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Ruining the economy of a company or country seems to be a very powerful weapon in terrorism. I know holidays may sound trivial to some but many people depend on tourism. Kenya has suffered badly, Tunisia will be the same. To weaken a country like that opens the way for a regime to take over.
Lynne (Tigger's Mum) wrote: "Ruining the economy of a company or country seems to be a very powerful weapon in terrorism. I know holidays may sound trivial to some but many people depend on tourism. Kenya has suffered badly, ..."Yes, Lynne.
Turkey is another to watch. Egypt has certainly been affected.
it doesn't take much to destabilise us does it. Two men and an automatic rifle and its worldwide in hours. I've been very cautious about Turkey for a long while.
Marc wrote: "Will it's more a point of if those powers of snooping are there, they will inevitably ( and have already been as above) be used in areas beyond security and terrorism. And I'm not saying we do no..."
You're getting to the heart of the relationship between a state and the individual - the very reason that we had the magna carta in the first place.
In order to do its job, a state needs to have power over individuals. We need to have laws, a police force, a judicial system, a regime of punishment.
All of those laws affect the freedom of the individual. We accept them because we make a compromise between individual liberties, the concept of fairness and the need to keep ourselves safe. And it is this tension between competing principles that forms the basis of our legal system.
Some states use these powers to restrict the right of individuals - arresting people they don't like, snooping, seizing assets, censorship.
But that does not mean that restrictions on the freedom of individuals is necessarily a bad thing. It is just that they can be used badly.
We are working within restrictions right now. There are restrictions on how we interact with each other on this forum. We don't whine (and at least most of us don't) about those restrictions affecting our freedom of speech. We know that we need some rules in order to get along.
So yes we need powers for surveillance in order to tackle crime and the threat from terrorism. Yes, those powers could be used for other ends. But ask yourself this - is the Government really that interested in you? Whatever it is you are doing that you don't want them to find out about, are they really going to be that bothered? There are 64 million people in this country ... and a very small proportion of people using surveillance to try to stop the bad guys.
Unless you are up to something particular naughty, you have very little to fear and an awful lot to gain. They haven't got the time, resources or interest to go snooping on you.
Actually Marc, we are in one accord on most things there.I too find the materialistic consumerism, the perpetual pursuit of personal wealth and aggrandisement distasteful and abhorrent, and strive for the opposite in my personal life (as Jim, who has been here will agree, I'm sure).
It's about getting the balance right, isn't it?
Lynne (Tigger's Mum) wrote: "it doesn't take much to destabilise us does it. Two men and an automatic rifle and its worldwide in hours. I've been very cautious about Turkey for a long while."We're thinking of having a short holiday in Turkey in October. We'll see how things are then.
I've been reflecting overnight on Jim's example on the Housing benefit cap as applied to the recently bereaved, and it is to me a great example of why I believe Conservative Policies are fundamentally immoral.The county has determined that there are 120 people affected. OK. Lets' start with who they are: Widows/widowers who have been unable to share a room with their spouse, normally on medical grounds. Those who have been living in with, and caring for, an elderly and infirm parent. Parents with a severely disabled child. High profile cases have included parents caring for a disabled child, whose disability arose as a result of being injured in combat as a member of our armed services. A few extra on that sort of scale, but these are our fellow members of society whose lives are affected.
Money: It's safe to assume that they are all living on benefits, else they wouldn't be claiming housing benefit. I don't know what the difference in rental sums is, but I'm going to assume £ 35 per week as the difference. Anyone with actual figures is welcome to comment?
£ 35 a week represents 25% of a state pension, a much higher proportion of other income replacing benefits, or a single normal breakfast for Iain Duncan Smith, according to his Parliamentary expenses claims. For older people alone, it's probably most of their weekly food bill. 120 people, at £ 35 a week represents a saving of £ 218400 over a whole year, for an entire county.
We know from Jim's analysis that there is a zero supply of alternative accommodation in the whole County. The Government knows all about that too.
So what is the Conservative administration saying to these people? WE will save what one of our ministers claims for breakfast from you on a weekly basis. YOU will either: move home a long way away from friends and family OR lose the part of your income that buys your food.
Moving a long way from the family /friends support network is a big deal for the elderly. So what's the choice? Starvation/foodbanks? This scenario is being repeated right across the UK. Tiny financial savings against a cost in misery I find unacceptable.
Who amongst the Conservatives here is first up to tell me I'm wrong and that the policy is being implemented in the right way at the right time?
I don't think Turkey will be a target. I just have a feeling that they won't cack on their own doorstep. I think Turkey is playing a waiting game and will step up to reform the caliphate when Isis has done all the dirty work. It's better to keep the eyes of the world elsewhere. I just do not trust those in power there.
I'm good friends with and worked in the same room as a Turkish fella all last year and he'd translate some scary fundamentalist stuff that was in the news at least once a week.I'll be talking with him before we book any flights.
There certainly seems to be a big undercurrent in all the news stories (in the real papers) that suggests Turkey is at best turning a blind eye to the stream of people and money finding routes into ISIS. At worst providing covert support and assistance.No one seems to want to come out and say so, though. I do wonder quite what influence that is having - if any? - on the negotiations with Greece. If Greece decides the money in the coffers is better spent on its own people than on the IMF and the ECB, then there's every change the whole edifice of the Euro will collapse. If Greece then accepts financial aid from Russia or China, both entirely possible, the European front line state between us and the Middle East has just gone.
I won't defend the bedroom tax, but I will try to explain it. But let's start by explaining the difference between the right wing and the left wing. It all boils down to one thing - "does it hurt?"
Fundamentally, both the conservatives and old Labour want the same thing. They want to make the world a better place and to improve the lot of ordinary people. They just have different ways of achieving that aim.
At their heart, the conservatives believe in tough love. Sometimes a policy has got to hurt some people in order to benefit a lot more. This means that a conservative Government won't prop up a failing business, for example, even though that means job losses. They will allow the business to fail in the expectation that the market will replace it with a more effective and efficient business. Hence the pit closures which lead to the miner's strike.
The bedroom tax is consistent with that principle. We have a housing shortage which means that some people can't find anywhere to live. Part of that housing shortage would be alleviated if people already in a home with empty bedrooms downsized to a property with fewer bedrooms. It's the "smart" solution, because it means that we don't have to waste the energy and building materials involved in making a new home.
Hence the bedroom tax. It was intended to be a little nudge to get people to move out of too large properties in order to help others who need those extra bedrooms. That's the theory, but I won't defend the application because I think it's been very badly handled.
Pure socialism doesn't work in quite the same way. Many people see socialism as the helping hand, which can equate to "never hurt anyone ever".
And that's the dilemma. The conservative approach usually produces better results, but it hurts people. The socialist approach doesn't hurt people in the short term, but it doesn't produce such good results and can be more expensive.
Some people have a strong dislike of the Tories because they cannot see past this point about not hurting anyone ever.
The ideal may be something in the middle. That is what Ed Milliband and Nick Clegg tried to offer. It's also what David Cameron means when he talks about "caring conservatism".
If someone could crack the conundrum and give us a good balance between the right wing "greater good" and the left wing "caring", and if they could convince the electorate that they had got the best balance, then the other parties might as well pack their bags and give up.
ISIS are little more than a shitsplat in the grand scheme of things.If we were really serious about stopping them, we would have told the Saudis to piss off a long time ago - yet we don't because they buy Typhoon fighter jets from us.
The current president of Turkey is pro-Islamic, unlike Ataturk who set Turkey up as a non-secular state. The urban population desire a non-secular society, generally. Hence the demonstrations in Istanbul. Unfortunately, a great portion of the population isn't educated urban.
Will wrote: "I won't defend the bedroom tax, but I will try to explain it. But let's start by explaining the difference between the right wing and the left wing. It all boils down to one thing - "does it hurt..."
Will, I've spoken about this before. It isn't tough love at all. It's taking part of a sensible policy - I've already said before that it is very sensible - and applying the hardship to those in distressed circumstances BEFORE the other part of the equation is even a glimmer on the horizon. You can't try and divert the argument into broader principles : answer the straight question. Is it right to do this when the alternative housing does not exist, and is known not to exist, and therefore the victims are not presented with a proper choice?
Edit: What about scrapping the Assisted Living Allowance, that helps the most seriously disabled get access to a more normal life? Again, the savings are small but the impact on people is enormous. Government is there to support its citizens - not the other way round, as the Conservatives seem to believe!
Michael Cargill wrote: "ISIS are little more than a shitsplat in the grand scheme of things.If we were really serious about stopping them, we would have told the Saudis to piss off a long time ago - yet we don't because..."
And we buy lots of oil from them - and they promptly give the money to ISIS and Al Quiada.
But hey, that's the free market economy, isn't it?
Will ... one of the arguments FOR the bedroom tax is that there is a lack of alternative housing. In particular we have a shortage of houses and flats with enough bedrooms for families and we have a lot of single people living in exactly that kind of home.If anything the housing market has over-provided small flats with one or two bedrooms. They aren't the problem at the moment.
That is why it makes sense to find a way to use those under-used bedrooms.
Finding a way to make the best use of the housing that we have already got is absolutely the right thing to do. The bedroom tax was a crude way to do this, but the reason for doing something like it is easy to see.
We have talked earlier about the minimum wage against the living wage, and how this impacts on the welfare budget/ austerity.Here's some statistics, found today, that support my view.
Next, the High Street & Online retail company.
Its employees receive more, per employee, in In Work Benefits than Next pays in tax apportioned per employee. Surely this deserves more Treasury attention than the out of work benefits which represent 10% of the in work Payments.
Tesco staff received £ 364 Million in Tax Credits. Roughly equal to the Corporation Tax paid by the company...
Will wrote: "Will ... one of the arguments FOR the bedroom tax is that there is a lack of alternative housing. In particular we have a shortage of houses and flats with enough bedrooms for families and we have ..."I am in entire agreement with the concept that after a year to grieve the loss of a loved one, a single person in social housing (or getting the equivalent benefit) should downsize. It's quite rational.
The point you are avoiding mate is this: when the housing stock is entirely devoid of any alternative accommodation because we do not build one bedroom houses or flats, where is the moral justification is saying - if you do not move to one of these places that we know doesn't exist, we will take away your food budget?
The eventual aim may be fine, but the callous disregard of the actual effect of the policy reveals an unacceptable moral attitude.
I am not avoiding any point. The stock of available housing is insufficient, so the Government are trying to make the best use of the existing housing by "nudging" (their word) people with spare bedrooms to downsize. This will free up housing stock for people with families. It's a better fit between houses and people.Some people will be hurt by this policy. Some people will be helped. That's how it goes.
You can't see past the people who will be hurt by the policy. That's the traditional left wing view of "some hurt = you shouldn't do it". What you are missing are the people who would be helped by it - the people with larger families who need those bedrooms.
Not a callous disregard of the effect of the policy. It is actually an attempt to do more good for a greater number of people.
But if you can't see past the initial hurt to some people and see the greater good argument, you will probably never get it. And that's the root cause of why some people don't understand right wing politics.
'The Greater Good'... Will, that phrase has some pretty nasty antecedants. You might want to rethink that one, before you get the nickname 'Lord Voldemort'... No, those with a moral compass will never get the concept that callously ruining some lives is worth while, when there is an alternative. build some single bedroom homes, then introduce the policy. And whilst we are at it, build some slightly bigger houses too. Outside bloody London, where ordinary people actually live.
Which is sort of why there is a right/left split isn't it? Those who value all the citizens, against those who don't consider that every life has a value in other than monetary terms. (and I know you have massive reservations about a lot of what is going on, so I don't class you there, OK?)
And the socialist view is actually : that damages lives: we should find a better way to do that. Not the conservative 'we'll find the cheapest way, and sod the ones who get killed'
I don't know why Scotland's getting the blame for a Conservative victory. It's not our fault if the labour party elected an incompetent leader, or had no policies of note. In contrast, the SNP where everywhere and I mean EVERYWHERE. On the buses, streets, stalls, town hall meetings, meeting hubs, your front door etc etc
Imagine the sight of your local candidate talking to normal people, or Nicola Sturgeon on a bus talking to people.
Imagine that. Politicians talking to the great unwashed :)
Contrast that with the careful PR events of Cameron and Miliband, where everyone was vetted in advance.
People on this forum may not like the SNP, but they would have been damn well impressed by the sheer legwork they put in to get those votes.
My father thought it was a political campaign from the 1960s!
The SNP essentially filled a void and it'll be interesting to see how they fare in 2020.A twenty year old got elected!
I guess they were the Scottish equivalant of a Tony Blair or Obama.
No, the SNP lied about austerity and made promises that they knew they have to keep. Labour couldn't possibly match what the SNP were saying because Labour did have a chance of being the lead part of a coalition in Government. Will - you're not listening. And bandying around terms like "moral compass" is dodging the issue. I'll say it as simply as I know how:
1. We have a housing shortage. There is a particular shortage of flats and houses with 3 or more bedrooms which families need.
2. Part of this shortage is caused/ exacerbated by people living in houses which are too big for them. Exactly those 3-4 bedroom houses that families need.
3. The Conservatives introduced a crude measure in the bedroom tax to encourage people living in houses with unused bedrooms to downsize.
C'mon, it's not difficult. It is most certainly not the case that one party values its citizens and another doesn't. It isn't callous. It is actually a case of someone thinking a little bit deeper about the problem than you are.
Will wrote: "No, the SNP lied about austerity and made promises that they knew they have to keep. Labour couldn't possibly match what the SNP were saying because Labour did have a chance of being the lead part ..."How come we've got a housing shortage? Is it because some Prime Minister flogged off houses years ago and didn't build any replacements?
What lies did the SNP make about austerity. They wanted a modest increase in spending to encourage growth.
Michael Cargill wrote: "The SNP essentially filled a void and it'll be interesting to see how they fare in 2020.A twenty year old got elected!
I guess they were the Scottish equivalant of a Tony Blair or Obama."
We don't need another Tony Blair!
Selling off council housing does not reduce the overall housing stock. It simply transfers an individual house from council ownership to individual ownership. Instead of paying rent, you pay a mortgage and eventually own it outright. But that house still exists. It still has people in it.Selling off council housing helps to promote interest in home ownership which stimulates the private sector to build more homes.
The main problem with the housing market is that we have a rising population at the same time as changing demographics such as people living longer and more people living alone because of divorce. And that means that we have a large number of empty bedrooms ...
... and that gets us right back to the bedroom tax.
That and the NIMBY tendency from existing homeowners to oppose any attempt to build houses near their house.
The SNP lied by promising to be able to spend more in Scotland and reverse austerity cuts without having the first clue about how they were going to pay for it ... apart from taking more money from England.
"apart from taking more money from England."Because nobody in Scotland has ever paid tax before in their lives. I can testify to this. I used to work 40 hours a week at a DIY chain. Every month, when I got paid, there was no NI and no income tax. I was very happy.
My friend would drive me back. He loved driving. Petrol was free. We would stop of at the shops on the way back and take advantage of cheap food prices because we don't pay VAT in Scotland. Ever :)
"That and the NIMBY tendency from existing homeowners to oppose any attempt to build houses near their house."Politicians could have changed the law to make it easier. Personally, I feel the NIMBY argument is overrated. People don't want to build more houses, Especially, in London and the SE because the economy is reliant on phony growth from property bubbles.
I engaged in a conversation with our former town Mayor a few weeks ago and got onto the subject of housing.The previous coalition government passed new housing rules (Called planning policy guidance documents). These are going to turn things around in the near future as they are only now being implemented by local and county councils.
The new rules change the emphasis for planning permission. In the past the default position was not to grant planning permission without satisfying a number of key criteria. Now the default position is to grant planning permission unless there is good reason to refuse.
This is what the building industry has been lobbying for. Now they've got it, lets see what other excuses they can come up with for not converting their land banks into estates with shiny new houses on them.
The former town mayor was bemoaning this change in policy as it reduced residents (NIMBYs?) grounds for objection.
R.M.F. - there are only two parts of the UK that generate more taxation income than they cost. London and the south east of England.The rest of the UK pays taxes but not enough to cover their costs. In effect, the south east of England is subsidising everyone else.
And Scotland wants to get more of a handout from the UK so it can avoid austerity? How else is it going to pay for anti-austerity policies?
Will wrote: "I too find the materialistic consumerism, the perpetual pursuit of personal wealth and aggrandisement distasteful and abhorrent, and strive for the opposite in my personal life (as Jim, who has been here will agree, I'm sure)...."I formally second :-)
But yes, Will could make serious money if he was willing to 'cut corners' (shall we say)
Will wrote: "No, the SNP lied about austerity and made promises that they knew they have to keep. Labour couldn't possibly match what the SNP were saying because Labour did have a chance of being the lead part ..."Will, you have indeed said it simply. You just haven't said it all, and you know it, because you are dodging the issue.
The issue is this: is it moral to force people out of houses when the alternative house you want them to move into doesn't exist? I'll say it again, as it doesn't seem to be getting through. The alternative, smaller accommodation DOESN'T EXIST. Where, then, are they supposed to go to? A tent? A tree house?
Of course it is callous an uncaring in those circumstances. Explain to me where Jim's 120 people are going to live and I'll listen with interest. Until then it remains as evidence this administration doesn't give a monkeys about those people, only the money.
Geoff, what happened to the Brownfield Housing initiative that was being widely trumpeted some years ago? Do you know?Close to where I live there are 3 new small housing estates being built. But guess what? Only two or three bed accommodation is included on the estate. No houses for our growing single population
Just back off holiday and found lots of interesting stuff appeared in this thread.On the use of cctv cameras, my son parked in a station car park. Returning a few hours later he found that his car had been damaged - not just the usual door ding, but a big impact that had buckled a front wing so badly that the car was undriveable. Cctv cameras were in operation, under the control of British Transport Police. When he contacted them they flatly refused to help him identify whoever had caused the damage on the basis that they didn't have the manpower to look at the recording.
The housing situation here in the Southwest is absolutely dire. The relationship between average earnings and average property prices is such that our young people cannot afford to buy, anymore than young people in London can buy. Down here the situation is caused by second-home ownership plus retirees from more affluent areas buying up properties that they consider cheap, but are unaffordable to locals.
The reason that the affluent south-east can afford to subsidise we residents of the impoverished fringe is because our infrastructure has been neglected for decades to the extent that we cannot attract businesses that pay decent salaries.
Jim wrote: "Will wrote: "I too find the materialistic consumerism, the perpetual pursuit of personal wealth and aggrandisement distasteful and abhorrent, and strive for the opposite in my personal life (as Jim..."But what would be the point, Jim? I have music, books,a garden (and if that's not big enough two bloody enormous national parks each inside half an hour's drive away AND an AONB 20 miles South). A £ 750 Alfa that I enjoy enormously, and my friends and family. I have leisure in which to write, and time to read. I cannot see what possible benefit money could bring me or find any conceivable motivation to earn more...
Travel? You've got that shiny new passport n all. What's an AONB?
BJ: the all-seeing intrusive eye of the state is ever watching you...Unless it is having the batteries changed, switched off to save money, down for repair and/or scheduled maintenance, been valdalised, gone for a pee or a kip, on shift change over, broken for lunch, having a fag, chatting up the girl in reception or switched over to the races out of terminal (sic) boredom...
Edit: and under Will's Austerity Programme had the installation date put back by three years for the second time...
Be Afraid!
Will wrote: "Geoff, what happened to the Brownfield Housing initiative that was being widely trumpeted some years ago? Do you know?As far as I'm aware it is still an "initiative" but unfortunately no one is doing anything about it, mainly because it costs more for the developer.
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Geoff (G. Robbins) (merda constat variat altitudo)
(last edited Jun 27, 2015 10:39AM)
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Will - the alternative house does exist, whether you shout it in capitals or not. Councils would dearly love to move people around their stock so that they can put families into family homes and move couples or single occupiers into single or two bedroom flats. What they have at the moment are families squeezed into houses and flats that are too small whilst some people are sitting on houses that are too big.You are only seeing a part of the problem. You are ignoring the larger families who are forced to live in council accommodation that is too small for their needs. Yours is the uncaring approach because it hurts a larger number of people.
So you would like more investment in infrastructure, eh? And where is the money for that going to come from when the economy is running at a deficit? That's right - you need to make savings elsewhere. It's called austerity, but what it really means is saving money in one area so that it can be spent in another.
Surely you must see that?
Ta. As usual for a government then, lots of posh talk and steering groups and no actual action.Patti: AONB stands for a Designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, and the first such area in the UK was in fact The Gower Peninsular, 20 miles from where I live: holding my fave place on earth, Rhossili Bay. Also often voted the best beach in the UK by the way, although not as crowded as anywhere on the South Coast
Will wrote: "Ta. As usual for a government then, lots of posh talk and steering groups and no actual action."Ah, no, sorry. Nothing like that.
Planning decisions are made by local councils - district councils, London boroughs and unitary authorities. They have to have regard to national planning policy guidance produced by the Government. These used to be called Planning Policy Guidance (PPG), which were then superseded by Planning Policy Statements (PPS) and more recently by a single document called the National Planning Policy Framework.
This puts a responsibility on local authorities to use brownfield land where possible:
"111. Planning policies and decisions should encourage the effective use of land by re-using land that has been previously developed (brownfield land), provided that it is not of high environmental value. Local planning authorities may continue to consider the case for setting a locally appropriate target for the use of brownfield land."
But it is for each local authority to make individual planning decisions. Some brownfield land may be unsuitable for development because of its environmental sensitivity or other problems such as poor transport access.
In other words, no posh talk, no steering groups. It's all down to local decisions.
Sorry for the techie stuff. It's my day job.
They're throwing up a load of plastic-fantastic houses here in Barry on what used to be the railroad graveyard, Dave sez,Is that brownfield land?
All two, three and four bed, looks like.
Brownfield is a term used in urban planning to describe land previously used for industrial purposes or some commercial uses. Such land may have been contaminated with hazardous waste or pollution or is feared to be so.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brownfi...
Sounds yum.
I can't see a rail graveyard being not at least a bit polluted but I know there's plenty of houses in Canada built on old rubbish dumps.Does that happen here too?
Yup... we built an entire Olympic Park on top of it!Part of the Athletes Village now houses students.
Will wrote: "But what would be the point, Jim? I have music, books,a garden (and if that's not big enough two bloody enormous national parks each inside half an hour's drive away AND an AONB 20 miles South). A £ 750 Alfa that I enjoy enormously, and my friends and family. I have leisure in which to write, and time to read. I cannot see what possible benefit money could bring me or find any conceivable motivation to earn more... ..."I agree entirely.
Will wrote: "But let's start by explaining the difference between the right wing and the left wing. It all boils down to one thing - "does it hurt...At their heart, the conservatives believe in tough love. Sometimes a policy has got to hurt some people in order to benefit a lot more. This means that a conservative Government won't prop up a failing business, for example, even though that means job losses. They will allow the business to fail in the expectation that the market will replace it with a more effective and efficient business. Hence the pit closures which lead to the miner's strike.
"
I can't decide if this is just naive or the view of an apologist. There is no doubt that by the end of the 1970s, the UK's state industries were uncompetitive, bloated beasts and needed an economic solution imposed from above. But to do it without any support for the workers tossed on the unemployment heap, at a time of large unemployment nationwide, to not provide retraining or reskilling but just to leave them to sink or swim, was uncaring and quite deliberate in my opinion. But let's also cut to the chase as regards to the Miners' strike. Yes the pits would fall into the above as needing an economic solution, but there was a parallel political stream to the economic solution. The Tories were itching to crush the NUM for the following reasons:
1) As a leading and sizeable trade union, it would signal to the TUC movement as a whole who was boss
2) As a particular personal battle to defeat Arthur Scargill and a brand of extreme left politics (Derek Hatton & Militant Tendency as a similar initiative) Thatcher's infamous "Enemy Within"
3) To continue the policy of attacking any and every communal, collective institution in order to promote a wholly individualist drive on the country. Mining communities were ripped in half, be it the divisions within its residents, or the police occupation of some of them during the strike.
Yes the NUM having Scargill at its head made it hugely problematical for the Union to win the battle for hearts and minds. Not having a ballot. The whisking away of the Union's funds, but then that was matched by government inducements to Miners returning to work or joining the fledgling alternative union that sprung up during the strike, or the stockpiling of coal from home and bought from abroad well ahead of provoking the strike, while ensuring it took place largely over the summer when demands on power would be less. They had learned the errors from Ted Heath's battles with the Miners. Maybe revenge for that defeat was a fourth factor itself, though I couldn't say definitively.
And finally, quoting the principle of Bentham's Utilitarianism (the greatest good for the greatest number) is priceless. Jeremy Bentham, the man who gave us Panopticism, or the idea of 24-7 surveillance. How very apropos. I'm interested Will, Max Weber points out that throughout history whole generations have been consigned to their society's scrapheap through no fault of their own, only the happenstance of when they were born. Those left behind by the Industrial Revolution in Britain being an obvious example. Do you just shrug your shoulders and say well it's for the greater good? What if you were one of the people on the wrong end of Osborne's austerity measures? Would you just shrug then?
Socialism believes that all people are equal if it weren't for social, educational and economic factors differentiating them. Conservatives have a fundamental belief that this isn't the case, that there are inherent and inescapable differences between people that serves to stratify them, what is usually referred to as a belief in original sin (not in a theological sense). The irony is that despite a belief in equality, socialist are usually insistent on laws to protect and ringfence rights as a bare minimum of quality of life, whereas the Conservatives who you might imagine would seek laws to protect vested interests from the rabble, those weighed down with original sin, tend to be against laws concerning statements of rights, leaning more towards a libertarian playing field. Funny old world.
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It's a balance, but you can't do nothing against such wicked behaviour. ..."
I've just been reading an NFU release. They've been working with Cafe Nero. From the ITV website
Caffe Nero has defended its boycott of milk from badger cull areas as necessary to protect its staff.
In a statement the coffee chain insisted it was not bowing to intimidation, but that it had to act when staff well-being was threatened.
With just 2% of our annual milk supply impacted, we made what we feel was the right choice ... We are not intimidated by protestors in spite of their ongoing and upsetting efforts to threaten our business. At the end of the day, we know that the authorities will support us if needed. However, we made a decision to limit any risk to our people as quickly as possible.
– CAFFE NERO STATEMENT
In the discussions with the NFU "At the meeting, Caffe Nero reiterated their position that they remained concerned about staff and store safety during the anti-austerity march, following a number of threats in the weeks leading up to it. Following police advice they put in place a number of measures to minimise the risk to their staff."
Terrorism is alive and well in the UK and you're right, we cannot do nothing against such wicked behaviour