Announcement: New publication will detail government attacks on citizens’ freedoms

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attack, bad, book, cack-handed, Coalition, Conservative, Data Retention and Investigatory Bill, David Cameron, Democrat, disenfranchise, election, example, Free, freedom, government, halfwit, Jeremy Clarkson, law, legislation, Lib Dem, Liberal, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, nominate, nomination, people, policy, politics, poor, protest, publication, Renault Captur, repress, Richard Hammond, speech, Surveillance Bill, Top Gear, Tories, Tory, undemocratic, Vox Political

The Renault Captur: It seems that David Cameron’s Internet filters would identify this as pornography. It is possible that this would make Renault executives proud.

Synchronicity? Coincidence? Isn’t it strange when you become aware of several instances of the same phenomenon at once.

Today, having written about the Data Retention and Investigatory Bill, Yr Obdt Srvt sat down to watch, of all things, an old episode of the BBC’s Top Gear from July last year in which, amazingly, Jeremy Clarkson criticised his Chipping Norton neighbour (and part-time Prime Minister) David Cameron for wanting to end our freedom to look at pornography on the Internet.

Some of you may approve of Cameron’s stand; that’s not the matter at hand. Clarkson’s point was that the way Cameron proposed to regulate Internet porn was so cack-handed, he was going to make himself – and his government – look even more of a gang of halfwits than they do already.

Cueing up an image of the Renault Captur (above), Clarkson told audiences they wouldn’t be able to see it, once Cameron’s filters are put in place.

“In what way is that pornography?” inquired Richard Hammond (he’s the short one).

“Well, it’s orange.”

“What?”

Clarkson gladly elaborated: “Well, the thing is – and this is a true story: A friend of mine has a website, okay? It has an orange backdrop. Now, in various offices and workplaces that have this porn filter on the Internet, orange is picked up as a skin tone, which of course it is in Cheshire.

“So it will just see that it’s a naked lady with a sort of a vajazzle in the shape of a Renault badge and it won’t let anyone see it.”

This is just one example of the idiocy inherent in Cameron’s attempts at repression, which also include legislation to stifle free speech and expression, permitting Boris Johnson to buy water cannon to prevent free protest (another pointless move, for reasons I may explain in the future), an attempt to stymie electoral freedom by cutting down the number of people permitted to vote in elections, and now the Surveillance Bill.

In recognition of this campaign of disenfranchisement against the free people of the UK, Vox Political proposes to publish a book of all-new material – that’s right, all new – entitled How the Coalition government tried to curtail your freedom – and how David Cameron c***ed it up!

Catchy title, don’t you think? The idea is for the words to take up most of the cover, so it won’t require artwork (you may have noticed art covers aren’t VP‘s strong suit).

We are now accepting nominations of repressive legislation or policies that should be mentioned in the new publication. Please post yours in the ‘comment’ column.

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Cameron faces post-election loss blues

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Baz Poulton, Coalition, Conservative, David Cameron, election, Europe, general, government, Graeme Beard, Helen Owens, Karlie Marvel, Michael Gove, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, Parliament, Richard Tait, Tories, Tory, UKIP, Vox Political, win

Political news seems to be in a slump after the excitement of last week’s elections, so let’s look at the damage – starting with the Conservatives and David Cameron.

Amazingly, Cameron was insisting that the Conservative Party could win next year’s general election, despite being pushed into third place for the first time in more than a century, by UKIP last Thursday.

A BBC report told us he “appreciated people were ‘disillusioned’ with the EU and he ‘absolutely understood and received the message’.”

Clearly he had not. The message was that people were SO disillusioned with the mainstream political parties – particularly the Conservatives and Cameron himself – that they were prepared to take a punt on a bunch of extremists rather than put up with more of the same.

Not only that, but Cameron and the Tories have not changed direction by one single degree since the result came through. They are still claiming that their referendum in 2017 will solve everything.

I posted up the link to the BBC report on the Vox Political Facebook page, to see what response it would provoke. Some of them defied belief but several are publishable.

Here’s Baz Poulton, who supplied the image (above): “The Tories have no chance at all, but considering how many fools voted for UKIP without the slightest clue about their actual motivations, plus the fact that Farage has already agreed publicly to support the Tories in the next election, means that the fake ‘alternative’ that the media is constantly pushing in their attempt to bring fascism to Britain, is actually getting votes!

“The Tories know that they are hated by the public. This is why UKIP exist, to take votes that the stupid believe are being denied to the establishment parties, and give them right back to the establishment.”

The man has a point. It has already been said on this blog that the Tories and UKIP are in coalition talks, because Michael Gove has denied it.

One of our younger readers, Karlie Marvel, also sounded a note of warning: “Complacency by the electorate and misguided protest votes for UKIP will allow these dangerous crooks back in. A much increased turnout at the General Election and some real opposition in the next year from Labour is desperately needed.”

The other comments were almost entirely negative. Richard Tait suggested: “Mr Cameron is being quite realistic about his chances and rather than sign on the dole to collect unemployment benefit, he is sounding out the possibility of a new career as a Stand Up Comedian.”

Appropriately, Helen Owens commented: “Go on, tell us another.”

But Graeme Beard, despite finding humour in the possibility, said he could not rule out a Conservative win because the stupidity of the electorate cannot be overestimated.

Looking at the European results, it is impossible to argue with that viewpoint.

He told us: “Win the next general election? Ha Ha Ha! Well actually yes they can! Frightens me but the great British public still believe in giving themselves a thoroughly good thrashing (remember the days of the Thatcher tyranny – elected time and again) and this lot loves dishing out the whip.

“Don’t underestimate stupidity, it’s all too common!”

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Let’s make it easier for young people to vote!

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BBC, bias, candidate, citizenship, Conservative, constituency, council, curriculum, democracy, Democrat, election, Europe, government, immigration, Labour, Lib Dem, Liberal, mainstream, Media, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, Party, people, philosophy, policy, politics, referendum, school, Tories, Tory, UKIP, vote, Vox Political, ward, young, youth

You can lead a young person to the polling station but you still can’t make them vote: How do we get our youth to exercise their democratic right? [Image: theday.co.uk]

Have you noticed how the mainstream media have glossed over the fact that so few people voted in the European elections?

Only about one-third of the electorate bothered to shift their backsides from the sofa to the polling station, and only a quarter of those gave UKIP its resounding (if you believe the BBC) victory.

That’s just nine per cent of the electorate!

The other nine-tenths of the country – including both voters and non-voters – didn’t want UKIP to win, and it is delusional of that party’s supporters to say the whole country got behind them.

The problem is, far too many people didn’t get behind anybody else.

My cousin’s daughter, at 18, voted for the first time last week. She said she found it extremely difficult to form any definite opinion on which party to support because it was almost impossible to find reliable information.

You see, she’s not stupid; she wasn’t going to take the parties at face value. She wanted independent validation of their claims, and that’s hard to find.

Obviously the mainstream media are a lost cause. They all have their favourites and it is impossible to get any useful policy information from them. If you were watching the BBC, you would know that UKIP want Britain out of Europe and an end to what party leaders see as indescriminate immigration.

What did Auntie say about Conservative policies, other than that they were offering an in/out referendum in 2017 if they won a general election next year, which is nothing to do with the vote we’ve just had? What was said about Labour? What was said about the Liberal Democrats?

I’ve got no idea, and I spend my life commenting on politics! What chance do these teens have?

The problem is that there simply isn’t a resource that can provide easy answers for young people. If they want it on a website, it would have to feature not only listings of what the parties say they’ll do, but information on the philosophies behind those plans – so readers can understand the proposed direction of travel. It would have to carry detailed information on each candidate, in each constituency and ward, to enable our young people to judge the character of the people they were being asked to trust.

It would be unwieldy and it would be controversial. Candidates would be accusing it of bias within five minutes of any such website going up.

My cousin-once-removed thought that local councils should have information on their websites but I pointed out that they would only be allowed to publish material from the parties themselves, without any kind of commentary at all; as such it would be nothing more than propaganda.

So what’s the answer?

That’s not a rhetorical question; it’s a call for suggestions.

Schools don’t teach politics in any meaningful way. Citizenship was supposed to have gone onto the curriculum years ago but this writer hasn’t seen any increase in political awareness amongst the young. Political representatives aren’t allowed to discuss politics with students unless members of other parties are also present, which means they can each obstruct the others from doing so.

Courses on politics at further or higher education institutions really are biased according to the lecturers’ own beliefs – look at Oxford’s neoliberal PPE course.

Young people don’t have time to cut through all of the babble.

So most of them walk away.

How do we get them back – or do we simply not bother, and watch as democracy is quietly euthanised within the next generation?

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Searching for silver linings in the Euro election’s purple cloud

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BBC, business, Caroline Lucas, Catherine Bearder, company, Conservative, corporation, country, David Cameron, Democrat, Ed Miliband, election, Europe, European Parliament, Eurosceptic, far right, federal, firm, general, Green Party, immigrant, immigration, Investment Partnership, Labour, law, Lib Dem, Liberal, migrant, multinational, Natalie Bennett, nation, National Health Service, NHS, Nick Clegg, Nigel Farage, private, privatisation, privatise, ransom, referendum, right-wing, sovereign, state, Tories, Tory, Transatlantic Trade, TTIP, UK, UKIP, Westminster

No cause for celebration: This man is now the leader of the largest British political organisation in the European Parliament.

Could the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership be sunk off the coast of a new, anti-federalist Europe?

It seems like a natural consequence of the election victories enjoyed by Eurosceptic and far-right parties across the continent – and one of the few reasons to be optimistic about the result.

We don’t have all the information yet, so it is impossible to be sure, but it does seem likely that people who won popular support by emphasising national sovereignty against that of the EU will be against a trade agreement that suppresses nations’ rights to make their own laws, and puts multinational corporations above countries.

Unfortunately UKIP, the British Eurosceptic party that has won 23 seats (so far), seems more likely to support the agreement that would force British workers into lowest-common-denominator working conditions and pay deals, in a betrayal of the populist promises it made to get elected.

Nigel Farage’s campaign took a leaf out of the Conservative Party’s book by hiding some of UKIP’s most unpalatable plans from the electorate; now that he has what he wants, will we see UKIP working to ensure, for example, that National Health Service privatisation is locked into British law? That would require support for TTIP.

If Farage’s party doesn’t support the controversial plan, they’ll probably stay away from the vote (as they do in most matters; UKIP has one of the worst attendance records in the European Parliament).

Of course the European Parliament doesn’t work the same way as the UK Parliament; UKIP may have won the most seats but this does not automatically hand it power – 23 UK seats is only one-third of those available, not a majority, and it will have to join a larger grouping in order to make its voice heard.

UKIP’s choices over the next few days and weeks will be crucial, as they will allow us to form opinions about how the party’s victory will affect life here in the UK.

The Eurosceptic party’s victory – the first time in more than 100 years that an election has been won by someone other than Labour or the Conservatives – means the other British political parties have more soul-searching to do.

Labour came second, defying right-wing pundits on the BBC and elsewhere who were hoping to see “weird” Ed Miliband suffer. But his lead over the Tories is just 1.5 per cent – hardly a ringing endorsement.

Clearly the British people were not convinced by his offer and Labour must revise its position on Europe or prepare to lose the next general election.

A good starting-place for the Party of the Workers would be a promise to halt the flow of migrant workers from EU countries with weaker economies by pushing for a change to the rule allowing free movement between countries – ensuring that this only happens between states that have comparable economies.

This would put an end to the economic opportunism that has caused the perceived flood of migrants from the poorer countries of eastern Europe, and make it possible for British people to get better jobs, offering more working hours – and negotiate for higher pay.

It isn’t rocket science, but Labour has failed to grasp this concept. One has to wonder why. Maybe Labour is still a bit too fond of Conservative-style neoliberalism. Is that it, Ed?

Labour’s problems are nothing compared with those of the Conservative Party. David Cameron wagered that his promise of an in/out referendum on the EU, to take place in 2017, would win him the next UK general election – but this result has shown that the British people don’t believe a word of it.

Rather than be held to ransom by an over-privileged nob, they have turned to an untried party of even more hard-line right-wingers who would probably create worse problems for working Britons than even the Tories, if they were ever elected into office in Westminster.

That is the message David Cameron has to swallow today: We don’t believe him. We don’t trust him. We don’t want him.

Yet his party seems unrepentant. Prominent members have already rejected calls to strengthen the referendum offer, for example.

The loss will make Cameron more likely to seek a deal with UKIP – and one is already in the offing, if we are to believe the denials coming from other leading Tories. This would be to UKIP’s disadvantage as Farage only needs to look at Nick Clegg to see what will happen.

Clegg should be a broken man. Not only have the Liberal Democrats haemorrhaged local councillors, but now he also has to face up to the fact that he has lost all but one of his party’s MEPs.

The BBC said the survival of Catherine Bearder in the South East region prevented a “humiliating wipe-out” – but isn’t the loss of no less than nine MEPs humiliating enough?

Clegg is already facing calls for his resignation amid claims that nobody wants to listen to him any more. This means the turnabout from “I agree with Nick” in 2010 is now complete. Anyone considering going into coalition with the Conservatives (Farage) should pay close attention. The British voter hates traitors.

There is one more matter arising from this result; a fact that you are not likely to hear on the mainstream media, but one that seems increasingly important, considering the demise of the Liberal Democrats.

The Green Party was fourth-placed in this election. Its 1,244,475 (so far) voters mean it had two-sevenths of UKIP’s support, while the Conservative Party – the party in power here in the UK – had only three times as many supporters.

Expect Natalie Bennett and Caroline Lucas to capitalise on this for all they’re worth.

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Surprises await us all in the European Parliament election

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BBC, bias, council, election, Europe, Media, member, MEP, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, Parliament, people, politics, proportional representation, UKIP, Vox Political

[Image: BBC]

One thing we all knew, before the first vote was counted in the council elections, was that the result would differ hugely from that in the European election taking place on the same day.

For a start, MEPs are elected on a system of proportional representation, meaning it is the percentage of votes cast in a particular region that determine who will represent it; it isn’t a straightforward race for the most.

Also, all regions of the UK are taking part in this poll – but many people are unlikely to have used their vote, due to disillusion with British democracy. This makes it hard to judge whether the results will have any bearing on next year’s UK general election.

Since it is a proportional representation election, the UKIP effect is likely to be far greater than it was in the local elections. UKIP picked up 17 per cent of the votes in the locals, and a similar performance in the Euro-poll will put it half a percentage point up on 2009, when 13 ‘Kippers were returned to Brussels.

Conversely Labour, which bagged more than half of all the council seats up for election, is likely to be far less successful in Europe.

It will be interesting to see how the media – particularly the BBC, which will be reporting the results as they come in – react. Thursday’s coverage of the local poll was appallingly misleading. For example, Labour was said to have performed very badly when it easily hit the target commentators said it needed to attain, in order to pose a credible challenge for the Conservatives next year.

Coverage of the count starts at 11pm on BBC1.

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Will you give British sovereignty to a foreign business?

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America, Britain, British, business, Conservative, corporation, Derek Vaughan, dispute, election, EU, Europe, Green Party, health, investment, investor, ISDS, Jill Evans, Kay Swinburne, Labour, member, national, NHS, Parliament, partnership, referendum, service, settlement, sovereign, state, Tories, Tory, trade, transatlantic, tribunal, TTIP, UK, union, United States, USA

[Image: The Guardian]

It is the eve of the European Parliamentary elections. How much do you really know about what your candidates would do – if elected?

Much of the debate so far has focused on personalities rather than policies – but does it really matter that Labour won’t commit to an in-out referendum on our EU membership (which is a UK Parliament issue in any case) if its MEPs do their job properly and defend the interests of the British people in the Brussels assembly?

Does it matter that the Conservatives are promising such a referendum, if they give away your right to a high-quality health service, along with your rights at work, to American companies?

These are the issues that really matter.

A few months ago, Vox Political was running articles on the highly controversial Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership, currently being negotiated between the European Union and the United States of America. Much of the groundwork has been carried out in secret, hidden from public scrutiny, but the information that has been made available has aroused serious concern that this agreement will weaken existing standards and regulations that protect workers and consumers in the EU.

In particular, the Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) would allow any foreign company operating in the UK to make a claim against the government for loss of future profits resulting from any regulatory action by the government, such as new legislation. Such claims would be considered by an unelected, unaccountable tribunal composed of three corporate lawyers whose decisions are likely to favour the corporations and would override national laws.

It is widely believed that the TTIP will be used by our Conservative-led government as a means of locking-in its detrimental changes to the National Health Service.

With this in mind, I wrote to three of the four current Welsh MEPs (the fourth is standing down), asking a few simple questions:

Do you want the health of your constituents to depend on a foreign company’s balance sheet?

Are you in favour of sales or the safety of your constituents?

Do you support attacks on workers’ rights?

Do you support the people who elected you – or are you a puppet of the corporations?

The response from Labour’s Derek Vaughan was characteristically short and to the point: “As you would expect, Labour MEPs oppose the ISDS in certainly anything which would allow the Tories/UKIP to argue for further privatisation of the NHS.

“You may also wish to take this matter up with those who really are the puppets of corporations.”

We’ll come to them shortly. Derek’s answer – though brief, tells you everything you need to know about Labour. They aren’t staying silent (as a recent Liberal Democrat letter asserted) and they aren’t pandering to corporate interests. Labour will defend British institutions against any European ruling or agreement that infringes on them. That’s a promise.

Jill Evans, for Plaid Cymru, had a little more to say: “I share your concerns regarding the TTIP as does the rest of my group in the European Parliament, the Greens/EFA group.

“We are 100 per cent against ISDS as we do not believe that extra-judicial powers should be given to foreign investors. We have been working hard to lobby the Commission to get them to make changes to the TTIP… The TTIP will include a strong focus on … co-operation but the regulatory cultures and social and environmental standards on both sides of the Atlantic are very different; conflicts over GMOs and Hormone Beef are just two examples.

“The TTIP is also controversial from an industrial policy point of view. The two blocs are not complementary, but in fierce competition for global markets and the setting of global industrial standards. Transatlantic cooperation could, however, pave the way for higher global ecological standards and for a faster conversion towards a sustainable green economy. Both the EU and the US need to find new avenues to create social wealth. The task we are set with is trying to find the right balance.”

So Plaid and the Greens are as strongly-opposed to the ISDS as Labour, but acknowledge there are advantages to be had – if this agreement is negotiated by the right representatives. This is why it is so important that you use your vote wisely. A vote for UKIP might seem like a worthwhile protest against the UK’s Conservative government, but what good will it do when the Kippers, who support corporate power, wave through measures to strip you of your rights?

And then we have Kay Swinburne, representing the Conservatives. Her response was the longest of the lot, perhaps suggesting that she knew her party’s stance was harder to justify.

“Transatlantic trade flows (goods and services trade plus earning and payments on investment) averaged $4 billion each day through the first three quarters of 2011. In 2008 EU/US combined economies accounted for nearly 60 per cent of global GDP,” she stated.

“However, for all its value and importance, the EU-US trading relationship still suffers from numerous obstacles, preventing it reaching its full potential to provide growth and jobs. It has been estimated that the deal could bring an extra £10bn to the UK annually, which would give a huge boost to jobs in our economy at a time when we are still suffering with the effects of the economic crisis.”

There is little evidence for this, and even that is poor. The European Commission’s own impact assessment admits that a 0.5 per cent increase in growth would be “optimistic”, and independent research suggests that a meagre 0.01 per cent increase in the growth rate over 10 years is more likely. The North American Free Trade Agreement between the US, Canada and Mexico led to a net LOSS of almost a million jobs in the US. You have to ask why this MEP is arguing against the facts.

“That is an extra £400 to every UK household and while some reports criticise the economic focus, I would argue that this is exactly the kind of stimulus package we should be focusing on,” she continued. Again, this is inaccurate. Every household will not gain an extra £400 because of business deals carried out between very few, very large, corporations. In fact, much larger amounts of money will go to the kind of people who have too much of it already.

“ISDS is a system that allows investors to initiate proceedings directly against a government should they believe that their property has been expropriated illegally, that is, not in conformance with the laws of that country itself,” she continued, skimming over the possibility that a legal challenge could be mounted against changes in a country’s laws – such as Labour’s planned repeal of the Health and Social Care Act that allowed the creeping privatisation of the NHS, if the Conservatives are defeated in the 2015 UK general election.

“The Conservatives in the European Parliament support the inclusion of an ISDS chapter in the agreement, because even with developed countries it ensures certainty for our investors, including SMEs.”

She does not explain what that certainty may be. Is it the certainty that they can run roughshod over their workers? That their profits will take precedence over our health? What about certainty for our citizens?

“Rest assured that this is not a mechanism that will allow for fundamental laws of the EU, such as the REACH legislation on chemicals or the Tobacco Products Directive, to be overturned by a foreign company.” That does not offer any consolation if the laws of the UK do not remain similarly inviolate.

“The EU and its Member States will and must remain able to adopt and enforce, in accordance with their own and EU laws, measures necessary to pursue legitimate public policy objectives in the fields of social and environmental standards, security, the stability of the financial system, and public health and safety.” This seems encouraging, but is overshadowed by what this Conservative MEP has already stated.

“The European Parliament, as well as the UK Government, will also have to give final approval to the deal.”

This is why we need a sceptical European Parliament, and a critical UK Parliament when the deal comes to Westminster for ratification.

That is the information provided by the Welsh MEPs. Labour and the Green Party will stand up for you, while the Conservative Party and UKIP will stand up for the few.

Put in that way, it isn’t a choice at all.

But is the electorate well-enough informed to make the appropriate decision?

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Tory Democrats on Europe: Confused and negative campaigning

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alliance, block graph, Brecon, broadband, campaign, Cardiff Bay, child poverty, Coalition, Conservative, Democrat, election, Enterprise, Europe, fund, Labour, Lib Dem, Liberal, medium, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, negative, Parliament, Plaid Cymru, quality of life, Radnorshire, Roger Williams, small, SME, Sunday Times rich list, Tories, Tory, tourism, toxic, UKIP, Vox Political, Westminster, work

Negative campaigning at its worst: It’s what the Liberal – or is it Tory? – Democrats do best.

If you thought the Tory manifesto was a deceitful joke, or the row over UKIP’s policies was damaging, have you seen what the Liberal (?) Democrats have been sending around?

Here’s a letter sent to houses here in Brecon and Radnorshire. It starts with the famous Lib Dem block graph, which is a mainstay of all their election communications in places where they have won seats. Presumably they keep using it because it is effective but one has to doubt this example, as it does not feature a European election result, but that of the last UK general election in 2010.

They cannot use a block graph to show a favourable result in the last European election because they don’t have any Welsh MEPs, and the result in the last Welsh Assembly election (in 2011) showed support was already eroding away as a result of their toxic alliance with the Conservative Party in Westminster, along with some spectacularly effective campaigning by the local Labour Party.

The result is a misleading graphic that shows a massive Liberal Democrat majority, coupled with the slogan, “Only the Lib Dems can beat the Tories here”, where in fact we have two Labour MEPs, one Tory and one representing Plaid Cymru.

It hardly encourages confidence when a political letter – from one of the ruling parties in Westminster – begins with a filthy lie.

The text of the letter, by the constituency’s Liberal Democrat MP Roger Williams, asks where the reader wants to be working in five or 10 years, and suggests we will be looking for more pay, promotions and a better quality of life. He states that it is important to protect the economic recovery, but “all that hard work could be undone” if Britain pulls out of the EU “as UKIP and many Conservatives want to do”.

Thanks to the UK’s Coalition government, ordinary hard-working people are receiving far less pay than before the 2010 election, with a corresponding drop in quality of life. Child poverty, for example, is rising fast. The economic recovery has helped nobody but the very top earners (like those in the Sunday Times ‘rich list’, published last weekend) – and besides, the Tory Democrats are not the only party keen to protect Britain’s place in Europe. For that, your best bet is still Labour or (in Wales) Plaid Cymru.

The letter continues: “Across rural Wales the EU has invested £5.8 million into local businesses struggling to find funding to grow and create more jobs, this is on top of the £26 million invested in promoting tourism to Wales which is vital to our local economy.” Yes indeed – but that money was negotiated by either a Labour government in Westminster or a Labour government in Cardiff Bay. It has little to do with the Tory Democrats!

The letter ends with an exhortation to vote for the Yellow Party’s nonentity candidate, whose name is instantly forgettable.

Alongside this came a double-sided flier offering more of what the Tory Democrats do best – negative campaigning. “Don’t gamble with Welsh jobs…” it states, “Stop UKIP and the Tories from risking Wales jobs”. A box-out with a red background says, “Labour stay silent” – which is a blatant falsehood.

Flip the page and you’ve got the pro-Tory Democrat bit – but they can only say they have “helped deliver” funding for superfast broadband, funding for small-to-medium-sized enterprises, and cash to support tourism. And who did they help?

Labour!

It’s a sad little screed from an organisation in its twilight days.

The saddest part is that someone will believe it.

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Six million people fall off electoral register due to ‘lackadaisical’ councils

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BBC, Coalition, Conservative, council, democracy, Democrat, election, electoral register, faith, household, individual, Labour, lackadaisical, Lib Dem, Liberal, Mid Devon, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, minority, politics, rig, Tories, Tory, vote, Vox Political

Local councils have been failing to check voter lists by making door-to-door visits – leading to a loss of no less than six million people from the electoral register, the BBC has reported.

This is before a new system comes into operation that will require people to put themselves on the register individually, rather than being registered as part of a household. This has been designed by the Coalition government and it is widely believed that it will discourage people who are not Tories or Lib Dems from registering – effectively rigging elections in favour of the ruling parties.

In addition, it is widely believed that the public in general is losing faith in democracy after being forced to put up with one government after another who have sidled into office with a minority of the vote – most people have voted against them. These governments have then imposed policies that have sucked prosperity from those who rely most heavily on the state for support, handing ever more cash and power to people who have too much of it already. The leaders of the Coalition government (the Conservative Party) were supported by around 29 per cent of the electorate in 2010 (although not all of the electorate voted).

In the light of this, it seems unfair to penalise our already put-upon councils for failing to go door-to-door – the Coalition has contrived to suck resources away from councils, meaning fewer officers are being asked to do much more work, and electoral matters could be deemed easy to sideline in favour of more pressing issues.

The story mentions Mid Devon Council, whose chief executive said he did not believe house-to-house canvassing was an effective use of resources when budgets were being cut.

So the electoral roll dwindles, faith in democracy stutters, leaving zealots to vote in the worst possible governments.

Is there an alternative?

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Lessons on positive campaigning from UKIP

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campaign, candidate, demo, demonstration, election, Europe, Facebook, Janice Atkinson, Maria Pizzey, MEP, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, people, placard, politics, press advisor, racism, racist, UKIP, Vox Political

The picture above was posted by Maria Pizzey on Facebook, along with text as follows:

“This is UKIP’s MEP candidate for the South East. She described herself as ‘Nigel’s number two’.

“She told us to f**k off because we stood peacefully holding placards accusing UKIP of racist policies.

“She offered no debate or arguments to defend her party and despite the chap in the picture asking us to pose for photos, this was her response when asked to return the favour.

“She made personal comments about my body size and when I told her I would quote her widely she said, ‘I don’t care where you f***ing post this, just f**k off!’

“Hilariously, I have just discovered she is UKIP’s press advisor. This is the most rude and aggressive individual I have had the misfortune to come across and she wants to represent this country in Europe. By the way her name is Janice Atkinson.”

The racism debate has been running for some time and many readers may wish to defend Ms Atkinson’s attitude towards people acting in as provocative a way as to display posters accusing her party of promoting such behaviour. In addition, it is impossible to provide empirical verification of the account; given the photographic evidence, there just seems to be little reason to accuse Ms Pizzey of falsehood.

Bearing in mind those caveats, we are told that Ms Atkinson did not even try to persuade the protesters that they were mistaken – she just went straight to the abuse.

UKIP is currently riding high in voting intention polls for the European Parliament election.

With this attitude, one has to ask why.

The Tory Euro threat exposed

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benefit, betray, Conservative, Council of Europe, ECHR, election, Europe, European Court, forced labour, general election, human rights, immigrant, Ioannina Compromise, legal aid, Lisbon Treaty, Mandatory Work Activity, MEP, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, Parliament, referendum, servitude, slave, Tories, Tory, tourism, trial, UK, union, Vox Political, Westminster, Winston Churchill, Work Programme, Workfare

Many a truth told in jest: This Labour advert was withdrawn after claims that it was in bad taste (although this could be said equally well of the television programme it references) – but it accurately summarises the Conservative approach to the European Union and our place in the world.

Here at Vox Political it has come to our notice that some of you are still thinking of voting ‘Conservative’ in the European Parliament elections. This would be a mistake.

The Conservative Party is trying to hoodwink you into thinking it has a host of great ideas dependent on having a large number of MEPs after May 22, but its own manifesto tells a different story.

Here are just three examples:

1. The lynchpin of the Conservative campaign is the pledge to hold an in/out referendum on Britain’s membership of the European Union. The party’s European manifesto states, “The British people now have a very clear choice: if you want a referendum on whether Britain should stay in the EU or leave, only the Conservative Party can and will hold one.”

This has nothing to do with your vote on May 22. It is a General Election promise involving the UK Parliament, not the Parliament of Europe. It is Westminster MPs who would push through the Tory plans for a referendum during the next UK Parliament, not MEPs in Brussels.

The suggestion that the proposed referendum – which is heavily promoted in the manifesto – has anything to do with these elections is a flat-out lie.

Long-term readers should not be surprised that Conservatives are lying again, but this may come as a surprise to Tory adherents. To them, we should say: “Wake up!”

2. One of the “key changes we will fight for”, listed on page seven of the manifesto, is “National parliaments able to work together to block unwanted European legislation”. If this seems like a good idea to you, it may come as a surprise to learn that it is a key feature of the Lisbon Treaty, that was signed by the last Labour government in 2007. That’s seven years ago!

It’s called the Ioannina Compromise, and it means that, if Member States who are against a decision are significant in number but still insufficient to block it (1/3 of the Member States or 25 per cent of the population), all of the Member States must commit to seeking a solution.

It seems likely that the reason the Conservatives are even mentioning it is that this part of the Lisbon Treaty is only due to come into force this year – 2014.

Tories have ‘form’ in this kind of legerdemain, having recently convinced the British public that they had imposed new rules on benefits claimed by immigrants, when these were in fact already enshrined in UK law.

3. One change the Conservatives are determined to impose is the removal of your ability to defend your human rights.

The manifesto states that they will “Undertake radical reform of human rights laws and publish a detailed plan for reform that a Conservative government would implement immediately: we will scrap Labour’s Human Rights Act, curtail the role of the European Court of Human Rights in the UK and make certain that the UK’s Supreme Court is in Britain and not in Strasbourg.”

Conservatives hate human rights laws because they forbid slavery, servitude and forced labour – such as the Tory-led government’s ‘mandatory work activity’ schemes; they provide a right to a fair trial – currently being removed in the UK by the Tories’ restrictions on Legal Aid; and most importantly they oblige nation states to “prevent foreseeable loss of life” such as that caused by the assessment regime for disability benefits, imposed by the current UK government.

You can read about these, and more, in a previous Vox Political article here.

The European Court of Human Rights is – as everyone should be aware – nothing to do with the European Union at all. It is part of the Council of Europe, which is composed of 47 European nations. The Conservative Party does not need a majority of MEPs to withdraw from it.

However, such a withdrawal would represent a betrayal of the Conservative Party’s great Prime Minister Winston Churchill, the man who is considered most directly responsible for the creation of the Council of Europe and the court. Dedicated Conservatives should consider this point well. None of the people currently running the Conservative Party have anything approaching the stature of a Churchill, yet they are taking it upon themselves to cut Britain off from his legacy – and they are lying to the public about how they need to do it.

In fact, let’s face it, the Tory European Manifesto for 2014 is a pack of lies.

The Conservatives currently have more MEPs than any other UK party, but any unbiased examination of their claims will lead to the conclusion that they deserve to have none at all.