The issues that should be (but aren't) election priorities

So, politics is a wide field covering more than just schools, hospitals and bloggers.

Here are some of the big issues that aren't being discussed (so far) at the election, that could (and should) have a massive part to play...

Trident
How we can be talking about budget cuts without a serious discussion going on about cutting Trident just highlights how wasteful our political parties are. The Government has conceded that
Trident will cost the British taxpayer £20bn. Now, not only is that a lot of nurses, it's also a lot of money. Opposition to Trident isn't just within the fringes of society, it is a widespread and morally powerful issue that some politicians are sitting quietly on, knowing that if this becomes a hot topic, their consciences will not allow them to tow the party line.


The Olympics
We, the UK, are hosting the Olympics in 847 days. Usually, in any other country, this would be something to celebrate, to draw on during an election and to inspire positivity during such a gloomy time. Yet, even now it's election time, one of the biggest events during the next parliament and I've not heard it mentioned once in the pre-election build up.

The silence surrounding this £9bn event is typically worrying.

Are we going to produce the sporting equivalent of the Millenium Dome? This is an event which has cost us £billions and will (hopefully) bring in many more £billions, but also has the potential to embarrass or galvanise our country. Yet no real noise (other than repeating an updating press release) at all from the Prime Minister, David Cameron, the Press.

This has f*ck up written all over it and whoever wins the election is going to look like a t*t.


Afghanistan
No, not the funding of our armed forces, I mean the actual conflict. It's not going well. This is never going to be a vote winner for the Government which is why it is not being dicussed.

I believe the total number of British soldiers lost now stands at 279.

I'm sick of hearing politicians spinning the line, 'if you attack us on the war you do not support our troops' and when asked a question on the conflict replying with no detail in the answer but highlighting the courage and bravery of our armed forces. If you respect our brave, courageous heroes, you will discuss the issue properly.
Subrosa highlighted an article in the Telegraph which questions why the Prime Minister is so quiet on the Afghanistan issue and increases the claim that his "antipathy" is worrying. I do now worry and believe that the Prime Minister does not regard the armed forces or the conflicts we are engaged in as anything other than "something that just comes with the job". What is equally terrifying is that I genuinely believe David Cameron is of exactly the same mindset.

Some have said Cameron just doesn't want to look like he's using the armed forces as a political tool because he'd get hounded out. I just don't buy it. Cameron wants to win voters round, in his own words on a "local" level and doesn't register the war in his head.

The war is a horrible result of misjudgement. The public don't support the war (but, politicians, we do still support the troops) and there is no obvious definition of what a win, success of endgame is. This is a major issue for the majority of the country and it is being sidelined during this election.


These are just some issues which I think should be getting more 'Prime Ministerial' attention from the Prime Minister, Cameron and Clegg. The Lib Dems are better on these issues, but the important thing is that Nick Clegg is not. His party 'gets it' but he doesn't use this when being leader. He is playing the 'Prime Ministerial' game which he cannot win and will look like nothing other than a desparate wannabe throughout if he tries to go toe-to-toe on "the so-called big issues" against "the so-called big boys".

I've not blogged for a while so might come back to this throughout the election to see what else isn't but should be discussed. The recession, the credit crunch, all that is being overdone and we are starting to lose focus on who we want to govern the rest of what we do. The majority of people's lives will only be impacted in a small way by the recession and the majority of Britain is not the credit crunch. We need to remember that one way or another, cuts or no cuts, everything else is still there and someone needs to organise it.

Thank you Tony Blair

I will start off this post by saying that Tony Blair got it right. He got it right in deciding to go to war and he got it right yesterday at the Chillcot Inquiry.

Did everything go 100% to plan in Iraq? No. Does anything? No.

So thank you Tony Blair. Many people expected (and demanded) that you show up, explain what you did, say sorry and piss off. Had you done that, it would have set a precedent that if there is a great swathe of (mostly) irrational feeling/anger and ill-informed-oppposition, then the mob must have its way. The number of journalists, protestors, grieving family members and all-round rabble-rousers who were salivating at the prospect of Tony Blair, tail between his legs saying "You know what, you're right. I signed a deal in blood with Bush, I made up the 45 minute claim all on my own and by the way, we did it for oil". Some people need an outlet for their grief and some people just need someone to hate. Blair fits the bill for a lot of people in this, but wrongly so.

Every war, and I do mean EVERY WAR, has had some people who believe it is illegal, or unjust, or not morally sound and Iraq was/is no different. As Blair said yesterday, it was a "divisive" issue and being in his job, he had to make a decision to pull the trigger or walk away. Had he walked away, and left Saddam to it, there would also have been protests from Human Rights organisations saying "you must do something for the Iraqi people" as there had been for years before.

His job was looking at the evidence that was presented to him and judging the situation based on that. Tony Blair wasn't on the front line looking for WMDs and providing intelligence reports. He was presented with reports that said "He's got them". The British Prime Minister's job is to protect the people of the UK but also, as a big player on the world stage, our country has a morale obligation to help out elsewhere where we see injustice, both through diplomatic routes, trade embargoes and, where necessary, military intervention and the day we don't see that as our role, then we are less of a country and less as people than we think.

Tony Blair took the decision to invade and topple Saddam. Why?

Because if he hadn't;
- more people would have been killed, tortured and massively oppressed
- Saddam would still be trying to obtain biological weapons and WMDs
- the terrorist threat, both in the short and long terms, would be higher
- We, as a country, would have stood by and averted our eyes to people who needed our help and whom we could help.

Families who have lost loved-ones in the conflict will no doubt be grieving but that is the risk of signing up to the military. The men and women that take on this role are brave commendable people who understand the risks. A good friend has recently joined the Marines and will be posted to Afghanistan shortly. Am I happy about it? No. But this is what he wants to do and he understands that he might never come back. Most members of the miltary I speak to understand why they signed up, why they are in Afghanistan and Iraq.

I think that the most important of Tony Blair's submission yesterday, which has been printed completely out of context by the Times to help spin it's atrocious article, is

"And that in time to come, if Iraq becomes, as I hope and believe that it will, the country that it's people want to it to be, then we can look back - in particular our armed forces can look back - with an immense sense of pride and achievement in what they did."

Thank you Tony Blair, for being as clear, honest and strong in your beliefs now as you were as Prime Minister.

It's our oil - a new Scotland

Once more I watched that fantastic BBC programme A History of Scotland, presented by the wonderful Neil Oliver.


Last night's episode was on Scotland 1920 - 2000, and was on Scotland's economic decline under various Westminster Governments, mass emigration to foreign lands to seek a better life and industry. It is an embarrassment that few Scots will know anything about these things (myself included). However, last night's episode was an extremely fair, but political, hour.

Towards the end it focussed on "Scotland's oil" and how the benefits it could offer increased the pro-independence/Home Rule feelings throughout the country.

I apologise for sounding like an SNP blogger, but having watched it...we got screwed. I now understand Salmond's ramblings about Norway, about what we could have achieved and could still achieve if we owned our own oil. To become independent on the basis of North Sea oil supporting us is, however, no longer realistic. There isn't enough left, we've missed out on the chance to use it while it lasted to invest in our country and will run out before the full effects would be realised. However, I strongly believe that we can have our own new oil in renewables.

Yes, yes, it's been said before, "we can be at the forefront of renewables technology, leading the way and reap the economic benefits blah blah blah". My suggestion is more focussed.

You may have read the story about the proposed Nigg wind farm being delayed. You may have also read the story about the Vestas plant on the Isle of Wight closing due to planning delays and no support from Government.

Planning delays are the biggest hinderance to any real progress and development (and therefore economic benefit) from the renewables sector. The UK has lost Vestas with jobs lost, and if we are not careful, KBR will decide that £100m could be put to better use elsewhere. We need to give them the signal that says, "No it wouldn't".

First of all, we need a faster, more efficient and more pro-renewables panel to decide the planning process. Aesthetics are, I'm afraid, not a valid argument against a wind farm. We need companies who want to invest in our country, bringing jobs to the remote communities to feel like they can do business here. We also need to make it more appealling and we would do that by lowering taxes for renewables firms. I don't know enough about taxation and I know (before anyone points out) that we currently don't really have the power to do it at the moment anyway, but renewables firms should be encouraged to come here as they would only have to pay minimal taxes, a couple of % each year, maximum. The more they invest, over the years, the better off as a country we would be.

Vestas wanted to make wind turbines, but were given no assistance. KBR wants to build an offshore windfarm and are currently reviewing this as a high-risk project as well as facing delay after delay. We need to do all we can, both for Scotland and the environment. Scots were denied a real voice at the Copenhagen table (and a real voice over our oil). But Copenhagen was never going to fix the problem. To do the right thing, to better Scotland, to be as green as we should and to right the wrongs of our oil, Independence may well be the answer to this sceptic as A History of Scotland has shown that Westminster rarely best serves our cold little country.

Political picture of the day...

As they always say...you should never work with kids or animals......ain't that right Fiona?

The BBC begins advertising...

Some of you may not be aware, but as of today, the BBC website has been including adverts on it's website.

The Beeb, paid for by taxpayers, has very quietly found a revenue stream outwith that of our pockets. However, if you go to the BBC News pages, you probably won't see it. That's because it is (apparently) advertising only "to visitors outside of the UK".

Apparently,

"We've introduced advertising to visitors outside of the UK because the new revenue created will allow us to further improve our journalism, our programmes and our website in the years ahead.

Impartiality is of the utmost importance to us at the BBC and for this reason advertising will be clearly separated from editorial content. Advertising will not have any bearing on the news, information or programme content or create the impression of endorsement by the BBC.

We guarantee that you will continue to receive the same high-quality independent content that has made the BBC website one of the most popular news and entertainment sites in the world."

(here's a basic mock up of how it looks - top yellow box: advert. Side yellow box: where adverts are now being placed also with the OTHER TOP STORIES being moved about 4 inches down, out of view when you first open the page)

But when I went on the website, from my office, in the UK, I could see those adverts as plain as day. That'll be the gap in the 99.96% accuracy then!

But my first big question is...if the BBC is now generating other revenue streams, whether outside the UK or not, will this affect the license fee? Nope - I'm going to guess not. (obviously this is not on the Frequently Asked Questions page, yet).

But my other question is...if the adverts are at the very top of the screen, pushing all the news content down by a few inches, and there is also an advert prominently at the top right where visitors are used to clicking for news links, how can they claim that this is "clearly separated from editorial content. Advertising will not have any bearing on the news, information or programme content". Clearly replacing, not separated. You have put an ad where a large proportion of the 'clicking' takes place on your page and the first view of the page now contains adverts when it didn't before and as a result...LESS NEWS at first sight.

What limits or controls will be put on what/who can advertise? There is nothing about this on the information pages. Is there an ethical list made up, so as not to support anything like the airline industry, the oil industry etc? Could David Cameron or Nick Griffin get an ad on there becuase if it's purely based on "who's got the biggest wallet" then there is a major ethical problem for the organisation.

I am a staunch fan and supporter of the BBC in general but the integrity of the Beeb is in question now. They are resorting to tactics which it is supposed to avoid and all with as little fanfare as possible and to be honest, in these hostile times for the BBC, it is, without realising it, looking for a fight that many will be happy to take it up on - and making me angry during lunch when I'm at work trying to read the news or about Rod Stewart as next Scotland manager.

(P.S. Does BBC Scotland get a cut of this money, I would like to know)

Dear Points of View...

Quote of the week...

"I think that Harriet Harman should run the country. Not THIS country. Some country where there is a possibility of a bloody military coup and she is violently dispatched to be watched on youtube."

Political Dissuasion agrees.

Sometimes racial stereotyping is unavoidable...

Sometimes the material just writes its self...