Below is the text of the latest update on the new petition calling for the Ruling Class to be held accountable.
At the weekend one of the Town councillors and his daughter cleaned up an area where rubbish had been dumped for quite some time at the back of shops on Boothferry Road which edge the Tesco’s car park. The sort of effort that enhances communities but shouldn’t have to be done.
Meanwhile, a radio programme has been broadcast: “Broken Politics, Broken Politicians”.
The focus was on backbench MPs of all parties and the difficulties they face caught between the general population who are increasingly angry and unhappy at life in the UK, and those who have power – the Ruling Class, the people this petition argues need to be held much more accountable to the wider population.
The programme makes shocking listening. There are MPs who have become suicidal because of the pressures they are under. Threats and abuse from members of the public, but also threats and abuse from some of the Whips who are tasked with maintaining party discipline. Some Whips do set out to achieve consensus, but others use methods which amount to bullying and coercion which would not be acceptable in most other workplaces.
The programme says that some Government whips threaten to withdraw funding from MPs unless they vote the way the Government wants. Some MPs say they have changed how they voted to something they didn’t agree with because of fear.
There is a feeling of powerlessness. MPs have lost power, the judiciary has been weakened, and laws to suppress protest are being strengthened. By the Government. The bigger the majority a Government has, the more it can do as it likes.
It was said on the programme that the majority of the UK population need a functioning government that cares what their needs are. MPs interviewed (including from the governing party) said the way things are going we will end up with a body of MPs who are very thick skinned but have no empathy for the difficulties ordinary public is facing.
In the midst of all this, we have the steady stream of crises, scandals and injustice. The latest is the scandal in which patients have died because they were given infected blood bought commercially from the US. This has been denied and covered up since the 1970s. It is not an isolated example. The Post Office scandal where lives have been ruined and innocent people jailed because the Post Office has pushed through prosecutions when it had the evidence, which it covered up, that the people were innocent. The water companies – debt free at privatisation because the taxpayer settled any debts. Now the billions that have been borrowed pretty much matches the billions which have been paid in shareholder dividends, with many powerful foreigners holding the shares, while the infrastructure has been starved of investment so there is widespread wastage due to leaks, sewage in the rivers, and people in Devon are ill because of cattle manure in their tap water.
Setting up this petition risks those who start it, and those who sign, being sidelined, rubbished etc. When our MPs and many local councillors feel as powerless as ordinary citizens, it is time for as many people as possible to gather and hold the ruling class to account – it’s not a one-off process, it is an ongoing battle. Taking the easier and more comfortable option in the end will lead to a much less comfortable and easy life.
Thank you to everyone who has signed so far. Keep talking, keep sharing, keep moaning, keep signing!
The radio programme can be heard here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m001zdf4?partner=uk.co.bbc&origin=share-mobile
The new petition is here: