Leave won the 2019 EU election in the UK.

Yes it did.

What the pro-EU commentary is forgetting is that the Conservative Party's official position on Brexit is Leave, albeit with a deal. Indeed, up until only very recently, Labour's position was the same, albeit arguing over the deal - Labour's position has only recently become more ambiguous.

So take the share of the hard Brexit vote (Brexit Party + UKIP) and one arrives at 34.9%, but add the Conservative share (9.1%), and you arrive at 44% for Leave. There is also an argument for adding in Labour's share of the vote (since their manifesto commitment of less than 2 years ago was to honour the result of the 2016 referendum), and Leave has 58.1% - that's a pretty clear majority, and up 6% on the 2016 referendum.

Compare the equivalent for the Remain parties (LD, Green, SNP, PC and Change UK) and you have only 40.4%. (41.9% if you add in all the other smaller parties and independents - which, btw, are not all Remain.)

This can, indeed, be considered an indicative "2nd referendum" or "Peoples' Vote", and if you are to do so, you have to consider it along the following lines. Indeed the Remainers I have discussed this with agree this approach would be fair, so as not to split the Leave vote:

The choices are:

Leave with a deal
Leave with no deal
Remain

The caveat is that if the combined Leave vote exceeds Remain, then it is accepted that the UK still wants to leave the EU, and then the choice is between Deal or No Deal.

On the results from last week, this would be:

23% Leave with a deal (Combined Labour and Conservative vote)
35% Leave with no deal (Combined Brexit Party and UKIP vote)
42% Remain (Combined Remainder)

Leave wins, and Leave with no Deal wins.

Another, undeniable fact about these results is that there is a clear advance in hard Brexit support since the last EU elections in 2014: then UKIP scored 27% of the vote, but the combined UKIP and Brexit Party vote in 2019 reaches 35% - an increase of 8%.

Any other construction on this is a continuation of the attempt by Extremist Hard Line Remainers (EHLRs) to overturn the 2016 result and pervert democracy to serve their own interests. The spin put, by EHLRs on these EU election results is, in itself, evidence that they will employ selective, subjective statistical analysis and renege on prior assurances to honour the process and outcomes of a public vote.

The anguish, chaos, divisiveness and uncertainty that has prevailed since June 2016, it not the fault of Brexit, nor the fault of Brexiteers. It is, partly, a problem of the inevitable delay from the decision to Leave being made to being implemented. But that situation has being exploited by EHLRs in their flat refusal to accept the outcome - using a shopping list of inconsistent excuses that they only suddenly decided to cite after the event, when they had ample opportunity to address them beforehand.

EHLRs did not accept the 2016 referendum result (despite saying they would). Given that, and this latest spin, there is every reason to believe their reaction to a Leave win in a 2nd Referendum or "Peoples' Vote" would be repeated.

2019s EU election results in the UK clearly demonstrate both that leaving the EU still has a clear mandate and that, no matter how many votes we have on the issue, there is a extremist agenda that will stop at nothing to overturn it.

Brexit Surely Now Has It's Mandate.

The Election result shows there is clear majority public support for Brexit, or certainly little to no appetite for disrupting or attempting to reverse the decision taken a year ago.

Both the Conservative and Labour manifestos indicated their commitment to honouring the result of last year’s referendum, albeit with some differences in approach and what exactly Brexit will entail. Moreover, neither party were offering a 2^nd referendum on the matter: either on a final deal or an option for remaining.

Contrast the Liberal Democrats, SNP and Greens who have been unequivocal in their opposition to Brexit: Both the LibDems and the Greens want a 2^nd referendum and the SNP want a 2^nd independence referendum for Scotland before the UK leaves the EU to gain Scotland the option of remaining.

Having now secured manifesto commitments to leaving the EU in the two most powerful of UK’s political parties, UKIPs raison d’etre is close to extinction. Now styling themselves as the “guard dog of Brexit”, their remaining function is, indeed, to keep watch over the process, with the threat of making a comeback if the government starts conceding too much over the next 2 years. Their electoral fortunes will remain inversely related to the extent to which the UK extricates itself from the EU.

Looking at the result in the context of the above, one can actually discern a uniform swing in last Thursday’s vote: away from those who most vociferously campaigned on both sides of the Brexit argument, to those who have the power and commitment to honour the outcome.

As I said, both Conservative and Labour, are committed, to varying degrees of detail, to securing the UK’s withdrawal from the EU, and, between them, polled 82.3% of the popular vote. (If you add in UKIP and the DUP, you get 85%). If you want to factor in the turnout at this election, which was 68.7%, you get a clear 58% of those eligible to vote, supporting a party that had a manifesto commitment to honouring Brexit.

Now given the apparent consternation at last year’s referendum result, and given there appeared to be no other option on the table of “changing your mind” over Brexit, would now not have been the time to seize this election as the most powerful opportunity to vote for dissent at the outcome of last year’s result?

Yet those parties with the strongest dissenting voices saw a fall in their share of the votes, both individually, and aggregately: the LibDems actually had their worst share of the vote in a General Election ever; the Green Party saw its vote halved since 2015; and Scotland saw a massive 13% swing away from the SNP to the Conservatives.

Now you’d be forgiven for thinking otherwise, with the post-polls media coverage, but this election saw the Conservatives poll their largest share of the vote since the Conservative landslide of 1983. Their vote share increased by 5.5% since 2015, and Labour’s increased by nearly 10%. Both parties were committed to remaining in the EU in their 2015 manifestos, both committed to have Britain leave it in 2017. There’s a correlation that cannot be ignored.

We have had four national votes: one every year since 2014, in which the subject of Britain’s membership of the EU has been either a major, or the only, issue. Under any analysis, the only reasonable and objective conclusion from the results, is that there is a clear mandate for Brexit in principle. The details of what “Brexit” will mean are to be negotiated during the 2 year window period provided for by Article 50 – that’s what it’s there for. Let’s get on with it.

Have a Heart Felt Hug . .

by Phil Cockayne.

Having been addicted to political debate for most of my life, I know very how impassioned it can become. And I know how devastating it can feel, and upsetting it can be, when something you believe in is defeated or overturned and particularly when it comes as a shock.

It is from those very experiences that I evolved my current political belief in Individualism: so if you voted Remain on Thursday, and are angry today, I genuinely understand how you may feel that you've been personally betrayed, that you've not been heard and even that you've had your rights taken away, amongst, I'm sure, many other thoughts and emotions.

This is the price of democracy: you cast a vote in the expectation that it will deliver what you want, yet, often, it delivers victory to your opponent and leaves you wanting. Democracy has its use but it is too often conflated with the concept of Freedom, which is something different. Freedom recognises the sovereignty of you, the individual, over any sovereignty of the majority.

That is why I believe in less government, less laws, less tax. The more control each of us has over our own life, the more the majority of individuals will be happier, and less resentful of each other. There are some areas of the UK that have seven tiers of government. The EU is one of those tiers. Where democracy is expedient, I believe that it should be as close to the people it serves as possible so that it is accountable. Hence, since this is what I believe, it is rational for me to want to start 'at the top' when it comes to trimming down government, which is why I voted Leave this week.

My first thoughts to the angry reaction at Thursday's result, was "accept it and move on", but this isn't helpful to you if you have been, or are still, feeling inconsolable and let down. So if you are still pissed off and feel the need to vent your spleen, do it. Don't internalise it. I genuinely understand how you feel: I have been there many a time myself, and have thrown my toys out of the cot so often in the past, most of them are now broken.

Over time, (and that time will be different for each individual), I am confident that anger and despair will evaporate. The future is always guaranteed to come with a few bumps and difficulties whichever path you choose to take, or whichever road your are forced to travel.

When you are ready, and in your own time, take a deep breath, sit down or go for a walk in a quiet and tranquil place and meditate over what you would do if you had that little bit more control over your own life: for this is where it begins.

UKIP calm and reason with some facts

Why I am voting UKIP on 22^nd May.

Firstly, and most importantly, I don’t agree with UKIP and Farage 100%: I do not agree with the way Farage has used what is, admittedly, a scare-mongering message, over and over again, about “opening our doors” to “29 million Romanians and Bulgarians” or “485 million Europeans”. It’s a bit lazy and crass (and potentially offensive to Romanians and Bulgarians) and whilst I don’t think it’s racially motivated in itself, it is certainly likely to pander to racist sentiment. It’s also not necessary and I think misdirects from what are, otherwise, some very solid arguments he has in other areas for being skeptical about the European Union.

Where I do agree with Farage is on the Euro and the legislative powers of the EU.

The Euro has proved an utter disaster and has left much of Southern Europe in a very desperate situation. A single European Currency, overseen by one bank is (and indeed has proved to be) a very dangerous monopolistic situation. The stability the Euro promised to bring has proved to be precisely the opposite with unsustainable and crippling debt levels leaving people poor and utterly disempowered. The consequences of such have been seen in much unrest across the South of the continent. Nigel Farage correctly predicted almost all of it, at almost every turn.

During the Clegg v Farage debates there was much disagreement about the exact percentage of laws that govern the UK that are made in Brussels. But one irrefutable fact is clear: some are. To me, the principal that unelected, unaccountable institutions can pass laws that tell you and me what to do, without one shred of our consent is nothing short of tyranny. Now, some of these laws may be ‘motherhood and apple pie’ to some people, but, unfortunately, that is not true for all, and, moreover, unless you can get rid of the people who make your laws, they are free to do whatever they like. The European Parliament is only one of the legislative institutions of the EU, the others being the Council of the EU and The European Commission – which are unelected. Now, admittedly, the Parliament has had increasing legislative powers over time (ceded from the Council and Commission), but it is still a very large and remote body – reason tells you that democratic accountability is better served by smaller, local bodies, closer to the electorate and, the problem with the Parliament being granted more powers is that indeed, national (and intra-national/regional and local) sovereignty and answerability will be further eroded, moving power further away from the people whom such entities are supposed to serve.

Let’s now turn to the issue of border controls and free trade.

Ideologically, as a libertarian, I am fully in favour of the free movement of peoples across national boundaries. Moreover, not just within a club of countries (such as the EU), but the world over. There are however and unfortunately, practical obstacles to this. The polarisation of wealth occurs not just the world over, but also within nation states themselves. Now whilst I appreciate that free movement, in the longer term, would go a long way to addressing such imbalances on a supra-national level, it is likely to cause problems and resentment within a single country. The tragedy being that it will not be, for example, the richest in the UK who have their wealth redistributed by cheaper labour from immigrants, but the poorest (who have precious little if any wealth themselves), and the big businesses who profit further from reduced labour costs.

And, I have noticed a conspicuous absence of any mention about the fact that the EU, itself, has border controls. Google “Frontex”, which is the EU’s border control agency, (or “border management” as the preferred phrase) and peruse what you find with interest. The EU accepts that border controls are required and if you are pro-EU 100%, then, by implication at least, so must you. So if wanting border controls is racist, as Farage and UKIP have been accused of, then it is not they who are the hypocrites.

Now, Farage has said he wants the UK to open up trade further with the developing world, so they can trade their way out of poverty and become more self-sufficient. I cannot find how that is remotely racist and I think the idea is entirely laudable. Again, of course, as a libertarian I agree with free trade and would, ideologically, like to see it the world over. And again, the “free trade” we have is restricted inside the EU, with policies, such as the Common Agricultural Policy, and tariffs which prevent poor developing countries from penetrating the wealthier markets of EU nations. The result is the developing world is kept poor, and we inside the EU pay a premium on our goods and services.

When you or I go shopping, we enter into a series of transactions in which we purchase a good or service for a consideration. Every transaction is an agreement between two parties, voluntarily (apart from those paid for by tax). I believe trade and movement of peoples would be a lot freer with a series of bilateral, voluntary agreements which would allow free-market redistribution of wealth from rich to poor on both national and international scales. That is not what we have at the moment: we are inside an entity which is evolving into an authoritarian and protectionist super-state at a very alarming rate.

Frontex Website

Wikipedia on Frontex

Frontex Watch

Human Right's Watch on Frontex

A belated tribute to Tony Benn, in context.

Many statesmen and stateswomen are defined as much by how they are perceived and portrayed as they are by what they say. Moreover the problem with politics, more or less the world over, is that it tends to be very tribal and governed by straw men mentality. That is to say, in isolation, if one broadcasts an agreement with a particular remark made by a well-known politician of the day, one can expect to be labelled with everything that politician stands for.

Further, opinions can, and often are, extrapolated by the recipient to mean something quite different from their basic meaning. For example, Euroscepticism (which is criticism of the European Union) is taken to be anti-European, and even racist (neither of which is true). This is the straw man argument – inferring or exaggerating a point of view to something which it is not. Benn was a Eurosceptic, but, maybe because he was part of the Labour movement and identified with the Left, he was, albeit quite rightly, never accused of being anything more than that.

Notwithstanding the left-wing pigeon-hole that received opinion would place him in, Benn held a number of views which fit quite comfortably in today’s fast-emerging Libertarian movement. Politics would be (and I think is gradually becoming) much more engaging and far less intellectually lazy if we recognise that those who have the courage to challenge the status quo, defy the prevailing orthodoxy, and refuse to be constrained by existing paradigms, may not curry 100% with our own opinion, or existing groupthink, but inspire us to think for ourselves and hold those that govern us to account more often and robustly.

Tony Benn was, like other politicians I admire, outspoken and a ‘convictionist’. For that reason alone, I have always held him in esteem, but, I’m happy to say there are numerous views and sentiments he held with which I agree, which are neatly articulated in his own following quotes:

“It is no good talking about being a good European. We are all good Europeans; that is a matter of geography and not a matter of sentiment. Are the arrangements under which we are governed such that we have broken the link between the electorate and the laws under which they are governed?”

“If one meets a powerful person--Adolf Hitler, Joe Stalin or Bill Gates--ask them five questions: "What power have you got? Where did you get it from? In whose interests do you exercise it? To whom are you accountable? And how can we get rid of you?" If you cannot get rid of the people who govern you, you do not live in a democratic system.”

“I think there are two ways in which people are controlled. First of all frighten people and secondly, demoralize them.”

“First they ignore you, then they say you're mad, then dangerous, then there's a pause and then you can't find anyone who disagrees with you.”

“[Edward Heath], who sold out Britain's interests to the Common Market and gave our sovereignty away without our consent—with support of Mr Thorpe and the Liberals—is not entitled to wave the Union Jack to get himself out of the mess.”

“The key to any progress is to ask the question why? All the time. Why is that child poor? Why was there a war? Why was he killed? Why is he in power? And of course questions can get you into a lot of trouble, because society is trained by those who run it, to accept what goes on. Without questions we won't make any progress at all.”

"Freedom of Choice" - A contradiction in terms?

In pondering economic and political theory, recently, I have reminded myself that all theory is constrained by assumptions. Now, extreme libertarianism, or Anarchism, seems to me to assume that “freedom” is measured, at least in part, by the amount of “choice” an individual has available to them. For example, in a Stateless (Anarchist) Society, individuals would have the freedom to spend all of their income as they choose – not the case currently, as the State takes a considerable percentage of your income by force, in the form of taxation – which, inter alia, is what Anarchists find objectionable.

However, although, under the current regime, you and I are, indeed, denied many choices, in a Stateless one, we would be burdened with innumerable decisions about how best to allocate our financial resources. We would have a limited income and therefore a limited amount to spend (as we do currently) but the difference would be that we would have to make additional decisions about how much we could afford to avail ourselves of amenities, such as parks, waste collection, street lighting, policing, fire service, education and, (for those who aren’t in BUPA) health services, among others.

Going for a walk in a public park is, currently, free at the point of delivery – the decision has been made for you, by the State taking money from you by force (tax) and spending it on maintaining the park. I love going for a walk in the public parks near where I live and one of the great benefits of it is that I don’t have to make a decision as to whether, or not, I can afford it. Denied the option of not paying for it via taxation, I may be – but I am, thereby, relieved of the decision and associated stress.

In a Stateless society, such amenities would be privately owned, either by individuals, or collections or co-operatives thereof. Unless I own the park myself, or have a share in it, I have to pay a fee to use it. And how would such a fee be structured? A flat rate that allowed me access for a day? A pay-by-the-hour fee? Maybe a monthly or annual subscription that would allow me unlimited access? Whichever of those it is, I have the burden of a decision set in the context of all the other expense commitments I have, complicated further by the decision I have to make about which tariff is best.

The burden of such decisions may well serve as a sufficient deterrent from doing something I enjoy (and which doesn’t harm anyone else!) What was a healthy and worthwhile leisure activity, under The State, has, under Anarchism, now become an extravagance. Currently, I might consider ‘a walk in the park’ essential to my well-being; ironically, I would be coerced, in a Stateless Society, into considering that such an activity is a luxury.

Add to this, all the other expenditure decisions I am burdened with. For example, there would be no Police, only private security firms – I would have to decide how much “private security” I could afford and, maybe, whether or not, I could afford it at all, given other commitments. Again, currently, that decision is arrested (pardon the pun!) from me. Consider the implications for all the other services that are currently State provided, and you can see how “Freedom of Choice” may, indeed, be a contradiction in terms.

So, where have I been?

Where indeed? Over the last few years, I have taken the opportunity to re-evaluate where I stand, politically, and am happy to say that I firmly remain a Liberal – although probably not in the sense of the word that fits with mainstream politics. I will admit I have been wrong over certain issues but remain tenacious over others. The Political Compass Test identifies me as a left libertarian; however, one should remember this is only one method of classifying political thought.

Some of my views have changed or evolved and some of them remain the same. Like many who are have been appalled at the excesses of capitalism, over the last few decades, I made the mistake of allowing socialism and statism to get the better of me: regarding Government (or The State) as a force against the polarisation of wealth and a guardian of freedom against large corporations, when, in reality, The State, to varying extents over time, has been either been colluding with conglomerates to deprive the majority of aspects of independence and self-determination, or actually, doing it all by itself.

Hence, over more recent years I have been considering the concept of Anarchism, having been drawn to it by my friend and erstwhile Liberal Democrat colleague, Jock Coats. I should explain that anarchism is a belief in a stateless (not lawless) society and has nothing to do with throwing fire extinguishers through high street store windows. For reasons I may explain in a subsequent article, I have, however, not seen such a belief as a panacea to how people should live. Nevertheless, my contemplation of it, has proved very useful in re-igniting the libertarianism in me which was becoming all but extinguished as an angry reaction to economic and social events that took place over the last 30 years or so.

For now though, I just wanted to focus on one aspect of my opinion: part of which has remained firm and part of which has changed:

I have always been a passionate advocate of small businesses, which, by their very nature, are privately, rather than state-owned, and are a feature of a free market. Albeit rather unconsciously, I have, in the past struggled to reconcile this with an opposition to privatisation and a baulking at the idea of introducing market forces into state-supplied goods such as health and education. More recently, I think I have reached a reconciliation of such a dichotomy by drawing a very important distinction between the free market and capitalism.

Much of the prevailing political and economic opinion (on all sides) seems to assume that the free market and capitalism are synonymous. I maintain they are not. For me, the free market is (or at least should be) an opportunity for the majority of individuals to create wealth for themselves; capitalism is the means by which the majority is coerced into creating wealth, not for themselves, but for a few others. It is the latter that I find repellent – not absolutely, but to the extent that it has been “allowed” to prevail in the way it has.

The aggressive advance of unfettered capitalism has seen certain corporations grow, merge, and grow again, at alarming rates, stifling any competition. With State assistance capitalism cripples and destroys the lifeblood that is small business and, hence, erodes rather than promotes a free market, forcing the majority to pay ever increasing prices for ever deteriorating goods and services, facilitating a self-perpetuating (and very dangerous) polarisation of wealth.

Having made such a distinction and thereby, identifying a problem, one may be part way to suggesting a solution. I am not sure that I have yet, but aim to get there one day. However, I do not see the solution as the removal of The State altogether as I am convinced that capitalism is perfectly capable of thriving without any assistance from Government, notwithstanding that the latter has, indeed, been partly accountable.

This, I grant you, is a very brief overview of some very complex issues and will pose many questions and provide much food for thought. I hope, in future articles, to provide further critiques of “The State” and endeavour to explain why I favour its reform rather than its abolition.

Everybody Out?

Opinion on the looming strike is by no means straight forward..

If you or I have our money invested in a bank, building society, or elsewhere, we have the right to withdraw it and keep it under our mattress – maybe because we thought we weren’t getting a sufficient return on it, or because we didn’t think our capital was safe.

In other words, one has the freedom to withdraw money capital and keep it somewhere unutilised. Similarly, one should surely have the freedom to withdraw human capital (labour), if one feels one is not getting a sufficient return or, indeed, feels one’s capital is not safe: i.e. the freedom to strike.

Why should there be the freedom for one type of capital and not another? After all, for many, labour is the only capital they have to offer.

But strike action causes disruption, you may say. Well, yes that’s the idea. Moreover, much disruption has been caused by the financial crisis of the last five years and what do you think that was, other than a mass withdrawal of capital?

Though, I am still assessing the facts over public sector pensions before I decide whether or not I support the cause of the general stoppage planned for this coming week. Gathering all the facts is not that easy and, even then, it depends in which context one sets them before reaching a conclusion on how justified it is.

Cable being pulled up to make way for Satellite

Rupert Murdoch was a candid supporter of Margaret Thatcher’s government, and he appears to remain firmly sympathetic toward the UK Conservative party (his papers The Times and The Sun supported the Tories at the last general election). Vince Cable has just been divested of his responsibility for media competition after, apparently, making effusive anti-Murdoch overtones. Ministerial responsibility for these matters has now shifted to Jeremy Hunt who has variously made pro-Murdoch comments and mooted large cuts in the BBC.

After considering this, one can’t help speculating as to how much this latest development has transpired by design: Cable had voiced his concerns over News Corporation’s bid to increase its ownership of Sky from 39% to 100%, earlier this year, and, I for one, no matter what kind of language is being used, struggle to understand why the opinions given by the likes of Jeremy Hunt are any less subjective (or more objective) than those provided by Cable.

The decision, we are told, is a quasi-judicial one: ultimately, Vince Cable would have potentially been the Judge and Jury on whether the News Corp takeover went ahead. However, if one (the one being the Prime Minister in this case) has the power to appoint the Judge and Jury, and you’re not comfortable about what ruling that Judge and Jury might make, then one, is, of course, going to find another that will make the decision you require.

For the Tories to have The Times pull the kind of sting that the Telegraph did on Vince Cable would have been far too obvious. A clever approach would be to choose another one of your mates in the media that appears more removed from the direct interest. It’s not difficult to work out that the Business Secretary must be feeling very rattled, angry, yet at the same time, vulnerable, at the moment.

So, if you’re a Conservative who, naturally, would rather have a Conservative majority government than share power with Liberal Democrats, you send along a couple of Daily Telegraph reporters, posing as members of Cable’s own party, to exploit his emotional turbulence: eventually he will give you a comment that can be construed as inappropriate and provide the key to getting him removed as the obstacle to securing your agenda.

I'm not Green enough to be shocked..

The report by Sir Philip Green on government expenditure is set to ruffle many a feather, but I for one, am not remotely shocked by his findings. As a former Councillor on Oxford City, I know only too well of the impenetrable silos of public expenditure and how both civil servants and local government officers alike, can be very cleverly evasive at providing any information that would reveal scope for some meaningful savings.

Back in 2001, when I was a member of the LibDem/Green administration, I was sounding like a stuck record with my pressing for zero-based budgeting and my passion for trying to get inside the £140million of Oxford City Council's annual spend. I am under no doubt that savings could have been revealed that would have freed up money to better serve the public and maintain and improve front line services. Suffice to say I did not get very far: some other councillors around me felt very threatened that my understanding was so obviously better than their own and I was not supported in trying to obtain information from officers.

You just need to watch the BBC's interview with Philip Green (see link top right to BBC article and video at the foot of this article) to understand the scope of just how much money could be saved. Green gives a very clear indication that obtaining information on certain expenditure amounts was no easy task: ambiguous answers (if you're lucky to get an answer at all) and the lack of accountable processes are symptomatic of how public money can be used to preserve the mini-empires of some unelected public officials on both local and national level.

This government has got it right in tackling this problem but it does beg the question as to whether, had it been done sooner (i.e. by previous governments), the welfare cuts need to be as severe as they are.

Hopefully, the BBC will leave the video up (see below): watch it, then watch it again if you feel yourself tempted to sympathise with civil servants and local government officers when they start demonstrating and striking over the cuts. Although I believe in the right to demonstrate and the right to strike (workers are merely withdrawing capital like investors did with Northern Rock), I do not believe individuals who's jobs are provided and preserved by your and my taxes have the right to be opaque about how those taxes are spent.

LibDems and CCTV

A short while after the Election, I googled +LibDems +CCTV in order to try and find out more about what how Freedom Bill would affect CCTV. All I can seem to find in terms of the Bill is that it means "further regulation of CCTV".

However, in my search I stumbled across a good few local LibDem websites that report how keenly their local councillors and activists have campaigned in favour of CCTV up and down the country. If you look to the right of the page you will see I have listed a link to all the ones I have found plus a few other links that are both relevant and interesting.

The efforts of all the local LibDem activists that have campaigned for and supported CCTV are laudible and I absolutely agree with them. However, the "Do Gooder" element in the national party must be raising an eyebrow at this as it does not sit well with what I understand to be the party's national policy on CCTV. "Further Regulation" could mean anything from tighter licensing and curbs on authorised use to effective outright prohibition. And by the latter I don't mean legislation to outlaw the use of CCTV, but rather red tape measures (rather ironically) that will make it very expensive or administratively inconvenient to use.

My experience (yes, note I use the word "experience", not "opinion") is that CCTV works. As for civil liberties, I believe it protects them, rather than erodes them. It protects the liberties of those who go about their daily, law-abiding business; it protects property and the safety of those living or working in it. Is not safety, or at least the feeling of it, a liberty?

I do understand and have some sympathy will the libertarian concerns of intrusiveness and spying. But I would rather people were allowed to protect their homes and businesses with cameras rather than guns (the latter being the Libertarian view). After all, if we are talking about civil liberties, I consider cameras far more civil than guns.

So I will await and see what the Freedom bill brings and in the meantime, as the LibDems make their national opposition to CCTV more vocal, it will be interesting to see how many of those webpages I have linked to stay live...

We are where we are

And, whichever way you look at it, a Conservative-Liberal Democrat coalition was going to be the most natural outcome of last Thursday’s result.

Not too many years ago, this idea would have made me very upset: I would have been very vocal about it and I probably would have resigned from the Liberal Democrats over the issue, had I still been a member.

If you’ve followed my previous commentary, you’ll see how I idealised a rainbow coalition before the phrase was being kicked around in the media in the last few days. But, the harsh facts are that the numbers in the Commons barely stacked up to it and trying to control its many constituent parts would have been like herding cats. Just as importantly, public opinion would just not have worn it – and we have to remember that where public opinion is formed from what it reads in the press, 80% of the newspaper circulation in the UK is Conservative with a very big and peremptory “C”.

But, having taken a bit of quiet time to absorb certain aspects of the new Coalition’s programme and the matters over which they have agreed, I have to confess that I am pleasantly surprised.

A very important measure is that to increase the basic personal annual income tax allowance to £10,000 (it is currently £6,475). This is a very progressive tax cut as it most benefits those on modest incomes (save for those, of course, who have incomes of less than £6,475). During 13 years in power, this should have actually been a very natural policy for Labour to implement, yet they failed to undertake such a fundamental procedure towards positive redistribution.

Whilst, I am disappointed that electoral reform will not take the form of ‘STV overnight’, I was really quite surprised to discover that there are plans to transform the House of Lords into a chamber elected by Proportional Representation. This is, at least, a step in the right direction and with more and more of Britain’s political assemblies becoming subject to a fairer voting system (and particularly the House of Lords), the day when the House of Commons finally has to yield to the same must draw nearer, albeit still slower than many of us would like.

When every other elected entity in this country is subject to a fixed term, it is absolutely correct that the House of Commons should finally be subject to the same: notwithstanding that that fixed term should be four years not five. (Either way, and the case being what it is, I have long thought it also the responsibility of electors to support the elected throughout an elected term rather than engaging in the very regular populist orgy of fame-envy that it does.)

These are just a few of the issues from which I take heart and so, despite the fact that 80% of the UK newspaper circulation does its level best to discredit the Liberal Democrats and the other 20% does its best to discredit the Conservatives, and, as I sign off watching the panellists on Question Time at each others’ throats with renewed petulance....

(draws breath)

.... I remain cautiously optimistic.

Phew! Where do I start?

The days since the polls closed and the results transpired have surely proved far more exciting than the election itself: we have not seen the like of this for many a decade at least.

And this is good; it’s all good. Usually a change in party and Prime Minister happens so very quickly that the constitutional process actually gets missed by the masses. Far from what the likes of the Dailies Mail and Express would like to have you think, the deliberations of the last half-week have given an opportunity for the electorate of the country to scrutinise the political and constitutional process, to an extent whereby those of us who are both new to it, and inured to it, have gained an appreciation of it, that benefits us more knowledge about it – and in gaining that knowledge we, the masses, the public, call us what you like, gain power.

So, far from the past few days being a “Sham” or being “Sordid”, they are merely a drawn out feast of our democracy and it is quite right that such a feast should take its very natural course.

That natural course is now reaching its conclusion and, my head tells me, that the conclusion that is being reached is the logical one: a Conservative – Liberal Democrat coalition.

This revelation is as difficult for me as it will be for those reading it and who share my staunch Progressive values.

The Vote Robbery

What you voted for:

Con 231; Lab 191; LibDem 148; Plaid/SNP 17; UKIP 20; BNP 11; Green 5; Others 9.

What you got:

Con 306; Lab 258; LibDem 57; Plaid/SNP 9; Green 1; Others 1.

Northern Ireland has been excluded for the purposes of this illustration.

OK, so it's a fairly crude application of Proportional Representation - in reality there would still be a slight skew in favour of the larger parties, but nothing like the result we have actually got, which, yet again, and despite having a hung parliament, is still a gross distortion of the actual poll.

It occurred to me today, that providing Clegg doesn't bottle it, I might well be becoming poltically active again, at least on this single issue. Be assured in the event he can secure, at the very least, the promise of a referendum on electoral reform I will be campaigning effusively for a "Yes" vote in favour of adopting a voting system that means every vote counts in every seat.

Don't come crying to me

If you voted for David Cameron’s Party because you were taken in by the Conservative dominated British media then more fool you. If you thought the recession of the previous few years and the budget deficit was solely the fault of Gordon Brown, I’d struggle not to tell you that I think you are too stupid to be allowed a vote.

However, here we are.

So if you lose your job, and you voted Conservative, don’t come crying to me.

If your mortgage payments soar or your own business suffers as a result of crippling, rising interest rates, and you voted Conservative, don’t come crying to me.

If your household budget gets squeezed because VAT is raised *by* 20% (*yes* by 20%!) on some goods, and you voted Conservative, don’t come crying to me.

If your council tax goes up because of cuts in central government spending, and you voted Conservative, don’t come crying to me.

If your local GP’s surgery or hospital closes, and you voted Conservative, don’t come crying to me.

If you’re a pensioner and you lose your free public transport travel pass, and you voted Conservative, don’t come crying to me.

And if you lose the right to receive free medication for a life-threatening illness and you voted Conservative, don’t, just don’t you dare come crying to me.

So my prediction..?

Well before the day ends, I guess I should at least answer the two questions people have been asking each other for the last month:

1. So what do you think the outcome will be?

And, if people are feeling a little a more forward:

2. Who are you going to vote for?

Sadly, my prediction is that the Conservatives will be the largest single party. David Cameron has, apparently, already intimated that he would be happy to lead a minority Tory Government. If they win a psychological 300 seats, albeit not the 326 needed for a majority, they will surely claim a ‘moral victory’ and mandate to govern. Add all the Ulster Unionists to this figure; subtract Sinn Fein (as they don’t take their seats), the speaker and deputies from the opposition and you can see the figure getting closer to that needed for a real majority.

The polls have been consistently tight throughout the campaign and the Tory lead has widened slightly towards the end. Everything points to them being short of a majority – but by how much?

Another interesting imponderable is would Labour and the Liberal Democrats win enough seats to form a majority coalition? I think that option is now, sadly for me, very much on a knife edge.

Who really will come second and third in the sheer popular vote?

Despite these I fear David Cameron will be our next Prime Minister, though I won’t rule out a cabinet including figures from the Liberal Democrats and others – and I think that will very much depend on the ‘magic’ 300.

There are still a handful of seats that won't start counting until Friday morning as well - so depending on how close the result it, we may not even know until Friday evening! Then, there may well be a weekend of "negotiations" before we see a new Premier doing the ritual posing outside No 10.

In answer to that second question that you’ve probably been asking for a while now, when reading my blogs (and if you haven’t I’m going to tell you anyway): I voted Green.

Oxford and the USA

Oxford and the USA, eh? What’s the connection and the context here you may wonder?

Well, there are two parliamentary seats up for grabs in a few days time and two newspapers that dominate what I like to call the ‘printed media’. Or are there?

There’s no argument about two parliamentary seats: Oxford East and Oxford West and Abingdon. The two newspapers I refer to are “The Oxford Mail” and “The Oxford Times”.

These two “news” papers are in fact, one and the same: one a daily tabloid that does not look out of place next to any other and the other, a weekly compact, former broadsheet, that basically cherry-picks and ‘re-brands’ the stories from the weeks “Mail”. They are, however, both produced by a company called Newsquest, which just happens to be the second largest publisher of regional and local newspapers in the UK. Not content with owning the titles of Oxford’s two “Premier” local newspapers, Newsquest also owns the title, The Oxford Star, the “premier” free advertiser.

In short, Newsquest has a monopoly on Oxford’s printed media.

Newsquest shares its reporters and other resources across its titles, which are not just limited to Oxford, but over 200 local newspaper titles across the UK.

If you’re both surprised and disappointed that the “Oxford Mail” and “Times” aren’t quite the cosy, re-assuring, little examples of local, responsible and investigative journalism you thought they were, then let me re-assure (or rather de-assure) you further: Newsquest is owned by Gannett, a publically traded company based in the United States.

What I am trying to demonstrate here is that our News is fast becoming polarised and uncompetitive – just like every other commodity in our daily lives.

Large Media businesses such as Gannett and News Corporation (the Rupert Murdoch empire) have an increasing and insidiously subliminal effect on the way we think: they have their vested interests – their shareholders.

So before you accuse the likes of the BBC of bias, and profess resentment at paying the licence fee on Facebook groups, remember that it does, thank goodness, remain and represent at least, some competition.

Who's family?

Maybe, I’m reading too much into this (and I have alluded to it previously), but one thing that has struck me during this election campaign, and the one same thing that has filled me with some disquiet is constant reference to “families”.

Now, it all depends on how “family” is defined. To give it its most emancipated definition, one could consider it to include any social group, irrespective of either gender mix or domestic arrangements. But I somehow think that what the politicians mean in this context is something rather more restricted.

Certainly, I get the impression that a Family means more than one person living under the same roof. This needs to be further delimited, I think, to exclude dwellings in multiple occupation, yet maybe to include friends, siblings and same-sex relationships.

Somehow, though, I continue to receive the very strong impression that Family means a unit of Mum, Dad, children: a very stereotypical ‘ideal’ of a domestic unit.

Despite the fact, I have the good fortune to have never lived by myself, I feel quite insulted by this. The message I am getting is: unless I can conform to this stereotype, my issues are judged to be of less importance in this election than those of “The Family”.

Now don’t get me wrong. Families (whoever they be defined) of course deserve due consideration when politicians formulate and disseminate their intentions, but not to the detriment of Everyone Else.

A lot of my arguments here are very dependent on the definition of “The Family”. But I think it is fair for me to point out that such a definition has been so very ambiguous (not to say absent) during this campaign (and in fact for some time) that it has been left wide open to both interpretation and offence.

The mainstreams in this election are all guilty of this to varying extents but it is the Conservatives who have put their money where their mouth is with the Couples’ Tax Allowance.

If David Cameron wins on Thursday, I warn you not to be Single.

Nick this chance, don't blow it.

If you refer back to my article of 8 March, you’ll see it concluded with a prophecy of a Conservative/Liberal Democrat coalition being the outcome of the forthcoming election. Comments from figures representing both those parties, and the current state of the opinion polls, strongly intimate that that prophecy is becoming ever more likely.

It will come as surprise to no-one that my preference in a balanced parliament would be for a Labour/Liberal Democrat coalition – in fact a better preference still, would a “Progressive Coalition” of Labour, Liberal Democrats, SNP, Plaid Cymru, SDLP, Greens and Respect (assuming the last two win seats on 6 May) – but that is of course, very unlikely.

Nick Clegg is right to play his cards as close to his chest as possible on this one – particularly as the hand has not yet been fully dealt. However, his comments on today’s Andrew Marr show are worth a bit of analysis. To say that it would be wrong to support a party that came third in terms of the popular vote (i.e. Labour, he assumes) appears fair and logical immediately. But be careful here Nick: whilst the polls make very rosy reading for you at the moment, remember second place in terms of vote share is not yet in the bag for your party. By the token of your argument, were the first and second places to be dealt to Conservative and Labour, respectively, then it should be Cameron and Brown (or their successors) that form the government.

I also believe if the country votes for a balanced parliament then that is just what it should get. The most recent polls actually point towards the Conservatives being the largest single party. This would mean then that the Liberal Democrats would have more sway if they teamed up with Labour rather than the Conservatives: 30% of a coalition with the former, as opposed to 28% with the latter. If I were Nick Clegg, I would feel a duty to the electorate, who had just charged me with the balance of power, to maximise that balance via a sphere of influence. Remember too, that the Conservatives have their, oft-forgotten, automatic buffer: the Unionists in Northern Ireland (including the DUP). So even if, on the face of it, they end up with less seats than Labour, adding a dozen or so Unionists to their tally of seats dilutes any Liberal Democrat power still further.

Whatever happens, the Liberal Democrats must use this opportunity to secure Proportional Representation for the very next General Election after this one and methinks that such an agreement on electoral reform is far more likely to be achieved with Labour rather Conservative – and it should be this consideration, not who comes first, second and third, that should be paramount to the Liberal Democrats’ decision as to with whom they form the next government. I hope to goodness they don't blow it, or compromise, for the sake of a few high-profile cabinet seats - or anything else for that matter...

The Campaign finally erupts..

Half way through then, this looks to be one of the most exciting elections in living history. At last we may see the Labour/Conservative ‘duopoly’ on power, broken. Alex Salmond, leader of the SNP, is quite rightly embracing the idea of a ‘balanced’ parliament – and using a term that, I feel, is far more appropriate and encouraging than ‘hung’.

The Liberal Democrats have already become such an important ‘third force’ in terms of their Westminster representation that it would be futile for either Gordon Brown or David Cameron to try and form a minority administration with the intention of going to the country again nine months later (as happened in 1974). It now does not look beyond the bounds of possibility that Nick Clegg’s party could secure something approaching 100 seats on May 6th: a number that cannot be ignored by the other two or is likely to be sufficiently demolished at a subsequent election.

Despite having left the Liberal Democrats a couple of years ago, this pleases me (although I fear and dread a LibDem/Tory coalition). However, what makes me happier still, is that this all seems to be confounding the ‘old main’ parties, sadly to the extent that you can see the carefully calculated media spin emerging in a desperate attempt to smear Nick Clegg and derail the surge in his party’s support. Their annoyance would be compounded, on election day, by the picking up of seats, hopefully, by the Greens, Respect, a smattering of independents, and less hopefully, by UKIP and, perish the thought, the BNP.

The Scottish and Welsh Nationalists have consistently returned handfuls of MPs (again since 1974) and, with a few exceptions, almost every one won by them in this election will be one less for the ‘duopoly’. (For me, this has an added bonus as I consider the SNP and Plaid Cymru to be very benign centre-left parties.)

With both the Liberal Democrats and other smaller parties being strong in the next parliament, one would hope that we will see them finally able to force the issue of a Proportional Representational Electoral system which, if introduced, thankfully, would see balanced parliaments the norm rather than exception.

Desperate to grab and retain overall power, this scares the Conservatives witless and hence they are leading the campaign against a long-needed breaking up of our two-party state – ironic for a party that is supposed to champion deregulation and the widening of ‘freedom of choice’.

Ken Clarke has been scaremongering that the IMF will be called in in the event of an “indecisive result”. Well, firstly, even if the IMF is involved, which I think it won’t be, this wouldn’t be the first time it has assisted Britain, and here we still are! Secondly, it would NOT be an indecisive result, it would be a DECISIVE one – the people would have decided that they do not want any single party governing the country and they positively want to see some multi-party co-operation. Good!