The General Election 2015, the Media, and, the way forward

I previously wrote a post asking if the media should change the way they cover politics way back in March, 2015.  Well I’m glad to report to all you avid readers that so far this post has been viewed a massive zero times!  However undeterred, now that the General Election is over, I thought I would return to the subject, in addition to my thoughts on the whole process, as it is even more salient now than it was before.

The first thing to get off my chest is that the whole General Election campaign was far too long.  The last Government passed legislation for a fixed term parliament, so it should not be beyond the realms of possibility to reduce the time spent campaigning.  This is my opinion should be a maximum of two weeks.  The Great British public should not have to endure the constant barrage of seemingly re-engineered policies being announced every day, with each one feeling as if it has been dreamt up overnight to combat an announcement from an opposition party the previous day.  I do not know how we were supposed to afford the announcements either, as I they usually involved giveaways, or, increased spending.  We never heard the mantra we need to raise more income as we have an £80bn deficit to plug.  Personally I would have given more credence to this instead of what appeared to be spend, spend, spend policies.  I constantly heard the phrase “hard working people”.  Well politicians, if these people are so hard working where are they finding the time to follow all the ins and outs of such a long election campaign?  This is where politics and reality are like looking at railway tracks in to the distance.  They appear to meet at some point, but in reality never do.

The next issue is again the media, and, of course the now infamous pollsters.  My goodness I feel as if I have wasted a large part of my life watching political media drivel for at least the last month.  In every interview the media focused religiously on the poll predications, which throughout showed an outcome for a hung parliament.  This then gave rise to the usual tiresome questions regarding red lines and who each party would make deals with.  Since the election result this has been shown to be totally irrelevant now.  What a waste of time.  The sad thing is that the interviewers pursued this topic with venom, not allowing any other issues to be even discussed or considered.  Why have we got to listen to what is effectively just gossip.  The Daily Politics spent every day discussing this.  If the interviewers / commentators are so experienced why didn’t they broaden the subject, and, try to give the public a more balanced view?  I don’t wish any of the media harm, but now that things have proved to be different than what was expected they should like some politicians have, resign and let some other people have a go.  Let us have a change, and, see if some fresh faces can make a better job of it.

The third point is the Conservatives fixation on passing what I feel is irrelevant legislation.  It effectively says that you cannot trust a word we say, so we will pass it in to law to ensure that we will keep our promise.  My goodness I thought they wanted to cut down on legislation and waste?  How is this helping to achieve that goal?  The next legislation which is going to be enacted in this vein is to restrict the increases in the main taxes (VAT, NI, and, Income Tax).  These taxes just happen to raise the majority of the income for the Government.  What has happened to the deficit?  The last time I looked it was still £80bn.  For goodness sake let us please tackle this problem.  The first thing the Conservatives should have done was to increase VAT.  This usually has the effect of providing a quick boost to the Government finances, although I am aware that above a certain level it can give a rise to counterfeiting.  If we can believe the economy is growing, this presumably means people have more money in their purses, and, so can cope with the increase in VAT.  I know this sounds harsh, but my feeling is that the quicker we can balance the budget, the greater scope we have to do some good things after this.  Instead of introducing a law not to increase taxes, why can we not have one to bind Governments to produce balanced budgets, so we do not end up in the mess we are currently in?  I know it easy to say, but we must be able to produce something that balances current income and expenditure, but allows for capital investment.

Finally to Labour.  I do not believe the drivel being bandied about that they are finished.  They will return, but they do need to have some common sense and work for the party as a whole.  It does feel that politicians only seem to think of themselves and not the party.  In truth I believe the party would have been better off with David Miliband.  Ed should never have stood against his brother.  Even up until the election, voters were still talking about how he stabbed his brother in the back.  If Ed would have sat back, he would have been able to put himself forward for the leadership now with even more experience under his belt, and, if David would have won, Labour would be in power so it would have been win, win.  Labour need to look far and wide for a new leader.  In my opinion it needs to be a fresh face, with leadership qualities.  Labour MP’s form the old guard need to sit back.  They have knowledge and experience which is incredibly important, but they need to use it for benefit of the whole.

So there we are.  I wonder if anyone will read this post?