Vote Leave because... Migration?

Migrants are flooding into the UK, claiming benefits, clogging up hospitals and stretching services to breaking point - all thanks to EU rules - or so the Brexit campaign seems to say.

But are they?

Well, some flood in, and some flood out. Lots of elderly Brits, for example, swarm to Spain and clog up their hospitals. Many British people work in Europe. Or study at European Universities - for rather less than £9000 a year! That is not so bad for this country.

Inward migration is mostly young people who are working, and paying taxes. In fact migrants on average pay more towards the NHS and schools than us natives. And being young and healthy, they use the NHS less. Win win! In fact, being in the EU means that if our under resourced NHS cannot provide treatment quickly enough, it is sometimes possible to be referred for treatment in a European country, free of charge.

So if the NHS is under pressure, and it is, it's not because of the disproportionate share of money the migrants are contributing - it's because it's not being funded properly.

Same with schools and housing. Rents are not high because of net migration - that barely compensates for our falling birth rate. Rents are high because there aren't enough houses. We have failed to build enough for the last few parliaments! The solution is building, not Brexit!

When a society starts to blame other ethnic groups or minorities for its problems, it becomes very ugly very quickly. And when the problems are caused by the politicians we choose, the hypocrisy is staggering.

But if the Brexit campaign wins and we leave the EU, with all the economic pressures that will bring, how much more will have to be blamed on migrants and innocent minorities. How much more divided will our society become?

Is that the sort of country we want?

We can choose a better way. Will we?

Farage - the new Trump?

The poisoning of politics continues apace, as Nigel Farage plumbs new depths. Following on his "there will be riots" speech, with its echoes of Enoch Powell, now he seems to be channelling Donald Trump, who earlier called Mexicans criminals and rapists. Farage in his turn seems to be characterising migrants - or maybe just Turks en masse - as molesters of women.

At least we have the English Channel, so Farage won't need to repeat Trump's demand for a wall. Would he have had it built by refugees, and funded by Turkey, I wonder?

Spend spend spend!

I wonder how many people the Brexit campaign have promised the £350 million a week of savings on EU membership to?

Last week it was the NHS. Then it seemed to be the Environment. Neither of them are causes close to the hearts of the right wing conservatives who make most of the running in the Brexit campaign. But if you talk to Brexit-inclined farmers concerned about loss of EU subsidy, they seem to think the savings will be spent on continuing the subsidies.

So the NHS, the Environment, and farmers could receive up to 350m of extra money (or not lose the money, in the farmers' case). It reminds me of the promised speeds in broadband ads. Up to 350 could mean very little indeed to your favoured cause.

But it's worse than that. Mrs Thatcher negotiated a rebate back in the last millennium, so it's only "up to £276m". Or "up to £161m" if you count the money the EU spends on support for the UK - from farming to projects in disadvantaged areas!

And if you want a hint about where the "savings" are actually likely to be spent, look at the government's current priorities - cuts for the disadvantaged, and tax cuts for the rich, and broken promises on pollution and the Environment. What are the real chances of a Damascus Road conversion to non-private health care, saving the planet, or support for the poorest parts of our country?

What next - Rivers of Blood?

The EU debate is becoming toxic. Nigel Farage seems to be channelling Enoch Powell, in his very own "rivers of blood" moment. He claims to foresee violence on the streets if immigration is not controlled. He says it is difficult to contemplate, but nothing is impossible.

Of course, by talking up the difficulties and ignoring the benefits of immigration, by stoking fears - not least by raising the spectre of violence - he can only increase the chances of mistrust, resentment, and inter-communal strife!

Christ said, "Blessed are the Peacemakers."

Or as my spellchecker put it, "needed are the Peacemakers!"

Things I don't understand about executive pay

rather apt image from clipartbest.com

Mark price, ex head of Waitrose, decided last year to look for a better job (or, more accurately, another job to add to the list of jobs he already manages to do at once). A week ago, it came out that this somehow entitles him to £1.9 million compensation. If the rest of us decided to look for a job we liked better, I'm pretty sure our employers would not be rushing to pay us for NOT working for them. And if he was so bad that they needed to get rid of him, why was he not just sacked - like less privileged people would be?

In case you're confused about any of this, Waitrose have explained it: The timing of Mr Price's exit was agreed "in the best interests of the partnership", and this had "private contractual implications, hence the payment announced today". Aren't you glad it's all clear now?

If this absurd payment really is a contractual requirement that can't be avoided (and it seems implausible that anyone would offer such a contract), shouldn't the staff, who own Waitrose, be looking for compensation from the crazily generous individual who negotiated such a ridiculously costly deal with their money?

1916 and all that

It's been a funny old year. One hundred years on from 1916, the Easter Rising, and Battle of the Somme, some of the old wars are still being fought. Just not quite how I expected.

The commemoration of the Easter Rising in the Republic has seen a nuanced, mature reflection on a rising whose failure is nevertheless seen as a foundational event for the Irish State. The rising was acknowledged as deeply unpopular at the time in Ireland, but the aftermath - the vengeful execution of the leaders by the British military authorities - turned the tide of Irish public opinion. The suffering and deaths, of civilians and combatants on both sides, have been acknowledged.

one of "theirs"

Up North, the picture is grimmer. Sinn Fein (North and South) seemed uneasy at the inclusiveness of the commemorations. The DUP's attitude was churlish in the extreme - it was not for them to empathise with the other tradition in this island. They even refused to attend the civic reception in Belfast's City Hall that commemorates this Nationalist event in the current "decade of centenaries". They will only commemorate "their own" events, it seems.

one of "ours"

When will we be able to deal with the divisions and hurts of the past?

What next for Labour

Labour has a new leader. Jeremy Corbyn won 59.5% of the vote. The party seems quite clear about this choice: Corbyn won a large majority - not just among recently-joining affiliates, but also among the full members of the party. They are clearly in it for the long haul - this was not just a campaign by a few blow-ins who wanted to sabotage the election.

And yet senior figures in the parliamentary party are resigning from their shadow ministry and spokesperson roles in protest. They fear Corbyn is unelectable, and will drag the party towards a position the electorate will not accept. Perhaps he will - or perhaps not.

But what these senior figures are missing,  or choosing to ignore, is that the party has rejected what they themselves are offering. They should think long and hard before plunging their party into a feud that will indeed make Labour unelectable!

Their party seems quite certain it does not want "more of the same." Now might be a good time to sit down and come up with an alternative to Cameron's Conservative austerity and Blair's almost-Conservative austerity lite.

picture: (c) Jim on Flickr, some rights reserved.

Party like it's 1997

It seems like both of Northern Ireland's main Unionist parties are stuck in the last Millennium, partying in the last chance saloon like it's 1997. The trigger was a murder, believed by the Police to be by members of the IRA, although sanctioned neither by the IRA's leadership nor by Sinn Fein (formerly known as the IRA's political wing).

First the Ulster Unionists walk out of the Executive. Then the Democratic Unionists join in the brinkmanship, with a secret ultimatum to the UK Government.

I'm not sure what to think.

Either the Unionist parties are still stuck in the 1990s, and have not noticed that Sinn Fein is firmly wedded to the political process, with no appetite for a return to "war" - or the two Unionist parties want to avoid the blame for the impending welfare cuts (and they hope that business as usual can resume after their teacup has calmed down, and their toys have been returned to the pram).

Is it too much to ask for some grown-up politics?

Crisis in Calais?

How is a strike in Calais suddenly all about immigrants?

If you've been watching the news on the BBC, you'll know there is a huge crisis of illegal immigrants swarming through Calais, and causing traffic chaos throughout southern England. At least that's how the BBC and other outlets have been telling it. But is this really what is going on?

Sort of. A bit. Apparently a ferry company is stopping a route, and the ferry workers in Calais are on strike. Hence the traffic delays, as lorries pile up in Kent, waiting for the routes to reopen. There are huge queues for the tunnel, and the migrants and refugees camped near Calais are taking the opportunity to sneak on board vehicles bound for the UK.

So a strike is causing traffic delays, which have allowed a few hundred illegal immigrants (or, quite likely, refugees fleeing from war and oppression) to try to enter the UK. But somehow in the media the story is an immigrant crisis.

Something is wrong, somewhere.

How history is made

Picture: Greg Gjerdingen

Henry Ford (of motor car fame) famously said that History is Bunk - or so we think. What he actually said, in the Chicago Tribune in 1916, was: "History is more or less bunk. It's tradition. We don't want tradition. We want to live in the present, and the only history that is worth a tinker's damn is the history that we make today."

He wasn't really talking about History though - he wanted people to work for the future, not to live in the past, But when he talked about "the history we make today," he said something very true about how history comes to be. History is not just remembered, or even discovered. History is made.

Back in May, we all knew that the Coalition's days were numbered. We knew there would be a new coalition. We knew the Tories were on their way out. But on 7th May the people spoke - and they didn't say what we had been told to expect.  Suddenly what we all knew wasn't true any more. The press and pundits had been caught out.

But just as Nature abhors a vaccuum, pundits need a Truth to tell. A Truth had to be found - and quickly! Labour needed to know why they had lost. Pollsters needed to know why they had been wrong. And we who had been following the news wanted to make sense of it all.

Some pundits and pollsters got in fast with Shy Tories: the voters on the right who didn't like to admit their right-wing tendencies in public (and especially to pollsters).  Although the UKIP campaign suggested that people weren't all that hesitant to speak out against what they saw as a "progressive" project of "uncontrolled immigration".

It turned out when the polls had been digested a bit that it was more "lazy lefties" that "shy tories" - voters on the Left had, for some reason, failed to turn out. The next question, in the solidifying narrative of how the election was lost, was "why". Why hadn't more people voted Labour? We already "know" why voters deserted the Lib Dems, but that's a whole different story.

There were a few theories to explain Labour's defeat. Ed Milliband had moved too far to the Left. Ed was unelectable. The campaign was ineffective. Their economic programme was not credible. The media were against them. Aspirational voters were turned off.

There was merit in many of these ideas, but the debate has been shaped by the Labour leadership contest - and in that contest, there are three broadly Blairite candidates from the right of the Party, and Jeremy Corbyn, the old-school candidate who is proving unexpectedly popular. The other candidates need to show that Corbyn is not the answer to whatever question we should be asking. And (post-Levenson) much of the UK's press is worried by any challenge to the narrative of deregulation and freedom for "wealth creators" (and mainly multinational wealth creators). So we have seen a sustained drumbeat of "too far to the left." A consensus is forming. The fluid Present, with its many competing stories, is solidifying into History before our eyes.

Soon history will be written in stone. We will all know that the UK electorate has no appetite for redistributive taxation or a non-punitive welfare system... that people don't believe we can fund adequate care or pensions for the elderly... that we won't vote for enough taxation to pay for public services... that people think regulation of rapacious multinationals and the finance "industry" will hurt the economy and cost jobs.

Perhaps before this becomes solid, unquestionable history - the stuff that "everybody knows" - we should look again at some of the unspoken assumptions that underlie this worldview, and consider some alternative possibilities?

Whataboutery

Just got around to watching the Northern Ireland Party Leaders Debate.

I can't remember when I last heard so much whataboutery from a single person. I'm struggling to think of a single positive thing the DUP representative said. It's depressing.

The political culture here in Northern Ireland, particularly in the DUP, really is incredibly negative and fixated on the past.  Could we get whoever is organising these debates to do something about whataboutery?  If sluggerotoole can do it, why not the BBC?

Who is the war criminal when a military robot starts killing civilians?

First autonomous flying "drones", then driverless cars, and now it seems autonomous killer robots are being planned. If it's possible, and military planners seem to think it may be, just think of the problems.

In real life Asimov's "three laws of robotics" which prevent harm to humans do not exist. Such a law, which would work reliably, is not even possible. So if machines are built which are intended to kill people without any human control, they will inevitably kill "innocent civilians".

I know that war is messy and great evil happens in current wars with current weapons. But at least that evil is the direct result of a human action, and humans can be held to account - at least in principle.

photo: Get t y images

This is not possible with autonomous killing machines. Who would be guilty? The programming team? The software designers? The builders? The person who fitted the weapons or loaded the ammunition? The commander who ordered the deployment? The politician who authorised the purchase or the deployment in the field? Or maybe the voters who said nothing, and allowed these weapons to be deployed in their name?

This is why such weapons must not be allowed.

The UN is discussing the Inhumane Weapons Convention in a session which opens on 13th April. The Campaign to Stop Killer Robots is lobbying to have autonomous killing machines pre-emptively added to the list.

During this election campaign, when our politicians are at least pretending to listen to us, is a good time to challenge them about this issue.

Human Rights Watch has a detailed report on the dangers.

And the Guardian has a rather shorter article.

We must stop this!

This Show is Dead

Me: Ello, BBC, I wish to register a complaint. This show is dead.

BBC: We're closin' for lunch.

Me: Never mind that, my man. I wish to complain about this show what I tried to watch not half a week ago on this very channel.

BBC: Oh yes, the, uh, the Top Gear...What's,uh...What's wrong with it?

Me: I'll tell you what's wrong with it, my man. It's dead, that's what's wrong with it!

BBC: No, no, It's uh,...it's resting.

Me: Look, matey, I know a dead show when I see one, and I'm looking at one right now.

BBC: No no it's not dead, it's, it's restin'! Remarkable show, the Top Gear, isn'it, ay? Beautiful Cars!

Me: The cars don't enter into it. It's stone dead.

BBC: Nononono, no, no! It's resting!

Me: All right then, if it's restin', I'll wake it up! (shouting at the TV) 'Ello, Mister Clarkson! I've got a lovely fast Maserati for you if you come to the studio…

(BBC fires the presenter)

BBC: There, it's running!

Me: No, it isn't, that was the news. You fired the presenter!

BBC: I never!!

Me: Yes, you did!

BBC: I never, never did anything...

Me: (yelling and typing into Youtube repeatedly) 'ELLO Top Gear Presenter!!!!! Testing! Testing! Testing! Testing! This is your Unemployment Channel interview call!

(Takes smartphone and thumps it on the counter. Throws it up in the air and watches it plummet to the floor.)

Me: Now that's what I call a dead show.

BBC: No, no.....No, The Producer's stunned!

Me: The PRODUCER’S STUNNED?!?

BBC: Yeah! You must've stunned him, shoutin' like that, just as he was wakin' up from his bleedin' lip and two hour trek to Casualty! You don’t get much sleep when you spend a night in casualty you know. And Producers stun easily, Major.

Me: Um...now look...now look, mate, I've definitely 'ad enough of this. That show is definitely deceased, and when I purchased my TV licence not six months ago, you assured me that its total lack of scheduling was due to it bein' tired and shagged out from the traumatic evacuation after the latest Top Gear Special!

BBC: Well, it's...it's, ah...probably pining for the fjords.

Me: PININ' for the FJORDS?!?!?!? What kind of talk is that? Look, why did it vanish from the screen just as the series got going?

BBC: The Top Gear prefers bein’ off the screen! Remarkable show, innit, squire? Lovely cars!

Me: Look, I took the liberty of examining the press coverage before I left home, and I discovered the only reason that it had been knocked off its perch in the first place was that you'd suspended the presenter.

(Pause)

BBC: Well, o'course we'd suspended 'im! If we hadn't suspended 'im, e'd 'ave beaten up all the crew, shot them in front of their families, and got a number plate mocking them. So we're hiring new presenters. VOOM! Feeweeweewee!

Me: "VOOM"?!? Mate, without Clarkson and the gang this show wouldn't "voom" if you put four million volts through it! It's bleedin' demised!

BBC: No no! It's pining!

Me: It's not pinin'! It's passed on! This show is no more! It has ceased to be! It's expired and gone to meet its maker! It's a stiff! Bereft of life, it rests in peace! It's pushing up the daisies! If you hadn't kept the story in the news with comparisons with Jimmy Saville it would be out of the papers and off the telly! It's metabolic processes are now 'istory! It's off the twig! It's kicked the bucket, It's shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible!! THIS IS AN EX-SHOW!!

(Pause)

BBC: Well, I'd better replace it, then.

Democracy in action

It seems the EU Commission is in secret negotiations with the US and Canada on rules to harm consumers and governments and benefit US & Multinational corporations. Secret as in they refused for a long time to tell the public what they were doing - even when the EU Parliament demanded to know, earlier in the process. And now that they have been rumbled, they are emitting clouds of spin, managed by specially recruited corporate lobbyists.

Here are some articles from the Independent http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/what-is-ttip-and-six-reasons-why-the-answer-should-scare-you-9779688.html and the Guardian http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/13/ttip-trade-deal-transatlantic-trade-investment-treaty. And the Guardian has an article here about the similar Trans-Pacific treaty:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/10/trans-pacific-partnership-a-guide-to-the-most-contentious-issues

Some details have leaked. Things like:- give multinationals the right to sue if consumer protection or public health laws cost them money - set up special courts for multinationals, run by corporate lawyers - make it harder for states to regulate things like fracking or genetic modification - weaken financial regulation - (And in the Trans-Pacific treaty, also unknown new rules on tobacco, requested by industry - export subsidies only to be allowed for USA producers - reduced protection for users and consumers from copyright and patent law, and criminalisation of even accidental, non-commercial infringement).

I don't think it is healthy, in a democracy, for laws to come out of secret negotiations with the corporate sector. Negotiations from which anyone who represents civil society, or anyone who advocates the common good, is barred.

Petition on the Stop TTIP site, here:
https://stop-ttip.org/

For UK folk, a link to write to your MP, MEPs, MLAs here:
https://www.writetothem.com/

But hey, I could be wrong. Maybe the finance sector has become suddenly honest and public-spirited. Maybe corporations are now putting other people first. Maybe the US government is trying to help the rest of the world, and its own people, rather than those who fund its re-election campaigns.

Tell me what you think...