Do we no longer live in a democracy?

[LilyBolero]

The United Kingdom purports to be a democracy. And yet, the people of this country have no say in what happens in this country.

Look at the NHS reforms. Nobody voted for them. Cameron and Lansley KNEW that if they announced what they were planning before the election, they would be roundly beaten. And so they kept it secret. Now, when polls say that 73% of voters oppose the use of private companies in the NHS, and 62% of voters do not trust the Tories on the NHS, when they are opposed by many health organisations (Royal College of GPs, Royal College of Nurses, Royal College of Midwives, Royal College of physiotherapists, and the list goes on and on) - their solution is to shut the door on them, and to exclude them from any further discussions.

How is this democracy? Most people DON'T WANT the reforms. Most medical people DON'T WANT the reforms. Even half the government DON'T WANT the reforms. And yet, because Cameron and Lansley want them, this is what is going to happen. Cameron said 'No more top-down reorganisation of the NHS'.

Then we have Michael Gove imposing his 'ban on termtime holidays'. Is it not up to parents to decide how to bring up their children? Has he forgotten that it is not 'his' country, to rule as he wishes, but all of our country.

Even on the economy, we have no democratic say. At the last election, there were 2 distinct approaches. The Labour way, and the LibDem way was to halve the deficit over 4-5 years. The Conservative way was to cut savagely and to eliminate the deficit in 5 years. Although elections are rarely fought on one issue, I think in the extraordinary situation of 2010, it would be fair to say that the economy was the over-riding issue, and if ever an election was mono-issue, it was that one.

The first solution, of shallower cuts received about 15.4 million votes. The second solution of savage cuts received 10.7 million votes.

So we get the second option.

The Lib Dems campaigned on a ticket of 'pledging to oppose ANY rise in tution fees'. In government, they are trebling the tuition fees.

David Cameron before the election said he 'liked child benefit being a universal benefit'. He said 'I LIKE child benefit, I WOULDN'T CHANGE child benefit'.

Now he is abolishing child benefit for some in an unfair and incompetent slash at families.

They are liars, and buy votes through lies, and then do whatever the hell they want. We should be able to force an election and actually hold politicians to account. We don't live in a democracy, we live in a fascist dictatorship.

We live in a democracy. All parties make claims and promises when campaigning. None can honour those claims and promises 100% when in power. We therefore judge them by their actions rather than their words and, when we next get a chance to make a choice, we express our approval or dissatisfaction at the ballot box. The complication at the moment is that we have a coalition government rather than one party being in sole charge. We also have a global economic crisis meaning that one wrong move or one badly timed statement could bring everything down on our heads

Coalition government means that we can't hold either group to their promises because they are, by definition, having to compromise between two different manifestos. If we hold the LDs to their ridiculous promise of getting rid of student fees Opinion polls are still reasonably in favour of what's happening. The economic situation, I am quite sure, is a lot lot worse than anyone is letting on, even at this late stage of the game. It's also a lot bigger than one government in isolation can influence.

The interesting thing about the university fee pledge is that, they say they cannot honour it because they didn't win the election outright.

But given that the pledge was to 'vote against any rise in tuition fees' - that could ONLY be applicable in the event of them not winning the election outright - because presumably they weren't planning a LibDem government to introduce a rise in tuition fees, and then vote against themselves! So, they were promising to oppose a rise in tuition fees proposed by the government, whoever they were.

They probably shouldn't have made the pledge. But they have made themselves unelectable, and the opinion polls are unforgiving and unrelentingly bad.

And Cogito - I come back to the promises on the NHS. They were promises they NEVER HAD ANY INTENTION of keeping - they were planning the opposite. And therefore it's not just a promise they found themselves unable to keep, it was a downright lie.

So don't vote conservative again... Personally, I'm quite happy with the plans because I happen to think there is a lot wrong with the NHS and I don't think I've been lied to. If other people think they've been lied to then they have the choice, when the next election is due, to vote accordingly. That's democracy.

Well I never have voted Conservative, never will.

I disagree that the democracy comes in 'not voting for them again'. An elected party has a mandate to implement their manifesto. It's not legally binding, but that is the premise of our democracy. It does not have a mandate to do the opposite to what it said in its manifesto.

Exactly Cogito. Lily, I'm a Tory (as you've probably gathered) and yes, I think politicians are economical with the truth to get votes, and I think that Labours expansion of the welfare state to create a client state which would vote for them for fear of their benefits perhaps being cut by a successive govt is one of the nastiest and most cynical pieces of politics I have ever seen.

It makes me sad for our local, excellent LibDem MP when I think what a fuck up Clegg has made for them. He has been serving his constituency well since 1997, and because of something nothing to do with him, he's clearly going to lose his seat at the next election. He has no qualms about voting against the Coalition in Parliament. We will undoubtedly get a Conservative MP next time round. Labour are a joke round here - they sent a teenager to cut her teeth in their last campaign, whose main promise was that she would "move to Cornwall" is she was elected. I know they have to start somewhere, but still....

I shall be voting Green next time. Or spoiling my ballot paper.

scaryteacher I had spotted

"Well I never have voted Conservative, never will."

A lot of people feel the same way and would never vote for a party than the one that they have always voted for. So our democracy is effectively determined by a few floating voters who are willing to change their minds. PR rather than FPTP is held up as being the way to ensure that we get a farer outcome but, as we would end up with eternal coalitions, we would also end up with eternal compromise.

An elected party has a mandate to run the country competently. We can judge them against their manifesto but only a fool would insist they implemented everything to the letter.

1. Nope; they're just riding the Chinese tiger. The Aussie bubble will burst when the tiger bites.

I agree with the first bit (eg they've been buoyed by China's industrialisation) but I'd say they're safe for a while. The thing Australia has on its side is huge amounts of natural resources, including export grade iron ore and coking coal (steel making raw materials). China doesn't have these things. Since China industrialised, there has been a huge structural increase in the amount of steel produced annually- 1mt in 2004, 1.5mt in 2011 despite a global downturn. Even allowing for Asian recessions (which will definitely come) there has been a permanent and structural shift in the demand for steelmaking raw materials because a country with 1 billion people want fridges, cars, sky scrapers, bridges, rail tracks etc. Australia has those materials and China needs them.

Bet they always knew all that red dirt would come in handy one day

id quite happy pouring money into the nhs-because it benefits us all.

why on earth would you not pour cash into something so important?

ive just emailed my tory mp and requested they publish the report, ive also asked for a public consulatation on nhs reforms.

asking isnt getting htough

"A lot of people feel the same way and would never vote for a party than the one that they have always voted for. So our democracy is effectively determined by a few floating voters who are willing to change their minds."

I have voted for 3 different parties. None of those 3 is Conservative. I live in a 3-way marginal, that is very close every election.

I'm not sure democracy is ever that effective as most people are fairly self-interested and their interests are primarily what's in their wallet.

When the economy is buoyant (which is hardly ever due to the government) then the government can do no wrong.

When the economy is in the shit (hardly ever the fault of the government) then the government can do no right.

The government is merely at the mercy of the global economy.

Actually I'm really surprised scaryteacher is trotting out the theory that the reason the Royal Colleges are opposing the reforms is because it will be bad for them. In fact, the 'reforms' are a potential goldmine for doctors. The reason they oppose them is because they are bad for patients.

Before the Royal Colleges came out against the reforms, Cameron was saying that 'the support of these organisations was critical to the success of the reforms'. Now that they actively oppose them, he says they are 'unions acting in the interests of their members'.

But they're not unions.

I get it that a lot of people are worried about the NHS reforms but the government is responsible for a lot more than one topic in isolation. Personally, I was horrified by (amongst other things) the attacks on civil liberties under the last government that weren't in their manifesto i.e. 90 days detention without trial and offensive ideas such as DNA databases and ID cards. However, the system is that we don't vote governments in and out based on isolated bad decisions unless there is a vote of no confidence in parliament.

Yes, RealLife, BUT... there's been an evidence-backed argument doing the rounds that what the Chinese have been doing with Australian natural resources is stockpiling, buying far more than they need for now, and that when they're done, they will suddenly pull the plug.

One can have all the natural resources in the world, but they are useless if there's a glut.

Cogito, I also get that an election isn't fought on one issue alone. But, to know that you are going to do something which would make you unelectable, and to lie and say you will do the opposite, imo, makes you guilty of deception and potentially fraud.

If you don't want to highlight it, don't mention it. Fudge the question. But don't tell a downright lie.

Midnight - are you happy pouring money into Greece without reform? No? That's how I feel about the NHS - in some parts (geriatric care / palliative care for instance) it is not fit for purpose. I ask again, why, for a place the size of the UK, we have the third largest employer on the planet in the NHS. Why do we need something that large and unwieldy? Could it not be done better, more efficiently with people moving between the private/state sectors as necessary?

Ariel - my MP is now Sheryll Murray, was Colin Breed. Yours is evidently Andrew George then.

Lily - going back on a manifesto pledge isn't fraud, and as Cogito has pointed out, trying to balance both the manifesto pledges of the coalition parties is an interesting exercise. As for including Labour MPs in the coalition - I can't think of any of them that I would trust to have there, unless it was Kate Hoey.

See, that's how I feel about the Conservative MPs. And the libDem ones.

The NHS reforms are not 'balancing' two parties' manifestos. Neither said they wanted to do this, the coalition agreement did not talk about it.

scaryteacher Evidently

Cogito, I understand what you are saying about the 90 day detention rule etc. However I think the difference here is that the NHS affects all of us at some point, whereas, for the majority of people in this country, the 90 day detention is something they feel, rightly or wrongly, doesn't affect them as long as they behave themselves. Don't jump on me for that - I said "rightly or wrongly".

The Chinese are stockpiling productive land as well as natural resources. They are buying up vast tracts of Africa. And so are western "democracies", at the same time as pouring food aid into the continent. But that's another thread...

Don they always stockpile to an extent (it's a feature of all commodities- Chinese inventories are always the X factor), but they cant stockpile that much (eg ten years worth or whatever), because the numbers simply don't add up- i.e. mining capacity (which is hugely stretched) less steel made = stockpile.

So prices go down for a bit as they work through the stockpiles and then they go up, and that's what commodity traders play, but structurally, China needs Australian iron ore or they cant make enough steel.

(The Japanese are stockpiling tuna. Planning for a rainy day so that when tuna become extinct sometime soon, they have a vast store they can charge a premium for.)

That's stupid. Tuna is hardly a global necessity. Also, how are they keeping it? The freezer costs must outweigh any premium they may get. I cant imagine it keeps for that long anyway.

You're being unrealistic. Tuna is an endangered species, for which there is huge global demand. Millions of Japanese eat fish every day. The freezer costs will be more than outweighed by the costs they will reap. It's like the race to kill the last dodo in the 17th century.....

Anyway, sorry for hijack.