03 June 2006

Is this the future we want?

The minimum wage is frozen so after a few years it is worthless, then it is quietly scrapped.

Tax is 'simplified' by Cameron and Osbourne (their new code for tax cuts for the rich) or as Thatcher & Howe put it 'tax reforms' so the poor pay more and the top rate is slashed.

Inequality once again starts to spiral as tax credits which have helped millions are scrapped. Labour had started to reverse the inequality gap (which has been difficult in times of economic growth and with the accumulated wealth gap of the Thatcherite years still helping the rich) but that would be destroyed.

Public services are starved of funds. Private healthcare and private education booms. NHS crises become common again, waiting lists start to rise and exam results start to fall.

Crime rates spiral as inequality rises.

An 'environmental' agenda of more road building and the climate change levy is scrapped. CO2 emissions inevitably start to rise.

Businesses are 'asked nicely' to help workers. The bosses laugh and their funding of the Tories (and funding of Cameron) pays dividends, as guaranteed holidays, maternity/paternity leave are eroded by the new government.

These are the sorts of things a Tory led government would do. Don't be fooled by their 'touchy feely' rhetoric. Voting Labour is the only way to stop this Tory hell from happening.

Even those who don't like this Labour government are compiling an impressive list of Labour achievements over the last 9 years. Don't throw that away. Only when the Tories are in power will you realise how much you miss this Labour government, but then it will be too late - the Tories are going to gerrymander the boundaries so they remain in power for a generation. Mark my words.

If you are lucky enough to pay the top rate of tax (and only 11% do), and you think your Tory tax cut will be enough to pay for private health and education for your family (doubtful), and you don't care what happens to the NHS and the poor, then vote Tory. Otherwise vote Labour. Once you see through the press lies it is not that difficult to work out. Here are some common right-wing lies;

The NHS is awash with cash: Wrong! We spend less per capita than France and Germany, which is why their health provision is better.

The NHS is inefficient: Wrong! According to the World Health Organisation we are 18th on overall health performance but only 26th on per capita health expenditure. By comparision the US spends the most per capita but is 37th on overall health performance. The NHS is far more efficient than the US health provision.

The Tories are more competent: Wrong! In 1995 the Tories were spending over 100m a year on management consultants with this expenditure rising quickly despite public service cutbacks. Thatcher created mounds of Quangos, Major gave us PFIs, Thatcher politicised the civil service, emasculated local government and centralised everything from Whitehall which is the current root of so many problems. Michael Howard presided over the Derek Lewis scandal of failing privatised prisons, with prisoner releases and the immigration process in a mess (admittedly this hasn't been fixed by Labour...yet).

The BBC is left-wing. Well compared to the Sun, Mail, Express, Star, Torygraph etc. I suppose it is. But compared to these right-wing mouthpieces, any balanced news would be left-wing. From my perspective the BBC is right-wing, because its news agenda follows the lead from this right-wing press.

Only the rich will benefit from a Tory government and the press are owned by the rich. That is something worth remembering.

Another thing worth remembering is that, if 200,000 of you who are unhappy with the direction of the Labour party, joined the party now, you would get to decide who will be PM when the leadership election is held in a year's time. Rather than saying nothing can be done, you could seriously influence policy direction.

8 comments:

  1. I thought you supported a basic/citizen's income - that would allow *us* to simplify the tax system.

    You are quite right about what the Tories mean when they use that word, though.

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  2. Well, yes, I am in favour of the Left simplifying the tax system.

    But as we both know the Tories mean tax cuts when they say simplify.

    I don't know if you have read stumbling and mumbling on the Basic CI.

    I would like to see a pilot project somewhere (say the Isle of Man) to test how a CI would work. I think people will only come round to a CI when they see how it works in practise. I believe that the incentives to work will be greater under a CI, but a lot of people are understandably worried that the number of shirkers would rise. Only a real example will disprove this.

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  3. Something you left out which the Tories will introduce is GM farming (the "co-existance arrangements").

    Oops, I forgot, Labour will introduce that anyway.

    Something you got wrong is: "Labour had started to reverse the inequality gap". Inequality has worsened under Labour. The statistics don't always lie.

    In fact doesn't this highlight the flaw in a lot of the points you mention: the current bastards are as bad as the future bastards.

    It's revealing that you refer to the "environmental" agenda in inverted commas... the current bastards could hardly be accused of following such an agenda, could they?

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  4. "the current bastards are as bad as the future bastards."

    As bad as Thatcher/Major/Cameron, you are having a laugh. The minimum wage alone proves you wrong on that and what about the extra expenditure on public services?

    "Inequality has worsened under Labour."

    No you are wrong, the latest figures show inequality back to 1987 levels, Labour still haven't undone all the damage done by Thatcherism but they are getting there.

    As for the environment. The boost to public transport, the cleaner rivers, beaches, the climate change levy, congestion charging in London. These may not mean much for the environment, but they are substantially more than the Tories would have done.

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  5. By "the press" in the statement "The press are owned by the rich" do you in fact not mean "the press" but "such newspapers as are not owned by The Scott Trust as the Guardian is"?

    Anyway, why does your webpage about Churchill read like a David Irving smear screed?

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  6. By 'the press' I mean 'the vast majority of the press'.

    Churchill was a fairly odious man and most Brits (at the time) knew this, which is why, even after leading his country to victory at WWII, most people rejected his reactionary, backward looking philosophy at the 1945 election.

    Look at the calibre of people in the socialist/Labour movement, Orwell, H.G. Wells etc, and their (at the time) radical left-wing views are moderate by today's standards.

    Most Conservatives like Churchill etc. look positively neaderthal in their opposition to votes for women and fascist contempt for human rights etc.

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  7. Come on, Churchill was re-elected after the country grew sick of Attlee. You don't seem to mention that.

    You also don't really answer the point: why does your webpage read like it was written by David Irving? There's fair criticism of Churchill, which you make in your response above, and there's just smearing. I want to know whom you wish to benefit? Whose cause are you advancing by republishing Irving's lies and half-truths?

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  8. The claim about the empire was not a statement in support of colonialism, I oppose colonialism. The point was that even by Churchill's own rhetoric he fell short by relinquishing the empire, just as Thatcher (for all her anti EU rhetoric) signed the Single European Act - its most federalist treaty.

    I've not read any of Irving's books. He is a racist idiot and his holocaust denial and support for facism is disgusting. What did Irving claim about Churchill?

    Churchill's neaderthal views on democracy and disdain for equality are well documented but unfortunately not well known.

    My agenda is to point out what an alcoholic, incompetent, sexist and backward looking bigoted buffoon that he was. The media have re-written history to paint him as some sort of accomplished and fair minded democrat that was worshiped by the working classes when the opposite is the truth.

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