GO ON THEN... PROVE IT... DO IT

Iain Duncan Smith says he could live on £53 a week.

I doubt if he could.

However, I think the man should be given the opportunity to try.

So I've signed the petition which demands that he do that.

THIS IS A OFFENSIVE IDEA; LET'S STOP IT HAPPENING

I think we have all been agreed for some time that, faced with the fact that Scotland was likely to leave the United Kingdom, the UK government was equally likely to be looking for means, fair or foul, to put independence back in its box.

I am willing to bet that we, as UK taxpayers, have been forking out for members of the security services to rifle through every tiny detail of the lives of anyone in Scottish government, or the YES campaign, to see if they can find anything discrediting about any of them.

Following the success of the year of Jubolympics,  it was always on the cards that they would want another big-money, flag waving exercise to take place during 2014.

In fairness, I would say that it is not likely to be a coincidence that the year of the referendum, chosen by Alex Salmond, will see a grand sporting event in Scotland, one in which our athletes will compete under the Saltire and not the union flag, and that the Ryder Cup will be held at Gleneagles, the first time in Scotland since 1973, and a great showcase for the country, around the world and at home.

So Cameron and his men must have been looking around for something that would allow for a sense of Britishness, like the Jubilee, that would pull people out together to sing 'Rule Britannia' and 'Jerusalem', and wave union flags, hold street parties, etc.

Of course we can still reasonably expect that Harry's wedding will take place that year, but in terms of the English aristocracy, the younger son has never quite the same importance as the heir. It is also not beyond the bounds of possibility that William and his wife might well be expected to be producing children by that time and it would be naive to imagine that this possibility has not been discussed. 

But Cameron needs more than one event of Britishness... indeed the more the merrier.

So, like many of the other ideas he has grasped at in his amateurish governance, he has come up with a bizarre notion that we should commemorate the START of the Great War, the war to end all wars.

Normally, one commemorates the END of a war. In that way the commemoration can be mixed with a celebration that the terribleness is over and a joy that life can return to normal. But 1918 would be too late for Cameron.  Scotland will have voted; the deed will have been done. And in any case, it's unlikely that he will still be prime minister.

We already commemorate the END of the First World War every year at the exact time that hostilities ceased, ie the 11th hour on the 11th day of the 11th month (or the nearest Sunday to that time). We shall do so again in less than a month's time. The Queen, members of the royal family, politicians from all chambers and old soldiers are watched in respect by the nation as they lay wreaths at the Cenotaph in London, in capitals over the UK, and in towns over the world. Politics are forgotten as people pay their respects. 

I have no issues with the various UK governments suggesting that children do special history projects, and if they can afford the money from the education budget, I have no problem this year, or any other, with visits being made to the graveyards and fields of slaughter.

But it seems to me to be open opportunism to exploit a war in which millions were killed and millions more lives ruined, in order to whip up some Britishness.

Cynical Highlander brought to my attention a petition asking the government to reject the plans. You might like to sign it, if you agree with me that this is a distasteful idea.

Here is the link again.

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The result of our poll for the least popular politician can be found on the comments of this post. For those who care enough to know who won, but not enough to go to the post, It was Tony B£air in runaway lead, followed at a distance by Mrs Thatcher, with Cameron in a respectable third place.

PAY YOUR TAXES, GEORGE

Further to the Dispatches Programme which Cynical Highlander highlighted last week on this blog, I came across this petition.

http://www.38degrees.org.uk/page/s/osborne-pay-your-taxes#petition

It is a ridiculous state of affairs that the people at the top of government, and in particular those who are responsible for, for whatever reasons good or bad, showering utter misery on large numbers of the population, to be taking advantage of tax loopholes to save themselves millions in taxes. Taxes which would otherwise be helping to pay down the massive deficit left to the government by the previous administration.

The petition text is as follows:

George Osborne, pay your fair share of taxes!

Stop using loopholes to avoid millions in tax. Start closing tax loopholes and make a real effort to get everyone to pay their fair share.

George Osborne likes to say "we're all in this together." But last week, Channel 4 revealed that he's avoiding paying tax. He pays accountants to help him find loopholes which Channel 4 reckons will help him dodge £1.6million. These kind of "legal tax dodges" cost the rest of us billions.

How can we trust George Osborne to do all he can to close tax loopholes when he uses the loopholes himself?

The government doesn't want to tackle tax dodging, but together we can embarrass them into action. Let's build a huge petition against George Osborne's tax dodges. We can prove that as long as he's not paying his fair share of tax, the public won't buy his claims that "we're all in this together".

I’m seriously incredulous that there are members of the Cabinet who are engaged in this kind of thing...just as the last lot were, except in the last parliament they put their tax accountants on expenses.

Tax loopholes are legal. I’m not suggesting that Osborne, Hammond and Mitchell are doing anything illegal, just immoral, and decidedly two faced when they spout that “we’re all in this together”

Until they plug the tax loopholes they should really be saying “YOU’RE all in this together”.

Pics: Osborne in the drinking uniform of the Bullingdon Club; Mitchell and Hammond. All of them Right Honourables!

The Man with an Ambiguous Relationship with the Truth

Stephen Byers, the Right Honourable Stephen Byers MP, to give him his full title... (Nope, it’s no good, I’m sorry, I can’t say the man’s name and ‘honourable’ in the same paragraph without busting out in uncontrollable laughter). What a complete and utter idiot this man is.

When you consider his career it’s hard to feel anything but complete revulsion for this self serving character.

In his early junior ministerial posts his blunders were legend, like, when introducing a literacy and numeracy campaign as minister at the English Dept of Education, he insisted the 7 x 8 was 54.

As Trade Secretary in 2000 he was responsible for the fiasco that allowed a few people to make a fortune at the expense of the taxpayer and the employees of the Rover Group. A disgusting display that was either incompetence or something like it.....

Then he put Railtrack into administration (and created Network Rail), all over a weekend. The result of this was that we eventually had to give the shareholders compensation after the largest class legal action ever seen in the English courts... all at horrendous cost to the taxpayer.....

On September 11, 2001, Byers' political adviser Jo Moore sent an email advising people that this was “a very good day to get out anything we want to bury", given that the news media were all engaged with what was unfolding in New York. Both of them survived that folly, but clearly no “lessons had been learned” because a few months later a memo from her immediate boss Martin Sixsmith warned her NOT to try to bury any more bad news on the day of the funeral of the Queen’s sister, implying that she had been intending to do so.... Of course Byers, who was responsible for these staff survived.

Then there was considerable bad feeling over Byers’ decision to allow pornographic-magazine publisher Richard Desmond to buy the Daily Express.......

In 2009 it was revealed that Byers had claimed more than £125,000 in second home allowances for a London flat owned by his partner (and where he lives rent-free), including £27,000 for redecoration, maintenance and appliances for this property...... Unbelievable, but he got away with that too.

And now the man that is for hire as if he were a taxi cab, or maybe he isn’t, if we are to believe Adonois and ... ha ha ha , wait for it.... Mandleson...

You see the problem? Who to believe? Made worse by the fact that Harry Harperson says that it’s alright, or rather says that the PM says that it’s alright, no “wrong doings” and absolutely no need for an inquiry. Phew, the whitewash manufacturers in China must be breathing a sigh of relief.

Anyway, he tells this young female undercover journalist that he can get things done, and has. £500 million here, Peter Mandleson there, red benches... no bother, leave it to him....

But then Mandy and the Adonis fellow say they’ve never heard of him, or at least they know who he is but they never talk to him.... In fact no one seems to know him, or want to know him...

What a stinking mess. What a bunch of sleazy self serving liars they are.

I know it would be better for Britain if we elected a hung parliament and benefited from some of the good common sense that Vince Cable will bring, and the influence of the National parties....but there are times that you just wish that almost every man jack of them would get crushed at the election, never to be heard of again.

http://www.gopetition.co.uk/online/34948.html

Pictured: Yeah, twice for a laugh, Stephen Byers.... lovely little man.

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