Britain and the UN are to slow on Libya

I have to agree with Shadow foreign secretary Douglas Alexander that the government was slow off the mark to send planes to pick up Brits from Libya. In light of the quick responses from many other European countries.

The government now appear to be much more up to speed today after several delays. With a plane on standby in Malta. There is also now a SAS contingent on standby and a special forces support group. I hope they can be used to get the foreign nationals out of the desert camps, where they are currently stranded. Many of these camps have air strips which could be used now. Britain should help other foreign nationals as those countries such as Poland and Portugal have already flown out Brits from Libya.

Of course its not just the UK which has been slow but the UN. These fast moving events prove just how slow the UN are in responding in a way which would of saved lives. Surely a no flight zone for Libyan jets to stop them from bombing their own citizens should of been imposed by now?

Race and adoption

We are to PC in this country. A good example was the adoption priorities.

Race is not the most thing for a child when they have no home. A loving home is the most important thing. Children in care do have their problems on average, so let's help them out and get them out if we can.

Let's not forget to that in today's Britain there is also a large number of mixed race children. I hope these new rules will make it simpler for these children to find homes to.

Can we really leave the European Court of Human Rights?

The European Court of Human Rights is often in the press and getting itself a bad name among the public. This is because it does appear to on the face of it come up with rights for those who we deem to have little rights because of what these people have done.

Human Rights apply to all of us, be them good or bad people. If you start being selective on human rights then there are no human rights in effect, because you are choosing how they should apply and who to, rather than all. These rights would wear away and start to breakdown.

It would be a dark day if Britain left the convention. How could Britain stand for Human Rights while lecturing other countries about their violation of them after leaving the European Court of Human Rights. How would that look when so many other countries are signed up to them within Europe. Do we say that the European Rights went to far for us Brits? But are good enough for France and Germany, Russian and Spain etc

There is often confusion with the European Union and the European Court of Human Rights which is not made clear by our media. There are 47 members who are signed into the European Convention on Human Rights. There are only 27 members of the European Union. The European court would be there with or without the EU. Each of the 47 countries are elected by the 47 states. The judges for these states are equal to the number of states who are signed up to the convention. It is not controlled by politics and nor should it be.

I'm not sure why anyone would be expecting a British bill of Human Rights to effect the conclusions of the European Court of Human Rights. The bill would change the relationship between the courts but we would still be signed up to the European Court of Human Rights.

Remember some of the stories you read on the Human Rights have not actually come to pass and when it does produce a common sense ruling then that is not reported. For example the patients at Broadmoor demanding state benefits under human rights laws, was already thrown out once and will be again because they don't have a need for this benefit. See the Daily Express take on the story here.

Should I be hanged?

The other day I was walking from home to town when I heard a male voice shout to me.

 

"Dazmando","Dazmando, you should be hanged, people like you make me sick"

Me "whose that?"

Voice "You earn £40k and your not happy, you should hang"

"What, where are you"

Voice "Go F' yourself"

I started to walk in the direction of the voice, "Talk to me about it?"

Couldn't find anyone,

 

I couldn't believe it, I'm still a bit miffed, There was no one around, perhaps I'm going mad? I could not see anyone or find anyone there. If your going to have a go at me, whoever you are then please don't run of next time. Talk to me!

 

I'm not holding office nor do I have any kind of power, I just blog an opinion, we all have them, some may disagree with it, that's fine. I see some good in many political theories and you can see my political compass on my blog. But I'm not comfortable with being shouted at, is blogging really worth tha. I don't get paid for this you know, so please just talk to me, I'm happy to talk to anyon. Don't shout at me or claim that I should be hanged, especially when I don't support the death penalty!

 

The above is in relation to this blog 'Sorry'

Yes 2 AV in town

Yes 2 AV are at the Bracknell bandstand for most of the day. Please do pop along if you would like any information on the alternative voting system.

Forests Saved

Sometimes politics throws up some real surprises. One of these is that over half a million people chose not NHS reform or housing benefit reform or government cuts as the big issue for them. This was not enough to spark a petition of half a million people, It was the forests which really got the public up in arms. Perhaps this is why governments don't like to take on middle Britain?

It also produced a real moment during prime ministers question time when Ed Miliband asked if the PM was happy with the plans for the forests, Cameron replied, "no".

I was never a support of the plans myself see 'Save our trees'. I understand the principal of having an agency regulate the forests and others manage it but in this case the system works so if it isn't broke don't fix it.

Doctor Phillip Lee MP does not agree with the NHS reforms

I recently met Dr Phillip Lee Bracknell MP at one of the bars in the houses of parliament. He told me that he does not fully support the coalition on the reform of the NHS using the proposed model for GP consortiums.

His concern is the size and split of services through the consortiums. Too smaller split could be less efficient. This is quite significant as he is the only (I believe) still practicing doctor who is also an MP.

Dr Phillip Lee while agreeing that most of the reforms are good and that changes are required (although he has some more ideas on this, which I won't explain here for fear of misunderstanding them).

He will of course vote with the government on these reforms because he feels he must represent his constituents who voted for conservative policy (although this type of reform was not in the Conservative manifesto).

I hope DR Phillip Lee MP is making clear his concerns to Andrew Lansley, the Health Secretary, as the experience of a practicing doctor and those MP's who were doctors could be invaluable on this subject.

With the NHS being the 3rd biggest employer in the world (Only the Chinese Army and the Indian State Railways employ more people) it is hard to imagine that it doesn't have an administration that is bigger than required.

Dr Phillip Lee spoke very honestly with me which I found very refreshing. I had a very interesting conversation with him about the MP expenses system and other details of his take on the policy within the coalition and what it is like becoming an MP.

I also read that Sarah Wollaston, the newly elected MP for Totnes in Devon who was a doctor before winning her seat has raised concerns about specific elements of the NHS bill while broadly supporting its overall aims but has been knocked back see the Guardian article here.

Sorry

In reply to this post 'I can't support the coalition anymore'.

 

This post was an over reaction after becoming a daddy. It's amazing how protective you become of your young family. I believe if I was still a single man then these tax changes certainly wouldn't of concerned me directly at least. Therefore I did rather throw my toys out of the pram (no pun intended). Perhaps the fact that the withdrawal of child benefit from higher rate tax payers however remains unfair from the point of view of shared family incomes mine being half of what other families with two lower rate tax payers who are just below the upper limit earn (i.e. on £80k against a family on £40k).

 

Lets make it clear, while I am finding my finances more difficult to manage given my new situation which is being a new daddy in a one bed flat with no equity living with my son and partner (who has lost her job for the government). I do understand that I am earning much more than many families and for that reason I am very privileged and fully support being taxed progressively to help people in low income situations. I have done ok for someone who is not overtly ambitious work wise and has not been to university and did very poorly at school due to both my behaviour and learning difficulties and started life on a lardge council estate.

 

So please accept my applogies for becoming so defensive with regards to my family income without considering the fact that others are in much worse situations than myself and are also paying for the cuts required to pay of this countries deficit.

I support the letter from Liberal Democrat Councillors

The main problem with the cuts at local level is the speed. This speed does not allow the councils enough time to implement or manage the cuts in a more efficient and controlled manner were cost efficient methods or solutions can be found or even to allow councillors to understand how their voters want services to be prioritised and therefore plan a controlled reduction is services.

 

I do agree with the coalition that more power should be with local councillors to decide what should be cut which means that less services should be ring fenced. Because if we elect local politicians to make local decision than it is for them to be held to account and for them to prioritise their spending on our behalf. Otherwise if there is to much top down decision making, it makes voting for a local councillor redundant and less clear cut.

 

I also agree with the accusation directed at Eric Pickles (Communities Secretary) on gunboat diplomacy. You should let councillors make their decisions locally or you control them from above, you can't do both. Eric Pickles can't be promoting localism while telling councils what to do.

Multiculturalism

Multiculturalism like it or not is here to stay. Governments can't change the mind of those that already live in different cultures.

As someone who has a baby from a mix of cultures and races I don't see multiculturalism as an issue. The real issue is living separate lives and lack of mixing.

Having more people from a bicultural background incorporating British culture would improve our understanding of each other and breakdown our cultural barriers.

Now please people just get on with it and don't concern yourselves with such terms like Multiculturalism all you need is respect and understanding.

Beware of the democratic

The ruling party in Egypt isn't really fooling anyone with their name 'National Democratic Party'. Surely there is no point in using a title when it is clear that the country is far from democratic.

Still at-least they haven't gone the whole hog like North Korea and called their country 'Democratic People's Republic of Korea'. A blatant two fingers pointed squarely at the USA.

It's a funny old world or it would be if things were a bit more equal.

MP expenses system I don't get it

I'm sorry but I don't understand, Is this expenses system really that complicated to complete? Why are MP's finding it so difficult to complete their expenses? Many people in business manage this every day of their lives.

I imagine MP's may have a point over how difficult this new system might be. I don't know I haven't seen it in operation. Maybe I will ask my MP in our meeting next Tuesday.

In the mean time the Independent Parliamentary Standards Authority has launched a public consultation and they are asking you for for views on the rules governing MPs' expenses. A consultation document list the questions on the scheme raised by MPs and others. The closing date for the consultation is 11 February.

You can sent suggestions to: schemeconsultation@parliamentarystandards.org.uk. Mark with 'Consultation response'. I have suggested that training could be the key as well as online documentation.

They also have a short online survey.  Theres also a public pole see the results.

Maybe we can fix it for them.

I can’t support the coalition anymore

I never wanted to have to write this post, but I just can't do it any more. I can't go on while being kicked in the face by the government and still support it.

I have to admit, I'm not very happy with the coalition from a personal prospective. I earn just a few hundred pounds over the new 50% tax band threshold* (this was an error I meant 40%). Which in itself is fine, I don't mind paying 50% tax on this income. But this put me in the squeezed middle. The movement of the threshold will result in my partner from 2013 will no longer receive child support for my son, a loss of over £1,000. National Insurance is also going up above £35k.

The government have also cut the office where my partner worked. This means that I am the only income earner as we can't really afford to pay for childcare despite the support provided with child care vouchers which would cover about 10%-15% of the cost if working full time.

Also I only live in a one bed flat so I need to move however I don't have the equity for a 10% deposit (flat has gone down in value) so I will need to rent. That's fine I'm not asking for a council house (although I won't expect to get one if I tried, and if I did it would take too long). If the banks offered some better mortgage deals which accepted lower deposits then perhaps this would help. Why are the government not doing more to encourage the banks to lend at better rates?

Before you say it was my choice to have a baby. Actually due to a medical condition we thought that we could not have children. But low and behold we have had a son (Landon), a miracle baby. We won't have an apportion for us its not right (although I fully support the rights of other to have them) and we didn't know if we could ever have this chance again. So actually we had no choice and I'm extremely happy we had a wonderful son.

I also understand that I'm still lucky to live in Britain and not many countries where these benefits would not be paid. But as these benefits exist, should couples like us should not be encourage to live apart to get greater benefits for our son. Surely it is unfair to have one family earning £80k (£40k each) to still receive child benefit when a family earning just over £40k lose this benefit.

So I can no longer support the coalition as it is detrimental to the up bringing of my son. I blame the banks and the last government for the financial mess we are in as a country but I also blame the coalition for the way the taxes and cuts are being distributed. I still support the Liberal Democrats as I believe in what they/we stand for as an independent party. However many Tories or Lib Dems never voted for a child benefit cut which although progressive is essentially unfair to many families in similar positions and does not encourage families to say together.

* This was an error I meant 40%