Saturday, June 12, 2010

make some cuts, and put us back in control of our lives

in the past 30 years, there has been the war on the motorists, the war on drinkers, and the war on smokers, and thanks to jamie oliver there's been the war on obese people. They all seem like good aims, i mean after all no one thinks speeding to excess levels is good and everyone knows too much drinking and smoking is bad for you, and that being morbidly obese doesn't help you in later life. However here's the thing generally when the government tell's you what do, it is human nature to want to do the opposite. Also in general the nanny state overstate's the case and the risks. So yes for example we all know drinking too much is bad for us, but isn't it up to us if we want to enjoy a few drinks, and is it really fair to keep putting the price of alcohol up and up, stopping people from enjoying the odd drink which they should be entitled to but have been priced out disgustingly by the state.

Then there is speeding, unfortunately as numerous newspaper reports show, speed cameras in general have nothing to do with stopping speeding and everything to do with being a money spinning exercise for local councils and as such is a stealth tax in all but name. Also from personal experience in my family, they penalise people for example going 34mph in a 30mph, when common sense would tell you this is a complete overeaction to put 3 points on a person's license for this. There is also with the war on motors, the constant rise in petrol, where thanks to our tax on petrol we have some of the highest petrol prices in the world, putting many hardworking motorists into debt.

then their is the anti smoking lobby. All the smoking ban has done so far, is kill the pub industry which whether you like or not relied on smokers. The old rules where you had smoker's areas in pubs worked, the smoking ban was just another attempt by the fun police to try and tell people how to live their lives without thinking of the effect they would have on great british pubs.

Then their is obesity, there have been ludicrous attempts to control what goes into our school dinners and control the amount of trans -fats etc. How about we reintroduce this concept of personal responsibility rather than the state telling people what to do, thats to say, you eat in moderation, you don't need to state to come in with their size 10 shoes and all the costs involved, telling you we are going to ban these foods, it is counterproductive and people rightly will want two stick two fingers up at the oppressors telling you what do.

So my proposal to save some money getting rid of all these Government quangos trying to tell us how to live our lives and in the midst increasing state dependency, destroying peronsal responsibility, and increasing state intervention in our lives. So get rid of Alcohol Concern, Action on Smoking and Health, Consensus Action on Salt and Health. That would save millions of pounds. On top of this they could cut the ludicrous amount of tax on petrol- which is harming our road haulier industry which we need to stimulate and get rid of the ludicrous supertax on cider as well as not even contemplating minimum alchohol pricing. On top of this, cut the number of speed cameras in half. There i've saved millions of pounds in waste we do not need, whilst giving people more of a say in life, and if this coalition government truly believes in less state interference, more freedom and cutting the deficit then the good place to start is here.

Friday, June 11, 2010

stand up for Britain's Interests Mr Cameron

mr cameron it is time for you to stick up for britain and stop sucking up to barack obama, his anti english jibes in relation to BP are disgenous, damaging our pensioners. Obama is using a major crisis for electoral tactics because he fears the way he has dealt poorly with the crisis will damage him in the midterms and conveniently forgets the role of haliburton who was involved in the cementing work on the seabed, transocean the american company owning and running the rig, and Cameron International US -manufactueres for the failed blow out preventer which was meant to contain any oil spill. In other words BP has disproportionately taken a kicking from the President. Find your voice Mr cameron if your truly ruling in the interests of Britain. I found it worrying that so far all we have heard is mr hague saying he has heard no sense of anti-british sentiment from the american government on the BP oil disaster, sorry Mr Hague, you must be hearing different things to the rest of us.

If Obama keeps criticising Britain, i remind him of the words Bhopal and Agent Orange, and would remind MR obama that BP have done more than the american government and companies ever did for example in Bhopal. Truly this is a case of double standards. Also a point of clarity for the american administration its Beyond Petroleum it hasn't been called british petroleum for years, so stop this xenophobia. Boris was right to say there is a worrying level of anti british sentiment from the American Government, Cameron needs to follow suit.

this american government from the response to the Argentinian government's belligerent stance on the Falklands, to BP etc seems to be doing the best to destroy the special relationship which I truly believe in. If Cameron doesn't stand up robustly to Obama now, the damage done will be irreparable, as the american government will realise that there is no point in the relationship when they can get away with ignoring its rules. No relationship however strong, can survive when one side is acting like they want a divorce.

Wednesday, June 9, 2010

The EU - Undemocratic, wasteful and anti National Self-Determination- Time to get out

Its funny i didn't used to be a fully blown eurosceptic, i truly believed with some reforms and through tinkering round the edges and getting some powers back we could get the EU to work in the interests of Britain. However the EU's actions on the lisbon treaty, which by the way according to the House of Commons Foreign Affairs select committee is 95% the same as the constitutional reform treaty which was voted down in referendums by dutch and french voters. Clearly then democracy means nothing to the EU, this is worsened by the fact that when Ireland had the temerity to vote no, they were forced to hold another referendum, and in the UK we were stopped from having a referendum because we would give the wrong answer. We give billions a year to the EU, yet it is one of the most wasteful institutions ever, it hardly ever signs off its audit books as its former auditor and now member of Ukip Marteas Andreassen Highlights, and if you think are expenses scandal are bad, you should just look at the EU parliament. So on a cost/benefit analysis of the EU, it is not value for money.

Also as a person who strongly supports national self determination everywhere, the EU undermines national sovereignty and in particular within this parliamentary sovereignty. The Lisbon treaty process crystalised this for me, the EU couldn't care about nations, or democracy and couldn't care about how much money they wasted as long as they moved forward in its vision of a EU superstate. Therefore the conservative/libdem coalition government's approach of getting a few powers back here or there, simply will not do, the only way we can get out of this nightmare is through pulling out.

we need an in/out referendum on the EU it is scandalous we waste money on this undemocratic institution who doesn't trust britain to govern itself. Just look at how it is trying to oversight our own budget, because they do not trust our own national government who we elected, to run their own budget, they the EU commission who no one elected thinks they can do it better.

Additionally EU law which we have hardly any say in and often originates from the secretive commission overrides parliamentary law, this damages parliamentary sovereignty and the only way we can stop this is pulling out of the EU. This is something the conservative right needs to unite behind - recent polls said if there was an in/out referendum over 50% would vote to pull out - we on the right believe in giving the people more power from government and therefore politicians need to realise they are out of step with the British public in supporting continued membership of the EU. It is what the british people want, and in the constitutional reform bill we should push for an in/out referendum. This is because in my mind all the constitutional reform in the bill, doesn't matter whilst we remain a member of the EU which ignores democracy and national self determination.

in summary the EU costs us loads, overides our own laws which our parliamentarians voted on and damages the UK. The conservative right needs to speak with a clear voice on this and I look forward to excellent new independent minded MPs like Mark Reckless uniting the conservative right behind this cause being a nuisance to the government who has not taken a strongly eurosceptic line, and calling Cameron out on trying to ignore the elephant in the room that being the EU.