Origin North West

Did the UK fall or were they pushed out to create the new Euro core group. As a strong supporter of the EU it is not an enjoyable scene. Yet the Tobin Tax seemed a bridge too far.  It doesn’t seem too clear why the French and Germans are so keen on this tax and why others thought it so desirable they voted for it knowing it was an arrow pointed at the UK.   Is it as some say that David Cameron didn’t manage his position well enough and perhaps allowed a rift to arise.

Preventing a disorderly crash of the Euro is the objective of all and now the UK is playing a lesser part.  Many Conservatives are elated by this.   As a supporter of the EU this is annoying, but as the EU seemed to be deliberately out to damage the UK more than anyone else, it becomes easier to tolerate.

Then it could be said that much of this is a temporary state. Can Greece stay in the Euro, it seems unlikely and other countries might leave. What would the status of Greece be then. How can the Euro work anyway if the Germans are so superior.  Constant re-alignment will be needed.

It might also be said that in many ways saving the Euro will be easier if France and Germany have no sceptical UK to consider. Having already influenced the appointment of the Prime Ministers of Greece and Italy they will now have less criticism for other action over the sovereignty of EU members.

If the UK are primarily interested in a trading agreement and this remains then in many ways nothing is lost.   Financial transactions with the EU may be taxed and strongly regulated but transactions with the rest of the world won’t be.  Many may to try to avoid EU regulation and the EU could try to prevent this, more interesting times could come.

One thing for sure is that President Sarkozy is no friend of the UK having been the main orchestrator of the rift and making some anti-British comments about the UK losing dynamism during the week.  At the last dramatic event involving the UK in 1991 it was the Germans who pointedly undermined the UK so at the end of the day there should be no emotion in the relationship from our side.  However we remain a member of the EU and must remain one.

Hard to imagine how the UK can benefit from being outside the EU. Surely we’ll have to implement their rules to trade with them. They will introduce rules that could harm us and we’ll have no say. They’re our biggest customer and some want to say goodbye.

Some say the EU damages trade, making us uncompetitive. How does that stack up with Germany being one of the worlds most successful economies.

Some say we’ll set up a trading arrangement. Maybe, but on who’s terms. Will David slay Goliath in this version.

If the UK was outside the EU we would not be part of any major world power. At a time of change in the world power balance is this wise. How long before Britain and France have to give up their privileged positions that create influence on world committee’s.

There are those who wrongly think the Human Rights Act and its court are related to the EU. These are nothing to do with the EU and non-members elect to be subject to them and members can elect to opt out.

Some say most of the population has never been given the opportunity to vote in a referendum. So what? Are we to have referendums every 10 to 20 years. Should we have had a referendum at all. What are General Elections about. What is the effect of UKIP. Probably more Labour and LibDem MP’s and so the opposite to their intentions.

Hard to find real positives about being outside the EU.

Rumour has it that inflation will be over 4% in September so my pension will take a knock. Lucky Public Service workers get full inflation proofing but those with company and private pensions are often capped, with mine being 4%.

In the 1970′s my father retired with a local government inflation proof pension that was half his brothers. By the time they died my fathers pension was twice his brothers. Yes the 1970′s had 20% inflation but an inflation proof pension costs about 25% more than a capped one and only the government can afford such luxury.

Boots the Chemist is considering offering its pensioners a large increase in pension to buy out the inflation proofing. My own opinion would be – absolutely no way! In 5 years you will have no gain and after that you will be getting a pay cut below where you are now every year.  We don’t know where inflation is heading, the Bank of England says it will come down but others say Quantitative Easing could stoke up very high inflation. My opinion would be unless you’re not expecting to live long tread the cautious path and don’t take jam today for penury tomorrow.

This brings the story to whether Public Sector workers should strike for their pensions. It seems Public Sector workers are very fortunate to have a government guaranteed inflation proof pension. It must be subsidised massively by the government as no private company can afford it and employee contributions are no bigger, if not smaller, than a private company employee.  They claim to take lower pay but there are millions of private care workers, and shop workers on the minimum wage and most reports say that like for like, public service workers wages overtook private sector workers 10 years ago.  Evidence supporting Public Sector workers pensions strikes seems hard to find except from those directly affected or politically motivated and even the Labour Party leaders don’t support it.

The impression this week is that the west is heading for a train crash and the driver has jumped overboard. All hope lies with the guard who is frantically blowing his whistle, shouting danger ahead, with no effect. Although could it be that in a secret factory; Drachma, Lira and Pesetas are being printed by the billion? If so will they arrive in time?

Is there a politician willing to risk their own career to save the world. Frau Merkel is probably the only person with enough power to stop the train in Europe but she appears to want to be a passenger. President Obama has a lot of problems of his own and he too seems reluctant, although whichever direction he moves it appears his opponents want to block him. The US, the leader of the western world, is a neutered beast creating opportunities for chancers the world over.

The only good news has been that some signs of light have been seen in Ireland. The Irish people have been very stoic and pulled together, recognising the difficulty their country is in. Quite different from the Greeks who seem to be unable to accept their situation and instead of working together are fighting each other to make it worse. Greece appears a dilemma similar to the bankers because to take the measures that natural justice would demand will bring about dangers too bad to consider. Logical people say we knew it was happening but didn’t act so the powers in place at the time are to blame, but which politician nowadays would stop a boom. Measures to stop the banks becoming too big to fail are allegedly being taken and no doubt we’ll hear about measures to prevent countries becoming too indebted to be allowed to fail. At least until next time.

Unfortunately, the EU is being shown once more to be incapable of holding a single line and taking action in times of distress. It seems very good at regulating the size of apples but when it comes to major world events the leaders go into hiding or do their own thing while claiming to be making momentous decisions. It seems the EU wants to be a major player but isn’t willing to enter the arena when challenges arise, that’s why we need the US to bring in the cavalry once more. So come on President Obama.

As a big fan of Amazon it was disappointing to read an article in today’s Daily Telegraph, tweeted by Rober Peston, about there being no evidence that Amazon pay any UK Corporation Tax. Now maybe they claim they’ve just opened a new distribution centre in the UK and employ thousands of people and their service is second to none. But is it right that their prices are improved by paying all their Corporation Tax to an off-shore country who have a miniscule market.

I’ve never been a supporter of UK Uncut as I can see a place for best use of tax advantages but paying absolutely no Corporation Tax seems to be taking it too far.

Last night on Newsnight it was brought out that until this week car parking at a supermarket and in town had different tax treatment favouring the supermarket. How many of these uneven surface regulations are there?

The mass of regulations is a nightmare and this government said it would reduce them. Yet if you knock down one end the other pops up. It has been reported that Civil Servants who are supposed to be cutting red tape are playing tricks by cutting trivia in exchange for even more complexity. Can we the voters ever win?

In the months after the election Labour increased their share of the vote and the Coalition parties lost theirs until it stabilised early this year.  It is now fairly common to see Labour 42%, Cons 36%, LibDems 9%.

It can be fairly confidently predicted that Labour would win an election held now. Yet at the moment a number of factors are moving against them.  Labour has no clear message or policies likely to improve the countries position. The UK seems to be out of the main firing line for wrecked economies because of the measures being taken.  Libya seems to be settling, unemployment hasn’t risen much and jobs are being created. There is also a feeling that the riots were sparked by Labour’s social policy that for some rewarded unemployment and created a culture of entitlement.

At the same time the government has a few hot topics such as reducing police numbers,  jails and immigration,  a strange conflict on planning where building is favoured but localism is as well which seems to affect the governments own supporters the most. There is a nagging concern about justifying wealthy bankers. Most of the cuts and tuition fees don’t start till next year.  It therefore could be forecast the opinion polls will read the same for another year at least and it will be 2013 before decisions can really be made about the Coalition policies.

It could also be said the shake up will settle down, some of the new policies will work well and many of the scare stories will be found to be untrue. The U turns will at look like they listened when trying many different ways to turn round the economy.  At this point with Labour only having a 6% lead during what seems to the deepest part of the recession could mean the lead will soon disappear when things get better. It also wouldn’t be a surprise if the LibDems benefit as they are showing themselves able to influence  some measures and with a mind of their own in a difficult position.   Turning round the polls looks like a long term project and it’s not certain it will happen if Labour gets its act together which is a subject in its own right.

Don’t panic, keep calm and carry on here comes Economic Crisis II to hit our already damaged economies. This time it stars the US, Italy and Spain along with the original cast of Ireland, Greece and Portugal. Somehow we expect our leaders to lead us out of this but it seems they only have sticking plaster when a major operation is needed.

In the US the Republicans are fighting the President and it isn’t that clear who is right although last ditch compromises hardly fill you with confidence that whatever has been agreed is the necessary solution. In Europe there is no admission that Greece can never be in the same economic bloc as Germany so they keep bailing out the water but it keeps getting higher. Now Italy is being drawn in with its huge debts. The Italians aren’t ones to worry about debts so nothing will happen there.

There is talk of economic catastrophe caused by the US downgrade that will cause a huge sell-off of assets. Luckily it seems common sense is being applied and the rules are being changed so the assets don’t need selling off. It really is time for some real and intelligent action.

In early May we are to be asked in a referendum whether we want to change our voting system from First Past the Post to the Alternative Voting System, or words to that effect. From a Liberal Democrat perspective its appeal seems obvious. They did get about 6 million votes and 50 seats. Whereas the other parties get around 10 million votes each and 300 seats each. So the LibDems are about 100 seats down proportionally. We mustn’t forget the next election is planned to have only 600 seats, down by 50.

Also the LibDems are everybody’s favourite second choice so they might expect to do well on second choices.  Some will also say that many LibDems will have Labour as second choice so that leaves the Conservatives in a worse position.

Is it likely that the AV system will create a permanent Labour government supported by a larger LibDem representation?  Is that a good enough reason to ditch First Past the Post or is it creating another unfair system permanently alienating a bigger single rump of people rather than a big mixed rump of people?  If you thought you represent more than any other single group but are unlikely ever to win what will be the result, sit back like the LibDems and be known as a protest gathering or take some form of action.

The AV system has already thrown up an odd result in that Ed Miliband was elected leader of the Labour Party using AV when his brother led the results up to the last count, and then it was only a very slim majority.  But would it have been fairer if David had won, perhaps not.

Another strange result was the BBC ran a mock election to demonstrate how AV worked but it turned out that many did not name a second choice and it became impossible for the winner to achieve 50%.  A bit egg on face if it was meant to show how good it is.

I need to ask myself who would I vote for as second choice. Then who is my third choice and so on.  Perhaps I’m a rarity but actually my 2 preferences would be the larger parties and for that reason I wouldn’t actually put in a second vote. Parties like UKIP are the last people I’d want electing and even though the LibDems seem to have shown a better hand in the Coalition they have a number of unelectable policies, such as defence and the Euro. The Green Party are useful as a green protest group but in reality they are to the left of Labour. So this has made up my mind. I haven’t a second choice so First Past the Post is the one.

Yet should I look at the bigger picture and decide as a principle of fairness?  Is it right that voters for the UKIP, BNP, Monster Raving Looney Party have no say whatsoever except to deny the other parties their vote and perhaps change the result or that in many constituencies more voted for someone other than the elected member.

This is making my brain hurt, do I want my MP to be decided because he is the third choice of someone who voted for someone who I dislike even more.  Will it make me happier or less dis-satisfied.  Seems reform sounds a good idea if it makes it fairer for the LibDems but when it comes to third choices deciding elections it begins to cloud the issue. At this moment still thinking First Past the Post is the one.