The norys are trying to make any real dialogue on the ground difficult in order to ensure the billionaire, London based press is the only outlet for "fair discussion." Demonising loud, enthusiastic voices is designed to demonise the very word, "Yes." A problem with this is, the press and other media outlets pretend to be neutral when they quite patently are not, so they gleefully print ugly words about our street and social media discourse. Those of us who, from the outset of this campaign have been assaulted, insulted and bullied on the streets by Labour hacks and right wing thugs, know the truth of who have tried to bring this campaign down to their sewer level. Project Fear, their name for their campaign, is also Project Intimidation, Threat and Violence.
Peaceful protest against the proto-fascist Farage and the Tory Leader Cameron is being made to look as if, 1, these people have something important to say to a country that has through democratic means rejected their politics of hate and division and 2, we are stifling debate.
Peaceful, and sometimes noisy, protest has been a feature of Scottish civil politics since Dundee Jute workers became the source of the term "to heckle," many, many years ago.
That said, we must ensure people hear our positive Yes message through the negative, nasty No camp noise. Yes gives a myriad of colourful, bright, healthy, wonderful, prosperous paths. No forces us on our knees, down the path towards the torture of continued and increasing austerity and poverty and robbery by the corporations and billionaires.
Any protest, if needed at all on the lead up to the historic day, against those who wish to impoverish our people with neo-liberal thievery and lies, must be turned into a joyous occasion with our alternatives to their austerity displayed imaginatively, positively, colourfully and in a way that ignores them, because they really have nothing to say to the majority of people in Scotland.
Let them lie to the media. Scottish people arny daft. Our truths should be displayed with pride.
Showing posts with label david cameron. Show all posts
Showing posts with label david cameron. Show all posts
Wednesday, 3 September 2014
Wednesday, 23 January 2013
Jo welcomes five more years of Tories at Westminster...
Why the EU referendum means Five more years for the Tories... by Neil Scott, SSP Campsie member.
Cameron has just created his NEXT coalition partners for 2015, UKIP.
He has just shafted the Libdems bigtime. Kicking a referendum into the medium grass (after 2015) means the Tories will get 5 more years and UKIP, winning some seats, will go into coalition creating the most right wing Government the UK has ever known.
The unquestioning faithfulness of the Liberal Democrats to the Tory programme, and the realisation that they, in the words of Martin Luther King, prefer a "negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice," has destroyed Clegg and Swinson's party. An increasingly hammered, impoverished working class will see the yellow albatross's off. A middle class who this week will see their wages reduced on average by £30 a month after capitulation by the LD's on pensions are leaving them in droves.
Cameron does not want to leave the EU, nor does he really care about re-negotiation. He does care about power in order to impose a dystopian future on the "UK", and this announcement of a referendum will more or less ensure a weaker opposition and a stronger right-wing coalition.
I don't feel sorry for quisling Libdems, but I did warn Jo Swinson she was a patsy (this article has my twitter conversation with her after the Coalition agreement was signed - HERE).
The patsies have just overseen the death of their party & the re-election of the greedy, lying, vicious Tories.
Long may the Libdems be in the wilderness for damning England to Tories part two.
Martin Luther King's words from the same letter written from a Birmingham, Alabama jail, "Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection." The working class of Scotland understand these words.
I am so glad we can vote to never have a Tory Government come 2014, and kick Jo Swinson and her Liberal Democrats right out of a job near to power.
Cameron has just created his NEXT coalition partners for 2015, UKIP.
He has just shafted the Libdems bigtime. Kicking a referendum into the medium grass (after 2015) means the Tories will get 5 more years and UKIP, winning some seats, will go into coalition creating the most right wing Government the UK has ever known.
The unquestioning faithfulness of the Liberal Democrats to the Tory programme, and the realisation that they, in the words of Martin Luther King, prefer a "negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice," has destroyed Clegg and Swinson's party. An increasingly hammered, impoverished working class will see the yellow albatross's off. A middle class who this week will see their wages reduced on average by £30 a month after capitulation by the LD's on pensions are leaving them in droves.
Cameron does not want to leave the EU, nor does he really care about re-negotiation. He does care about power in order to impose a dystopian future on the "UK", and this announcement of a referendum will more or less ensure a weaker opposition and a stronger right-wing coalition.
I don't feel sorry for quisling Libdems, but I did warn Jo Swinson she was a patsy (this article has my twitter conversation with her after the Coalition agreement was signed - HERE).
The patsies have just overseen the death of their party & the re-election of the greedy, lying, vicious Tories.
Long may the Libdems be in the wilderness for damning England to Tories part two.
Martin Luther King's words from the same letter written from a Birmingham, Alabama jail, "Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection." The working class of Scotland understand these words.
I am so glad we can vote to never have a Tory Government come 2014, and kick Jo Swinson and her Liberal Democrats right out of a job near to power.
Monday, 2 April 2012
State monitoring of YOUR emails...
Jo Swinson was on TV last night defending the Governments want to monitor your emails, Facebook, Twitter, web history etc. This is a complete flip from her stance back in 2009 when she hadn't tasted power.
Please email Jo Swinson and David Cameron and let them know you feel this is an infringement of your civil liberties.
David Cameron's private email - privateoffice@no10.x.gsi.gov.uk
Contact Jo Swinson - http://www.writetothem.com/
Please email Jo Swinson and David Cameron and let them know you feel this is an infringement of your civil liberties.
David Cameron's private email - privateoffice@no10.x.gsi.gov.uk
Contact Jo Swinson - http://www.writetothem.com/
Thursday, 23 February 2012
TORIES OUT OF SCOTLAND!
No to another lost generation!
By Richie Venton, SSP national workplace organiser
The Tories are returning to the scene of their many crimes against the working class! Westminster's Butcher-in-Chief, David Cameron, hopes to breeze into Troon on Saturday 24th March to address the Scottish Tory party conference.
Ayrshire has the highest unemployment in jobs-starved Scotland, which makes this Eton boot-boy's visit all the more provocative. Cameron's slaughter of the public sector will add thousands to the queues of misery in this area. And for every civil servant, council worker, NHS worker or teacher who loses their job, at least another private sector worker will be made jobless through the knock-on effect.
Demo against youth unemployment
Ayrshire has already been turned into a desert after numerous multinationals were bribed by grants and government subsidies, only to then 'up sticks' and move to richer pastures and cheaper labour abroad.
Now a whole new generation is being condemned to oblivion by a capitalist system and capitalist government whose only interest is profit, not people.
Scotland is virtually a Tory free zone, and the SSP in Ayrshire and beyond aim to help keep it that way. We are spearheading the buildup of a mass protest against this invasion by an unwanted representative of brutal, red-in-tooth-and-claw capitalism, around the message "Tories out of Scotland - fight the crime of youth unemployment - no to another lost generation".
The STUC has called a demo in Troon against austerity-induced youth unemployment. The SSP is wholeheartedly building this, calling on workers and young people in Ayrshire and Scotland to keep Cameron out, and to demand that everyone over 16 should have the genuine choice of either a decent, well-paid job; proper training with a job at the end; or a living grant to fund further or higher education.
Plague of mass unemployment
Mass unemployment is stalking the country like a plague. Nobody is spared, apart from the capitalist elite who are perpetrating this crime against working class communities.
Over 230,000 Scottish people are officially unemployed, though the true figure is far higher. Of these, an obscene 103,000 are under 24 years old, a terrible indictment of a society with no future.
For everyone directly hit by it, unemployment is a human tragedy. It means eking out an existence on £65 a week, as inflation lets rip, usually spending it all on essentials the first week, begging or borrowing for the second week. If anything worse still, it means a sense of hopelessness and living without purpose, something nobody should be subjected to, whether that be older workers who have contributed to society's productive wealth for decades, or young people stepping out on life's journey.
Free labour in the 'free' marketThe victims of mass unemployment are being used as slave labour by the same government and same capitalist employers whose system creates the jobs wasteland in the first place. Under the coyly-named Mandatory Work Activity, the government's Department for Work & Pension is forcing unemployed people into jobs with multinationals, retail sector giants, and even some 'charitable' employers - but unpaid, apart from their benefits and expenses!
These unemployed people face the choice: work for nothing, or lose your benefits!
The government has so far refused to reveal details for Scotland, but down South the companies exposed for this 21st century slavery include Tesco, Asda, Sainsbury's, TK Maxx, Waterstone's, Matalan, Pizza Hut, Poundland, Shelter and Oxfam. The public outrage has forced most of these outfits to withdraw or 'review' their involvement, but there is still a big job to be done, in tandem with unions in retail like USDAW, to oppose this ruthless exploitation, which is also a huge threat to the jobs of the low paid workers these unemployed conscripts could potentially replace.
No excuse for jobs slaughter
And the criminal reality is that there is no excuse for mass unemployment. Plenty of jobs need doing. Kids need smaller classes for a better education, which demands more teachers. Elderly people need expanded care services, which requires trained staff. The burgeoning housing lists cry out for a massive house building programme, to the highest environmental standards, offering the opportunity for thousand of apprenticeships and secure jobs in the construction industry. The SSP's demand for free public transport, to combat poverty, pollution and social isolation, would require thousands of extra jobs as drivers on trains, buses and subways, as well as job expansion in the manufacture of buses, trains, railway networks, ferries. A serious investment programme in publicly owned energy would be another source of sustainable, green jobs that could benefit people and planet alike. And those are just a few illustrations of the much needed, socially useful jobs that could and should be created.
Long hours - and no hours!
In tandem with the jobs that need to be done, there are plenty of potential sources of funding and ways of creating these jobs, if the political will was there, and if we challenged the very foundations of the rotten system of capitalist contradictions.
Whilst 230,000 Scots are officially unemployed, working no hours, 260,000 workers in Scotland are enduring the toil and stress of working over 48 hours a week. And a breathtaking 54,000 Scottish workers are putting in more than 60 hours a week!
Why do workers do such backbreaking hours, with the horrendous consequences to their health, stress levels, family life, health and safety risks at work - and even the damage to the economy that tired and dispirited workers create?
Appallingly low wage levels, clashing with rising prices, are the prime cause of the 'long hours culture'. Added to that is sheer terror at losing your job, having to 'show face' and put in extra hours when it is demanded to suit the business needs of bosses who use the threat of mass unemployment, and the existence of a mass 'reserve army of labour', as a battering ram.
If wages were raised to a decent level, including the national minimum wage being hiked to £9 an hour to match two-thirds of male average earnings, the pressure to work outrageously long hours would be largely eliminated.
Cut hours of work - not jobs or pay!
The fight for a shorter working week is a central demand that the trade unions should champion far more forcefully, in an aggressive a campaign against unemployment, in favour of jobs for all.
But in doing so, why should workers pay for the crisis created by the capitalists, bankers and billionaires? Why should workers suffer even a penny cut in pay with the introduction of a maximum 35 hour working week, as a first step towards the goal of a 4-day week? The unions and their allies should fight around slogans like "cut hours - not jobs or pay", "for a 35 hour week with no loss of pay".
Given the growing trend towards long hours of toil alongside mass unemployment, well over two million full-time jobs could be created by this one measure; around 200,000 in Scotland - enough to eliminate current unemployment.
Jobs, not profit
But of course this flies at the heart of the capitalist system: profit! Demanding shorter hours with no loss of earnings, as a way to share out the work and enhance everyone's life, challenges the whole idea of production for profit for the few, which is why the capitalist exploiters will have to be defeated and replaced with a system of democratic public ownership and control of the major economic sectors.
Unpaid overtime: start being paid on 24 February!
There is also a more naked form of exploitation, mostly caused by bosses using the weapon of mass unemployment as a threat to employed workers - but which adds to that very unemployment: unpaid overtime.
How do you fancy working your full hours, from 1st January to 24th February this year, before you get a penny in pay?! This is no fantasy nightmare; it is the reality, the average, concrete consequence of the two billion hours of unpaid overtime worked last year.
Over one in five workers across the nation felt bullied and terrified into giving this free labour to their employer, 'donating' £29.2billion worth of free work in 2011. That is an average of £5,300 each lost in wages.
And the two billion hours worked were the equivalent of a million full-time jobs across the UK, about 100,000 in Scotland, which in one fell swoop would mop up all the unemployed young people languishing on Scotland's unemployed registers.
Tax the rich to create jobs
The SSP unashamedly campaigns to tax the rich, as another central means of creating well-paid jobs for all, as well as funding decent public services. To take one simple example: the richest 1,000 fat cats last year enjoyed a combined income of £350billion. A modest 10 per cent wealth tax on their ill-gotten gains would rake in £35bn, enough to fund 1.4 million new jobs with an annual wage of £25,000. Scotland's share of that would be about 140,000 new jobs, with decent pay, and increased spending power that would create even more jobs and boost local communities.
Fight for decent jobs for all
Nobody should believe the dirty lie that there is no alternative to mass unemployment. It is not a divine creation, but the product of a profit-crazed, grotesquely contradictory system known as capitalism - and the result of conscious political decisions by politicians who support and uphold the system of capitalist profiteering.
Join the protest against cuts and youth unemployment in Troon on Saturday 24th March. Keep the Tories out of Scotland. And join the SSP in a campaign for socialist measures that would create millions of secure jobs, give young people a future, and improve the lifestyles and well-being of all workers.
Monday, 2 August 2010
Review - The Truth About Empire
The Imperial Controversy: Challenging the Empire Apologists
By Andrew Murray, Manifesto Press
Foreword by George Galloway
152 pages, paperback £12.95
In the past decade or so, politicians, journalists and academics of various stripes have attempted to rehabilitate the notions of empire and imperialism. For example, in 2009 the then British PM Gordon Brown told the Daily Mail newspaper: “The days of Britain having to apologise for its colonial history are over. We should move forward. We should celebrate much of our past rather than apologise for it”. Likewise academic historians such as Niall Ferguson and Andrew Roberts have attempted to rewrite the history of the British Empire as something essentially beyond criticism. Ferguson has said, “I am fundamentally in favour of empire. Indeed, I believe that empire is more necessary in the 21st century than ever before”, while according to Roberts, “Imperialism is an idea whose time has come again”. Of course, these defences of historical imperialism serve merely as a prelude to a defence of the contemporary neo-colonialist projects promoted by the likes of former US president George. W. Bush and former British PM Tony Blair.
In this tightly argued book Andrew Murray, who is chair of the British Stop the War Coalition, takes on both historical imperialism and its contemporary neo-colonialist variant. Murray demonstrates that the British Empire, far from being the benign paternalistic force portrayed by the apologists, in fact delivered war, racism, famine, state terror and the suppression of self-determination and democracy on a scale comparable to that wreaked by Hitler’s Third Reich. For example, Murray points out that in the 18th century, there were 119 recorded wars involving the British Empire, and 72 such wars during Queen Victoria’s reign in the 19th. In the 20th century, major colonial conflicts occurred in South Africa, Kenya, Palestine, Malaya, Iraq, Egypt, Yemen and Ireland, and Murray also lists Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Iran, India, Korea, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Guatemala/Belize, as sites of British military involvement, not to mention the invasion of Bolshevik-led Russia after World War I and more recent interventions in Greece, Cyprus and the attack on Yugoslavia. Far from being a “Pax Britannica”, the British Empire waged endless war “both against rivals anxious to share the spoils, and, more persistently the peoples of the subject territories themselves”.
In addition to detailing the vast human cost of colonial war, Murray highlights the racism at the core of the imperial project and demonstrates what it meant in terms of lives lost due to man-made famine. For example, the mass starvation suffered by the indigenous Irish population in 1845-7 was not, as is commonly thought, the result of crop failure caused by potato blight. Murray points out that this crop failure was general across Europe, and that only in colonial Ireland did it lead to widespread starvation. Murray quotes the historian T.A. Jackson who asserted that “the amount of corn, cattle etc exported from Ireland in these years would have fed all those who hungered twice over”, and he identifies the “absolute priority given by the government in London to maintaining the social position of the landlord class in Ireland” as the reason for the mass starvation. As Murray notes, a concomitant of this was a racist attitude towards the Irish peasant, regarded as a subhuman to be condemned on the basis of class and religion as well as race. This was not an aberration in the history of the British Empire: “anything from 12 to 29 million people died from starvation across India in the famines largely caused by the structures of economic development imposed by the Raj and greatly exacerbated by laissez-faire dogma and official indifference”.
In addition to highlighting the Empire’s frequent resort to state violence and terror – often in the service of quashing local movements for elementary democracy and national self-determination – Murray also marshals overwhelming evidence “that imperialism, far from promoting economic advance, actually undeveloped the colonies”. In colony after colony, as a matter of deliberate policy “indigenous routes to industrialisation were blocked off, monocultural crop economies were imposed on the widest scale possible, forced labour utilised to maximise profit to capitalist investors and the entire course of development subordinated to the needs of the imperial power”.
Nor were endless war, famine, racism, state violence and the suppression of democracy features specifically of British imperialism: Murray summarises the “achievements” of Belgian, German, French, Dutch and Italian imperialism to show that they were comparable to those of the British.
Some interesting political facts emerge. For example, the famous Liberal Party leader William Gladstone is described by the Marxist writer R. Palme Dutt as supporting imperialism “under a rose-tinted eiderdown of pacific sentiments” – but “No sooner had he taken office than he continued and carried to new heights Tory imperialist foreign policy”. Gladstone’s duplicity is now taken a further step by his descendant as leader of the British Liberal-Democrats, Nick Clegg, who “opposed” the 2003 invasion of Iraq, but now serves as Deputy PM in a Conservative-led coalition fully committed to the ongoing neo-colonial occupation of Afghanistan. Moreover, although the Labour Party has contained over time many committed anti-imperialists, the pro-imperialist sentiments of Blair and Brown were apparently shared by the first Labour PM, Ramsey MacDonald, who advocated “socialist imperialism” based on “pride of race”.
Murray reserves his most scathing arguments for erstwhile “left-wing” journalists such as Christopher Hitchens and Nick Cohen (who described the British army in Iraq as “the armed wing of Amnesty International”). Murray very effectively takes to pieces their arguments in favour of the invasion of Iraq, and shows that the “peace, prosperity and democracy” promised for the Iraqis is as illusory as that cited by 19th century apologists for imperial involvement in India or Ireland.
Overall, Murray’s book provides an important and timely reminder that imperialism, whether in its historical or contemporary form, is in Galloway’s apt phrase “murder in the guise of a civilising mission”. In writing it, Murray has done a great service to the progressive and anti-war movement.
[Available from www.manifestopress.org.uk]
By Andrew Murray, Manifesto Press
Foreword by George Galloway
152 pages, paperback £12.95
REVIEW BY ALEX MILLER
In the past decade or so, politicians, journalists and academics of various stripes have attempted to rehabilitate the notions of empire and imperialism. For example, in 2009 the then British PM Gordon Brown told the Daily Mail newspaper: “The days of Britain having to apologise for its colonial history are over. We should move forward. We should celebrate much of our past rather than apologise for it”. Likewise academic historians such as Niall Ferguson and Andrew Roberts have attempted to rewrite the history of the British Empire as something essentially beyond criticism. Ferguson has said, “I am fundamentally in favour of empire. Indeed, I believe that empire is more necessary in the 21st century than ever before”, while according to Roberts, “Imperialism is an idea whose time has come again”. Of course, these defences of historical imperialism serve merely as a prelude to a defence of the contemporary neo-colonialist projects promoted by the likes of former US president George. W. Bush and former British PM Tony Blair.
In this tightly argued book Andrew Murray, who is chair of the British Stop the War Coalition, takes on both historical imperialism and its contemporary neo-colonialist variant. Murray demonstrates that the British Empire, far from being the benign paternalistic force portrayed by the apologists, in fact delivered war, racism, famine, state terror and the suppression of self-determination and democracy on a scale comparable to that wreaked by Hitler’s Third Reich. For example, Murray points out that in the 18th century, there were 119 recorded wars involving the British Empire, and 72 such wars during Queen Victoria’s reign in the 19th. In the 20th century, major colonial conflicts occurred in South Africa, Kenya, Palestine, Malaya, Iraq, Egypt, Yemen and Ireland, and Murray also lists Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Iran, India, Korea, Vietnam, Indonesia, and Guatemala/Belize, as sites of British military involvement, not to mention the invasion of Bolshevik-led Russia after World War I and more recent interventions in Greece, Cyprus and the attack on Yugoslavia. Far from being a “Pax Britannica”, the British Empire waged endless war “both against rivals anxious to share the spoils, and, more persistently the peoples of the subject territories themselves”.
In addition to detailing the vast human cost of colonial war, Murray highlights the racism at the core of the imperial project and demonstrates what it meant in terms of lives lost due to man-made famine. For example, the mass starvation suffered by the indigenous Irish population in 1845-7 was not, as is commonly thought, the result of crop failure caused by potato blight. Murray points out that this crop failure was general across Europe, and that only in colonial Ireland did it lead to widespread starvation. Murray quotes the historian T.A. Jackson who asserted that “the amount of corn, cattle etc exported from Ireland in these years would have fed all those who hungered twice over”, and he identifies the “absolute priority given by the government in London to maintaining the social position of the landlord class in Ireland” as the reason for the mass starvation. As Murray notes, a concomitant of this was a racist attitude towards the Irish peasant, regarded as a subhuman to be condemned on the basis of class and religion as well as race. This was not an aberration in the history of the British Empire: “anything from 12 to 29 million people died from starvation across India in the famines largely caused by the structures of economic development imposed by the Raj and greatly exacerbated by laissez-faire dogma and official indifference”.
In addition to highlighting the Empire’s frequent resort to state violence and terror – often in the service of quashing local movements for elementary democracy and national self-determination – Murray also marshals overwhelming evidence “that imperialism, far from promoting economic advance, actually undeveloped the colonies”. In colony after colony, as a matter of deliberate policy “indigenous routes to industrialisation were blocked off, monocultural crop economies were imposed on the widest scale possible, forced labour utilised to maximise profit to capitalist investors and the entire course of development subordinated to the needs of the imperial power”.
Nor were endless war, famine, racism, state violence and the suppression of democracy features specifically of British imperialism: Murray summarises the “achievements” of Belgian, German, French, Dutch and Italian imperialism to show that they were comparable to those of the British.
Some interesting political facts emerge. For example, the famous Liberal Party leader William Gladstone is described by the Marxist writer R. Palme Dutt as supporting imperialism “under a rose-tinted eiderdown of pacific sentiments” – but “No sooner had he taken office than he continued and carried to new heights Tory imperialist foreign policy”. Gladstone’s duplicity is now taken a further step by his descendant as leader of the British Liberal-Democrats, Nick Clegg, who “opposed” the 2003 invasion of Iraq, but now serves as Deputy PM in a Conservative-led coalition fully committed to the ongoing neo-colonial occupation of Afghanistan. Moreover, although the Labour Party has contained over time many committed anti-imperialists, the pro-imperialist sentiments of Blair and Brown were apparently shared by the first Labour PM, Ramsey MacDonald, who advocated “socialist imperialism” based on “pride of race”.
Murray reserves his most scathing arguments for erstwhile “left-wing” journalists such as Christopher Hitchens and Nick Cohen (who described the British army in Iraq as “the armed wing of Amnesty International”). Murray very effectively takes to pieces their arguments in favour of the invasion of Iraq, and shows that the “peace, prosperity and democracy” promised for the Iraqis is as illusory as that cited by 19th century apologists for imperial involvement in India or Ireland.
Overall, Murray’s book provides an important and timely reminder that imperialism, whether in its historical or contemporary form, is in Galloway’s apt phrase “murder in the guise of a civilising mission”. In writing it, Murray has done a great service to the progressive and anti-war movement.
[Available from www.manifestopress.org.uk]
Saturday, 26 June 2010
Sunday, 16 May 2010
Left Banker on the Austerity measures of ConDemNation
Friday, 14 May 2010
Gleichschaltung - an update
Update on THIS ARTICLE - please read -
The Scottish Situation
I am concerned that the Con/Dem coalition are using the Scottish experience - ie. the 66% requirement of members supporting dissolution - out of context.
One Tory commentator on BBC News 24 this morning has stated that this 66% was brought in by the "Labour Party" last year. This, first of all, does not ring true, as any documentation I have managed to find seems to go back at least until 2001 and if it was only introduced last year, it would have been the SNP Government who would have done so.
This use of the Scottish requirement for 66% seems to be the only defence the ConDem coalition are using that will ensure continuance of a Tory minority Government if the Liberals walk away from any agreement. I feel any misinformation should be countered - and I feel it is imperative that MSP's explain the thinking behind 66% in Scotland. (It has to be remembered the Scottish Government elections are STV and have a term of only four years - so the ground is quite different from the 5 year term first past the post system in Westminster).
This is at the very least, an attack on the integrity of our Devolved Parliament.
If the 66% was debated and discussed cross party - and it was cross party agreement that had it implimented, then it differs greatly from this proposal of 55% by the Tories and Lib Dems in Westminster.
In effect this 55% will mean that regardless of the coalition, and regardless of a plethora of no-confidence motions the Tories will remain in power for five years and ensure the Scottish budget is decided by a tiny minority only representative of 15 % of the Scottish voting public.
I have not yet been able to find the debates/discussions that led to this figure of 66%.
I will update as I find more information on the Scottish situation.
The Scottish Situation
I am concerned that the Con/Dem coalition are using the Scottish experience - ie. the 66% requirement of members supporting dissolution - out of context.
One Tory commentator on BBC News 24 this morning has stated that this 66% was brought in by the "Labour Party" last year. This, first of all, does not ring true, as any documentation I have managed to find seems to go back at least until 2001 and if it was only introduced last year, it would have been the SNP Government who would have done so.
This use of the Scottish requirement for 66% seems to be the only defence the ConDem coalition are using that will ensure continuance of a Tory minority Government if the Liberals walk away from any agreement. I feel any misinformation should be countered - and I feel it is imperative that MSP's explain the thinking behind 66% in Scotland. (It has to be remembered the Scottish Government elections are STV and have a term of only four years - so the ground is quite different from the 5 year term first past the post system in Westminster).
This is at the very least, an attack on the integrity of our Devolved Parliament.
If the 66% was debated and discussed cross party - and it was cross party agreement that had it implimented, then it differs greatly from this proposal of 55% by the Tories and Lib Dems in Westminster.
In effect this 55% will mean that regardless of the coalition, and regardless of a plethora of no-confidence motions the Tories will remain in power for five years and ensure the Scottish budget is decided by a tiny minority only representative of 15 % of the Scottish voting public.
I have not yet been able to find the debates/discussions that led to this figure of 66%.
I will update as I find more information on the Scottish situation.
Thursday, 13 May 2010
Gleichschaltung
Dave and Nick came skipping down the garden path hand in hand, heralding the dawn of a “New Politics.” The fawning press -both the BBC and Sky- spoke about the beautiful weather and the birdsong as the two men kind of half mapped out what form this new government would take.
Everyone seemed to agree – this was a wonderful thing for the country and we would all benefit from the steely hand of the Tories being stayed by the “lefty” liberals.
After the coalition was voted on by the Parliamentary Lib Dems in the early hours of Tuesday morning, Jo Swinson broke her tweeting silence and said -
• astonished that Tories agreed to fairer tax, extra early years funding for poorer children & political reform while Labour didn't … and looking forward to seeing so much of what @libdems campaigned for in this election implemented in govt
SSP Campsie (@sspcampsie) immediately tweeted to her - @joswinson astonished you lot let the tories in. Incredible. You've been had at our expense.
Her reply: 1. Lab bottled out of agreement 2. good LD policies on fairness included plus much more fairness agenda than minority Tory govt
Campsie SSP: we'll see. You've played your part, Jo,a patsy again.U got two terms.But that's it.Haven't met 1 happy Bearsden neighbour tonite
Her reply: we will see - do look at the coalition agreement when published tomorrow and compare to LD manifesto though
Campsie SSP have looked at this agreement, and all is not what it seems. This article is only SOME of the reservations we have about the agreement - there are many more, not least how our young people will be treated after they leave school, but we have to start somewhere -
Let’s start with the fairer tax, for example.
The original Lib Dem policy was for a “Tax Switch” – which meant this £10k allowance would be paid for by the ultra rich in a progressive policy which would have taken £17bn. The Lib Dems have dropped other progressive measures they had in their manifesto that would have paid for this gift to the middle class – like their mansion tax and the higher rate of pension relief – and instead this gift to the middle-high earners will be paid for through the cuts the cabinet now know of, but are not telling us about.
The claims – and unquestioning repetition by the BBC etc that this is tax relief for the poor is completely untrue. Three million poor households will not get an extra penny as they are too poor to pay income tax. That includes pensioners (the ConDem coalition are selling this as £100 to pensioners when it is £100 to the richest 40% of pensioners and nothing to the other 60%)
This £17 billion tax giveaway means that £1bn goes to the lower incomes that pay income tax- the majority – while £16bn goes to the higher income bracket. 70% of the benefit goes to the top earners in our society!
So the LibDem promises and nods to an equitable society are actually undermined by this Tory wet dream. Those near the top of the income spectrum would get on average four times as much as the poorest. (see http://short.to/2fr1j for more detailed breakdown of this regressive tax give-away, plus graph and links to stats etc).
Briefly – other measures that are ominous…
The agreement states;
“a significantly accelerated reduction in the structural deficit over the course of a Parliament, with the main burden of deficit reduction borne by reduced spending rather than increased taxes.”
This has terrible implications for Scotland. Scotland is a nation that was robbed of its manufacturing base during the Thatcher/Major years. It has not recovered that during the New Labour Parliaments – and is hugely dependent on the public sector for work. Already, Scotland is suffering more job losses than England because of this. This agreement will step up those job losses (which will have to be explained by the Lib Dem Scottish Secretary Danny Alexander – the Tories hadn’t the brass neck to take the post of explaining their Scottish economy wrecking policies – the patsies had to do that one).
Another interesting point about the proposed £6bn cuts this year – a sentence in the agreement says,
“Some proportion of these savings can be used to support jobs, for example through the cancelling of some backdated demands for business rates.”
What that means is that those companies who did not pay their business rates – some in the hope that there would be a Tory Government, will now no longer have to pay that. I bet a lot of those people who with-held their Poll-tax payment and who were pursued for the decades since, would love such a tax amnesty. This is barefaced tax avoidance – and it has been ok-ed by the ConDem government. A taste of tax avoidance measures for the rich to come?
It is also noteworthy that Vince Cable -a luke-warm supporter of the Tory-LibDem deal and tough on 'the City' - entered the Govt to find there had been a "misunderstanding" about his position in Cabinet. He had understood he was to be in charge of regulation of the banking and financial services sector but finds that George Gideon Osborne (who has a 2:1 Degree in history – has been able to hide what A levels/ other qualifications allow him to be in charge of our economy beyond the fact he is Son-in Law of Lord David Howell, Baron Howell of Guildford – and the fact he is heir to a billion pound fortune) will be doing all that stuff while Cable takes care of other "business."
Ominously, the Tories have been consolidating their power. They have castrated any kind of dissent in Government by roping the Liberal Democrats into an agreement that means they have to abstain rather than vote against any Tory madness. The incredible thing about this is that in the agreement, not only do they curtail dissent by ensuring the Libs don’t vote against them, but this sentence –
“legislation will be brought forward to make provision for fixed-term parliaments of five years. This legislation will also provide for dissolution if 55% or more of the House votes in favour.”
So what, you may ask? Well, at present, the Govt can be curtailed – recalled – brought down by a simple majority of 51%.
A breakdown of this has been done by http://northernheckler.wordpress.com
“That means that this parliament (not a future one – THIS one) will be able to be brought down by a vote of no confidence – but only if 55% of the MPs vote to do that. Note that this is not 55% of those who vote, but 55% of all MPs. And not just a simple majority of 51% – but 55% – OK not much difference I hear you say, and it introduces a little more stability by discouraging interminable series of confidence votes designed to sabotage the Government of the day.
But how much is 55% – Well it’s 357.5 seats – so as it needs to be more than 55% it would need to be 358 – no half seats. So that would need (typically) : All 258 Labour votes; all 57 Lib Dem Votes; & all 28 of the “other” votes – totalling 343 – so it would also need a further 15 Conservative votes. Actually not quite true – it would also need a further 5 votes – because Sinn Fein would be likely not to vote at all – not to mention anyone who was ill or otherwise engaged on the day of the vote.
So the Conservative Party, with help from the Liberal Democrat party are planning to enact binding legislation - enacted with a simple majority of those MP’s who turn up to vote – which would ensure that the Conservative Party remained in office for the next 5 years in all circumstances save that when at least 20 of their own number decided to vote against. So actually they could sell the Lib Dems down the river without a second thought – they wouldn’t be able to do a thing about it.
The Conservatives lets remember hold just 306 of the 650 seats – a mere 47% – which they gained with 36.1% of the popular vote, on a turn out of 65.1% – this represents just 23.5% of the total electorate.
This is the kind of immunity from accountability that is the hallmark of dictators and despots. It is a manoeuvre of which Adolf Hitler would have been proud – effectively preventing opposition to the ruling party.”
This is the reality of the New Politics and political reform. The much vaunted PR? It is kicked into the long grass. The system that the Tories are allowing a referendum on – AV – is not much better than we have – and not close to the STV system that has given Scotland stable and representative Government since the formation of the Scottish Parliament. Whether AV is accepted or not by the UK public, it means that any real electoral reform will not happen for at least a generation.
As I said, Jo, you, again, have been used as a patsy.
The word Germans have for the consolidation of the Nazi Party is gleichschaltung.
Everyone seemed to agree – this was a wonderful thing for the country and we would all benefit from the steely hand of the Tories being stayed by the “lefty” liberals.
After the coalition was voted on by the Parliamentary Lib Dems in the early hours of Tuesday morning, Jo Swinson broke her tweeting silence and said -
• astonished that Tories agreed to fairer tax, extra early years funding for poorer children & political reform while Labour didn't … and looking forward to seeing so much of what @libdems campaigned for in this election implemented in govt
SSP Campsie (@sspcampsie) immediately tweeted to her - @joswinson astonished you lot let the tories in. Incredible. You've been had at our expense.
Her reply: 1. Lab bottled out of agreement 2. good LD policies on fairness included plus much more fairness agenda than minority Tory govt
Campsie SSP: we'll see. You've played your part, Jo,a patsy again.U got two terms.But that's it.Haven't met 1 happy Bearsden neighbour tonite
Her reply: we will see - do look at the coalition agreement when published tomorrow and compare to LD manifesto though
Campsie SSP have looked at this agreement, and all is not what it seems. This article is only SOME of the reservations we have about the agreement - there are many more, not least how our young people will be treated after they leave school, but we have to start somewhere -
Let’s start with the fairer tax, for example.
The original Lib Dem policy was for a “Tax Switch” – which meant this £10k allowance would be paid for by the ultra rich in a progressive policy which would have taken £17bn. The Lib Dems have dropped other progressive measures they had in their manifesto that would have paid for this gift to the middle class – like their mansion tax and the higher rate of pension relief – and instead this gift to the middle-high earners will be paid for through the cuts the cabinet now know of, but are not telling us about.
The claims – and unquestioning repetition by the BBC etc that this is tax relief for the poor is completely untrue. Three million poor households will not get an extra penny as they are too poor to pay income tax. That includes pensioners (the ConDem coalition are selling this as £100 to pensioners when it is £100 to the richest 40% of pensioners and nothing to the other 60%)
This £17 billion tax giveaway means that £1bn goes to the lower incomes that pay income tax- the majority – while £16bn goes to the higher income bracket. 70% of the benefit goes to the top earners in our society!
So the LibDem promises and nods to an equitable society are actually undermined by this Tory wet dream. Those near the top of the income spectrum would get on average four times as much as the poorest. (see http://short.to/2fr1j for more detailed breakdown of this regressive tax give-away, plus graph and links to stats etc).
Briefly – other measures that are ominous…
The agreement states;
“a significantly accelerated reduction in the structural deficit over the course of a Parliament, with the main burden of deficit reduction borne by reduced spending rather than increased taxes.”
This has terrible implications for Scotland. Scotland is a nation that was robbed of its manufacturing base during the Thatcher/Major years. It has not recovered that during the New Labour Parliaments – and is hugely dependent on the public sector for work. Already, Scotland is suffering more job losses than England because of this. This agreement will step up those job losses (which will have to be explained by the Lib Dem Scottish Secretary Danny Alexander – the Tories hadn’t the brass neck to take the post of explaining their Scottish economy wrecking policies – the patsies had to do that one).
Another interesting point about the proposed £6bn cuts this year – a sentence in the agreement says,
“Some proportion of these savings can be used to support jobs, for example through the cancelling of some backdated demands for business rates.”
What that means is that those companies who did not pay their business rates – some in the hope that there would be a Tory Government, will now no longer have to pay that. I bet a lot of those people who with-held their Poll-tax payment and who were pursued for the decades since, would love such a tax amnesty. This is barefaced tax avoidance – and it has been ok-ed by the ConDem government. A taste of tax avoidance measures for the rich to come?
It is also noteworthy that Vince Cable -a luke-warm supporter of the Tory-LibDem deal and tough on 'the City' - entered the Govt to find there had been a "misunderstanding" about his position in Cabinet. He had understood he was to be in charge of regulation of the banking and financial services sector but finds that George Gideon Osborne (who has a 2:1 Degree in history – has been able to hide what A levels/ other qualifications allow him to be in charge of our economy beyond the fact he is Son-in Law of Lord David Howell, Baron Howell of Guildford – and the fact he is heir to a billion pound fortune) will be doing all that stuff while Cable takes care of other "business."
Ominously, the Tories have been consolidating their power. They have castrated any kind of dissent in Government by roping the Liberal Democrats into an agreement that means they have to abstain rather than vote against any Tory madness. The incredible thing about this is that in the agreement, not only do they curtail dissent by ensuring the Libs don’t vote against them, but this sentence –
“legislation will be brought forward to make provision for fixed-term parliaments of five years. This legislation will also provide for dissolution if 55% or more of the House votes in favour.”
So what, you may ask? Well, at present, the Govt can be curtailed – recalled – brought down by a simple majority of 51%.
A breakdown of this has been done by http://northernheckler.wordpress.com
“That means that this parliament (not a future one – THIS one) will be able to be brought down by a vote of no confidence – but only if 55% of the MPs vote to do that. Note that this is not 55% of those who vote, but 55% of all MPs. And not just a simple majority of 51% – but 55% – OK not much difference I hear you say, and it introduces a little more stability by discouraging interminable series of confidence votes designed to sabotage the Government of the day.
But how much is 55% – Well it’s 357.5 seats – so as it needs to be more than 55% it would need to be 358 – no half seats. So that would need (typically) : All 258 Labour votes; all 57 Lib Dem Votes; & all 28 of the “other” votes – totalling 343 – so it would also need a further 15 Conservative votes. Actually not quite true – it would also need a further 5 votes – because Sinn Fein would be likely not to vote at all – not to mention anyone who was ill or otherwise engaged on the day of the vote.
So the Conservative Party, with help from the Liberal Democrat party are planning to enact binding legislation - enacted with a simple majority of those MP’s who turn up to vote – which would ensure that the Conservative Party remained in office for the next 5 years in all circumstances save that when at least 20 of their own number decided to vote against. So actually they could sell the Lib Dems down the river without a second thought – they wouldn’t be able to do a thing about it.
The Conservatives lets remember hold just 306 of the 650 seats – a mere 47% – which they gained with 36.1% of the popular vote, on a turn out of 65.1% – this represents just 23.5% of the total electorate.
This is the kind of immunity from accountability that is the hallmark of dictators and despots. It is a manoeuvre of which Adolf Hitler would have been proud – effectively preventing opposition to the ruling party.”
This is the reality of the New Politics and political reform. The much vaunted PR? It is kicked into the long grass. The system that the Tories are allowing a referendum on – AV – is not much better than we have – and not close to the STV system that has given Scotland stable and representative Government since the formation of the Scottish Parliament. Whether AV is accepted or not by the UK public, it means that any real electoral reform will not happen for at least a generation.
As I said, Jo, you, again, have been used as a patsy.
The word Germans have for the consolidation of the Nazi Party is gleichschaltung.
Tuesday, 11 May 2010
The ConDemNation
So there you have it. We have a Government none of us voted for. Most of those who voted Lib Dem in Scotland did so to keep the Tories out. 85% of people in Scotland voted anti-Tory, - 68% UK wide. Two Eton boys then sat down and carved out a Government made up of old Etonians, bosses, Lords and Ladies. Not one person who negotiated this ‘coalition of thieves’ had a working class accent – nor did they stand a chance of being hit by the austerity measures the so called “left of labour” Lib Dems and the Tories are about to mete out on the working and middle classes.
All of the negotiators were white, well shaven men. No women, single mothers, Union representatives – no-one with a modicum of empathy for working class people and our struggles were there. The public sector is – East Dunbartonshire is - about to be hit with a barrage of cuts that will see working families and the poor bleed to feed the markets and to pay off the rich man’s debt.
This is not what we voted for in the UK, neither in Scotland nor in East Dunbartonshire. Jo Swinson was buoyed up by a tactical vote both from SNP and Conservative supporters who gave her a 4000 vote margin between her and Labours John Lyons in 2005. This time, the tactical vote, for the most part, was seen to be unnecessary. The SNP vote gained, as did Labours. Swinson halved her majority.
Sally Magnusson hit the nail on the head in her recent TV programme, "Why didn't the Scots vote Tory?" She concluded that the electorate here do not vote out of the self interest promoted by the Tories - we think of others. Self interest sums up this squalid deal. Swinson and the Lib Dems delivered Tory majority rule – and the swingeing cuts and misery the Tories and Liberal Tories will mete out on us.
Let her know your thoughts and ensure the non-alternative – the lie of a “left of Labour” Liberal Democrat party is put to rest. Do not vote Tory/ Lib Dem again – they are unnecessary in East Dunbartonshire. The Tories can only win in this constituency with a leg up and the “looking in both directions” of the Lib Dems. This has been proved both here and country wide.
This is a coalition of cuts.
It has been strapped together in order to allow the worst cuts meted out on the working and middle class in history. Brought together by the ruling class and their media. The markets are not happy, we are told, and this means you should lose your job or take pay cuts.
Let’s unite against the rubbish they spin – the racism and the financial fairy tales that are forced down our TV sets that set working class against working class. The true enemy is not the immigrant, the true friend is not the “markets” and marketeers who are making you pay for their gambling.
We need a coalition of the electorate. - We need a vote for real – Scottish Left– alternatives.
The Scottish Socialist Party believe the rich bankers and corporations who got us into this economic mess should pay – not the health workers and bin men , education workers, small businesses, posties, rail workers or street cleaners in East Dunbartonshire. Ordinary people and their jobs should be protected from this greed induced crisis, not made to suffer to allow the rich to keep their millions/billions.
Friday, 30 April 2010
Who is fooling us?
A common thread ran through Twitter after the last leaders debate. “Were the pollsters watching the same debate as us?”
This was the case not only in the “Twitter-sphere,” but the right wing Andrew Neil pop-politics show panel named the debate as being Browns.
Channel 4’s live poll, like quite a few of these live polls, named Cameron as a poor third or at least, neck and neck with Brown or Clegg as second place.
Even Murdoch's Sky, in a poll it has no members on the board – ie. a radio listeners poll, put Brown in first place.
So what is going on?
The biggest and most quoted pollsters in the media at the moment are You Gov. YouGov, like all polsters, tell us they are “neutral.”
Let's see. The CEO of YouGov PLC, Stephan Shakespeare, is a business associate, close personal friend and former campaign manager of Jeffrey Archer, the disgraced Tory Lord. He owns the ConservativeHome website, was Jeffrey Archer's spokesman during his London mayoral bid and was the Conservative candidate for Colchester during the 1997 election. Archer, by the way, was on telly last night for the first time in years - STRAIGHT AFTER THE DEBATE ON NEIL'S BBC PROGRAMME "THIS WEEK", calling his man the winner because of the "polls." Ahem.
An “ex” YouGov CEO Nadhim Zahawi is standing as a Conservative MP for Stratford Upon Avon in the 2010 General Election. Nadhim Zahawi also worked on Lord Archer's mayoral bid. Nadhim has stated he is not CEO anymore however he is still an active board member
see
HERE
HERE
and HERE
After Craig Murray published evidence that YouGov’s polls were rigged, they (or more specifically, Sheakspeare) denied it -But where did they publish their denial? ConservativeHome!
I am at present trying to get info on ComRes, the polsters that seem to be the second most quoted.
The Daily Mail were caught out rigging their polls and had to change the result after 1o,000 people read the analysis of how they were doing it
As has been pointed out on the Campsie website before, Murdoch and the Daily Mail have made a deal to back each others editorial in order to get the Tories in AT ALL COSTS. So, not only do the Tories at the moment own the press, they own the “independent pollsters.”
Don’t get me wrong – I cannot defend Labour in this – they quite happily took support from the Murdochracy from 1997 until this election – and their spin has been overtaken by the Tories ability to pay to buy search terms on google (enter “Leaders debate" into your google search engine and notice the advert from the tories at the top of the page).
The New Labour project has failed - and the public's Clegg/Lib Dem love in has shown that (even though the Lib Dem message is full of HUGE holes and spin) the truth starved public want to hear alternatives to the non-answers the politicos throw at us.
But what has become clear in this election – the media needs to be separated from the political parties in the way the BBC are supposed to be (though Nick Robinson, the Tory political editor at the BBC needs a slap) – and this would be a priority of a Scottish Socialist Party politician.
Follow the debate on the pollsters
HERE
Campsie articles relating to this
HERE
HERE
and HERE
Polly Toynbee on Murdoch's scandalous influence on our political system HERE
This was the case not only in the “Twitter-sphere,” but the right wing Andrew Neil pop-politics show panel named the debate as being Browns.
Channel 4’s live poll, like quite a few of these live polls, named Cameron as a poor third or at least, neck and neck with Brown or Clegg as second place.
Even Murdoch's Sky, in a poll it has no members on the board – ie. a radio listeners poll, put Brown in first place.
So what is going on?
The biggest and most quoted pollsters in the media at the moment are You Gov. YouGov, like all polsters, tell us they are “neutral.”
Let's see. The CEO of YouGov PLC, Stephan Shakespeare, is a business associate, close personal friend and former campaign manager of Jeffrey Archer, the disgraced Tory Lord. He owns the ConservativeHome website, was Jeffrey Archer's spokesman during his London mayoral bid and was the Conservative candidate for Colchester during the 1997 election. Archer, by the way, was on telly last night for the first time in years - STRAIGHT AFTER THE DEBATE ON NEIL'S BBC PROGRAMME "THIS WEEK", calling his man the winner because of the "polls." Ahem.
An “ex” YouGov CEO Nadhim Zahawi is standing as a Conservative MP for Stratford Upon Avon in the 2010 General Election. Nadhim Zahawi also worked on Lord Archer's mayoral bid. Nadhim has stated he is not CEO anymore however he is still an active board member
see
HERE
HERE
and HERE
After Craig Murray published evidence that YouGov’s polls were rigged, they (or more specifically, Sheakspeare) denied it -But where did they publish their denial? ConservativeHome!
I am at present trying to get info on ComRes, the polsters that seem to be the second most quoted.
The Daily Mail were caught out rigging their polls and had to change the result after 1o,000 people read the analysis of how they were doing it
As has been pointed out on the Campsie website before, Murdoch and the Daily Mail have made a deal to back each others editorial in order to get the Tories in AT ALL COSTS. So, not only do the Tories at the moment own the press, they own the “independent pollsters.”
Don’t get me wrong – I cannot defend Labour in this – they quite happily took support from the Murdochracy from 1997 until this election – and their spin has been overtaken by the Tories ability to pay to buy search terms on google (enter “Leaders debate" into your google search engine and notice the advert from the tories at the top of the page).
The New Labour project has failed - and the public's Clegg/Lib Dem love in has shown that (even though the Lib Dem message is full of HUGE holes and spin) the truth starved public want to hear alternatives to the non-answers the politicos throw at us.
But what has become clear in this election – the media needs to be separated from the political parties in the way the BBC are supposed to be (though Nick Robinson, the Tory political editor at the BBC needs a slap) – and this would be a priority of a Scottish Socialist Party politician.
Follow the debate on the pollsters
HERE
Campsie articles relating to this
HERE
HERE
and HERE
Polly Toynbee on Murdoch's scandalous influence on our political system HERE
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