The Political Thread

[Proudhuff]

Glad to see BBC's Panoramma are giving Ukip a free advert on Moday night, half an hours peak viewing. Will we be seeing the same for the Greens? and the third largest membership in UK; the SNP?

[The Legendary Shark]

I can't get excited by any of the parties, I'm afraid. To me, they might as well be running for office on the Moon, their policies and ideas are so far removed from my experience and perspective. It's like watching a dozen differently painted buckets of shite trying to out-stink one another.
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How anyone can still believe in any of them is a source of a genuine and frustrating mystification for me.

[Proudhuff]

I can and mostly do think similar thoughts but its policies, not parties or personalities that interest me....  so its the less stinky option and then 'hold heir feet to the fire' (which is why the big two got rid of their pesky conferences setting the manifestos, then wondered why they lost touch with their rank and file...go figure, as the yanks would say)   

[TordelBack]

Half-a-dozen anti-Water Charges candidates to vote for, just 35% turn out in yesterday's Dublin South-West by-election, and yet all you hear from everyone all day is "we won't accept water charges".  Well get out and vote, you bloody muppets.  Two out of three of you don't give a fuck what they charge you.

On the entire registration page for our road, only one other person had turned up when the missus and I voted at 7pm.  Pathetic.

And I speak as someone who broadly supports the introduction of water charges, even as I object to the way their implementation has been structured as a flat, regressive tax, while our so-called austerity government  moves to cut the top rate of tax.

[The Legendary Shark]

You see, Tordels, I'd take charge of that personally - balls to giving the responsibility to some politician who doesn't know me from Adam.
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I'd write to the Water Company and tell them what you're going to pay. If they demand more simply agree to pay whatever you have contracted with them to pay. As there is no contract and the water company has a legal responsibility to supply people with water (which is vital for life), you're in charge.
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It's all about attitude. You have to be sovereign of your own world, your own life, and treat councils and utilities like the servants they are. Try to be a good sovereign, polite but firm - like the Lord of the Manor in those old black and white Ealing comedies.
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But don't go too far or you'll end up sharing a ditch with me. As I said, this is what I'd do (roughly). Imagine 1,000 people in one town doing that. You vote for someone to do it for you and you have only one point of attack, one warrior who might well not be as keen to tangle with Big Business as they seem. And Big Business knows how to deal with political attacks - they simply fudge for as long as they can, knowing that you'll all keep paying in the meantime, until the attack runs out of steam.
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Do it yourselves and you've got potentially unlimited points of attack and what practically amounts to an army. Don't form any official groups or any other targets, do it all by word of mouth and, before you start, remember to do three things; research, research, research.
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That's what I'd suggest, anyway. Of course, you have to take my situation and history into account before considering this - but don't let that put you off. I pushed in a dangerous direction, and continue to do so, but water should be easier.

[Ancient Otter]

And I speak as someone who broadly supports the introduction of water charges, even as I object to the way their implementation has been structured as a flat, regressive tax, while our so-called austerity government  moves to cut the top rate of tax.

You may be the only member of the general public I've heard to support it. AFAIK water charges are usually a condition the IMF bring when they take charge of things, so our politicians would not have much say on it.

The Legendary Shark. have you heard for the Irish water charges, every household supplied by (semi-state company) Irish Water have to give the social security numbers of everyone living in the house to them?

[ZenArcade]

Details which, correct me if I'm wrong, can be 'shared' with other non nongovernmental and indeed non Irish bodies. Z

[The Legendary Shark]

That sounds like legislation, Otter, and legislation is law given force by public consent - so don't consent. Just because the government says you must do a thing that doesn't make it so.

[TordelBack]

You may be the only member of the general public I've heard to support it.

Well, I support the polluter-pays principle, and metering is a good way to develop conscious attitudes to resource usage: see also separating your waste, gas, electricity etc.  In addition, through mismanagement and underresourcing the Irish water network is a wasteful, awful mess, and needs an injection of funding to get it into the 20th C, never mind the 21st.  So the money has to be found somewhere.

What I object to passionately is what is in effect the flat standing charge built into the allowances, which I view as regressive, since it affects the poor massively in comparison to the wealthy.  The water network infrastructure should continue to be mainly funded by general taxation, primarily income tax, as it has been since the beginnings of the State.  A *sensible* sustainable consumption level should be established, and only excessive use above this level charged, and usage under this level rewarded.  When the wealthy's gardeners waste water on their begonias, they should be funding the desperately urgent upgrading of the system.  When the cautious use rainwater-collection, they should be rewarded with rebates on USC or property taxes. Awareness, revenue, stick, and carrot, all sounds good to me.

As things stand, the initial 'assessed' charge (prior to meter readings coming on line, but obviously indicative of what is expected) represents a ghastly burden to those of us scraping by (to put it in perspective, the 12-month charge is all the money we have put by for Christmas so far this year), and a non-event for those on 50K a year, the equivalent of one decent night out. 

So while I advocate the idea of raising funds through metering of water, I fundamentally object to the manner in which it is being executed.  Oh, and I hate privatisation, sorry 'semi-state bodies', and always have. But that ship sailed a long time ago as far as Irish utilities are concerned.  The PPS number thing doesn't really bother me, since of you're at the bottom of the heap you depend on the state making use of it on a weekly basis.

And yes, I do understand that all taxation in this state exists merely to pay off our creditors and keep our betters in the style to which they have become accustomed.  But you have to play along or you'd go mad.

[Frank]

Glad to see BBC's Panoramma are giving Ukip a free advert on Moday night, half an hours peak viewing. Will we be seeing the same for the Greens? and the third largest membership in UK; the SNP?

On the other hand, last week's Panorama about ordinary families trapped in low paid jobs, whose employers are subsidised through the tax system, was the single most relevant TV documentary I've seen on domestic issues in an age, from any broadcaster:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b04l6x1k

[CrazyFoxMachine]

My partner looking over my shoulder "eww why does that forumer have the UKIP symbol as their avatar?"

Me "Not sure, I think he thinks it's funny"

"But it just looks like he supports UKIP"

"I think that's part of the joke"

"That doesn't seem like a joke"

"I'm not sure that it is - maybe that's the joke"

[Frank]

"I'm not sure that it is - maybe that's the joke"

My last avatar was the fairtrade sticker you peel from your banana, along with a username that referenced the workers' co-operative movement. If I was a sandal wearing leftie who also wanted to send them filthy foreigners back to the Muslim hell from whence they came, I would be a confused person. Like the BBC, the terms of my charter mean I'm obliged to reflect every development in public life.

[ZenArcade]

Hmmm, donno lads. 'We have four coloums marching on Madrid and a fifith coloumn waiting within': this amorphous sauchie charachter seems like just the sort of plant the forces arrayed against us would use to sow confusion and dissent in our ranks....someone call the peoples commissars, Comrades Deever and McBear to expose and deal with him. Comrade Z

[CrazyFoxMachine]

Is the Sauchie charter a publicly viewable thing? How long is it?

[Professor Bear]

In addition, through mismanagement and underresourcing the Irish water network is a wasteful, awful mess, and needs an injection of funding to get it into the 20th C, never mind the 21st.  So the money has to be found somewhere.

If someone says they'll build you a wall and then said they need more money to finish it weeks after it should have been done already you'd tell them to fuck off, and that's for a wall.  Why is it different because they're working on an essential service that your home requires to function?
The Irish government has had plenty of time to fix this, and it wouldn't need the money it does if they'd fixed it like they should have.  They can find a way to fix it themselves or they can fuck off.