Conservative Manifesto Run Through

This is the first of 3 Manifesto Run Throughs that I will be penning before the election, as ever I will endeavour to stay unbiased as to give a representative and balanced view of each Manifesto, to give credit where credit is due and to pinpoint inaccuracies in them. I shall begin with the Tories as they’re the governing party at this moment in time.

Their first main point is Strong and Stable leadership, as I’m sure you’ll have heard this slogan by now. This has received plenty of negative press so I shall give a balanced outlook, what I think they’re trying to get across is that in this massive transitional period for our country, we need stability and certainty, this would only be achieved (in their eyes) by keeping the status quo and re-electing the Conservatives, so that the negotiating team in place can get to work as soon as possible in securing an amicable split from the European Union.

The next points they make are the big challenges that face them. The first being a strong economy, which to be fair the Conservatives have done a fairly good job at creating. Unemployment figures are down, economic forecasts are positive and investment post Brexit looks to boom. This is not to say that massive cuts have had to occur and hit some demographics hard and increased the need for food banks, but on balance the public spending of Labour was unsustainable and needed cutting as the Tories were left in a ridiculous amount of debt.

Their second point is about Brexit and the need for a smooth and orderly exit from the union. Also to try and create a deep and strong rooted relationship with the remaining EU nations, which personally I think there has been a massive irreparable rift caused, this spawning from our own interests and the jealousy of the other nations who secretly crave self determination. They also make a good point of stating we need to stay strong and united, aimed at the United Kingdom as a whole, in contrast to the Republican views of Corbyn who would like to see the split of the UK. Now is definitely the time to stay together and I like to see this message staged in this point.

The third point they make is to fight enduring social divisions. This is mainly made out to be about social mobility and making sure people aren’t held back by where they come from or where they’re born. I think it’s also aimed at second generation immigrant votes, the Tories try to include them as historically they don’t pick up those votes. I also think it’s aimed at people who will be here post Brexit and saying that as long as you work hard you have a place here. Even though they haven’t given a guarantee on it yet, I think this will be one of the easiest bargaining chips we have in the negotiations.

The fourth point acknowledges the ageing population and people with long term health conditions, expressing the need to find a solution and accepting the reality of it.

The final big point is looking at innovative technology and being at the forefront of the technological wave. I think this is wise as there’s a lot of wealth to be created from this industry and is still in its infancy (relatively) in the grand scale of things. It points out the need to staying safe and secure in regards to privacy, which is quite contradictory, being that civil liberties and privacy in regards to technology have slowly eroded under the Tories and so much privacy has been lost online. This was overseen by the Tories and it’s a slight slap in the face to include that.

The Manifesto then goes onto separate sub headings outlining viewpoints and the direction of the party and what they expect to achieve. They start by stating they want to govern from the mainstream, they believe they can be the central party and govern on behalf of the majority of the electorate, by making decisions in the interests of everybody, which in itself gives off a conflicted viewpoint. You can’t please everybody and not everyone will agree on things, I understand we live in a divided nation currently and maybe this is their way of trying to combat this but by contradicting yourself is not a good start. They believe they can bridge the gap between left and right, which is a risky statement as you can end up alienating your core supporters, whilst losing the undecided voters by sounding wishy-washy. They say they’ll reduce and control immigration, which yet again is a risky pledge considering Cameron made the same one and failed on a monumental scale. They want to defend our nation from terrorist threats which is a double edged sword, as on the one hand yes I fully believe them but on the other, funding has steadily been cut to our police over the period of Tory rule. Yet they were cuts that needed to be made, I return to my earlier point of labour’s massive budget of public spending (and borrowing) and having no way of paying it back. Whilst I understand the police forces of this country are stretched, you can only spread out the funding you have. Yes they could free up extra capital by scrapping the foreign aid budget but lefties won’t accept that or the notion that in order to pay for something you have to take money away from something else. Our budget is finite. Unless you borrow money like Labour and then you get stuck in the cycle all over again.

They wish to protect workers rights and develop industrial strategy to work better in favour of the economy. Finally in this section they state that they won’t drift to the right and make decisions based on what works, which is refreshingly realistic.

Their next point is the age old adage of governing in the interests of ordinary, hard working families which has become a catchphrase for all political parties as trying to project an air of caring for Joe bloggs and his family, and aiming themselves at a majority of the electorate. Boring, NEXT! The next passage just rearranges and reiterates all of the previous points to try and drum it into the reader, which is understandable if you want to learn what they actually stand for as most people you ask on the street wouldn’t be able to tell you the differences of what the major parties even stand for anymore.

The next section is entitled Our Principles, where they try and rebrand what it means to be a Tory, which is a massive turn off for people with traditional conservative views. They establish a notion that people owe a debt to the community and society which I’m at odds with, whilst I understand they’re trying to convey an expectation of a strong work ethic, I don’t think we’re born into debt with our nation. We’re born free.

They then set out how they’re going to achieve these goals in greater detail which I have no desire to deconstruct as I’m currently on my honeymoon, so I shall simply bulletpoint these with a brief explanation and whether it’s a pro or con for voting.

Keeping taxes as low as possible – freezing VAT (pro – goods and products won’t increase in price for consumers), increase personal allowance to £12500 (pro – relieving £2500 taxable income for lower earners), local residents can opt out of high increases of Council Tax via a referendum (con – too vague, if they slowly increase it, it won’t be classed as high increase so no basis for referendum), Corporation Tax to fall to 17% (pro – actively seeking inward investment from overseas post Brexit is a good think ahead however, Con – Labour have applied pressure to big corporations and called them out for not paying their fair share, so won’t sit well with low earners or students who don’t understand basic economics).

Increasing Trade – Lodging new schedules for the UK with WTO (pro – looking ahead post Brexit we’re going to need trade schedules in place to ensure a smooth exit and to strike free trade deals around the world and become a stronger trading nation BIG PRO), Creating a network of 9 trade commissioners to promote trade abroad and increase trade between the members of the UK (pro – self explanatory), push forward with UK export finance (pro – ensuring that no viable UK export fails due to lack of finance or insurance).

Wages – Increasing the National Living Wage to 60% of median earnings by 2020 (Con – this will back fire massively, as wages increase so will the number of redundancies as companies can’t afford to employ as many people, which in turn increases workload for workers, unsustainable).

Modern Business Strategy – Freeing up funds for research and development in fields of future technology e.g batteries for electric cars (pro – this will keep people on side who believe in renewable energy, Con – we don’t know where these funds will come from, most likely through Green levies or taxing the current motorist more. Which I can’t get behind!), A modern technical education for everyone (pro – any education made available can create social mobility, Con – being traditional I’d prefer that people are still taught in the old school way, as we can’t be reliant on technology for everything).

National Productivity Investment Fund – £23bn set aside to enhance certain infrastructures, £740m on digital infrastructure, big increase in spending on railways (no figure attached provably because of HS2) £1.1bn on local transport and £250m on productivity skills enhancement (pro – I believe that the money is well spent in this venture as the Tories are trying to keep with the times, you can guarantee part of the digital infrastructure includes rolling out super fast broadband everywhere in the UK).

Future Britain Fund – holding investments of the British people to go towards future funding of infrastructure and the economy, made up of profits of shale gas extraction, dormant assets and the sale of some public assets (Pro – if they can research shale gas and it doesn’t harm the environment then good, Con – selling off public assets automatically makes you think of parts of the NHS like buildings and equipment).

Support for industy – After Sir John Parker’s review of shipbuilding there will be a push for modernising and revitalising the shipbuilding industry (massive pro – we used to be world leaders in shipbuilding, creation of jobs all over the country E.g Clyde, Barrow, Portsmouth).

Support for Farming Industry – Grow more, sell more and export more post Brexit (Pro – on the face of it the notion is great as I live in the countryside and support our farmers, Con – yet they expect more but state they’ll give the same amount of cash to aid development, you can’t expect more for the same amount of investment, it’s unrealistic).

A Free Vote on Fox Hunting (Pro and Con).

Clearly setting out to leave the Common Fisheries Policy and exercise our control of our sovereign waters (Biggest Pro on here! No legal uncertainty will be made during negotiations, this is not up for debate! Preserving and increasing the fish stock which has been overfished under the EU’s common fishing policy, which introduced quotas and have depleted our fish stock, massively looking forward to our thriving fishing industry in the future).

Completely ruling out a divisive Scottish referendum and pointing out that regardless of the devolved powers given to Scotland, they’ve squandered growth potential and have lagged behind (Pro – nothing else needs to be added!).

As part of infrastructure investment, bringing Welsh railways up to speed (Pro – massively overdue, Con – Plaid Cymru will say money better spent on Welsh NHS, which is a fair observation).

Look to re-brokering a power sharing deal in Northern Ireland as soon as possible (Pro).

UK Shared Prosperity Fund – Replaces the funding sent from EU (which was our money in the first place) and redistributes it accordingly with consultation between Westminster and other devolved powers (Big Pro – shuts up all the Remainers moaning about ‘lost EU money’).

The Great Repeal Bill – EU law will be enshrined into UK law, so no rights are lost overnight, yet it gives parliament the right to amend, repeal or improve any piece of these laws. It also gets rid of the ball ache of sorting out 41 years worth of laws, we can slowly over time strip all the unsavoury laws out of our law. (Pro – get overall power of our legislature back and Human Rights Act will be reconstructed after formally leaving the EU, Cons – it’s a time consuming exercise, we’d still be signed up to ECHR for the next parliament, which I oppose massively but it’ll be reviewed in 2022).

In conjunction with our Overseas Territories, create a Blue Belt and aid conservation by creating the largest marine sanctuaries in the world (Pro for anyone in the world).

Continue commitment of 2% of GDP to defense as part of NATO obligations (Pro – normal humans like to be safe, Con – if you’re a Stop The War supporter or pacifist), (lol).

£178bn spread over a decade on strengthening our depleted Royal Navy, by building new vessels in conjunction with rejuvenated shipyards up and down the country (Pro – Brittania rules the waves).

An introduction of no payment of employers contributions of National Insurance for a year, if they take on an Ex-serviceman/woman (Pro – finally beginning to look after our serviceman upon leaving the forces, Con – too little too late).

Reducing the number of MPs to 600 (Pro – the chamber is far too crowded, Con – this lends itself more to the FPTP ‘first past the post’ system).

They promise to retain FPTP (Con – Proportional Representation is a more realistic and representative system and ensures as many people’s views are heard, it would also end the monopoly of the two party system, which is why the Tories and Labour will never back it, as it’s not in their interests).

The reintroduction of Grammar Schools (Pro – increases social mobility immensely so that kids from disadvantaged backgrounds get a better education based on their skills and attainment, Con – funding for the education system is already poor so it begs the question where is the money coming from, it also leaves behind the children in state schools of mixed abilities, where they won’t mix with smarter children who boost attainment figures of state schools, meaning a drop in ofsted standards nationwide).

Cutting student loan repayments for teachers in their first year to encourage them to stay in the profession (Pro – it’s a start, however looking at the research, teachers in general can find easier jobs for more money elsewhere so aren’t incentivised to stay anyway).

Centralising all teaching jobs to a single jobs portal much like NHS jobs (Pro – it increases the effectiveness of getting current teachers into vacancies, Con – there is already a teacher shortage and I reiterate my previous point about teachers finding jobs elsewhere).

Cutting of free school lunches to most children in the first three years of primary school (Pro – they will receive free breakfast instead and low income students still receive free lunches, Con – very reminiscent of the ‘milk snatcher’ Thatcher!).

Introduction of T-levels, a technical qualification equivalent to A-levels will most likely replace BTEC, which includes three month work placement as part of the course (Pro).

Breaking down barriers to public sector jobs based on attainment E.g teaching assistants can become teachers through an apprenticeship degree, healthcare professionals can do the same to become nurses (Pro – it eliviates the shortage of teachers and nurses, Con – have you ever had to live off apprentice wages?).

Reintroduction of pledge to decrease immigration to tens of thousands (Pro – After Brexit we should have full control of immigration and should for once be achievable, Con – Cameron made this pledge and failed massively with net migration ballooning, troublesome waters for Tories).

Further cultural integration through schools (Pro – forcing schools with one predominant race, culture or religion to teach basic British values regardless, to ease social cohesion, Con – too little too late, why hasn’t this been the pre existing building block to interracial cohesion for the last 60 years, since mass immigration started?).

There is a section regarding combating Islamic extremism which doesn’t outline how to root out and defeat it (Con).

Audit of gender and racial pay gaps in the workplace (Pro/Con – can lead to disharmony in the workplace and start on down the slippery slope of quotas rather than merit based advancement, which doesn’t help anyone).

Over the next parliament extend funding to mental health by an extra £1bn (Pro/Con – throwing money at things doesn’t automatically fix them, they need to improve diagnosis and speed of people being seen and treated, too many people suffer in silence in fear of not being believed, I have seen this first hand).

Ban letting agents fees (Pro).

Increase in NHS spending by £8bn over next 5 years (Pro).

In negotiations with EU try and ensure the 140,000 NHS workers from the EU can stay post Brexit to continue their essential work (Pro).

Government building new homes on its own property as part of its plan to build 1 million homes by 2020 (Pro/Con – it’s good they’re addressing the issue but it could include building on NHS land, the sooner they can address the real root cause which is immigration, the better).

30 hours of free childcare for every 3 and 4 year old (Pro – it’s a start, Con – we’re so behind other nations in this aspect, looking forward at the ageing population and the eventual need to replenish the population, the government need to be making childcare almost free until school age, we need to reward the people adding to our society by making having children affordable, they wonder why birth rates are so low!).

By the end of the year, 19 out of 20 premises will have access to super fast broadband in conjunction with their detailed digital plan (Pro – I’m still waiting at home for this, one of the last areas on the list I’m guessing!).

Introduction of comprehensive relationship and sex education to primary and secondary school students to include cyber bullying and online grooming (Pro – a realistic and important step in protecting our children online and in the real world, Con – weirdly still a hotly contested subject, some parents still don’t feel comfortable with their primary school age children learning about sex and needing to protect their innocence, maybe a minimum age should be introduced maybe 8 or 9?).

A random one but one with great potential, the digital amalgamation of HM Land Registry, Ordnance Survey, Valuation Office Agency, Hydrographic Office and Geological Survey to provide the most comprehensive map of the UK (Pro – can be used for more efficient planning of housing and creating digital maps of our land, this also creates an innovative tool for video games developers in making real world UK games, GTA London remake anyone?! Big Pro).

Overall I rate this Manifesto a very modest 8 out of 10. Very comprehensive and set out a detailed plan for governing our country. I felt it could have been shorter than 88 pages, as on more than one occasion it felt like they were repeating the same points. I also felt that on balance their Cons were easily avoidable but like I said, you can’t please everybody!

I hope this cuts through media bias and gives you the basic outline of what the Tories wish to achieve, parallel to this I will now write up the run through for the Labour party. Thank you for reading!

 

The Next Big Movement

People who have read my articles in the past know that I don’t support our outdated voting system. Now is probably the best time to bring this up again. After the result of the American Presidential election and the anger and outrage at the electoral college and their outdated voting system, it’s time we have a look at our own. My main reason for taking interest in this issue originally was in the last General Election I voted for UKIP, perceived by most as a ‘protest vote’. The party overall made massive inroads on the overall vote, collecting 3.8 million votes. To put that into context we got nearly three times the amount of votes than the SNP who collected 1.4 million votes, yet they gained 56 seats in our parliament and we got 1 seat. From what I see in this divided country at the moment I would expect mass outrage from our ‘liberal’ friends who are busy trying to delay brexit. Yet not a whisper has been heard. They tried to champion proportional representation in a white paper motion which I fully commend the Greens for doing, I even wrote to my MP Sir Paul Beresford and asked him to get behind the motion which was a fools errand, as I was told in no uncertain terms that he whole heartedly opposed it and that was the end of that. It fell on deaf ears. I understand why, the people in power aren’t going to give away more of their power and damage their own party and interests.

Also it didn’t have the full blooded support that it really needed to get off the ground. I don’t think however that this is the best course of action or indeed the right cause to be supporting. When going for complete change you have a harder time persuading people and changing their minds. So I move onto the next stage. I had a massive brainwave (or so I thought) about 2 months ago of a brilliant new system that I devised in my head that supported both the current way of voting and a form of proportional representation, a hybrid if you will. Which would be easier to sell to the public and parliament alike, rather than cutting numbers of MPs or anything drastic of that nature. Yet to my disbelief after looking it up online, a form of my ‘vision’ already exists. Before I tell you which system it is I shall explain it and try to sell it to you.

Quite simply the numbers and areas that hold the power in parliament aren’t proportionate, so why not tip the balance of power. There are a huge amount of seats in London and Scotland which don’t reflect the views of the overall country. So by changing constituency boundaries of places like London and Scotland you could essentially free up a huge amount of seats and put them to use. By creating a regional MP as well as a constituency MP, so that say for example a party gained a huge amount of votes but came second in all of the constituencies they would still get some MPs who would be the voice for the people who didn’t vote for the constituency MP. Otherwise you get what we have now, with swathes of UKIP support but no one to give us a voice in parliament, including might I add the House of Lords (that’s for another time!). So it would give more of a balanced debate in the House and actually reflect the views of the country, there would also be no more ‘shock’ results like Brexit as people would actually be heard and their opinions transmitted onto a higher platform.

Now the downside to this is that where it’s already used, the regional MP is looked upon as a lesser MP and someone who couldn’t win a seat. So to combat that I thought of a different way to approach it, instead of being picked from a party list system the MP who wins the largest majority in a region is ‘promoted’ to regional MP and a candidate of a party who won the most amount of votes but came second would take his/her place as constituency MP, thus taking away the stigma of regional MP because the regional MP will have resounding support from the electorate. This is of course is the Additional Member System which is currently used in the Welsh Assembly and Scottish Parliament, but with a few tweaks. Imagine my excitement and then withering disappointment all in the space of about 5 minutes when I devised it and then the realisation it already existed in some form! So there goes my dream of being a pioneer or revolutionary of electoral reform. I’ll just stick to fighting it out with Liberals and shouting down Political Correctness shall I…?

There is a huge disconnect between the London Elite and the rest of the country, this is why it needs to change and why in this form of voting the number of MPs from London would be more evenly distributed. There is no doubt that this country is divided, especially when it comes to politics. This form of voting system would be easier to use in persuading the masses as it isn’t too far different from the current system and from what i’ve seen after Brexit, change angers privileged millenials and the upper classes alike. Yet if we’re actually to move forward as a country after Brexit has actually taken place then we definitely need to drag this archaic system into the 21st century and really give the power back to the people. This legal farce that is taking place isn’t ‘giving the power to the people’ it is creating a bigger divide still. Gina Miller has single-handedly disenfranchised 17 million voters. Quite frankly, the abuse she receives is duly deserved apart from the death threats as I don’t believe people should be killed or threatened for their views. She actually believes she is the ‘champion of the people’ and believes in parliamentary sovereignty, then please explain why she is taking court action against the government and their plans on Brexit. The DEMOCRATICALLY elected government who have a mandate to govern the country from the electorate. Yes the referendum was advisory, yet the government would take the advice and implement the decision. It is as clear cut as it can get. Yet this rich women who thinks she speaks for normal ordinary people is trying to bypass the system by throwing money at it. She’s also cast doubt over the judiciary in this country by dragging it through the courts, as the verdict was poorly devised by the three judges in charge. The people voted to Leave why delay it, if it’s a matter of Royal prerogative then why hasn’t anyone talked to the Queen? I understand that she has to stay impartial as a constitutional monarchy and can’t show any political leaning, yet the decision rests with her and surely if the people she rules over have spoken then it should be implemented. The question was asked and you got the answer, stop being a sore loser and get on with your life. Trying to throw the country into further turmoil should be seen as a treacherous act, the end.

This movement is where the next big burst of political pressure should come from. Maybe in the new year and before Article 50 is triggered, UKIP especially should get behind this as they have the most to gain from it. But also it should be considered by normal voters as regardless of whatever political allegiances we have, this move is in the interest of the nation. Scotland and London won’t see it in this way, but then again what they think doesn’t reflect the views of the nation as a whole and it would benefit us to go down this road. It would also help to bridge the divide in the country and hopefully give hope to the electorate that eventually everyone will get a say in how their country is run.

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The Death Of 21st Century Politics

I have spent so long away from blogging due to my laptop being unable to type properly, so firstly I apologise.

The one thing that has bothered me this whole time, has been the current political system in the UK. It’s old fashioned and doesn’t work anymore. Forgive me for stating the obvious but no one seems to have addressed it properly in my view. They wonder why the youth are “disaffected” by politics, we’re not. It’s just the current system doesn’t work and we aren’t buying it!

The last General Election was a hung parliament, we could all see it coming. Yet again the General Election looms and at least they all have acknowledged that this will be the outcome this time around. Yet it seems they have not learnt from the mistakes of the last election. The FPTP (first past the post) system doesn’t work within a current democracy, especially in our “multi-cultural” and diverse nation. We have so many different views, cultures and religions, that having 2 opposing parties that stand for literally the same thing isn’t enough anymore.

Introducing UKIP, Greens & SNP onto the scene, in the last few by-elections UKIP have come out as strong favourite to re-write the politics of this country by stealing votes from every side. It’s not hard to see why, we want change. Yes some may call it a ‘protest’ vote, yet it stands for something more potent than that. People don’t trust that things will change under a Labour or Conservative government, as they seem so happy with keeping the current system which suits them so well, yet not taking the country’s needs into account first, which is what the ruling government should always keep at the front of it’s mind. Say we were to move to a PR (proportional representation) system, not only would the % of the vote accurately distribute the seats to the most popular party, but it would also give a greater insight into how we are voting in the elections and technically who the real winner is.

I never use to believe in PR, mainly because we had a two party system and it worked. I look back on myself 5 years ago before the last election and realise how wrong I was. I can’t be blamed for this bearing in mind my knowledge of politics was nowhere near at the level it is now and I didn’t really understand how everything worked. Now I do and in keeping with the times I say the next government should change the system in which we operate. If they come out with this policy they have a chance of gaining the youth vote, as many statistics show a more liberal leaning in the 16-24 year olds and PR being quite a liberal way of looking at things, this would go down well with them. They (or I should say me) want to see change, a shake up of the government. We don’t want to see it designed for the same old people and the way things ‘were’. The old system died the moment we had a Tory – Liberal coalition. Two parties you would never see together in a million years, yet we were stuck with it for 5 years. However, it sort of worked out between them, which proves my point that the two main parties (and liberals) are all spouting the same shit and we don’t want to hear it.

The reason people are ‘sympathising’ with UKIP, Greens & SNP, is because they actually stand for something different, no matter how ‘extreme’ they see the views, people can visibly distinguish between them and gives them a clear choice of which side they are on. Bring in the ever looming discussion of self governance, which in a way I can see could work by taking the power out of the government’s hands and actually giving ourselves a direct involvement in politics. However, thinking of a way to construct this is the problem i’m facing.

The only way I can see things changing are the following ‘ideas’:

1. Taking into account we are in the 21st century and the number of computer/smart phone users is at such a largely staggering amount, why don’t we incorporate this into our system. Firstly, vote on which policies the voters actually want to see implemented, also giving us the choice to vote on things that actually matter rather than giving the mandate to a government to ‘make the decisions on your behalf’. This way we can clearly decide what should happen by manually voting (which would take seconds on a smart phone) by a set deadline in which the votes are automatically counted online and the deciding outcome would make the decision, thus stopping any arguments between people and whether their point is more important or more ‘right’. Bearing in mind this isn’t on the day to day issues of the House of Commons, just the major things (e.g NHS, education system), the things that directly effect us should be directly handled by us. It would also cut out the outdated shouting over each other in the House of Commons, which puts off so many young people as no one seems to get anything done and seem to get paid lots of money for it.

2. Secondly, taxpayers should all be given an app in which they decide where their taxes are spent. Giving a cost breakdown of where all the money (GDP) is going currently and where WE decide the cuts should come from and where the money should go. This should be done once every 6 months instead of them issuing a ‘budget’. For example, I don’t want any of my taxes going on foreign aid, so I would save £400m from that and could transfer that into something like the NHS or where it was needed more. Obviously as I don’t have access to all the information I can’t give amazing examples. Also we should be able to decide whether we need certain ministries as getting rid of them would also save money. Then taking into account of where everyone has decided the money to go we take an overall average and implement it. Slowly it will start to dawn on people that it’s their duty to vote on this as it will effect them if they don’t, thus getting people involved and actively responding to politics.

3. We should decrease the amount of time between General Elections, 5 years is too long if you get stuck with something you didn’t vote for. It should be either 3 or 4 years, also we should include a clause where if more than half of the voting population don’t want the current government if it fails half way through its time in office/ does something no one agrees with, then it should automatically trigger a snap election.

This is just the start of the ideas in which I feel we should implement to reintegrate the youth into politics and the General public for that matter. We are sick of what is going on and we want change.

Sorry for this being so long and thank you for reading!