I posted a message in here earlier - has it been removed for a reason?? It was a positive one, nothing shocking in it!

Under the Tories, Britain suffered - Boom and bust economies - Workers legally paid a pittance on just £1.20 an hour - Child poverty doubled - Chronic under investment in our schools and hospitals - 3 million unemployed Hmmmm Under Labour ------------- - Boom and Bust economy - Workers pensions legally plundered - Workers income legally plundered due to abolishion of 10p rate of tax - Highest petrol duty paid at the pump ever No difference. The future for Britain is picking up the pieces of 11 years of economic mismanagement that our the younger generation and their children will have to live with.

It's a shame we are feeling just as disgruntled about this government as the last tory lot. You are correct for highlighting the similarities. Brown and co should feel totally ashamed of themselves. They have no idea how tough the daily standard of living is. I've said it before and I'll say it yet again...Stop spitefully attacking the hard working people. TAX THE RICH and stop wasting taxpayers billions on consultancy fees when common sense is more effective and a lot cheaper. Brown and co. Shape up or ship out! .

Almost eleven years ago the conservative government was overthrown the Labour Party’s victory in the 1997 general election. Man! It felt good to be alive! On the morning of the Friday after the results were declared I remember driving to work filled with euphoria: finally the arrogant, corrupt and incompetent Tories had been ousted and defeated. Labour had achieved a landslide! We put our trust in the new administration and held our breaths expectantly, waiting on tender hooks, for the promised new age of decency and social justice to be ushered in. Yet within a few months it began to go awry. Armed with a stupefying majority of supine, self-satisfied and acquiescent MPs Blair cut the heart out of the Labour party which immediately stopped being socialist: stopped being left wing: stopped being left of centre: stopped being anything at all. Within a mere decade the Labour Party has degenerated to the point where its latest housing minister Caroline Flint can, after a fortnight in her job and doubtless minutes of mature analysis and reflection, float a policy initiative expressly designed to enshrine in law a power to evict unemployed council house tenants from their homes leaving them destitute and starving on the street. This pernicious policy is supposed to encourage a “something for something society” and to “help the unemployed” according to Ms. Flint. Apparently “...council hosing will always remain... as a safety net...". Flint seems to have noticed that unemployment is disproportionately high amongst council tenants, coincidentally often some of the poorest and most disadvantaged people in society, but is seemingly blind to the bald facts that under her successive political masters Blair and Brown homelessness has more than doubled and that one and a half to two million people have been languishing on council house waiting lists semi-permanently for years or that, despite a desperate need for social housing and promises made by her party that much more would be built, New Labour has commissioned the least quantity of social housing since records began. Here are a couple of other facts that Flint seems ignorant of: homelessness was less and social house building more under the conservatives than it has been under New Labour! As a lifetime Labour voter, up to the last general election that is, I find Flint’s proposal as repulsive as it is inhumane but revelatory as per the unimaginative and icy “mind set” New Labour apparatchiks all seem to possess. Moving on consider New Labour’s schools minister Jim Knight? Heard of him? No? Apparently Mr. Knight recently stated that he considers classes of up to SEVENTY children "perfectly acceptable" provided more than one teacher or one teacher and a couple of teaching assistants are present in the room at the same time! Try selling class sizes of SEVENTY to the electorate at the next general election and see whether parents with children being educated in the state system find Mr. Knight’s premise “perfectly acceptable” or not! Armies recruited from the ranks of the ordinary working people and enlightened middle classes of the UK – people who supported the Labour party through thick and thin, financially and otherwise - appalled by what the government has done, is doing, plans to do and has become are walking away from the Labour Party in droves. Yet, as I sit typing these words into my computer’s browser, the saddest event I can remember personally was the premature death of John Smith, a good man and fully paid up member of the human race whose broad intellect and compassionate heart might have made all of our futures a lot brighter and more worthy; everything could have been so different if only Smith had not been lost. In another version of history in which Smith was elected to be Prime Minister of our nation we might have been spared the sleaze, pettiness, nastiness, deceit, delusion, war, injustice and infinite series of crushing disappointments that Blair and Brown inflicted on us, as well as the promotions of amoral characters like Flint and Knight to positions of significance beyond their capabilities.

Under the Tories - Britain suffered - I agree. With Labour, Britain has got better - I disagree. Is crime truly down? Do we record all the drunken behaviour in our towns now, do the figures reflect massively improved security on cars i.e. car thefts harder, do the figures reflect the loss of confidence in the police to the point where we no l;onger report less critical offences. Record numbers of people are in work - yet too many jobs are in a fragile service sector with limited skills/prospects. Kids, especially young men have too few jobs capable of giving them a sense of pride/achievement I could go on but why is it that I suspect everything I am told by labour these days - I feel like the child in "The Emporers new clothes"

Well, now I've heard everything. New Labour seems to be determined to reduce working class council house tenants to the level of medieval serfdom. I speak of Caroline Flynt's audacious plan to throw unemployed men, women and families out of their council houses and only note from council houses if they cannot satisfy the clerks at their local job centre that they are actively seeking work. A simple mistake could see such people evicted and ejected onto the street. Very progressive. What I wanted to hear from her was that Labour would be committing itself to a massive programme of social house building, not that it intended once again to demonise and piliory the poorest and most helpless people in society. And as per usual the whole sorry announcement was wrapped in a cliche: "... something for something society". That a female member of the Labour Party could be capable of devising and arguing the case for so cruel and wicked a policy is extraordinary. I don't believe Flynt is suggesting that this perfidious policy is applied to unemployed people in housing association, privately rented or privately mortgaged homes, in which the occupiers receive housing benefit or help with their mortgage interest payments while unemployed. Her sole focus is on council tenants. I thought Labour stood for fairness and equity. More and more it seems the Labour party stands for nothing anymore, least of all natural justice. All my life I have voted for the Labour party in every election local and general. No more. Now I will be voting for any party other than the Conservatives most likely to keep the Labour candidate out. Shame on all of you Labour MPs for passively supporting your leaders through thick and thin. I would begin polishing up my CV if I were you: in a couple of years most of you, including Ms. Flynt, will certainly be looking for other jobs.

Poor old Caroline Flint. It's Edwina Curry and Ann Widdecome all over again isn't it? - i.e., a case of a minor and almost unnoticeable female politician trying to win herself a higher profile by being controversial. And where are the two aforementioned harpies now? In high office? Globe trotting? Doing good? Saving the world? No. These awful women are reduced to spending their days writing unreadable novels and spasmodically appearing, in bit parts, on shows like Hell's Kitchen, Loose Women and Have I got News For You. Don't worry about Caroline Flint. She's already scotched any nominal chance of significant advancement as a politician by making an exhibition of herself trailing her coat about her desire to throw unemployed and poor out of their homes and on to the street. You must know in your heart this isn't a serious policy that the Labour Party could ever sponsor, it's simply a stupid idea put forward by a very stupid woman in an attempt to court favour with a robotic and cold hearted leader - like a dog begging for scraps from its master. How utterly foolish. You see, in a democracy it isn't the market or politicians that ultimately decide on what is fair but the electorate. It was corruption and a litany of petty cruelty that blighted the Conservatives and doomed them to over a decade in the wilderness. The same thing is now beginning to happen to the whole sorry New Labour project. Still, as they say, "What goes around comes around".

I just can't get over Ms. Flint's proposal. A lot of council house tenants are unemployed so what does New Labour want to do? Provide transport so these people can travel to work affordably? Set up educational and training centres in and around troublesome estates to reskill these unfortunate people? Set up govenment sponsored work programmes, paying idle people real wages to do useful work in and around these decaying areas? Inject the cash necessary ito these communities and housing stock to regenerate the area? No. New Labour's solution: threaten these underdogs with homelessness and destitution if they fail to toe the line. This policy is beneath contempt and should be beneath every decent Member of Parliament's consideration. Shame on Caroline Flint! Shame on Gordon Brown, who MUST have "green lit" this pernicious policy. Shame on the hollow shell that used to be the Labour Party. Shame on you all.

No to long ago I put up on here about Labour stance they have lowered employment, when I look around me I see people who might be working but working at what, I see men and women working at three four jobs and yet earn nothing a pittance. The ONS the Office of National statistics and the unemployment office are so far part in facts somebody is telling fiction. Inactivity means any person below working age who does not have a job, be they to rich, to poor or have saving who for what ever reason cannot claim benefits. Labour changed the rules in 1997 which in one stroke removed 3 million people from the unemployment figures. Now Labour are saying we have less then 1.5 million people unemployed, but what they mean is we have 1.5 million people claiming JSA. now if you lose your job and get a payment for your job loss or have saving or have a family member who works you cannot get benefits, you might register for work as do 4.5 million people but the are not counted, I mean talk about cheating it's scam, 4.5 million people have registered for work but cannot claim benefits, plus the 1.5 million who do claim benefits we have 6 million people unemployed add this to the 10 million people who are sick or disabled and we have 16 million. Labour has spent about 1 billion getting so they say 23,000 people back to work, out of this they say 2,000 disabled people have returned, but I ask would these 2.000 people have returned anyway. I think what we need to know is what are the real facts, here is one for you, Labour says they have 666,000 jobs available in the UK, we all know we have about 1 million immigrants who we are told have come here to work and yet the jobless totals did not move, except the total at the Job center which went from 660,000 down to 360,000, Labour are saying this is not in fact right, I know which I believe because it sound and looks right. Labour has used the figures for unemployment since 1999 it has to have moved even if it's up wards. I think we have had enough lies and targets we need facts and the Truth.

All you say here is true. I would say one thing about immigrant workers however. Often we here things like "A million Poles came to the UK and found jobs, why can't own own unemployed find work." Well, the average age of a Polish imigrant is twenty four years old. These people are, for the most part very physically fit, uncomplaining and exteremly mobile: they travel nomadically to wherever work exists, generally live in poor conditions and work all the hours god sends for a pittance. British men and women in their thirties, forties, fifties and sixties, often with families, are neither mobile nor physically up to hard manual labour these young immigrants undertake. What good is a job picking cabbages in Devon to a fifty five year old female ex-office worker in London with dependents? The majority of Poles also go back home at some point: even they wouldn't put up with the poor conditions they live under in the UK forever. Once they've earned a nest egg they return to their native land. But I would agree with Treborc that the labour and unemployment statistics have been shamelessly distorted. Officially a "full time job" is no longer a five-day forty-hour week but any job that employs someone for 16.5 hours or more per week!

The calibre of ministers and secretaries of state under Gordon Brown fills me with despair. A couple of examples of the "new breed" might be Gordon's old mucker the smiley Ed Balls (Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families)and the mother of his three children partner Yvette Cooper (Housing Minister). Neoptism anybody? When you look at these insubstantial, full-time, professional politicians do they inspire you with trust and confidence? Does Ms. Cooper look like the kind of firebrand that will stand up to Gordon Brown and fight for the monies needed to tackle the housing crises? Does Mr. Balls appear to be the capable character who will sort out once and for all our failing and ailing educational system? Uh-oh! The UK fell from 8th in 2003 to 24th in maths in 2006 and 7th to 17th in reading over the same period - both rankings make the UK's performance average for OECD countries. And Ed Balls is the man to rectify this. I don't think so.

The future of Britain... ... I would expect more erosion of liberties, more political interference in criminal investigations and more ministers refusing to accept that they have done anything wrong (£103,000 anyone?)... All parties become corrupted by being in power for too long. It's time to go.

You're right of course. I reckon that the very best that the Labour party can hope for is a hung parliament after the next general election. But if they lost completely would the "New Conservatives" under David Cameron be any better. I don't think so; not even slightly. There are too many innacuracies and inconsistencies in what they say and how they behave for my liking. For example the Tories have always said that they'd scrap Labour's failing and ailing New Deal programme and use the money saved to boost the poorest and most elderly pensioner's incomes. But recently they've announced a new "forced labour" programme (based on ideas culled from the state of Wisconsin in the USA and Australia, both of which have very low population densities) which they intend to implement that sounds even more of a "dog's dinner" and far more expensive to administer than Labour's tawdry New Deal. Where's the money for that coming from for that? Remember the announcement at the Tory party conference vis-a-vis cutting inheritence tax? This proved inexplicitly popular considering it wouldn't be applicable to 94% of the population and was based on extremely dodgy data and statisics informally gleaned from data accumulated by the Scottish Widows Fund and Life Assurance Society in Edinburgh. Subsequent analyses show that that the Conservatives were wildly incorrect in their massively optimistic calculations and that fewer than 6% of the population would actually benefit from the policy if implemented as it had been stated. Looking abroad for ideas, which both paries are fond of doing seemingly having no original ideas of their own, we observe that in America Bush froze the minimum wage for over nine years, leaving it to wither and die on the vine, bringing misery to the poorest working men and women in that country. Is that the kind of thing we can expect to see under a David Cameron premiership? I think yes. Under a Tory administration will Tax Credits be frozen, cut or completely abolised? May be. Will the old age pensioners lose their free TV licenses and winter fuel payments? Probably not. The greatest thing the Tories have got going for them is that they are NOT the Labour Party who have abandoned and been abandoned by their natural constituency among the working and enlightened middle classes. Labour is stale: the Conservatives half-baked: the Liberal Democrats utterly irrevelant outside of a hung parliament. Does it really matter any more who we vote for or even if we bother to vote at all? Millions of people now believe that it doesn't. How sad.

This Christmas I witnessed the spectacle of a Conservative shadow housing minister voluntarily spending a night on the streets to draw attention to homelessness and general lack of affordable social housing after ten years of government by New Labour. So now the conservatives care more about the underprivileged and the homeless than the Labour party! You couldn’t make it up could you? Under Blair and Brown homelessness has more than doubled while social house building programmes have plummeted to their lowest level since records began; over 96% of first time buyers cannot now mortgage even the cheapest properties in their area. Social house building was higher and homelessness 100% lower under Thatcher and Major than under Blair and Brown! What an absolutely shameful legacy for two “Labour” leaders who pretend to own smatterings of social conscience. Poor old John Prescott (remember him?) toured the radio and television studios before “New Labour” gained power in 1997 boasting that the capital receipts from council house sales would be released to build the “affordable rented accommodation” that was “so desperately needed”. I don’t blame John Prescott for promulgating this out and out lie; I think the poor old duffer really believed that social housing would be near the top of Labour’s agenda once they were returned to power. More than anyone else - even more than the arch and crypto-conservative Blair - I blame Gordon Brown for the woes now suffered by the homeless. After eighteen years of Thatcherism the downtrodden looked to him more than anyone to deliver equity and social justice and instead received only hectoring lectures about “rights and responsibilities” et al. (I bet Brown will be taking this cliché out of mothballs again in the future. Watch out for it! Whenever Gordon traipses out this tired old maxim it is always prelude to some announcement which reduces every citizen’s “rights” and heaps a mass of unjustifiable “responsibilities” on to their bowed but unbroken shoulders.) For example men and women (over the age of sixteen!) now have the responsibility to travel up to three hours to a minimum wage job but have no right to expect to be able to secure a home fit for them to live in. Obviously the poorest in our society cannot and will never be able to mortgage a property and now, because housing benefit has been capped at too low a level to enable those eking out a miserable existence on the minimum wage to meet unregulated market rents, cannot afford to rent a private property, even if awarded extra monies derived from the slew of arcane means tested tax credits and sundry top-ups that are temporarily available. On top of this such unfortunates have virtually no chance of winning a council house or housing association tenancy because such properties are in incredibly short supply and therefore rarely become vacant. Thanks to Gordon Brown the poorest and most helpless men, women and children in our society have been ignored and abandoned as far as housing goes by a political party that was created to stand up for them and take steps to improve their lives. Millions of men and women are now forced to live at home with their parents until their thirties, forties…indefinitely! Three and four generations of the same family are often now forced to live under the same roof. Hundreds of thousands of decent and hard-working families have been reduced to living in one furnished room and sharing a kitchen and bathroom with strangers. No wonder teenagers binge drink and take proscribed drugs: any kind of escape from such a miserable existence must be a temptation under such terrible living conditions even for only a few hours. No wonder crime is escalating: what have people got to lose if they have nothing of value that can be taken away from them? I do not believe not even for one instant that the robotic, pitiless and remote figure of Gordon Brown cares one jot about such suffering but even from an economic standpoint his current housing policy is nonsense. Why? Without a sufficient supply affordable housing for PURCHASE AND RENTAL you end up with an insufficiently mobile workforce. Vacancies will not be promptly filled because men, women and families will be unable to move from one location to another to take up these various positions! What has happened to the Labour Party? How could its elected MPs and activists – the handful that are left that is – have passively stood by while their leaders committed them collectively to policies of such ignorance and systemic wickedness? Food, drink and shelter used to be considered by the Labour Party to be basic human rights both at home and abroad but apparently no longer feature in Gordon Brown’s “vision” of the United Kingdom in the twenty first century. Brown must be looking into the future with his good eye closed: unlike Nelson who did much the same thing on the eve of his greatest battle it is cowardice and not bravery that motivates him to do so.

Long term unemplyed people should not be allowed to vote. That way only the productive people can shape the political landscape. Votes for parties that promise better state hand outs will be avoided thus producing a productibe Britain.

Interesting ideas Simon but not new ones. Nazi Germany implemented many of the policies you advocate and achieved zero unemployment; they also had a few interesting ideas about dealing with foreigners, ethnic and other groups they disapproved of usually involving forced labour and murder. If you think coming on to a forum like this and having a right-wing rant will persuade people to vote Conservative you're even crazier than your semi-literate posts seem to indicate. The Conservatives wouldn't want to be associated with a loony like you in a million years! It's people like you that earned them a bad name! Keep taking the tablets and I hope you get better soon.

Well said sir ,Well said, but do you think this idiot is a Tory more likely BNP.

Yes. You're probably correct Treborc. It never crossed my mind that Simon might be a BNP sympathiser because the BNP never crosses my mind as being a genuine political party with sane, humane and progressive policies. I've never voted for the Conservative but take this opportunity to apologise to them for inadvertently linking them with the aforementioned "goose stepping" character.

Well, things are not looking too good for any of us are they? First, Gordon gets all coy about holding a general election. "Will he, won't he, will he, won't he, won't he join the dance?" Then the Tories announce a planned reduction in inheritance tax, which would only affect 6% of the population in any case, win back some points in the opinion polls on the back of this and Gordon gets cold feet. "I want to show people my vision," he claims. How silly of him to continue to insist that he never seriously considered calling a general election and that the opinion polls played no part in it. Next, within five days of the Tory initiative, Alistair Darling announces that New Labour were going to reduce inheritance tax in a similar fashion to the Conservatives and that his announcement of this policy had nothing to do with the Conservatives but had been planned by him, independently and beforehand. Then the Tories say they're going to get "tough" with the unemployed. So what do New Labour do? - they announce that not only are they going to get "tough" with the unemployed but that they're going to get even tougher with the physically and mentally ill claimants of incapacity benefit as well. (What's with this competition between the parties vying with each other in an effort to be the nastiest and the meanest?) Now we have financial scandals, part of Tony Blair's "legacy", with Gordon seemingly having no idea what to do abouth them. He can't even say if he backs Harriet Harman or wants to sack her because she accepted £5,000 from Abrams. He just stands there like a rabbit in the headlights, frozen and unable to move forwards, backwards or sideways. And now it looks like there may be a housing market crash in the offing with houses potentially losing up to 40% of their value according to some commentators. Gordon Brown seems to me to be a man with his finger off the pulse of the nation: he doesn't seem "connected" with the real world and real people and has to rely on advisors in order to make decisions. The best advice I can give you Gordon is: hire some new advisors. The ones you have at the moment are useless and are leading you up a blind alley. Blair won three election. How awful it must be to be the New Labour leader that seems destined to lead his party out of power. Fancy being New Labour's equivalent to that loser John Major.

God do not tell me you want that squirt Blair back

Good heavens, no! I can't bear Tony Blair or his grasping wife. What I want is for Brown to do what's right rather than what he thinks might win him back a few points in the polls. He's got to stop all these "knee jerk" reactions to Tory spin. He's promised action on housing so let's see some council and housing association houses build. I want to see Brown honouring his promises, not prevaricating in the slimy way Blair used to do. I want to see ACTION from Brown not empty words and I want to see original policies not ones stolen from the Conservatives. It's still not too late, but it isn't looking good for the Labour Party.

The IS no worthwhile future under a Labour government. We are simply doomed, doomed, doomed ...

Is that you Private Fraser?

My pet subject is education. Having been Mrs Angry-with-everything-that-is-wrong-in-the-world and believing that I had all of the answers, but was powerless to do anything about it (hence the anger), I decided to write my theory. I took up my computer and wrote and wrote and wrote. Eighty thousand words later, I realised that I didn’t have the answers at all. However, all was not lost, because the cathartic venting brought me to the firm conclusion that our future was dependent on the quality and appropriateness of mainstream education. I’ve spent the years since, preparing for opportunities that will allow me to be part of the future of education. I now know that children are born with an innate passion to learn; I now know that different types learn in different ways; I now know that current mainstream education is geared to a particular type; I now know that we are failing all of the others; I now know that it's time our education systems evolved. My vision for future education is 1) One that impassions the child; for too many, education has become a chore they’d rather live without - education is a joy, we’re born learning and we continue to do so until we take our last breath. 2) A system that allows the child to learn at their pace; does it really matter that Sonny isn’t reading until he’s nine, ten or eleven? Of course it doesn’t – better nine than not at all! His university place (if that’s what he wants) will still be there for him whether he’s eighteen or twenty-five. 3) A system that is true education; not one that teaches kids how to pass tests, but real, in-depth knowledge that they will understand, that will become part of who they are. 4) A system that will engender true self-esteem and confidence in all of its stakeholders. I believe we have the resources to make the future of education a reality today. Any comments?

I do agree that learning should be at the child's pace and the person who is able to make such judgements to move a child on is a teacher. However, their hands are tied to meeting targets and testing children at 6 years old! Children are making themselves ill because they feel they are failing. Should it not be their progress abd achievemnets no matter how small that we celebrate and make known. As for university places, at the age of 25 university can be very expensive to access, especially once you are in full time employment.

Hi Kim, you’ve hit the nail on the head – we’re reliant on our teachers to create the education system of the future. However, in order to enable them to do that, we have to give them freedom to bring to their profession their passion for teaching. And that means empowering them to do what they were born to do, not what section 5, subsection 25 of the education code tells them to do. Our education system was great during the time at which it was its best. However, we have evolved and in order for it to serve us into the future, so too must our education system. In the short-term this can be achieved at the teacher training stage and/or with coaching sessions for those teachers who have done the rounds and taken a few knocks (that way, their experience will add a greater depth of understanding to the sessions). Either way, we’ve got to become smart at bringing out the best in our teachers, in order for them to bring out the best in our children. Education of the future is empowerment, not instruction.

when i ask my freinds what they think about Britian at the momment they just go on about how bad crime, education, health care and poverty is. then they go about blaiming the government. why is it that we blaim them, when it comes to crime the government spends a lot of money and gives the best protection it can offer, i hate the people that complain about the NHS because unlike other countries we have one, i've always said to these people that if you dont like it save us some money and go private, and then it comes to education well im a 17 year old student and top be honest i've had the best education and i dont mean private schools i've spent all my life in comprehensives and got everything out of it. i think the next step in education should be to make scholls as pupil freindly as possible. in my schools teachers knew every students name and what they liked. in others i know teachers who dont know this basic information. In my opinion the biggest issue is how teenagers are portrayed, people need to stoop blaiming teenagers for every peice of crime i've done a lot of good things for my community and seen a lot of good things done in communitys by other people, but i dont see these in newspapers.

Come back when your fifty and needing to use the NHS, like myself I've lost my legs through MRSA. then come back and tell us what you think.

My fellow members in Keighley tell me - and I agree - that reducing inequalities, global warming and under-achievement in education are each critical to all our futures. Full employment is wonderful and would help marginalised families. But we won't stop hideous inequality unless we find ways of positively motivating under-achievers at school and in the workplace. Strong public services is a meaningless objective. What we need are rising productivities from all public services from improving skills and new technologies. So that good outcomes for users increase faster than budgets. Causes of crime and AS behaviours are rooted in low aspirations and alienation caused by lack of opportunity and self-belief: we must be tough on those causes of crime.

David. Teenage kids are the new scape goat for all societies ill's. When i was a kid under the thatcher years single mothers we're the scape goat for all societies ill's. As for inequality i'm afraid that is a sad part of life and no rantings of social idealist will ever change that. However don't get me wrong always look after and stand up for others and never just except what you are told by the media, politicians, or it would appear scientists. These people who proclaim to have your best interests at heart are just people they live their lives in a self centered manor they will lie to get a round of applause and will not speak against the general consensus (or the general view of the media, government, the public and their own piers) for fear of ridicule. I went to a run down school under the Thatcher years and yet most left with a good education not necessarily with qualifications but a good education all the same. This was not down to the state this was down to the teachers that as much as i hated them as a kid i now realise put their all in to what they we're doing. I've got one piece of advice which is when ever your told something don't take it as fact always look at the other side of the argument and form your own opinion.

Lets see how did that song go. Always look on the brigh side of life. dah deedah

Sadly Britain as we know it has no future... After having recently returned home from my 8 year stay in Italy I am shocked and appalled by the state of this country. I have always gone out of my way to try and understand others and their views and will tolerate anyone who shows me the same respect, I learned to speak fluent Italian which I considered the correct way to go about intergrating into someone elses country remembering that I was after all a guest there. This same courtesy I do not see being expressed in my home town of Birmingham, having realised that in certain areas my presence is simply not welcome. "Strange I'm sure I showered this morning", I ended up thinking to myself as I dared to purchase a lettuce in Sparkhill while various members of so called ethnic minorties wrinkled there noses at me. I have been leered at, followed, insulted (in arabic) called white **** ( may I add wearing nothing by any way revealing generally jumper and jeans and all without ever having exchanged a word with anybody) and made to feel so uncomfortable that I no longer go there. If I really have to, I make sure I only look at the floor. Initially I thought that I might as well go back to a country were I was made to feel welcome but then I was overcome by a feeling of defiance afterall both my grandfathers fought for this country as did their fathers before them. I will not be pushed around in my own home or be told what to think, having two Egyptian stepbrothers I will not be made to generalise about all Muslims either.. I propose that we as a nation start to use some common sense, our welfare system is a safety net and not a bottomless pit, our NHS is what it says on the tin and if we continue to allow people from lawless societies into Britain lets not be surprised when they break the law. If we have to stop and search 400 buddists to justify searching a muslim when fighting islamic terrorism then surely we are wasting valuable rescources. I also object to made to feel dirty for being a free woman born to a free country. Sadly however I feel it is all a little late as we have been censored by pc laws and I can now sit back and watch while any response to this blog starts with the witch hunting word of the 21st centuary... RACIST.

I lived in America for about five years, specifically Phoenix, Arizon and Washington, and believe me living in the UK is like living in Paradise by comparison. The crime, injustice and cruely I witnessed on a daily basis that was, seemingly, invisible to native born Americans made me want to pull my hair out. Elderly women wandering the streets like tramps, pre-teen girls prostituting themselves openly on the streets, murder and rape almost daily occurences... uuuugh!... it makes me shiver even now. I couldn't wait to leave the shores of that awful, superficial, deluded country and return to sanity and civilisation of the UK and Europe. Believe you me this country is light years better to live in that any city in America.

Hi Victoria, and welcome back! I believe we are all on this planet to learn, and I believe that those who have travelled, have a lot of good to share. Travel is one of the best forms of education, as it takes us out of our comfort zone and enables us to learn a little more about ourselves - in effect, it helps us to realise our values. The key point for me in your post was when you stated: "... and will tolerate anyone who shows me the same respect." The key to respect is that we feel as though it is something we need to be given by others. However, the only respect we need is that true respect we have for ourself. When we have complete respect for who we are and what we are doing in life, not only does it strengthen and make clear our sense of self, but also earns us the respect of others (not that we need it, but it's a good feeling all the same). Respect, demanded is: shortlived, shallow and worthless; whereas true self-respect, enables us to be ourselves and live by our values. Disrespect is borne of fear and we must first address our own before looking to help others with theirs. True self-respect, enables us to recognise the disrespect of others as being a reflection of their fears. You are angry about the state of the country, because you care about this wonderful country of ours. There is a future for Britain, a great future for Britain, because of the millions of people who live here and do care.

Pat I agree with you.

I don't see a Britain as we know it for the future. This country has been ruined our customs etc are diminishing. I see a European country with a ethnic majority in about 20-30 years.

Hi Chaps, I've noticed on this forum that there seems to be an inordinate amount of post removals. Yes, even the 'karma yogi in training' has been hit by what appears to be over-zealous censorship. So, my thought is: has anyone thought of creating their own website in order to discuss constructive ways of putting the great back in Britain?

There is compass the Labour party left, then you have a newish site well one which is being done up called RED PEPPER. You have many other sites and blogs all waiting for you. sadly site are OK but you will always get people who will discuss Labour and then see messages removed. Labour are not censoring this site, if you write something another person does not like they remove it. Freedom of speech

Thank you Treborc. Perhaps what is called for is a message to those who feel compelled to remove other people's thoughts and messages: Next time you feel compelled to remove a post, ask yourself this question: what is the post telling you about yourself, that you are too afraid to admit, to yourself? Although you might rationalise that you are protecting others from what you believe is wrong, you are removing something that frightens you - nobody else, just you. When you remove a post, not only are you running away from your fears, but you're also removing the opportunity for others to get something from the post. My advice? Leave them all on. We all write for our own personal reasons, drawn from our own personal life experiences; and we all, every, wonderfully unique, one of us has something to offer.

"To speak his thoughts is every freeman's right, in peace and war, in council and in fight." Homer (The Illiad)

Not on this forum it's not. I think this lot run with the mind set of 'We have made up our minds. Please don't confuse us by telling us the truth'.

It seems to me that some few people we share this forum with seem to want to gag anyone from airing an opinion contrary to their own views. It's a case of "There's a right way of doing things (ours) and a wrong way (everbody elses)". Just because some of us have different ideas doesn't mean we are your enemies. I don't know why so many posts are needlessly removed from this site just because they are critical of aspects of government policy or the actions of some contemporary politicians. Let free speech reign! Let everbody have their say and be listened to! If you think they are wrong offer a counter argument to explain why. Don't keep deleting people's posts. I believe in climate warming other people don't but I would passionately defend the right of those who challenge my views to explain where and why they think I'm wrong: given a good enough argument and sufficient evidence I would change my mind and move over to the other lobby. Unless they are obscene all posts should stand and not be deleted. "Free speech, exercised both individually and through a free press, is a necessity in any country where people are themselves free." Theodore Roosevelt.

You have hit the nail on the head we are becoming less and less free. Every day are rights and liberties are being slowly removed. Not taken in mass no government would dare but just chiseled away at one little piece at a time then it hits you personaly and theres little you can do. The most cunning form of this is 'political correctness' to hold a view or exspress concerns about anything that steps out of the 'party line' will be ignored deleted or will receive cries of prejudice, racist etc.. The truth is people who delete these mesages just can't deal with the truth or realise they have no basis of their own opinion which was not well thought through in the first place it just gets them a round of aplause off their colleges. A great example went to a barbecue raising money for green peace i asked a fair few people how they felt about patric more resigning from green peace as he felt the movement had been hijacked by political movements and politicians (algore) using the whole environmental issue to promote their own political agenda. With out exception i got the response 'Patrick moore the astronomer i didn't know he was a member' on replying 'No Patrick moore an american one of the co founders of green peace back in the 1970' i got the cold shoulder they could not handle the fact they had no idea what they were talking about the only thing they understood was if they held a certain opinion they were part of a social group and this is what is happening in politics and the media.

But the worst of it is you see this kind of exclusion with political leaders, i.e., they surround themselves with toadies and sychophants who will not challenge them when they begin to make bad decisions. This was the undoing both of Blair and Lady Thatcher: no one had the guts to put their hand on their shoulders and say, "May be this isn't such a good idea, Prime Minister." And then we get dire mistakes being made like the Poll Tax and the Iraqi War. Political correctness is another American import like "Trick-Or-Treat", baseball and their daft version of football, which, as far as I can see is synonymous with "censorship". The best illustration of this I can think of comes from a cartoon called "King of the Hill". The main character in this had an absolutely terrible neighbour who had immigrated to the USA from Laos. After an argument, which the neighour started, Frank goes into his house and says to his wife: "I can't stand that guy next door." To which his wife replied: "Don't say that outside the house or they'll think you're a racialist". Frank slumped down into a chair: "So I'm only allowed to dislike white people then!" he shouted to his wife. And it really is getting that daft. An increasing area of discourse is becoming more and more taboo. Race, religion and politics are the three main area where you have to walk over eggshell these days. While I have no wish to deliberately offend or upset anyone I do still want to be able to express my opinion as a free citizen in a nominally democratic country.

Britain has no future when Brown signs the EU constitution sorry treaty.

It's not over until it's over, Daniel! Sadly this kind of anti-democratic behaviour is becoming standard with all political parties. I live in Cornwall where the Liberal Democrat councillors have decided, in collusion with the current government, to abolish all of the district councils in favour of a single unitary authority which they expect to be dominated by... guess who... yes, the Liberal Democrats in perpetuity. Nobody asked the Cornish whether we wanted this or not. In point of fast polls carried out by the district councils, in the face of fierce opposition by Cornwall County Council, showed that 85% of their constituents DID NOT WANT OR SUPPORT the single unitary authority; despite this we're getting one anyway! And now we're seeing the same kind of behaviour, on a grander scale, in respect to Europe! Doesn't anyone believe in democracy any more? What on earth is happening to our nation? Are we living in a democracy? Or an oligarchy?

From my perspective, my idea for Britain of the future is one where all individuals take complete responsibility for their own, wonderfully unique life. We each have so much to offer, but much of what we have is currently hidden from view by our fears and diminished sense of self. It's all well and good complaining about politicians not doing this and that, but at the end of the day, what does complaining achieve? Nothing, nada, a big fat zero. The politicians view the complaints, as being due to the ignorance of the masses, and the person complaining? Well, there is a certain amount of temporary relief from being given the opportunity to vent, but it is only temporary, because the issue remains. Complaints are a negative response to a negative action. The way forward? I think not. The way forward is to provide positive responses to negative actions. You see, the only permanent way of ridding ourselves of frustration, is to work towards finding constructive solutions to the cause of the frustration; it's our problem, don't we owe it to our sense of self to help sort it out? What the way forward needs is: a change in mindset. Now, our immediate response to that might be "But what can I do, I'm only one person in 60 million?" My answer is: we each have only one life to live and that is our own; we cannot expect anyone else to change theirs in order to make ours better. We have to make it better for ourselves and well, if we all do that... The answer is a simple one: instead of complaining, think of the problem as a challenge, one that you really want to find a solution to. All we have to do is believe that we can do some good, that we can make it better; even if it is just a tiny bit better, it's a step in the right direction. That change in mindset not only empowers the individual, but also brings a whole new, positive aspect to the world in which we live. We are each responsible for the life we live; we know it's not going to last for ever, so let's make every day a good one... for all.

Nice sentiments. "I want to change the world... and I'm going to start with me." Well, it's always good for individuals to side with the Angels rather than their opposites but try telling that to some completely powerless individual on the minimum wage who cannot get a mortgage, or rent privately and has no chance of securing the tenancy of a socially provided home. On the other hand, if people acted in the manner stated this shouldn't be a problem because homeowners would take people in and offer them accommodation in THEIR own homes and people with second, third, forth... homes would give them away or at the very least rent them out affordably to the homeless! You're right, but in a Platonic sense: the world we live in is far from ideal. Big issues e.g., climate change, homelessness, criminality etc., have to be addressed collectively and internationally on a governmental level. Politics today (and economics too for that matter) are based on the notion that we are all totally selfish, self-interested individuals who always seek to maximise our benefit at at all costs irrespective of how our actions affect others or the world in general. The classic illustration of this idea is encapsulated in Baroness Thatcher's famous statement: "There is no such thing as society. There are men and women and there are families". You're right and are probably a very nice person but sadly your ideas will not be adopted by many in our fractured and imperfect society.

Hi Derek, your post gave me three options: 1) Do nothing, 2) React badly, due to the point of my post being ignored or 3) React in a respectful manner, by taking responsibility for my own hurt feelings and due to me wanting to take the discussion further. I feel that there is more to be said, so I opt for 3): Yes, I know that we live in an imperfect society. However, I know that we’re only going to make it worse by instilling yet more fear. When we abuse ‘those who have’ or try to guilt them into doing more for the good of the whole, nine times out of ten, they’ll raise their defences; fear instils selfishness. No good done, only more harm. However, if we can stop ranting at others and instead look to ourselves, we’ll see that what we’re trying to guilt others into, is a reflection of what we would like to do ourselves ‘if only we could’. We can! All we have to do is take responsibility for our own wants and stop expecting others to provide them for us. Yes, I know big issues have to be addressed on a collective basis. However, as I hope I’ve illustrated above, just because politics today is selfish, it doesn’t mean we’re going to fix it by complaining about it. We each have the responsibility to keep our government representatives in check and, in order to do that, we have to be better than them; we have to show them by providing constructive and responsible advice. We can’t force any other to change. However, we can change the way we react to their actions and words, thereby affecting a change to the outcome. Taking responsibility is not as you imply, passionless, in fact, it enables the individual to find within themselves their passion; their reason for being and more importantly, it empowers them to live their passion. How? We must first respect our self, only then will we respect others. Only when we take full responsibility for our own life, do we truly begin to live.

You sound like a karma yogi, Pat! Of course it IS much better to light a candle than curse the darkness as I conceeded at the end of my post. All power to you. The British are still a great, compassionate and generous people; what a pity we have no great, compassionate and generous politicians to lead us towards a brighter future.

Ah, but that's the rub: we do have great, compassionate and generous politicians. However, just as we have fears that halt us from being true to ourselves, so too do they. That's why we have to be better than them and offer respectful, constructive advice... it has to be worth a try. As you said, we are truly a great people - we are worth the effort. By the way, having looked it up on Wikipedia, I take being likened to a karma yogi as a major compliment - thank you - you've made my day!

It was SUPPOSED to be a compliment!

Let's get things into perspective. Personally I'm more afraid of the WHOLE WORLD dying from a runaway greenhouse effect than I am of being blown up by terrorists; I'm more fearful of the consequences resulting from America, China, India and the other great polluters than Iraq, Iran or North Korea waging war.

I can tell you some people who will not agree with you, those in the london bombings and those left scared for life or family members who lost somebody.

Derek don't subscribe to the great global warming con.It's all about taxation.All governments want to tax you, infact they want all your money.They look for ways to justify it but the great global warming con is the manna from heaven it's the tax governments have longed for.

But if that's true and climate warming is a lie that would mean that the vast majority of the world's scientists were either mistaken or in collusion with and in the pocket of the politicians. That seems impossible to me. The vast majority of scientists agree about the world's increasing carbon emissions and say that even the best-case scenario puts millions of lives at risk by the end of the twenty first century. The expected 3C rise in global temperatures is within 100 years will lead to a rise in sea levels and increase in desertification that will place 400 million people at the risk of hunger. Parts of Britain will be flooded as the UK comes under coastal attack. Developing countries will be the hardest hit, with ecosystems failing to adapt and between 20 million to 400 million tonnes of cereal production being lost. The temperature rise would be the consequence of carbon dioxide levels of 500 parts per million, roughly double those of the Industrial Revolution. The current carbon dioxide concentration stands at 380 parts per million, already the highest levels likely to have been experienced on Earth for 740,000 years. The polar caps are melting. New Orleans was devastated by a hurricane, which storms are becoming far more frequent in and around the pacific basin. Extreme events, like flooding, droughts and fires are happening with alarming frequency. The great barrier reef is dying because the ocean is warming. Glaciers are retreating... I could go on... and on... and on. As far as I can see the evidence for climate change is incontravertible. To deny it seems, to me, like denying the American moon landings or that the earth is flat: it flies in the face of every scrap of reputable evidence assembled by the cream of this planets science community.

I never said the climate wasn't changing, in fact it is but it's a natural cycle the earth goes through always has done since the earth was born. Why is it heating up well the sun is actually burning hotter now than it has ever done, that’s bound to heat up the globe and nothing can be done about that. Something that is always conveniently sidestepped is that as a result of the sun heating the earth a by-product of this is that carbon emissions go up. In the past, there have been many times when the global mean temperatures were warmer... Global mean temperatures are cyclical with the seasons but also with other normal cycles, as they have been for the entire history of the Earth. Scientific data from ice cores, tree rings and other indicators of global mean temperatures prove this. Human activity has never been the cause of these global temperature swings as the “global warming” advocates claim. If human activity was the cause, where were the cars, the power plants and industries in our historical past? They did not exist. Oceans are also a major source of greenhouse gases, as are trees. Trees and other vegetation take in carbon dioxide and give off other gases such as methane, a major greenhouse gas, and a host of other compounds, many of which are also greenhouse gases. Decaying vegetation also gives off methane gas. Studies of smog in the Los Angeles basin indicate that over 90% of the smog is generated by the vegetation in the area. It is the fluctuations of the Earth’s orbit around the sun, volcanic eruptions, the emission of gases by oceans and trees, all natural occurrences, that cause rises and declines in global mean temperatures, i.e., “global warming” and “global cooling,” not human activity. No government can stop any of this, but it can be used to convince people that they should pay more tax.

1) David have you got a deploma in environmentals? or you a scientist or ar you simply spouting something you heard on panaroma on the BBC? 2) You could be right or the scientists could be right, but what harm is it going to do to cut back on harmfull emitions? Is it so bad that we finally become more aware and conciderate of the environment?

Where did you get your statistics from David? Mine came from our own Royal Society and the IPCC. I remember similar things being said in defense of tobacco and asbestos, i.e., claiming that the cancers that we now KNOW that they cause we due to other factors. As per the past, it is well known that the Earth was much more geologically active: emissions then WERE due to volcanos. Over geologic time the Earth has cooled and vulcanism reduced to a relatively low level. As for trees, yes, they do emit methane but, due to defoliation and deforestation we now have fewer trees to emit methane than at any time in the last several million years, so their contribution should have gone down not up. When you analyse the data there really is only one conclusion: climate change is a reality. Sadly, I do not believe that human being are rational enough or possess enough self control to do anything about it. The pity of it to me is all the beautiful and rare animals that will go extinct before we become extinct ourselves.

Lets say it's natural, so your saying the millions and millions of cars are having no effect, that we had all those coal fired houses in the 1800 right through until the 1980 did not affect our world, all the steel making, all the coal fired power stations made no difference, all the billions of tree cut down is not affecting us. Yes I agree taxation is not the answer because with Labour it's tax and spend culture has failed, but make no mistake the world is changing and in years to come it will change until we have lost it.

No Simon I don’t have a deploma or a diploma. I’m not a scientist. Call me cynical but I’m just not convinced of any of the arguments on global warming which ultimately mean government is going to tax me more and sort it out. Many scientists outside the IPCC criticize what they described as the "arrogance" of the UN body, insisting that the evidence for global warming was still far from certain. Professor Philip Stott, from the University of London, said recent research had damaged the credibility of the IPCC and its climate predictions. "In the last month alone, serious scientific studies have undermined the whole basis of these predictions, with the temperature over the oceans seen as exaggerated by up to 40% and the very relationship between carbon dioxide and temperature questioned." Professor David Unwin, an environmental scientist at Birkbeck College, London said the IPCC was guilty of glossing over many of the uncertainties in climate science. These uncertainties are never really made explicit," he said. "The IPCC will give you error bars but there are huge uncertainties to do with the science that goes into the computer models that predict the future." He said the models had progressively drawn back from the real doomsday scenarios of a few years ago as climate processes had become better understood and incorporated into calculations. "And in my view, and in the view of many other scientists, this refinement has a long way to go." Check out Astrophysicist Nir Shariv he states, according to the IPCC's own findings, man's role is so uncertain that there is a strong possibility that we have been cooling, not warming, the Earth. Unfortunately, our tools are too crude to reveal what man's effect has been in the past, let alone predict how much warming or cooling we might cause in the future. "Solar activity can explain a large part of the 20th-century global warming," he states, particularly because of the evidence that has been accumulating over the past decade of the strong relationship that cosmic- ray flux has on our atmosphere. So much evidence has by now been amassed, in fact, that "it is unlikely that [the solar climate link] does not exist." Even doubling the amount of CO2 by 2100, for example, "will not dramatically increase the global temperature," Dr. Shaviv states. Put another way: "Even if we halved the CO2 output, and the CO2 increase by 2100 would be, say, a 50% increase relative to today instead of a doubled amount, the expected reduction in the rise of global temperature would be less than 0.5C. This is not significant."Does that answer your point Cornelius? Nobody’s picked up on THE SUN’s contribution. What should we do put a big sunshade up? You see at the end of the day something is happening but nobody has come up with a definitive cause.

I'll ask again, because I dont think you answered me! What is the harm in cleaning up the environment, cutting back harmfull emitions and invsting in new forms of fuel? It shouldnt take a global warming scare (whether it be tru or false) to make us want to clean up this world. So whats the harm in doing all this stuff anyway?

There is no harm.

Good to see the message of the con of man made global warming is getting out their. The manor in which the UN, the EU, and our own government have used this to steal our money and promote their own political agenda is disgraceful.

Simon If Cameron hugging some hoodies says it all to you, what exactly does the establishment in the last 10 years under labour, now lets see..early release from prison, toy coppers,losing hardened criminals/murderers ( our own plus the labour imports ), Police on the ground frustrated by the political correct top brass, security tied by human rights act, what does that say Simon ?

Mr. Cameron likes cycling so, after the next general election, he can put Norman Tebbit's advice into practice and "get on his bike and look for a job" because he is never, never going to be Prime Minister. If he stays on in politics, like most of his colleagues, he'll be looking for part-time non-executive directorships et al. So if he continues a pert-time political career he'd best learn to ride a unicycle!