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
Blair wants to leave his mark on
history - looks more like a stain to me.
Peter Thorndyke, Diss, Norfolk
- Daily Mail, May 23, 2005
I know I'm me - why do I need an
ID card?
"Sorry, officers, I don't have
an ID card. I never applied for one. It seemed a bit steep
at 300 quid. I do have my free passport, my driving licence
and my London freedom travel pass, each with my photograph.
I have my NHS medical card, with its lengthy number, given
me at birth, my RAF service book with my Armed Forces number,
and a chit authorising me to wear a few gongs -including
a General Service Medal with Malaya bar, for fighting communist
terrorists on behalf of my country, or so they told me.
"I've also got various credit cards and
store cards, all with my signature on the back, generally
good for buying the everyday requrements for life as well
as the odd luxury. If you decide to arrest me, I suppose
I'll have to be photographed and given another number, besides
my PINs.
"I'm afraid I haven't got a pension book;
it was taken away."
"By thieves, sir?"
"No ... well, not exactly. By the Government.
By the way, may I see your warrant cards please, gentlemen?"
Oh dear, they've disappeared. E. Harry Gumer,
Romford, ESSEX - Daily Mail, June 1, 2005
NO means NO
When does NO mean MAYBE?
When it's not the answer the EU wants. With the courageous French
NON resounding in their ears, shabby, undemocratic self-interested
leaders of Europe propose ignoring the part of their precious
constitution that requires ratification by all members and
continuing without one of the biggest founder members to
prevent derailing the gravy train.
As in Ireland, they refuse
to accept any NO votes, ignoring the will of the people,
and re-stage votes until they can engineer the 'correct'
answer. Sadly, Foreign Secretary Jack Straw dances to their
tune like a puppet on a string. With tactics such as these,
how can anyone really believe the EU has our interests at
heart. Letter from Steve Penny, Kingsnorth, Kent - Daily Mail, June1,
2005
Surely the French
result makes the £1million the EU recently spent on
a treaty signing ceremony seem a trifle premature and extravagant.
Letter from Keith Wiseman, Bury, Lancs. - Daily Mail, June1,
2005
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Britain has traditionally
been one of the biggest net contributors to the EU because
we do not get as much money back from Brussels in farm
and regional subsidies as our rivals.
According to Treasury
figures, between 1995-2002, Britain's average contribution
taking the rebate into account, was £2.6billion,
or £43.55 per head of population.
The French - the biggest
recipient of farm subsidies - contributed £1billion
a year or £16.08 per head of their population.
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Tony
Blair should know that respect comes by example - from the
top. If a country's leader has no respect for the rule of
international law and no respect for the truth, how can
he expect anyone to have respect. Letter
from P.J.Atkinson, Ashford, Kent - Daily Mail, January 12,
2006
The
Chancellor's single greatest act of vandalism in almost
nine years in office has been his wanton destruction of
Britain's private retirement industry. By slapping a massive
tax on pension funds, now worth
£7.3billion a year, he has helped to turn
the best private retirement industry in Europe into a basket-case
in perpetual crisis. Together with the adoption of European
accounting rules - which make it much riskier to operate
a company pension scheme - hundreds of firms have shut their
final salary plans to new employees and slashed benefits
to existing staff. From
Allister Heath: "I've seen the future and its grey"
in THE SPECTATOR - April 15, 2006
Nine
years ago the British people were sold a fantasy of clean
and competent government of principle and honesty. Its shiny
wrappings stripped away, the product now reveals its true
nature: Personal greed, arrogance, incompetence, shamelessness,
rash warmongering and an inability to accept - as is clear
to almost everyone else - that it is time to go. Editorial
- The Mail on Sunday, May 28, 2006
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May
15, 2009 (1445 days since war ended)
Death
Toll: 3401 US - 148 UK - >1,000,000? civilians - 25 media
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site has had 
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Pensions
apartheid
State
staff could soon retire eight years before those in the private
sector
By
Becky Barrow - Business Correspondent - Daily Mail, May 16, 2007
Gold-plated
pensions for public sector workers have created a dangerous two-tier
system, the architect of Labour's retirement reforms has warned.
Lord
Turner criticised the widening gap between public sector employees
and the rest of the workforce during a heated debate in the House
of Lords. He warned that public sector workers will soon be able
to retire eight years earlier than those in the private sector.
In a veiled attack on the Government's policies, the country's
top pension expert said Britain is storing up serious problems
for the future.
Of
the country's 29 million workers, a fifth work in the public sector
and can retire at the age of 60 - some even younger. But the remaining
four-fifths of the workforce will not be able to claim their state
pension until they are 68 under the Government's pensions reforms.
Lord
Turner said he supports 'good occupational pension provision in
the public sector', but raised doubts about the eight year gap.
He said: "There is an asymmetry when the state pension age
is ... rising to 68 by 2045, while someone who joined the Civil
Service before 2005, even if currently aged only 25, will retire
at the age 60."
Lord
Turner added he thought the highly controversial issue of public
sector pensions 'cannot be considered as fully settled'.
Tom
McPhail, of financial advisers Hargreaves Lansdown, said yesterday:
"The Government is cynically presiding over the formation
of pensions apartheid, where a minority of the population - employed
in the public sector - retires in comfort and privilege, while
the rest are being asked to work extra years to pay for it. It
is madness and it has to stop."
Labour
was attacked in 2005 for a humiliating U-turn over its long-awaited
reforms to public sector pensions. It outraged many critics by
dropping plans to raise the retirement age from 60 to 65 for existing
NHS staff, teachers and civil servants.
During
the debate on the Pensions Bill on Monday night, other peers were
even more vocal in highlighting the crisis. Lord Oakeshott, the
Liberal Democrat pensions spokesman, called for a commission to
be set up to review Labour's plans. He said: "It should make
recommendations on the affordability of public sector pensions
and the changes needed to ensure that the string of long-dated
blank pensions cheques, issued with such gay abandon by Gordon
Brown over the past ten years, do not bounce."
The
total cost of paying the pensions of the public sector workforce
- known as 'liabilities' - is estimated to be between £700
billion and £1 trillion.
And
keeping up the gold-plated pensions of public sector workers will
cost every British household an extra £400 in this tax year
alone. The extra cost comes largely from the fact that State employees
can stop working young and will enjoy the longest retirements
in history because of rising life expectancy.
In
a cruel twist, the figure of £400 is more than the average
private sector worker can afford to save each year for their own
retirement. If
Labour continues to do nothing, taxes will have to rise sharply
or public services will face a savage cut, the Tories have warned.
The
business lobby group CBI - where Lord Turner used to be director-general
- is calling for 'urgent reform' of public sector pensions. The
group's current head, Richard Lambert, described State workers'
gold-plated pensions as a wholly unsustainable burden for the
taxpayer.
At
last night's annual CBI dinner, its president Martin Broughton
slammed the Government's failure to tackle the issue. He said
that Labour has done nothing, while business leaders around the
country have made painful changes to pension schemes which were
unaffordable.
Mr
Broughton warned: "This liability is simply not sustainable."
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