Enjoy

Max

It was announced only a mere few minutes ago that the former Conservative Prime Minister, Margaret Thatcher, passed away due to a stroke this morning. She was Britain’s longest serving post-war PM and the only woman to ever hold the job.

I will be honest, on a political level, Thatcher symbolised and represented nearly everything I stand against. Her policies as PM have done more untold harm than of any PM since the war. But on a personal level, I do have great respect for her. The thought of a woman PM in the early 1970s was almost unthinkable, even to Thatcher herself at the time. Upon becoming leader she spent the next seven years fighting an uphill battle, effectively fighting those within her party who deemed little would become of her leadership and then Administration. No post-war Prime Minister has so radically shifted the discourse of British politics (with the exception of Attlee). Taken all together she commands at the very least, considerable respect for how radically she changed and shaped Britain for better or worse. I do admire most principled individuals and Thatcher is no exception.

This is how I will remember Thatcher, a skilled, principled and determined supreme heavyweight figure of 20th Century politics, but a political opponent and adversary all the same.

Max

Chair-elect: Alex Swanson

Vice-Chair-elect: Ellis Stacey

Secretary-elect: Joe Armer

Treasurer-elect: Jas Kandola

Campus Campaigns co-ordinator-elect: Mike Grocott

Social Secretary-elect: Stephen Bowcott

Publicity Officer-elect: Rob Parkinson

Local Campaigns co-ordinator-elect: Tarquin Pritchard

Congratulations to the new committee-elect and comiserations to anyone who was unsuccessful.

So how much of the Welfare budget do you reckon is spent on unemployed people? 42%? How much do you reckon is claimed fraudulently from the Welfare budget? 27%? Who do you reckon will be hit most by the 1% limit on benefits, the unemployed “scroungers”? And how much do you reckon is given to the skiving “scrounging” b*rstards on Job Seeker’s allowance (2 kids aged 6 and 10) a week? £147?

If you’d given answers close or on the same as the ones suggested, well, then, you’re completely full of sh*t.

This is what was revealed in a YouGov poll where respondents gave answers similar to the ones suggested. Want to know the real answers?

1. Welfare budget spent on unemployed people? – 4% not 42%.
2. Welfare budget claimed fraudulently? 0.7% not 27%
3. Who will be hit most by the 1% limit on benefits? – Primarily the employed and those seeking work.
4. And average weekly Job Seeker allowance? – £111.45 not £147.

(Don’t believe me, check the link above).

This is of course shadowed by the outright attempt by Conservative HQ’s attempts to divide the nation like never before by turning the working poor on the unemployed poor (most of whom are seeking work).

While instead, this is the poster they should have published.

I’m tired of this, I’m tired of the demonisation and scapegoating of the poor. But hey, why try solve society’s real problems when you can lie and create scapegoats out of the most vulnerable in society?

Max

Happy New Year to all our readers (yes, they do exist) whatever your political stripe or leniency! Have a great 2013!

Even now, over 24 hours after hearing these two men, I’m still struggling to comprehend and properly articulate a response to the sheer detachment from reality and supreme level of wheedling these two men committed. In case you missed either men, LaPierre advocated that US schools should be guarded by armed guards and that ”The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun,”. The latter blamed gun violence in the US on mental health issues and lack of proper treatment.

At this point I was seething in the car. Now, I’m not saying I have all the answers, but I have a pretty good idea of what the problems are. No Mr LaPierre, giving “good guys” gun to stop “bad guys” is not a good idea. You see Mr LaPierre, I’ve never had crack cocaine for breakfast, one because I never would, but mainly as I don’t keep it in the fridge. I’ve never been butchered by my slave’s in a bloody uprising, primarily by not keeping slaves. Because you know what Mr LaPierre, not having the means to commit crimes is a far better method to preventing gun homicides than simply believing everyone should arm themselves in the name of mutual deterrents.

I’m not advocating outright banning of guns in US right now, as like I said, I don’t have all the answers and there’s a chance there’d be a backlash against such a move. But when you live in a country where there’s no nation-wide policy on firearms this allows dangerous people to easily buy guns from other states without any background checks and then bring them into other neighboring states. The system also has no check for those “good guys” who you so uphold Mr LaPierre who may turn dangerous (and indeed they do, for whatever reason). It gives no account on a federal level for other members of a family who may own firearms (as what happened with the latest Connecticut shootings). And Mr LaPierre, you live in a country where there are roughly 300 millions guns or 89 firearms per 100 civilians and have an average death toll of around 10,000 gun homicides a year (roughly 3.2 deaths from guns per 100,000 people). This is in direct contrast to countries like here in the UK or in Japan, (countries you probably believe have “bad guys” running around unchecked) have roughly 6 and 0.6 guns per 100 civilians respectively yet have a mere 0.1 and <0.01 deaths by firearms per 100,000 people respectively.

I’m sick and tired of hearing such divorced ideas from reality that if you give people more guns there’ll be less gun crime. This is something that really struck me with Piers Morgan, I actually agreed with him on something:

Like I said, I don’t have all the answers, but how many more people are going to have needlessly die before the likes of Mr LaPierre realise that having more guns to solve gun crime is an absurd idea?

Max

For Jack Matthew’s benefit (and yes, Norway is included).

Here we have the results from BULS:

And here are the results from BUCF:

Enjoy comparing.

Max

Enjoy. Maybe this was BUCF members 5 years ago?

Max

Enjoy.

Max

It turns out the Deputy Prime Minister, Nick Clegg, was due to deliver a speech in support of gay marriage which criticised those who opposed said government proposal as “bigots”. Sadly, it seems Clegg and his aides have quickly removed the “bigot” parts of his speech on the grounds that it was included as a “mistake”. It seems the only “mistake” Clegg had made was removing the term “bigots”, and for incredibly good reasons.

I have long despaired at the remarks by opponents to gay marriage from the Catholic Church, the Church of England and other smaller organisations. This is something we here in the UK have been able to watch, almost smugly, across the Atlantic in the USA for many years now. But no, it turns out the UK has it’s bigots on this issue as well. Yes, that’s  right, I’m willing to say what Clegg never could. Given there is no reasonable or legitimate secular reason to oppose gay marriage, what so ever, I am fully inclined to regard those who oppose gay marriage as bigots. This is not said in attempt to silence opponents, it’s not an attempt to close the conversation but it is simply the most logic explanation given the reasons we’ve heard so regularly in the USA and now here. And I’d like to take a moment to address four of the most common I hear:

• But gay marriage will change the definition of marriage!

- So? Your point being? First off, marrying for love is a rather recent idea, until the last 150 years or so marriage was arranged around power relationships between families and often the woman would become property of the husband…but we re-defined that. In fact, the ‘re-defining’ argument fails to provide any reason why this would be a bad thing to do in the first place, but all is given is vague unfounded assertions.

• But my religion means I must oppose it.

- Well ok, you’re welcome to oppose upon religious grounds. But the thing is that we make laws based on secular reasoning. You can’t force your religious views on another section of society…period.

• But gay marriage will lead to bestiality and polygamy!

- Now this is what we call a slippery slope fallacy. Just because one thing is allowed it does not mean we’ll move onto other actions. That’s why when homosexuality was decriminalised under Roy Jenkins in the mid-1960s, bestiality and polygamy have still yet to be legalised by this obscure argument. Hell, while I wouldn’t call it polygamy (polyamory for a better term), I would have absolutely no problem with polyamorious (if that’s how it’s spelt) marriage.

• But it’ll be damaging to a child’s upbringing.

- There’s two problems to this assertion. 1 is that there’s absolutely no evidence that a gay couple would fair any less in raising a child than a straight couple. 2  this argument implies the sole purpose of marriage is to produce children which is just nonsense on so many levels. First off, would you then not bar seniors or infertile straight couples from marrying as apparently the only purpose of marriage is reproduction? It also implies that having children out of wedlock is fundamentally wrong, which of course is complete bull, don’t even go there.

For once, Clegg could’ve made a principled stand on something that really matters to ending LGBTQ discrimination, but it turns out he’s too much of a coward. Thankfully, when I see an individual oppose gay marriage for incredibly poor reasons such as above, I’m happy to make no reservations in pointing out the most logical assessment.

They. Are. Bigots.

Max

Enjoy.

Max

Enjoy.

Max

Enjoy

Max

So, with the US Presidential race entering it’s final stages Romney has finally played one of his last cards (so to speak), Congressman Paul Ryan. Well, daring dynamic or damp squib of a running mate? Well thankfully at least, the American public have so far opted for the latter with Ryan failing to provide any real boost to Romney’s campaign. Ryan may well give Romney a boost in the single Vice-Presidential debate given his reputation as a ‘numbers guy‘. Having Chaired the House Budget Committee in the House of Representative since January 2011 Ryan does have the potential to give Romney the detailed policy and authority he has so lacked up until now. However, Ryan, like Palin (though probably to a lesser extent) still has the potential to be the Republican nominee’s undoing….as can be seen here:

1. Voted against the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act (A strong step in the right direction for equality in pay for women).
2. Voted 59 times(!!) against abortion in Congress. (And yes, this is a bad thing as I’ve addressed previously).
   
3. Voted to cut all Federal funding to the amazing organisation that is Planned Parenthood.

Now I accept these political stances, as disgusting as I may find them may not always quite enrage the American people, there are some ideas that Ryan believes that potentially could:

1. Ryan’s budget proposals as a Chair of the House Budget Committee effectively sought the end of Medicare. (Turning it into an effective voucher system which is HUGELY unpopular amongst senior citizens…a high turnout demographic especially in the key swing state of Florida).
2. His budget proposals would cut $3.3 trillion from low-income programs (over at least 10 years, but I could be wrong on that specific number).
3. And at the same time cut taxes for the wealthiest in American society (an equally unpopular idea).

Still believe Ryan will be a game changer for Romney? Well I sincerely hope not, but you never know when it comes to the often intellectual backwardness of American politics.

Max

FYI: for those wondering why I’m still ‘blogging’ here, why you might think, “Didn’t Max graduate last July…isn’t he no longer a student.” Well yes and no. I did graduate last July but I will be returning to the University of Birmingham (and BULS) this September to train as a Primary School Teacher, so will ‘Ramsay’s F Word’ will see one last final year out of it.

I’ve always been one for giving credit where credit is due to opposition parties and I make no exceptions here. It seems the SNP Government in Scotland has the good sense to bring forward draft proposals to have Gay Marriage legalised in Scotland (after proposals here in England were put on hold).  This is nothing less than a momentousness step in the right direction for LGBTQ rights and the UK as a whole. I’ve become in recent months splutteringly enraged at the pathetic excuses made by those who oppose Gay Marriage, “It’ll redefine marriage” (which isn’t even a reason). I’m incredibly happy the Scottish government has moved beyond such bigotry and I hope the Scottish Labour Party gives this proposal it’s full backing.

Bad news:

When I started University back in the September of 2009 (back in the middle of the previous recession) I always had it in my mind that, ‘Hey, at least the recession will be over once I finish my degree.’. Now ignoring the fact that I’ll be returning to the University of Birmingham (and BULS for that matter) in September to train to be a Primary Teacher. But now I’ve finished my degree I realise that this was a foolish assumption to make as the UK now suffers it’s 3rd consecutive quarter of negative growth at 0.7%. Now of course, we’re going to hear all the usual excuses, oh the Jubilee Celebrations, oh the weather, oh the Eurozone (which is nonsense on the latter given the UK and Italy are the only two major G20 economies back in a double dip recession). This was a recession made in Whitehall and in Downing Street.

It’s about time Cameron, Clegg and Osborne own up to their own mistakes and take responsibility.

Max

There are points throughout history where established cultures near a breaking point. Today is one of those days.

£13 trillion ($21tn) is the rough size of the US’s and Japan’s economies combined. That same £13 trillion (and this actually a conservative estimation) has been hoarded and hidden from tax by a mere (estimated) 90,000 individuals.

I don’t think any one individual can truly comprehend what this £13 trillion could have been effectively used for. To find a cure for cancer, to vaccinate millions of vulnerable people in third world countries, to fund an almost infinite supply of scientific research or to provide free education for millions of children worldwide.

This is what has happened under the culture of neo-liberalism. The right has found it fitting to shift the blame onto “benefit scroungers”. What is apparent instead that this has been a mere smokescreen for a far wider problem. We have also been encouraged to not question and even idolise these “wealth creators”.

As Labour members we must accept that our party had helped facilitate such actions, we’re not innocent in all this.

I can only hope that one day soon, the established culture will finally break.

Max

Regardless of your view on the government’s austerity drive, it is easy to sympathise with the young Ms. Smith, an MP since 2009, she was only 15 when Michael Howard took his mauling from Paxman over the whole ‘did you threaten to overrule him?’ saga. Smith’s boss George Osborne was otherwise engaged, and so it fell to Smith to defend the government’s latest instalment of ‘omnishambles’ over the u-turn on the plans to increase fuel duty.

And so it began: ‘When was this decision taken?’ demanded Paxman, on no less than seven occasions. ‘I can’t tell you the ins and outs’ came the response from the obviously rattled Smith, before adding that she was not going to provide ‘a running commentary’. The need for a running commentary there was none; Paul Mason’s introduction had listed the recent u-turns for those less well versed in the burning issues of pasties, caravans and charity boxes. Mason’s piece to camera even included the dreaded ‘i’ word: ‘incompetent’. Shades of the Charge of the Light Brigade therefore, as Osborne’s miscommunication and responsibility shirking left Smith to bear the brunt of Paxo’s wrath.

Back to the interview, and there appeared no end to the onslaught: ‘Is it hard for you to defend a policy you don’t agree with?’ ‘Nice question’ she snapped back, before offering the profound Aristotle-esque analysis that ‘I don’t think many things are certain in this world’. The gravitas of this statement was undermined slightly however by the spluttering and large gulp of water that followed immediately after. It was clear that Paxman could scent blood: ‘Which department has underspent?’ he enquired on five occasions, to be told that ‘they fall across and in different ways’ (yeah, me neither). That was the final straw, and, risking an enquiry from the League Against Cruel Sports into his conduct against the flailing Minister, Paxman bellowed ‘Is this some kind of joke?’ Not even Howard had had it this rough. Smith was clock-watching by now, counting the seconds until she could return to the relative tranquillity of the Treasury Office. The ‘i’ word raised its ugly head once more; ‘Do you ever think you’re incompetent?’ Smith muttered something about ‘the best interests of her constituents’, and that was that. Phew.

By Dan Harrison, Former BULS Chair

To remind you why this is such a cracking idea, here’s some reasons why:

1. The UK already has the most expensive rail fares out of any European nation
2. The UK is the only nation in Europe not to have a nationalised rail industry
3. UK rail users pay 10 times that of their Italian counterparts
4. The UK already subsidises Virgin by £1.4 billion (a company that should not receive a penny in my books)
5. For those who say Privatisation leads to better organisation, think again
6. Estimates figure that £1.2bn of public money has been lost each year as a direct result of privatisation and fragmentation, money that could have allowed fares to be 18% lower than at present.

In a nutshell, Privatisation has indeed failed for the rail industry. There’s no real ‘choice’. If I want to get a train from Birmingham New Street to Manchester Picadilly I can only go via CrossCountry and if I want to get a train from Birmingham New Street to London Euston I can only go via Virgin trains.

As a semi-regular train user, this is a brilliant step in the right direction for Labour and the rail industry. Hell extend it to Buses as well!

Max

In the last week, the Trade Union, GMB, called for the expulsion of Progress as an affiliate organisation to the Labour party. Now whatever you may think of Progress this is indeed a nasty authoritarian streak by the GMB leadership. The Labour party has always prided itself on being a broad church and it’s only through open and fair debate within the party that we can come to a united progressive/social democratic/socialist agreement and movement. Yes, I’ll admit in the last twenty years or so this open debate and communication between different segments of the party has often subdued or ignored. But as a party pluralist and a man of consensus this is the ideal way forward.

If GMB is really not a fan of Progress, how about an open and honest dialogue to attempt to come to a common agreement or even to persuade members of any ideological flaws they may have.

We are stronger united as a Labour party and yet we are still entirely capable of having our own internal disagreements and discussion. Childishly excluding segments of the party will only take steps to further alienate ‘factions’ and even lessen our electability.

Max

I’d like to nip this in the bud now. To say this is a personal attack on Mark (as some short-sighted individuals claimed my tweet from last night regarding this claimed to be) would be hugely misleading and would be over-flattering of our outgoing Guild President. There’s a very small select group of individuals I feel comfortable attacking personally and Mark certainly doesn’t feature as one. As someone who genuinely cares in determining what is true I find it entirely comfortable criticising absolutely any idea. I find it entirely reasonable to point out to individuals when they believe the wrong ideas (given the right circumstances) they are then able to recognise their mistakes, because we are all stupid on issues at some point in our lives. I’m incredibly stupid when it comes to understanding cricket, art, pop culture references and popular music. As I’ve already said, I have a great deal more respect for the outgoing President and all the other outgoing Sabbs after last night. Mentioning Mark in my tweet and this post is not a personal attack as some individuals may claim, it is an attempt to make him and many others realise the flaws in the idea of the “silent majority”.

Moving on, the “silent majority” idea invokes my own personal love/hate fallacy of argumentum ad populum. In a nutshell, the level of popular support has absolutely no bearing on what is right or wrong, true or false. If we’d always bend to the will of the “silent majority” homosexuality would not have been decriminalised in the UK in the 1960s and desegregation in Southern US Schools in the 1950s would have also never have happened. Or at least without it, introduced both far too sooner.

You may ask how this is relevant to the wider Labour party, NOLS and BULS. Sadly far too much. Too often do I hear 60% believe x, 80% support y. So what?! This has no absolutely no bearing on the truth! This personal distaste for argumentum ad populum has been particularly tested over the Diamond Jubilee and to be honest, I’m becoming incredibly tired of hearing it. More often than not, the “silent majority” fallacy is too often produced to legitimise truly false or morally wrong policies and ideas. As someone who cares about the truth and its ultimate pursuit, I hope we would all speak out against such basic yet widespread fallacies.

Max

I seemed to have developed a particular reputation of disdain for two prominent branches of British society in my final year of University, religion and the institution of the Monarchy. Religion bashing is something I spare for my own personal blog as after all BULS is an entirely secular society. So today my focus will be on the institution of the Monarchy and the case against it.

Unlike some fellow Republicans, I’m not too fussed about the costs it brings. My own personal gripe of the Monarchy is how it undermines our own basic sense of ethics and morality. We can all say as an ideal that we strive to not treat anyone differently or give special privileges or persecute others merely because of their background or the family any individual just happened to be born into. In a nutshell we try not to value an individual’s self-worth on the family they just happened to be born into. This is the very basis of meritocracy and equality (well at least equality of opportunity). Yet, when it comes to the Monarchy we seem to conveniently forget this ideal.

Now personally, I like to have a consistent a world view as possible. If a base ethics works in one area I’m sure as hell it’ll probably apply and work in nearly any other area. And this is what we get from many Royalists, a suspension of such basic ideals and ethics all in the name of making them feel special. This is also an argument I often hear/see “But the majority of people are in favour of the Monarchy.”. So what? Popular support/belief has absolutely no bearing on what is right or wrong, or true or false.

I’d also like to address the famous fallacy from tradition. Last year at my work (Lifeguarding) at around the time of the Royal Wedding where one of the cleaners (a lovely old dear) asked what I’d be doing on the day of the Royal Wedding. I honestly replied, “Oh, I’ll be avoiding the celebrations as much as possible as I don’t think we should have a Monarchy.”. I was met with a disgruntled reply with mutterings of ‘It’s good for tradition.”. I didn’t have the heart to say this at the time as she was an old dear but what I really wanted to say in response was, “So was the bubonic plague for 300 years, and so was persecuting gays and women for hundreds of years and not giving them the vote!”. Like popular support, tradition has no bearing on whether something is right or wrong, or true or false. Tradition is not a reason to keep or get rid of anything.

I realise I’m in a minority here and I realise that my dream of a Republic is far flung dream probably beyond my lifetime. But all changes for the better have to start from some where.

Max

I read with despair the comments of those supportive of Equal Marriage and I wanted to shout: ‘Can you not see the mind-forged manacles of institutionalism that Marriage (in any form) brings?!’. The Gay Liberation Front, nurtured on the campus at LSE in the early 70s was very clear in its view, condemning on page 2 in The Gay Manifesto the ‘archaic and irrational teaching [that] support the family and marriage as the only permitted conditions for sex.’ The Gay Liberation Front’s key theme was anti-assimilation. Gay people were equal, sure, but they were different as well, and as such should play no role in conforming to the ‘archaic’ institutions and cultural practises that made up Britain’s history. It was this direct, ‘in-yer-face’ attitude which makes the GLF so important to Gay history in Britain. The concept of Marriage could play no part in their ‘aim at the abolition of the family.’ (p.9)

I for one oppose marriage. I agree with the GLF when they stated that ‘we will not be freed so long as each succeeding generation is brought up in the same old sexist way in the patriarchal family.’ It would have been hypocritical of me, I believed, to oppose marriage, but be in favour of Equal Marriage.

I then looked to see who also opposed Equal Marriage. I could find nobody that shared my opinion on the fundamentally unjust nature of marriage. Instead it was a collection of knee-jerk Tory MPs (the dusty and offensive Peter Bones of this world) and irrelevant Church Minsters, whose quest to preserve ‘traditional family values’ was little more than thinly veiled homophobia and ignorance. These people seem to advocate human rights, as long as this doesn’t stretch to sexuality equality. And I was not prepared to enter this unholy coalition.

It then dawned on me that my argument was flawed. Basically, I was being an academic elitist, pontificating from the comforts of a university on how ‘blinkered’ everyone was apart from me. (I once heard this described as ‘intellectual masturbation’).

So if gay couples wish to show their love to one another and society at large by entering the traditional institution of marriage then there is absolutely no argument, certainly morally, why this shouldn’t be allowed to happen. Sign me up as a convert. Just don’t expect any Queer Radicals to be heading up the aisle any time soon.

By Dan Harrison, former BULS Chair

The election of Francois Hollande will certainly shift the debate in Europe, with how to get growth into our continent now being the primary focus. In his victory speech , the new French President spoke of breaking with austerity, of making a better world for the next generation and how the young will be at the centre of his presidency. Listening to his priorities, it felt in stark contrast with the current situation we are in on this side of the Channel and indeed in many countries throughout Europe.

Throughout his campaign, Hollande also spoke of wanting to unite people, of a dislike of divisiveness. This also tells us something about how President Hollande will lead Europe, on a night when neo-Nazi’s made gains in Greece. Attitudes towards immigration within the EU and the divisiveness they have created have for too long gone unchecked and have only got worse during these times of economic crisis. It’s not just growth that Europe needs, it’s inclusion, unity and, in that most French of words, fraternity.

Cameron, watch out. Change is here.

By Hannah Johnson, BULS Member

This is a tweet from Conservative Central Head Quarters (CCHQ) twitter account from the middle of the results night.

Labour had a net-gain of 824 councillors by the next day.

Max

Dorries goes on to claim that “we do not have true conservative values in our party at the moment – we have a predominance of Liberal Democratic values”, a sentiment most grass-roots Liberal Democrats would wholeheartedly disagree with. Can a government which has implemented such draconian cuts really be considered one which has embraced ‘Liberal Democratic values’?

The problem for the Liberal Democrats is that their vote share declined to a measly 16% of the vote, a second year of pain for a party which has traditionally done better in local elections than in general elections. Lib Dem activists fear that the loss of so many councillors may result in the party facing an ‘electoral wipeout’ in 2015. The Liberal Democrats do deserve the rejection by voters due to Clegg’s decision to abandon core Lib Dem positions, such as on tuition fees, and the failure to moderate a government dominated by conservative principles. However, the product of weaker Lib Dems may just be an even stronger Tory party, especially in the south, or worse, a stronger UKIP.

The worry is that the Tories’ declining share of the vote, coupled with the success of smaller parties such as UKIP, which polled 14% of the vote in areas which they contested, could lead to the party making a further lurch to the right in order to win back the more conservative voters won over by UKIP. Calls have been made by MPs such David Davis to abandon progressive elements of the coalition’s policies such as Lords reform and gay marriage in order to give a “more Conservative flavour to the coalition”.

In particular the success of UKIP has the potential to ignite a fight from Tory backbenchers over Europe, and in this regard both the Tory right and UKIP represent a further danger to Britain. With the European elections approaching in 2014, the Tory party could see the increasing popularity of UKIP, who usually perform well in elections to the European Parliament, as a sign they need to adopt a more Eurosceptic approach. Following David Cameron’s recent unwillingness to work with fellow European leaders on solving the Eurozone debt crisis, a more Eurosceptic approach has the potential to further isolate Britain on the periphery of the European project.

Although, the EU has many, many problems, including a clear democratic deficit, it is an institution which ultimately does serve the British interest. In particular, when it comes to the environment, Europe has led the way internationally in agreeing to ambitious emissions targets and unilaterally implementing a tax on aviation.

What Labour needs to do is address the genuine concerns the public have when it comes to the EU. Last week, the former business secretary, Peter Mandelson, called for a referendum on Britain’s membership of the EU, due to the fundamental changes in the nature of the EU in the decades since the last referendum on Britain’s relationship with Europe. Such a high-profile call for a referendum by a former Labour minister, should be heeded by the current Labour leadership. The Labour party has the potential to redraw the debate around Europe by taking the initiative and adopting a policy which would show that the party is listening to the millions of people who clearly have issues with Europe. The opportunity to make the case for Europe would expose divisions within the Conservative party over the issue, while also giving the British people a chance to have their say on a changing institution which does have huge implications for the democracy of this country.

A (mostly) referenced version of this post is available at https://docs.google.com/document/d/1WcmZYW11nzzWq1OWKVc7s2laxdhHAVJHyp7UsqA4W9Y/edit

By Alex Swanson, BULS Website Editor

I think our very own Max has already eloquently and fairly captured Labour’s performance in this week’s mosaic of elections, rightly arguing that although it was a fantastic night for Labour and a bad night for pretty much everyone else, including the media who wound themselves up for a Labour defeat in Glasgow and drubbing in London, we still have a long way to go, and are only at ‘Kinnock levels’ of support at present.

Therefore I will just sum up where I think the main parties should go from here, and although I am in no position whatsoever to know what goes on in the heads of the British voters (all five of them who bothered), I will try tentatively to capture what they may have been thinking.

First of all, the Tories. These guys need to get real – after weeks of headlines about being out of touch, with pasties, grannies and income tax, they see the local election results as a resounding call from the electorate to try and get more out of touch, if that is at all possible. In backbenchers’ post-match analysis  (reliably backed by the Daily Mail) this has varied from House of Lords reform, to equal marriage concerns to a need for fewer wind turbines. They’re even proposing an ‘alternative Queen’s Speech’. As if those who voted against the Tories who were unemployed and couldn’t afford to pay the gas bill, or even had to resort to food banks, weren’t bothered by this, but were damned if they were going to see Lord Sugar get made redundant, or let Adam and Steve down the road get hitched. No, guys, they don’t want YOU redistributing wealth from the most vulnerable to the richest in society, making them pay for the failure of neo-liberal economics.

Next, Labour: We need to be confident in our leader, who may have some work still to do but is a leader who is connecting with people, does have a vision for the future forming in his head, and is capable of heading a talented team of potential ministers. We also must reach out to those who didn’t go out and vote on Thursday, giving them a positive reason to run to the polling booths at 7am to vote Labour – even in the bloody rain. We need a plan for fair, green investment in industry to bring growth and jobs back to the economy. We need to bite our tongues and reach out to the Liberal Democrats, and not be tempted to laugh and cackle at their coming behind penguins and fascists in some wards – this isn’t funny, this is worrying. Everybody knows most of them would rather be in coalition with Labour than the Tories.

What about the Greens? They need to let us steal some of their policies.

And finally, the Lib Dems: Exit the Coalition, stage Left.

Ed Miliband in Birmingham yesterday with Birmingham Council Labour Group leader, Sir Albert Bore

That’s right, throughout Friday Labour saw it’s best performance in a local election since 1995 (all in proportion to how many Council elections were up for grabs as last year we gained more but far more were up for grabs). And similarly the Tories saw their worst local election result since 1996 and the Lib Dems now have dropped down below 3,000 councillors for the first time in the party’s existence.

This was a result that exceeded everyone’s expectations on all fronts. With most Tories attempting to spin the result to say we needed around 450 councillor gains to be seen as a success, we only smashed that with 823! When everyone expected Scottish Labour to lose Glasgow City Council we not only fought off a SNP challenge but took control of the council at the expense of the Lib Dems and Tories. When everyone said Labour would only win a slight majority in our very own Birmingham City Council, we smashed all expectations by gaining 20 councillors and winning a 34 seat majority. When it was expected Welsh Labour would fail in taking Cardiff City Council, we defied all predictions by gaining 33 councillors and winning a majority of 17! And we’re very proud of very nearly almost gaining control of the Greater London Assembly, falling short by 1 Assembly member.

This election wasn’t without its disappointments though. BULS’s very own Honourary life Member, Dennis Minnis, was unsuccessful in taking Edgbaston. And biggest of all, huge disappointment at Ken’s defeat. We are all glad Ken did defy most  (but not all, sadly) odds by not letting Boris have a shoe-in election by pushing the margin on the second round to a close 3%. Many Tories see Boris as the next leader and Prime Minister in waiting. “Wiff-waff” may well have edged it in London, don’t expect the country to do the same.

Of course, the results did see successes close to our hearts in BULS. Obviously there was turning Birmingham City Council red, but BULS saw former student of the University of Birmingham, Karen McCarthy, join former BULS Secretary, Brigid Jones, as a Councillor for Selly Oak. Quinton ward, where Grandee Nash played a large hand in, was also successful in electing Caroline Bradley.

All in all, while this was a brilliant result for Labour nationally we have to remember this has happened to opposition parties in the past. Hague, Howard and Kinnock all saw similar successes at mid-term local elections in their time in opposition. This was a much needed boost, not a prelude for the general election. Though it is safe to say, that the media, politicians and the wider public can no longer claim Miliband has no chance at 2015. There’s still a hell of a lot of work to be done, but we now know that we still do have a shot at 2015.

Max

Mr Cooper is a cruel and selfish individual. He has attempted to take advantage of a high unemployment rate to undermine basic working conditions and to exploit desperate people. You might think it unfair to single him out for criticism; he is just one greedy self-serving individual among many.  Maybe I would have dismissed him if it had been just the confidence trick. One obscure tinpot little company out in the sticks barely registers on the global scale of corporate injustice. But because Mr Cooper was outwitted by seven unemployed people he’d so clearly thought beneath him, he decided to launch a smear campaign.

This is why you may have read about Mr Cooper in the gutter press, in the corrupt Murdoch tabloids, in the hate-soaked columns of the Mail, and on the front page of Friday’s Metro (which presumably no unemployed person is expected to read). Bitter at being outwitted by dole scum, he has decided to add to the drip-drip of hateful propaganda against them. I’m going to look specifically at the Sun, that bastion of working class divide-and-rule. Mr Cooper looks bemused around his soulless office, making awkward half eye contact and sporting one of those ‘70s style striped shirts with plain collars that David Steel used to wear. Apparently the hired staff failed to turn up because of rain, not that any evidence or testimony is given to prove this. In all likelihood Mr Cooper plucked it gracefully from his arse. Then the real slurs begin.

A picture worth taking up darts for.

The general assumption made by Mr Cooper is that the potential employees were “work-shy”. In fact, throw in all the tired clichés you can think of. Draw an elegant but oh so two-dimensional caricature if you please. It’s so much easier than genuine analysis – you don’t even need evidence. To quote “Stunned Carl”: “I cannot believe that these layabouts can have such a pathetic attitude to a day’s labour”. The measured tones of a decent chap, I’m sure you’ll agree. For the real reason why not one of the seven did not turn up, Mr Cooper need only look at the pay he was offering. Did it ever occur to him that it isn’t work, or even the specific type of work that people object to, it’s the insulting poverty pay?

£50 a week is well below the poverty line for a single person. Subtract travel costs and its questionable as to whether anyone could afford to remain alive on such a sum. “Even the basic pay for fulfilling the minimum requirements of the work would be double what they could get on Jobseekers Allowance” is Mr Cooper’s justification. With such an evidently poor grasp of basic maths, I could fear for the financial future of his business, if I cared. For comparison the JSA rate for under 25’s is £56 a week. From experience I can say that it’s certainly a struggle keeping the Koi carp pond stocked on 56 quid. Alternatively it’s “too generous” if you agree with Mr Cooper, which I don’t. People are indeed better off on the dole, but in the way that the ‘flu is better than the Black Death.

Would I rather pay people to stay on the dole? Well yes actually, yes I would. As a taxpayer, I would much rather pay to support someone in looking for work on their own terms; work that will be suited to their talents, complement their general well-being, and ideally be of a credit to wider society. I would favour this even more so if the alternative is to force the desperate into an exploitative working relationship with the Carl Coopers of this world, encouraging a race to the bottom for wages in a sweatshop economy. I would see the end of parasitical businesses like CarSmart. What a beautiful irony it would be if Mr Cooper found himself unemployed; would his Just World philosophy survive? Would he continue to think of himself as superior to “those people” when he’s stacking shelves for free in the Darwinian future he encourages?

“The benefit system rewards people for doing nothing” says Carl. No mate, it protects them from abusive scumbags like yourself.

Max

He has been the only candidate to continuously fight against the Tories’ fee regime and its further marketisation of our education system. Michael has been instrumental inthe organising of two national demonstrations, mobilising thousands of students across the country. Such demonstrations proved highly successful, gaining the support of Labour Students, and the general student population, nationally.

As Labour students we should be fighting against the current coalition government’s outrageous, and damaging, policies concerning higher education fees and their on-going commitment to severe austerity measures. Education is a public good and, at Birmingham, we believe that education should be universally accessible and publically funded. Michael Chessum is the only candidate for VPHE who we believe shares our values and will fight to defend them.

Furthermore, Michael is the only candidate committed to opposing Theresa May’s regressive and racist visa changes, which will have a detrimental effect on International Students who contribute so much to our higher education institutions and country as a whole.

Michael’s past record shows that he knows when and how to use direct action tactics, whilst his pivotal role in founding NCAFC proves his dedication to fighting the government’s austerity measures.

We need a VP Higher Education that will offer a robust defence against the coalition’s stark attacks on education. We wholeheartedly believe it is time to put factional divides behind us and unite in our support for Chessum, as the candidate most able to deliver.

Catie, Ed, Ellis, Areeq, Alex, Sam and Dan

The quite excellent Johnny Void documents more fully Grayling and the DWP’s shameful back-story. Today I come to credit Grayling. In between selling our youth as slaves and branding the Archbishop of Canterbury a militant Trotskyite, he has successfully created one new job. Just the one. Here [link].

I know from experience that jobs working for MPs can receive hundreds of applications for a single position. In this case there may be fewer, given what any politically aware unemployed person will know about Grayling. But if Hell itself were looking for part-time bar staff, even Satan might receive CVs from desperate job hunters. When hundreds of people apply for one position, 99% of those are mathematically guaranteed to be unsuccessful. How will Grayling reconcile these masses of doomed applicants with his wider responsibility for policy? Will he realise that his hateful ideology is wrong in blaming individuals for economic circumstances far beyond their control?

Here’s an idea. The deadline for this job is not until Monday (23^rd). The essential qualifications and requirements are actually very low. Any young person who has passed a handful of GCSEs could, with a minimal amount of on the job training, perform the advertised role. I’m going to apply. You should to. So should everyone who is currently unemployed, and even those who aren’t but who will need a job in the near future. We’re all qualified. Assuming that the position is filled on a loosely meritocratic basis, we should all have a fair chance of consideration.

If, by Monday morning, Grayling’s office inbox is fit to bursting with job applications (“the standard was very high”) then maybe, just maybe, he’ll start to consider the massive competition that exists for even the most basic of jobs. Maybe he’ll begin to appreciate just how many individuals are trapped in limbo by a lack of opportunities. Maybe (and this is a long shot) he’ll cut us some slack, stop using his departmental jackboot to bully and intimidate, and start creating real jobs, beyond making cups of tea in his constituency office.

It won’t take long. Thirty minutes to draft a covering letter, and any good student/graduate job-hunter should have a CV to hand, one that can be appropriately tweaked. Grayling may endorse lying, but I encourage honesty, these should be genuine applications. I could put an example here, but several hundred individual submissions will carry far more weight than a thousand copy and pastes. Apply. Apply now! If you’re really lucky – and I mean really lucky – you might just end up working for the Right Honourable Member.

The ad in full (courtesy of w4mpjobs):

Cannabis use, in particular is quite popular with a lot of students of Edgbaston and Selly Oak, as well as some permanent residents of Selly Oak. But other drugs such as cocaine, ketamine, MCAT, and MDMA are also just a phone-call away. And if that number is engaged? Well there’s about ten other numbers you can try. I guess this blog-post is really a call-to-action for local MPs Steve McCabe and Gisela Stuart, as well as local Councillors, the West Midlands Police, and the University of Birmingham Guild of Students to work together and seriously tackle the issue. Matters such as recycling, burglary, and even poor broadband service are generally prioritised in Selly Oak, and understandably so, but why not drugs?

The negative ramifications that drug use can cause are serious and sometimes irreversible. Whether that be damages to your mental health, your physical health, or even just the increased likelihood of bad things happening when you’re intoxicated, in the long term, substance abuse just isn’t worth it. And financially, take it from an economist, none of this stuff is actually worth the prices that they are sold at; the reason they are priced so high is because they are illegal. The money would be better spent on clothes, books, or even food rather than blindly investing money with questionable characters. A lot of extremist groups and terrorist groups are known to be funded by narcotic drugs trade – another reason right there to tackle the issue.

A lot of people take drugs though in Selly Oak, even people you wouldn’t normally suspect, and it is a very tough problem to tackle, of course it is. However, I am only going to suggest one method for these community powers-at-be to use, and that is to educate students about the negative effects of drugs. In my view, education is often a remedy to a lot of the world’s problems and I think education in this situation could do a great deal of good. Ideally, I would like there to be termly anti-drugs campaign weeks at the University as well as public information campaigns in Selly Oak. A lot of people won’t pay attention, sure, that is to be expected, but even if one or two people are turned away from substance abuse, it would be worth it. As it is now, there simply isn’t enough being done.

This isn’t an exaggeration or an over-dramatisation of the issue, it’s real and it’s happening. I want to make it clear, however, that this isn’t any kind of moral judgement on my behalf, no one is perfect, and I am certainly no angel myself. It is a serious issue in Selly Oak though, and I am positive that the problem is replicated in other areas of Birmingham. In schools, children are educated about these sorts of issues, and rightly so, but at University, where students are most exposed to the problem, there is next to nothing in terms of education and campaigning. Substance abuse can have short-term, medium-term, and long-term negative effects on individuals, and I guess I hope that the local council hopefuls, our Parliament representatives, and our upcoming Guild of Students Officer Team prioritise this issue in the coming years. Even if helps just one person.

By Areeq Chowdhury, Secretary-elect.
@AreeqChowdhury

Now for those of you who know me personally as an ‘angry atheist’ may start worrying “Oh no, what’s he going to come out with now, destruction of all religious buildings?”. Fear not, while many of you do see that side of me I’m also an ardent secularists. I recognise the right of religious organisations to play a legitimate part in society but I also am opposed to having the state play any part in religious affairs. So this is why we need to tax religious organisations like any other organisation that has an income.

Some of you may have reeled back from such a suggestion, but hear/read me out. To become a legally recognised religion with a tax-exempt status an organisation has jump through a large variety of hoops set by the state. That’s right, the state sets the criteria and by extension determines which organisations are worthy of having tax-exempt statuses. I’m not proposing we take religious rights away from organisations and individuals, rather to take away the privileges granted by the state a select group of institutions based on no sound secular reason.

If you want to ensure true neutrality from the state in regards to religion (aside from a much needed separation of church and state, but that’s a whole other post) no tax-exempt status should be granted to any religious institution and yes even atheist/humanist/secularist groups that may have won a tax-exempt status. Churches are free to continue with any charity work they so wish and I think we can all agree that area will remain tax-exempt but separate from the organisation.

On a more personal note, with the billions upon billions of pounds that go into religious organisations world-wide only to spent on other churches, missionaries and aid to foreign countries which is too often conditioned upon meeting certain religious criteria. This money could be far better spent on real secular matters like schools, hospitals and roads.

Max

Never let it be said that I am an unquestioning partisan. George Osborne has attracted a lot of criticism in the past few days for his plans to cap tax relief for charitable donations. Tax relief allows wealthy individuals who donate to registered charities to claim back from the treasury. The Chancellor is proposing to cap the amount of tax-free giving at £50,000, or 25% of a person’s income, whichever figure is the greater. I agree with him.

It is an unusual situation where a Tory chancellor can consider myself as an ally (and the Daily Mail as an enemy). The official reason given by Osborne is that this is a means to reduce tax evasion. If you remember back to the budget, Osborne declared such evasion to be “morally reprehensible”. At the time I expressed deep cynicism about what actions if any would follow such fine words. The charity tax relief cut is a welcome start, even if the limit is still too generous.

What have I got against charity? Consider it like this – under normal circumstances an individual who has been fortunate enough to become a high earner will contribute back to society through taxation. A progressive tax system will endure that the tax rate collects most from those who can most afford it. Revenue raised then goes back into services from which we all individually or collectively benefit. An educated, healthy and contented society then feeds into the entrepreneurs and genuine wealth-creators of the future.

Now consider the tax relief route. The rich individual decides to reduce their tax bill by donating to a registered charity. This could be any such charity of their choice, regardless of size or activity. The charity would be run by its directors and trustees entirely by its own rules and priorities, with little oversight, and no accountability to the general public. Because the donor has claimed tax relief, the funds raised for the treasury are reduced – the state has less to spend on health, education, and other public services. The donor themselves, if wealthy, is probably not affected but the general public will suffer as a result.

The charity tax relief system is effectively a system for the subsidy of charities at the expense of public services. Public services face an immense amount of scrutiny, and they are always accountable to us through our elected representatives. Even the largest and best known charities carry out their activities in relative secrecy. Some charities do nominally “good” work, such as running hostels or after-school tuition. Yet what logic can there be in the treasury subsidising a charity to support a public service, when that same public service only needs support due to treasury spending cuts?

Philanthropy is also strongly anti-democratic.  A donor decides which causes they believe are worthy. They also decide how much to donate and when. Where a charity has a few large donors it has to dance to their tune, to beg. To quote Toynbee and Walker in Unjust Rewards (2008):

we suggested to a major donor that paying more tax might be a better way for the wealthy to pay their dues than random gift-giving. He answered that the state could never spend his money as well as he could. If he gives he can direct it exactly where he wants and oversee what happens to it. Follow this recipe to its natural conclusion and anarchy and plutocracy result.

Charity tax relief allows the wealthy to take money from the tax system – from all of us – and spend it on their private causes; be they decent state substitutes, the idols of privilege, or just delusional make-believe. I applaud Osborne for cutting it.

Will the relief cut seriously reduce donations? That only depends on the true motives of the donors. From the Independent:

Why are charities so fearful that a limit on how much donors can offset against tax will reduce their income? This will only happen if the tax concessions of the past constituted a major – the major? – motivation to give. No limit is being placed on how much anyone may donate, only on what draws tax relief. If big donors are sufficiently committed to their cause, there is nothing to prevent them giving as before. If they don’t, does that not suggest that the tax break was, if not being abused, at least a persuasive consideration?

I am not against charity in itself, but it must never be a substitute for the consistent and equal provision of essential services. Services that only the state can provide fairly and free at point-of-use to all of its citizens. The welfare state was founded by Liberal and Labour governments precisely because the threadbare safety net of charitable provision was never good enough. Cutting the tax relief threshold could mean an actual spending increase for our public services, and in that I agree with George.

However, whilst these candidates have received plenty of media coverage, it remains that others have been pushed into the background. So what I want to – very briefly – highlight, are a couple of local council candidates in Birmingham.

BULS has, in the last year, been very active in the local area. Last year, Edgbaston council candidate Dennis Minnis lost by only 21 votes. This year, he is standing again, and BULS has been behind him 100%. A few weeks ago, a few of us went out on a Saturday to talk to local residents with Dennis. As we were walking down Charlotte Road (not too far from the Vale), Dennis told us that in the early 1990s, he won a large redevelopment fund for the street. Before, he said, there were partially deserted and dilapidated high rise buildings. These tower blocks are now gone, and the street looks entirely different (there’s even a nice playground there, where Catie Garner, our incoming Chair, got very distracted with the shiny swing sets). Dennis is incredibly passionate about his local community, and this is just one example of the astounding work that he has done in the past.

Another candidate who I would like to quickly mention is Elaine Williams, the council candidate for Harborne ward. Unlike Dennis, she has never been a councillor before, but is by no means any less passionate. I met Elaine last October, and have been out campaigning for her ever since. Recently, she wrote in Harbone Local News about the local elections (http://www.harbornenews.com/April2012/index.html). On page 15, she talks about the work she has done in the last few months for Harborne. One point she highlights concerns the sale of the Clock Tower on Harborne High Street, a former local community centre. In short, the grade II listed building was in need of repair, and the local Tories commissioned the erection of scaffolding on the building. Along with James McKay, the only Labour councillor in Harborne, Elaine found through an FOI request that the scaffolding cost around £12,000 a week. They then subsequently found an alternative quote of £2,000 a week, which was ignored by the Tories. Within no time, the debt quickly amounted to around £800,000. Recently, the centre was sold for £100,000, effectively meaning that £700,000 of local taxpayers’ money was lost. As James said in a radio interview, you’d be hard pressed to find a flat for £100,000 in the centre of Harborne, let alone a grade II listed building.

It’s also worth having a look at this – http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/harborne_clock_tower_sale_price?unfold=1 – to see more about the work she’s done regarding the Clock Tower (scandal). 

As one of the most talked about issues in Harborne, Elaine has been at the forefront of the debate. Like Dennis, she has been passionate about local issues, and would no doubt do a fantastic job as Harborne’s second Labour councillor.

This is my first blog, and as boring as it might be, I really wanted to highlight this issue. Whilst other political issues like the London mayoral election and the Birmingham Mayoral referendum are at the forefront of the news, dedicated individuals like Dennis and Elaine are hardly talked about. Of course, I’m not surprised, but I wanted this rant to provide some needed attention to our local candidates. It’s easy for these candidates to be lost in the political mix, but with the local elections dawning on Thursday 3^rd May, I wanted to quickly show that councillors can make a difference, and that these candidates will make a difference if elected.

By Ed Gilbert, Vice-Chair-elect

As far as I can make out, Santorum has two positive qualities. 1) He’s seemingly quite fond of a drink before noon, and 2) he wears those lovely sleeveless jerseys (great for keeping your core body snug while letting your arms and armpits breath!) I liked having an “underdog” candidate in the race, and I was sympathetic to his plight of being massively outspent by the Romney campaign.

Not too hot, not too cold. By far his most sensible policy decision.

Then again, I loathe nearly everything that Rick Santorum stands for. There’s far too much for one post, so I shall focus on two prominent issues. Firstly the man is a bigot. He is a homophobic bigot. You cannot justify homophobia, not in the 21^st Century, not in a civilised society. Dressing it up as a feigned defence of the “traditional family” cuts no ice; its like saying you don’t want any black kids in your white children’s class because you’re afraid they’ll learn bad habits. You assume there’s a threat and use that to justify your pre-existing bigotry. This should not just be an LGBT concern – if you’re capable of hating one group solely because of something intrinsic to their being, you can just as easily hate another. As a socialist and a social liberal I find it abhorrent.

Before I was a socialist I was already a scientist. Santorum’s second negative trait is his preference for non-evidence based policy. Here is a man who prefers to substitute his own reality. It is not enough to say that he is anti-science; he is anti-fact. From a genuine objectivist point of view, he is anti-reality. Call it creationism or call it intelligent design, it’s still bullshit. Then there’s the Dutch euthanasia epidemic which doesn’t really exist, except in Rick’s head. An oblate spheroidal 4.54 billion year-old Earth? Just a “liberal” media conspiracy. Probably.

Ultimately I suppose I should be glad he’s gone. Unfortunately there was his speech after Wisconsin last week, where analogies were made to the Republican nomination races in ’76 and ’80. Pick the moderate (Ford, ’76) and lose, pick the conservative (Reagan, ’80) and win was the message. Santorum sees this as his ’76, and he’s now positioning himself as nominee heir-designate for 2016. Be afraid. 2016 would be a much better year for him than 2012 could have been. Romney, near certain nominee, faces an incumbent President with decent approval ratings and an improving economy. The precedents aren’t good. But assuming Obama’s re-election, by 2016 the party political pendulum will be swinging the other way. Apart from 1988 the last time a party retained control of the White House into a third term with a non-incumbent candidate was 1928. Santorum will grow more electable not less, especially if a second “moderate” Republican loses to Obama.

On the other hand, as recently six months ago people were still speculating about Palin 2012. Hopefully Santorum will disappear into obscurity. Either way, the 2012 race just became much less interesting, with the next election results worth staying up for being the Big One itself in November.

Don’t assume from any of this that I like Romney. To me he represents an equally insidious hatred, though in a much more subtle flavour. His evil is a delicately refined one, and the more dangerous for it. I’ll deal with him later.

It is bad enough that the NEC has imposed a shortlist system for the nomination, cutting down the choice that will actually go to party members from at least four candidates to only two. It is also underhand that they have suggested sitting MPs should resign if they become a nominee, before they even win a mayoralty. The whole idea behind these various restrictions is to prevent unnecessary by-elections, especially in the wake of Bradford West. It is probably also to ensure that the “right” candidate (from the central party’s perspective) gets the nomination. To me the whole thing stinks of heavy handedness.

The whole point of elected mayors (and police commissioners to an extent) is greater local democracy. Two key words their, “local”, and “democracy”. Arbitrary decisions and rules being handed down by the NEC are neither local or democratic. The field for the nomination should be as open as possible, and that field should be presented to the membership. That is the democratic way. It cannot be right for someone in London to ultimately decide who we in Birmingham have as our mayor for the next 4 years.

The danger here is that, by being heavy handed and trying to force nominations, the NEC risk seriously alienating sitting MPs and CLPs. The NEC and the Labour Party as a whole does not actually have the power to remove sitting MPs – all it can do is expel them from the party, most likely if they persist to run against the “official” candidate. For an MP set on becoming mayor, this offers a simply choice; give up ambitions or leave the party. I can’t imagine a Labour MP actually running as an Independent, yet were it to happen and were a city to find itself with an “Independent Labour” Mayor, then this whole affair would have backfired horribly on the central party. Not only would Labour still face the by-elections it had hoped to avoid, but under the unfavourable circumstances of having just lost a mayoral election to and Independent and having a hostile outgoing MP.

Instead the selections should be made as open as possible, to all Labour candidates who wish two stand. Any further elimination can come when the party membership in a given city fill in their ballot papers. The eventual nominee will be the genuine choice of that city, and not just the preferred placeman of the party machine. Is there a risk that some cities will end up with maverick Labour mayors, who don’t tow the line, who do things their own way, and who embarrass the party leadership in London? Possibly. Should the decision as to whether this happens be entirely down the party membership and the electors in that city? Absolutely.

The mood on the doorstep is promising – those who voted Labour in 2010 and 2011 (and who successfully voted in several new councillors) are staying with us. National-level polls look promising, even with just under four weeks to go. However what is most noticeable is the level of anger directed towards the government, both by our supporters and those of no declared preference. In the latter instance a dislike of the Tories does not mean support for us. Too often I hear the common refrain “They’re both as bad as one another”. This is frequently coupled with “they’re all in it for themselves”, or “there’s no difference between the main parties any more.” Tragically these clichéd anti-political statements are most common in the more deprived areas.

Why? It is true that in government we were perceived as forgetting our traditional base. It is probably true that Labour neglected those less well off while pandering to the already privileged middle classes. Where we did immeasurable good (the minimum wage, proper funding for health and education) people have already adjusted their base levels and forgotten what existed before. Some people simply grew bitter as we failed to live up to high expectations. None of this justifies the intellectual laziness of the anti-politics sentiments, but it perhaps helps to explains them.

In short, just because people are learning anew why so many of us hate the Tories, a Labour vote is not inevitable. There has been enough analysis of the Bradford West result to be sure of that. YouGov’s fortnightly “Best Prime Minister” question shows that while Cameron has dropped to 30% (-8), Ed Miliband has only risen to 19% (+1). The difference has gone to the “don’t knows”. Most striking of all was today’s Survation voter intention poll which puts UKIP joint with the Liberal Democrats on 11%. All three main party leaders have negative approval ratings among the general public. Barring any great enthusiasm for Labour, the May elections could be a good time for the minor party protest vote.

Looking to Birmingham, the Statement of Persons Nominated was released earlier in the week. All three main parties have candidates in every ward. The Greens (for whom I have a fair amount of sympathy) have also put forward 40 candidates. The BNP and UKIP have both put forward 18 candidates each. In addition there are ‘80s throwbacks the Social Democratic Party and the National Front (both with 4). Add to this one Independent, the Socialist Labour Party (2), and general anti-cuts groupings (3 between them). Finally, don’t forget one lonely English Democrat. None of these minor parties currently have any representation in the City Council. Respect, which does, is fielding no candidates, a decision they may now be regretting.

Will any of these minor parties do well on May 3^rd? The excellent Political Betting does a good national analysis for this question. Specific toBirmingham, I would imagine not. The vote margins as they currently stand are too large – only someone withGalloway’s personality cult and the publicity of a by-election could achieve the swings needed. Looking at many wards there still exists a two party system straight out of the 1950’s – it genuinely is a “two horse” race in many cases, no matter how infuriately those dodgy bar charts are. Quinton ward last year saw Labour and the Tories win 89% of the vote between them. If I were a partisan I might be glad that we don’t use some fancy preferential voting system – the power of the “wasted vote” is strong indeed.

Will there be Green (or UKIP) councillors in the Council House after May 3^rd? My judgement is “No”. On the other hand, I can easily see the minor party vote having a spoiler effect on one or two results. Looking at last year’s Harborne result, the difference between winning Labour candidate and losing Tory was smaller than the total votes won by the Greens. In a two-way fight one could assume that Green voters would favour Labour over Tory, but you can never be certain. Minor parties from left and right could be responsible for many split votes this time around. It might not cost us a majority, but it could cost us seats.

We should never assume that just because voters are anti-Tory, they are pro-us. We are not the only opposition, and we have to earn the trust and support of the electorate, otherwise there could be more Bradford-style upsets in waiting.

Every so often there is a news story absurd enough to make cliched people ask: “Is it April 1^st?” This week there was one, it was April 1^st, but the story is depressingly real. I refer to government plans to extend the surveillance of our online lives.

While I believe in a strong state, and I certainly trust a democratic state more so that any private company, this represents another unnecessary intrusion into the private lives of us all. I believe that the internet must be totally free; that is as a true anarchy. A “crime” can only exist on the internet where is co-exists in reality (e.g. fraud). It must be a totally free place where ideas can be exchanged and where speech must be entirely free. While this naturally carries risks, I believe these can be better averted through user education rather than through cumbersome regulation. The internet can never be policed to protect the naïve or the over-sensitive from the troll, nor should it be. I realise that this probably sounds a little woolly or idealistic, but I will always favour the optimism of hope in humanity’s better instincts over the pessimistic urge to control and restrict us.

This isn’t just about our ability the watch daft videos of cats, to pointlessly argue the toss in comment sections, or to create weakly satirical memes. Consider how online communication is used to build campaigning and enable activism. Most organised protests will have Facebook events, with wildly optimistic “attending” lists. Debates over the injustices or otherwise of government policies will rage on page walls, or in twitter feeds. Last year saw the (perhaps over-hyped) power of online protest in deposing dictators. Fear those in positions of power who wish to curtail our online freedoms – they are a threat to democracy itself.

I am not talking only of the specific implications of these more recent proposals. They build gradually on the already extensive powers of our police and security forces. If implemented I imagine they will ultimately be another notch on the ratchet towards an authoritarian state. A future Prime Minister, trying to reduce these powers, would no doubt have their ear bent by senior security figures. They would supposedly be so useful in catching the genuine terrorists (who may in any case have been caught though traditional methods). Never mind the “inconvenience” to the ordinary citizen who by now has normalised having their online activity watched. I argue for a free internet, and against all efforts to regulate it, from a point of principle.

Remember ID cards. New Labour was at its worst in its authoritarian spasms. Remember the Tory manifesto of 2010: “Labour have subjectedBritain’s historic freedoms to unprecedented attack. They have trampled on liberties.” Now see that opportunism exposed as another incumbent government threatens the sacred privacy of the individual. To quote inhuman oxygen thief Chris Grayling in 2009 “Too many parts [of the government] have too many powers to snoop on innocent people and that’s really got to change.” This same creature is now involved in the DWP’s outsourcing of databases to India, with the privacy of millions of innocent people being dependent on the integrity of the lowest bidder.

If the Tories believe in freedom it is merely the freedom for the powerful to enslave the rest of us. Labour have barely shed the worst of our authoritarian Blairite heritage. The Liberal Democrats are making very promising noises, but I don’t fancy placing too much faith in them any time soon. Who then will stand up for our online freedoms?

What worries me is that this noble cause where women rightly have more of a choice in living their lives as they want to live them has created a culture and a mindset where those who choose – actively, rather than subjects of some false consciousness or religious pressure – to stay at home or only work part time to be with the kids as they come home from school, are targeted as a drain on society and the public purse. Housewives (sorry), homemakers, stay-at-home mums: whatever the word we use for them, their work is indeed that – work, which for example produces far more of a social good than the likes of bankers or estate agents or lawyers. Yet it is not categorised as such, and our society does not reward it, it penalizes it.

This is nothing to do with a woman being made to feel guilty for not pursuing her career – of course women should strive for the top echelons of the work pyramid, breaking the glass ceiling and entering the boardrooms; it is nothing to do with sexism – I firmly believe a ‘househusband’ can do the same job, and in our modern age with “all sorts of families” (Mrs. Doubtfire, 1993), including women with higher-paying jobs or same-sex parents, this is increasingly common. However there is a cultural bias against those women who choose to remain at home and work bloody hard to raise a family, often while holding down part-time or volunteering work, and this is reflected in our nation’s appallingly inadequate childcare arrangements.

In other countries – such as Germany with its stronger economy – there are subsidized childcare benefits, or help for mothers. Child tax credits and SureStart centres used to come close to this, but these are being slashed by the Coalition, which prefers to reward bankers, those earning above £150,000 a year, and potentially those who are married as opposed to all parents, co-habiting parents included. Mothers who decide to give up or put their careers on hold are penalised again later as they pick up their state pension, at a time when older people are living in fuel poverty, struggling to finish paying a mortgage and helping their children to get onto the housing ladder or with university tuition. They may even have to bring up another generation, as their children cannot afford childcare for their own sprogs so have to hand them over to the grandparents, who have no recognition or help from the state for helping bring up the politicians, doctors or teachers of tomorrow.

Nowadays, if you’re not contributing to economic growth or paying income tax, you effectively do not exist.  If you are doing your best to balance all of your commitments and bring up well rounded children you are ignored. It is about time mums who choose to stay at home for all or part of the time are recognised and treated with the respect they deserve by our policymakers.

It may be humorous, but some of the jokes around the notoriously ageist BBC’s choice of old-time crooner Engelbert Humperdinck to represent the UK at Eurovision have masked some alarming underlying currents of ageism and ridicule which are common in today’s media and discourse but usually pass unnoticed. Some of them have been about dementia and Alzheimer’s. There has also been serious criticism that he has been chosen, arguing that he should get out of the way and allow young talent to fluorish. People in the public eye who dare to continue in their career beyond 65 get sniffed at, despite still having the energy and drive to continue working. Why should he crawl into some care home and age quietly, with no fuss?

This brings us onto the more unnerving aspects of ageism in today’s society. The care system in England is a disgrace. Almost on a weekly basis there are reports of neglect and abuse in care homes up and down the country, with some staff accusing patients of “attention seeking” for desperately needing help to relieve themselves, children and grandchildren never visiting them, and pensioners still at home never getting out of bed because if they did they would freeze, as they cannot afford to put the heating on and pay the bills to the six main lecherous price-fixing gas companies (who are the real drain on our society). Meanwhile people are forced to sell their homes or inheritances to pay for their parents’ care because they receive little or no help from the government. Never mind inheritance tax, what about the low and middle income people who receive nothing from their parents because they have to give it to a private organisation which may or may not treat their loved ones with dignity and respect?

The state machine also picks on the elderly because they are vulnerable, in the same way that they pick on the young, the unemployed and the disabled. While the heads of top banks avoid paying tax altogether or manipulate it so they only pay the lower corporation tax, and Osborne no doubt prepares to justify lowering the 50p top rate in the Budget, ordinary retired pensioners are being routinely harassed to pay back money handed to them by mistake, without having it explained to them that it doesn’t have to be in a lump sum. I know a 93-year-old lady who took the trouble to write a letter asking why her winter fuel allowance was being slashed, and all she got back was a letter saying there is no money left and why doesn’t she ‘go online’ to find out more. Now there are many tech-savvy elderly people out there, but I don’t know many nonagenarians who served in the war who have a Gmail account and Facebook profile.

We live in ‘tough times’, as they keep ramming down our throats, and money doesn’t grow on trees. Yet times were harder in the 1940s austerity period and they managed to establish the National Health Service. Instead of spending money on the implementation of the Health and Social Care Bill (a laughable title for the effective privatisation that awaits us), why not set some aside for the eventual creation of a National Care Service for the elderly, or at least a free service for the poorest old people? Andy Burnham called for one in 2010, and now sadly Labour, in its’ attempt to appear economically competent, has gone quiet on the proposal. Yet it can be done.

It’s about time the elderly who don’t need patronising were allowed to continue living their lives to the full, and it’s about time those who no longer can do so without help are treated like human beings, and not a burden on the public purse which should die quietly.

Whilst we can look back proudly on all Labour achieved in equality – and there is no need to list these here – ending legislative homophobia is not the same as ending homophobia engrained in society. Top-down measures can only work so far. Greater acceptance of homosexuality as being ‘equal but different’ to heterosexuality can only be achieved through increased exposure of what it is to be gay, i.e., being capable of loving someone of the same sex. At its most basic this can include couples walking down the street holding hands. Unfortunately, we are not yet at a stage where this simple statement of homosexuality is uncontroversial. There is still a need for gay couples to act as pioneers. I can speak from experience that some members of society are not ready to witness such sights.

Labour is at its best when fighting for the rights of minorities within society, championing the fundamental need for equality. However, whilst I am well aware that homophobia remains an issue, the greatest issue of inequality relates to income. The lack of equal opportunity in the world of work adversely affects women, the BME community and disabled people more than it does the LGBT community. With this in mind, the LGBT Labour needs to rally round and support those who also fall under the umbrella term ‘minority’. Liberation Campaigns and caucuses are vital in recognising and celebrating our differences (note the very discourse of the word ‘Pride’ in our annual Pride Marches, and the rightful presence of Labour at these marches), but our shared difficulties and experiences need to be at the forefront of our campaigns.

This is, I believe, should be the next step of LGBT Labour in Britain, standing up for the voiceless in society, speaking for those adversely affected by the Government’s draconian and ill-balanced cuts. Even if we do not self-define as members of a particular caucus, Labour needs to unite and continue the fight for equal opportunity for all.

By Dan Harrison, Outgoing BULS Chair

According to Grayling and IDS though, we opponents are just a tiny “unrepresentative” bunch of extremist “trots”. Ah yes, “trots”, meaning trotskyists; because if you can’t counter an argument with logic, reason and facts, then why not descend into slurs, name-calling and ad homninum? I have used the term “trots” in the past to refer to left-wing opponents. It was wrong of me then, being both ignorant and a lazy and knee-jerk form of argument. All in all its use by the government signifies an intellectual unwillingness to engage in the issues.

Yet what can we expect from men who so clearly do not know the difference between right and wrong? Already they have lied through their teeth about the “voluntary” nature of workfare. Government documents are, even now, being fabricated or hidden from official websites. The DWP, as always, peddles its Orwellian propaganda. Everyone who has first hand experience of the Job Centre and these schemes knows that Grayling and IDS are open liars. When brave individuals like Cait Reilly have dared to stand up against workfare, they have been mercilessly slurred and slandered in the Tory press. Now there are threats of a heavy police presence at future workfare protests – presumably to intimidate the vulnerable into compliance.

I am against workfare because I believe in a fair days pay for a fair days work. I oppose businesses exploiting the free labour of the unemployed. I oppose the unemployed being punished for economic circumstances beyond their control. I oppose undermining the wages of paid employees by working for free. I oppose already rich individuals and shareholders profiting from forced and unpaid labour.

According to Grayling and IDS, all this makes me an “extremist” and a “trot”. This being so, all hail Comrade Trotsky!

By Chris Nash

Chair – Catie Garner

Vice-Chair – Ed Gilbert

Secretary – Areeq Chowdhury

Treasurer – Ellis Stacey

Website Editor – Alex Swanson

Communications Officer – Sam Faulding

This represents the beginning of the end for what I’d like to call, the ‘General Election generation’ of BULS. The last contingent of the BULS society who still remembers the day the final Leader’s debate came to campus, the day we met the Cabinet (shame he didn’t shake my hand) and the day we watched Giesla Stuart win Edgbaston in Joe’s Bar on results night.

I wish the new committee-elect all the best and hope they will be a progressive force for good and a committee based on consensus and mutual trust and respect.

By Max Ramsay, outgoing Vice-Chair

Enjoy

Max

What is beginning to emerge is that Europe’s (and more specifically, the UK’s) austerity programmes are not working. If you make too harsh a cuts to the public sector you’ll also damage the private sector as numerous contracts are arranged between the two sectors. That’s right, they’re intertwined, you attack one part too harshly it will have a knock on effect on the other.

It is hugely unlikely Cameron, Clegg and Osborne will take notice of Obama’s successes. But at least the American people hopefully will this November.

Max

Andrew Lansley recently showed a prime example of how not win your case by describing the ever growing opposition to his NHS reforms as being motivated by “political” reasons.

I’m sorry but “political” reasons? The British Medical Association (BMA), Royal College of GPs, Royal College of Nurses, the Conservative dominated Commons Health Select Committee and Norman frigging Tebbit all oppose the reforms, which will open up the NHS to EU competition law, for “political” reasons? These are not organisations (with the exception of the latter obviously) that sit from the outside and attempt to vaguely analyse the inner workings of the NHS. No, these are organisations that deal with the inner workings of the NHS every single day. They know how it works. They know what will be detrimental. And they are the ones that will know that these reforms will fundamentally destroy the NHS.

Cameron said it himself, no top down reorganisations of the NHS. Now drop this bill!

Max

Sorry for the break in blogging, we’re trying to up the ante this year

Probably the most pressing of all news items is the recent dismal growth figures. Over a year ago when Cameron and Osborne claimed we were “Out of the woods” and “Out of the danger zone”. How very wrong they were. With the final quarter of 2011 seeing a contraction of 0.2% this then means that in the last 15 months since Osborne’s Comprehensive Spending Review (CSR) in October 2010, we’ve had a massive 0.3% of growth. Cameron then has the audacity to blame the recent growth figures on the Euro crisis. Well I’m sorry, the UK economy has been stagnating long before the crisis began to effect.

Cameron you said it yourself, “I take full responsibility for everything that happens in the economy.” then take responsibility and change course!

Max

Everyone is encouraged to stand for any position and please feel free to contact us at committee@bulsonline.org if you have any questions. We would recommend writing a short speech to read and if anyone wants flyers or manifestos printing then send them to the BULS account and we’ll sort it. However, this is optional and we would want to reiterate that we encourage anyone to stand and get more involved! If you can’t physically  make the meeting and wish to stand for a position, email us at the above email address and someone will read it out on your behalf.

Preliminary position descriptions:

Chair

The chair liases with the National Organisation of Labour Students as well as the Guild of Students.  Organises events and chairs committee meetings and full member meetings.  Organises speakers and writes speaker-request forms.

The Chair is a financial signatory on the clubs accounts.

Vice-chair

Assists chair in organising events. Organises transport for all events necessary, eg. Trains to national events. Assumes duties of the chair if the chair is temporarily unable to carry out his or her duties or if a complaint is made against them until it is resolved.

The Vice-chair is a financial signatory on the clubs accounts.

Secretary

This Secretary takes charge of the organisational side of the club and, along with other members of the committee, helps to organise events.  Assumes duties of the chair if the chair and vice-chair are temporarily unable to carry out their duties or if a complaint is made against them until it is resolved. Also writes the minutes for full member meetings and committee meetings.  Writes the risk assessments for events.

The Secretary is also a financial signatory on the club’s accounts.

Treasurer

Has full-responsibility for the management of accounts.  Decides on levels of subsidies when appropriate.  Organises fundraising and Workers Beer Company summer work.

The Treasurer is a financial signatory on the clubs accounts.

Communications Officer

Writes weekly email, to be sent to all members.  Uploads member email address onto email account at start of term (with assistance if needed).

Website Editor

Has editorial responsibility over the website; http://www.bulsonline.org also jointly responsible for updating the pages on the website along with the Communications Officer.

Women’s Officer

Elected in a seperate caucus (i.e. chosen by Women only). The Women’s Officer has the job of liaising the views and grievances of all Women of the BULS ot the committee. The Women’s officer is also encouraged to organise campaigns on women’s issues such as eqaulity in the workplace, maternity leave, etc.

Black and Ethnic Minorities (BEM) Officer

Elected in a seperate caucus (i.e. chosen by Black and Ethnic Minorities only). The BEM’s Officer has the job of liaising the views and grievances of all Black and Ethnic Minorities of the BULS ot the committee. The BEM’s Officer is also encouraged to organise campaigns on Black and Ethnic Minority issues such as rascism, equality, etc.

LGBTQ Officer

Elected in a seperate caucus (i.e. chosen by LGBTQs only). The LGBTQ’s Officer has the job of liaising the views and grievances of all LGBTQ of the BULS ot the committee. The LGBTQ Officer is also encouraged to organise campaigns on LGBTQ issues such as discrimination, right to marry same sex marriages, etc.

Disabled Officer

Elected in a seperate caucus (i.e. chosen by Disabled only). The Disabled Officer has the job of liaising the views and grievances of all Disabled members of the BULS ot the committee. The Disabled Officer is also encouraged to organise campaigns on Disabled issues such as discrimination, etc.