Friday 14 July 2017

Tories dig holes deeper

Personally, I love it when Tories are in a hole; I like it even more when they insist on digging it deeper!  Most recently, Michael Gove, best known for backstabbing colleagues and reforming school examination systems to favour middle-class children, announced that the Conservative party could use Momentum-style tactics to to get young people "involved in politics" (Morning Star,26/06/17). He appears to think that Tory policies, such as adopting fiscal policies to benefit the wealthy, doing nothing about the trillions squirrelled away in tax havens, and running down the NHS and state school sector, will appeal to younger voters. He is so out of touch, he probably assumes all young people aspire to join the local hunt, and would flock in their thousands to hear him speak at Glastonbury!
      Tories like him simply don`t get it! Corbyn`s popularity with younger voters stems from a party leader who is genuinely different from the politicians young people usually see. He connects with people, hugs ordinary people in distress rather than shuns them, and has policies based on fairness, aimed at reducing inequality and making the rich pay their fair share. Corbyn demonstrates that politics is for everyone, not something imposed on the populace by the government. He wants to see young people engaged in politics; Tories don`t, and Gove clearly doesn`t understand why - they won`t vote for a party which throughout history has been anti-worker and anti-poor.
       Just in case there is anyone in the country who still doesn`t think most Tory politicians are out of touch with the ordinary people, Lord Patten appeared on television last Sunday. Naturally, he was there to promote his book, but couldn`t resist the opportunity to demonstrate how people like him clearly reside on another planet! By stating that there is a danger that the Tories, in making a deal with the DUP, could make it look "as if the Conservatives have become nasty again", Patten ignored the fact that for seven years they have supported an austerity policy, which has hurt those least able to withstand benefit cuts, cut jobs, frozen pay for state sector workers, thereby reducing real wages, and introduced cost-cutting, threatening safety and lives. At the same time, hospitals and schools have had their funding massively reduced. Does it come any nastier than that? 
    Failing to vote for a Labour amendment to the 2016 Housing and Planning Bill, which would have ensured all landlords were bound by law to provide accommodation "fit for human habitation" adds to a long list of Tory action and legislation which cannot be considered as anything other than extremely "nasty". Promising to help the "just about managing", and then ignoring them in two budgets, and pledging instead to take away school meals from 600,000 children from working families; bedroom tax; benefit cuts for the disabled; etc.etc.
      It has taken a tragedy of immense proportions to get this government even to think about "health and safety", something which previously was seen as burdensome, EU-imposed, "red tape".
     And Tories fear they might be called "nasty" if they do a deal with the DUP to stay in power! Give me strength!

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