My Political Views
I am a centrist social libertarian
Right: 0.44, Libertarian: 5.6

Political Spectrum Quiz

I think this test is actually a little more accurate than the one I completed in June 2006. James Hellyer, where are you?

Now, watch the first half of that video (and don’t get suckered in — religion and politics are separate things and I cannot condone the Christian parties that are united behind this candidate) and tell me whether you see anything offensive. I don’t.

Now, back on message:

Vote Boris in London
Vote Kennard in Buckingham Ward
Vote Conservative in Adur

BBC News

When will the Tories start being the party of merit?

Why is this message considered too sensitive?

Let her be promoted and her sense used to fight the advancing hordes of (wrong) socialists.

The UK has a major problem with new political parties. Inertia amongst the membership of the other parties (and those who are not members of a party) means that new parties must have some major backing to make any headway at all. UKIP is the only recent new party to have gained any sort of significant political power and the last party to start and gain power from the incumbent two is the Labour Party.

So it is interesting that The New Party is offering free membership; it is interesting that The New Party introduction letter is written by a former Labour Councillor; and when you read the detail you can see a bizarre mix of Labour’s social ideals alongside genuine free market economics to reform, positively, the NHS, welfare, pensions and education. In truth, the economic section shines.

But there are problems:
1) Their policy on drugs is out of date and will, inevitably, fail as badly as the other parties’ policies have. Cameron’s hinted at a more relaxed drugs policy and this is right.
2) The Party notes the ideological and practical problems that Planning regulations introduce. But their solution is odd — very odd. They would allow local Councils to set up Planning-free zones. I don’t think I can say anything helpful about this policy but it strikes me as a half-measure. It would be better to limit planning authorities’ powers in some areas (and strengthen in others)? Actually, in my opinion, the single most important area of planning reform needed is a reduction in the number of appeals processes available to people — it should be simpler and much, much quicker.
3) The lovely glossy manifesto completely ignores devolution and the fundamental constitutional problems that it has created.

Don’t get me wrong, there are some great policies in there — some that Cameron would do well to incorporate into a radical first term’s manifesto — but there doesn’t seem to be a single message. I may be wrong here, but I suspect each section was written by different people completely independently of the other sections. The “wills” and “woulds” are particularly jarring.

If you agree with the Manifesto of The New Party you should join it — inertia is a result of people not doing what they should. But you may want to wait for Cameron’s policies to know whether that party reflects your opinions more closely than do the Conservatives. I strongly suspect the Conservatives policies will be excellent with only a very few mistakes (like the Barnet formula’s continuation etc).

The parties would only now have to debate the levels of taxation and the amount of state intervention in public services and regulation.

The way is open for coalition if Cameron doesn’t do as well as expected.

Now ask yourself, which party could that be? Conservatives? LibDems? Certainly not Labour…

No, it’s the Scottish National Party (SNP). Jolly good then.

The reason I’m not as surprised as I expect at least some of you to be, is that the SNP are not anti-English, they — like I am — are anti-British!

Nigel Farage is the best MEP that I know enough about to make a fair assessment of. This video should be, like the last, played to anyone who finds it in themselves to defend this corrupt, expensive, pointless, arrogant, supra-national organisation.

I have cheekily referred to the EU as the E-USSR — I didn’t realise how accurate that was!

Thanks once again to Andrew Kennedy for making me aware of this video.

A couple of posts you should read on why the EU ain’t for us:

Devil’s Kitchen

Strange Stuff.

A little prediction for you:
- The, frankly, vast numbers of eastern European immigrants will be remembered as the beginning of the end of Britain’s involvement with the EU.

I support Poland’s membership because I believe it is not only in the interest of Polish people (if not the country), but also because it is in the spirit of the EU… That spirit, though, is one of the things that is wrong with it, and one of the reasons we should leave!