THE CASE FOR HOME RULE FOR ENGLAND

In this blog I will argue the case for English independence  or home rule.

England is an a anomaly in being the only one of the four countries in the United Kingdom without  home rule. Decides being unfair the people of England are clearly discriminated against financially. Also members of parliament from Scotland can vote on issues like education in the British parliament which only they can vote on in the Scottish parliament in Edinburgh.

Students from Scotland  and Wales get the student tuition fees paid by the scottish  and welsh government. While students from Northern Ireland have their fees capped at £3200.00. Only students from England pay the full £9000.00 tuition fees 

In 2010 Professor David Bell from Stirling university said that England was losing 4.5 billion pounds per year due to subsidies going to Scotland.

Clearly there is an English deficit.

Besides personally I can identify with the flag of St George but not the union jack. The union jack is an imperialist flag of the British empire. Also I can identify with St George  who was reported to be from  Palestine or Turkey

Clearly there should be a referendum in England between a choice of English home rule or English independence. Personally I would vote for English independence as it would be a progressive vote against the British American alliance and would weaken this war based alliance.

I would very much welcome an independent England just a normal European  country free from imperial constraints.

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CARE HOMES A NEED FOR A CHANGE IN POLICY?

This latest blog affects me personally. My Mother is in a care home she is 86 years of age and suffers from senile dementia. I think the carers mainly Polish do a fantastic job  for very low wages.

The British care home system for senior citizens is at present  in something of a crisis.

Southern Cross a leading care home business in this country has lost 310 million pounds in the recent period. It looks after 50000 vunerable residents. Four Seasons another care home provider are 700  million pounds in debt.

There has been a large scale privatisation of the care home system in the last twenty years in this country. In 1990,  200000 out of 500000 care home beds were provided by local authorities.Today only 31000 care home beds are provided by local authorities.

With the private care homes suffering big losses a time for a rethink in policy is neccessary.It is rare for me to praise our politicians but I did admire Andy Burnham the    Labour shadow cabinet member when he spoke movingly about a relative going into a care home and of the need for a national care fund.

What I would suggest is that  people pay a national care fund from their earnings as this problem of senile dementia is affecting many old people when they get to the age of 70 or 80.We need to show solidarity with the elderley when they suffer from this tragic health problem.

With the introduction of a national care fund we could open more local authority run care homes. We could also have greater local authority regulation of private run care homes.

With many private care homes in bankruptcy clearly a change in direction in care home policy is urgently needed in this country.

SUMMER ROCK FESTIVALS

This week end you may or not know the Glastonbury rock festival takes place.

Now a must confess I don’t particularly like rock festivals. The only one I ever went to Reading in the late 1970, I left after the first day despite buying a ticket for three days. In fact now I quiet dislike rock music although I was once a vocalist in a punk rock band around about 1980.

It seems to me that rock festivals nowadays including Glastonbury are dominated by corporate sponsoship.Carling black label and various other corporate business groups. It seems that for the last 15 or so years rock festivals have been a chance for nice  middle class things to have a weekend of fun. Long gone are the days of radical  political  inspired free music festivals.

In fact the same must apply to rock and roll itself nowadays.Most rock bands tours seem to have corporate sponsorship. In fact very few modern  rock bands seem to have much to say about the world being mainly dull apolitical outfits.Rock and roll short radical period of  punk  has long gone. 

The rock stars of the 1960,s Mick Jagger, Ray Davies and Paul McCartney are mainly pro establishment bootlickers.Rock and roll is now largely a corporate industry. Most so called NEW bands sounding just like the bands they have taken over from. It is just a nice corporate consumer  product.

I must also confess I have never liked rock and rolls links to drug taking.Drug taking and rock and roll are both a way of making modern youth apolitical.

Th rock festival goers will  of course return from their festivals to their mainstream jobs and middle class life as part of the system.

But as a final thought as part of a new human paradigm is it not time to bury rock and roll and create a new music paradigm. Have fun at your music festivals but start thinking about what you listening to is it not time for a new paradigm music change.

The Westminster Parliament from the May 2011 general election to now

After reading in the Guardian media page on Monday that most of the political elite turned up for Rupert Murdochs News International summer party the week before. David Cameron, Ed Milliband and Ed Balls etc it prompted me to write a blog on the Westminster parliament from the May 2011 general election to now.

The attendance at news Internationals summer party shows how our political elite are under the sway of the corporate autocracy. However this is only stating the obvious. So lets take a look at  the Westminster  village since the May 2011 general election.

The biggest disappointment has been Nick Clegg I had been taken in by him. Before the last election I thought that he was some sort of radical.But he is a fraud just a typical supporter of the word neo liberal globalist coporate order.

The Conservative allies in the coalition governement would probably like to take the neo liberal project further but are held back by the Liberal Democrats. The working class must pay for the crisis of the world coporate globalist system. Higher taxes, welfare cuts higher rents and unemployment and hey rich people you don,t have to pay your tax ,vodafone and co.

Labour have been pathetic.David Milliband the defeated candidate was a typical Blairite New Labour pro business clone. He speech which he was going to make if elected leader of the party published in the Guardian recently shows a politician who clearly does not see much wrong with the world order.

Ed Milliband and Ed Balls have been disappointing.Ed Balls recent call for a cut in vat was such a lame policy it was pathetic.Ed Milliband has been as quiet as a mouse.

So basically our political class all gather together at the News Inrernational party in tow to their coroprate masters.They do not seem to realise that there is a lot wrong with the world the coming crisis of peak oil. The struggle of many ordinary people to pay their way, high fuel bills and rent. The growing debt crisis .

There a world apart.So as I have said in my previous blogs we will have to build an alternative system from below.

RICHARD GAGE TALK AT ROYAL INSTITUTE OF ARCHITECTS

Last night I went to the talk by San Fransico architect Richard Gage at the Royal Institute of Architects at Portland Place in Central London.

The talk was of course on 9/11. Suprisingly the talk was very well attended between 150 and 200 people. This was very encouraging as I thought that 9/11 has died to a certain extent as an issue in the last few years. The  9/11 truth movement   has declined very rapidly in the UK in the last few years.

Richards talk was of superb. He was however largely talking to the converted as the audience was overwhelmingly made up of 9/11 truth movement supporters.

The talk lasted for about two hours.The first section dealt with the collapse of the World Trade centre building. The film clearly showed the WTC was brought down by a controlled demolition very rapidly.

However it was in the section on the twin towers that Richard came into his own. The presentation was superb about this section of the talk.

Richard showed that no building has collapsed before through a fire. He showed fires raging in high tower buildings for over two days but the buildings did not collapse.

Regarding the twin towers he quoted 118 eye witnesses who heard explosions in the building.He quoted numerous fire fighters who heard explosions in the twin towers.

The film presented showed the twin towers collapsing in just 12 seconds from top to bottom so the contolled demolition would have been placed in the top of the building

To sum up the talk just confirmed the views of the audience who were largely converted to Richards point of view.

My own take is that it is obvious that 9.11 was an inside job. However unlike Richard I do not feel that we will ever prove this. I suspect that the subject will play like the President Kennedy  assassination people will still be talking about the subject in years to come.

 

 

DISMANTLE EUROPEAN UNION

Until a few years ago I used to be sympathetic to the European Union being  in favour of the concept of European Unity. However the last few years have changed my mind. I feel that the European Union needs to be replaced by a Confederation of Independent European States.

Let  me explain why. The unelected European Commission are passing orders to democratically elected goverments in a dictatorial manner. A typical example is Codex Alimentarious.The centralised dictate from the European  Union Commission that virtually outlaws Herbal Medicine and also makes the dosage in herbal medicine so low as to make it ineffective. This means alot to me as I rely on herbal medicine a great deal.The use and regulation of herbal medicine should be down to the individual governments in the European Union.

The most outrageous plan is for the EU to set up a committee to privatise Greece state owned assets as part of the bail out they are proposing for Greece.This is theft on a grand scale looting Greece of its assets and loss of its independence.

The EU headquarters is awash with corporate lobbyists.Also the wages paid to people like the Kinnocks when they worked for the EU over one million pounds per year plus the lavish expenses is outrageous.

However it is important not to be taken in by the UK Independence Party reactionaries. They support the world free market neo liberal globalist system. Big business control of the world econmomy. They supported the war in Iraq. Many of its members support a UK link to the USA and NAFTA. UKIP is a fake democracy party who do not support economic democracy but  neo liberal globalism in a differerent form from the European Union.

So the fight must be for a Europe of national economies not controlled by the neo liberal globalists.

BRITAINS PENSIONS

The report on pensions for the public sector made interesting reading  particularly with the strike coming on the 30/6/2011. A number of points need to be made.

Firstly the government should consider collecting the billions in unpaid taxes from multinational corporate finance who do not pay any income tax at all that would help close the gap in public sector pensions finances.

However I have a number of what I feel are sensible suggestions to make.

Firstly there should be an independent committee made up of the government, local authorities and the public sector unions  to see if there is a gap in public sector pensions finance funding and to see how much pensions contributions may have to be increase by.If at all.

Gordon Brown  was of course   the main guilty person with his tax raid on the pension funds when he was finance minister in the Tony Blair government.

Secondly we need more work flexibility when people get  older .As people get past the age of fifty many people do not have the energy to do a full 37 or so hours per week.People  should be given the option of working part time say two or three days a week as they get past the age of fifty.

In conclusion  people are living longer so there may have to be a rise in pension contributions but lets  investigate this with an independent committee.But if people are going to have to work longer they should have the opportunity of working part  time as they get older.

PS. If you want to read my blogs  prior to 12/6/11 go to my previous blog .www.kevcally-channells.blogspot.com

 

A new political movement needed. DEMOCRACY NOW

Just a discussion on the fact that this country needs a new political movement totally free from the coporate interests of the three main parties.

Also free from the outdated slogans of Lenins dictatorship over the working class.

I feel we will soon be entering a new human paradigm and this will require a new political movement with fresh ideas. The name I feel should be Democracy Now.

We must fight against the world globalist corporate fascist big business dictatorship.Their control over the world economy by the IMF, EU central banks and the World bank and the international corporations that control them.

We must fight for national controlled economies,with co-operative owned decentralised people controlled enterprises. Building an internet based independent based media,co-opreative housing.

The new movement must be democratic and fight for a democratic economy.

Build DEMOCRACY NOW

BRITAINS HOUSING CRISIS

Ed Milliband,s comment last week that priority for council housing should be given to people in work or who are volunteering shows that he and the rest of the Westminister Village do not understand the crisis and problems facing working class people in this country particularly in London in finding decent accommodation to leave in.

In London flats costs about £250000.00 for one bedroom flats.That a nice one for people earning around £25000.00 per year,weekly rents for one bedroom flats in London for private accommodation one bedroom flats are about £280.00 per week.

More and more ordinary people in London and the rest of the Country can just expect a life of living in insecure bedsit accommodation paying £100.00 per week for the pleasure.Thats great, perhaps consider moving to Berlin where one bedroom flats can be obtained for around £30000.00.

A survey about a year ago showed that there were 1,77 million households are on the council accommodation waiting list. Also 77% of young people never expect to own their own property. A recent Department of Communities and Local Government survey showed that homlessness has increased by 10% in the last year.

The question is what is to be done.Firstly a massive council accommodation programme.How about building 400000.00 council properties per year,Ever thought of that one Ed Milliband.The last Labour government virtually stopped building council accomodation.

Secondly reintroduce mortgage tax relief for owner occupiers.

Thirdly we need a new rent act.Offer security of tenure for private tenants.Introduce private rent controls for private landlords.Let rent tribunals set the rents for private landlords.If it works in Germany,France and most states of the United States of  America it can work in this country.

We also need an investigation of why property is so expensive in this country compared to say Germany.We need to move away from a property based economy more to a goods and manufacturing economy like Germany.

Please comments are most welcome this is a very important subject.

 

 

 

 

 

THE GENIUS OF ANTON BRUCKNER

Last night concert at the Barican was a joy to behold.The LSO performance of Anton Bruckners fourth symphony was superb I heard it a few years ago performed by the Bavarian Orchestra. It is pure bliss

Bruckners seventh symphony is without doubt his best.But there is just something about Bruckners symphonies that just lift you up to heaven.I was in a state of total high.

Just why none of Bruckners symphonies are not in the classic FM easter annual top three hundred just amazes me.He is just so fantastic it is unbelievable.

Bless you soul Anton Bruckner where ever you are.I would just love to discuss your music with you in heaven