A Little Bit of Politics.

[f4f3]

So, how long have I given our new ConDem government before passing judgement? Well, about 90 seconds, to be honest, but I haven't commented on them till now. Partly because I was waiting for them to do something, partly because I didn't want to be the one to wipe the spawn off the faces of my Lib Dem friends who'd gone to bed as noble princes, and woken up as frogs.

The theory, as far as I can remember, was that the conscience of the Liberals would rein in the Tories tendency to reward the rich and punish the poor. That the Tories, perhaps, had changed - that they weren't the Thatcherites of old, that they might even had developed a social conscience of their own. I quite wanted to believe that.

However it doesn't seem to have worked out that way. The Liberals have become the nodding dogs of the austerity apocalypse. They agreed with the rise in VAT, arguing that a rise in personal income tax allowance would take the pinch off that extra tax. Despite knowing that VAT is universal, and that income tax is only paid by those working. So, a swift kick at the unemployed with a lie thrown in. (Oh, and a total lack of embarrassment at having campaigned against the Tory VAT bombshell. 

The week after that, Ian Duncan Smith revealed that the age at which a state pension is paid will go up from 65 to 66. His justification for this is that life expectancy is now 84 for men and 89 for women. He didn't say that was for people being born today, not those reaching retirement age today. He didn't say that life expectancy is significantly lower for poor people than rich. How significant is significant? Well it's 63 for men in Shettleston, a couple of miles to the east of me, and in Kensington and Chelsea it's 83.7.

I heard another two things today. One, that the government aims to take a third of people off invalidity benefit. How? Are they going to increase standards of care, introduce new treatments, licence new drugs? Nah, they're going to change the rules so that you have to pass new tests to qualify for the benefit (I nearly said "make you jump through hoops", but I don't want to give them any ideas).

The other was that Theresa May announced a cap on non-EU immigration to the UK, the first time this has ever been done. I feel slightly ashamed, and slightly dirty.

And I'm not even keeping them in power.

Comments

[psychochicken.livejournal.com]

Remember that I didn't get the government I voted for either and I'm not agreeing with everything the one we got is doing but I am trying to see the sense in it, and I see quite a lot. I also see a lot that's guided by tory values and well, although I don't agree with those, I can't criticise an elected government (and they won by vote share as well as first-past-the-post) for sticking to the principles they campaigned on. Whether or not the Lib Dems should have joined forces with them I'm split on - at first I thought no, but I'm starting to think yes.... Time will tell on whether or not that was a good thing.

Ultimately we're never going to agree on politics because I don't share your socialist views. This doesn't however make me a rabid tory. Here - I'm just trying to *understand* what the government is doing rather than butt against it, because in one thing I do agree with them wholeheartedly: we're up shit creek and tough measures are required to get us out.

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

What was the Tory vote share? 30 some percent? On a sixty odd percent turnout? So about 20% of the people eligible to vote voted for them?
I wouldn't laugh about this so much if you hadn't taken me to task so strongly for describing a win with 20% of the eligible vote as convincing back in November...

[psychochicken.livejournal.com]

I didn't make any comment on the quality of the win, I merely stated the fact that they got more votes than anyone else, ergo they won the by vote share. I'm not championing it, merely stating the fact. Sure, more people should get off their arse and vote but short of making it mandatory there's not a lot we can do about that.