The General Election - my verdict

I haven’t written in a while. Term time will do that. The fine balance of working and studying.

Term is nearly over for the summer and the General Election has taken place and the results were horrifying. The Conservatives won a Majority. No poll had predicted, even the Tories did not predict it. As I sat watching the exit polls coming in my heart sank through the floor. My hope faded, only temporarily as it will be found and returned to its owner soon, and my anger began. As if the country had not enough the electorate wanted five more years of pain and suffering. BDSM party goers, the lot of them.

There are people blaming the SNP. I don’t blame the SNP. I have a soft spot for Nicola Sturgeon. I don’t want independence. I am an idealist who feels that unification is best as opposed to splitting into different parts. Ultimately though who are we to tell the Scottish, the Welsh or the Northern Irish how they should vote or feel about Westminster? My only issue with Scottish independence is the idea that if Scotland are fine then that is the main thing. The North of England are just as hard hit by the cuts and feel what Scotland feel. We should come together not split apart. This is after all only my humble opinion as I have never lived anywhere outside of England.

Ed Miliband was not to fault either. He was a strong man, maybe not a natural leader but certainly had courage of his convictions and the right ideas. Unfortunately he was trying to bring the Labour party to back whence it came in an ideological sense which didn’t seem to go down well. There are now calls for the Labour party to submit further to the centre than where it lies now.

So what led to the Tories coming to power and defying all odds?

Despite Ed Miliband not being at fault, the Labour party did not seek to dispel the idea that they were not to blame for the financial crash. This has been accepted by many as a financial crisis and yet the Labour party still get wacked round the head every time it comes up in conversation. Before the recession, caused by the fall of Lehman Brothers in America which sent shock waves through the globalised economy, our deficit and spending were about as high as you’d expect. When recession hit this caused businesses to liquidate therefore making people redundant and therefore causing people to lose their homes. This caused overspending, not the government itself. I am not a fan of New Labour but this is something they needed to fight back on.

Scottish Independence, whether you agreed or not, Labour and the Conservatives provided a united front who did nothing to help in Labour’s image in Scotland. The people of Scotland wanted change one way or another and Labour did nothing to present they could pursue this change in their ‘No’ campaign. 

The argument always came back to Ed Miliband and his image. The right wing press love the fact he couldn’t eat a bacon sandwich and tended to trip over a lot. Since when has this ever been important in politics? It is ridiculous that this is how we judge our politicians in the mainstream media. Ed Miliband genuinely wanted to do something different but the sandwich let him down or rather the media did. There were attempts to humanise this accident which lets face it has happened to the best of us, but unfortunately image was a problem. It shouldn’t be but it was made an issue.

In addition to this the Tories spoke the right language. People are scared and the landscape at the moment is fear. Recessions have been an occurrence every decade or so but this past one was the worst and it made people uncertain about their future. They guaranteed more of the same and it comes back to this idea of if me and mine are fine then screw everyone else. This is the issue we face now, we see this is in our dealing homelessness, the environment and climate change, immigration and welfare. As a child we are told to leave something as we found it. By this virtue we will not leave the Earth as we found it. If we are not careful we will see the end of the NHS, schools run by the local councils for local children, Human Rights Bill and an environment where we’ve plundered all of its resources with our children cleaning up the mess. 

A change in direction for me...?

This is an honest post. It is honesty because I am going to admit that I am leaving the Labour Party today after being a member for a few years. I am leaving to join the Green Party. I am joining the “other” alternative party. 

Why?

I do not dislike Labour. I was quite young (around eleven) when we went to war with Iraq. Throughout my teenage years it was seemingly quite normal for us to have presence in the Middle East. I formed no opinion about Tony Blair’s involvement in this. My mother and Stepfather were not particularly political and I lived in a Liberal Democrat stronghold. Cornwall was not really a place where politics was spoken about, either that or I wasn’t listening which is entirely possibly.

Despite this I have always swayed towards typically left wing ideologies. Whilst part of me admires Margaret Thatcher’s strength of character and I respect her as a leader I despise the steps she took. Yes, we were in the midst of a Winter of Discontentment, interest rates were rampant and public services were losing far too much money. England in the early 70s had a centralised system based on the Keynesian model which served us through the post-war period helping to rebuild a broken Britain. Keynesian economics centred largely around strong public sector investment, a commitment to full employment and an economy which allowed supply and demand to flourish. The National Health Service was created. The benefits system was implemented. These were desperate times but they ensured that we grew as a country.

Margaret Thatcher ensured these values were swept into the history books. She sought mass privatisation, brought the unions to their knees, reined in public spending and won in the Falklands War. In doing all of this she certainly secured her place in the history books. As a politics student I cannot name every Prime Minister there has ever been but I can name Clement Attlee, the Prime Minister who helped created the National Health Service and I can name Margaret Thatcher, the woman who brought entire towns into poverty because their work source dried up.

The issue I have with Labour is not with Labour itself. It is with New Labour, the Labour Thatcher helped form with Tony Blair. They took the party towards the righter end of the scale. They did not regulate the banks after Thatcher deregulated them. They did nothing to try and keep the housing market in check. They introduced a minimum wage, introduced Sure Start and gave Scotland and Wales greater powers to govern themselves. These were achievements but as ideological as I may be, I think they stepped away from the true Left and in doing so they did not leave anywhere for the Lefties to go but with them kicking, screaming and begging for mercy.

Ideological and morally I am behind the Green Party. They are often laughed off as hippie tree huggers who have no great policies other than to save the planet. But hey, the planet is our home. It is worth saving and no other party seems bothered that we are running ever closer to the point where oil will be depleted and climate change will be changing the way we live our lives. Potentially for the worst.

Austerity does not work Mr Cameron, Mr Clegg and Mr Osbourne. I know you have teams of economists and sociologists writing your policies. I understand that little ol’ me in Sheffield with a head full of nice ideas will be viewed as no more than a keyboard warrior. Despite this, you’re wrong. 

The issue with your policies is that a lot of the population, certainly the Northern counties, are looking for someone else to vote for. Your policies benefit no one but you and your friends. If free-market capitalism is your bread and butter then why you don’t put out contracts for investment in actual renewable energy? An alternative to oil? An affordable electric car? 

We could invest in people with real money and not zero hour contracts or unpaid internships. But actually deliver real jobs with real training if required. We should kick start manufacturing in our poorest cities. We should stop Right to Buy to keep and preserve council housing because affordable housing is needed. 

When I was a teenager I was involved in a community outreach programme which was an absolute life saver. Those “chavs” we label so ruthlessly could be told they are a valued member of society. When I thought the world had forgotten me there were a group of youth workers in Cornwall who showed me that I mattered. I will never be able to thank those three women enough for what they did for me.

So instead of investing in austerity and universal credit, why don’t we invest in the population eh peeps? This is why folks, I am putting my support behind the Green Party. I can believe in them.

Russell Brand - voice of a nation?

Russell Brand rarely leaves my twitter and Facebook feeds these days. I do follow his posts so I realise this might be something to do with it but The Guardian and Huffington Post create many articles about the man with the crazy hair. Some feel he is evil, doing this just for the marketing value and some feel he is the the voice of the nation. 

 I have always had a soft spot for Russell Brand. At the time when he was on MTV causing havoc I lived in a house that didn't have TV. I knew nothing of this time of his life but only the time he emerged with his autobiography "My Booky Wook" which I sort of read (by sort of I read about half of it). I liked his voice, his vocabulary and his style. He wasn't a teenage crush but I certainly found the idea of him appealing. 

 Only in the past two years since his marriage split from Katy Perry has he emerged as almost a prophet. He wants to see equality in the world with corporations and their capitalist ways fail. Quite left wing in ideologies I don't believe he is wrong to want what he does, but is he going about it the right way? Firstly he doesn't believe that voting makes a difference. I can see why this point of view is largely shared. General opinion states that currently the question is do you want the Conservative Conservative, Convservative Labour or Conservative Liberal Democrats? No party at this moment in time, besides the Green Party, have left wing attitudes at heart. Unfortunately with the Green Party they are not popular enough with many having misconceptions that they only have policies for the environment. Therefore the only choice being provided is UKIP who just seizes every opportunity they can to market themselves using some ill of the world that only them and their supporters seem to think is a bad thing. 

 I digress, I think that voting is important. If no one votes, democracy falls down and the politicians will not have their actions kept in check. All of a sudden we will have an American style healthcare and have to remortgage every time we want to send our children to school, if we even have a property to remortgage because of course by this point landlords and banks will have inflated our house prices to a point only a few of us could ever dream to buy. On this day the people who didn't vote will wonder what happened. 

 I don't disagree that currently our system appears flawed however actively engaging in with the government is the only way we can stop it from slipping from our fingers altogether. I don't believe Russell Brand is wholly wrong. He is providing a left wing voice challenging the right wing voice of Nigel Farage. He brings attention to issues that need addressing albeit sometimes in a way that doesn't have its desired results for example the banker who missed out on his lunch. But we do need people like Russell Brand engaging in issues which need support but I do wish he wouldn't tell people not to vote. 

Voting engagement has been slowly creeping down for years and we certainly don't need it having any more encouragement. I would go as far as saying that whoever you want to vote for, just vote because then the voice of the people will be heard. Votes do not lie and ultimately this country needs to be run by the people for the good of the people.