The target of political ire today is the tory MP for Totnes in Devon who i heard interviewed on Radio 4 this lunchtime. He's standing down at the next election after using the allowance for MP's second homes - originally designed to allow MPs to have a residence in London as well as their constituency and thereby be able to attend parliament - to claim £87,000 of taxpayers money to maintain his country mansion in his constituency.
He may not be the worst offender in the whole expenses debacle, but he incited my anger by the attitude he displayed in the interview. First he maintained he had behaved impeccably throughout and had done nothing wrong, nor anything to be ashamed of. Then he launched a stinging attack on the government (no surprises there), but not for their own expenses abuses or their mismanagement of the whole affair, but for introducing the freedom of information law which makes these details open to the public.
You see the problem is not that MPs have been abusing the spirit (if not the letter) of the law to claim far more of the taxpayer's money than they should be and that this has been going on for years. No the problem is actually that now the public are finding out how their money is being spent and this constitutes an unwarranted invasion of MP's privacy!
As a side note - if the number of MPs who claim to have made an honest mistake claiming for the wrong mortgage or a mortgage that's been paid off really have made an honest mistake, then we must have the dumbest bunch of elected officials this side of the Atlantic.
Thursday 21 May 2009
Right Wing Nutters No. 1 - Which Century is this?
As somebody who is still somewhat undecided on who to vote for in the upcoming European elections, it is with some dismay, not to mention disgust that I must report that so far the only parties who seem at all interested in winning my vote are the BNP and UKIP. This dismay turns to something much closer to anger on examination of their obnoxious election literature.
First the BNP - "British jobs for British Workers - because we've earned it!". Leaving aside questions of whether they would still be so up for jobs for British workers if the British worker was called Asif or Mohammed or Tasneem, let us take a look at how we've earnt it. Those good old boys in the British National Party have the answer: "Trafalgar, The Somme; Dunkirk; D-Day; Falkland Islands". Trafalgar is presumably included as the last time we beat the French at anything. Hmm - excuse me, but don't three of these at least represent Britain being more involved in Europe? And for that matter, in many of these battles British troops were fighting alongside European allies and the British armed forces (in the Second World War at least) would have included soldiers from among other places Poland and the former British colonies - the very places from which the BNP would like to stop immigration in order to preserve British jobs for British workers.
After this re-writing of history there follows a whole list of things that the BNP would say NO to, but not one thing they would actually support.
But my purpose here is not to critique the BNP. That's not worth the effort - whatever protestations they may make, they are racist and if you vote for them, then so are you. No instead I want to point out how close their leaflet was to the second one i received - UKIP.
The UK Independance Party make more of a pretence of being a serious political force. Whilst completely disagreeing with it, I am prepared to admit that advocating the UK's withdrawal from the EU is a valid political position which can be legitimately argued in a modern democracy. And they have gotten rid of the perma-tanned monstrosity of Kilroy-Silk. But just when I'm almost fooled into believing that they're ready to be taken seriously as political party, one of the spokespeople opens their mouth, and I'm reminded again that they are still a bunch of slightly deranged, xenophobic fools who would prefer to pretend the last 70 years haven't happened.
Even given that, it is actually quite disturbing to see how close their election literature is to the BNP's. The BNP appeal to Dunkirk and D-day, UKIP stick Winston Churchill on the front of theirs. I mean, come on, the man's been dead for 50 years, what possible bearing does he have on these elections? They also have an almost identical list of things to say NO to, and a similar lack of anything positive to propose.
Come on, the European parliament has powers over a range of issues, including economic and environmental ones, surely somebody out there has something constructive to propose to try and win my vote. More inportantly, if you have a vote, use it on June 4th to keep these nutters out.
First the BNP - "British jobs for British Workers - because we've earned it!". Leaving aside questions of whether they would still be so up for jobs for British workers if the British worker was called Asif or Mohammed or Tasneem, let us take a look at how we've earnt it. Those good old boys in the British National Party have the answer: "Trafalgar, The Somme; Dunkirk; D-Day; Falkland Islands". Trafalgar is presumably included as the last time we beat the French at anything. Hmm - excuse me, but don't three of these at least represent Britain being more involved in Europe? And for that matter, in many of these battles British troops were fighting alongside European allies and the British armed forces (in the Second World War at least) would have included soldiers from among other places Poland and the former British colonies - the very places from which the BNP would like to stop immigration in order to preserve British jobs for British workers.
After this re-writing of history there follows a whole list of things that the BNP would say NO to, but not one thing they would actually support.
But my purpose here is not to critique the BNP. That's not worth the effort - whatever protestations they may make, they are racist and if you vote for them, then so are you. No instead I want to point out how close their leaflet was to the second one i received - UKIP.
The UK Independance Party make more of a pretence of being a serious political force. Whilst completely disagreeing with it, I am prepared to admit that advocating the UK's withdrawal from the EU is a valid political position which can be legitimately argued in a modern democracy. And they have gotten rid of the perma-tanned monstrosity of Kilroy-Silk. But just when I'm almost fooled into believing that they're ready to be taken seriously as political party, one of the spokespeople opens their mouth, and I'm reminded again that they are still a bunch of slightly deranged, xenophobic fools who would prefer to pretend the last 70 years haven't happened.
Even given that, it is actually quite disturbing to see how close their election literature is to the BNP's. The BNP appeal to Dunkirk and D-day, UKIP stick Winston Churchill on the front of theirs. I mean, come on, the man's been dead for 50 years, what possible bearing does he have on these elections? They also have an almost identical list of things to say NO to, and a similar lack of anything positive to propose.
Come on, the European parliament has powers over a range of issues, including economic and environmental ones, surely somebody out there has something constructive to propose to try and win my vote. More inportantly, if you have a vote, use it on June 4th to keep these nutters out.
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