Osborne's Not-so-Grand Design

  Well, THAT was anticlimactic, wasn't it?

  For those who pay no attention to politics whatsoever - other than reading this masterpiece of a blog of course - yesterday the Right Honourable Mr. George Gideon Osborne announced the government's Budget for the financial year ahead. This document contains many things, ladies and gents, but by far the most important is that word which strikes fear into the hearts of princes and paupers alike - taxes.

  Now, the Budget is usually one of, if not the most important pieces of legislation of the year. It allows an ambitious chancellor to restructure the UK economy at a stroke, changing the very way in which that shiny stuff we call cash in transferred to and from the vaults of Her Majesty's Treasury. Judicious use of the Budget can make the reputation of a Chancellor, and of a party too.

  But it can also break it. And perhaps that is the reason why this particular Budget has contained virtually nothing of any importance. There is an increase in the Personal Allowance (untaxed income) to £10,500. That is welcome, but is a limited change, considering that such an Allowance still falls more than £5,000 short of covering the minimum wage. The threshold for the top 40% rate of income tax has also been raised slightly, effectively extending the tax break given to low earners to those earning more money. For those lucky enough to fall into the reprieved bracket, such a change will also be more than welcome - for the rest, this is actually a bad thing, as it means less tax revenue for government and therefore more spending cuts to follow. But hey, we're used to that, right?

  Other than this, not a lot has changed. Pensioners can now withdraw their savings as a lump sum rather than an annuity - this makes sense, as it allows people to organise their own spending, but has little actual effect, provided the pensioner in question is able to resist the temptation to spend it all on sweets. Savers have had a break - after long years of irritation over the low 0.5% interest rate, the removal of the 10% starting tax rate on income from savings will surely be welcome. Alcohol duty is down 1%; tobacco duty up 2%. But these are small changes - tinkering at the edges. There is no meat on the rather bleached and sandblasted skeleton of this Budget.

  Why is this? Most likely, Osborne is saving himself for next year. For that will truly be a momentous occasion - the last Budget of this Parliament, just a couple of months before the general election in which the record of the first Coalition in Westminster since the Second World War will be tested. Osborne will be desperate to make sure that that budget goes down very well with the public indeed. It could have a huge effect on the outcome of the election, one way or the other, and the government needs as much money in the bank as possible to create a plan which will inspire the public to cast their vote in a favourable manner. The best way to achieve that, at least in the traditional Conservative mindset which dominates the Coalition, is to keep the economy steady and scrimp on spending now so more money will be available in the future. Hence the tinkering.

  Oh, and give us a lovely new pound coin to keep everyone occupied. Look! Isn't it shiny?!

  Ahem. In any case, Osborne and co. must have access to data I don't if they think that their current approach is going to get the economy to a position in just one year that they can provide an attractive Budget in time for the election. Much has been made of the drop in UK unemployment in the last quarter, but it must be emphasised that this is merely a numerical drop. Percentage-wise, it hasn't budged one iota - it remains 7.2%, currently 2.33 million people. And that figure doesn't include other dependents, such as pensioners and children. There's still a long way to go before Britain is working again. 
  
  Meanwhile, the government - for all its talk of austerity - borrows more every year, with the result that the UK structural deficit is now 5% of GDP. To put it another way, fully one twentieth of everything this country produces is rerouted to pay off the interest on our national debt. The interest Not the debt itself - not by a long way. Despite this rising borrowing, however, public sector cuts continue. All this begs the question - where the Hell is all our money going?! It would be incredibly cynical even for me to suggest it might be to line the pockets of wealthy elites and Tory business partners, but there it is. 

  All in all, not very impressed, Mr. Osborne. For your sake, and your Party's, next year's Budget had better be a vast improvement.

  Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm off to play with my shiny new twelve-sided pound coin like an obedient corporate puppet.
  

Russia... It's not the only place that hates gays

I’m sure we have all read or seen something upon Russian anti gay legislation recently with all the media concerning the Olympics etc however I’m not paying as much attention to that as some may think I should.

Now don’t get me wrong I am by no means a fan of Russia and detest the way they are treating my fellow LGBTQs, however with all the focus upon them currently it is all too easy to forget one simple thing.

There is discrimination  in other countries throughout the world and many at a far higher level than Russia.

The Russian law is incredibly vague which has allowed people to make claims about what its intentions are and what it allows. And thats fine you can argue back and forth about what it allows and how it is discriminating against us it is great to see people so passionate about LGBTQ rights. What I wish is to see that transferred to other countries throughout the world who are for the most part ignored. Also you have to remember that no one has been killed in Russia as a result of this and only a few dozen at most have been arrested. It is still an unacceptable breach upon their human rights and I detest it and wish to see it disappear but I am more concerned about those in other countries who are threatened with losing their life.

So what countries am I talking about at discriminate worse than Russia? Well the list is quite long, however there are a couple that implemented legislation very recently or are going to as a result.

Obviously Uganda, this one was in fact recently challenged in court by activists in Uganda but first what does the anti-gay act in Uganda entail?

You see this bill does infact ban homosexuality completely heres a quick summary:

• Life in prison for gay sex of including things such as oral or life imprisonment for being in a gay marriage.
• Seven years for attempting to commit homosexuality which includes things such as simply kissing a man.
• Seven years in jail if you “promote homosexuality” and/or a 25,000 pound fine.
• Seven years in Jail for the director of any business that “promotes homosexuality” and the business being shut down.

Obviously this is a simplification but I think you can see why this is worse than Russia.

Granted you might have heard of the Ugandan legislation as it has at least been reported on, however not nearly in the same amount as the Russian one has.

So why is this? Well a couple of reasons spring to my in this case one is minor and pure speculation, but I find it interesting enough to consider and the other is more important.

The minor reason is that the problem is fueled at the moment by American Evangelical Christian Conservatives. A several hundred have set up parishes and are preaching literalist Biblical views causing the anti gay views to grow in Uganda, now you could say that the American Media has no wish to report this fact though either way I have nothing concrete in support of it. I just thought it was a possible idea and it does help explain why there is so much anti gay feeling in Uganda and many other African countries as Uganda is not an isolated incident of this.

Now the bigger reason that it is gaining less attention is the HIV or AIDs virus which is prolific in African countries such as Uganda. Now the gay population gets the blame for this problem so some people, mostly right wing americans, attempt to justify the legislation against homosexuality in this way so feel there is no need to report upon such things as it is to them an acceptable concept.

I will point one thing out however, gays do not count for the any significant amount the AIDS problem in places such as Uganda. It is infact impoverished couples that account for the major population with the AIDs virus. This is because they do not have the means to protect themselves from the virus with condoms etc and in some cases, again due to evangelicals and people such as the ex-pope, they are told not to use condoms and are lied to saying that it encourages the spread of aids. Meanwhile the legislators are of the opinion it is the fault of the LGBTQ community so make such things illegal.

There is hope though, organisations are pushing for education of the population of these areas and the provision of condoms etc, so while I cannot think of a solution for Russia apart from perhaps a complete governmental reform. I feel that there is at least a chance for people in Africa as they have legislated out of fear essentially, so bringing media attention could not only highlight the plight but help to promote education and aid in such countries and to highlight those who spread the lies that the gay population is to blame. So don’t just focus on Russia the please do report on it, devote a larger amount of time to a problem we could actually solve.

Finally I recommend watching Kenya as due to Uganda a study has been ordered as to how they can enforce their own anti gay legislation more severely, so keep an eye on them as it is likely to develop in the next few months.

Blood On the Sands

  On Wednesday, a barrage of rockets was fired by Gaza-based Palestinian militants into the southern part of Israel. Later that day, the Israeli government launched retaliatory airstrikes on twenty-nine sites in the Gaza Strip in an attempt to destroy the culprits. For a wonder, no-one was killed - this time.

  But since the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948 countless people - soldiers and civilians; citizens of Israel, Palestine, Egypt, Syria, the Lebanon and other countries further afield - have perished in the conflict which has been a central feature of the Middle Eastern political landscape for long, painful decades. Approximately 16,000 people have lost their lives. And for what?

  The roots of the conflict stretch back into ancient history. The expulsion of the Jewish people from their homeland of Judea after the Jewish-Roman War of 132-135 led this people to spread across Europe, the Middle East and North Africa, facing much persecution for many centuries. After the atrocities committed by Nazi Germany against the Jews during the Holocaust, the victorious Allies - particularly the UK and the USA - felt it was their responsibility to bring an end to the persecution of the Jewish people. They decided that the establishment of a Jewish state in the land of Eretz Israel, as long called for by the World Zionist Organisation, was the best way to ensure this.

  But there was one slight problem: Eretz Israel was part of the British Mandate of Palestine and home to 1.76 million people, over a million of them Palestinian Arabs with a history of conflict with the Jewish nationalists in the area dating back at least twenty years. Nonetheless, the State of Israel was created and achieved independence on the 15th of May 1948. A separate Palestinian state was also intended to be created, the two countries almost overlapping one another (see map).

  The next day, however, the fledgling nation was invaded by thousands of troops from neighbouring Arab  states, beginning the first in a series of intermittent wars which would tear the region periodically apart throughout the mid-twentieth century. During these conflicts, the land designated as Palestinian would be seized by Israel, along with other Arab territories (see above).

  Fast-forward to the modern day, and the divisions remain as deep as ever. There is religious conflict - many of the holy sites of both Islam and Judaism are the same and extremists on both sides demand that they be denied to the opposition; this on top of a deeper inter-faith conflict which has existed in the area for centuries and also includes Christian groups. There is ethnic hatred - anti-Semitism as a phrase cannot be used here, as both Jews and Arabs are Semitic peoples, but there is a definite and ingrained racial and nationalistic prejudice on the part of each group for the other. There is good old-fashioned economic self-interest - the richer Israelis make a good living out of exploiting the poor Palestinians. And there is severe political pressure on the leaders of both sides to continue the conflict - after all, the Egyptian-Israeli Peace Treaty after the 1973 Yom Kippur War led to the assassination of Egyptian President Sadat for daring to conclude peace talks with the enemy.

  And all the while, the conflict escalates. Israel builds illegal settlements on Palestinian soil, destroys shipments of humanitarian aid and launches airstrikes at civilian targets in the hope of picking off a few Hamas fighters. Even as I write this, the Israeli Parliament has passed a law to extend military conscription. The Palestinians respond with missile launches, bombs and other terrorist tactics. And understandably so.

  Let me make this clear - I do not support the terrorism of Hamas. But I do understand it. Whilst there has been in the past clearly fault on both sides, the fact remains that the land Israel occupies is fundamentally not theirs. No Jewish state existed in Canaan for over 1,800 years. That is far too long a time to maintain any kind of legitimate hold over a territory. By that argument, a quarter of the world's surface is sovereign territory of the UK, most of Asia belongs to Mongolia and the coastline of the Mediterranean should be in Italian hands. This kind of reasoning is frankly preposterous. Added to this is the hugely heavy-handed tactics of the Israeli military in response to a relatively minor Palestinian threat - airstrikes in response to the launching of a couple of rockets is the kind of over-exaggerated response that no principle of self-defence can possibly condone. In recent years, casualties in the conflict have overwhelmingly been Palestinian fighters and - tragically - Palestinian civilians, even children.

  The fighting must end.

  Clearly it is no longer practical to remove the State of Israel from the region. The Jewish population is too entrenched and would be persecuted terribly in an Arab-dominated state. But, equally, the terrible racial, religious and socio-economic apartheid of the Israeli state must end. We have to, therefore, push for a two-state solution - one in which both sides have sovereign territory to call their own, so that both Israelis and Palestinians have the security to establish their homes and raise their families in peace. What is more, the Palestinian people must be compensated for the land that has been progressively stolen from them - involving, if not a return to the original 1947 UN plan, then at least a significant redrawing of the status quo.

  If this goal cannot be achieved, the conflict will rage on. More young men will lose their lives in pointless fighting. The lands considered holy by three major world religions will continue to be a battlefield for those same faiths to clash in fruitless war. There will forever more be blood on the sands of Canaan.

Workers of the World Unite! Or Something Like That...

  This famous (mis)quotation from the 1848 Communist Manifesto sums up the general mood of the Year of Revolutions. There was a general feeling among the lower classes across the nations of Europe and their colonial empires that the aristocracy and the rising bourgeoisie had oppressed the rest of the population for just about long enough, thank you very much, and the people were going to do something about it. And though in most places the wave of revolutionary activity failed to achieve lasting change -  Denmark, France and Austria-Hungary being notable, if partial, exceptions - the 1850s saw an upsurge of socialism and trade unionism on a scale never before imagined. For a time, it looked as if the words of Marx and Engels might inspire real, dramatic reform.

  Now, with the death of Bob Crow, RMT leader and surely the most outspoken trade unionist since the 'glory' days of Arthur Scargill, perhaps it is time to look back on the long decades of unionism and ask ourselves whether we need a change in direction.

  Like it or not, Trade Unionism has become synonymous in recent years with a bullying, self-serving group of powerful union bosses who held large portions of the country to ransom in order to preserve their own popularity within their unions. This kind of behaviour was emphatically not what Marx and Engels had in mind. The purpose of trade unions in the 19th Century was to protect their members from the callous abuse of power that many employers chose to undertake. For the most part, they performed this purpose admirably. As employment laws became more and more stringent during the twentieth century, the role of the unions changed. They became policy-makers, becoming involved with the process of formulating new laws. This allowed the governments of post-War Britain to ensure that new economic and industrial policy would be amenable to the workers who had to live by it. But this new function, whilst undeniably useful, had problems.

  Trade Unions placed themselves in the position of having considerable power over legislators - particularly the Labour Party, which they had disproportionate control over - whilst simultaneously trying to continue in their original purpose of championing the rights of the workers. It should be fairly clear to see how this could not be sustainable - one cannot both be part of the establishment and attempt to challenge it. The unions did try, however, and it led to chaos - anarchy in its least political, and most total sense. When Margaret Thatcher came to power in 1979, she was having none of it, and curtailed the powers of the unions so severely they have never really recovered. And when Tony Blair took over Labour following the death of John Smith, that party too began to cut the ties with the now-disgraced unions.

  Witness the modern trade union, then - an organisation largely founded around the personality of its leader, where the individual members have little power. A group associated to other unions through the once-titanic TUC - now relatively powerless and no longer in control of the Labour Party it helped found - many of whom have nothing in common with it and whose interests are as likely to run contrary to its own as alongside them. A political entity reviled by the media, disparaged by government and opposition alike, and whose support among the very people it claims to represent is falling away.

  It would be a shame if the death of Bob Crow also marks the final nail in the coffin of British trade unionism, but to be honest I wonder who exactly would shed a tear if it did? In its current state, I certainly wouldn't.

  But this terrible tragedy, the death of a man who - whether you liked him or not, and I didn't - died far too young and had much left to offer British politics can be used to fuel a revolution within trade unionism itself. Ed Miliband's Labour Party, by removing the unions' disproportionate level of control, has in fact done trade unionism a favour. Now finally separated from the political establishment, the way is open for new unions, democratically organised and without the dominance of the individual we have seen in recent years, to step up to the plate of truly representing the working classes. 

  It would be a fitting tribute to Bob Crow's memory, after all, to create the kind of unions he always aspired to but never succeeded in building.

Newer Labour?

  One week on from Ed Miliband's landmark speech on Labour Party reform, things are looking generally positive for the party. In case you've been in the political wilderness for the last month or so, Miliband's reforms are intended to complete the work of John Smith, forming the culmination of a 21-year process of democratisation of the party. Essentially, the three-college electoral system of the Labour Party - whereby the MPs, party members and affiliated trade unions carry equal weight in elections - is being replaced by a one member, one vote electorate. And this only 86 years after the UK itself introduced a similar system! My, they do catch on quick, don't they?

  In all seriousness, though, this is a significant step forward for Labour. The issue I have always had with the party, and no doubt many others have experienced similar frustrations, is that is claims to be the party of the working people but in actuality concentrated its own internal power in the hands of its increasingly middle- and upper-class MPs and the frankly self-indulgent, megalomaniacal union bosses. These people did not represent anyone much, and as long as the party's fortunes were in their hands no kind of moral high ground could be taken over the opposition. After all, it's hard to criticise the Tories from being in the thrall of multi-millionaire business leaders if your own party dances to just as much of an external tune.

  Miliband, by breaking the stranglehold of the unions and bringing Labour MPs back down to the level of ordinary members, has made good on Labour's claim to represent the people - made it good for the first time since at least the 1960s. However, by cleverly still allowing union members to participate in leadership elections - for a relatively small contribution as compared to Labour party members - he has eliminated the power of the big bosses without narrowing his support base. Miliband's expressed wish is to bring more working people back into party politics - and with these reforms, he might just do it.

  With an 86% approval rate within the party - and this without John Prescott shouting from the sidelines - the reforms are looking popular. It is difficult to imagine Bob Crow and the other union bosses being too pleased, but no-one need lose much sleep over that. Perhaps they will take this as a sign that they, too, should look at internal reform - maybe even deciding to genuinely represent workers, rather than selfishly advance their own interests by holding the country to ransom? We can but hope. In the meantime, though, at least this shows that the Labour support base isn't as idiotic as some of the people it has representing it.

  And with these reforms in place, they might get rid of some of them, too!

  The icing on the proverbial cake, though, is the number and diversity of political heavyweights who have expressed support for Miliband's move. And, whilst the interjection of Tony Blair has put rather a dampener on things (why did he have to go and support the changes? That's bound to put people off) the fact that David Owen - (in)famous member of the so-called 'gang of four' who split the Labour Party to form the SDP in 1981 - has been so impressed with the changes he has made a significant public donation to the party cannot be over-emphasised as a success for Miliband's grand strategy. 

  It is just possible that the man who, less than a year ago, looked like the worst leader Labour could possibly have chosen might actually turn out to be the best thing that has happened to them in a long time.

  We shall see...