SNP in the House of Commons

The Phoenix rises from the ashes as the SNP reactivate the House of Commons with a clear parliamentary based opposition to the brand of Tory rule.
It used to be the role of the Labour Party to enunciate the condition of the poor in our society but since New Labour came into being there often seemed less than the thickness of a cigarette paper between themselves and the Tories as Labour tried to invent a centre ground political party.
Apart from the "braying" which goes on at Prime Ministers Question Time, usually a measure of grandstanding and mud slinging which makes the dignity of Parliament look like a junior school playground, the weight and tenor of the questions, since the Scottish Independence Party came into the chamber has greatly improved.
The SNP are clearly a party much closer to its electorate. The members themselves coming from the very estates in which their electorate live, know first hand the problems which to the 'professional politician', having learnt what they know through a political degree and the apprenticeship they gain of knowing the ins and outs of the Westminster bubble by attaching themselves to a party as a political advisor, Labour, vis a vis SNP, are like chalk and cheese. There is little of no connection, other than a philosophical connection learn't in university, to the people they are supposed to represent and you see the difference in the type of questions and the radical fervour as the SNP address the government. It is dramatically different.
We had become emmured  to a middle class discussion about the technicalities of government forgetting that governance is about people. The debating chamber had become nothing more than an ongoing discussion with few if any positive outcomes.
The rise in the 1920s of a people's party, the Labour Party, to represent their specific problems had been swept to one side by Tony Blair in his concept of what a people's party should look like dressed in the clothes of Middle England. The word "socialism" was out of bounds for fear of frightening the horses, and with it went the compassion that a party reared on humanitarianism must have at its core.
Humanitarianism was replaced with the balance sheet and balanced budgets which, whilst essential must not be allowed to supplant "compassion" at the top of its agenda.
It's hard to believe that politician today who joins and is part of the Labour Party understands, beyond the "statistical" nature of the electorate, how the electorate gets through their day with the enormous stress of not having enough to make ends meet.
Yes the Scots are refreshing but it is to be seen how soon the carnival that is the House of Commons will take its toll as the Tories under the generalship of George Osborn, stonewall any sense of compassion or fair play and the Scots become disgruntled and disillusioned. There are people in the House for which being a member is but a badge. It is a lifetimes obsession to catch the Speakers eye and for a moment or two take centre stage in the drama !!




Sent from my iPad

Poor advice

Mario Draghi, - Mario who ?

Well, he is the President of the European Central Bank (ECB).
His 'resume' prior to him being made the boss of the ECB was holding the position of Deputy Chief of Goldman Sacs.
Now why is that important. Well perhaps it isn't, perhaps it's just chance, perhaps his employment by Goldman Sacs and then as 'head honcho' to the European Bank and then as part of the charge against the Greeks in their financial dilemma is coincidence.
But the really interesting fact is that the Greeks, who to anyone with any knowledge of bookkeeping, a suspect case for being financially acceptable to join the EU, their case for entry was presented by Goldman Sacs !!
At the time of the Banking collapse in 2008, Goldman Sac's Executive Board were questioned by the American Congressional Oversight Committee. I have rarely seen a more collective disdain evidenced, especially by their chairman, Lloyd Blankfein towards a very senior and powerful select committee. I wrote a blog about their air of ridicule when asked "if they didn't feel that the derivative market was fundamentally corrupt in its use of selling a monetary product knowing full well that the contents of what they were selling, was not what was written on the tin".
Mr Blankfeins dismissive answer to the Committee was that "the trade was carried on by adults" implying that if you didn't understand that what you bought then you shouldn't have bought it.
In a simplistic way it makes common sense, that anything you buy is your responsibility but remember the more complex the instrument your selling as was the case of the packages of
derivative conceived debt, the more likely the product will be misunderstood.
Being the masters of deception they were paid a very large fee to present the case for Greece to enter the EU. They did the job of presenting the Greeks as a normal, fiscally assured country when clearly they were not and the story begins to come to a close today with the Greek population in tatters.
Goldman Sacs meanwhile walk away stuffing the notes into their Swiss Account, oblivious and beyond the reach of anyone !!

Being British

I'v been reading a recently published book describing the torment of a girl forced into marriage by her parents to an older man living in a society halfway around the world and finding the experience deeply traumatising.
There are a number of books written on similar stories of girls who are forced to visit a foreign country with a person they trust, their parent, to find that a negotiation has gone on to hand over their daughter to someone she had never, met for marriage.
This custom, this tradition is so alien to what we in this country believe in we have to ask the question what does it mean to be British.
The term which used to be understood by the world at large is not always sympathetic.
The term "perfidious Albion" comes to mind when the French remember occasions when we have gone back on our word. The image of the 'larger lout' parading around the the towns in some sun kissed places does not make me particularly proud to carry the nomenclature British but this is far far and away removed from selling my daughter to the highest bidder !!
How do we assimilate such disparity in what should be a country of similar attitudes towards humanity at large. We don't after all condone chopping off the hand that was used to steal.
If your attitude towards your daughter is to see her as a "commodity" used in tying cultural strings between families, if that is acceptable, is this acceptability compliant with being British.
Of course we have national born foreigners who have become British and fully established here with, as is often the case, their 'offspring' accepting to a larger or lesser degree the traditions of their parents. Would we feel that "our" concept of Britishness is the same as theirs.
If not we have reached a dangerous moment when short of becoming schizophrenic we have to decide what is right and what is wrong and if deemed wrong we have to outlaw it and take a view on whether we should withdraw their claim to being British.
As usual we will dither around the issue and kick the tin up the road until the numbers decide.
Multiculturalism is an "ideal" but not always attainable. When we have no rules other than common law, no written Constitution to say what our values mean and where the boundaries lie. We need clear guidelines what being British means and if it upsets people in this country so be it. Better to have clarity than this hotchpotch of assimilating at all costs to avoid conflict. The conflict is there but at the moment it's underground, simmering with mistrust and resentment. The strength that our political establishment has to insists that everyone conform to British standards (and not be side tracked by people who question what being British means).
If you disagree you must return to your home and the culture you desire or, in the case of people born here, we must insist that they conform to norms of the country they live in or leave !!!

Greece, what might have been.

It seems to me that the people, the financial players and the financial experts seem to have been hatched from a different egg.

Their egg doesn't contain the normal the albumin to help the blood carry nutrients to other parts of the body. Its as if it is independent of the body, seeing its function as maintaining its own ideas of what the blood should carry, even when the body at large is failing.
Like a religious mantra the aim of finance seems to not based on the rationale of the "patient needs" but is a sort of sacrament, a form of gods grace, only given to a believer who submits. Like any religious tenet, the financial rules have little sympathy for situations where their lending criteria is flouted, we hear little in the financial dialogue to describe the misery which goes on behind the scenes, caused by financial orthodoxy 

Well insulated, the suited executives and the advisor's are never heard to show their concern for the ravages that their rules prescribe. Arbitrary time scales are in place as if the "lender" were also on the bones of a dilemma, itself needing repayment to meet its own creditors.
It is claimed that the Greeks have not been serious about looking to rectify their financial construct, especially the generous pension provision where people can retire as early as 50, the avoidance of tax by the workforce, especially the rich and powerful was seen as a traditional and a cultural anomaly
This disconnect from the payment of taxes, necessary for a functioning democracy was in part the result of years of plutocratic rule by a limited influential group of Greek families, oligarchs who's rule, until recently was all powerful.
Germany and France waved the unsuitability of Greece to become part of the EU aside since this was the pre Euro zone period and the obvious unsuitability was avoided because of their blinkered political objective.
I am not privilege to the current picture but it does not seem to me impossible for the ECB to have sat alongside the financial industry to ensure, over a reasonable time, that the tax take and the pension gap was brought slowly into line whilst effectively placing a repayment moratorium on the Greeks, removing the impossible pressure wrought on the country by the creditors.
This is all in the past and now it looks as if the Greeks can have a fresh start and seek their own future in the world at large. I for one would spend a holiday there to help.

Investment in space.

I suppose the mantra that everything "privatised" is better, more efficient, that private enterprise is cleverer more astute more switched on, has been shown not to be true at least at the high end of technological enterprise.

Yet another spectacular failure of a rocket designed to replenish the space station with stores has occurred and once more we must rely on the well tried Russian rockets to relieve the people on the space station.
What must we make of this.
The space race from the days of the Russian Sputnik and the corresponding American NASA.  establishment was a massive national prestige effort costing billions. Money was no problem and the best engineers were employed to push engineering techniques which allowed the business of getting rockets into space to became very reliable.
It's a strange turn around, the West has now to rely on the Russians. One of the reasons the Communist in the USSR cried "no mas" and buckled under the weight of the arms race was the cost and whilst we are told that the Russian economy is in a bad way since the imposition of sanctions since the Ukraine war they still seem to have the money to launch expensive rockets.
The Russians in their engineering design brought a very high degree of redundancy into the spec.  It was a feature of the superiority of their tanks in the Second World War and even their fighter air craft (MIGs) which were a match for the Western fighter planes, that their designers and the manufacturing establishment were second to none.
Redundancy in this instance is a term used to describe the backup systems, an alternative to a piece of equipment should something fail.  Redundancy and the over specification within the design meant they can launch these technological monsters time and time again without mishap, or  at least any they are letting on to!
When profit, enters the equation then the designs become that fine line of building in sufficient numbers redundancy, which leaks away the profit and, in effect cutting corners to make the project financially viable which the National expenditures would never condone.  
When the engineers are subverted by the accountants you are asking for trouble as was the case in the only major disaster of the American space effort, Challenger in 2007. The disaster was traced to some O rings which a manufacture was supplying and which the engineers had begun to question. The flight was waved on its way by the insistence of the management who, having an eye on the finances were worried about the delay a redesign would take.
Money has bedevilled  mankind since its introduction. Its worth has surpassed that of human life and I wouldn't be surprised to see more disasters as Private Enterprise seeks to turn a buck on an endeavour which should relegate cost into second place.

Greece

So it looks as if the Politicians in Europe have decided to let Greece go. The spectre of Greece holding out her hand for more money without the austerity that was demanded within the time scale which was deemed reasonable by the creditors has nearly played out.
Firstly who are these creditors. 

Well they are the Banks and the investors in the banks and, importantly, the International Monetary Fund an off shoot of Washington. It is their refusal to extend the credit, I think the amount is 750 million euro loan to the IMF due on Tuesday and so true to form, the IMF, the traditional "ball breaker" of many poor economies throughout the world is once more seen leading the fray.
In 2008, not long ago we saw the "taxpayers" (you and me) in the leading economies "give" (hand over without any clauses or need for repayment) the Banks trillions of dollars to shore up their ravaged balance sheets. The Banks had been ravaged, not by being held in the vice grip of German led economic rules and regulations which for instance prevented a country like Greece, from independently offering the market "short term government debt", this is apparently against ECB rules. But ravaged by the insolence of the bankers who in 2008 had gambled the (depositors) funds on the roulette wheel of the money market and the contrived market in derivative spun debt. These same bankers are now shrieking for financial discipline but where was their financial discipline in 2008 ? 
The financial straight jacket and the demand for further austerity has meant that the Greeks are backed into a corner. To continue to oblige your creditors they have to ignore the "impossibility" of the Greeks to survive with their economy in free fall and a debt plus interest which can never be paid. If an individual gets into such a financial mess the only way out is for them is to to seek bankruptcy and have their debt written off.

Greece is bankrupt and has to declare itself so with a view to reinventing itself. Of wanting to exist as a nation of people. Which means they must leave the Euro and re-establish the Drachma and begin trading their tourist attractions and what ever they produce, free of Europe. 

The Greeks were the bedrock of the West's intellectual substance and there is no doubt that they can reinvent themselves as a proud people freed from the shackles of capitalistic dogma !

Religious values vis a vis Secular values.

How did we get into such a mess.
I remember a time when things seemed rational. When the society I lived in had a view which represented the facts on the ground, when we understood ourselves and shared a common heritage.
Yesterday a Tribunal handed down a verdict fining a company for ignoring a persons human rights. Compensation was levied on the company and paid to a man, £6000, because he had been refused access to his "boss's office" to pray !

Obviously the man was a Muslim and had according to the dictates of his religion and it's instruction that he must pray 5 times a day, negotiated with his boss that he could use the managers office to prostrate himself according to practice. Unfortunately this particular day the managers office was in use with a disciplinary meeting being held and the man took umbrage and went to court suing the company.

A Discriminatory Court found for him and the company was fined.
Where do we start.
Since when is it a right for an employee to demand that a place is set aside for him to pray ?
As I interpret the matter It is purely on the grounds of not "discriminating" against a person of faith that company has to consider the use of an area for prayer. So whilst there is no compulsion to provide, there is a compulsion  not to discriminate. Which comes first the hen or the egg.
The concept of discrimination is a minefield since one man's actions could always be held, by another to be discriminatory. If the "cause" is religious this is given priority over what might be considered secular discrimination.
The demand by Muslims to practice a code of prayer as part of their commitment to their God has implications that are not evident in other religious faiths and reading the Muslim Councils opinion on the matter is revealing. There is no common ground, simply a set of prerogatives, of rights, privileges and entitlements we, non Muslims should take on board for the sake of religious harmony. It appears in my reading of their text that harmony has to be granted by non Muslims in response to seeking cultural harmony.
It's a powerful message to us all.  "Understand our unique needs and specialisms and we will coexist, otherwise we will seek redress through the Court".
It has to be remembered that the powerful lobby 'the Political Establishment' seeking to diversify our nation into a multicultural hotchpotch, have captured all the high ground (we were asleep whilst they were at it)  and through immigration, much of which was economic, filling the quotas as industry tried to expand after the war, the ethnicity changed beyond all recognition.
The distillation of English values for those values and cultures coming from abroad was considered multi-culturally beneficial as if the more mixed up you are the stronger the breed. Much was made of the expanded selection of food outlets which adorn the high streets.
What we had failed to understand was that the largest minority the Muslim population had imported a strong, some would say a fanatical religion into these islands just at the time when the traditional religion on these shores, Christianity was becoming sidelined in a gathering sense of the population at large which were becoming immune to the religious argument.
The question is :-
Should we in the 21st century, when all signs lead to debunking the religious story, (it's time line and it's fables), should we be turning back the clock to allow a millennium old, Arabic, misogynistic faith, re-describe our society and subordinate values hard-won over the last hundred years and more ?