UK: Local Elections 2006

[Garok]

We need a new political party. The "Peoples Party" or something. A party who understands what the man and woman in the street is concerned about. The big 3 parties are all out of touch with your average Joe. I'm not sure whether its a case of cant be arsed to empathise once we've got a few seats in the Commons, or a case of starting off with the best intentions but becomming a victim of the political process and end up being isolated from the electorate whether you want it or not.

Trouble is most parties have (policy wise) blended into one. Then when they get in your pretty much guaranteed that the majority of pledged policies won't go through due to "a change is the climate" or some other bit of spin.

Regarding the way politics works in most countries are pretty much summed up by these two Churchill quotes

It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried.

The best argument against democracy is a five minute conversation with the average voter.

 

[Gamah]

Work for Wernham & Hogg?

Theres a pub called that in Slough, and I did used to work there ;d, before it was that name though.

 

[Benedictine]

We need a new political party. The "Peoples Party" or something. A party who understands what the man and woman in the street is concerned about. The big 3 parties are all out of touch with your average Joe. I'm not sure whether its a case of cant be arsed to empathise once we've got a few seats in the Commons, or a case of starting off with the best intentions but becomming a victim of the political process and end up being isolated from the electorate whether you want it or not.

Its partly the parties' fault and partly the electorates...

If politicians were brave enough to do what we wanted them to do, they would be voted out within one term - and that's if the law/finance/etc allowed them to do it.

 

[Lethul]

monarchy!

 

[Aiteal]

The BNP are racist through and through, they may be more media savvy than they used to be, but I've been following their policies for many years now.
It's no coincidence that the youth wing of the BNP chose the Othala Rune as it's symbol.
Take a look at the books they sell in their online bookstore, sad psuedo-scientific coffee table hate books like The Bell Curve.

Who can forget the C4 documentary on Mark Collet

Immigration is always going to be a problem, who can blame people for not wanting to stay in an underdeveloped country and earn a dollar a day making jeans and trainers for people in the west who want cheap goods. Thats capitalism for you, not that you can vote for anything different, you can only vote to change the managers, not the management system.

 

[Raven]

while i agree imigration is getting out of control, i dont like the BNPs policy on it. the way it should be is no skills no work ethic, no stay, kick them to france, we should encourage the movement of skilled labour. will probably vote independance again next election, fed up of europe trying to throw their weight around, its is not democratic in any way shape or form. would vote conservative in local council elections though. where i live its labour, public services and the housing suck pretty bad round here.

 

[ilaya]

i voted BNP at last euro elections yeah.. does that make me racist? nope.

here's why.

where i live.. south shields we have a world famous marine and technical college.. where peeps from all around the world come to learn their maritime skills. as a consiquence (sp?) we have a very large muslim/hindu/sikh population here. got no problem with them whatsoever lovely peeps, went to school with em and grew up with em.

but.. reason i voted BNP last time was coz of this:

i worked for NHS with their prescription certs yeah. ALL applications by immigrants from peeps were FASTRACKED!. i kid u not.. u an asylum seeker from china (who they at war with btw?) u get priority treatment over pensioners who have lived here all thier lives.

i made my vote in protest on that subject, but here's another thing to consider.

housing prices: i cant afford a house.. neither can i rent one, because they all taken. government response.. build more houses.. who buys em? property letters.

i aint saying BNP are right.. but somebody has fucked up bigtime and it wasnt them...

 

[Lamp]

Labour have really screwed up

And who's coming in to replace worn-out Blair ? Gordon Brown !

He'll either be a spectacular success or a spectacular failure. I'm going with the latter.

 

[Naetha]

I went to Uni with Mark Collett - thoroughly nice guy until you got him talking about anything other than beer.

As for the current state of politics at the moment, its all media spin and hype at the moment. Generally I think Labour have done a good job, and they're doing a better job than the tories or Lib Dems will do. However, they have become stagnant - they need to fight for what they believe in rather than be able to steamroll any idea that they have through parliament. The only way I can see the Labour party really renewing its vigour in politics, is to spend a term out of power, and in that time hope the tories don't do too much damage.

With respect to the BNP, they do have some good points - when it comes to receiving benefits, there needs to be a "triage" type process where each application is briefly regarded, and prioritised, rather than asylum seekers and illegal immigrants getting priority over people who actually pay taxes.

What this country needs at the moment is a huge injection of cash into public services - the NHS, education, council services, public transport etc. Until the government (whoever it may be) can close all the tax evasion loopholes that private companies and people that can afford the best accountants use, then there will be no improvement in public services.

 

[Cadiva]

housing prices: i cant afford a house.. neither can i rent one, because they all taken. government response.. build more houses.. who buys em? property letters.

i aint saying BNP are right.. but somebody has fucked up bigtime and it wasnt them...

That would be the decision that it was a great idea to sell off all the council housing stock which was first introduced in 1919 and then not replace it.

There wasn't necessarily anything wrong with the idea of Right to Buy where people like my grandparents had lived in their home since it was built and paid rent in all that time.
The problem was when they let people who'd only lived in their home for 2 or 5 years (can't remember what the minium was but it wasn't long) to be able to buy them.

That, plus not building any new council housing stock, combined with this stupid idea of a reduction on 'homes to let' mortgages has led to the problem.

Where I live the starting price for a 3 bedroom ex-council house is around £150,000 and there is a real lack of 1 or 2 bedrooms flats. The ones that exist start at around £125,000.
Non council housing starts at about £180,000.

As to which political party's fault this is, well both the Conservatives and Labour have been responsible for it.

At the end of the day, it's the faceless civil servants behind the scenes who formulate the strategies and the policies. Anyone who thinks the Government is actually doing the Governing is probably indulging in wishful thinking.