Fortsätt till huvudinnehåll

British political parties short of funds

There area reports that the main political parties are running short of funds again. People will not contribute. I wonder why?

The collapse of the present political parties could be the best thing that could happen in British politics. Good riddance to them.

The people who get to lead the parties are those who are least suited to do so - at their higher levels they are a magnet for the ambitious and unflective. The disastrous handling of the economy by Labour throughout its period in office and the inadequate critiques of government economic policy by the opposition parties appear to be an inevitable outcome of the system.

A curious feature of the British party political alignments is that they do not reflect genuine economic or social interests. The Conservatives are an uncomfortable alliance of landowning and business interests which are inherently in a state of mutual opposition - most businesses are rent payers and get screwed by their landlords. Labour is an uncomfortable alliance of intellectuals and what remains of the working classes, when the latter can be characterised by attitudes which would be regarded as right wing and authoritarian, especially as regards issues such as immigration and the law.

There is no party representing the interests of employed middle class people, nor is there one representing the underclass or the retired. This must surely be one reason why the parties are constantly looking over their shoulders and weighing up their chances at the polls, which is fatal to effective political leadership and policy making.

The country is, however, fertile ground for a populist party of the extreme right.

Kommentarer

Skicka en kommentar

Populära inlägg i den här bloggen

The Zombie Train that refuses to die

The Guardian has published a couple more articles against HS2, one by specialist rail commentator Christian Wolmar, and another today by journalist Simon Jenkins. The main arguments in favour will doubtless be wheeled out by the commentators: the need for capacity and the disruption caused by upgrading existing routes. HST itself will severely disrupt services to Euston during the construction period. Capacity can be increased at a fraction of the cost by a variety of measures, provided that it is accepted that the additional traffic will run at existing speeds. It is not generally known that the Midland main line is, or was, four track all the way from London to Trent Junction, between Nottingham and Derby. This is because the additional tracks are separate, having been added for coal trains which trundled down to Brent sidings, on the edge of London, from a collection point at Toton in Nottinghamshire, where the Midland Railway build a huge marshalling yard. Beyond Derby, the main l...
Skicka en kommentar
Läs mer

Importing people to sustain demand

I got involved in a discussion with a Youtuber called “Philosophy all along”. This was in connection with criticism of Trump’s policy of deporting illegal migrants, which he argued would be bad for the economy as it would reduce demand. This implies that there is a need to import people to sustain demand. There is no obvious reason why a population should not be able to consume everything that the same population produces. If it can not, then something else is going on. It is a basic principle that wages are the least that workers will accept to do a job. Wages are a share of the value added by workers through their wages. The remainder is distributed as economic rent, after government has taken its cut in taxes. Monopoly profit is a temporary surplus that after a delay gets absorbed into economic rent. Land values in Silicon Valley are an example of this; it's like a gold rush. The miners get little out of it. Rent and tax syphon purchasing power away from those who produce the g...
Skicka en kommentar
Läs mer

Beyond electrification

In an earlier post I suggested a core list of lines which ought to be in an electrification programme spread over twenty years of so. This leaves a residue of routes which it is unlikely will ever be electrified. This include for example All lines beyond Glasgow, Stirling and Aberdeen All lines west of Exeter and Swansea All lines west of Chester Shrewsbury - Chester Everything not listed in my previous blog - electrification plans only scratch surface   Some of these routes carry main line services to London and other cities on parts of the network that are already electrified or included in electrification plans. Others are self contained and others carry light traffic - less than a dozen trains a day. The current plan is that main line services will be operated with the hybrid trains on order from Hitachi, but this is a costly, wasteful and ineffective solution. The performance of the trains will be inferior to the present Inter-City 125 trains on non-electrified lines and the ...
Skicka en kommentar
Läs mer