By every measurable standard, interest and participation in the established political system is in freefall decline. Political parties of state who, only a generation ago, could boast of membership numbers in the millions, can now barely muster a few hundred thousand between them. The most apparent and immediate effect of this is a funding crisis, with both of the main parties now teetering on the edge of bankruptcy.
But, on the other hand, who needs voluntary donations when you can help yourself to some dollops of tax:
LABOUR wants taxpayers to plug a gaping hole in the party’s finances caused by a collapse in donations after the cash-for-peerages allegations.
Hazel Blears, the party chairman, told The Times yesterday that Labour, as the party of government, should get more public money to support political work.
There, problem solved. Can’t get people to give their money to you voluntarily? Then simply take it from them whether they like it or not. It’s not as if they will object or anything:
“That will mean, hopefully, you don’t have to go out and raise huge sums of money because there will be a level playing field….
“I think that is what the public wants…”
Want it? Why, they are crying our for it, demanding it, begging in the streets for it. In fact, I have no doubt that, within days, an ‘opinion poll’ confirming 100% public support for this measure will be cheerfully announced by every media outlet in the nation.
Ms. Blears will assuredly get her way. After all, we have a political establishment whose main (and perhaps even sole) preoccupation is now its own survival. In truth, it is a rotting carcass rolling around on its death bed gasping for a few more lungfuls of sweet oxygen.
A crisis of funding is easy to solve, if you have political power. A crisis of legitimacy is rather harder.
They do now, to the tune of around 3,000 government employees more than there used to be, telling us all how wonderful are the policies of New Labour, and in persuading Parliament to vote for them.
Do they really need more?
Best regards
It’s amazing what you can get away with once you disarm the general population.
And they got to this point by banning anonymous individual donations and putting barriers in the way of corporate donations, in order to strangle their opponents’ funds – in the name of fairness, of course.
Compare also the UK’s vanishing sperm donors, since the state in its wisdom decided they must be identifiable to any consequent child.
Not that there aren’t a few other wrinkles. You or I can’t spend more than a token sum to support or disparage any candidate or group of candidates within a year before a relevant election (seemingly including in advance of elections whose date isn’t known), without becoming a “controlled third party” who must submit accounts to the Electoral Commission of what’s spent and where it comes from and must adhere to strict spending limits. Trades unions, quite mysteriously, are exempt from this particular provision.
If they must force the taxpayers to “contribute” they can at least have each taxpayer automatically made a peer.
They will not lie gasping for long. If need be they will take the fresh living blood of men and women and inject it into their own veins.
Blears is an alien. It has now been proven.
I am not one for revolutions and violence, but sometimes that creature Blears makes me wish for a row of spikes upon which a certain head should be impaled.
In many ways, the comments of slugs like Blears make me empathise with the Hungarians who are rioting about the recent statements of that country’s hapless Prime Minister.
I think we should have a referendum on the issue – in a modern democracy the governement shouldn’t be able to steam-roller legislation through in the interests only of itself!
http://www.our-say.org
I think you clearly misunderstand the nature of modern democracy then. That is exactly what it is about, offering you largely interchangeable professional politicians who will almost always vote their own institutional interests.
It is indeed the political establishment as a whole – not just the Labour party.
For example the “Conservative” party has finally admitted that it’s membership is in decline (and only 1 in 4 of the members it still has bothered to vote on Mr Cameron’s statement of basic principles).
I doubt there will be much opposition to more taxpayer funding of political parties – after all “short money” is already accepted.
Of course if the public really “wanted this” they would fund political parties without being threatened with prison if they do not.
It is much the same with the B.B.C. – if the public were really in favour of giving it money they would do just that (donate money), rather than have to be threatened.
As for the United States – hardly perfect.
There is taxpayer funding for the disgusting public television and radio (although it is limited) and there is taxpayer funding for election to the office of President (although I believe that George Bush did not accept this money in either 2000 or 2004).
And, of course, there are restrictions on donations to political campaigns (in direct violation of the First Amendment) – restrictions that recently got worse due to the statute put in place by Senator McCain (the mainstream media and academics told him that yet more “campaign finance reform” was a noble thing – so it must be a noble thing).
So, who rules, appears to be a matter of indifference to the majority of people in this country.
Libertarianism, whatever it means, doesn’t even register with most people. The Green
Slime and Looney Left are much more visible. The only people making any political headway are extreme religious groups.
Before this political decline results in disaster, can Libertarians provide a vision of a political future to maintain and enhance that provided by our forefathers?
Perhaps, I’m just another doom and gloom merchant and the Indifference Party is the way to go?
David Roberts
Taxpayers will be delighted to pay for the Labour Party, just as television watchers are said to be thrilled by an increase in the License Fee.
(Link)
Allan, do you really have to post a link that contains a close-up of Tessa Jowell. I’ve just eaten.
The way her department is run, I think it should be renamed The Department of Bread and Circuses.
This is one of the few occasions where I would have thought that a large scale petition might be a very good idea.
Any offers from those more organised than me?
Canker
Maybe we should take a better look at the Thai way of handling things?
There is obviously a decreasing demand for tha Labour and Conservative product,leave it to the markets.
If Blears wants a taxpayer funded job for life,she can get a job with the council.
All organizations, both public and private, have an innate tendency to become engaged with internal needs and internal agenda as opposed to the declared purpose of the groups’ efforts.
Thus, corporations become obsessed with ways of rewarding their officers and internal turf wars, while the design and production of innovative products and services languishes. Unions become so involved in political and other influence wars that the idea of actually representing their members’ interests fades into the background, along with their membership and actual influence on public affairs.
Political parties, often founded by fiery theorists concerned with elemental public questions, such as the emergence of the Republican party in the US during the debate about slavery in the middle 1800’s, for one example, soon become employment agencies for loyalists, consumed with internal maneuvering, losing sight of any principled position in their all important search for political power, money, and security for their functionaries.
Why should there be any surprise at the fact that many people are losing interest in elections, traditional political parties, or, indeed, have become apathetic and disinterested in the whole subject of government, except for those small areas from which they wish to gain some largesse for themselves.
And, honestly, hasn’t that become the very definition of government in the modern paternalistic state? Find the office that caters to your particular set of wants and needs, work your way through the maze of offices and petty desk-sitters, and, if your persistent enough, you will finally have filled out enough forms and kowtowed to enough minor mandarins to get your check, or exemption, or permit, or variance, or whatever it was you thought you needed, until the next time.
And there will always be a next time.
There is now no aspect of human endeavor, no minor or major concern of human existence, no nook, no cranny, no task, no tittle, no jot, from the ridiculous to the sublime, no work of human hands or the human brain which is not monitored, overseen, regulated, permitted, prohibited, and sometimes all of the above.
For every cubby, a resident apparatchik, rubber stamp in hand, ready to ignore and delay as long as possible, sitting at a desk with drawers full to bursting with all the forms no one ever reads or remembers, but which all must be filled out precisely, each i dotted, each t carefully crossed.
Yet, in the midst of all this overwhelming concern, and compassionate involvement, citizen after citizen stifles a yawn, turns away indifferent, rolls their eyes at another speech, tosses down the news of the world to get to the sports page, or the fashion section.
Year after year, the same fretting complaints from the public monitors. Election after election, the same ennui, indifference, momentary fire, like a roman candle that goes pop in the sky and then is gone, and we’re back to the same old grind.
Why? Because people are not stupid. Regardless of what the sneering intelligentsia may say, it’s not that the issues are too complex, but that the situation is simplicity itself, transparent, like glass, about as complex as a child’s crossword puzzle on a restaurant kiddy menu.
We are the people who invented cars. And yet, year after year, the big shots and public officials try to sell us the same old lemon, with bald tires, bad shocks, worn brakes, a dubious odometer, and way too many rust spots filled in with cheap primer and painted over.
We’re not buying it. We’ve already given it a test drive, and it didn’t handle too well, no power, blew out a lot of blue smoke.
No sale.
I have a suggestion about circumventing the spending limits at elections. If you, and your freinds, go down Prontaprint and get those leaflets printed (coincidentally supporting a particular candidate), and stuff them through letter boxes (without, of course, the knowledge of any party official), what can be done about it?
I expect something, but I’d like to know.
So, who rules, appears to be a matter of indifference to the majority of people in this country.
I don’t think it’s indifference. My guess is that alot of people simply feel that they have no influence whatsoever over the movement of politics. Politicians and business do what they want anyway. Perhaps this is the reality and people are waking up to it. Others actively refuse to vote and I believe that these people may be increasing in numbers. Whether this is a temporary reaction to the current state of politics or a deeper sense of disillusionment I do not know.