Clement Attlee didn’t need a ‘Ceremonial Funeral’ – why I am wearing Red on Wednesday

I will be in bed on the day of Maggie Thatcher’s funeral (I will be on Nights), but when I am awake I will be joining the ‘Wear Red’ protest, I am not sure if I would have gone to London to protest at her funeral – I read an article of a Mum who had applied to the Police to protest by turning her back on the procession, she had to because she couldn’t afford to be late for work and had to work to support her kids – but I will not let the funeral of Maggie go without protest. On Facebook we are protesting by changing our profile picture to that of Clement Attlee. I particularly like this protest as it contrasts the ground breaking Attlee administration that created the National Health Service, the Welfare State and Workers Rights, and is pertinent to what this Government is destroying, and what Thatcher sought to destroy.

I am sure this will not be my final piece on Thatcher, but it is for her funeral.

The funeral contrasts sharply with Winston Churchill’s funeral of 1965 when the nation was truly grief-stricken and said goodbye to a national leader, and head of the National Government during the war – don’t get me wrong he was far from perfect, but he died with the respect of a grateful nation, I feel confident that no-one even thought of protesting his funeral. I am afraid Maggie’s funeral will be a lot more tense, for the wrong reasons. Contrast this again with Clement Attlee, who reconstructed a war ravaged country, who’s administration built 1 million new home, employed 25,000 new teachers, and introduced Child Benefit, Sickness Pay, Invalidity and Maternity Benefits amongst a radical agenda to rival anything that Thatcher did. All this from a man who, when he was Prime Minister, went on holiday in Caravan in Devon.

In retirement he co-founded the Homosexual Law Reform Society, and remember that was well before the Wolfenden Report. I am actually inspired that this man was a social and political reformer of gargantuan proportions, flawed yes, but a leader, a reformer and by all accounts humble, not for him the ‘pomp and circumstance’ of a State funeral.

Attlee’s funeral, as befitting a humble man with a vision, consisted of 150 mourners in the Church of the Templars in London. The times records the event as such:

ALL the trappings of power were absent last week at the funeral of Earl Attlee, Britain’s Prime Minister from 1945 to 1951: no honour guards or artillery caissons, no press or television, no crush of spectator

A Prime Minister who served in Government during the war and totally revolutionised British society in six years, taking it from a scene that Hogarth would have been at home in, to a country that that could be proud of its achievements, there is no other honour that could be given this man, if he wanted one, than he was radical and improved the health and welfare beyond comprehension. What greater accolade is there than the appreciate of a grateful nation?

On the other hand the funeral Margaret Thatcher has a ‘State Funeral’ in all but name, and that funeral she continues to tear apart the nation in controversy over her legacy, over the cost and her politics. The funeral, and apparently she never wanted the fuss, is a monument to the ego of the radical right of the Conservative Party, the Party that de-selected her as Prime Minister. Her record will be her eulogy. Yes she did some good, but the evil schisms she manipulated are still tender today, and have been reopened for the salt of a £10 Million funeral to be poured into.

As an openly gay man growing up in the Pit Villages of South Yorkshire I cannot mourn for this woman. I cannot mourn for the devastation she wrought not for the rampant homophobia she encouraged. Matthew Todd in his piece ‘Margaret Thatcher was no poster girl for gay rights’ reminds us:

The 1987 election saw Tory ad campaigns trying to portray Labour as actively trying to pervert children. One billboard showed a line of young men wearing badges such as “Gay pride” and “Gay sports day” with a slogan, “This is Labour’s camp. Do you want to live in it?”.

After winning the 1987 election Thatcher knew she was on to a winner. She denounced local education authorities for teaching children that “they have an inalienable right to be gay” and brought in the hated clause, then section, 28, which outlawed the promotion of homosexuality as “a pretend family relationship”

The last comment drove someone to scrawl over a Tory Poster ‘Lesbian Mums aren’t pretending’

The recent vote on Equal Marriages shows that the Tory are still stubbornly anti-gay, even Cameron couldn’t vote for a Bill he introduced.

On 17 April 2013 I am wearing Red in memory of the woman who tried to tear up the social reforms that helped the weakest, I am wearing Red to honour the Miners, the Miners who were fighting for their lives, who were refused State help in funeral expenses, I am wearing Red for the Steelworkers who lost their jobs and are now sweeping floors, I am wearing Red for the members of the military that dies in the Falklands War that could have been avoided – I am wearing Red in solidarity with the lives ruined by Section 28.

More than anything else on 17 April 2013 I am wearing red. I am wearing red to honour the achievements of a great leader who was humble, led this country, and created social and political reforms that made me proud to be British

Ding Dong the Beeb’s impartiality is dead

I do not agree with a lot of the tweets that are flying about Margaret Thatcher The Guardian published an article about Thatcher being a remarkable woman, but an awful Politician, which kind of give me a framework to begin to understand this week.  Unfortunately the two are merging.

The BBC’s decision to play five seconds of the ‘Ding Dong the Witch is Dead’ – a song from a 1939 musical starring gay icon Judy Garland – is made in the light that the song has gained a cult status as a protest against the legacy of Thatcherism.  I appreciate the sentiment of the song as a protest, as a child I was taught the slogan ‘Maggie Thatcher milk snatcher’ it was part of growing up.  She was called a lot of things during her time as Prime Minister due to the misery she inflicted. Whilst I do not wish her personal ill (nor her family)I do appreciate the sentiment.

There are better songs to be honest ‘Ghost Town’ by ‘The Specials’ could almost be the anthem of Sheffield:

This town, is coming like a ghost town
Why must the youth fight against themselves? Government leaving the youth on the shelf
This place, is coming like a ghost town
No job to be found in this country
Can’t go on no more
The people getting angry

But the mood has been ‘ Ding Dong The Witch is Dead’ is the chosen song of protest, and whilst I do see the reasoning behind it I can see why celebrating the death of anyone is macabre, it shows the hatred in our hearts, and more than a lack of compassion, and even though compassion is something that Thatcher lacked for the North, but still my calmer voices says the song is wrong.

The decision has been made not play the song, even though it is in the ‘Top Ten’ – instead of impartiality and playing it as ‘another record’ it has made a political decision to censor a record because of pressure from the Conservatives who feel it is disrespectful  - which it is probably is.

Any decision we make, or do not make, is political. The decision, whether right or nor, was a political decision by the BBC and its impartiality has been seriously called into question.  .

George Orwell said

“If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.”

The record may be wrong, but the decision not to play is also wrong

I can say a lot about Thatcher, but she was about ‘freedom of choice and speech’ and the power of the market place, and this record being in the Top Ten is a result of market forces, and the Government cannot predict or control the market. I see a deep irony in that a woman who was for deregulation and that we cannot stomach today the results of the outcome, after all we had to stomach the ravages of Thatcherism.

Baroness Margaret Hilda Thatcher, by women

She is finally dead, and to be honest is not like I thought it would be.

Baroness Margaret Hilda Thatcher died, in comfort, surrounded not by family but by people paid to care for her. On 08 April 2013 she entered immortality.

I am choosing ‘she entered immortality’ with care as it is  a line from ‘Evita’. In a cold Buenos Aires cinema the film slowly winds to a stop and a booming voice announces:

It is my sad duty to inform you that Eva Peron, spiritual leader of the nation, entered immortality at 20:25 today.

Their lives having passing images of each other,  both were operating in a ‘mans world’ both took on impossible odds, and both held power, both engendered a mythology about their lives, but in so many other ways they are the antithesis of each other.  The final similarity is how the truth will lie buried with them, surrounded by the myth.

A couple of weeks back it was reported that from Thatcher’s private papers that she cried uncontrollably for 40 minutes before a speech on the Falklands War, this was the first time I had noticed that Thatcher’s story was being rewritten. We had to feel sorry for this vulnerable woman, this leader.

Then came her death, the Twitter went into meltdown.  The Tories had been fed red meat and were in a frenzy slapping down any criticism of this woman, she was the saviour of the United Kingdom, from the brink of a precipice, she was Churchill, she was Wellington, and she was Elizabeth Tudor and of course Marilyn Monroe.

The Telegraph proclaimed she was a ‘working class hero’ someone ventured that her most cruel policies were not all her own, that she was a housewife. The rewriting of history was being penned.

Even as a Socialist I have to agree that the Unions in the 70’s were way too powerful and that any country needed to be run by the elected Government, but she went too far, too fast.

My first recollections was seeing Thatcher as Prime Minister was speaking  the words of Francis of Assisi

Where there is discord, may we bring harmony.
Where there is error, may we bring truth.
Where there is doubt, may we bring faith.
And where there is despair, may we bring hope.”

Her words on the steps of No 10 were as callous and as shallow as her policies. She brought, and still does, discord and despair.  I well remember the human misery she caused in Sheffield, and many other places, the decimation of villages, towns and cities offered as sacrifices on the altar of monetarism.

Thatcher’s Britain was a cruel and hard place, the poor – as now – were scapegoats, and to be weak was to fall victim.  I remember walking around Sheffield looking for a job, any job, because she had left the city a wasteland; once proud steel workers reduced to sweeping the floors of Shopping Malls, unemployment at 4 million, wages at an all time low. Sheffield, were I come from, was battered, she closed the steel works, she closed the pits, she flogged off anything she could lay her hands on.

Someone said

“Thatcher did more damage to Sheffield than Hitler did”- it was true.

The stories of the Miners Strike, the human misery visited on the coalfields was heartbreaking. It was not the politics that was heartbreaking, it was the broken families, the ruined lives, the sense of despair that still lingers even now.  Even during the devastation of the war people had hope and purpose.

Of course change was required, but it was brutal, and how come other countries still have mines and steel works, and a manufacturing sector?

From Sheffield we could see the affluence of the south growing, we were not part of the United Kingdom anymore, she had favoured the Moneylenders over the Miners, they grew richer, we grew poorer.  The difference in wealth between rich and poor tripled under Thatcher, Child poverty skyrocketed.

Glenda Jackson the Member of Parliament for Hampstead said today, 10 April 2013, said this:

Everything I’d learned & still believe to be a vice was hailed as a virtue under Thatcher, greed, selfishness and envy … of unleashing the most heinous economic, social, and spiritual damage in the history of the UK

Glenda Jackson came from Nottingham, she knows where I am coming from.

The Falklands War was hailed as Thatcher’s finest hour, cementing her reputation as an ‘Iron Lady’.  The blood from that war has stained her soul; an avoidable war the Government of the day ignored every warning from the British Ambassador to Argentina, ignored the ‘exploratory expedition’ to the outlying islands, sank the ‘General Belgrano’ as it headed for Port, away from the war zone.  She won another election over the dead bodies of British and Argentinean Troops.

Her list of inhumanity is getting buried, the refusal to impose sanctions on South Africa over apartheid (Bishop Tutu begged for them to be imposed), the sheltering of Chilean Dictators, the Section 28, ‘Suss Laws’ Hillsborough.

As a final insult the raw meat fed Tories are giving Thatcher a ‘Ceremonial Funeral’ – such funerals are for the ‘good and the great’ and to unite people of the country in grief and appreciation.  Thatcher divides, and so does the funeral,

I do not gloat in the death of Margaret Hilda Thatcher, her judgement will come before God, but history is being rewritten, as Golda Meir, Israeli Prime Minister said:

One cannot, and must not try to, erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.

The First Time

Last week the “Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Bill was passed for a second reading, in effect the first stage in it becoming law. The voting figures are revealing, 45% of the Conservatives voted against it, and even worse 40 Conservatives failed to vote, including the Prime Minister whose party introduced the Bill.

Of the 205 Labour MP’s only 9 voted against it, the Liberal Democrats voted in favour to give the Bill a comfortable 225 vote majority in the House, the vote being a tidy 400 in favour of the Bill with 175 against the Bill. Whilst a triumph for social justice this is disaster for the Conservatives, unable to provide a majority vote on their own legislation and relying on ‘Her Majesty’s Loyal Opposition’ to get the vote passed, as will be relied on for further stages of the legislation.

Not only has the David Cameron very visibly exposed his inability to enforce order on the Parliamentary Conservative Party he has also exposed the bigotry and reactionary nature of the Party that brought the infamous ‘Clause 28’ is still alive.

The Government were under no obligation to enact such legislation, it certainly wasn’t part of any manifesto, but it was probably a good ‘vote winner’ for the whatever percentage of the LGBT community if affects – unfortunately it has totally backfired creating rifts in the Government, splitting the party (along with other issues such as Europe) and highlighting the fragile nature of the tenancy of the Prime Minister; that a Prime Minister cannot command a majority ‘in the house’ from his own party was probably last seen in 1974 under Harold Wilson and wreaks of incompetence. Shrouding the vote as a ‘conscience vote’ fooled no-one, morally we have to ask when was Human Rights a matter of conscience, and not a matter of principles?

No matter how much I welcome the passing of Bill I have to conclude that this has been a shambles for the Conservatives.

The ball was fumbled, to get around the European Human Right Act the Government introduced clauses that religious organisations do not have to perform Equal Marriages, unless the Priest agrees to it – this is similar to legislation in Denmark – of course because we have a State Church, the Church of England, it is not only exempt it is illegal for them to performs Equal Marriages. The Church of England and Wales were furious, basically saying ‘no-one asked us about this’. The Government has dropped the ball with the electorate, the Church and the Parliamentary Party – could it be much more of a disaster?

Thanks to Twitter we now have direct access to our MP’s, for some this is boon and to others a curse. My MP, @JTomlinsonMP (Conservative) said that he was going to vote for the Bill, which I give thanks, @Tom_Watson (Labour) wrote:

I’ve had 112 letters and Postcards against gay marriage and one in favour. I’m voting in favour in gay marriage.

The above obviously earn my praise, but none more so than Mark Menzies MP (Conservative) who said:

“I came here today intending to abstain, but now I am going to vote for the Bill”

My utmost scorn belongs to David Davies MP (Conservative) – you can follow him at @DavidtcDavies – when he wrote

“Some 1 asked if you can compare gay marriage to moxed (mixed) marriages. Ludicrous question”

Coming from the MP who said, very publicly in the Guardian Newspaper, that he thought parents would prefer their children not to be gay and that the wasn’t homophobic because he fought a Gay Boxer I shouldn’t be surprised, even more so I would not be surprised if Tory Central Office banned him from having a Twitter account to be honest.

My funny response would be from Torch Song Trilogy, when Harvey Fierstein confronts his mother at the graveside about the loss of his partner and his Mum, played by Anne Bancroft, fails to see how her loss in a mirror of her grief:

You’re right, how dare I? I couldn’t know how it feels to put somebody’s things in plastic bags and watch the Garbage Men take them away; or how it feels when you forget and set his place at the table. The food rots because you forgot to shop for one. You had it easy, you have your friends and relatives, I had me.

In a real way the scene from Torch Song Trilogy deals with the ‘how can you compare straight marriage to gay marriage’ question of comparing gay and straight marriages, it’s just marriage, it is just sharing your life and hopes.

On a personal note last November me and H came back from Germany, normally we had flown back into Birmingham, or had a few days chilling before work, this time I was straight back to work, and H had to be back at work as well. Due to circumstances we live 75 miles apart at the moment, but that will hopefully change soon, so having flown into Gatwick we got the train to Reading. The sense of loneliness and being ripped apart at Reading Station as I boarded my train and left him behind, and then tracking each other’s progress as we made our way through a bitterly cold night was painful. It was the first time that I had felt this pain at being ripped apart.

I am sure if David Davies, MP for Monmouth, was in a similar situation he would feel the same, so what else is there to compare?

Skivers and Strivers

If his Omni-shambles of a government is good at anything it is the sound bite – reducing complex political and social issues to binary opposites, to black and white, good and bad. I the parlance of this Government my Mum would have been a striver and my Dad a skiver. Mum worked as ‘Buffer’ in one of the Cutlery firms in Sheffield, my Dad latterly unemployed. The fact that the reason my Dad was unemployed was that he had broken his back down a Coal Mine would have escaped notice, We would also be more socially suspect that it was broken marriage, so I guess ‘The Sun’ would have weighed with ‘stay away Dad’.

No need to bother questioning the facts – it only complicates matters

Making ends meet was a problem, and I know Mum struggled to pay the rent and keep putting food on the table, but she did. Of course we must have been on ‘State Benefit’ so Mum was probably a ‘scrounger’ as well, and was in a Council House – the list of our social crimes must be endless as imagined by this Government.

Mum was proud, fiercely proud, and tenacious with it, she fought the Sheffield Council, the fifth largest in the UK, for a house for us to live in, she wasn’t seeing her kids in ‘Care’ – she held the family together with a rod of iron, normally used for battering anyone who cared to ‘have a go’. My paternal Grandmother who took over the looking after me and my brother after Mum and Dad died was no pushover either. They came from a time when you had to survive somehow, and after 1947 and Labour Government victory, the State stepped and helped. It helped by providing social support, a health service and Welfare assistance – it was there to help ‘from the cradle to the grave’.

I was in Sheffield yesterday, and impromptu visit, and couldn’t help wonder what had gone wrong. I looked around at the decaying city centre where once there had been thriving businesses there were just ‘For Lease’ signs, or grubby little second-hand shops (I have no problem with ‘second hand’ by the way, in fact I love the idea); the Cocktail Bar where we used to decamp from the Theatre is now looking very tired and has become a ‘boozer’ and ‘Redgates’ – the emporium of literally everything in the universe that you could buy (I was seven at the time) now lies empty and forlorn.

More than anything else I looked at the people, the life blood that courses through any city, the same old familiar faces, but more and more I saw families barely old enough to have children, more than likely jobless, pushing Pram. I know it’s a cliché but rather than castigate the Chavs I could not help but wonder that Socialism had failed them. They were given everything the State could offer, education, health care, and housing and they did not use it. Yes I know we are in a recession, but I have to agree with the Tories, like I did in the late 70’s for a few weeks, that people should be entrepreneurs and seek advancement.

Surely the aim of socialism is not necessarily to provide, but to enable? Socialism should be about providing people who do not have equal chances to education and health care access to the means of bettering their lives and in the process bettering the life of society? Socialism is not about hand outs, it about enabling and providing a safety net that capitalism cannot, or will not.

I read recently in an article that the reason why people who receive a State Education fair less better than those who go to Eton is not so much the education, or the social connections, it is that people are told incessantly how inferior they are, and that the constant erosion of self-confidence leads to under achievement, yes I can run with that one. What socialism in the UK has totally failed to provide is a sense of confidence in people, a sense of aspiration and a sense of possibility.

Of course we cannot have a sensible political debate, and the binary opposition of skivers and strivers will have to suffice, not only is it binary opposition (you cannot have a skiver without reference to its opposite) they sound similar but mean the opposite, it is clever, and it’s definitely catchy, but it’s not helpful, it does not discriminate and yet on the other hand it does discriminate.

I not sure where we go next, but labelling people ‘skivers’ – or labelling people at all – is not the way forward, it creates for more divisions and a society that finds it easier to alienate those who are a burden, mainly through no fault of their own. It is designed to divide.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow

The 24th December 2010 will be etched in my consciousness for a long time, it was a perfectly sunny day but it had snowed, it was the thick crunchy stuff that makes a satisfying crackle under foot as you wade through it – wading through was a good description as it was fairly thick.  The air was freezing, and I was Dog Sitting, my partner had decided that he eeded ‘Spike’ – a gorgeous Husky – keeping company.   I had meant to out with the camera taking the perfect winter pictures, but I was I Dog Sitting.

I haven’t quite forgiven my partner for that.

It snowing as I write this, it’s the  ‘flurry’ type of snow, or as British Rail famously called it -  but very accurately  – ‘the wrong type of snow’ when it got into the filters of the new ‘BedPan’ trains (yes they were called BedPan after Bedford – St Pancras  line they were working on).  Yes, it’s the wrong type of snow.

Despite my Twitter feed being full of the #UKSnow hashtag (well it used to be, it has been muted) I fail to be very excited by snow, yes it looks pretty, and I can take pretty pictures, but my mind wanders from the artistic to the mundane.

My first thoughts are always with the street homeless of the one of the richest nations on the face of planet, that whilst we look from our central heated rooms we fail to see the huddled homeless, finding a little shelter underneath an archway or in a subway.  Winter is a bitter time, and the heartlessness’ of Westminster Council forbidding charities from distributing a cup of hot tea or soup make the winter a lot bleaker. Whilst we rush to work and complain about the slush we pass the ‘The Big Issue’ seller standing in the doorway, trying to get our attention and flog us a paper, spare a thought, a few words, a few pound to make the this cold day a bit warmer,  a bit more human.

The pretty postcard snow is lovely, but if you are a Pensioner or an employed parent trying to juggle the needs of food or heating then it becomes a nightmare, the current Benefits cuts will be biting harder than the wind this winter.  In its infinite wisdom this Government feels that capping Child Support is required to save money, if you earn more than £49,000 you lose it, it is no longer a universal benefit.  I can run with that to be honest, the only problem if you earn £49,000 and your partner earns £49,000 then you still get it, the math is simple if your household earns £98,000 you still get the support, if you are a single parent and you earn £49,001 then you lose it.  The Government thinks this is fair, so it must be.

Under the Government’s plans for the economy this Christmas and New Year were going to be better, we were going to have growth of 2.4% but it has decided it would be fairer to have a triple dip recession, upwards of 6,000 people have lost their jobs in the UK within the first two weeks of 2013, will they be putting the central heating to keep the biting cold out?  In Swindon alone 800 jobs are under threat from the Honda plant, and another 300 from its suppliers, and this is not counting the staff of Jessops and HMV. As someone tweeted, are these people classed as ‘scroungers’ or are hey still ‘strivers’ until the axe finally falls?

The song for this is weather is not the 50’s classic ‘Let it snow’ it more the Dickensian ‘In the bleak mid-winter’

Why Popeye’s is the answer to the Recession

I am not at work today, I had planned to go on a photographic expedition to Bodmin, but the weather is pretty m’eh so decided not to go, instead I had a lazy morning and ambled down stairs and do some ‘Channel Surfing’ and came across ‘Undercover Boss USA’ - a series where a Boss goes undercover and experiences life at the ‘coal face’ to see what life is like outside the Corporate Bubble – todays installment was Popeye’s. Watching the moving stories and the people, mainly Black Americans and ex-homeless people, I actually wanted to work for Popeye’s. One got my attention was the enthusiasm of the staff, ok I know that the camera was on them and they were specially selected. It occurred to me a major part of the worlds economic problems could be solved not by the Bankers, but by the Workers – but then again I am a Socialist, so I would say that wouldn’t I!

Employment is a contractual obligation, rather like prostitution in most cases, I work the company gives me money, if I am really good at my job they will give me more money until they have no use for me. I see a different paradigm, I see a better way, and it was articulated in the programme. Firstly the previous paragraph is important and needs little, if any modification, though I want to eliminate the term ‘prostitution’ from it. It works like this:

• The employer provides a safe environment, it has corporate policies on bullying, it promotes team work, and it operates in an environment of respect – which has to be mutual.

• Individual Managers see their staff as an asset, and invests training and assists where practicable in helping employees through difficult circumstances.

• The State legislates for maximum number of hours for an employee to work (to ensure work/life balance and peak performance – you thought I was going to leave all the benefits on the employee didn’t you?) and that the workplace is a safe place to work, within the bounds of common sense.

• The State creates a system where disputes can be mediated, and that employers cannot do things like sack for the sheer hell of it, they have to provide a valid reason – the employee has after all invested time in the company and has probably moved location to work for them.

• The employee responds to this positive behaviour by giving 100%, by attending work, by promoting an excellent employer and working to save the company money and boost the economy in the process.

On the whole this is the situation we have in the United Kingdom, without the negative effect of the recession and with the above in force employees will give good service. When I worked for South West Trains all the above criteria were broadly met (and more) and to be honest there were days when I walked in the office and thought “OMG, and I get paid to do this as well!” It was a company that respected its employees and to honest it was difficult for an employee not to want to go ‘the extra mile’. I would happily do a couple of hours of extra work, go in on a Saturday, stay behind when the ‘brown stuff hit the whirly thing‘ and had an immense pride in working for them.

Not only was there was immense pride with working for them, there was a wealth of ongoing experience that was just growing each year, and when people retired new people could learn from the ‘hive mind’ at Waterloo. To me it was a ‘win-win’ scenario.

The only reason I left was that you were waiting ‘to fill Dead Men’s shoes‘ for the next promotion – staff turnover was unbelievably low. All I will say is that where I am working now the staff turnover is ludicrously high – nuff said.

The Government’s solution to the supply side of the economy is to reduce the role of the State in ensuring Workers Rights. It wants to enfeeble Health and Safety Legislation and it wants to introduce ‘dismiss without reason’ for employers; the latter will be basically a ‘Bullies Charter’ in that if anyone ‘makes waves’ they will be sacked. This will lead inevitably lead to negativity in the workplace, it is a race to the bottom. It is what the UK is really good at since 1945, a false economy that does not invest in the future, but tries to struggle with the present. It is not only a false economy it is also ideological thuggery, with little to do with the economy.

Let us invest in a company’s greatest asset, its people, the people who produce goods to export and to pay taxes; let us not go down the path creating a rancid plutocracy where the coporate Fat Cats dine on the misery of its employees – let us cooperate; unfortunately ths Government is ‘old school’.

The Conservatives are still reeling at the moment from the Andrew Mitchell ‘Plebgate’ fiasco, and the reason is not what Mitchell said, or didn’t say, it is the appearance – based in fact – of Government that is hellbent on recreating the working practices of Dickensian Era, we already have the highest number of food kitchens, people living on Benefit and the number of scandals and cock-ups per week of any Government. The proposed revisions of Employment Law is edging it way to recreating the ‘Poor Laws‘. The fundamental arrogance of this Government is summed up succinctly by two Tories – Theresa May, the current Home Secretary, and Nadine Dorries MP for Mid-Bedfordshire.

When Theresa May was Conservative Party Chairman in 2002 she addressed the Tory Party Conference and said, in her ‘Nasty Party’ speech:

Politicians are seen as untrustworthy and hypocritical. We talk a different language. We live in a different world. We seem to be scoring points, playing games and seeking personal advantage – while home-owners struggle to make ends meet and schoolchildren see years of hard work undermined by the stroke of a bureaucrat’s pen.

The full text of the speech is worth a read, and is sadly more true today – with Chancellors trying to ‘blag ‘First Class Train Tickets, swearing at Police with impunity, with Rib-Eye Steak costing £2.70 in the Commons Restaurant (a full article is ~ here) – which is less than a slice of cake at Starbucks, and now refusing to reveal more expenses scandals of MP’s renting houses to MP’s and other ‘dodges’. The Government is no longer ‘of the people’.

The second quote is from Nadine Dorries, this year:

Unfortunately, I think that not only are Cameron and Osborne two posh boys who don’t know the price of milk, but they are two arrogant posh boys who show no remorse, no contrition, and no passion to want to understand the lives of others – and that is their real crime.

Doesn’t that really sum up the past few weeks, this Government and it’s core attitudes – I think it does.

A joke in search of a punchline

The Lunatics have taken over the Asylum

Someone tweeted on my timeline that the UK Government is “… a series of jokes in search of a punchline” and in a week when the Government could have been getting some kudos it has managed to do a passable impersonation of a Laurel and Hardy film.

I have kept quite on the West Coast Rail Franchise where Government Ministers publically lambasted Sir Richard Branson for being a poor loser on losing the West Coast Rail Franchise, in one of those moment that most politicians dread, normally a few days after Justine Greening (Minister for Railways) said that the deal with First Group was fair and would be signed, and that the process was sound, it was then announced that the process was fatally flawed and would investigate what had happened, and a new competition instigated.

Of course it was all the Civil Servants fault.

If Sir Richard Branson had not had the guts to do the unspeakable and challenge the Department of Transport we would have been in a mess. The Government having to eat humble pie and ask Sir Richard to run the railway for a few more months – after categorically saying it would never happen is embarrassing. The antipathy between Virgin Rail and the Government has gone to the ‘personal’

Of course the other thing Justine mentioned was that Virgin would not get to hold the franchise until the fuss had died down, as it transpires Virgin will retain the franchise for several months, then an interim bidding process would be instigated, for two years, and then another 15 year contract would be let. So having three franchise bids is not at all wasteful!

Of course the farce not only delays the franchises (First Great Western, First Capital Connect, etc) it also costs the tax payer £40 million to reimburse the original bidders, that’s not government money, its my money.

Yesterday at PMQ’s the Prime Minister basically got ‘shish kebabed’ over Andrew Mitchell and plebgate affair, after the spit roasting (the Tory 1922 Committee baying for Mitchell’s blood, but Cameron defended Mitchell – today ‘Thrasher’ Mitchell resigned. It has taken him 4 weeks to ‘do the right thing’ and Ed Milliband to ask for his head on platter before he relinquished power. Our politicians are too attached to their Ministerial Cars to let it go. Lets face it the Andrew Mitchell thing was embarrassing, and Cameron has been weakened over not asking for his resignation – how many chances does he have give people.

Cameron was on a duty-free freebie to the European Summit, I say ‘duty free’ trip because no-one in Europe is actually listening to the UK, in a Government that believes in collective responsibility Cameron said nothing at a Minister saying the UK should leave Europe; as vile as Enoch Powell was at least he left the Cabinet when he disagreed with it. Of course the EU Leaders gave the PM a polite reception, didn’t yawn too much, and politely asked when the UK would be leaving the EU because they actually want to do some serious stuff, like rescue Europe from a financial implosion.

The UK has never signed onto the ‘European Dream’ the ideal, as much as I am a supporter of the EU, and I passionate about the EU, France was right not to let us join, in the 50′s and we shouldn’t have been allowed to join, we cannot understand the concept of ‘cooperation’.

I believe the qoute came from Le Monde the last tiem Cameron used the vetoed like a kid throwing his toys out of the Pram in 2011, and it sums up the UK and Europe perfectly and will be our epitaph:

The British do not believe in the European idea. They are alien to this project, which is currently bogged down, but which appears to be more necessary than ever; to forge a single entity that will be able to exist as such among the other powers of the 21st Century.

We should have no regrets about what happened in Brussels. The ambiguity about the role of Britain has been cleared up: deep down the British, who joined what was the European Economic Community in 1973, are only interested in one aspect of Europe – the single market – while they have remained indifferent, if not hostile, to the rest of the European project.

Cameron spoke about cutting staff, saying he would Veto stuff (as usual) and would not be attending the Nobel Peace Prize presentation for Europe, well that’s a few less heads to feed at the Reception I suppose.

Not to be left out the Home Secretary decided she would use the Human Rights Act she wants to abolish to stop a deportation of a hacker to the USA on the grounds of he might kill himself, she also said she wants to withdraw from EU Policing Treaties, and then pick, a la carte, the bits they want; unfortunately Treaties do not work like that. The announcement was made days after the process had been used to return a young girl who had run off with Teacher – to France which, I understand with my socialist education, is in Europe.

The timing of this Government is comedic, just like Mitchell swearing at the Police days after two Police Officers were murdered in the line of their duties.

Today the beloved Chancellor has caused furor in travelling in First Class with a Second Class Ticket (apparently he did not want to sit with the plebs), though apparently he offered to upgrade – oh, did I mention it was Virgin Trains he was travelling on? Perhaps at the next PMQ’s Ed Milliband should upgrade and ask Cameron for the Chancellor’s head on a platter rather than the Chief Whip’s.

David Cameron when asked why he wanted to be PM said, and this is the truth “because I think I would be rather good at it” – Dave, you’re not, really, you’re not

The Nasty Party Conference

I have a broken finger so please excuse lack of finesse – if I ever had any – but just reading the news about the Tory Party Conference I to write something, or throw something, and writing is the less painful.

Cameron waving the ‘butchers apron’

It’s the first full day of the Nasty Party Conference and I am already spitting feathers!
Sunday brought our beloved leader, fifth Cousin of Queen Betty, on TV telling the world he wouldn’t mind altering the EU Treaty, not Maastricht or Lisbon, but the Treaty of Rome, the one that established the EU, or European Common Market, just minor amendments like the free movement of labour with the EU. I have to confess an interest here that my partner is German and as much as I would love to live in Germany that is not going to happen in the near future. Cameron thinks there are too many Europeans in the UK, and like any fascist he needs a scapegoat, and that is the EU. Most Fascists look for s subset of a group, but our Dave, he goes for an entire continent. Of course David forgets the other side of the coin that many British people chose to work in other European countries, such as Spain, Germany and France to name three, I also have a friend working and living in Poland.

Of course we could seek a special relationship with Europe like Norway has. Norway sits in the EU Council as a obeserver,enjoying trade with the EU but not having any say in the rules but having to abide by them – this would suit the British down to the ground, alone, without influence, but being bound by the EU rules, we could carry on in our ‘splendid isolation’ forever British wallowing in past glories.

Today, Monday 8th October 2012, the glorious Chancellor took to the stage to talk to the faithful!

‘We are all in this together’ and will take money from people who have been made unemployed by our disastrous policies because our policies are disastrous and are not working, and will definitely not take a penny more from the people we gave a £16,000 bump in earning by reducing the rate of tax on the super rich who might want to sell a £2 Million Home, that is not equality. Then of course we have those people who are in work.

Just to prove that the Tory Party is the Party of Business, ie funded by business, they will empower workers to sell their employments rights for £2k, well not exactly £2,000, the employers will give employees £2,000 IN SHARES – when the employers decides to sack them the employee can sell the shares back to the employer, only at a fair rate; the fair rate will determined by the employer, of course if you were given an unfair rate you could legally challenge them, but not having a job you would be hard pressed to afford a lawyer …

Employee rights are just that, they are not privileges, they are not a birthright to be sold, they are protection for honest people trying to make a living.

This Government is thoroughly evil.

At a fringe meeting Lord Carey, of the Coalition for Marriage, spewed forth some of his bile about te effect of equal marriage in Mexico and the Netherlands that have, apparently – and I would like proof – of a three-way marriage, God forbid! Of course, and this explains why the Catholic Church opposes Equal Marriage, they would have to change the wording. Actually they wouldn’t and that is a stupid argument.

The other argument is that equal marriage was not in the manifesto, well neither was the privatisation of the National Health Service.

In two days the Tories have proved beyond a doubt that they are probably the nastiest government this country has ever had – the uncaring, unthinking, pathological set of ‘arrogant tory boys’ ever to sit on the Government bench

Cable’s breach of Contract and Kate’s boobs

The man who sold out the Working Classes

The second phase of the assault on the Working Classes has begun.

Whilst the first paragraph reads like a Communist Manifesto is not, slightly Socialist maybe, particularly political, it is just a fact. Having been softened in the media to expect that ‘no fault dismissals’ was on the cards for this Parliament, which could come later of course, we have been given the sop that workers rights to Tribunals and Redundancies are to be curtailed.  I appreciate that in some countries our rights seem like a paradise, but to coin an American concept, we have a social contract with the State that goes back to the settlement after the Second World War.

Regressing workers to the 80′s – and as pointed out Cameron’s version of the 80′s is the 1880′s – does not solve the economic crisis and the double dip recession that this Government has managed to get us in, of coure a severe recession is very good cover to make unpopular ideological changes.  Put very simply the changes to employment laws alter the Supply Side whilst the problem is on the Demand Side of the economy.  The Government readily admits that big problem we face is DEMAND not an inherent problem with the labour laws.

The ConDems have produced the first double dip recession since the 1970, have produced the longest recession since the The Great Depression, and after nearly three years in Government they still have an economy 4.3% smaller than the economy was in 2008 – this is not because it’s difficult to sack people, it is because of the Chancellor’s incompetence and a lack of demand.  It is an easy problem, send George Osborne on a Maths course, he only managed an ‘O’ Level in Math!

The Government could be potentially damaging demand in the economy by introducing more uncertainty into the Labour market, or at more uncertainty then there was before. Put simply the Government is making it easier for the employers to sack people, with a maximum pay out of one years salary.

This introduces another factor, basically creating a Bully’s Charter whereby an employee will be forced to tolerate bullying for fear of losing their job, whilst the proposals are not ‘no fault dismissal’ where an employer can just sack someone because they feel like it, it is coming.

Taking one example, Germany, the powerhouse of Europe, it has a growing economy in the midst of a downturn in the European recession, though only the UK, Spain, and Greece have managed a double-dip recession, and it has some of the most generous Labour and Health and Safety Laws in Europe, though it has no minimum wage and it does have micro jobs which I am not too happy about.  Germany is not tinkering around workers rights, it is investing in its workforce and management and the workforce actually co-operate. Germany, and I am sure many other European countries, is not suffering because it can’t sack its employees on a whim, but succeeding because it sees the workforce as an investment.

Of course the Government has to decide if it wants to sell the British economy to lowest bidder for a sweatshop  economy, or if it wants an economy that produces quality and is productive.

I will repeat again that this Government has no mandate to make fundamental changes to the social fabric of this country – even though they are destroying it.

A few months after this Government came to power The Guardian wrote about the Tory ideal based roughly on the social and economic framework of Downton Abbey … let me see Arrogant Post Eton boys in charge – check Tory Toffs – check  millionaires out of touch with the working classes – check – Workers in fear of their jobs – check – Maggie Smith in charge – we have a Thatcher, will that do? 

The creator of Downton Abbey is a Tory MP, theres a surprise.

Today the news will about Kate’s Middleton’s boobs -  bread and circuses.