Elections woes
Saturday, 3 October 2009
So the last couple of weeks we have been enjoying the extremely boring coverage of the 3 main political parties' conferences. I have tried to delve into some of the coverage, but I abandoned these attempts for my own mental health. I now fear greatly what is going to happen at the next election, truely fear, as the only truly electable parties (due to the hugely unjust, unfair voting system of first-past-the-post) are truely missing the point of what is happening in Britain today, and the BNP are filling that void- which has even worse repercussions for Britain than Gordon holding on for a few more years (despite what some of the right-wing press will have you think).
Firstly, Britain needs new industry. Thatcher completely ravaged and destroyed Britains industry during the 1980s as she feared the power of the Unions. She stripped whole regions of their one source of income and employment, and then blamed them for being unemployed. By destroying Britains industry, and funding it in the financial industry (which surprise surprise happens to be based in the South, providing jobs for well off Southerners, not unemployed Northerners) she took away Britain's recovery tool for when the financial industry goes to shit. You could say 'she wouldn't have know this was going to happen', but she had a hell of a lot of neo-liberal economists, who must have understood that capitalism is designed to collapse, and the financial industry is the most precarious of all industry. Not to mention, that the Pound has been in a 50 year decline, so by putting all Britain's eggs in the financial market was ultimately destined to fail, as no one is going to want to buy a decreasing in value currency. SO- here we are in 2009, when the financial industry has gone to pot, and we have no means of other trade to get Britain trading again. And here comes my longwinded point- Britain needs to invest in new industry to, 1. provide jobs. 2. provide Britain with something to trade, that isn't just financial capital. So what the next government needs to do is to create a new Green industry. By investing in Green companies and setting up Green schemes such as building carbon-efficient housing and producing environmentally friendly products, Britain can become a leader in Green products, and make more jobs for people around the country.
The banks and big corporation's based in the UK must also be reigned in massively. We can't have the state of our economy put in the hands of money-hungry yuppies. By investing more in Green industry we will take the risk element of our economy away. Huge regulation has also got to come in to stop the banks lending money between each other, and learn that a bank is a bank- it is there in the interests of those who put money in their accounts- not the boardmembers. And a more general point, these companies should be radically restructured, so the few at the top don't benefit from the companies profits more than the people at the bottom to eradicate this vulgar bonus-culture. By enforcing a more cooperative element to these companies will stamp a responsibility into them, and huge risks will not be taken. We must put the economy in the hands of the people producing our tradable goods and people doing good in communities, not some careerist banker. And by creating collective and egalitarian element to businesses they can be transformed into Green companies with low carbon-emissions; whereas at the moment these businesses are not going to become Greener as they are run by the elite at the top who will only change in the name of profit, so the change must come from below. Becoming Green should also come with benefits, and a Green credit scheme should be considered.
By creating new industry we will create more jobs, obviously. And this will quell the problems in communities that are leading to the rise of the BNP. Many BNP voters buy into the view that foreign-migrants are taking their jobs away from them, and a lot of BNP voters do not support this racial crusade that Griffin and the rest of the Gestapo are pushing- the majority just fear for their jobs, and quite rightly. But they are pointing the finger of blame at the wrong people. It is not the migrant workers coming to the UK that is creating this unemployment, as the migrants filled the jobs that many UK workers did not want to fill- such as restaurant jobs and hard labour. But now the economy has failed, these workers are now wrongly blaming the migrants, when it is the government and the banks which should be blamed. So by creating new industry and thus new jobs we can alleviate the problems going on in communities.
Britain needs to be opened up. By this I mean that too many years of Conservative rule and neo-liberal politics has cut communities apart. People entranced with the capitalist dream are so encapsulated by the pursuit of bigger salaries and more things to fill their lives, they have forgot the importance of community. The problems in the UK, that Cameron condescendingly calls "broken Britain", aren't an excuse to up police powers and patronizing social policy but a call to fix the economic inequalities are so rife within British society. We must organise the economy to benefit not those who work in the City crunching numbers that have no meaning, but those who really contribute something to society; people who organise social groups for teenagers, who those who set up charities to help the disadvantaged in their community. By rewarding the people who do real good, people will see the benefits of helping out others, and it will be a chain reaction. By doing this we can also cut down the endless laws that do little to help the lives of most, and decentralise our political system, so it benefits people as much as possible. And the voting system is linked very closely to this. First-Past-The-Post is unrepresentative of general feeling across the country, and plays into the hands of lazy MPs who have had safe seats for years and years and years. By making the voting system more representative it will not only reduce people's apathy as they can see their role in the political system, but it will also challenge these lazy MPs to defend their seats and by involved with their constituents, rather than being a ghost in their constituency who only appears around election time for a few photograph opportunities. By making people feel part of the political system, they will feel a responsibility and take an interest in what is happening, and not just sit by and let things happen.
These are just my feelings on the issue at hand in Britain, but what do I know? The 3 political parties will endlessly talk about where cuts should be made, who is more progressive in social policy blah blah blah blah, but this whole party-bravado is just a distraction from the real issues at hand. There are honest, hard-working people out there, who aren't getting their just-rewards, and are becoming disenchanted with society, and we must help these people, and create a greater sense of community. But will they listen? Will they fuck.
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