Rescuing
Democracy in the United Kingdom from our current Elected
Dictatorship
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Spin, not
face-to-face confrontations with the voters, is the Government's
chosen method of communication. Ordinary
people are dangerous. Ordinary people might ask a question
which throws a politician 'off message'; the Cabinet member
might reveal himself or herself to be a human being like
us, and not a programmed android. Worse still, he or she
might tell the truth.
Ann Leslie - Daily Mail, September
16, 2004
Power
cut, please
Labour's
pollsters have Tony Blair running scared, because they have
informed him that if turnout at the next election is below
50%, the result will be a hung parliament. This would be
good news for those of us who, viewing the damage inflicted
by recent governments, would like nothing better than a
Parliament powerless to do anything. Letter from Ron
Phillips, London W14 - Daily Mail 17/2/05
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Howard
pledges to slash OAP tax bills
A
better life for Britain’s pensioners
Speech
by the Rt Hon Michael Howard QC MP - February 17, 2005
If
you want to know about a family, look at how they treat their
older relatives. And if you want to know about a country, look
how it cares for older people.
People
deserve to be treated with dignity and respect in their retirement.
But in Britain today too many pensioners are not shown the respect
they deserve.
Many
pensioners have become prisoners in their own homes – too
frightened of yobs and muggers to go out even during the day.
Thousands
of elderly patients – people who have worked hard all their
lives – have to wait in pain for operations.
And
millions of pensioners have been pushed onto means tested benefits
– forced to go cap in hand to the State.
Older
people make a huge contribution to our society. Where would our
charities be without the active contribution of the older generation,
who've decided to use their time and energy to give something
back to society? How would many mothers juggle the demands of
work and family life without help from their own mothers –
and dare I say it their mothers in law? And let's never forget
- older people contribute around £200 billion to our economy
- a quarter of the total.
We
are blessed - blessed by a generation alert to what life has to
offer; a generation that aspires to second and even third careers,
towards travel and the discovery of new opportunities; a generation
that accepts its responsibilities to family and to society.
The
older generation don't appear to feature in Mr Blair's New Britain.
No - New Labour's Britain is a young country, a country where
the older generation is airbrushed out.
I
am especially conscious of the duty we owe to the older generation.
Many served this country at our greatest hour of need, preserving
liberty, freedom and Britain's independence for future generations.
Yet
for much of their working lives in the post-war years, the older
generation were actively discouraged from doing the right thing
- penalised for trying to save for their retirement through a
toxic combination of high taxes and high inflation.
I
am proud to have served in a government that did more for pensioners
than any other since the War.
Defeating
inflation, cutting taxes, restoring the incentives to save, transforming
Britain's economic performance enabled a generation of pensioners
to retire having saved more for their retirement than any other
in history.
But
as Frank Field, Mr Blair's own former social security minister,
said Labour took one of the best pensions systems in Europe and
turned into one of the worst.
People
who saved for their retirement suddenly found that the money they'd
put aside simply wasn't there – that the value of their pensions
had been destroyed by Gordon Brown's stealth taxes.
Pensioners
on fixed incomes have struggled to cope with an ever increasing
Council Tax. And Labour has created a situation today where nearly
half of all pensioners are on means testing.
Imagine
if you've worked hard and saved all your life – and you then
have to fill in a 12 page form just to get what you are due?
Pensioners
quite rightly resent means testing.
Over
one and a half million pensioners eligible for means tested pensions
don't claim them – it's complicated, it's humiliating, it's
wrong.
Means
testing penalises the forgotten majority for doing the right thing
– saving for their retirement.
And
it says to the younger generation: "Don't bother to save.
Spend whatever you can before you retire, because your future
is one of dependency on the State".
I
want to live in a country where we honour our older generations,
cherish their wisdom and care for their needs - a country where
they can live out their days in security and with dignity, respected
and protected.
To
those who have given so much, we must surely give what is their
due.
A
strong, prosperous economy is the foundation for everything we
do. It supports our pensions in old age. It funds our health service.
And it pays for our security – our police and our border
controls.
Everyone
has a stake in prosperity. But Mr Blair is putting our future
prosperity at risk. He's let spending spiral out of control –
wasting and taxing as he goes.
Governments
which let public spending grow faster than the economy as a whole
eventually destroy the capacity of their economies to keep growing.
As
virtually every independent commentator admits, Labour will have
to raise taxes if they win the election. That is the big economic
challenge facing Britain.
Conservatives
have clear, costed plans to bring spending back under control,
give taxpayers value for money, stop Labour's tax rises and put
Britain on the path to lower taxes.
It's
why only a Conservative government will be able to meet Britain's
obligations to pensioners and give them a better life.
It
means a Conservative government can afford to increase the state
pension in line with earnings, not prices, to provide an extra
£7 a week for single pensioners and £11 a week for
couples.
By
increasing the basic pension, we will free pensioners from dependence
on means tested benefit. It's how we will help restore pensioners'
dignity and self-respect, which Labour has traded for increased
dependency, turning pensioners into supplicants.
We
will also abolish the government's requirement that people with
private pensions are forced to buy an annuity at the age of 75.
We
will end the situation where the elderly are forced to sell their
homes, saying goodbye forever to their independence as they go
into residential care.
We
will provide security to those who pay for the first three years
of residential care by guaranteeing free long-term care after
those three years, regardless of the value of their house or savings.
Important
as economic security is, pensioners realise perhaps better than
anyone else that there's something even more important –
the values which underpin the sort of society we live in.
As
a society we need more respect, discipline and decent values.
We need to put the rights of law abiding citizens first –
not obsess about so-called human rights. We need to draw a clear
distinction between right and wrong. We need to ensure that actions
have consequences.
Mr
Blair has had 8 years to do something about the problems facing
our country, and now just a few weeks before a General Election,
he expects people to believe he's suddenly going to sort things
out.
Promises
come easy to Mr Blair. The trouble is he doesn't think he has
to be accountable for them. By contrast, we have a Timetable for
Action – a firm, written commitment outlining what we will
do and when we will do it. This means we will be accountable to
people – a commitment Mr Blair can't match.
So
the choice at the election is clear: four more years of Mr Blair's
talk, or a new direction with the Conservatives who will take
action on the things that really matter to the forgotten majority.
Unlike
Tony Blair, we will be accountable to them: a government that
makes a real difference because it cuts the talk and takes action."
Howard
pledges to slash OAP tax bills
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After
a clear vote against them, we still got eight non-elected
Regional Assemblies. When we vote against the EU Constitution,
we'll get them anyway. Letter from P.Cove, Aylesbury,
BUCKS.- Daily Mail, January 31, 2005
THE
TIMES slavish support for the Government worries some
members of the paper's staff, not to mention any perspicacious
readers who are left. Political editor Philip Webster
was questioned about this when he addressed colleagues
as part of an in-house 'masterclass' exercise. Small wonder.
One of his Blair-worshipping subordinates wrote a news
story yesterday poo-pooing the row over Labours anti-semitic
poster mocking Michael Howard, saying it was merely £5million
worth of 'free publicity' for the party. Ephraim Hardcastle
- Daily Mail, Febrauary 2, 2005
Hold
the front page
Further
to BBC bias (Mail), very often on BBC Breakfast and Breakfast
With Frost, coverage of the morning papers is censored.
If the front page of the Daily Mail is critical of Tony
Blair and his Soviet-style Government, it is not shown,
although the front pages of all the other newspapers are
shown. A supposedly independent broadcasting body is acting
as censor for this Government - an absolute disgrace.
Letter from Peter Fish, Chippenham, Wilts. .- Daily Mail,
February 17, 2005
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The
REAL NASTY PARTY- How
Labour is the true home of spite, bigotry and contempt for the
public
For
the health of our democracy, we, the people of the United Kingdom,
must find a way to force Mr Blair to resign
Such
defiance of the democratic process and the will of the majority
of we people of the UK, must be exposed by voters as a matter
or urgency, and not just in the two by-elections we have had this
July and the European elections in June 2004. But how can this
be done?
The
most effective way of getting our deceitful PM to resign would
be to mobilise the army of Labour MPs currently in the House of
Commons and get them to demand it, the loss of their seat to be
a penalty if they did not. All voters in Labour-held constituencies
need to write a letter along these lines to their local Labour
MPs:
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Dear
Despite
his absolute and unequivocal assurances over the past year
of the serious risk to our security of Saddam Hussein's
'weapons of mass destruction', Prime Minister Blair
has admitted, that the threat was non-existent. For that
critical error of judgement and for his gross incompetence
in handling this very important issue, I ask you to take
immediate steps to ensure that Tony Blair does the honourable
thing and resign without delay..
I
would therefore be much obliged if you would propose and
help mobilise a Parliamentary vote of 'No Confidence' in
Mr Blair which, despite Labour's huge majority, would leave
the PM with no option but to resign.
If
I get no reply to this letter, I shall assume you will continue
to support Mr Blair as our Prime Minister. In such circumstances
I shall not vote for you in the forthcoming General Election.
Signed:
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Simple,
non-violent, protest letters along these lines on a variety of
issues could be the basis for re-vitalising our democracy and
increasing voters' interest and participation in politics. Download
a printable copy of the above letter here.
There
is another way for the voice of the silent majority to be heard,
a voice that made sure broken promises would not only be revealed,
but punished in subsequent elections.
In
the year available before the General Election expected in 2005,
many topics are available as ammunition, each one asking questions.
A weapon for our purpose will be the results of Opinion Polls
in individual constituencies using ICM, NOP, Gallop, Mori
or YouGov.
Questions
suggested for this purpose are listed here.
CAST
YOUR VOTE ON A VARIETY OF OTHER IMPORTANT ISSUES HERE.
Current
and prospective Parliamentary candidates of all Parties running
for election could share a platform at public forums in every
constituency. They would be presented with the results of
polls on this issue expressed by the majority of voters in that
constituency.
The candidates could be asked if their own views and that of their
Party manifesto corresponded with the polls, and if not, how they
intended to represent the will of the majority of local voters.
Local and National Press, Radio and TV coverage would be arranged
and the results published on this web site.
Here
is another powerful strategy for using your vote effectively in
the forthcoming General Election. Send your sitting and prospective
MPs a letter defining your requirements if they want your vote.
This example deals with the proposed
EU Constitutional Treaty.
Your
letters would end: "If you do not answer
this letter, I shall take it that you intend to follow the Government
line. I shall act accordingly in the forthcoming General Election.
Or
why not create a questionnaire that you send to all the candidates
in your constituency, getting them to give yes/no answers to questions
of your choice, and ending it with the same paragraph(above).
Download
a printable example of the questionnaire.
It
is high time for the people of this United Kingdom to stop allowing
themselves to be manipulated by politicians. We need our representatives
in Parliament to genuinely reflect the view of the majority in
their own constituency, even if this means going against their
personal and/or their party's policy. While they may argue their
case, hoping to change the minds of the majority in their constituency,
they should ultimately be obliged to reflect the majority view
of those who elect them.
It
will be argued by politicians of all parties that most voters
don't have the knowledge necessary to express an opinion on important
subjects at issue, and that our vote is a form of delegated democracy.
We should argue that it is their duty to ensure that we voters
do have ready access to such information as is necessary to form
an intelligent opinion. That, after all, is one main purpose of
Opposition Parties in our Parliamentary Democracy.
Most
important of all, such proceedings would rekindle in voters their
latent interest and obligation to cast their vote, knowing that
the candidate of their choice would be more likely to act in accordance
with their wishes. A much higher turnout in elections would be
the result.
Contact
your local Party Chairman. Gain his support for setting up public
forums in your constituency on these, as well as any other relevant
topics, well before the next General Election expected in 2005.
You should then, depending on the integrity of the candidate of
your choice, feel fairly certain that your view on any subject
being debated in Parliament will more accurately be reflected
by your representative in that assembly.
