Let the Green Party join the debate

There is an air of absurdity to the Ofcom ruling that the Green Party are not a major political party but UKIP are. 

Everyone seems to bring their own highly biased view of what should entitle a party leader to take part in a televised debate.  Usually it is the qualification that ensures their own favoured party has a place and cuts off another party.

To my mind, the key determinant should be the number of candidates a party is standing.  There was (and perhaps still is) a understanding that any party standing 50 candidates at a General Election is entitled to a party Political Broadcast.

The same principle should apply to the Leaders Debates.  Not to do so gives a catch 22 situation where a party, particularly a smaller party  is not given the opportunity to increase its support and then the failure to increase support is in turn is used as the justification for not giving it the Party the opportunity to increase support.
 

Great Book by Bill Clinton

Back to work - why we need smart government for a strong economy by Bill Clinton ISBN 978-0-091-94413-1

This was a bit of a shock to read .  A book by a politician full of policy and argument :-O  Actual policies set out, as opposed to cliches recycled and philosophical musing of little relevance to public policy.

It is a concise and easy to understand case for the form of Liberal Government espoused by Bill Clinton.

What was depressing is that it is so unlike any book you are likely to read from a UK political leader.

Bill Clinton takes on the arguments of the Tea Party and defeats them.

He covers the whole range of USA political views, Democrats, Republican, Libertarian, Conservative, Progressive, even Tea Party and tries to show where they ought to be able to make common cause if they follow the logic of the evidence.

It sets out clearly the problems with leaving the deficit untackled and sets out how to tackle it.  He puts a case for Government taking on the argument that all Government is bad.  The shows the flaws and inconsistencies in the particular brand of politics that has dominated the republican party since the 1980's.

Sadly too, it shows how little the Labour party in the UK had learnt from Bill Clinton.  It took the slogans but rarely the policies. In fact the Labour Party in Government was more like the Republicans in the USA -  spending without raising taxes, not reshaping Government but creating more of what Governments do badly.

Hereditary Police Commissioners ?

Hereditary Police Commissioners ?

While our MPs are busy ensuring that their wont be any elections to the House of Lords - they have at least given the consolation prize of elected Police and Crime Commissioners.

Anyway, there hasn't been any great outcry over the dropping of elections to the House of Lords - even Liberal Democrats who are usually reported as ultra-in favour of an elected Lords don't seem too miffed.  The wiser ones
probably realise they do better under the current crazy appointment system than they would do under elections.

So in November you will be able to vote for your 'local' Police and Crime Commissioner.   I bet you haven't been so excited since you had the chance to take part in the referendum on the Alternative Vote system.

Oddly enough many of the arguments against an elected House of Lords apply to elected Police Commissioners. Well, probably not oddly, as politicians, like the rest of us, tend to be a contradictory and flexible lots
There is no great public demand for Police Commissioners, the existing system though illogical seems to work sort of OK, no one seems sure what the purpose of elections is when the are contested in huge constituencies where few people know anything about the candidates and most crucially what powers they have (virtually none)

Elections for Police and Crime Commissioners are already descending into farce.  Third rate ex-MPs who in the old days would have gone to the Lords or become an Euro MP can now sew up a £80,000 a year job on the basis of
the votes of a few hundred party members.

We know that the winner in Surrey will be the Conservative nominee just as we know Liverpool will elect the Labour nominee. Turnout is predicted to be so low that even Postal Vote Fraud will be OK as long a sit ups the turnout.

In contrast defenders of the Lords tend to be enthusiastic about the institution -  plenty of people think the totally and later mainly Hereditary Lords should never have been got rid of. Rather then elections, they warm to the idea of "experts" being appointed to the Lords.

So why not consider Hereditary Police Commissioners - and if they didn't want to take up the post they could appoint an expert in their place until they wanted to take up the role.  It would be alot cheaper than holding elections with a derisory turnout  for a post with no real power.

I am joking. Really Police and Crime Commissioners are a bad idea and should be scrapped.

French Election Result

The choice in the French Presidential election was not inspiring.  The incumbent President has done some good things and some bad.  Mostly I suspect that the job of President is too vast for anyone to do really well. If ever there was an argument for more devolution of power - Presidents are it.

It was disappointing to see 18% of the  vote going to the Front Nationale - a French equivalent of the BNP.   On the other hand, they probably expected to do better than they did and this might be a high water mark for them.

influencing elections - how not to do it

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/doctors-bid-to-unseat-50-mps-in-revenge-over-nhs-bill-7576423.html

It is reported that many Doctors are to stand for Parliament in the hope of unseating coalition and particularly Liberal Democrat MPs.
I am all in favour of people getting more involved in democracy - but don't think this is really the best way.    Firstly, this is the single issue campaign - so where does that leave the candidates on all the other issues ? If you vote for one of these candidates - even if you 100% agree with them on the NHS bill chances are you disagree with them on other issues. Conversely, even if you 100% disagree with an MP on the NHS bill, chances are you will agree with them on many more issues.   Can life be reduced to one issue ? 
Even on a single issue - politics is rarely (never ?) black and white.   Inevitably, politics involves compromise - even dictators have to compromise when they run up against reality.   
Politically, it is also naive. The people most likely to vote for a GP against the NHS bill is most likely not voting for a sitting coalition MP anyway.  So the effect is to "split the vote" of the opposition candidates.  Say a Conservative MP has a majority of 2,000 over their Labour challenger, every Labour voter who switches to a GP against the NHS bill makes Labour less likely to win  and increases the likely Conservative majority - the opposite effect of what is intended.   That is why Conservatives tend not to mind if socialists and greens stand, because they feel that in their absence, many of their supporters would instead vote Labour.  Similarly, Labour tend to be relaxed about UKIP and  independent candidates, as although some people may switch form Labour, they assume that overall it means fewer people voting Conservative.

Thirdly, the NHS bill is long and complicated and is open to many different interpretations - from what I have read, there are something that I would support and others I wouldn't and much that frankly I don't understand.  To me the worse thing about the bill is it seems very similar to what Labour did in Government and not that radical at all.  

So as always the question is what would the GPs do instead ? Leave the NHS exactly as it is ?  How will increased expenditure be funded - what taxes will be raised or other expenditure cut to pay for it ?  Choice choice choices and all politics. Some might even say party politics.  If it is, I believe that is no bad thing.  So instead of standing themselves, I would urge the GPs and others to get involved in party politics. Join the debate, deliver leaflets, go and camapign with party candidates - take part in the process of forming policies.  Make your views know but  strengthen the political process - don't step outside it.

145 times

Ed Milliband (Leader of the Labour Party in the UK) made an interesting speech the other day.
In it he noted a number of points:

In the last ten years the pay of someone at the top of a company has gone from 69 times the average wage to 145 times.

Every time a chief executive gives himself a massive pay rise - more than he deserves or his company can bear it undermines trust at every level of society.

But then he rather spoils it.

He says Labour was seen "however unfairly" as the Party of those ripping off society. Even as he acknowledges that Labour "Was intensely relaxed about what happened at the top of society".

How "unfair" to blame the "intensely relaxed" Labour Government for the massive pay rises!
But Ed has a solution - He rules out the Government setting maximum pay ratios - perish the thought.

The solution Ed offers is - well it's sort of make a speech and the top paid people will see they error of their ways and change. Job done. So as my only contribution to "sending out the right message" I just like to say that noone deserves to be paid 145 times anyone else.