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I posted an earlier version of this a while back – inspired to do update following THAT discussion about all things ULEZ.
The “manifesto”, in terms of transport, only mentions stopping HS2, but there’s plenty on the usual right-wing obsessions: Brexit, immigration, veterans and climate change. I had another look because I worry about the ongoing decline of the two main political parties.
If the Cons stay wedded to Brexit, then we will go into the next GE with all the widespread impoverishment Brexit has ushered in – not helped by Covid, Putin, etc. People generally vote according to their pockets. I don’t get Labour’s current position on Europe either, but let’s see how that evolves, and even the Cons may also evolve, or even pivot, but time is already running out for them.
Several roads now lead to the horrors of a further lurch to the right in this country. Let’s hope Labour get the GE landslide the polls are predicting – but we’re still at least a year out from the real campaigning beginning.
A cycling angle? With the Reform Party and its ilk, Facebook Steve and Nextdoor Dave attain real political influence. It’s not spelt out in the manifesto, but you can see where this is probably heading and what it is likely to mean for cycling. You can bet that this lot are very much “on the side of hard working drivers” etc.
As you all know, Dave’s going to “sort the traffic” and no doubt show them lazy planners how it’s done: Steve thinks the Council are corrupt, the police blinkered and is, if he can fit it in to his busy schedule he’s going to “teach them Lycra’s a thing or two.” It won’t concern him that his Mondeo is 3 months out of MoT or that Mrs Steve sometimes drives the kids in it uninsured.
As vulnerable road users, vulnerable people, we rely a great deal on the rule of law for protection. The rule of law means that we understand what the laws are, they are in general fair, and how they are applied and to whom is even-handed and consistent.
The fascist position is broadly the opposite – it’s all off-the-cuff to support today’s particular agenda – that’s why the Iain Duncan-Smith “happy to see ULEZ infra vandalised” comment is, as an example, so very worrying. In the Conservatives, here is a party happy to send signals to enable the mob to attack RNLI stations, beat up immigrants, shout at teachers, doctors etc.
This right-wing stuff works by allowing/enabling significant privileged groups to to think of themselves as the downtrodden underdog and here is a way to fight back. The pro Brexit campaign played on people’s ignorance, fears and prejudices exactly as this does.
It’s all about freedom, innit, less regulation, less tax burden, and damn the climate. There’s more polar bears now, so it’s fine. Let’s have open-cast coal mining, lithium mining and fracking. The section on climate change stumbles around like a Friday night drunk, trying to explain he wasn’t being racist to the barman – a denier position emerges, unsurprisingly.
In places, the mask really slips: “We must keep divisive woke ideologies such as Critical Race Theory (CRT) and gender ideology out of the classroom.” – to be honest, I don’t even know what those two are.
The standard enemies are put up – the civil service, the BBC. Amid all the thrust and parry, there’s nothing about making a better, more inclusive and cohesive world to live in; arts, sports and culture don’t feature in this barstool view of the world: a dullard’s grim vision.
Don’t be a member of the wrong sort of minority would be my advice, should any of this come to pass.
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Thanks. Blink, as I did, and
Thanks. Blink, as I did, and you’ll miss it; the story has gone from KOL and has been picked-up by the Daily Mail.
My search on all this below: I haven’t got time to chase down every thread, but the same figure is also claimed for neighbouring East Sussex CC, something to the effect that the Kent £160k includes personalised tuition.
I assume this figure is from the KCC “DoLGE” initiative. I did see that KCC in its official papers is building two special needs schools that were due to open in September ’25 that are delayed 2 years. And that the budget in question is underspent.
https://democracy.kent.gov.uk/documents/s131341/Outturn%20Report%20FINAL.pdf
Gonna say it again – Brexit has made the UK poorer, and here’s the grating sound of that poverty in action.
We’re also OK because we got rid of slavery; not wishing to come over all Guardian reading metropolitan elite or anything, but out of a centuries long history “Prolific c18th slave trading nation takes decades to end the practice and over a century to finish compensating the slave owners out of the public purse” would be a better headline.FTFY
Indeed. At 46 I feel my generation is lost, those that have fallen for right wing populism are gone.I would dispute that, certainly the numbers who have fallen for Reform are depressing but many of those are former Tories anyway who hopefully will split the right wing vote. I’m from the generation above you (56) and I don’t know any friend who has moved to Reform, although admittedly the majority were left-wing to start with. If you look at this month’s voting intentions, 36% of your generation intend voting for the right wing (13% Conservative, 23% Reform) and 58% left/centre (31% Labour, 13% LD, 14% Green), so you’re not lost yet.
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All I can find today on Kent
All I can find today on Kent Online is the far right trying to prioritise stopping the boats over stopping the traffic. How very suburban.
Union Jack dress girl: I
Union Jack dress girl: I think there’s more to come out about what has gone on here. For sure, the grifters have not been slow to try to make both revenue and capital out of it:
The Gofundme seems to have been pretty short-lived. I did catch a guy on a Facebook reel reading out the whole of the letter, second stanza of which was getting into All Lives Matter territory. At a practical level, I’m not sure what the indigenous white pupils are meant to do on a day like this; a bit like bringing in an example of British cuisine.
The rabbit hole also led me to this patch of historical illiteracy and present day confusion – tolerant, pluralistic, etc but you’re doing your darndest to take a wrecking ball to that:
“It doesn’t matter how many polls show the United Kingdom to be one of the most pluralistic, tolerant societies on the planet and far less racist than its European neighbours who somehow still summon the balls to sneer at Britons as bigoted retrogrades to be crushed under their metropolitan heels.”
We’re also OK because we got rid of slavery; not wishing to come over all Guardian reading metropolitan elite or anything, but out of a centuries long history “Prolific c18th slave trading nation takes decades to end the practice” would be a better headline.
https://www.itv.com/news/2020-06-11/what-was-britains-involvement-in-the-slave-trade
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