Don't Bottle It Brown - The Inheritance Outlook

The press in recent days have trampled over the Brown premiership and left Labour damaged., Alistair Darling, the chancellor is expected to try and regain the political ground by announcements over Inheritance Tax and private equity on overseas business men. Yes he should chase the latter, however if he bottles it and swings inheritance tax in favour of the rich, then he will have shown great weakness, and i for one would lose the respect that he and Brown had gained from me since taking over from Tony Blair.

"The Death Tax"

Inheritance tax should never be scrapped in the short term for opinion poll votes, in favour of long term poverty. If Labour scrapped the progressive tax and it's agenda which it set out at the last budget it will not help as Brown is damaged over this already, he should be instead be showing the public tomorrow how a progressive Britain moves forward with a redistribution that as he liked to say "gives every child a future" and not just the ones who inherit wealth. Maybe the level of such tax should be raised but by no more than £50,000, this would safe guard the aspirational working/middle classes who could at some point if house prices continue to spiral, fall under such a tax.

Tory Spin

The facts are that it affects 6%, the Tory tax plans DON'T give the middle classes some breathing space, they basically take from the very rich, to give to the fairly rich. That's Tory redistribution for you, a pathetic attempt at tackling an issue that would be nothing without the media who build it up with words such as "Death Tax" and wheel out some old granny who apparently will be effected, but who disappears from the radar, political communication at it's very worse.

"Progressive Taxes"
These taxes, while they don't affect 94% of people, pay for many a service which the people who are in the highest 6% enjoyed. Many of the people who are now entering the retirement age never had it so good, especially the affluent and well off. The youngsters of the current generation are paying taxes that are at the highest levels, and money from these are being fed into a state pension scheme which they are likely never to benefit from. How can this possibly seem fair? It isn't, and that is why inheritance tax should remain at a certain level so not to tax the aspirational working/middle classes, but also to bring money back for the economy that funded them throughout most of their lives.

Serious About Leading

If Labour is serious about giving every child a chance, and remember this was Brown's statement, whilst the Tory conference was all about an "Election" and policies that bring on unfair tax systems, then Darling will not heed to this short term idea, if he does he will lose some of the party and along with it he will give the Tories a stick in which to smack Labour down.

Should He Stay.....Or Go To The Country

After a 100 days of plentiful popularity that lasted throughout conference, and aligned a party and a leader together you had to expect some fall out. Cameron and "that speech" as some of the media have dubbed it, seems to have whipped the polls against Labour. Falling popularity and a silence from Labour Party HQ seems to be deafening.

"You never had it so good"
Unlike the recollections of the past this is different, a winter of discontent fell on a country that was stuck in the past, second class in Europe, a failing economy and industry all lead to "Big Jim" losing out. Many pollsters predicted a hung Parliament before Brown hit the town so to speak, and this poll boost may be explained coming of the back of a successful Tory party conference. After all if you are to receive a week of total promotion across all forms of the media you are barring a massive split going to be boosted.

Bold Predictions
I stated in a previous blog entry only a week or two ago that this country would not go to the polls this October, the flames were never fanned, and now Brown has to go in November, if he doesn't the Tory party will smell blood and will be in for the kill. Silence or at least media silence on the subject from Labour seems strange, and the recent Northern Rock Debacle will have shaken thoughts on the economy for many. If the polls continue to falter for Labour, and the key ones are not this weeks but next weeks, then it is reasonable that this country could wake up on a dark November morning facing 5 years of a Conservative government. Do I think this will happen? Probably not. The Tories as most pollsters know need to be quite ahead in the polls at this stage, but if Brown continues to falter, continues to look less of a leader and less of man with principle then yes the Tories will be in Government or at the very least, we will have a hung Parliament and then the Liberal Democrats are welcomed to the show.

The Future?
If an election is called, and Brown wins but with what looks like a smaller majority, Cameron will remain and revitalised, Brown will tow more of the party line, and Labour though may look tied down maybe more efficient. A Hung Parliament would bring the fringe parties into line, the main factor behind whether the Lib Dem's would join in with Labour would be election reform, something which may also benefit Labour later. A Tory victory with a mandate to govern for five years would leave Brown probably battered, surely his annoyance would signal the end for Brown and as one of the architects of the original New Labour idea, it would close this chapter, however the mantel would be passed on and Labour will not spend 18 years out of government again, if this is indeed the end of Gordon Brown.

From The Fringe - Monday

So Day Two of Conference, much schmoozing of journalists and politicians before the "great one" Gordon took to conference floor to deliver a 63 minute speech that pleased some, disappointed others but in all generally seemed from the heart.

Gordon Brown's Speech
What Gordon said was mostly empty rhetoric sadly, it was a crowd pleasing rallying call to troops and destroyed every solid prediction i put down yesterday of there being no snap election. I feel now is the time not to say anymore on the subject, in case i get it totally wrong.
Gordon's youth speech however sat well with me, i felt it was about time the young was given more of the political thought and this only bodes well for hopefully another term.

Lib vs Lab - Who's The Real Progressive Party
A debate which included former Labour defector Vince Cable, covered several topical issues including tuition fees, chaired by Tim Horton a lively debate left a sour taste in most people's mouths after accusations and counter accusations of sabotage in rival electioneering campaigns. Politics is pointless when it falls into the category of Punch and Judy and sadly for such a debate with so much, it fell so short.

So Day Two, I believe Labour are a progressive party, however certain areas of the party are backward in going forward....comrades.

From The Fringe - Day 1 of The Labour Conference

Sunday and sticky rain greeted many of the Labour delegates and general cling-ons, the town bristling with people was a welcome to many of the hotels who had been hit by the constant changeable weather of this summer.

The talk among the people in the bars, restaurants and gardens was elections, and were we prepared, some felt so others weren't to sure, even Bournemouth's West own candidate muttered something along the words of "pointless", when the question was brought up at a Fabian fringe meeting.

Other debates included the stoppage of the BNP, Northern Rock and the Impending Iranian question, but not my question on the media and it's power, ah well you can't win everything or in fact anything when your brolly suddenly breaks mid-walk to the second of the fringe meetings.

Fabian Society: Question Time
The first of the two fringe meetings was in the surroundings of Hot Rocks Cafe, a seafront venue with the surfboards around, over looking the vast coast in front. Free Wine and nibbles greeted the large yet subdued crowd, and the panel consisted of Ed Balls, David Blunkett among others.

What struck me was the quality of debate, whilst Blunkett a former minster seemed to drive over the views of others, Balls was more compassionate more aware and delivered the best of the comments. For example: when commenting on the foreboding general election decision he was cagey, but it is clear that an election will be held in Spring and not in 5 or so weeks, the decision to neither confirm or deny is to shake the Conservatives, and Conservatives already battered and bruised by the government handling of as Blunkett described: Fire, pestilence, famine and Capitalism.

On faith schools, Ed Balls said that it was not the case that the government wanted to increase faith schools, yet "certain faith schools had worked better in communicating than the none secular schools". He however in a rare backtracking motion suggested that this was not common among all faith based institutions and neither were all secular schools were non cooperative.

Young Fabian Reception
I'm not sure on when you stop becoming young, but some of the people at the launch of a pamphlet on how to stop the BNP must of been past the bench mark of 31. Anyhow I don't discriminate just ailenate, spending most of the time talking to this old woman and drinking far too much wine, It got to me in the end, shortly leaving after a passionate but brilliant speech by Liam Byrne.

And thus Day 1 ended.

Maybe a "Modern Labour"

Recently, I've been considering my idea's and values in a social and political way. It's not that i feel i have become more centrist, it is that i have felt uneasy with the relative concepts that the left views itself in.

Furthermore upon reading Phillip Gould's Unfinished Revolution, i came to feel more not old or new labour, but an inbetween. I don't feel the modernising force that became blurred under New Labour, nethier do i feel the cold static outdated past of old labour.

"Certain Ideas"
Perhaps as i question my standing, i can view different points of view. I was against the war, the reasoning was flawed. However what really irratates me on the war is the way we simply breezed in without a plan, and are now leaving with a hundred fewer servicemen, and what really for, Hussien never collectively had power in much of the country much like the current government. Iraq is split by religion, it always will be, no one will have a stable country, but i do believe maybe that it is time for us to leave.

For the union question, i believe unions need to modernise, the collective vote was a mistake, and a mistake that clause Iv, and Blair forced out. However, how can a union modernise, how can they force through action when most of the public just complain when a strike happens. This countries forgotten that the workers, who would think themselves as middle class have been pushed to the limit. We need a new thinking, a third way for the unions, as well as Labour.

"Modern Labour?"
I got the term "Modern Labour" from a interview i did, And it seems quite apt at the end of Tony Blair, the Labour party needs a new view, a world view that relies less on the US, more on the collective europe. We need a better serving transport plan, no more cancellation of train and tram projects in the face of increased road building. On the society we have we must listen to the youth, we must for once welcome them to debate, and not just the ones who are at the lowest or the highest of the education spectrum, the generation this country has lost. We should not condone Video Games or Tv as a quick fix to a society that isn't broken, but needs to be talked too. And we should no longer attack the needs of university generation, one which is now a customer, and a customer the universities should be offering far more to, and not less.

I've had the idea of collecting a manifesto together for some time, I want to collect a jumbled few ideas, such as this and put something i feel will benefit the country. Modern Labour needs the power to run this country that's 21st century, sad to say that Thatcher started and sped the modernising of this country up too quickly. Gould, Mandelson and others collectively modernised and developed the plans for a future Labour government, now it's time to start to build the country, we modernised too quickly and that we have little time is the most worrying thing.

More About The "Racist" Tory

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/6439101.stm

Mr Clarke told BBC One's Sunday AM show: "There's nothing that Patrick said actually that was remotely offensive or racialist.

Apart from Mercer suggesting that black people are idle and useless and that they use racism to protect themselves.

I don't think anybody should ever see Patrick Mercer as a racist. If there is an opposite of racist, that's Patrick."

Nah the opposite of a racist would not suggest some black people use the racism card as cover for being idle or useless.

Last week, Mr Mercer, who spent 25 years in the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters regiment, said in a Times interview: "If someone is slow on the assault course, you'd get people shouting: 'Come on you fat bastard, come on you ginger bastard, come on you black bastard.'"

The fact he suggested that others that shouted such crass remarks remain in the army is pretty sad. Apparently he claims his demotion was because of political correctness, However i woudld suggest he take a long look at himself, his character and his remarks and actually realise what he said is very very wrong.

These remarks coupled with the remarks made by Davis & Clarke suggest, that you cannot teach a dog new tricks.