Ok, I finally admit it - I am a left-winger.
If being 'left-wing' means that you find it somewhat hard to take when Network Rail takes billions of pounds of British tax payers money to electrify the line between London and Bristol; makes everyone's lives difficult during the initial work by taking over yards and parking spots for over a year; gives all the lucrative contracts to outsiders; refuses to invest any of its own money into the project for the sake of shareholders; announces that they have run our of money and cannot complete the contract without further public investment, and THEN announce that they are putting up all fairs on all routes by about 3% over inflation and 4% over any ordinary wage increases.
Now I can just hear certain retired ex-pats who have made their fortunes by both hook and crook with the system as it was in times when it could be milked by ordinary people, accusing me of displaying the politics of resentment. Fucking right I am resentful.
There are middle-class people here who can only just afford food for their families, and their future is looking very uncertain.
I cannot actually refer to myself as an ex-pat, for I never was patriotic.
ReplyDeleteNether would I refer to you as practising the "politics of resentment" because it seems to me that your comment is totally justified.
I feel the need to add that the UK by activating Brexit is now in a position of being totally isolated from her former allies and more alone than ever before... an unenviable political position.
Brexit just means we are going to be punished as much as the remaining 27 can without losing money themselves. It will all be ok for exports in a few years if there is any disruption at all. It will be poor people who lose out, as usual.
DeleteTom, I think we need another war. The allied forces can crush the right wing forces of evil. When it's over, the good guys can pool their money to reconstruct those areas of the US, Britain, France, Europe. Then a full middle class economy will grow and flourish and all will be well for a good number of years. Oh, damn, I forgot global warming...
ReplyDeleteI think you may have forgot the last 70/100 years as well, Joanne. Anyway, if Trump last another six months, all your dreams will come true - again.
DeleteIn case anyone thinks that I am truly resentful, I have been kept in gainful employment by multi-billionaires for the last 25 years, and may they not die before I do.
ReplyDeleteI understand fully your point, Tom.
DeleteYet my impression is that 'feeling resentful' brings at the moment more people to the right wing than to the left.
That's because the poor right have been ripped off as much as the poor left.
DeleteI class myself as " middle class" whatever that means
ReplyDeleteI have no spare change at the end of the month
As a nurse you were expected to save for your retirement as well as spending as much as possible for the sake of the economy.
DeleteI wouldn't say that your attitude towards the rail system is left wing; it's every bloody wing!
ReplyDeleteMust rush, I'm needed down pit.
What pit? The one in Cornwall extracting lithium?
DeleteNo, the orchestra pit at the Scala.
DeleteAh, I misread you. I thought you said t' pit.
DeleteGo back over your life time and remind yourself what poverty was. Poverty like that does not exist now.
ReplyDeleteTrue but when the basic form of poverty existed it didn't cost you £200 a week to get to a poorly paid job.
DeleteIt is all relative.
DeleteNo it isn't. Modern forms of poverty are just as real. A higher standard of living means a bigger market that's all.
DeleteI have to own up to being to the right of the soup spoon. I'd better leave it at that or there might be trouble at 'mill.
ReplyDeleteIn many areas so am I.
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