The idea behind this blog is to catalogue the unfolding ConDem cuts and their effects on communities across the UK both nationally, regionally, locally and personally. Along the way I’ll no doubt deviate into other areas of policy – Gove’s Education Bill boshed through parliament by way of emergency legislation; Lansley’s scrapping of the PCTs and subsequent railroading of healthcare privatisation with next to no debate nor mention in any manifesto; and the rewriting of our constitution to allow for fixed 5-year terms to name but three that spring to mind. But in the main these pages will be concerned with ConDem cuts.
Without going into the weirdness that was the few days post election 2010, the fact is we now have a government headed up by a Conservative Party that ran for election on a ‘One Nation’ ticket promising a new social democratic conservativism, with the added bonus of no immediate rises in VAT. If only…
Having lived my formative years through the 1980s I’ve witnessed the damage that Thatcherite Tory ideology can inflict on the social fabric of this country. Fast forward and we find ourselves once again faced with a government that seems hell-bent on rolling back the state, reversing the majority role of the public sector, and imposing savage spending cuts across all sectors of our community. No great surprise perhaps, but all the more galling given the colourful make-up of the current coalition administration.
That the LibDems are fully complicit in the current zeitgeist for hard-and-fast spending cuts is a lesson in crass political opportunism – demonstrated by both sides of the coalition. Clegg and his yellow cronies are clearly revelling in their collective political prizes, while Cameron’s manoeuvring to set the administration on a radical right-wing path (in no small part engineered by Hague & Osbourne – and all propped up by a bank of ‘bleating pinko liberals’) is a political coup de grace.
And by the way – I voted LibDem in the last two general elections, this year going so far as to place a billboard outside my house (much to the chagrin of my other half), so my current disquiet with the current political landscape has more to do with the coalition’s failings than any belief in a Labour alternative.
While the budget deficit is obviously a serious problem (albeit one that’s been hugely compounded by the recklessness of the banks and the necessity of the state to intervene in propping up capitalism as we know it), there is a growing media and political consensus that we must completely balance the books by way of savage spending cuts. This consensus needs to be challenged. Sensible cuts are one thing, but the ideological assertion of the private sector over the public sector is quite another.
Finally, ConDemUK is not meant as a vehicle for me to pontificate but rather as a blog to catalogue the key cuts, policies and events as they unfold by way of reference to articles and blogs that I stumble across online and in print. That said, I’m hoping to get a few more regular voices heard along the way, so if you want to get involved email me at dan@condemuk.com
That is all.