An utter disservice to democracy
Before I went away, I
had applied for a postal ballot knowing I would not be in the country when the
UK General Election takes place. Sadly, our council in its lethargy and lack of
alacrity must have thought all applications for a postal ballot were from those
who out of some sort of incapacity could not make it to the polling station.
Despite the fact that
my application went in the day after the election was announced and I posted
the additional information they asked for a few days later, the postal ballots
were not posted until the third week of June, by which time it was too late.
What I even found
more annoying was, I was already on the voters’ register for 10 years at the
same address. I unfailingly renew my registration every year, and I received a
voter’s registration card which I used for the local elections in early May.
Another card was mailed to me for this election if I were to choose to vote in
person, but my postal ballot was nowhere to be found.
I can only wonder
about the many Greater Manchester voters that have been so poorly served by the
electoral services unit with regards to postal ballots.
On balance, 14 years
of failure
If there is anything
to consider about the last 14 years of the Conservatives in power, I reckon we
are at a net negative if a balance sheet were set out about the benefits and
the demerits of having that party preside over our dear country of many
nations.
When I returned to
the UK in late 2012, I was a European citizen who had spent over 12 years in
the Netherlands with untrammelled rights of a European freely able to visit,
live, and work in one of 28 countries, if I chose to. If I was gifted with any sense
of prognostication, I could have naturalised as a Dutch citizen any time from
2005, but I never thought the UK would risk leaving the EU, we were too
invested in the project.
I was wrong, as in
the 5 Prime Ministers that the Tories have given us since 2010, each in their
own way has gambled with livelihoods for personal and partisan expediency to
the detriment of the fortunes of our country. There is no need to rehash the
points, we are much worse off, where a parliament that is self-servingly
incapable of the kind of collegiate thought to progress anything.
Having lost a sense
of responsibility
The entrenchment of
the entitlement to power has become so ingrained that the facts of the
situation mean nothing if we can be scared into believing the populist simple
solutions for practically difficult problems.
The Tories need some
time in opposition to regain a sense of what the responsibility of governing
and impacting positively on people’s lives beyond culture wars and pandering to
the basest of our human instincts. The idea that a limited company masquerading
as a party with the face of an indolent representative who has the gift of the
gab and nothing else to offer, being our future is a fantasy begging for the unfortunate.
The best option for
government today is the Labour Party, if only for the fact that they would
appreciate the opportunity to govern and do much more to attend to the
atrocities passing for policy that the Tories have enmeshed themselves in without
the quality of scrutiny necessary among them and beyond to jettison the bizarre
and refine the barely acceptable.
A possible future in
our votes
The Labour Party
offers a new direction that will address many of the issues of today, it is
change-focused, future-looking, ready to grow and invest in our economy, seeking
to divest power from central government, helping people back to work,
addressing the immigration issue that has been lost by the Tories, and
introducing the modern industrial strategy. Their manifesto reads like
something to have expectations for rather than one that offers trepidation and
fear.
The polls will
suggest Sir Keir Starmer will be kissing the hand of the king on the 5th
of July 2024. I enjoyed some years of Labour-driven prosperity from 1997 to
2000 before I emigrated to the Netherlands, and this prosperous spell continued
until the financial crash.
It is evident that
after so long in power the Tories are bereft of new or useful ideas, they
cannot even look on their record of the past 14 years which have given us some
of the worst Prime Ministers to ever preside over His or Her Majesty’s
Government.
I appreciate some are
too tribal to vote for another party, but the future of our country is at
stake, we cannot sacrifice this to sentiment when competence is required. I
would rather have a boring competent and disciplined government than an entertaining
relatable but totally incompetent politician run the show. It is not pot luck,
lives are impacted beyond your door.
