Manifesto for the Common Man

With the release of the regular every 5 years ‘Lying for a Job’ Manifesto’s, I thought I’d put down my own take on the whole state of the Nation (whatever Nation actually stands for these days).

Just to set the scene, I believe the combined countries (can’t with all honesty call it a United Kingdom these days) are at their lowest ebb after 14 years of Tory abuse EVER. All the taxes we pay, all the income generated, is being stolen from under our noses by a combination of foreign ownership of vital services and ‘share holders’, who take the monies that should be redeployed maintaining and improving infrastructure and services out of the Isles as dividends, money forever lost in the maze of offshore banks and faceless accounts. And then we, the people actually badly effected by the lack of investment, are left with the aftermath.

Above all, what annoys me most are the many, many lies being told about all this, treating us all like unintelligent morons incapable of seeing what is in plain sight. For over 14 years, the Tories have destroyed a once prosperous country while enriching themselves and their ‘chosen ones’ and while the wealth of the rich grew exponentially, the rest of us suffered. The Tory parties Austerity program introduced by David Cameron in 2010, starved all public services of necessary funding, from education to transport, reduced the welfare state to the worst funded in the developed world and enforced the longest period of wage stagnation since the early 18th century. For those at the bottom of the food chain, living has become increasingly difficult, with life expectancy down and increasing rises in child poverty, with day on day rises in the necessities of life such as food and utility costs.

The continuing destruction of a once thriving National Health Service has nothing to do with the Doctors, Nurses and ancillary workers who continuously give their all to help those in need. This is deliberate, no matter what the liars in Government tell us. You know, I know, they are well on the way to introducing a USA standard private health system that will require you to have an insurance to cover even the most simple of ailments so that those that hold the shares in the new system can continue to benefit from fleecing the public, as they did with the PPE scandal (for which, as expected, nothing has, or will probably ever be recovered).

What this means for us is stark. Health insurance will come in levels, depending on how much you can pay. Really, this is in place already to a degree, and has been for many years, but with the acceleration of its introduction, will mean a 2 or even 3, tiered system. No insurance = no treatment, simple as that. And even if you can afford the insurance, the overheads you will pay will be astronomical. It is no coincidence that across the world, the ONLY country where bankruptcy can follow illness and treatment is, yes, you guessed it, the good old United States of America. In fact, under the US healthcare model in the  United States  643 THOUSAND people who go bankrupt every year because of medical bills.

And if you don’t think this will happen, it already has begun, with the starvation of resources and funding to essential health services. In Wales for example, the NHS has been ‘devolved’ to be run by the Labour Party based on decreasing year-on-year budgets enforced by the Tory Westminster-based government. This is what you get with 10 million immigrants, cutting 300k beds to 140k, and taking billions off the budgets to pay themselves for unsupplied PPE equipment over their disastrous reign of destruction. This isn’t just a Welsh problem; this is UK wide.

You only have to look at what has happened with the dental service, once free for all, now requiring you to have a ‘scheme’ to get treatment in most dental practices. People are already taking to home treatment i.e. pulling out their own teeth, as they can’t afford to eat and have dental treatment, ironically ending up with nothing to eat with! What next? Barbers will revert to being barber\surgeons for teeth and minor operations? Maybe that would explain the abundance of Turkish barbers in most towns, when they’re not laundering money, or whatever else they do, they can pull your teeth and supply you with Turkish Teeth without the hassle of going to Turkey! These are the entrepreneurs the Tories so value that they want to no longer have them pay any National Insurance, but somehow receive a pension when they retire that they have contributed 0% to, but the rest of the employed (or enslaved?) workforce have to contribute to for at least 40 years? The Tory logic behind this latest statement belongs in a Brothers Grimm fairy story.

I could go on and on describing the utter destruction the Tory reign has created, with ‘projects’ such as the utter waste of money on HS2 and so many other such scams (how can this cost the UK between £72 and £98 billion for a 140-mile line between London and Birmingham, when there is already a train line there? Why when people are dying on corridors due to spending cuts?). So, what do we do about it?

Firstly, use your vote, don’t just sit back and take it. If you don’t vote you can’t have an opinion, or, at least, it’s pointless having one. And then choose a Party that fits YOUR ideals, not be told what you should vote by talking heads on TV screens. Don’t listen to the lies, look through then, read the information that is readily available, not just Party-Political propaganda.

And then, make your own list of what you are looking to change or accomplish. This is mine:

• End corruption in politics across all parties. Until we send this message to politicians, they will continue to steal from and lie to us.
• Investigate all contracts issued by the Government including Covid based contracts with the legal power to prosecute any misappropriation or malpractice. Retrieve the monies stolen in plain view from us all, hunt down and prosecute those that gave it away and those that stole it.
• Replace First Past the Post with Proportional Representation
• Ban tax havens and retrieve misappropriated public funds. No non-domestic status anymore, make people and companies pay tax on any UK earned income.
• No ‘side jobs’ for MPs, no distractions and possibilities of cash for votes. They should not be allowed to take any funding beyond salary and should disclose their bank details annually for scrutiny. How are we meant to support or respect them otherwise? Just look at Vaughan Gething and his distinctly unethical acceptance of funding to become First Minister in Wales. That stinks.
• Renationalise transport, water, power and any other essential industries. Stop foreign and domestic shareholders syphoning money abroad.
• Rejoin the Common Market, bring back open trade and movement borders and collective responsibilities
• An elected house of Lords and abolish all hereditary honours.
• The Royal family should pay taxes like everyone else.

It’s not a comprehensive list, it won’t fix everything, and it will take years to recover, but we have to start somewhere, and the above items are my cornerstones, you have to have good foundations to build a solid future.

But above all, remember, on July 4^th, 2024, YOU can make a difference. Think about where we were, where we are, and where YOU would want to be. Your vote matters, people have, and continue to, die for democracy, don’t let democracy die of apathy.