I admit that I feel sick this morning. Now that may be because I have both my sons off school, feeling quite unwell and I am coming down with what they have got. But I do not think I am sick because of them: I think I am feeling sick for them, and millions of other young people of their generation.
The papers are full of analysis of what George Osborne had to say yesterday. It is very obvious that his cuts focus most heavily on the poor, on women, on children, on the disabled, on those with learning difficulties, and because so many from racial minorities work in the public sector, on them as well. I'm sickened that my children will have to spend their teenage years in a country that will be torn apart by the deliberate choice of the Conservative Party and the Liberal Democratic Party in this country. I make clear, that is a choice. I know that we could have had a Green New Deal. I, and colleagues, have shown we can afford it. I know it could have rebalanced our economy.
What really sickens me is that I know that I will see my sons going through their teenage years without there being hope in our country. What hope will there be of employment for them? What incentive to create a business? What reason to take on the debt of going to University? In essence, what am I going to do apart from firing them with the desire for a different world to motivate them to play a full part in this society in which they live when those who are leading that society at this point of time have rejected all hope for the people of this country in their sacrifice to the bankers of this country?
The sight of ConDem backbenchers cheering the creation of millions of unemployed people yesterday; their pleasure at seeing so many people's lives blighted by the poverty they will deliver and the backslapping on the frontbench for George Osborne having delivered the greatest economic body blow to this country it is received for generations might have brought this sickness on. But this is no superficial complaint. A deep malignancy has been unleashed upon the United Kingdom and the person who is not worried to their core about the consequence has not appreciated just how serious the issue is.
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They have already said they are going to reduce tax evasion, probably by sending inspectors to building sites and ‘phoning window cleaners.
Benefit fraud is going to be reduced (more inspectors to burger vans)
The armed forces are not going to be starved of funds (Chinooks down from 22 to 12, obviously an increase)
The new Nimrod is cancelled (already paid for, so in effect billions in waste to be scrapped, or sold to the near/middle/far east)
And all the obvious tax avoiders/evaders work for, or advise, the government.
Job done.
Off to the club for champers old man.
Nearly time for the Chrissy hols.
I see that Steve Bell has a succinct comment in The Guardian today.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cartoon/2010/oct/21/steve-bell-comprehensive-spending-review
@Brian
Very good
wow, you sound completely under the weather – get well soon.
I think the ConDems were cheering a good speech and a good plan to get this country back on an even keel. The unemployment thing is a red herring, as well you know. There are no plans announced for compulsory redundancy (something the non-government part of the economy are more familiar with). The plans show a reduction in employment levels over a 4 year period, with the plan to loose posts through natural wastage.
The education thing is more of a challenge, and I have to agree with Vince, who said it was not somewhere he wanted to go, but there really is no choice. But whilst it will undoubtedly make many youngsters think again about their education it is still true that a good degree is a worthwhile investment, and of course it is a progressive charge – only pay it off, in the future, if earnings get above an average level.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/10/21/new_eu_payment_rules_passed/
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Richard,
I just had to write – your tireless blogging on this issue, and many others has been a voice in the wilderness. The question one has to ask is why the news media is so reluctant to engage with your stories? Had your dispatches programme been aired about the Labour party, for example, do you honestly believe that it would have been overlooked? Especially if that party had then lurched rightwards/leftwards in such a clearly demonstrable fashion.
I’m not by any measure a financial expert, but even I can tell the supine unquestioning interviews on the Today programme with ‘financial expert’ such and such aren’t getting to the heart of the matter, and are leaving the giant elephants in the room unexamined. I’m in the generation that you fear for – for our sakes please keep going. This is quite clearly a highly conservative budget, and you must keep pounding the drum ‘there was no mandate for this.’ Every single libdem voter I’ve spoken to (younger, mostly) feels sick to their stomach.
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Richard – I also feel sick and couldn’t sleep for the same reasons as yourself… but the psychotherapist’s view of depression/crisis is that it is an opportunity for real change. When ‘things’ are not at all great but bearable, most people just put up with it. There has to be pain which is so bad that there is nothing to lose.
The way that this country has tolerated inequality to date, corresponds to the former. Perhaps, we are moving to a place in which the New Green Deal can be implemented properly and quickly. I just wish we had more time with regard to peak oil and climate warming.
We need to keep on fighting for a different better world.
“you must keep pounding the drum ‘there was no mandate for this.”
Yes there was – every party said they’d cut deeper than Thatcher. So let’s nail this myth once and for all.
syzygy,
I agree. I made a post yesterday that got lost in the chatter. Too many people are thinking about economics: how bad is the deficit, how should we deal with it etc – when what we should be thinking about is the simple, unarguable fact that very few people (both rich and poor) are that happy with the way society is, and we should be debating what sort of society we want to be and how do we achieve it.
And it is the left as well as the right who are missing the point, and in doing so may be missing a unique opportunity.
“you must keep pounding the drum ‘there was no mandate for this.”
Yes there was – every party said they’d cut deeper than Thatcher. So let’s nail this myth once and for all.
So no choice between candidate parties equals a mandate?
Thanks Paul, you beat me to it. I’m sorry Neil, I didn’t express myself clearly. You are of course correct, all of the parties essentially had the same line on the economy, (except for ‘nationalising Vince’, for whatever his opinion is worth now) and all dissenting opinion was stifled. I would argue that is a less than optimal democratic process.
@paul
What else can it mean?
Of course, when I said “every party” I should have said “every major party” but I hope my point was taken. Parties are of course free to espouse a different position (i.e. Green, SNP etc) but they got little more than 10% of the vote between them. So yes, I’d call it a mandate.