aid spending in real terms whilst the country is in fiscal crisis;
- Refusing to abolish the 50p top tax rate while public sector pay is frozen;
- Put a FLOOR under landfill tax;
- Retaining the ridiculous and distortionary "free at point of use" policy of the NHS;
- Encourage councils to build more council housing;
- Limit non-EU immigration;
- Maintain most of Labour's expanded welfare state.

No, it doesn't inspire. It doesn't promise to not increase other taxes, like fuel duty and VAT. Welfare dependency remains, as do victimless crimes and the nanny statism over children that Labour introduced. It is at best devoid of ambition, with the only positive sign the education policy (even that is the ACT policy of 2008). The rest is denial of the need to confront socialised medicine, a complete disregard for private property rights and being hijacked by the inane environmentalist lobby to strangle growth in aviation.

Gordon Brown it is not, New Labour it is not, but does this deserve moral endorsement from me as a libertarian?

Sadly, no. I can't endorse the environmentalism, the confiscation of property rights, the weasel words around the deficit and tax, and the embracing of the NHS.

The question is whether the Tories are that bad that it wouldn't matter if Labour won or the Conservatives won. The problem I have is that if I vote Conservative I hardly have a right to object if they do what they say, since I would have had a hand in saying YES GOVERN ME.

I don't think I want to do that.

27 October 2009

George Osborne does not know banking

George Osborne is the Tory Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer. He has never had a real job. He has a second class degree from Oxford and has spent almost his whole working life either as an MP or working for the Conservative Party. His own ample inherited wealth has protected him from risking his own money in business.

So for him to call for banks to limit bonuses to £2000 or hand them out in shares is stupid, stupid indeed, and shows him up for how incredibly shallow he is, and indeed how shallow the Conservatives are.

The Conservatives are going for the envy vote, knowing that those in the banking sector are small in number and will probably vote Conservative.

The Times quotes Liberal Democrat Treasury spokesman Lord Oakeshott:

“If state-owned banks such as RBS and Lloyds pay bonuses using shares, they would have to issue new equity, which would dilute the taxpayer’s holdings,” he said. “George Osborne clearly does not understand how shares work . . . His ignorance is toe-curling and he hasn’t a clue how markets and public companies operate.”

Osborne talks of retail banks, but it is investment banks that pay large bonuses. So he doesn't even have a cursory knowledge of the banking sector.

Allister Heath in the excellent City AM got it bang on
:

"The Tories are persisting in their belief that there is a moral equivalence between RBS, which went bust and had to be nationalised, and HSBC, which didn’t take any money from any government. Talk of moral hazard: regardless of how well you do, you will still be hammered by the government."

This, you see, is the moral vacuum that those almost across the political spectrum fail to note. Politicians want to punish all banks, yet they rewarded the bad performers, so only the good performers truly lose out. Heath eviscerates Osborne in his editorial and concludes that the outlook is bleak if the Tories really do believe this nonsense:

"expect HSBC and Barclays to start working on their exit plans: no other country, including the US, is planning this sort of separation."

08 October 2009

Nanny Tories to tax alcohol more

Why be surprised? It is in the school prefect, oh "the working classes as so incompetent we must save them" holier than though attitude that the party sadly personifies too often.

You see the problem isn't the drinkers, it is apparently those who sell to the drinkers. Well you shall not do that, of course young bankers who get bladdered on champagne wont be affected, after all drunk upper class people are just funny aren't they?

Nice cheap way to excuse not focusing the criminal justice system on real offenders.

07 October 2009

Tories announce cuts

Conservative Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, presented his plan to cut spending to eliminate the budget deficit at the Conservatice Party conference. Is it bold? No. Is it acceptable? Just. Is it enough? Not by a long shot.

His ideas are:
- One year pay freeze on all state sector employees earning more than £18k a year, excluding the Armed Forces (this includes teachers, doctors and the police);
- £50k cap on pension payments for state sector employees;
- Reducing "size of the Whitehall bureaucracy" by a third;
- Abolition of "baby bonds" and welfare tax credits for those earning over £50.
- Increase state pension age to 66 from 2016 (for men);
- NOT to abolish the forthcoming 50p tax rate on earnings over £150k;
- Increase inheritance tax allowance to £1m.

To be fair he laid it into Gordon Brown saying:

“The Iron Chancellor has turned into the plastic Prime Minister. Free social care. Free hospital parking. Free child care places. We would all like those things. But where is the money coming from? He is treating the British people like fools,”

Quite right, but whilst this is a start, I still think far more can be done as I outlined before:
1. Abolish all corporate welfare, stop trying to pick winners;
2. Lead a call to cut the EU budget at Brussels;
3. Sell Channel 4, Royal Mail and the tolled bridges/tunnels of the highway network;
4. Cancel plans for a high speed railway, no new taxpayer spending on rail infrastructure;
5. Scrap the ID card scheme;
6. Scrap a wide range of government IT projects;
7. Scrap subsidising rural broadband;
8. Abolish regional development agencies;
9. Fund Scotland on a per capita basis, forcing it to make budget cuts;
10. Eliminate additional welfare payments for those on welfare who have extra children;
11. Negotiate an end to EU welfare tourism;
12. Freeze NHS spending, introduce charges for "no shows" at appointments and charge for more than 1 GP visit a year for those between 18 and 65;
13. Freeze all public sector pay until there is a budget surplus;
14. Terminate public sector pension scheme membership growth;
15. Abolish all NEW agencies established since Labour was elected.

So far we have only number 13. 1 out of 15 George, must try harder.

and I wasnt even being libertarian.

06 October 2009

Tory conference

Given that the current Labour government in Britain is morally bankrupt as it:

- Calls for MORE big government to try to get elected;
- Lies about the need for spending cuts, then admits they are needed after no one believes it.

and is third in the polls, you might hope the Conservative Party would be worth looking forward to.

Well the party conference is a chance to present itself as a government in waiting, so what have we seen so far?

- Boris Johnson demanding a referendum on the Lisbon Treaty, even if every other country ratifies it. I'll believe it when I see it, as William Hague has said the CURRENT policy is a referendum. Frankly, all that matters to me is that the UK relationship to Brussels is renegotiated;
- Promises that every town will have a school for tradespeople. Oh dear.
- Boris Johnson noting that he has freezed the Greater London Assembly portion of Council tax for another year, and will again next year, and wants the forthcoming 50p tax rate abolished;
- National Insurance (a tax) to be abolished for new companies for the first two years;
- Waffle about cutting "NHS red tape" to save money;
- People on incapacity benefits to face tough tests to check if they are capable of working.

Yawn.

Janet Daley in the Sunday Telegraph made a great point when she demanded the Tories put forward the moral case for spending cuts.

"The Conservatives must stake their claim to be the party that has a positive account, a morally attractive case, for saying that public spending – which is to say, the power of the state – can and should be reduced permanently. Sounds like heresy? Only if you buy into the lexicon of the Labour-Guardian-"equality" lobby – which is, of course, precisely what Mr Brown wants you to do."

"David Cameron's Tories can present themselves as sole custodians of the future in which a smaller state will mean a stronger society."


I'm not holding my breath. This is, after all, the party that still believes in stopping a private company expanding its airport.