A damp Saturday morning has changed my plans for the day. There were going to be no blogs, but I always reserve the right to change my mind on such things. So I will share this new report from King's College London and others:
The report looks at indicators of trust ver time in a rang of nations. The methodology is not flawless: surveys are not all taken simultaneously. But these surveys are always indicators at best. I can live with the faults.
The key findings are on two pages:
The second is this:
I will contextualise both of those with this data:
My interpretation is straightforward. As the UK public has been fed what is a very obvious lie over the EU they have lost faith in politics, the media and the institutions of power that support the operations of the state. Is there any surprise in that?
Of course, there is more to this loss of trust than that one issue. But is it pivotal? I think it might be, because when senior politicians - of all parties - so obviously lied about this issue and are now in denial about it they made lying acceptable elsewhere. The consequences are obvious.
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Well, it sums up my feelings very well but my distrust has been growing for years to the point that my local election ballot card (telling me to brig some ID!) went straight into the shredder last week. And the general election one will too if I don’t see anything genuinely better.
Pilgrim, I know what you mean but by shredding your ballot paper you let the politicians off the hook as they’ll write that off to ‘voter apathy’, effectively blaming the voter when the blame is theirs. I would rather spoil my ballot paper by writing ‘None of the Above’ on it and voting. That way it can’t be written off, must be counted and will be shown in the results. Petty perhaps and ineffective but I live in hope that if enough people do this, eventually someone will ask why there are so many spoilt papers, far more than there used to be. I’d also favour NOTA as an official option on all ballot papers.
This is a very curious analysis of ‘trust’. First, I was struck by the fact that trust is signficiantly greater for Parliament (albeit low) than for political parties; by a factor of 2. This supports my belief (often expressed here) that it is political party that undermines public trust in politics; Party is not a convincing solution, but rather an endemic genetic disease of politics.
Second, for trust in Government and Parliament should be around 24%/22% is a dreadful indictment of British politics, but there is something wrong. I am a great believer in healthy scepticism; it should never leave us, for a second’ but if the British public has such little trust, why do they vote for big majorities for Parties laed by the likes of johnson, May, Truss and Sunak. Then I was struck by a curious macthing of the numbers. The current Government hangs on to power because of an election that delivered a majority of 80, built on the back of the support of only 24% of the registered electorate. The King’s College analysis gives a figure of 24% for the public’s trust in Government. Curious; we have FPTP, could it be that it is the gullible trusting who deliver a skewed vote to the untrustworthy? Now wonder the Conservatives defend FPTP.
The press has a lot to answer for. I’m surprised that the press is not trusted to a very large extent yet their daily propaganda on behalf of the Tories seems to be effective.
Until we rein in these monsters, we will be stuck in this loop, unfortunately. Just having internet campaigns and trying to do selective voting means naught in places like East Dorset where Chope has a massive 24.6k majority. Yes, there are lots of elderly here so that figures but my vote will only be a protest vote.
I think low trust in the press fits the picture perfectly. It allows voters to exercise their prejudices without the feeling that they have been unduly manipulated by the media.
I hope I am forgiven for a selfish, downbeat comment to start. I am old and see that as a blessing in that I don’t have to suffer what’s going on for much longer, I find it painful. However, I will keep voting against the worst, which is certainly the Tory Party, and propagating my views to as many people as possible – though I don’t see much improvement if Labour forms the next government (I am outraged by what happened to Jeremy Corbyn with hideous institutional deceit). The only start of hope that I can see is if Labour have to do a deal on PR with other parties in order to form a minority government. It may need a cataclysmic event to start a change.
“because when senior politicians – of all parties – so obviously “………….lie almost all the time. Brexit opened the flood gates and has resulted in all parties being packed to the rafters with liars (this is not to say that there are only liars, there are also fantasists and a wide range of nutters…. e.g. Smogg) & yes men (in the case of Liebore).
I was watching Novara Media.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c774KKhtnPI
One section covered a promise by Liebore to freeze council taxes this year. The relevant bit starts @ minute 23 . Dodds was interviewed on the subject and twisted and turned like a hampster on crack cocaine. As was pointed out by the interviewer: It is not in Liebore’s gift to freeze council taxes ……….for the rather obvious reason that……….they ain’t in gov. Dodds was functionally incapable of saying that it was only a hope (“Labour would freeze council taxes…”……………”yeah but your’e not in goverment”……”yes but we would freeze them”. etc etc. As Novara noted: fake news – or more correctly…..lies.
When Starmer was asked if he would freeze council taxes if/when Liebore is in gov…….he said this would depend and he could not commit Liebore to such action.
In their prevarications and lying Liebore makes Johnson look good – they could even give him lessons!
This is what Starmer said about the UK’s shit filled rivers: “sewage dumping was “ruining so many areas of our country and the Conservatives are sitting on their hands, with no response to it”. He promised “real action on this scandal” under Labour, including automatic fines for sewage dumped by water companies, and to hold water bosses to account for negligent practices.”……….so we are in wrist slapping territory. The man & Liebore are pathetic liars and will do exactly nothing if/when they get into gov, we know this is true – because in a roundabout way (via lying), they have said exactly that.
I interpreted ‘Labour would freeze Council Tax this year’ as – but next year if we are in power we will not do it.
? Does the press include TV Broadcasters?
From a Scottish viewpoint all of the London based broadcasters ( BBC, ITN, Chanel 4, Sky, etc) present a continually Union skewed of Scottish politics and what’s happening in Scotland. This also includes their Scottish based subsidiaries.