Current Affairs 2023

[Onelife]

A snippet from this mornings paper.
Apparently Great Ormond street hospital has issued instructions not to call children Girls or Boys.
One must not assume a child's gender.
I'm sure the medical staff will be able to spot the difference.

Great idea…lets just call them all “unisex” then let’s see how people react

Oh! And I want to be known as Keefy, Meghan, Onelife from now on, it brings out the softer side of my personality

[Stephen]

What shade would you like.

[Ray B]

Ignore Megan Onelife, next week heshe will change and want to be called Harry Andrew Camilla Onelife.

[Onelife]

Ignore Megan Onelife, next week heshe will change and want to be called Harry Andrew Camilla Onelife.

You've just made me throw up

[towny44]

What’s happened to this country is that we have a political system not fit for purpose…radical changes are needed if this corrupt political system is ever going to get sorted (even if it is in the short term or until the present system cleans its self-up)

I would start by getting rid of the freeloaders who sit at the top of the pile.

You might need to name names, unless you consider all captains of industry to be worthless freeloeaders.

[Onelife]

What’s happened to this country is that we have a political system not fit for purpose…radical changes are needed if this corrupt political system is ever going to get sorted (even if it is in the short term or until the present system cleans its self-up)

I would start by getting rid of the freeloaders who sit at the top of the pile.

You might need to name names, unless you consider all captains of industry to be worthless freeloeaders.

Most so-called Captains of industry run companies that pay minimum wages to many of their employees, and for this generosity they get awarded titles from the freeloaders who create the social divides that society has now.

[oldbluefox]

I think he means politicians............
For the record I don't agree with titles any more than I agree with bonuses being paid.

[Onelife]

I agree on both counts

[towny44]

I think he means politicians............
For the record I don't agree with titles any more than I agree with bonuses being paid.

I am not unduly bothered about titles, if some people get off on those sort of things then I am happy to let them.
However I agree that company CEO's pay has escalated far too much in recent years, but like PL footballers wages I dont know you can reverse the trend without ruining the sport or the businesses.

[oldbluefox]

I think the awards system has been devalued. Nowadays it seems every Tom, d**k and Harry is a Sir or a Dame for actually doing very little.
As for the Lords, similarly I question the qualifications of those honoured in this way. Nadine Dorries? How many more are there like her? Maybe it is time we scrapped the whole chamber and had a rethink who should really be scrutinising what the government is planning. We could save ourselves a lot of money.

[Onelife]

The way to go Sir Foxy.
………

With regards to being qualified to do the job, this is where our political system fails to deliver on several fronts.

The term “Jack of all trade, masters of none” is perhaps the best way of demonstrating how reshuffles fail to deliver time after time. Being a supposedly good manager does not necessarily equip a person with the expertise or knowledge to perform tasks in fields for which they have no experience... moving ministers from one ministerial position to another in the hope that they will learn on the job is in my opinion why we are constantly failing to achieve political outcomes which stand up to scrutiny. Not wishing to knock Boris but he alone demonstrated how a cabinet should not be formed….jobs for his mates was always going to be a disaster.
Our present political structure just goes round in circles with little or no clear direction. Our political system is broken and the sooner we accept this, the sooner we can change direction with Ministers who are selected by qualification not loyalty.

Love a good rant, me

[towny44]

The alternative to our democratically elected system, Keefie, is a dictatorship, which is fine as long as each individual can chose the dictator which I am sure even you would agree is impractical.
However in mitigation of the current system It is only fair to point out that govt ministers do not need to be experts in the field of their dept, the dept civil servants should provide that expertise, and it is then the task of the minister to steer the dept along the govts chosen path, and to ensure that his experts provide him with the necessary skills and information to avoid any significant road blocks.
Of course where you have a civil servant with opposite views to the govt, then you have the danger of leaks to the sympathetic media, which does not foster confidence and seriously undermines the govt strategy of whichever party is in office.

[Onelife]

In theory that is how it’s supposed to work John, but in reality, our political system is one with a mindset that rarely deviates from the past. The political landscape is still using ideas from the past which in some respects give continuity but fails to tackle the problems. We need a more efficient style of politics, one where we don’t look for excuses but one that acknowledges its problems and accepts that you can’t keep using old style politics if you want a progressive future.
So how do we go about this? This is where it gets complicated, how do you change a political system that uses ideas from the past as its comfort blanket…Difficult!
In the short term but with a view to the future I would like to see the emergence of a new political party, lets call it the coalition party, a party that could foster sound policy making through collective decision making. In time we could do away with the other two main parties along with the Monarchy and move forward in what could be a new political era.

Must dash as I've got to pick my Gee Gees

[oldbluefox]

Sounds fine on paper but in the real world of politics it would never work. Unfortunately idealism and reality are not good bedfellows not sure in these wokey times I am allowed to say that!!)
As for getting rid of the monarchy you know my views on that. President Boris, Truss, Corbyn or even Putin, Trump, doddering Biden or any other corrupt dictators in that position around the world, no thanks. I prefer the stability away from the political arena that the monarchy affords us.
Good luck on the geegees. I think you will have better chances of winning with them.

[Onelife]

Sounds fine on paper but in the real world of politics it would never work. Unfortunately idealism and reality are not good bedfellows not sure in these wokey times I am allowed to say that!!)
As for getting rid of the monarchy you know my views on that. President Boris, Truss, Corbyn or even Putin, Trump, doddering Biden or any other corrupt dictators in that position around the world, no thanks. I prefer the stability away from the political arena that the monarchy affords us.
Good luck on the geegees. I think you will have better chances of winning with them.

This is what we have come to believe but lying on your back thinking of England will make us all impotent.

We live in hope for a good outcome

[Stephen]

News update

Missing prisoner Daniel Khalife arrested by police in Chiswick, west London

[oldbluefox]

Sounds fine on paper but in the real world of politics it would never work. Unfortunately idealism and reality are not good bedfellows not sure in these wokey times I am allowed to say that!!)
As for getting rid of the monarchy you know my views on that. President Boris, Truss, Corbyn or even Putin, Trump, doddering Biden or any other corrupt dictators in that position around the world, no thanks. I prefer the stability away from the political arena that the monarchy affords us.
Good luck on the geegees. I think you will have better chances of winning with them.

This is what we have come to believe but lying on your back thinking of England will make us all impotent.

We live in hope for a good outcome

Nowt wrong with lying on your back thinking of England. Better than lying there dreaming.
If your ideals are so good and work surely most, if not all countries would be adopting them. Can you name me a country where your ideals have been successfully adopted? Merv was asking

[towny44]

If you look at societies throughout history, it is the conflict between the rich and the poor which dominates and dictates their success.
Cruel as it seems in the good old days the death rate of the poorest was very high, which is what kept the poor from reaching a dominant position.
As societies developed they produced a middle class as the brightest of the poor became wealthier. This also restricted the poorist from becoming a dominant force.
The concerning feature of our society at present, is that economic migration is leading to a significant increase in the poorest members of our society, which combined with a more vociferous liberal elite, greedy lawyers and a weak judiciary is pushing our society too far to the left.
Just my opinion of course, but I am becoming more content that at my age I am unlikely to see the major conflicts and reduction in living standards that might ultimately result.

[david63]

I agree with OL about the training, or more to the point lack of training, for MPs which is not helped by the high salary they are paid. To the best of my knowledge there is no other job that you start with no experience and paid over £80k.The first thing that needs to change is that the starting salary for an MP should be nearer to the national average and as they become more proficient then their salary rises and the same with their pension.

Then there is the question of the second chamber. I have no doubt that there needs to be some reform here but I would not want to see the second chamber being elected - this would just end up being more of the same. The current system where the members are peers is in principle sound - the logic being that these people have achieved something in life and have life experiences that they bring to the process. I agree that it is not perfect but then what is?

In the UK the Monarchy has no involvement in the day to day government but what it does provide is continuity. A Monarch sees governments change colour and sees PMs come and go but provides stability. Most, if not all, Prime Ministers have said that they valued their meetings with the late Queen.

As for ministers running a department then yes they do need to have some experience in that area as relying on civil servants for advice can be dangerous if that advice cannot be verified. The problem here is the same as in all other businesses - the "new boy" comes along with the new ideas and the "old hands" say "tried that didn't work last time so won't work this time" resulting in there being no enthusiasm to make it work and on top of that all civil servants have their own agenda - the main one being to keep their job.

How do you go about creating a new style of government? Every time there is a change of either leader or party in government it is heralded as "new". Creating a new party has been tried and failed as it is almost impossible to change the minds of sufficient of the electorate to bring about such a change - remember that there are some areas where voting for a particular political party is the way it has always been (I'm not saying it is right - just how it is). Even if you could create such a party whilst they would have one, or perhaps two, ideas in accord they would almost certainly differ on virtually everything else and you could find yourself in a worse situation than you are in now.

[Onelife]

Sounds fine on paper but in the real world of politics it would never work. Unfortunately idealism and reality are not good bedfellows not sure in these wokey times I am allowed to say that!!)
As for getting rid of the monarchy you know my views on that. President Boris, Truss, Corbyn or even Putin, Trump, doddering Biden or any other corrupt dictators in that position around the world, no thanks. I prefer the stability away from the political arena that the monarchy affords us.
Good luck on the geegees. I think you will have better chances of winning with them.

This is what we have come to believe but lying on your back thinking of England will make us all impotent.

We live in hope for a good outcome

Nowt wrong with lying on your back thinking of England. Better than lying there dreaming.
If your ideals are so good and work surely most, if not all countries would be adopting them. Can you name me a country where your ideals have been successfully adopted? Merv was asking

I should have known when I started writing this morning today wasn’t going to be a good day…I backed four horses with the results as follows…
2nd 10/1
3rd 50/1
2nd 16/1
2nd 28/1
Not bad you may think but I had a fiver win on each of them…and now you want me to reply to Sir Merv …give me a break Foxy, I’m in mourning .

[Ray B]

Interesting about MP really nead to be trained, it reminds me of 'Yes Minster'. Who is running the country,?

[oldbluefox]

I should have known when I started writing this morning today wasn’t going to be a good day…I backed four horses with the results as follows…
2nd 10/1
3rd 50/1
2nd 16/1
2nd 28/1
Not bad you may think but I had a fiver win on each of them…and now you want me to reply to Sir Merv …give me a break Foxy, I’m in mourning .

Not your best day Keefy. I think you'd be best to cut your losses and have an early night.

[Onelife]

Good evening, Foxy…You will be pleased to hear that after having had an early night I woke up this morning with renewed optimism for my new “ideals”.

Therefore, I thought I would start off by answering your Sir Merv‘s question Re:

If your ideals are so good and work surely most, if not all countries would be adopting them. Can you name me a country where your ideals have been successfully adopted? Merv was asking.

To answer that question, one must ask oneself how do we measure success? In times of political crisis coalitions have been successful, whilst accepting in most instances it is a way of holding on to power Re: election shortfalls. There are many countries that have coalitions (in one form or another) and whilst these coalitions may have been be formed out of necessity, my “Ideal” would be that the “Onelife Coalition Party” would be more appealing to the electorate because it comes with a promise that this would be a coalition party formed by a cohort of people with a shared belief that our present political system is not fit for purpose. From this foundation our party philosophy would be one where we stand aside from the present unproductive party bickering to one which the electorate have a restored faith, a faith in knowing that our founding members will be drawn/poached from the most talented, be that from present political parties, advisers, industry, finance etc… all of whom will be willing to pledge allegiance to the true principle of a consensus-based coalition.

The initial funding of our new party will come from philanthropists who like me are so disillusioned with our present political system that they are willing to fund change.

Failing this, donation can be made to the usual address…

www.onelifecruiseappeal.com

Thank you and sleep well

[david63]

That has been tried - it was called the Social Democratic Party and never took off.

[Onelife]

That has been tried - it was called the Social Democratic Party and never took off.

Hi David, how sad it is that we no longer have the calibre of MP such as Shirley Williams, honest principled and without doubt a visionary. If she were here today she would be ashamed at the state of our political system… but not surprised I would suggest as she could see where it was all heading.