New Blog

Just a short post to introduce myself (Richard Davies) as another, now, long distance member of UEA Conservatives. As well as writing in this blog I have my own one. I have just set it up so hopefully I will get some stuff put onto it soon.

You can find it at http://el-presidento.blogspot.com/

Cheers Rich

Brown a Great Chancellor?

Gordon Brown the rather dour heir to the throne of Merry King Tony, is often described in terms which can be paraphrased as “he is a safe pair of hands.” His economic record is then cited to explain this claim. This is an interesting claim as it is a rather simplistic assertion. Brown loves to talk about the low inflation and high steady constant growth and high employment he brought about. That these lovely conditions do exists is impossible to refute. No matter how long I spend with my fingers in my eyes, crying “not true not true,” these facts shall remain facts.

It is from this healthy economy brown has drawn the funds for King Tony’s grandiose projects, the billions extra spent by the government on public sector improvements, and a continuing flow of sufficient funds to them depend on this situation of high employment, low inflation and constant growth. The Blair/Brown project along with those of any government’s is dependent on a strong economy, and as such we must look not at how well has the horse run in the last race but instead the next one.

Here the situation becomes far less obvious and favourable to brown. Under Brown Britain has steady declined in competitiveness. Some interesting facts have winded my way which I thought worth sharing. Though on paper and currently in practice Britain is swimming along happily its comparative ability to survive economic down turns has fallen drastically.

Since 1997 we have fallen from 4^th to 10^th in the International competitiveness report.

We have fallen in productivity, in 1992-1997 we had productivity was measured at 2.7 for 2001-2006 it was measured at 1.5.

Brown has failed also to control inflation it is now firmly over 2% the CPI currently stand at 3.1% half the level of 1997.

We have had record trade deficit of 54 billion pounds in 2006, compared to a positive balance of trade in may 1997.

For the first time since records began business investment as a proportion of GDP has fallen to under 10%

For every working day under the current labour government 14 new regulations have been imposed.

Consumer debt has nearly tripled to 1.3 trillion.

Tax has risen 111 times under Brown and now we have the most complex tax code in the world at nearly 10,000 pages.

All in all not nice figures nor encouraging ones when it comes to the future. Ah but some of you will cry remember how bad it was under Thatcher and wheel out statistics about the situation then. This is a crude argument Thatcherism was a product of the breakdown of the post war consensus which was no longer sustainable. In the situation things were bound to be tough and yes with hindsight mistakes were made, but everything is easier with hindsight. The fact remains that her reforms although harsh allow for the strong economy which the Conservatives gifted Brown and the rest of the New Labour team in 1997. An economy which Brown has been busy hollowing out. Impressive on paper Brown’s achievement has only been a relative decline.

Aid and preaching for the sake of preaching

Hallo again, before we go any further I must apologise for my slowness in writing something. I wish could present you with a legitimate reason beyond I could not decide on what to write and I went out too much last week, but I can't. Please be soft on me, this is my first real attempt to write a political blog and so I may descend into ramblings and I am sorry in advance if it is hard to follow. Everyone has to start somewhere. Saying that I am going to go for an ambitious first topic today I was struck by the FrontPage of the Independent today.

The Indy loves it's preachy front pages which tend to fall into three categories; firstly there is the REPENT FROM YOUR CARBON CONSUMING WAYS (dealing with the environment); then there is the REPENT FROM YOUR WAR MAKING WAYS (Iraq etc), and finally there is YOU ARE ALL CORRUPT AND WICKED PEOPLE AND AS SUCH ARE NOT AS GOOD AS US FOR WE ARE THE ENLIGHTENED ONES WHO KNOW BEST (for every possible domestic story). This is a crude generalisation but one most people I am sure will have some sympathy with, this front page however is a cross breed. http://news.independent.co.uk/world/politics/article2611752.ece

in truth it was the tone of moral smugness which irritated me. It rightly points out that the G8 is failing to make good the pledge of 50 billion in aid, but then provides us with comparisons intended to tug at our heart strings and make us feel shame. Britain spends more on champagne then our government does on aid is one example. It seeks to demonstrate the gulf between our lives and those in the third world, and accuses us of forgetting about the rest of humanity. The paper has a point. The west could provide more money to Africa and certainly if it did promise money we should provide it, however what is the point of spending more money, money taken by taxes from hard working families when it is just going to be squandered? The articles did not argue that we should not donate money to charities but instead the government should spend more tax payer’s money on Africa. Individuals have the right to give as much or as little as they wish, and I am not going to talk about how people spend their own money, governments however only ever spend other people's money and as such they should attempt to spend only what is needed. More money is needed in African but even more important is good governance.

In the very same edition of the paper it admits that in Sierra Leone much of
the "country's £140m annual foreign aid income - is now being either misspent or squandered." Africa is still ruled largely by incompetent tyrants, who may be elected but have little regard for democracy. Even where elections are large free, as in South Africa a situation exists where the president refuses to believe in the AIDS crisis and will not spend money on the needed drugs. Africa needs good governance as much as it needs more aid money. While African dictators shift money into their own accounts, castles and family, poverty will remain. Indeed if we just continue to plough money into the Africa in ever increasing volumes all we are doing is setting them up for a fall. Corrupt governments use aid to replace the money the have stolen and wasted and so hold on to power, but when the aid stops all their failings will become apparent very quickly. It is not the job of the G8 to bankroll tyrants and incompetents, by all means give more money but only once we are sure it is being spent properly.

In fairness to the article it did point out that more than money is needed and suggested other measures as well as just ploughing money into the hole. But to condemn us for wasting our own money on luxuries instead of allowing African dictators to waste it for us is not the way to go.

Welcome.

Hallo and welcome to the UEA Conservative society’s collective blog. This blog is still a work in process so please bear with us, it is more than possible the format will change, and it will take time to get the solid core of regular contributors set up, so it is likely that the majority of posts at the moment will be by me. As this is the first post it makes sense to talk a bit about the society, myself, and what this blog aims to do.

The UEA Conservatives is one of the University of East Anglia’s largest political societies and the largest of those affiliated with a mainstream party. Founded nearly 25 years ago on October by the well known blogger Ian Dale, it has continued to grow. With just over a hundred members, we are actively involved in local politics and organise a wide range of events for our membership. In addition every member receives free membership of Norwich South Conservatives, our local area association, with whom we have a close relationship.

On a brief ego boosting detour we turn to me. I was elected president of UEA Tories about a month ago by a large margin, and hope to make the society more sociable and active than ever before. Coming originally from rural Essex, (the Maldon region) I came to UEA to study History and am now finishing my first year. Politically I like to consider myself to be moderate One Nation Conservative with libertarian tendencies. Though that may just be a cunning subconscious plan which will allow me to condemn anyone I disagree with as being “Extreme.”

This blog is intended to open to all members to contribute either by directly posting stuff or just commenting on posts. Anyone who writes is welcome is disagree with any of the opinions expressed, hopefully all the views within the party can be expressed and debated over in a positive way. Likewise outside readers are also more than welcome to post comments and become involved in debates etc. Any topic within reason is open to debate and I certainly will not restrict myself to posting on just Conservative or National politics.

I will be posting something more interesting in a little while.