Politics

Stop Worshipping ‘Centrist’ Voters – They Are Responsible For Britain’s Woes

Samuel Hooper8 Comments

Swing Voters - Couch Potato - 2

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First published at the Conservatives for Liberty blog

What exactly constitutes the political centre, anyway? Is it even a real thing? And why are we so in thrall to something so vague and ill-defined?

The political centre ground: people talk about it all the time. It is meant to represent the silent majority, that great conclave of wise and sage-like citizens who – unlike us hotheated partisan folk with our strong beliefs and awkward ideals – remain serenely above the political fray, calmly and methodically weighing competing policies against each another before arriving at their pragmatic, irreproachable voting decision on polling day.

Every British political party leader since Thatcher left office has been in hot pursuit of the political centre ground, happily throwing established party orthodoxy and revolutionary thinking alike out the window, preferring to court the good opinion of people who took a good look at Labour’s managed decline of the 1970s and the Tory individualism of the 1980s, and, Goldilocks-like, decided that they prefer something half way between the two, thank you very much.

But who are these political centrists? Do they actually exist, or are they an artificially created demographic, an amorphous and shifting blob of people whom the pollsters have not yet found a better way to categorise?

It’s a relevant question, because you can be assured that British politics for the next five years – or at least, the narrative around politics constructed by the media – will be all about the political centre, and which party is doing the better job of wooing it approaching the 2020 general election.

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The Great European Migrant Crisis, And The EU’s Failure Of Morality

Samuel Hooper3 Comments

Europe Asylum Immigration Crisis Boats

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It should not have taken images of a drowned three year old boy lying face down in the sand on a Turkish beach for politicians and commentators to finally declare that “something must be done” about Europe’s migration crisis

Shame on us. It should not have taken pictures of Aylan Kurdi‘s lifeless body splashed across the front pages of the world’s newspapers to force the British government into a strategic rethink about how we tackle Europe’s great migration crisis and work with other countries to offer a just and humane response to this ongoing tragedy.

But nobody can say that it has not made a difference. Only yesterday, David Cameron was insisting that nothing “can be achieved simply by taking more and more refugees”, proposing instead to solve the crisis by simply ushering in world peace. Today, the Prime Minister announced that Britain will take thousands more Syrian refugees, insisting “we will do more, we are doing more”. What a fine, principled leader we have, daring to do the moral thing only after being emboldened by shifting public sentiment.

But this dithering in the face of human suffering and clear moral imperative is not new – it has been going on for months and years. Only last month, an Afghan military interpreter who served in Helmand with the Parachute Regiment was executed by the Taliban after being denied refuge by the UK government, despite pleas from senior military figures for the government to remember our moral obligation to our friends in danger overseas.

Prior to his death, the Telegraph reported:

Britain will have “blood on its hands” if Afghan interpreters are killed by the Taliban, the former head of the army has warned. Lord Dannatt said that the nation has a “debt of honour” and a “moral obligation” towards those who served alongside British forces.

It comes amid mounting controversy over the government’s refusal to allow Afghan interpreters to return to Britain, including one who worked as a translator for David Cameron.

Behold the sheer perversity of Britain’s approach to immigration and asylum – two separate issues, but conflated together and both woefully mishandled by successive governments of both parties.

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The EU “Renegotiation” Is An Attempt To Deceive You

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EU Renegotiation - Brexit - European Union

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By Ben Kelly, blogger and editor of The Sceptic Isle.

If you are one of those many people who consider themselves to be a “Eurosceptic” and lean heavily towards the “no” (for “Brexit”) vote yet still believe in the so-called re-negotiation – because “it’s worth a try”, you never know what we might get, we’re in a strong position to win back powers, et cetera – then please stop. Stop wasting time, and wake up.

If you are against our membership of the European Union on principle then the possibility of “winning” some minor cosmetic changes to our relationship should not give you cause for doubt. You need to focus on arguing for secession, now.

The renegotiation is a pretence conducted by avid europhiles with the sole intention of shutting down this debate and sealing the United Kingdom’s fate as a permanent part of the political union, destined for deeper integration. The evidence for this plain to see, and eurosceptic Conservative Party members and MPs should not allow the party leadership to get away with its insultingly transparent charade.

The image being portrayed is that of our government locked in a “renegotiation” with other EU members; with all the arguments, banging on the table and defiance that this entails. Please don’t fall for this, David Cameron is not a born again eurosceptic. None of that is happening, it is all nonsense, complete make believe; at best it is elaborate political theatre.

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Why Can’t We Raise The Quality Of The Debate On Europe?

Samuel Hooper3 Comments

EU UK Britain Flags

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The stakes could not be higher for our country, and yet the debate about Britain’s place in Europe takes place in a febrile atmosphere where blinkered partisanship and confected outrage on social media draws a larger audience than reasoned argument. No wonder we are incapable of disagreeing with honour when it comes to our place in the EU

Why can’t we disagree well on Europe?

That is the question posed by Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury, in a thought-provoking intervention posted at Reimagining Europe, a new Church of England blog examining Britain’s place in Europe and the world from a Christian perspective.

In his piece ‘Learning to disagree well on Europe’, Welby writes:

People will say that we should not take the risk of leaving, others that it is less of a risk than staying. There will be talk of national sovereignty, of national confidence, of repatriation of laws, or being bound by European laws over which we have no control. The only certainty is that there will be much heat, probably slightly less light, but that it is a hugely important decision, with thoughtful and committed people, including Christians, on both sides.

But what about those in the UK for whom our membership, or withdrawal, from the Union, is not a major question, those for whom the needs and responsibilities of each day take precedence, and mention of political debates such as this leave them cold?

[..] How can we revitalise ideas such as sovereignty and subsidiarity – ideals formed out of Christian faith whose political dimensions capture their meaning only in part – and help encourage a clearly values-based approach to Britain’s future relationship with the EU; one that includes, but does not end with, economic and political perspectives?

All worthy questions. And in the spirit of making a constructive response, I would offer two main reasons that the quality of the debate has been – and is likely to remain – so desperately low.

First, the stakes of the debate are so high: we are not talking about tweaks to the tax code or welfare system which can be easily undone by a future administration, this decision will shape the future of our country, and the way in which the whole world responds to the challenges of globalisation. And secondly, the quality of our political discourse in general is driven by the internet and social media, democratising in their way but also a megaphone for those with the loudest and most outrageous opinions to seize control of the narrative.

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The Left Are Weaponising Human Rights In Their Hatred Of The Tories

Samuel Hooper10 Comments

UN Declaration of Human Rights - United Nations

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The United Nations – that bright and unstained beacon of morality in our dark world – is to investigate claims that Britain’s welfare reforms are an infringement on the ‘human rights’ of benefit claimants

By now, we are used to the continual cheapening and debasement of the term ‘human rights’, transformed from the noble assertion that every individual is entitled to live in freedom and security to its new meaning as code word for the petulant, open-ended demand for benefits and services funded by other people.

This much is not new – almost every swivel-eyed anti-austerity protester seems to have a tale about how the Evil Tories are callously and deliberately violating their ‘human right’ to something or other. And as small government conservatives or libertarians we must continue to contest these fatuous claims as best we can. But now, those people who believe that their life circumstances endow them with a government-enforced claim on the wallets of their neighbours without so much as a thank-you have won themselves a new ally: the United Nations.

From the Herald Scotland:

United Nations officials will visit the UK in the next few months to investigate whether Iain Duncan Smith’s welfare reforms have led to “grave or systematic violations” of disabled people’s human rights, the Sunday Herald can reveal.

A formal investigation has already been launched by the UN’s Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. UN investigations are conducted confidentially, but a leading Scottish disability charity has told the Sunday Herald it has been advised a visit by the Special Rapporteur and members of the committee on the rights of persons with disabilities is expected in the “near future”.

The only surprise is that this has not happened sooner, some time in the last parliament. After all, when your existence in a left-wing echo chamber destroys your ability to construct an intellectual argument or engage with those who think differently, the only remaining option is to appeal to outside bodies to bully, shame and intimidate your opponents into reversing course.

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