More Ideas For Electoral Reform

This is the transcript for my YouTube video "More Ideas For Electoral Reform". 

Just over a year ago, I posted a video about mitigating the damage caused to our political system by Big Money.  It’s taken a long time to feel up to writing down more of my thoughts on electoral reform and rooting out the bad apples from politics but here I am with just a couple of ideas.

1. We don’t pay Members of Parliament.
        a. Anyone who becomes an MP will be allowed reasonable expenses to live on up to the average wage in the UK. 
        b.   If an MP lives in a constituency too far away from Parliament to travel, they will be provided a council flat to live in somewhere in London. 
        c.   They will be provided expenses for cheap breakfasts, lunches and dinners.  There will be no publicly subsidised meals or alcohol in the Houses of Parliament.
        d.   If the MP is single, their constituency home costs will be covered. However, if they have a partner who works, the costs awarded will be reduced based on means-testing.
        e.   MPs with private wealth will have that wealth frozen for the duration of their Parliamentary career and their bank accounts monitored to ensure that they cannot use their wealth or benefit from any information they gain from their work as an MP.  Transfers of money, stocks, bonds or shares between MPs and their family members or friends will be confiscated to prevent family and friends helping an MP to bypass the rules.
        f.     If an MP wants to have a second job, they are only allowed to have a job that pays minimum wage so that they are grounded in the world of the average worker.
        g.   MPs are barred from taking jobs in any business sector that their Parliamentary career may have intersected with when they leave politics to prevent using knowledge of government for the benefit of businesses or businesses capitalising on employing a former MP.

2. Any individual must spend at least 6 months living in a council property on benefits before they can even be considered for being put up for a Parliamentary candidacy.  This should be mandatory training for a prospective candidate. 

3. All prospective candidates must undertake mandatory mental health, neurodiversity and disability awareness training.  The training must be delivered by people with lived experience of mental ill-health, neurodiversity or other disability and any prospective candidate who fails to pass the final tests will be barred from standing in an election.  People with lived experience will mark the final tests. 

4. All prospective Parliamentary candidates must undertake a course of basic economics so that they understand how the economy really works and not how politicians have said that it works.  Failure to grasp the information will result in the prospective candidate being barred from standing in an election. 

5. No individual will be allowed to stand for public office if they have accepted any money from large corporations, lobbying groups, rich individuals or foreign States or any individuals with ties to foreign States.

These are just a few of the ideas I’ve been mulling over but ideas that I think might help give us representatives who are more fully rounded people and not going into politics simply for the power over people. 

Why not let me know your ideas in the comments below?

Do Elected Politicians Automatically Deserve Respect?

This is the transcript of my YouTube video "Do Elected Politicians Automatically Deserve Respect?". 

Do elected politicians automatically deserve respect?  It’s an interesting question and I guess there are going to be as many answers as there are respondents to the question.

I’m sure the response from elected politicians would be “yes, I automatically deserve your respect because I was chosen out of thousands of constituents to represent them”.  I call bullshit on that answer and here’s why:

The truth is that most members of a constituency wouldn’t know the person chosen to be a Parliamentary candidate from any other random stranger in their area so that reduces the pool of people who actually chose the candidate.

The Parliamentary candidates are chosen by the local constituency party which can be a very small number of people, depending on the size of the party at the national level and the level of engagement at the local level.

If you’re extremely lucky, you might be a member of the local constituency party and have a say in who’s picked to be the candidate but you’re probably not given a blank piece of paper to write any old name on it that’s then put into a box and whoever gets the most mentions becomes the candidate.  The truth is, there will be a small committee who choose a number of potential candidates and the constituency party members get to chose from that very small sample.  Not exactly the badge of a true chosen one.

You may not even be that special if the national party is being led by an authoritarian control freak like Keir Starmer because he overrode the wishes of many of the local constituency Labour party branches at the last General Election and parachuted in his chosen handpicked candidates that may not even have a connection to the local area they have been chosen to represent, meaning that a number of Labour candidates were picked by a single person, Starmer.  And it’s not just Labour who picked candidates with no connection to a constituency so how can those candidates possibly be considered “chosen out of thousands”.

The truth is that most people vote for the party, not the candidate, meaning that a particular party could put up a trained chimp and win a seat.  Some would say that that’s exactly what happens all the time.  It certainly explains the moral and ethical vacuums that represent the Starmer regime.

I couldn’t guess what your answer would be but here’s mine.

All human beings are worthy of a baseline level of respect for their basic Humanity.  We should treat everyone with a bit of respect until they prove themselves worthy of more respect or worthy of none.  Members of Parliament are deserving only of that baseline respect.  Every other bit of respect they think they deserve should be hard fought for and as fragile as Hell.  The more they do to benefit their constituents and society as a whole, the more respect they deserve and should get.  The more they do to harm or ignore their constituents or society or the more they serve themselves at the expense of their constituents or society as a whole, the less respect they deserve and should get.

It’s a simple equation – good – harm = the level of respect you deserve. 

That’s how I’ve worked my entire life and it’s worked for me so far.  It’s just a shame that most people don’t use that equation or those of us who’ve worked hard for the respect we deserve would actually get it.

GE2024 – Hopes and Fears

This is the transcript for my YouTube video "GE2024 – Hopes and Fears".

There is precious little to look forward to under Mr Kid Starver’s leadership but there are some shoots of hope to be found.  The Left may have been virtually swept from the party formerly known as Labour’s benches but the increase in the vote share for Left-leaning candidates, the increase in Green Party MPs from one to four and the reduced majorities in formerly safe Labour seats gives the progressives in the electorate some measure of hope.

Mr Kid Starver may be the Prime Minister now but on the Opposition benches is the spectre of the man he helped undermine and tried to destroy in the form of the newly-elected Independent MP for Islington North, Jeremy Corbyn.  Corbyn whilst still a Labour Party member had his hands tied to a significant extent in any attempt to hold the Starmeroids (similar to haemorrhoids, but a significantly bigger pain in the arse) to account.  No longer is Corbyn so restrained and he’ll no doubt make sure that he’s a thorn in their side for the next five years.

Mr Kid Starver will also find himself under greater scrutiny on his pro-Israel stance from the so-called Gaza Block of MPs who were voted into their positions on a pro-Palestinian mandate, a group of MPs that, ironically, he created.  Several more thorns in the side to contend with.

Of course, the landslide in terms of seats was not based on a love or even like of Mr Kid Starver and his party but on the almost total collapse in the Tory vote, the Tories having become so corrupt and toxic that even their voter base couldn’t bring themselves to support their favoured party and either stayed at home wallowing in self-pity or moved their vote to Reform UK or another party although precious few moved to Labour.  The rise of the independent candidates, several of whom were former Labour candidates purged in favour of Starmeroid drones, cut into the Labour vote count, reducing some former Labour majorities to a mere handful of votes, setting the stage for an electoral defeat at the next General Election if the party formerly known as Labour doesn’t deliver real change for the working class and disadvantaged.

At least one positive thing to come out of the political chaos of recent years is that there seems to be very few safe Parliamentary seats of any colour.

Unfortunately, the number of fears we now face are growing.  Apart from the dozens of MPs for the party formerly known as Labour returned to Parliament, which is bad news in itself, some of the more swivel-eyed loons from the Tories also got returned to Parliament including Dr Death himself, Iain Duncan Smith, the man personally responsible for the premature and preventable deaths of 148,000 benefit claimants.  Former Labour MP Ed Balls Up reportedly said that not taking Dr Death’s seat was a price Mr Kid Starver would consider worth paying which shows the level of hostility towards the Left within the Blairites even now but they can voice such odious opinions because they’re not the ones paying the price, are they?

We now have a weather vane as Prime Minister, a man who changes his position depending on the strength of the gust of political wind that does him the most good personally and who seems unable to lead, as evidenced by the fact that he waited for Sunak and Biden to give their positions on anything before he would commit to a position himself.  Not what the UK needs right now.

And who else has influence over Mr Kid Starver?  He started his term in office saying he was going to withdraw the objection to the arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant for war crimes but, a couple of days and a visit to Israel by David Lammy later, the objection was back in place.  Does Netanyahu have influence on UK foreign policy?  And, if so, will the UK be run in the interests of the citizens of the UK or in the interests of the state of Israel?

Mr Kid Starver believes nothing, stands for nothing, promises nothing and that’s what he’ll deliver – nothing.

Mr Kid Starver’s policy position prior to the election was to promise little to nothing and, despite using the word ‘change’ as his slogan, was offering nothing but continuity Tory austerity policy.  Many of his Cabinet members are funded by Big Business, private healthcare companies or pro-Israel lobbyists which means that policy will be formed on the basis of what’s best for their donors and not what’s in the interest of the country.

Wes Streeting, the man now in charge of the NHS, is pro-privatisation of the NHS and, why wouldn’t he be, he’s paid for by private healthcare companies.  Ironically, the party that gave us the NHS and the welfare state, will be the party, albeit a bastardised version, that finally takes it away.  The NHS will falter and die, not due to lack of investment but due to a large percentage being creamed off to pay the profits for the private healthcare companies that Streeting will bring in.  The service will suffer and health outcomes will tank.

Rachel Reeves is unwilling to do what’s necessary to reverse the decline in public services because she has set herself fiscal rules that are meaningless, tying her hands when they don’t need to be tied. 

The sick and disabled benefit claimants so harmed by the last 14 years of Tory cruelty can look forward to more of the same if the pre-election rhetoric from Liz Kendall is to be believed.  She was the person who stated that the Tories were too soft on benefit claimants so it seems that, now she’s in charge of the Department for Work and Pensions, we can expect her to tell Dr Death to hold her beer while she shows him how many benefit claimants she can drive to a premature and preventable death.

And, finally to return to Mr Kid Starver himself, we can look forward to him wringing his hands and complaining that his hands are tied because the Tories crashed the economy and his party has to stick to Reeves’ meaningless fiscal rules.  He’ll say that we can’t afford to lift hundreds of thousands of children out of poverty and that it’s a “difficult decision” or a “tough choice” when that’s not true especially when he’s just decided to send more money and arms to Ukraine.  Where’s the money for Ukraine coming from, Mr Kid Starver?  If we can’t have nice things because there’s no money, how can we send money to Ukraine?

We can look forward to the UK’s reputation on Human Rights and international law descend to the depths of Hell with his unwavering support for the genocide being perpetrated by Israel on the people of Gaza and the blind eye he’s turned on any racism other than anti-Semitism. 

Given his extremely thin skin and his abhorrence of dissent, we can look forward to the cracking down on our right to protest and there’ll be further attacks on democratic processes if his anti-democratic actions within his party are any indication.

What we have in government now is a vain, Narcissistic, power-crazed, control freak with a hair-trigger temper who’s economically illiterate, lacks compassion and empathy and has absolutely no backbone.  A Prime Minister who is so weak he can’t take criticism or opposing views and who’ll have his hand on the red button controlling our nuclear arsenal.  Let’s hope no other leader upsets him or he might nuke them in a fit of pique.

If I’ve painted a bleak picture of the future it’s because it is bleak.  Care to join me on the fringes and watch the UK burn?

GE2024 – Final Thoughts

This is the transcript of my YouTube video "GE2024 – Final Thoughts". 

This year’s General Election truly was the culmination of the last few decades, the slow rightward drift of UK politics until reasonable political stances are considered extreme Left and the extreme Right is now considered standard operating procedure for the Tories. On top of that, lies that were always a part of politics, regardless of the country, have become so prevalent that no one bothers to push back on obvious untruths in political discourse.  Once upon a time you could barely spot the lies until they were pointed out to you but now the lies are so barefaced and blatant that they are accompanied by flashing neon signs and a klaxon declaring “BULLSHIT” at top volume yet they are still ignored as just something politicians do.

The Rightward drift of politics and the constant lies have also brought us to the point where there is no trust left in politics, not that there was much to begin with.  There’s little left of the thin veneer of democracy that we laughingly considered we had and the electoral system we have has delivered a result that is hardly representative of the electorate.

The Tories are gone.  Too bad, so sad, don’t let the door hit you on the way out.  The party formerly known as Labour has taken power on what seems to be a landslide until you realise that the so-called landslide victory has merely highlighted the corrupt and broken nature of the UK’s electoral system.  The massive majority now held by the party formerly known as Labour is based on the lowest voter turnout for 20 years, fewer votes than Corbyn’s Labour got in 2019 and a smaller vote share than Corbyn received in 2017.  The fact that Corbyn’s Labour got more votes in 2019 yet resulted in a massive defeat and loss of seats whilst the party formerly known as Labour received fewer votes that results in a massive win and a large majority is an artefact of the First-Past-The-Post system that we have been lumbered with for years because it has produced a system that favours the two main parties, led to increasingly disproportionate allocation of Parliamentary seats and penalised the smaller parties who have to get a disproportionately high number of votes per Parliamentary seat compared with the main parties.

It’s time that the First-Past-The-Post system was changed to allow a truly representative Parliament even if that means more Members of Parliament from the Far Right or Far Left.  Proportional Representation would be a far more democratic system and now that the Tories have been almost wiped out even they are moving towards a pro-PR stance with only the party formerly known as Labour against the idea.

We need a better political system and better people for our politicians neither of which will happen unless we demand them.  What we have isn’t working but what we need isn’t in the interests of career politicians so we have a fight on our hands or my fears will be only too real, however, that’s the subject of my next video.

GE2024 – Excuse me but haven’t you forgotten something?

This is the transcript for my YouTube video "GE2024 – Excuse me but haven’t you forgotten something?". 

I don’t know about you but I’ve been watching a lot of coverage of the bun fight that we call the General Election (or at least I had until a couple of days ago) and I noticed a glaring omission in the offers put forward by the main parties.

I’ve heard culture war crap from the Tories (Blue and Red) and I’ve heard a lot about the Rights of different demographics of voters that they are vying for with one exception – the disabled.  Now I agree that the Rights of the LGBT (and whatever new letters have been added this week) and BAME communities are important as are the Rights of the groups I haven’t listed to keep this video as short as possible but, I’m sorry, the Trans community is a small one, dwarfed by the size of the disabled community, yet I have seen Trans Rights highlighted but not Disabled Rights. 

It hurts me to buy into a hierarchy of Rights position especially as I have a Trans Facebook friend and Facebook friends from the wider LGBT and BAME communities but I’m disabled and I despise the fact that my community which cuts across all the other demographics is being ignored in this election (if I’ve missed any coverage on disabled Rights, please let me know in the comments with as much detail as possible so I can look it up for myself).

The Tories have scapegoated, tortured and killed many people over their 14 year reign of terror but the rhetoric coming from The Kid Starver Party suggests that it’s a situation that may continue or even worsen under a government under their control.  Disabled Rights have been trampled on by the Tories, especially if you happen to be a disability benefit claimant, and those Rights will all but disappear under another 5 years if they win the election.  The situation doesn’t look as if it will change under the Red Tories either.

It would be nice if the disabled could be offered something other than more of the treatment they’ve been getting over the last 14 years but no one seems to want to talk about the disabled except in a negative light if they’re mentioned at all.  Isn’t it about time that changed?

Where are the rights that disabled people are supposed to have?

This is the transcript for my YouTube video "Where are the rights that disabled people are supposed to have?" 

Rishi Sunak has said that he wants to replace Personal Independence Payment cash payments with a voucher scheme, presumably to control what PIP claimants can purchase that aids their day to day living and where they can get those items.  If my presumption is correct, the scheme will probably enrich a Tory donor’s business as it will be one of the only places that you can exchange the coupons for the items or the coupon scheme will be administered by a Tory donor’s company. 

Again, if my presumption is correct, this is another way of controlling and abusing the sick and disabled through undue interference in their personal lives.

I don’t know how far the proposals regarding the PIP voucher program has gotten but I think Sunak has forgotten one of the guiding principles of Tory ideology in proposing this idea.  The principle to which I refer is that of personal responsibility.  If the government is going to restrict what a claimant can buy the goods or services that aid their day to day living it is taking away the claimant’s responsibility to use the money they currently get to buy what they deem helpful.  Very anti-Tory thinking that also flies in the face of their hatred of the ‘nanny State’, a term which has always confused me as most Tories grew up having their backsides wiped by their devoted nanny so their parents could ignore them until they became the hateful adult babies we know and despise.

Ultimately, a voucher scheme in place of PIP cash payments is an infringement of our Human Right to have a private life free from interference by the government and will more than likely cost the country more than it saves the public purse but as the goal is control and abuse I doubt that would matter to the current Tory administration or, indeed, a future Labour administration led by Mr Kid Starver.

Of course, this isn’t the only potential future attack on disabled benefit claimant’s rights as the DWP want to give themselves the power to monitor claimant’s bank accounts, another breach of the Human Right to a private life and weapon to attack those whose bank accounts are being monitored.

The disabled benefit claimants are a casualty of the culture wars being fought by both the Right and the Left wings of politics, the politics of division, used as a scapegoat and political football rather than address the real causes of society’s problems.  The Tories and the Right blame benefit claimants, immigrants and anyone other group they can think of for the mistakes they’ve caused and Mr Kid Starver’s ego party are going along with it while the Left fight for the Rights of increasingly smaller minority groups as the basic Human Rights for all are eroded by the incumbent administration, ironically weakening the rights for the smaller minority groups as well.

The disabled have been chosen as an easy scapegoat despite not being responsible for the mess the country’s in.  Screwing over disabled benefit claimants is described as “making the hard choices” when it is nothing of the sort.  The real hard choices are the ones that would put the blame and the responsibility of the mess we’re in on the shoulders of those who really did cause the problem and have the resources to mitigate the damage.

Of course, we’re just disabled people and not seen as worthy human beings by the politicians who suckle at the teat of the public purse in greater amounts than a single disabled benefit claimant could ever hope to achieve.  The politicians who are so out of touch with reality and lack the compassion and empathy needed to be a human being with their snouts firmly stuck in the trough while punching down on some of the most vulnerable people in the country, stripping away our rights as they do so.

Does anyone really care anymore?