Tag: election

Election Talk Again – Who Foots The Bill?

With the country being in disarray and the cost of living crisis being the hot topic of the moment, every politician is being asked how the policies on their manifestoes are going to be funded. Growth seems to be the answer for one or two of the parties, whilst this is a great idea in theory, it is a bit like telling your mortgage provider that your next payments are coming from your imminent lottery win! Good luck with that.

With this in mind, it gave me a chance to regurgitate another one of my older posts. Originally titled, Once Jesters Now Kings, it was my response to a news story of the time commenting on the high salaries of certain BBC presenters and personalities. Reading through the post again, I still believe that the basic premise is relevant and would provide a viable alternative to raise much needed funds for public services…

I’m sure that everyone has noticed the slight kafuffle in the news concerning the salaries of a number of BBC employees. Whilst I agree with what seems to be the overwhelming opinion that these salaries seem to be completely out of step compared to the average wage of your general BBC viewer, especially when it is said viewers that are funding these pay packets, my concern comes from a slightly different direction.

Let’s step back a few years to an age when entertainment came in a slightly more basic format. Back to a time when what was considered to be entertainment was watching someone dressed in bright coloured clothing, perhaps juggling or walking on their hands.  Jesters in favour were rewarded with scraps of food, a place to sleep and maybe the odd coin or two if their antics and stories were funny enough. Jesters, or fools as they were commonly called, were considered to be no more than servants and were treated accordingly.

Fast forward a few hundred years and entertainment and more importantly, entertainers, are now viewed in a completely different light. Some are now the earning elite and command vastly inflated salaries for what appears to be the most perfunctory of roles. Whilst you could argue that newsreaders and the like perform a vital role bringing us the latest news and current affairs, does this really justify six and seven figure salaries. Especially when you consider that the average annual salary in the UK is approximately £26K. Basically, the lowest paid are helping to pay the wages of the top 1% of earners – that sounds fair! To look at it another way, if you were to relieve the top BBC earner of their salary, you would be able to give 440 nurses a £5K per annum pay rise.

And then it dawned on me. There is a solution to this problem. Are these people going to relinquish their salaries and take a huge pay cut? Of course not. Instead, what we should do, is re-categorise everyone’s job based on its usefulness and contribution to the rest of society. For example, jobs such as nurses, police officers, firefighters, teachers etc., would be seen as vital as their contribution is immense. As a result, these jobs would score relatively low. On the other hand, jobs such as actors, film stars, pop musicians, footballers (other sports are currently available) would be scored highly as their contribution to society would be seen to be comparatively low. Should the scoring system not be the other way around, I hear you cry! No, no, no. The reason being, the lower score a job carries, the lower tax that that person has to pay. Conversely, the higher the score, the higher the tax. Imagine an actor earning several millions for making a single movie paying 70 or 80% income tax, or a football player earning £500K per week paying a similar amount. All of a sudden, we would be in a position to lower the tax for everyone employed in one of these more “vital” roles, maybe even to the point that certain roles would actually be tax exempt. Writing off the income tax bill for a nurse is almost the equivalent of awarding them a 25% par rise.

I understand that there would be a huge resistance to such a scheme, but only from those top earners that are in that top 1% category. It would be down to the rest of us to ensure that the scheme was adhered to and people were accountable for what they owed. Incentive schemes could be set up, whereby discounts were applied for people that willingly “gave up” a percentage of their earnings. So, the footballer earning £500K per week could be liable for a £350K income tax bill, or alternatively they could “surrender” £250K of their salary into a government pot that then went to help fund health care, education, the police force etc.

On the other side of the coin, perhaps it would help encourage more people into jobs that were once seen as vocational rather than a career path to higher earnings. Am I being idealistic as well as unrealistic. Probably, but something has to be done to try and address the balance. And when all is said and done, if I were that footballer whose £500K per week was slashed to a mere £250K, could I survive. Possibly. It would be a struggle, but I’d give it a go!!

Election Time Again!

With election time almost upon us again, I thought this would be a relevant time to regurgitate an earlier post. As tactical voting is a hot topic of discussion with many media outlets currently, I thought this issue would be worth re-sharing…

Well, it’s that time again and we are beset with election fever; when I say fever, I mean more of a slight temperature and that scratchy feeling you get in the back of your throat. Now don’t worry, this isn’t going to be some typical rant berating one party in favour of another, but rather my view of the political “scene” as an overview. I know, I know, never discuss religion or politics, but how are we ever going to change things unless we engage in some form of meaningful dialogue.

I was flicking, or should I say, scrolling through some news stories on the internet the other day and saw a headline tearing into a certain soap actress for admitting that she had never voted in an election. The particular site that I was on didn’t seem particularly interested in covering the serious issues of the topic, but instead seemed more interested in the frills and frippery and so concerned itself on whether the actors outfit was de rigueur or not. I realised that the report didn’t give a reason as to why this particular actor hadn’t voted before, but it made me realise that there have been elections where I too have failed to register my mark in the necessary box. Now before you start lambasting me for not upholding my democratic right and pointing out that we have fought for our liberty in order to exercise this right. let me explain. Posed with the question, would you like to be stabbed in the face, or shot in the chest, I sincerely hope that your answer is, none of the above please. At this juncture, I would like to thank and apologise in equal measure to Rufus Hound, as I have stolen/paraphrased this question from some of his material – and damn funny it was too! (his material, not my question)!

The origin of the above material to one side, it does pose a very interesting question and that is, why should we feel compelled to vote, especially if we are left feeling as though we are picking the lesser of two evils (or many evils as is case in many constituencies). Surely this opinion is backed up when you consider just how many, or to put it more accurately, just how few people turn out to the ballot stations come election time. Whilst I don’t recall the exact figure, I believe that less than 40% of the electorate turned out for the last election and even those people couldn’t decide a definite majority. Surely with around a quarter of the electorate forming the “majority”, the result should be deemed null and void. I won’t labour the point (forgive the pun!), as many discussions have been had on this subject, but surely isn’t it time we had a “None of the Above” option on our ballot cards and we can then see what the real majority want. Then and only then can you truly berate myself, aforementioned soap actors and other abstainers for not exercising their constitutional rights.

That’s all well and good, I hear you cry, but what do we do if the none-of-the-above-ers achieve the majority. I should also make the distinction that “none of the above” isn’t the same as “I don’t know”. In my opinion, the “I don’t know” faction are people that the politicians have failed to engage in politics, rather than people that have weighed up all the options and have made a conscious decision that none of the political parties available to them are able to steer the country in the direction that they see fit. In my opinion, if the majority of the electorate tick, “none of the above” on their ballot papers, then the election should be suspended. The main parties involved should be given an opportunity to go away and re-group, even elect a new leader if needs be, within a pre-determined time span. You would hope that any necessary action taken would be driven by the actual numbers counted at the polling stations. If a particular party spectacularly under-performs in certain constituencies, hopefully this will then force them to make the necessary changes in order to win the voters on-side. Who knows, perhaps it will force the main political parties to draw-up manifestoes based on what the electorate wants as opposed to want they think we want to hear.

Idealistic and fanciful – maybe; impractical and unworkable – perhaps, but what’s the alternative, a constant round of being lied to and mis-represented. Surely, isn’t it worth a little bit of extra pain and hard work in order to get a government that is genuinely looking out for the well being of the majority, or in other words, a truer democracy than we have now.

So Brother and Sisters, when election day comes, join with me and demand a better future with a brighter outlook and vote for…….None of the Above!!!