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Resignations on the Horizon?
In case you have been living under a rock or on the moon, you will no doubt have seen the news this week that the recent drama about the Horizon Post Office scandal hit the screens and forced the government into action. Sadly, their action has been the same as always, trying to pin the blame on someone – anyone – else. Right now, their two targets are Keir Starmer, who was directing the Public Prosecutions Service at the time when the sub-postmasters were prosecuted, and Ed Davey, who was Post Office Minister as part of the coalition government at the time. Was it either of their faults? No, definitely not. Was this the fault of the Tories in government? No. I am not writing this to assign blame to them, but instead to step above petty blame games and talk about the real culprits. Fujitsu At the heart of this scandal is the Horizon software, which was essentially a cash reconciliation programme installed in sub-branches of the Post Office in the 1990s. This software was developed and ultimately installed by ICL Pathways Limits, now part of Fujitsu, a large technology company with a pretty strong reputation. Unfortunately, it seems that there was a flaw in the software. For those of us with experience of developing software, this is probably not a surprise – every IT project has bugs, they are essentially unavoidable. However, in this instance the software bug made it appear as though cash was disappearing from sub-branches. I don’t understand the specifics enough to go into details, but these seem to be agreed facts. There also seems to have been some delay over the development of the software, which likely put more and more pressure on the coders to rush the job. To cut a long story short, though, the error seems to have originated from Fujitsu, so when the error was discovered they should have indemnified both the Post Office and the falsely accused Sub-Postmasters. That is what I would expect from a company that released a product which caused harm. This is not saying that they shouldn’t also be subject to fines or sanctions, but rather sets out the bare minimum they should do for rolling out a product which caused so much harm. There is some speculation that Fujitsu were given preferential treatment because their staff included the husband of our current Education Secretary, Gillian Keegan, and given the other cases of Tory corruption we have seen in recent years, this wouldn’t surprise me. The Post Office As I understand it, this is where the true blame lies. The Post Office management were aware of the issues as early as 2000 and didn’t report them back to MPs. They proceeded with charges that they knew – or reasonably ought to have known – were false, and in doing so ruined the lives of over 900 sub-postmasters. These were their staff, they absolutely had a duty of care to look after them, and given these hundreds of people were not guilty of stealing from the Post Office, they absolutely deserve compensation. The Post Office management needs to be investigated for ignoring the issue from 2000 to around 2013, when they finally obtained an assessment from Second Sight (which itself was wrong, as it concluded that the software was fine but the Post Office’s procedures were flawed). This means that for 13 years they had information from sub-postmasters that the software had a major flaw and for 13 years they ignored it. Post Office Ministers? If after reading this you still think that the Post Office Minister might still be to blame, here’s a list of such ministers since Horizon was installed: (Thanks to Christopher Hope for collating the data on the terms and names of the various ministers) The obvious question to ask is “what makes Ed Davey special out of this list?” Why is so much ire being directed at him (as well as Keir Starmer) as though this was his personal failure rather than the 19 other ministers with the exact same duties? Look into the source of said claims and I expect you will find a Tory donor desperate to create news that will keep his friends in power for a little longer. It won’t work. We see through the lies, and the British people will likewise see through the lies when they are presented with unbiased facts. Change is coming, and this might well be the last ever Tory majority government.
5 Parliamentary Anachronisms
No, I am not doing an article bashing the Conservative Party, or at least not with that as the sole focus. Instead I wanted to cover some of the oddities of Parliament that stem from tradition rather than any reasoned process. As such, here are some of the weirder parliamentary anachronisms that we can see today. Minimalist Architecture In somewhere like the Palace of Westminster, it is hard to believe that the phrase “minimalist” could accurately apply to any part of the building. Nevertheless, the heart of our democracy, the debate chamber in the House of Commons, is woefully undersized. At the moment the UK has 650 elected Members of Parliament. Some of those do not take their seats, so the actual number of active MPs is a little below that, but the capacity of the debate chamber is well below that level, around 427 seats. This is why many of the well-attended debates see Members cramming into the chamber, with a significant number of elected officials reduced to standing to watch the proceedings. Oath of Allegiance I mentioned above that some seats are not filled at all. This is mostly due to the fact that the elected representatives of Sinn Fein do not take their seats, entirely because they will not swear the oath of allegiance. This is wholly understandable, as the oath is a personal declaration of intent to follow the orders of the monarch of the UK, while the whole purpose of Sinn Fein as a political entity is to separate Northern Ireland from the UK. Such an oath would directly contradict their party’s stance, so they refuse. Incidentally, it is not possible for an MP to either draw their salary or speak and vote in debates until they swear the oath, so that means that the current system specifically excludes representation for anti-monarchists. The Mace If you see a large ceremonial mace in front of the Speaker’s chair and wonder “what is that for?”, this is the section for you. This isn’t a table decoration or a paper weight, instead it is the symbol of the Crown in Parliament. By tradition, the monarch is not allowed to set foot in the House of Commons, so instead the Mace is present. Bizarrely, this means that any debates or decisions made without the Mace being present are not valid and will not be recorded in official proceedings. When Parliament is prorogued (brought to a temporary close) the Mace is removed, symbolically withdrawing the authority of the Commons to make any decisions. The Mace is returned at the Opening of Parliament. Member Behaviour One of the odder things about Parliamentary process is the way that MPs refer to one another. In short, naming another MP is taboo. Addressing another MP directly is likewise not permitted. Instead all comments are made to the Speaker and any referrals to active MPs is made by referencing their constituency (e.g. the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip). This is intended to increase the decorum of debate by stopping MPs from outright insulting one another, but I think it’s fair to conclude that Prime Minister’s Questions demonstrates that the quality of debate is woeful. Voting At the cry of “Division” by the Speaker, the Commons officially enters a closed state for voting for a motion. This is a literal reference, in that the lobby doors used to be physically locked to ensure that MPs didn’t vote multiple times or that outsiders weren’t called in to cast a vote they shouldn’t have. You might think that in this modern era of connectivity, there would be a move towards using that for votes so that more business could be done. Sadly not, the division is still counted by the MPs present physically walking through one of two side lobbies, casting their vote by tapping their membership card onto a scanner (a recent upgrade to each corridor having its own set of counters who would report back after a manual count). This is one of the more egregious anachronisms for various reasons. First, it is not particularly friendly to disabled MPs or those dealing with a new child to force them to physically move through a voting lobby. Secondly, it is grossly unfair to restrict MPs who cannot be in Westminster from voting. This is less of a problem for a London constituency as it is for one of the outer Scottish regions, which might be seven or eight hours away from Parliament. This is an area which could easily be modernised for the good of the country. A modern electronic voting system would be very simple to set up, and would reduce the time needed for divisions from 20 minutes or so to under a minute. With an app-based voting system and biometric protection, MPs would be able to cast their vote from anywhere in the world, allowing them to spend more time in their constituencies.
What do Liberal Democrats Stand For?
A regular question asked is “What Do X Political Party stand for”. For most parties, this can be summed up in a single phrase, but it can be more difficult for the Liberal Democrats. So this article is about what the main political parties stand for. Conservatives What they stand for: rich people. I’m not going to sugarcoat this, the current Tories are all about looking after the wealthy in society, hence they make tax cuts that affect the rich far more than the poor and cut the services that the poor rely on. It’s fair to say that the Conservatives simply do not care about you if you don’t have a Coutts bank account or make large donations to their party. Labour What they stand for: ostensibly they are focused on helping the working class. In reality, their current stance is almost entirely a continuation of the current government. They support staying out of the EU, they have not proposed any sort of tax reform to specifically target the rich other than closing the non-domiciled loophole, and they have refused to back democracy by supporting the Proportional Representation demanded by their own party. In short, Labour really are not demonstrating that they care about anything other than getting into power. Reform What they stand for: think “Britain First”. This is a party for those who look at the Conservatives and think “nope, not fascist enough”. Frankly I am astonished that they are as popular as they are, as they have shown that they only really care about white British people and want to pursue very much an isolationist strategy for trade and international relations. A Reform government would likely ruin our international standing for years. I honestly do not know who they care about, because all of their policies seem to be largely based on hatred of “other” groups. Green What they stand for: the Greens put the environment first, with all of their other policies deriving from the idea that the country needs to still exist in 100 years or so. The Greens are advocates of Proportional Representation and rejoining the EU, so in many ways are natural allies of the Liberal Democrats. Unfortunately they are a very small party indeed, with only a single MP at present, who is due to step down at the next election. As such, anyone voting for them might want to consider whether their vote would be better placed with the Liberal Democrats. Liberal Democrats Saving the best until last, the Liberal Democrats essentially stand for fairness as a broad concept. This is best exemplified by the drive to make votes match power share in parliament, bringing proper democracy to the UK for the first time. As a party we are wholly committed to peace, with all of our MPs voting to make statements that we in the UK wanted a ceasefire in Gaza, something opposed by the Conservatives and largely abstained on by Labour. Our love of fairness extends to both the NHS and carers, and we believe firmly in a “cradle to grave” health service, which means that all medical staff need to be comfortable with their remuneration and benefits, and that our NHS buildings, such as Hillingdon Hospital, are properly renovated and modernised. We also firmly believe in education. It is unconscienable that we cut the education budget year after year, and we believe that both schools and universities should be available free of charge at the point of service. Finally, the elephant in the room, we believe that we must urgently rebuild our relationship with Europe. This doesn’t necessarily mean that we ought to rejoin immediately (though that would be my preference!), but it does mean that we need to step back from the highly adversarial position we have taken with our European members. Overall, what do we stand for? the answer is so much, but it all falls into the category of “fairness”.
Hillingdon MPs Vote Against Child Safety
Yesterday saw an opportunity for MPs to do the right thing. Somewhat predictably, both of our Conservative MPs, David Simmonds and Steve Tuckwell, voted against the opposition day “Safety of School Buildings” bill, along with most of the rest of the Conservative MPs in Parliament. This was a sad day for Hillingdon, with both of our Conservative MPs nailing their colours to the mast for all to see, showing that both of them care far more about party politics than actually looking after our children. What Was This? This motion, one of the few that can be brought by the opposition parties, was a response to the recent news that many of our schools are dangerously delapitated. This was described recently as a “critical risk to life” by Jonathan Slater, who was permanent education secretary from 2016 to 2000 and who specifically asked the Chancellor at the time – Rishi Sunak – for funding to repair the crumbling infrastructure. Sunak refused, offering only a fraction of the amount actually needed. Now we have schools turning into ticking timebombs, and Sunak’s Conservatives are doing everything they can to pretend the problem isn’t real. Unfortunately for them, the problem is real. Unfortunately for the rest of us, the critical risk to life means that our children and vulnerable loved ones are in danger (remember that the exact same problematic material was also used in the construction of many NHS hospitals). This bill was the first step in a long path towards finding out the extent of the problem. This was an opportunity to step up and protect the most vulnerable in society, and unfortunately the Conservatives blocked it. Our Conservative MPs Hillingdon is “fortunate” enough to have two Conservative MPs at the moment, and both voted against this Bill, essentially voting to cover up the failings of the government and the Prime Minister. These are not the actions of anyone who cares about the safety of our children, so both David Simmonds and Steve Tuckwell should think about their duties to look after their constituents, and should both be ashamed of what they have done. Steve Tuckwell’s voting record is here, and David Simmonds’ is here.
Leopards Changing Spots?
It is a fairly common maxim that a leopard never changes its spots, meaning that the very nature of a leopard is such that it will always look the same. A little closer to home, in the finance business we tend to cite that someone is statistically more likely to get divorced than change their bank account. In the interest of assessing the likelihood of certain things happening, I was wondering to myself “how often do constituencies change party hands?” Snow leopard – also not known for changing their spots. The answer to this was not easy to find. There are records of elections on the Office for National Statistics website spanning back to 1918, but oddly enough there didn’t seem to be a dataset focusing on changes in party affiliation. The data is definitely out there, but it doesn’t seem to be easily accessible. I decided therefore to do some legwork myself to answer that question. Methodology I started with a raw document outlining the votes received in each constituency between 1918 and today. From this, I applied a lookup function which matched the largest proportion to the column header for that party, which allowed me to easy work out the winning party for each constituency. I then used ChatGPT to produce a list of constituency creation dates. I have checked some of these, but not all, so this is a definite area of uncertainty. The final step was to create another lookup function to check the winner in an election year and identify whether the winner was different in a previous year. Due to the difficulty of including by-elections, this table only looks at the results during a General Election, so if party A was replaced by party B in a by-election, but then by party A again at the next General Election, this data would assume continuous loyalty to party A. The Data – “How Often do Constituencies Change Party Hands?” After analysing the data, I came up with the following table of results, so here’s the answer to the question “how often do constituencies change party hands?”: Importantly, this data shows that of the 650 current constituencies, 295 (45.38%) have either never changed party hands or have not changed hands since 1918. How might we fix this? With my favourite proposal – Proportional Representation.
Guido Fawkes, you ok?
Those of you who follow my blog – all three of you – may already have seen that Guido Fawkes did an article about me in which the anonymous author attacked me for, among other things, respecting the anonymity of people providing testimonials. This felt like it should already be the lowest point in their “investigation” of me, but they found a way to descend even lower. In short, they posted another article which stated that I had launched my campaign from the wrong constituency. The glee that they demonstrated by “finding out” that the video was shot in South Ruislip rather than Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner was palpable. Unfortunately for them, this wasn’t a discovery. The video of my campaign launch included a mention in the description that I was filming in South Ruislip since it was first uploaded in June. In fact, it even gives a partial explanation of why I was filming there, though clearly there are more details than that for anyone genuinely interested. I promise, it’s not an interesting story. Importantly, this description has remained unchanged since the day that I uploaded the video, which can probably be tested using things like the Way Back Machine if anyone is actually interested. So once again, Guido Fawkes latched on to what they thought was an easy “gotcha” and didn’t even bother to do a cursory bit of research to make sure that they were actually discovering something rather than repeating something I had announced months before. If this is the quality of their research, then they have absolutely no credibility as a news source. On the other hand, I have been 100% open and honest about what I am doing and why I am doing it. I can definitely see why that would be terrifying to someone with a poor record for honesty.
Lessons Learned
Well, that was a very unexpected result from Uxbridge & South Ruislip. If you had asked me even a week before the vote, I would have assumed that Labour would win and Conservatives would be a very distant second place, with us in third, but really pressuring the Tories. Sadly this was entirely incorrect on every count, but there are definitely some lessons to learn from this by-election. This email is also about the upcoming events in Hillingdon and Harrow, so if you’d like to join us for drinks or a barbecue, read on! Lessons Learned It’s fair to say that when we face challenges in life, we can either seek things to blame or we can look instead at how we can improve our own strategy so that next time is better. Obviously with an election like this, there will be a combination of things that we had no control over and things that we could have done better. Out of Our Control Starting with the things that were out of our control, it is worth mentioning that the Conservatives turned this into a referendum on ULEZ and Labour let them. In reality it wasn’t – ULEZ is a delegated Greater London Authority power, therefore the local MP has precisely as much power as any local citizen to stop ULEZ. The fact that Labour did not call the Conservatives out on this – as we did, repeatedly – was a major failure on their part that we have no control over. In the absence of that very specific local issue, Steve Tuckwell’s campaign was largely non-existent. He wanted to keep Uxbridge police station open (all candidates agreed) and to fund Hillingdon hospital renovations (all candidates agreed). Otherwise his entire strategy was that he was the most local candidate, which is frankly a terrible reason to elect someone as an MP. I suspect that Tuckwell would have performed worse had he actually showed up to the hustings event that he skipped, as he came across as a pretty deflated candidate and was roundly attacked by other candidates and the audience, but Danny Beales really dropped the ball by not showing up to two such events. His performance in the one he actually attended was good, and the numbers show that actually a decent performance at just one additional hustings might have been enough to make him the next MP for Uxbridge instead of Tuckwell. Regardless, we can’t control how other candidates campaign, but you can be absolutely sure that we will refer to decisions made and promised broken at the next round of campaigning. Under Our Control This category is more difficult to approach rationally. I genuinely thought Blaise did really well in both the hustings and canvassing stages of the campaign. There’s really not much about his performance that I think we need to change, so it falls to the rest of the campaign team. So what might we do better next time? Funding – we were lucky to go into this campaign with a couple of large donations, but in reality it would be better for us to build our war chest for campaigning in this non-campaigning period so that we can focus on the action itself when the next election rolls around. This will be extremely important, as we will be managing more elections across the borough, so there will be less opportunity for me to help Blaise out, for example. Our donation page is here, or you can get in touch if you would prefer to make a direct payment. Volunteers – we are lucky to have a few people that are happy to help out at any time, but we really need to increase our volunteer numbers, especially if the plan is to run successful campaigns in the coming General Election. If you’d like to help out, our volunteer page is here or you can get in touch. Materiel – it makes sense to spend some time during this period of low campaigning intensity making flyers and posters, even if they are never used. The goal here is to build a repository of useful documents that can be repurposed for specific campaign issues. Should We Have Stood Aside? I have seen plenty of comments lately that we should have stood aside, as the seat was not winnable. While I can appreciate that it might seem at first glance that our standing was enough to shift the winner from Labour to Conservative, I don’t believe this is the case. Some of the reasons for this include: We didn’t force anyone to vote for us. That was their democratic choice, and if Danny Beales had offered sufficient reasons to vote for him instead of us, that’s what would have happened. The simple fact is that voters clearly didn’t think that he offered enough of a change from the Conservatives, hence the very low turnout rate of only 46%. There are very significant deviations in core beliefs between us and Labour, most notably with respect to electoral reform. In short, we believe that it is absolutely impossible for the UK to shake itself loose of the Tories without Proportional Representation, and under Starmer Labour is currently opposed to this despite the wishes of its members. This would be a major stumbling block between our parties allying. In terms of the electorate, it is worth mentioning that there were three hustings events, and Danny Beales failed to turn up to two of them. Had he done so, maybe the outcome would have been different. Not doing so likely made the electorate feel taken for granted, which was definitely not the right approach. Ultimately we are political candidates, Blaise and I, and that means that it is our job – albeit an unpaid one – to stand and campaign on the issues that make our party special. If we thought that the country would be best served by us not standing as Liberal Democrats, then we would already have
Uxbridge & South Ruislip: Your New MP
Well, the people have spoken. 46% anyway (where were you, 54% – let me know on Twitter). And you have selected as your next MP Steve Tuckwell of the Conservatives. I thought it would be useful to document some of the things he promised and did as part of this campaign. Hustings Remember the hustings on 13 July 2023? Steve Tuckwell doesn’t, because he didn’t go. Didn’t send a proxy, didn’t turn up late, just didn’t go. The next day his team started showing recordings of the council meeting that he attended instead, and frankly it seems like a very poor excuse for missing a fundamental part of the democratic process. Frankly Steve Tuckwell is either afraid of the electorate or holds them in contempt. ULEZ The core of Steve Tuckwell’s campaign was opposition to London’s Ultra-Low Emissions Zone expansion into Hillingdon. Clearly it makes sense to listen to local issues when campaigning, but Tuckwell deliberately ignored several key points: The MP for Uxbridge & South Ruislip has absolutely no power over ULEZ. This is a devolved Greater London Authority power, therefore it sits with the Mayor’s office, not parliament. ULEZ was first rolled out by Boris Johnson while Mayor. For those that don’t recall, Johnson was a Conservative. Hillingdon was included in a letter that Grant Shapps sent to Sadiq Khan requiring the expansion of ULEZ. Grant Shapps was at the time a Conservative Transport Minister. In short, this entire promise was a lie built on a foundation of lies. Steve Tuckwell has done the political equivalent of promising voters a unicorn each, and he will have as much success delivering the herd of unicorns he now owes. Importantly, the Conservatives might apply pressure on Sadiq Khan to slow or mitigate the expansion of ULEZ. It is vital to remember that anything they do at this point is something they could have done with or without Steve Tuckwell as an MP. This was a truly disgraceful campaign, and I hope that voters remember these promises and omissions when Tuckwell campaigns to keep his seat at the general election, whenever that is. Uxbridge Police Station Throughout this election, Tuckwell claimed that Sadiq Khan was closing Uxbridge Police Station. This of course glosses over the fact that the partial closure of the station was down to – you guessed it – Boris Johnson, the serial liar and regular absentee from Uxbridge. Not as an MP, but as Mayor. Which, like the ULEZ issue above, is where the powers for policing lie, not with the local MP. As such, this is another example of Tuckwell making promises that he does not have the power to deliver. Hillingdon Hospital A recurring theme through the campaign was the state of Hillingdon Hospital, famously referred to as a monstrosity by Wes Streeting, Shadow Health Secretary. The issue here is not the staff – though the Conservatives are responsible for the repeated strike action – but the building itself. In short, it is dilapidated and needs a very significant investment to modernise the building and upgrade the services that the wonderful staff have to help us with our health needs. Sadly, no mention was made of the fact that the former MP – one Boris Johnson – supposedly secured funding several years ago for much-needed upgrades. Ground has not been broken, contracts have not been agreed, funding has not been released. In short, the Conservatives have absolutely no progress to show after 13 years in government. Given this, it was depressing to see Tuckwell running on the promise to help the hospital, as Conservatives have had ample opportunity to help the NHS in the last 13 years, and have failed to do so at every turn. Conclusion It feels very early to be making a prediction for what pledges a politician will keep and which they will break. In this case, though, I am confident that I can predict which promises will be kept – none of them – and which will be broken – all of them. This is down to the fact that Tuckwell’s main priorities of ULEZ and Uxbridge Police Station are entirely outside his control. His other priority of getting an investment for Hillingdon Hospital is, I suspect, doomed to failure based on how the Conservatives have treated the NHS to date.
More Hustings
Still not me actually participating as a candidate in the hustings process, but I had the pleasure of watching Blaise Baquiche twice more on Thursday evening and Friday morning. This follows on from my first hustings, and this article covers the second Hustings event hosted at Brunel University. If you couldn’t make it and want to view the whole thing, the livestream of the event was made available here. The Candidates The first hustings this week was a fairly chaotic event, with 11 of the 17 candidates present. Nevertheless, the moderator did a great job of ensuring that all candidates got to speak, though I am sure that the audience wished that some of them would pipe down! Notably, neither Labour (Danny Beales) nor Conservatives (Steve Tuckwell) turned up. Personally I see this as contempt for the democratic process, as this was otherwise the most complete hustings event for Uxbridge & South Ruislip, and it felt like a return to Boris Johnson hiding in fridges or himself not bothering to attend hustings events. Notwithstanding these absences, the stage was pretty crowded. The following candidates were present (from left to right, from the audience perspective): Blaise Baquiche, Liberal Democrats Piers Corbyn, Let London Live Lawrence Fox, Reclaim UK Steve Gardner, SDP Ed Gemmel, Climate Sarah Green, Green Kingsley Anti-ULEZ, Independent Richard Hewison, Rejoin EU Rebecca Jane, UKIP Leo Phaure, No ULEZ Leo 77 Joseph, Independent Several of these candidates can, I think fairly, be lumped together for review. So that’s what I will do. 77 Joseph I’m going to get this out of the way early. I liked Joseph, thought he brought a sense of honestly and genuine desire to help. Unfortunately for him, he is a single-issue candidate and freely admitted that he didn’t really have any stances on major issues. Additionally, Joseph’s single issue is highly divisive, a large scale monument to the monarchy. As a committed abolitionist, this definitely didn’t win me over. Joseph, if you read this, please know that you have my respect for what you chose to do, but I think we both know that being an MP isn’t the right place for you. Anti-ULEZ candidates As you can see from the candidate list, two candidates explicitly stated that they were standing primarily to stop ULEZ. As I pointed out in the preamble to my question towards the end of the hustings, ULEZ is a devolved Greater London Authority power, and an MP has no say over whether the ULEZ applies to their constituency. As such, this completely undermines the entire purpose of these candidates running. Incidentally, one of the candidates tacitly admitted to vandalising existing cameras and said that if unable to stop ULEZ through legal means, he would take matters into his own hands. This is absolutely not how society functions. We all have laws that we don’t feel are fair, but that does not give us carte blanche to go out and destroy public property. As an MP, we need someone who understands that the rule of law is all that keeps our country civilised, and fully accepts that they will be limited on the things they can directly change because of how democracy works. In short, these candidates seemed nice enough, but didn’t strike me as MP material. The Conspiracists Given both Piers Corbyn and Lawrence Fox were on stage, I expected more of a trainwreck. Importantly, both of these candidates represent what happens when we let personal prejudices blind us to actual expertise. For Corbyn, he denies anthropogenic (man-caused) climate change and seems to be opposed to vaccines, for Fox, he is rabidly transphobic. As if that wasn’t enough, Fox was also the only candidate who didn’t say that billionaires should be taxed, instead shifting the topic to companies. As before, these candidates turned up with some of their acolytes, so they got applause every time they said something frankly ludicrous, but no-one that went along looking for a serious candidate would have been attracted to either, no matter how charming and charismatic they were. The Pessimist Rebecca Jane of UKIP said something like “I’m not going to win, so I’m here to send a message”. As such, I don’t really see much point in reviewing the other things she said, as it’s very clear that not even she thinks she has an actual chance. The Climatists We had representatives from two climate-focused parties, the Greens and Climate. You might wonder what the difference here is, and I think that’s most easily described with the standard “left/right” economic scale. Greens are left wing, Climate are self-described as centre-right. I have said before that I like listening to Sarah Green, as I think she brings a very well researched and supported statement whenever she talks about issues. We don’t see eye to eye on all issues (e.g. ULEZ), but I hope that she would agree that we both want to achieve positive climate outcomes, we just have a slightly different approach on how to implement the necessary strategies. Ed Gemmel spoke well on a number of issues, and held his own well against heckling from climate deniers. The Democrats The last two candidates are Steve Gardner (SDP) and Blaise Baquiche (Liberal Democrats). Of all the candidates, these were the hardest for me to tell apart, and it is very clear how similar the two parties are (unsurprising given the origins!). In fact, the only major issue that I could look at which would be a point of disagreement is Brexit – the SDP is prominently pro-Brexit, while the Liberal Democrats are anti. Incidentally, borrowing an event from the next morning’s hustings, Steve indicated that his first policy as an MP would be to ask the people what they want and then implement that. This to me is a complete abnegation of the responsibility of an MP to sometimes do things for people’s well-being, not necessarily what they say they want. A classic example here would be taxation. If you asked
Episode 4 – Luca and Mental Wellbeing
The delay to this episode was far more than just slight, but for those of you who have been waiting patiently, here you go! A discussion on mental wellbeing, particularly during this period of cost of living crisis.