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0131 Make sure you have not missed the previous edition of LivePolitics
Check
it out
And the
one before
that?
Other recent topics
highlighted
here
Week 33
Monday 11 August 2003
Down to Earth
You have complained
that I seem preoccupied with the
state
of the Government,
and with the
state of our society,
to the exclusion of day-to-day political issues. Let me assure you that the ol' grey matter is still processing such matters.
 Health Checks for Immigrants
Nasty idea, barely covert racism, wrong in principle, oppressive in practice
- no administrative decision should turn on the presence or absence of
infection or illness, and therefore "prior checks" are
wrong, oppressive,
discriminatory - it's a matter of
respect.
Identity Cards
This is mischievous authoritarianism, populist billboard politics,
with profound adverse consequences for the character of our society - our
adult fellow-citizens should retain maximum freedom from state surveillance,
maximum individual sovereignty unless there are the
most extreme
overriding societal considerations - it's a matter of
respect.
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top
Government
intervention
to
limit personal borrowing:
Government should not intervene to restrict personal borrowing - our adult
fellow-citizens must remain
free to make their own mistakes - its a matter
of
respect.
Drugs Prohibition - the prohibition of "drugs"
should be ended, and the oppression of the drugs laws removed from the
shoulders of our people - our adult fellow citizens should be free to make
their own personal choices, their own mistakes, their own choices of
existence - all my thoughts are set out at the Angel Declaration, and you
can sign up there -
it's a matter of
respect.
More housebuilding
in the Thames Gateway - good idea, because we must come to terms with the
fact that the UK economy is in truth the "Greater London economy", and the
vitality of London represents the primary trading asset of our small country
- it is wrong to subject low-income Londoners to
bad housing conditions -
it's a matter of
respect.
Expanding
Prison Usage - I am dismayed by
Labour's unprincipled penal strategy, with both Straw and Blunkett, bereft
of new ideas, merely depositing more and more of our fellow-citizens in
prison, to fester untrained and disregarded. I am further incensed by
Labour's failure to put an end to the private contract provision of prisons.
Nowhere is the mindless new authoritarianism
of New Labour more apparent than in this sector. In dealing with the
most heinous and threatening of criminals, it is vital that we retain a due
sense of
respect.
Increase UK roadbuilding This
U-turn is long overdue - sound move by Alistair Darling - rail
should be cut back and the residual InterCity and commuting network properly funded,
and fares significantly increased - more public investment should go into
all modes of road transportation - it is the
People's Highway,
rather than the
Queen's Highway
- "road" is the true democratic mode of transport, accessible to all,
benefiting all, enriching the lives of all - it's a matter of universal and
common
respect.
Immigration controls - while national
Governments are entitled to assess and influence the impact upon their
societies of population changes, methods of state intervention must always
acknowledge the dignities of common humanity, both that of the host society
and the newcomers - the challenge to Labour is to initiate a new
international scheme which will accord
honour and fair treatment to all
-
it's a matter of respect.
Planned
"new citizenship" rituals
are now OK, Sir Bernard Crick
having knocked some sense into them - I am hopeful that they could grow to
become a positive rite de passage, instead of the nasty authoritarian
device originally conceived by David Blunkett - it's a matter of
respect.
respect."
I emphasise this reasoning, because as pressures mount upon mankind's
stewardship of the globe, there is emerging a nasty
New Authoritarianism which
threatens to engulf our values and our love for one another. There
is a new need to assert at every turn the values of our common humanity.
It's a matter of
respect.
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top
 Try BBC News, the public service website
for the best and quickest access to the news, as well as a huge political
data resource, the BBC is unbeatable. We must never lose sight of the
distinctive qualities, and unique potential, of public service institutions.
I assert that, in spite of present differences with Greg Dyke...
I enjoy dipping into informed US West Coast chat,
always up to the minute,
at www.metafilter.com.
Lane Rental
telltale PFI faultline
Knowledgable friends sometimes praise to me the ingenuity of the Highways
Agency lawyers in incentivising road-contractors to work faster, by devising
the concept of lane rental.
It means that the contractor must pay "rent" for his occupation of each lane
of the highway, and can minimise his costs by keeping lanes open whenever
and wherever humanly possible.
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top
One year ago
Moving into August - last year at this time, we were on
holiday in Estonia and Russia - I will be updating
my Russian Diary -
but there's lots more to tickle your intellect...
Personality
is
central to politics
S ocialists
are too soft on capitalism
Les Baynton Poet Laureate
Police Reform urgently
needed
Using our Canals for freight
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top
...reminding you of the great UK stamps of
2002
My diary
Now up to date (well, more or less...)
I have re-structured my Diary to give you a day-to-day
means of looking back, throughout the year
just click
through
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top
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The Truth is OK, but...
David Kelly, now
buried,
the Government scientist who probably took his own life (though
no inquest has yet been held) had six years earlier embraced the Baha'i faith, with its assertion of the central importance
of truthfulness, as the true core of common humanity, and a great unifying
influence in the world.
But I am no enthusiast for absolute truth,
or the belief in the possibility
of "total honesty". If you read my experience at the Dusseldorf Truth
Trial, you will understand why..
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top
More than
a Welsh tea-cup
 The Welsh take "language" very seriously indeed, both
their own and everyone else's. The very institution
of "language" excites far greater genuine passion - affection and aversion
- than in England. I too take language very seriously indeed
- it's no accident that I am near-professional linguist (French,
German) - I am spending this entire
coming week at Nant Gwrtheyrn Study Centre in North Wales, to
improve my
faltering Welsh. And I am sure that Labour in Wales will have to
come up with more sophisticated language policies, if we are counter the
amateur politics...
I believe that Welsh Labour should take the lead
in developing a new form of generic "languages policy", to steer the
affairs of the multi-lingual state. If the Welsh do not take
responsibility for this, nobody else will
 This
is where I shall be this week, while others occupy my Swansea home - I
shall be studying at the Welsh language centre at Nant Gwrtheryn.
I gotta'n idea!
Not
another one..." groans my long-suffering wife Elizabeth, "What is
it this time?"
RWE: "It's how to handle teenagers"
Elizabeth: But you don't know anything about that. And
anyway - that's my department, I'm the professional teacher in the family...
RWE: Ah, but I do know about commercial property
matters - and that is where I have found the solution to "the teenage
problem".
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top
These men
are
crooks...
 A criminal conspiracy rules our lives. And this is
their HQ, openly flouted in the heart of London, in Pall Mall - the Institute of Directors. For the leading
conspirators are the top Directors of the corporate sector, listed recently
in The Guardian.
That gruesome list can be replicated
for every statutory jurisdiction with its own system of company law - 235 territories
in all, globally. The defects of company law, of mankind's failed control of
artificial personality, have allowed the corporate sector to become a
vehicle for
systematic
theft, perpetrated by powerful Directors upon their shareholders and
employees.
I am sure
you will want to
keep in touch with what Steve Bell has drawn, in
The
Guardian
even though Steve is on holiday until 22 August.
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top
I am angry
 The imprisonment of
drugs campaigner Shane Collins for
cannabis cultivation* is an outrage.
I fail to understand how Labour Ministers can continue to preside over the
immoral and bankrupt system of drugs prohibition which we have inherited from
earlier generations. This anger recalls
a 2002 Drugs Conference in Kent, where I tried - from the podium - to give
constructive expression to that anger.
*
I am delighted to report that Shane Collins was released immediately on
appeal, having served just five days of a six-week prison sentence -
injustice, although done, was rapidly undone...
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top
...reminding you of the great UK stamps of
2002
Other recent topics
New legal Profession needed >>>
BA abuse Concorde power >>>
The great Pensions Crisis >>>
What
Gordon Brown
must do >>>
Fabians:
Dodgy Royal Priorities >>>
Creating "special electorates"
>>>
I oppose
"Share Options"
>>>
Six-month Notice for all
>>>
The politics of
insurance
>>>
Psychological economies
>>>
Future community government
>>>
Judges
v. Politicians
>>>
TU socialism insufficient
>>>
Six key Socialist issues >>>
Baha'i
and The Truth
>>>
GM This is where I stand >>>
And read my Big Theory itself, at
Multiple
Differential Uncertainty
Also my more practical political thesis about the Corporate Sector and the Left
Coming to Terms
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top
Special Footnote
I love the online newspapers, which are my access to the world - share
them with me - click through to their Homepages from here
Daily Telegraph
Independent
The Times
Financial Times
New York Times
Le Monde
Die Welt
Moscow Times
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top
Monday
11 August 2003 |
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