05/25/2010: "and the responsibility lies with...."

talking online last night, 3 good friends, who are firm labour supporters and open enough to reveal it, told us that they would never vote conservative and denied some of the clear facts, on our previous "new" labour government.

indirect and reactive government are a dangerous mix for any country, this is what we have just got rid of in the UK.

indirect government - is to shift any any blame from the government's door, but allows them to take credit for anything that goes well.
reactive government - is short sighted and lets the country tick along, but does nothing groundbreaking, this type of government is revealed when it needs to show it is working.

examples of this:
The state of the UK's borrowing - the banking world and "global" factors are blamed for a financial crash not seen since before the war, in the great depression of the 20s and 30s
my friends and labour supporters everywhere state that its a "global" problem and that the regulation would have been the same under a conservative government... not true!

the banks in the UK can only operate under UK business laws - prior to a "new" labour government, the laws stated that if a bank was borrowing too much money - to lend to their customers to make more profit on - then the bank of england could step in and stop them borrowing more, until the individual bank could cover its borrowing losses in the event of a crash.
labour and only labour, removed this power from the bank of england, and gave it to the FSA - a new banking body filled with labour people - to give the impression of an independant bank of england whilst maintaining control.
when the bank of england dramatically cut interest rates and kept them down to fight off recession, labour attempted to take credit for it, as they made them "independant"
had the BofE really been independant, it would have curbed bank borrowing years earlier, and provision would have been in place to protect the banking sector... the FSA who had these powers, did precisely nothing.

as the FSA were tied in with labour supporters, it was revealed by those that quit the FSA, that they were put under pressure by the new labour government, not to act or use their powers to step in and prevent bank borrowing from over stretching - as the government had an interest in a booming banking sector for their popularity with voters.

severe flooding in parts of the country
heavy rain of course was the main factor in the disastrous flooding that we have seen in recent years... but why have we had this flooding, in areas quite often that hasnt seen flooding before or flooding but not on this scale?
prior to a "new" labour government, there were strict laws governing the building industry, especially underground.
it defies belief that today, there are now no laws that govern what building developers install underground!

because of the removal of laws and in conjunction with the government allowing rain water and sewerage to go into the same pipework, developers have been fitting smaller storm drains under ground.
an example of this, came far too close to home where i live.
up the road, developers built about 40 flats and a few houses on the fields at the back of us. once put up, they then dug up our street for two weeks to install the drainage for these new builds.
all filled in and road repaired... all was well until a month later, when heavy rains fell.
the result was our street was flooded out, for the first time in more than 30 years!

the developers had put in storm drains half the size of the ones that were in place for our estate when it was built in the 50s - as we live under high hills without trees, they are essential for drainage.

after an outcry locally, they were forced to dig up again and replace the storm drains with the correct size.
they may not have been used often, but when it rains heavily, they are essential to avoid flooding in the area.
who is to blame? the developers for cutting corners with the development? or the government for removing laws allowing them to do this?
the developers can only work under the rules/laws that the government have or have not set in place, so the blame lies with the "new" labour government!

there are endless examples of indirect government from labour - ever wondered why train fares have more than trebled?
those mean and nasty profit making private train companies... or could it be that the train companies are locked into 7 year contracts and now have to pay network rail increased prices for maintainence and lines etc.
network rail is owned by taxpayers like you and me... they used to be called railtrack, owned privately, and their charges for track, stations etc, were locked once a 7 year contract was agreed with the train operators.

the "new" labour government broke it up, renamed it, and put it in taxpayer ownership, then got rid of the fixed fees to train operators, then more than trebled the prices, what do you think the train operators did then?
of course, locked into 7 year contracts, they were forced to increase the prices to customers - the customers (or voters) then blamed the train companies for being greedy... when all the time it was the government behind the scenes, who had caused the increases to come about, to raise more revenue for other schemes they wanted to throw money at!

i was always taught to take responsibility for things i had done...... the outgoing labour government were forced out by the people's votes, otherwise they would never have gone!