Silent Majority Speaks
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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May 31, 2005 (761 days since war
ended)
Death Toll: 1,657 US - 89 UK - >6,164?
Iraqi - >17,300 civilians - 25 media
June 17, 2005 (779 days since war
ended)
Death Toll: 1,716 US - 89 UK -
>6,164? Iraqi - >17,300? civilians - 25 media
June 26, 2005 (788 days since war
ended)
Death Toll: 1,737 US - 89 UK -
>6,164? Iraqi - >17,300? civilians - 25 media
July 6, 2005 (798 days since war
ended)
Death Toll: 1,751 US - 90 UK -
>6,164? Iraqi - >17,300? civilians - 25 media
August 24, 2005 (847 days since
war ended)
Death Toll: 1,869 US - 93 UK - >>6,164?
Iraqi - >>17,300? civilians - 25 media
September
29, 2005 (883 days since war ended)
Death Toll: 1,928 US - 96 UK - >>6,164?
Iraqi - >>17,300? civilians - 25 media
October
11, 2005 (895 days since war ended)
Death Toll: 1,956 US - 96UK - >>6,164?
Iraqi - >>17,300? civilians - 25 media
October
20, 2005 (904 days since war ended)
Death Toll: 1,986 US - 97UK - >>6,164?
Iraqi - >>17,300? civilians - 25 media
October
25, 2005 (909 days since war ended)
Death Toll: 2,001 US - 97UK - >>6,164?
Iraqi - >>17,300? civilians - 25 media
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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December
28, 2005 (959 days since Iraq war ended)
Death Toll: 2,172 US - 98UK - >>30,000?
Iraqi - 25 media
Labour's
public sector army to top six million
Diversity
director, cultural strategy programme manager, senior birth-to-three
advisory consultant. Glance at these adverts for non-jobs and
explain again (to us voters) how you're cutting back the State
sector, Chancellor Brown
By
Steve Doughty - Social Affairs Correspondent - Daily Mail, December
29, 2005
Lucrative
'non-jobs ' in the public sector are booming - despite Government
promises to cut back the ranks of state workers. Councils, quangos
and state employers are recruiting tens of thousands of staff
for obscure, highly political or bureaucratic job titles.
A
burden that keeps on growing
Comment
- Daily Mail, December 29, 2005
Bloated
and burdensome, a blight on the taxpayer and seemingly
out of control; can anything
stop the remorseless growth of Britain's expensive
- and too often unproductive - public sector?
Even
Government appears to have taken fright. Last year, it
promised to cut the number of state employees by 104,000.
But how many have gone? Zero. Zilch. Not one. As a report
from the Taxpayers'
Alliance confirms, jobs in Whitehall, town halls and
New Labour's myriad quangos mushroomed by 95,000 last
year.
Public
sector jobs are increasing at almost twice the rate of
those in private industry, which must now pick up the
bill for ever-increasing public sector pay and those inflation-proofed
pensions too. No fewer than 5.8million are employed by
the Government or State agencies. And don't think they
are all in worthwhile jobs in teaching, nursing or the
police.
Advertisements
in the Guardian for public sector employment reveal a
truly disturbing number of non-jobs paid handsomely from
the public purse. Anti-smoking outreachers, five-a-day
vegetable officers, an international affairs coordinator
for London - these are just some of the 23,000 posts on
offer, costing nearly £800million in pay last year
alone.
Public
sector profligacy distorts our enterprise economy. Britain
may pay a bitter price for this Government's failure to
confront a problem of its own making.
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Bizarre
jobs from 'female advocacy manager' to 'supporting people manager'
offer generous salaries and conditions. Successful applicants
can expect to be paid an average of £35,000 a year - almost
40% more than the average pay packet in the commercial world,
a Taxpayers' Alliance
study found.
They
are also likely to receive cars, transport allowances, long holidays,
short working hours and generous guaranteed index-linked pensions
paid for by the taxpayer. The £35,000 salary figure was
the average for jobs advertised in the public sector jobs pages
of The Guardian newspaper this year.
Positions
on offer ranged from a £66,714 -a-year 'diversity director'
for Greater Manchester Police to an 'International affairs co-ordinator'
for the Greater London Authority at £27,489 (which came
with the offer of a loan to buy a bicycle to get to work). A study
of non-jobs carried out by Taxpayers' Alliance showed those advertised
in just the one newspaper this year would amount to a bill of
under £800million for the Treasury.
The
boom in non-jobs, many of which are part of a politically correct
push for 'diversity', continued unchecked as the Government failed
to live up to its promises to cut back state employment. Over
the past year, the public sector payroll has grown by 95,000 jobs.
A total of 5.8million staff - one in five of all workers - work
in state sponsored jobs paid for out of taxes.
Chancellor
Gordon Brown's promises to slash 104,000 central government workers
to meet argets set in a review by Sir Peter Gershon have come
to nothing. So far, not one civil servant or state employee has
been sacked.
Peter
Cuthbertson of the Taxpayers'
Alliance said yesterday: "The Government has failed to
halt the rise of public sector non-jobs despite its clear promise
to adopt the Gershon recommendations. The Guardian's advertising
section is notorious. Opening a page at random reveals a recrutment
page, but not as we know it. Salaries unusual in generosity are
twinned with job titles baffling in their description. Taxpayers'
money is being wasted on job-jobs rather than frontline staff
such as nurses or teachers. Few of the positions advertised are
poorly paid, but jobs that pay least seem to be the most useful.
Advocacy managers and behaviour co-ordinators add up; they add
up to over three quarters of a billion pounds of taxpayers' money
every year."
The
report, based on an analysis of public sector recruitment advertising
in November this year, said that over a year nearly 23,000 jobs
are available through the Guardian, at a total salary bill of
£787million. Posts such as 'female advocacy manager' or
'antisocial behaviour co-ordinator' paid more than £30,000
a year. A 'supporting people manager' could earn up to £46,548.
Many
jobs were said to require only 35 or 37 hours work a week. Others
offered more than six weeks holiday, loyalty bonuses, 'fringe
allowances' and 'additional payment for travelling time and costs
incurred'. Cars were commonly available, along with more money
'for an exceptional candidate'.
In
one case, this offer was made for a job already promising £106,000
a year.
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