Let’s give these Kippers a chance to come clean

Tags

abuse, clarify, clarity, domestic, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Bill, EU, Europe, Gender-based Violence, home, hypocrisy, hypocrite, kipper, marital rape, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, motion, Nigel Farage, Parliament, partner, people, physical, politics, resolution, sexual, UKIP, violence, Vox Political, women

Farage: The UKIP leader voted against an EU motion for laws to end marital rape in 2006 – now that such a law is going through the Welsh Assembly, would he hypocritically support it?

Back in 2006, UKIP’s then-Members of the European Parliament voted against a resolution calling on member states to legislate against violence on women, including marital rape.

According to at least one UKIP supporter, this was done “simply because of their opposition to the EU and all its works”.

How unfortunate for UKIP, to be seen to support the continuation of domestic violence – including marital rape – simply because the idea of making laws against it was put forward by the wrong people.

That isn’t statesmanlike – it’s childish.

Now a UK legislature has taken forward the ideas in that EU resolution; the Gender-based Violence, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Bill aims to end domestic abuse, gender-based violence and sexual violence.

What a pity UKIP has no Assembly members!

If it did, the party could clarify its position – although this is not without its drawbacks.

If UKIP still opposes such legislation, then we will all know that the party supports a loathsome philosophy – that it is all right to commit physical and sexual abuse against a partner in the home.

If UKIP now supports it, we will all know that it is a party of hypocrites who would think nothing of allowing such abuse to continue, in order to push forward its own agenda.

Without Assembly members voting on the proposed Welsh law, UKIP does not need to clarify its position – but that lets Mr Farage and his friends off the hook far too easily.

Isn’t it time UKIP clarified exactly where it stands on this issue – so we can all be sure to despise that party for the right reason?

(The above article has been sent in letter form to the major national newspapers and the BBC. Let’s see if the mass media can do their job.)

(Note to any readers who are getting bored of all this concentration on UKIP: I promise I’ll write about something else tomorrow.)

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It’s time to smoke a Kipper

Tags

European Parliament, kipper, Lord Pearson of Rannoch, marital rape, meme, Michael Abberton, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, mislead, Nigel Farage, people, police, policies, policy, politics, Scriptonite, The Axe of Reason, Thomas Evans, threat, UKIP, vote, Vox Political

[Image: alecshelbrookeblog.com]

Shortly after Vox Political posted Embarrassment for UKIP as hypocrisy is exposed in the local press, the blog’s Facebook page received a message from one Thomas Evans.

It isn’t VP policy to name names usually, but this gentleman’s tone was so aggressive that he deserves to be identified. On his own FB page he describes himself as ‘Belligerent Ruler of the Planet Earth’. You are encouraged to visit if you want to enjoy more of his pearls of wisdom, such as: “Mental. Thankyou very much to the lefty anti-UKIP article someone posted the other week listing me in the top 8 ‘worst UKIP tweeters’ my Twitter following gave me a much needed boost from fellow Kippers!”

He’s right – that is mental. Or maybe they are…

His communication with me was as follows (in fact the first is much the same as a comment he posted to the blog itself): “The UKIP picture you have published as an article was created by a Green Party member/supporter before the European and Council Elections.

“It’s so outdated it’s cringeworthy.”

Let’s just pause for a moment and look at the caption under the image, which states that “Most of the links on this now-infamous meme have been taken down by UKIP members, anxious to hide the embarrassing facts they revealed. The vote in favour of marital rape is not so easily removed as it is recorded on the European Parliament’s official website.” It explains perfectly adequately that matters have moved on since the image was created.

Back to Mr Evans, who asks: “Are you just recycling out info to damage UKIP or are you genuinely just that out of date?!”

Neither. I was using it as a direct example of the way UKIP behaves.

“The picture makes use of 2010 manifesto policies which have long since been abandoned.

“UKIP’s 2015 General Election manifesto doesn’t come out until September. Same goes for the other parties if you hadn’t realised. So how on Earth can you be critical about any parties policies for an election when they haven’t even been released yet?!

“In fact the only certain policies released by UKIP aren’t mentioned anywhere in your article or that picture so are you intentionally trying to be misleading?!”

You will know, Dear Reader, that this ground has been covered very thoroughly already – here, for example, and also here and here.

So Yr Obdt Srvt was very sure of his ground when he responded: “I checked the accuracy of the information contained in the meme and was able to substantiate everything except the claim about cutting education funding to build aircraft carriers.

“Just because this information has since been taken down (to eliminate embarrassment for the party?) that does not make it any less valid.

“Don’t waste my time with the argument about the manifesto.

“And don’t waste my time with suggestions that I am trying to be misleading. It is UKIP that has tried to mislead the public, and it is UKIP that is desperately trying to cover up its policy indiscretions.”

Alas – as noted in my article earlier today, Kippers don’t like to let the facts get in their way. Mr Evans got back to me with the following:

“‘eliminate embarrassment’

“Eliminate what embarrassment?

“You are referring to past policies as current policies in your article.”

No. He inferred that, but the line “Policies put forward by UKIP or by high-level members of UKIP include…”, although a quotation from a previous article, is as accurate now as it was when it was first typed, a couple of months ago. UKIP, or high-level members, did put forward those policies. There is no reference in today’s article to whether they are from the past or still active.

“Understand this…

“2010 manifesto – 4 years ago for the 2010 General Election
“2015 manifesto – Released in September this year for 2015 General Election.”

None of the references in the meme – or those that were discovered when VP was researching its allegations – are from this 2010 manifesto, though. Some are from the 2013 manifesto, and some are from the party’s own policy page (now deleted, although the likelihood of eliminating embarrassment is muted by the fact that UKIP cannot say it was left there for so long by mistake and still expect to be taken seriously).

“UKIP have only divulged a handful of policies non of which are detailed on the picture you referenced.”

Perhaps they weren’t relevant to the points being made.

“What you have referenced has been discussed to death on Twitter and Facebook and even the Green Party chap who created it has admitted it is outdated information.”

We’ll get back to Mr Abberton momentarily.

“Nigel Farage party leader said 5 MONTHS AGO that the 2010 manifesto is outdated, unwanted and will not be used again policies wise for the next General Election.

“Lord Pearson of Rannoch was the party leader at the time of the 2010 election, he compiled and produced the manifesto.”

Irrelevant, for reasons mentioned above. Now we get to the grit:

“Your comment about ’embarrassing the party’ is more an ’embarrassment’ to yourself. You are referencing outdated information as if it is current policies and information. So what you are in fact doing as you have been informed to this fact by myself is lying to your readers…

“Is this what you are? A person intentionally lying to mislead the electorate? If so please tell me…

“You say that UKIP are misleading the electorate. Feel free to tell me how?

“UKIP have said on numerous occasions, varying members and reps that the 2010 manifesto is defunct and not worth the paper it is written on. It no-longer represents UKIP.

“Yet you are posting it as current information which is misleading.

“You are the liar. You have been informed and if you continue to mislead people with discredited and past policies I will make people fully aware of your willingness to do so and your willingness to mislead people for your political agenda.

“You have been warned.”

Oh, really?

Let’s go back to Michael Abberton, the “Green Party chap” mentioned a few paragraphs ago.

He and his meme first came to attention when it was revealed that the police had been sent to visit him after UKIP complained about an entry in his own blog, The Axe of Reason. He said he knew the image had been on Twitter for a while so he had set about seeing if its claims could be verified.

In his blog discussing the police visit, far from admitting he was quoting outdated policies, he states: “All I had done is promote the party policy using links to their own sources – no editorialising, no commenting. And in fairness highlighted those allegations I could find no evidence for.”

Take a look at the date on the blog – May this year. “So outdated it’s cringeworthy“?

Mr Abberton continued: “About fifteen minutes after they left I received a threatening tweet from a party member I had had an exchange with earlier in the day. Though appearing to be no more than a party supporter, he seemed to know that the police had been involved. I copied the tweet and sent it to the police.”

So we have evidence that Kippers are willing to cause a nuisance with the police in order to silence critics who have divulged information that UKIP would rather keep quiet, and we have a Kipper who has denounced Yr Obdt Srvt as a liar (despite the evidence to the contrary) and who has “warned” that he will act against VP if the blog continues in its function, which is to provide accurate information, no matter what he asserts.

For further information on Vox Political‘s attitude to this kind of interference, see the Scriptonite blog on the same matter.

That is why he got this response: “They are not discredited policies. They are not past policies until they are replaced with something else.

“It is UKIP that is trying to mislead – the party’s attempts to shut down its critics are a clear example of this.

“Don’t think for a moment that you can threaten me. I’m fully aware that UKIP and its adherents like to throw their weight around and I am not impressed at all.

“Now you’d better get off my page before I have you slung out of Facebook for threatening behaviour.”

There will be no tolerance of any UKIP member or representative who wants to threaten this blog, Mr Evans.

That is all.

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Embarrassment for UKIP as hypocrisy is exposed in the local press

Tags

hypocrisy, marital rape, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, UKIP, Vox Political

Not great reasons: Most of the links on this now-infamous meme have been taken down by UKIP members, anxious to hide the embarrassing facts they revealed. The vote in favour of marital rape is not so easily removed as it is recorded on the European Parliament’s official website.

Everybody loves a good political debate in the letter page of the local paper, right? Everybody but UKIP, it seems.

In the recent European Parliament election, the party of right-wing anti-Europeanism won more votes than anyone else here in Powys. Dismayed, Yr Obdt Srvt wrote to the papers to ask whether those who had supported UKIP were aware of the facts surrounding their chosen representatives.

“Policies put forward by UKIP or by high-level members of UKIP include raising income tax to a flat rate of 31 per cent for everyone (a rise of 11 per cent for the poorest; a cut of 14 per cent for the richest), speeding up NHS privatisation (in all parts of the UK), and making it legal for a man to rape or assault his wife (UKIP voted against a law to ban this in the European Parliament),” I wrote.

The response, the following week, was predictable: “Is this likely? I cannot imagine a political party of any hue, anywhere, in favour of such abhorrence,” wrote a UKIP supporter of very long-standing, of the vote in support of marital rape.

“My guess is this assertion comes from the rumour mill in the fibs factory. It should be taken with a large pinch of salt and Mr Sivier should check his sources.”

So I published my source – the European Parliament’s official record, available on the Internet for anybody to look up.

This should be enough for some, but not for UKIP and its adherents!

“It is true that in 2006 UKIP voted in the European Parliament against a non-binding resolution – not a law – to ban marital rape. Context and interpretation are relevant. They did so simply because of their opposition to the EU and all its works.”

Well, now – this response puts UKIP in a bit of a quandary. Firstly, the writer had to twist my words to make his interpretation of the 2006 vote fit – the resolution was calling on member states, including the UK, to create their own law regarding the subject. My comment that UKIP voted, in the European Parliament, against a law to ban marital rape is correct because UKIP opposed the resolution.

Now it seems that opposition has come back to bite them because the Welsh Government is considering just such a law at the moment. According to Assembly Member Joyce Watson, the Gender-based Violence, Domestic Abuse and Sexual Violence (Wales) Bill places duties on the Welsh Ministers, Local Authorities and Local Health Boards to prepare and publish strategies aimed at ending domestic abuse, gender-based violence and sexual violence.

If UKIP and its supporters say they support this law, they will make hypocrites of themselves – publically – in the light of their opposition to such legislation in the European Parliament. If they oppose it, then they prove my point about their policies. Either way, UKIP is shown up as a gang of evil-hearted villains.

Oh, and if Mr Farage and his friends voted in support of marital rape “simply because of their opposition to the EU”, why did its members not simply avoid voting altogether – as that party has done in more than two-thirds of European Parliament votes since 2009?

UKIP has the worst voting record of any British party in the European Parliament; the fact that its members took the trouble to attend and vote on this resolution indicates that they actively opposed ending marital rape and the many other examples of violence against women that were included with it.

It seems these last points may not see the light of day in the local newspapers, as editors can tire of long-running debates.

How fortunate that we have the social media to save the day and bring this important information to the masses!

Feel free to disseminate this article as freely and as often as you like, to get the message across.

Follow me on Twitter: @MidWalesMike

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At last the crisis of British democracy is addressed by a party leader: ED MILIBAND

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communities, community, crisis, democracy, disenchantment, Ed Miliband, Facebook, fair, future, government, hard work, inequality, job, Labour, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, people, politics, Queen's speech, reward, share, UKIP, Vox Political, wealth

Champion of democracy: Ed Miliband told the country he wants Parliament to provide what the people want, signalling that Labour plans to return to the principles of democratic government that have been abandoned by the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats.

Hopefully the naysayers among Vox Political‘s readership will have a little more respect for Mr Miliband after today.

He is the first – and so far, the only – leader of a mainstream British political party to have correctly identified the biggest problem facing our democracy at this time:

The fact that people aren’t bothering to vote.

Here’s what he said, in his response to the Queen’s Speech:

“The custom of these debates is to address our opponents across the despatch box in this House, but today on its own that would be inadequate to the challenge we face.

“There is an even bigger opponent to address in this Queen’s Speech debate – the belief among many members of the public that this House cannot achieve anything at all. Any party in it.

“About 10 per cent of people entitled to vote, voted for UKIP in the recent elections. But – as significant – over 60 per cent did not vote at all.

“And whatever side we sit on, we will all have heard it on the doorstep: ‘You’re all the same, you’re in it for yourself, it doesn’t matter who I vote for.’

“Of course, that’s not new, but there is a depth and a scale of disenchantment which we ignore at our peril – disenchantment that goes beyond one party, beyond one government.

“There is no bigger issue for our country and our democracy.

“So, the test for this legislative programme, the last before the general election, is to show that it responds – to the scale of the discontent and the need for answers.

“In this election, we heard concerns about the way the EU works and the need for reform. We heard deep-rooted concerns about immigration and the need to make changes. But I believe there is an even deeper reason for this discontent.

“Fundamentally, too many people in our country feel Britain doesn’t work for them and hasn’t done so for a long time:

“In the jobs they do and whether their hard work is rewarded.

“In the prospects for their children and whether they will lead a better life than their parents, including whether they will be able to afford a home of their own.

“And in the pressures communities face.

“Above all, whether the work and effort people put in is reflected in them sharing fairly in the wealth of this country.

“The Governor of the Bank of England gave a remarkable speech last week saying inequality was now one of the biggest challenges in our country. We should all be judged on how we respond to this question, right as well as left.

“There are measures we support in this Queen’s Speech including tackling modern slavery, an Ombudsman for our Armed Forces and recall.

“But the big question for this Queen’s Speech is whether it just offers more of the same or whether it offers a new direction, so we can genuinely say it works for all and not just a few at the top.”

Yes – exactly. Yes!

Within the last couple of days, I was saying on the Vox Facebook page that Labour needs to recognise the threat posed by UKIP in the context of disenchantment with democracy: With so few people voting, the door is thrown open to loony extremist right-wing parties.

The only solution is for the mainstream parties to ensure they know exactly what the people will support and offer the electorate what we want, rather than what they want to push on us.

With this speech, Mr Miliband has made it clear that he gets it, and that he is listening.

As the only leader who does – and is – this should put him well ahead by next May.

All he has to do is deliver what he has promised.

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Labour has lost its ideals – now the Party of the People needs to find them again

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Conservative, Daily Mail, economy, Ed Balls, Ed Miliband, Facebook, fairness, focus group, Guardian, hard work, housing, ideal, insecurity, Keith Joseph, Labour, living standard, Margaret Thatcher, Mike Sivier, mikesivier, neoliberal, Nicholas Ridley, opportunity, Owen Jones, people, policies, policy, politics, poverty, promise, reactionary, right-wing, social, special adviser, Tory Lite, Tristram Hunt, UKIP, union, value, Vox Political, work, yvette cooper

Isn’t it desperately disappointing that, after the British people showed Ed Miliband in no uncertain terms that Labour is still going in the wrong direction, his first response was an appeal for us all to rally in support of his values, whatever they are.

No, Ed, no. It’s time the Labour Party gave up trying to force us to accept something we don’t want. It’s time you gave up being Tory Lite. It’s time – for crying out loud, this isn’t rocket science! – it’s time you gave us all a chance to believe you share our values!

Can you do that – you and your pseudo-socialist friends Ed Balls, and Yvette Cooper, and Tristram Hunt (and the rest)? If not, you need to make way for people who can – before it is too late.

The people’s response to Labour’s offer was written very clearly across ballot papers all over the country on Thursday: Too similar to the Conservatives! We won’t have either! In fact, we’ll support a party that is even more madly right-wing than either of you, just to show that we don’t want you.

And that’s just the response of those who voted. Those who didn’t were making an even plainer message: Why bother, when there isn’t a cigarette paper that can slide between any of you?

Look at this response from Terry Cook on the Vox Political Facebook page: “It [Labour] needs to prove it doesn’t share UKIP or Tory values; simple.”

Now look at the graph at the top of this article, showing that the public has lost faith in Labour every time it has supported reactionary, right-wing, Conservative, neoliberal policies – while announcements of policies that actually help people have restored support to the party.

The people don’t believe Labour should be having anything to do with anti-Socialist schemes. Here’s Alan Weir: “Labour lost my vote. They are no longer a socialist party and do not represent my views.”

He’s one of millions of potential Labour supporters, Ed! Why are you slinging them out wholesale in order to gain a handful of Daily Mail readers (a forlorn hope anyway)?

The evidence suggests increasing numbers of people are rebelling against Conservative control – but the lack of any credible alternative from Labour has left them with nowhere to go. In that sense, Labour may be said to be driving people away from democracy and into slavery in a complete U-turn – away from the principles on which the party was created.

Martin Williams: “He is totally ignoring the electorate because these people only do democracy when it suits them!”

Ros Jesson: “Some Labour people… on BBC’s coverage… their frustration with the leadership was almost palpable.”

Ed’s message highlighted his values of “hard work, fairness and opportunity”. What did people think of that?

“I am sick to death of ‘hard work’ being touted as a value, as if those desperate to find a job were of no value,” commented Pauline Vernon. “The Labour Party is still so determined to occupy the middle ground they are becoming indistinguishable from the Conservatives.”

Paula Wilcock: “Half hearted promises, no believable policies. I want to hear a realistic plan of what they are going to do to get voters like me… to go back to the Labour Party.”

Baz Poulton (who supplied the image), had this to say: “Why not actually stand up for Labour values and ideals instead of just subscribing to the same as the Tories? Labour’s support has been dwindling as they have become more and more right wing… Standing more in line with Labour’s original values sees an obvious climb in support, while their desperation to be more Tory than the Tories is seeing their support suffer.

“It’s obvious why that happens, and what they need to do to get the support of their traditional voters who are turning elsewhere now. Labour’s manifesto reads like the Tory one.”

The worst of it is that, looking at the historical context, this is what Labour wanted – from the New Labour days onward. Look at Owen Jones’ recent Guardian article: “For years the political elite has pursued policies that have left large swaths of Britain gripped by insecurity: five million people trapped on social housing waiting lists; middle-income skilled jobs stripped from the economy; the longest fall in living standards since the Victorian era, in a country where most people in poverty are also in work.”

That was exactly what Margaret Thatcher, Keith Joseph and Nicholas Ridley planned back in the 1970s, as revealed in The Impact of Thatcherism on Health and Well-Being in Britain: “Their view was that defeat of the movement that had forced Heath’s U-turn would require, not simply the disengagement of the state from industry, but the substantial destruction of Britain’s remaining industrial base. The full employment that had been sustained across most of the post-war period was seen, together with the broader security offered by the welfare state, to be at the root of an unprecedented self-confidence among working-class communities.

“Very large-scale unemployment would end the ‘cycle of rising expectations,’ [and] permit the historic defeat of the trade union movement.”

This is exactly what Owen Jones wrote about on Monday. Nicholas Ridley put these ideas forward in (for example) the Final Report of the Policy Group on the Nationalised Industries in – prepare to be shocked – 1977.

And Labour – in office – did nothing about it. This is part of the reason people don’t trust Labour now.

Let’s go back to Mr Jones: “For years Labour has pursued a strategy of professionalising its politicians: its upper ranks are dominated by privileged technocrats who have spent most of their lives in the Westminster bubble.

“The weakening of trade unions and local government has purged working-class voices from a party founded as the political wing of organised labour: just four per cent of all MPs come from a manual background.

“Special advisers are parachuted into constituencies they have never heard of.

“Policies are decided by focus groups; a language is spoken that is alien to the average punter, full of buzzwords and jargon such as ‘predistribution’ and ‘hard-working people better off’.”

All of these things are wrong. There’s no point in even going into the reasons; any right-thinking person will agree that an MP who has never had a proper job (working as a researcher for another MP doesn’t count) is infinitely less use than one who has had to work for a living.

What is Labour’s reaction to UKIP’s Euro win? “The likes of Ed Balls want to respond to the high tide of Farageism with a firmer immigration-bashing message.” In other words, following UKIP’s right-wing lead.

Owen is correct to say: “This is political suicide”. In fact, for Ed Balls, it should be a sacking offence. He’s got no business coming out with it and has embarrassed Labour and its supporters by doing so.

He is also right to say that Labour must be more strident about its policies. Not only that, these policies must address the problems that have been created by neoliberal Conservatism and reverse the trends. That doesn’t mean using the same tools, as New Labour tried – because when the electorate gets tired of Labour again, the Tories would be able to change everything back and hammer the poor like never before.

No – it means removing those tools altogether. A fresh approach to clean out the rot – and the vigilance required to ensure it does not return.

If Ed Miliband really wants to win next year’s election – and this is by no means certain at the moment – then Labour needs to rediscover the values of the British people.

And that means paying attention when we say what those values are.

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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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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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[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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Dire day for Tories – so why were the pundits hammering Labour?

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[Image: BBC]

Own up: How many of you stayed up into the wee hours to watch TV coverage of the local council elections?

If you did, you would have witnessed a curious phenomenon. As the Conservative Party lost seat after seat (at the time of writing they have lost 113 seats altogether) and Labour won seat after seat (currently 125 seats better-off), the pundits sitting around David Dimbleby on BBC1 started telling us this put Labour in the poor position!

This, we were told, was because UKIP’s performance heralded the arrival of “four-party politics” – but does anybody believe that? UKIP won protest votes against the UK Coalition government’s policies at a time when elections to the European Parliament were also taking place. Anti-immigration feelings have been stirred up and people have been led to believe – wrongly – that a vote for UKIP will cut off the flow.

In fact, UKIP did damage Labour in areas like Swindon, where they took working-class votes and enabled the Conservatives to hold that council with a slightly increased majority.

But the ‘Purple Peril’ did far more damage to the Conservatives, with Essex Man and Woman voting very strongly for it.

What does this mean, translated to the Westminster Parliament?

The answer is, it’s difficult to judge. Turnout was only around 36 per cent – half the number who take part in a general election – because faith in democracy is so low. This means any predictions are more likely to be wrong than right.

But if the results are replicated, then the Conservative Party will lose seats to UKIP and it is possible that Labour will become the majority party in a Hung Parliament, and then…

… UKIP will do a coalition deal with the Conservatives because Nigel Farage wants a taste of power, and we’ll end up with five more years of David Cameron.

We know they’re already talking about it because Michael Gove has denied it.

To avoid this, Labour will have to consolidate its gains and show that it can make a real difference where it wins.

A good start would be to cut the harmful social policies in Hammersmith and Fulham, which Labour took from the Tories last night. H&F was once dubbed David Cameron’s favourite council. Why? Well, a recent Guardian article showed that the council was selling off its housing stock at an increasingly accelerated rate, while forcing homeless people into temporary accommodation outside the borough. Ending this wrong-headed nonsense would be a good start.

The new Labour administration could re-examine the planned closure of Sulivan Primary School in Fulham, which won an award from London Mayor Boris Johnson at the end of last year after it “succeeded against the odds in improving pupils’ aspirations and achievements”. According to The Guardian (again), campaigners fighting to save Sulivan say it has been targeted because there are plans to turn the site into a new Free School, part of Michael Gove’s silly pet project that has been haemorrhaging money.

And Labour could halt the Earls Court Project redevelopment scheme, which will knock down elderly residents homes – buildings which are perfectly sound – in order to replace them with “impossibly expensive” flats.

The Guardian (yet again) states: “To the Tories of H&F, though, such things are of no value if there’s more money to be made from tearing them up, clearing them out, knocking them down… The council and its friends do not see what they are doing as wrecking. They see themselves as grand creators. They see those they would push aside not as citizens to be considered but non-believers, blockages, impediments; as inefficiencies that have to be squeezed out.”

Labour would score hugely if it took a stand against this merciless money-driven destruction of a neighbourhood that belongs to ordinary people. Elderly people, in fact. Not only are they vulnerable; they are also voters.

So let Hammersmith & Fulham become the example Labour holds up to the nation: “This is what we can do across the country, if you only give us the chance!”

One thing’s for sure – whatever Labour does there, The Guardian will be watching!

Results are still incoming from the council elections, so undoubtedly the ‘expert’ opinions will change before the end – and then we have the European election results to come on Sunday.

A quick anecdote about that: Yesterday evening Yr Obdt Srvt was at a meeting on a completely different subject (a local festival here in Mid Wales – I’m the organising committee’s secretary). Afterwards I was chatting with a friend about the election when a young man approached us in search of the nearest polling station.

My friend passed on the directions and the man thanked us and started on his way. “Don’t vote UKIP!” shouted my friend.

“I won’t!” was the response.

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