Britain’s race debate is unhealthy

Britain’s race debate is unhealthy

Yesterday’s Murder of a British Solider in Woolwich was a truly tragic event, it also illustrated the unhealthy state of Britain’s debate about race.  You may think I am going to launch a full-scale attack on the EDL, but I am not as they are only part of the problem.  The problem is twofold the first part is large sections of the media are mad about political correctness, if you point out a problem in a race or culture that is not your own, then you are branded a racist.  The second part of the problem is groups like the EDL who are violent and thuggish, their behavior damages race relations and creates extremists.

The first part of the problem, that political correctness is suppressing debate with damaging accusations of racism being thrown at anyone who brings up a problem with race relations.  Imagine a politician saying that some Muslim communities have problems fitting into wider society.  It does not matter if there is a large amount of evidence supporting their claim they will be labelled a racist and their career will be in tatters, this means is a minority group has a problem it is not solved and is left alone in the hope that the problem will sort itself out.  In America a politician known as Patrick Moynihan wrote a report called, The Negro Family: The Case For National Action, the report was wrote to highlight a problem of family breakdown amongst the American underclass particularly African Americans (hence the reports name) and how welfare was increasing the problem.  Despite this being a genuine problem with statistics to back it up he was labelled as a racist, and the debate killed and the problem remains today.  Patrick Moynihan was not trying to persecute African Americans he was trying to help them, but as he was not part of that community he has no right to point out problems in it. 

So you may or may not agree with me that societies natural response to people who point out problems in a community is to call them racist.  You will probably agree that the debate about race in this country has been practically shut down and is only fought out between far right groups like the EDL who demonise Muslims and the left wing political correctness brigade which will not allow a bad word be said about anyone, no matter if it is right or wrong.  This creates an unbalanced debate and no other issue in UK politics has a debate fought out purely by extremes, the way race is debated in the UK is absurd.  It is the equivalent to debating the economics and saying you can have an economy purely controlled by the state or the state has absolutely no control.

 The majority of people in the UK understand that not many Muslims are radicalised but understand that, as with any community they will have problems.  The big problem we have with Islam in this country is understanding, most people don’t know much about Islam, so when they hear about suicide bombers or an Asian sex gang it creates a climate of fear.  Race relations are not helped by parts of cities becoming almost exclusively Muslim as this creates an, us and them mentality, it does not matter that most of them have been in the country for two or  three generations or that many Muslims serve in our armed forces or are doctors.  Because areas become fractured, they are seen as Muslim or British Muslim rather than just British, a solution would be to mix communities break down the wall of fear and misunderstanding.  However mainstream Politics ignores the facts that we have fractured cities with communities living separately, the problem is never bought up in Parliament as bringing it up is racist.  Multiculturalism is not working because politicians are letting it fail.  Multiculturalism is a good thing but by failing to mix cultural groups, you don’t have multiculturalism you have several separate societies who risk not getting along.  This unspoken fault with multiculturalism has spawned groups like the EDL, because communities are not mixing properly it creates a climate of mystery then something happens e.g. a terror attack, or just a crime involving members of different racial communities.  Suddenly you have a climate of fear and groups like the EDL grow to protect their community, this leads to minorities in this case Muslims being persecuted, a small number of the minority become radicalised as they feel shunned by mainstream society then you have your own home-grown terrorists. 

To conclude, because political correctness has stifled debate politicians fail to address problems in society to do with race due to fear of being branded a racist.  This stops problems being addressed like communities not properly mixing, separated communities creates a climate of fear and this creates groups like the EDL and radical Muslims.  If the UK can’t have a grown up debate about the problems with multiculturalism race relations could worsen, you only need to look a N.Ireland to see that if problems between communities are ignored they can snowball into bigger problems.              

For Cameron Unity Is Key

For Cameron Unity Is Key

This has been a tough week for Conservative party unity, after the funeral of Maggie Thatcher the party seemed so united.  Then came the local election and the party returned to the usual battle on Europe, there is a strong consensus within the party that we should have a referendum.  However some want it before the general election to stave off the UKIP threat while others don’t believe it is necessary until after the next election.  Then we had gay marriage in which the party was split and both sides were passionate about the issue, which makes the split even more damaging however I believe this rift will heal.  The most damaging thing to happen this weak was the Swivel eyed loons comment, but this highlights a greater communication problem between the grassroots of the party and the leadership.

Whatever your view on gay marriage you will probably agree it was not a shrewd political move by David Cameron to try to pass a law legalising it.  His thinking was that the bill would detoxify the party image and in theory, it would have however in practice backbench MP’s don’t always dance to the tune of the leadership.  Gay marriage was an issue which stirred passions amongst many Tory MP’s and has left the party looking intolerant, although the main opposition argument was not one of tolerance it was more about the definition of  marriage but the truth does not matter perception is what matters.  The most damaging thing to come out of the gay marriage debate for the Conservatives was it once again showed the divisions in the party between socially liberal modernisers and socially Conservatives.  This is only one rift in the party there are the Europhiles and Euro sceptics, there are One nation conservatives and Thatcherites.  It seems at the moment on any issue us Conservatives could scrap amongst ourselves, we fought over gay marriage, we are still fighting over Europe, we fight over how to deal with UKIP, we fought over what Osborne should have done with his last budget and we fight over David Cameron’s capability to lead the party.  Labour also has its infighting largely to do with their current policy vacuum but these have not been publicised of late.

To conclude the Conservative party is a broad coalition, it is a big tent party and that is why it can be such a political force.  However when the party is not properly managed it can wage war upon its self, Europe is the major flashpoint issue but as the gay marriage bill illustrated there are other serious dividing lines within the party.  If David Cameron intends to remain in number 10 after the 2015 election he has to steer the party away from these flashpoint issues, the party needs to be united come 2015.  There are issues which he can stick to, although there are differences of opinion on how to manage the economy there is a broad consensus within the party we need to tackle the deficit.  He can also continue with other big projects like education reform, but if he intends to win in 2015 he needs to avoid infighting by choosing policy wisely.  He also needs to make sure no member of his inner circle mutters a bad word about the party members, and he would be wise to start looking at reforming the party structure to attract more members and so the leadership has clearer communications with the grass roots.   

Send In The Clowns

Send In The Clowns

Tonight will be a night of celebration for UKIP after a brilliant set of local election results, if the 2013 election is remembered it will be for one thing, the election UKIP made its mark on the domestic political scene.  Although they did not win the most seats, they had a healthy net gain of 139 new councillors and have started to lay roots in local politics, which will be essential if they intend to establish themselves as the fourth main party of British politics. 

The three main parties did not do so well the Lib Dems lost 124 seats and were wiped out in the South Shields by election.  Meanwhile Labour showed once and for all they are not the one nation party they claim to be, experts said Labour should be gaining 500 to 600 seats, that estimate has been revised to 350 seats but on all accounts they failed to hit the number of seats they should have won.  Labour had a gain of 291 councillors and gained control of 2 councils, publicly Labour said they would have been happy to win 200 but they know that, that sort of total would not be good enough for this stage of the election cycle.  As for the Conservatives, David Cameron will not be celebrating at the fact his party lost 335 councillors but many experts were expecting much worse with numbers like 600 being mentioned.   The Conservatives also lost control of 10 councils Labour only took control of two of these councils while the rest had no overall majority, one gold nugget amongst the Conservative results was that they held onto Staffordshire one of Labours big targets.  The Conservatives took control of Staffordshire for the first time since 1981 in 2009 and were expected to lose control of the council this time round, failing to regain Staffordshire is a glaring defeat for the Labour party.

There is one piece of bad news for UKIP though Sky news showed on Friday night that if the support in the local elections were the same across the country in 2015 UKIP would fail to win a seat due to the first past the post system.  Labour would have a slim majority of 12 on 331, the Conservatives would have 245 seat, the Lib Dems 48 seats and other parties on 26 seats.  However, Labour will not celebrate at this statistic, they know they are not doing nearly well enough at this stage of the electoral cycle and if the UKIP vote is eroded by 2015 (which it probably will be) then they are likely to remain in opposition for another term.

Britain expected to avoid triple dip recession

Britain expected to avoid triple dip recession

George Osborn may allow himself a pat on the back, as it is expected this week the UK will avoid a triple dip recession.  Senior ministers are quietly confident that figures will reveal growth in the UK economy for the first quarter of the year, even if it is minimal growth.  City economists predict 0.1% growth, not anything to shout about but importantly for the Chancellor the Economy will avoid a triple dip recession.  In recent years, Britain has seen a damaging series of recessions in 2008, 2009 and the beginning of last year, if the economy was too slid into a triple dip recession it would have been hugely damaging for the Chancellor.

Ministers are starting to believe that the worst is over and this may be the beginning of a sustained economic recovery.  Positive growth figures would be a huge relief for the Chancellor after a week in which he has faced increasing pressure from the IMF and the UK’s credit rating has been downgraded by Fitch.  Nevertheless, even the downgrade had a silver lining in which the Chancellor was warned that the UK would face a further downgrade if they relaxed efforts to reduce the deficit.

The Chancellor still won’t be able to rest easy and Labour will not see such anaemic levels of growth as positive.  In fact Ed Balls will still be able to attack the Chancellors flat lining economy and the fact that the UK’s predicted growth for the year has been slashed to 0.7%.  In all honesty, growth figures of 0.1% would be nothing to get excited about but they would allow the Chancellor to rest a little easier knowing the economy will not be heading for a triple dip recession and that his economic plan may be starting to produce sustainable growth by 2015.  There are no guarantees yet but maybe George Osborne’s economic plan will actually work.     

Will Ed Risk Increasing Spending?

Will Ed Risk Increasing Spending?

Rumours are circling that Labour could reject austerity at the next election and increase government spending in an attempt to restart the economy.  This could see Ed Miliband reverse conservative cuts and offer the electorate a radical choice in 2015, one thing is certain if Miliband does end up rejecting austerity the 2015 election will offer the electorate the starkest choice since 1983.  It will soon be time for Labour to start unveiling some policies and most importantly setting out its spending plans this is going to be a tough decision for Miliband as not matter what he chooses he will face criticism.  

If Miliband accepts austerity he risks being branded a hypocrite and losing plenty of support, this is mainly down to the fact that under his leadership Labour have been strong critics of every coalition cut.  If Miliband says, Labour won’t reverse the cuts and will stick to Conservative spending plans it will likely win Labour some economic credibility.  However Labour has gained plenty of support from opponents of the cuts, it is reasonable to say that most of Labours new found support since 2010 has come from people who oppose the cuts.  It is likely that Labour will be unsuccessful with their plan to win over former Lib Dem supporters if they start to support cuts and can’t promise to reverse austerity.  So surely  Labour should promise to increase spending and roll back austerity, but in reality this option is just as dangerous for Labour.  Labour is already trailing when it comes to opinion polls on economic competence and on their ability to make tough decisions, if Labour comes out against austerity then further questions will be raised about their economic competence.  Conservatives will also be able to level blistering attacks at Labour reminding the electorate of how Labour ran the economy into the ground and their new plan is to bankrupt Britain again.  If Labour chose to reject austerity, they face the prospect of a 1992 re-run, there are questions about whether Labours leader is fit to be Prime Minister, and there are big question marks on Labours Economic competence.

Miliband is in an unenviable position he risks losing support no matter which way he goes,  the best thing he can do is chose the route he has the most belief in because come 2015 he will have to explain his economic plan and protect it from opposition attacks.  There is no point of Miliband winning the election if he does not win it on a platform he believes in at the end of the day if Ed Miliband becomes Prime Minister he does not want to implement the same policies as the Conservatives.  If he does choose to go against austerity and offer the electorate a real choice the next election will be a fascinating battle of ideas and which will probably increase turnout, which has fallen since 97 with a slight bounce in 2010.  However, I believe whatever Labour decide to do the Conservatives will win the next election with a small majority, as Labour will lose some of its new found support to the Lib Dems and UKIP’s vote will collapse in favour of the Conservatives.  Furthermore, if the economy picks up before 2015 it will be a Conservative landslide. 

An argument for longer school day and shorter holidays

An argument for longer school day and shorter holidays

Michael Gove has recently unveiled in a speech that he would like a longer school day and a shorter holidays.  Although this plan may sound radical, is not as radical as it may first  sound in fact many academies already implement these policies, and Gove says our current system was designed around an agricultural economy in which children would help with with the harvest during their school holidays.  Whether or not this is true matters very little, as school timetable reform is practical and can offer a stack of benefits to students and parents. 

One of the strongest arguments for these reforms is to help working parents, your average full time employee will work 9 till 5 but the school day starts at 8 and finishes at 3:30. This can lead to parents having to look for after school care or having to work part time or not at all.  Increasing the length of the school day would save parents child care costs, and getting a young child to and from school will be less of a hurdle for parents who want to work.   This is mainly a benefit for parents off young children as this is less of a problem for parents of older children who are more capable of getting themselves to and from school.  Importantly the reforms would also have a positive effect on the education of the child, after all this is the most important aspect of any sort of education reforms.  A longer school day could be used in several different ways to benefit a child, one suggestion is to use the extra time to make sure students can get at least one hour of PE a day.  This would help tackle the countries childhood obesity problem and relieve pressure on the NHS by giving children a daily dose of exercise, and installing an exercise ethic in children.  Extra time in the school day could be employed to help older children with their studies by making it an enforced study period, or use it for support sessions to help struggling students or use it for other extra-curricular activities. With the new reforms schools could provide all sorts of extra-curricular activities in the additional time rather than an extra lesson, however schools could increase their lesson length from 1 hour to 70 minutes.  This additional 10 minutes in each lesson can facilitate late students, allow students time to unpack, and give teachers time to settle the class down while still having a full hour of teaching.   Some of the academies that already run longer days put forward the argument that longer 9 till 5 days better prepare children for the world of work.  This is because it’s as long as a day of work so when students go to work they will not face the additional challenge of longer days.  Longer school days will face opposition from both students and teachers that does not however make it a bad idea as almost every reform to education faces opposition.  As for shorter holidays I think there may be much more resistant than a longer day, the argument for shorter holidays is that children's academic performance dips if they spend too much time away for school, so if they had shorter holidays then they would not suffer this dip.  However if holidays are to short students particularly younger ones are likely to suffer a dip in performance due to fatigue.  Again childcare costs are an argument for shorter holidays as parents can rarely schedule their holidays to coincide with their child’s school holiday which means childcare costs, shorter holidays are unlikely to solve this problem but they will reduce it.  Personally I like the idea of longer school days, but although I can see an argument for shorter holidays I would rather see half-term holidays removed and keep the main holidays the same length.       

 One of the best things about academies is the freedom they enjoy; they are testing grounds for new ideas to improve education.  The department of education needs to cherry pick the best reforms and apply them to local authority controlled schools, this would improve the every school in the state sector.  It is important that local authority schools are not neglected due  to the rise of academies and that the department of education actively helps them to compete with academies and try to make them an attractive choice for parents to send their children.  The whole idea of academies was for greater competition in education.  So it is important that they are not just competing with each other but are also forced to compete with local authority controlled schools and that local authority schools are not left behind to become relics of the old education system.    

Scotland should be wary of going it alone

Scotland should be wary of going it alone

Scotland shares a complex web of economic links with the rest of the UK.  If Scotland happens to vote for independence in next year’s referendum there will be huge economic and social consequences as these links gradually come apart.  One of consequence would be Scotland would need a new currency, a debate in the lords earlier this week showed that the rest of the UK would not be willing to share a currency with an independent Scotland.  The key reason for that is it would give the new nation some control of monetary policy, Lords said it would be unacceptable to have members on the Bank Of England’s monetary policy committee who represent the interests of a foreign country.  This is quite right as an independent Scotland could end up going in a very different direction to the rest of the UK leaving them with very different interests to us, so it would be an act of lunacy to allow an independent Scotland to have any influence of the rest of the UK’s monetary policy.  Currency will be a big question for an independent Scotland, and if they join the EU as they intend to they will in all likelihood end up joining the euro and does anyone in Scotland really want that?

Another big problem for a newly independent Scotland is their share of the national debt, anyone who thinks the new nation would be free from its share of the national debt is living in a fantasy world.  This debt will be around £93 billion, which totals up to 63% of Scotland’s GDP, Scotland would also have to take on its share of future liabilities such as public sector pensions which would push Scottish national debt to around £185 billion which amounts to 123% of Scotland GDP.  Another point to make on an independent Scotland’s Debt is that they will have no record of servicing their debts so it is unlikely they will be able to borrow at a low interest rate.  Scotland’s new economy is also going to be hugely reliant on oil, and the price of oil is famously volatile so it is unlikely to provide Scotland with a stable income.  Scotland would also be expected to lose a quarter of a million jobs in the defence sector.

However, the SNP deny these claims and say that if Scotland voted to stay in the UK it would be responsible for over two trillion pounds worth of debt, which is 145% of Scottish GDP.  They also went on to say that talk about job losses in defence are ridicules.  The part about the defence jobs may be true, but once when it comes to Scotland and debt the SNP are once again twisting the facts.  It is true that Scotland is responsible for over two trillion pounds worth of debt and that is 145% of the Scottish economy.  However, they share the burden of this debt with the rest of the UK and it amounts to only 85% of the UK’s GDP which is significantly smaller than 145%.  So once again, the SNP are playing fast and loose with the facts.  A final point to make is that Scotland’s spending is heavily subsidised by the rest of the UK plus it is likely it will borrow money at a much higher interest rate than it currently does and its economy is largely reliant on the public sector.  So it is not unthinkable that it will run large deficits if it goes independent and this would further increase its debt burden.