Reasons *not* to vote conservative today

[RosaMolesworthemburg]

What the tories say and what they really mean

Imogen, I too opposed the Iraq war, and I've been thinking about voting LibDem too, but on balance am sticking with Labour, though with a heavy heart. Just wanted to pick up your point about increasing inequality - what you say is true, but only slightly. The huge increase in inequality in this country was under Thatcher and it's been wobbling up and down ever since. If you haven't read it, I really recommend Wilkinson and Pickett's book on equality - The Spirit Level. I heard Kate Pickett talk at an event recently and I've been evangelical about it ever since. More equal societies do better according to every marker - lower rates of drug addiction, crime, infant mortality, teenage pregnancy. It's not about being richer as a society, it's about having a smaller gap between the richest and the poorest. Voting Tory definitely isn't going to help achieve that.

Imogen - please read the letter Molesworth posted.

If you care about poverty - don't vote Conservative.

The message hasn't been put out there, goodness knows why not, but the poverty gap has been a global thing. We have been running to just ... not go backwards very fast. Britain has done better than other first world countries. It is going to get a lot worse under a Conservaitve government + cutbacks.

no they won't. I don't think the Tories are great, just far better than Labour for all the country's people. In 1997 I voted for Labour, I wanted the Tory rascals out. But having seen what Labour have done to the country, how they fine struggling pensioners because their bin lids aren't closed and don't give a damn about the ordinary people, I think it's time for a change. In 5 years time, it may well be time for another change, but next time it will be for the Liberals. After what Labour have done and how they have let the people down, it will be decades before they ever get back in.

I just don't get that.

The majority of us are now better off, absolutely not relatively. With far better public services - and astonishingly little civil unrest. We are a more tolerant, peacable society than under la Thatch.

The global economic crisis is that - global. And it didn't turn into a recession.

And Britian is equipped for a global market. Not lagging behind, trying to compete at the very bottom. And we no longer sell arms to dodgy countries under the pretense of foreign aid.

It's like a mania - everyone voting for what might happen.

In answer to that, I'd say that labour has done good things (wrt child poverty, wrt equality, wrt minimum wage etc - things that don't get as much publicity as they should, and things which labour themselves have failed to shout loudly about during this campaign). They've also done some awful things. I'm a lifelong labour supporter and even I have struggled to stick with them, so I do totally understand why others don't want to vote for them.

This time my vote is guided much more by not wanting the conservatives in power. It's not that I'm so convinced by labour; it's that I'm 100% convinced that a tory government will be a bad thing for our country.

well done imogengladheart. Great news that the people are out in force, same in my area. Everyone was so happy, there were smiles all around, the queue stretched outside the polling station. Everyone is relieved and knows that it's not long now before Brown and his brigade of brigands and buccaneers will be packing their bags and no one will shed a tear.

sorry, that was in answer to claig's post.

I think the country is crying out for electoral reform and whoever wins must do something to show us that our votes count.

says it all reallymarkgorman.files.wordpress.com/2008/10/cameron-bullingdon-dining-club2_468x420.jpg

I can never understand the Tory argument that inequality is a result of Labour policy, inequality does not suddenly happen but it is a result of social policy and the 80's did a lot to create huge gaps, profound problems which we are still dealing with today
it is never a short term problem

I could never vote Conservative because I was alive during the 1980s.

...and everything else that Molesworth has already said.

I agree Labour have done some good things. It's just that the bad that they have done far outweighs the good. People should worry about what further bad things they will do if they manage to scrape back in. We trusted Blair in 1997, we hoped he was for real. Of course we were disappointed. Now all we can do is hope that Cameron is not like Blair. We can't vote for Labour again after what they have done, we know they hold us in contempt, they think Labour core voters like Mrs. Duffy are bigots, one of their candidates thought that old people were just coffin dodgers. To vote for Labour again would be like turkeys voting for Christmas.

also all this talk of voluntary organisations taking care of all social ill independent from government do people actually understand how voluntary and charitable organisations are funded
do they think of an alternative funding mechanisms?

I confess to being a little lost over the whole economic situation, what state we're in, what this means etc.

So I've done a bit of googling and found this article.

It's cheered me up a bit actually. Although things are by no means rosy, I don't think it sounds quite as bad as some of the scare stories I've been hearing. It actually gives some credence to the governments plans to deal with the deficit.

I hear you Claig, but bringing up bigotgate and 'coffin dodgers' is silly: I could equally mention Philippa Stroud driving the demons out of gay people or any number of tory gaffes!

Hear hear SAF. There's a big, echoing silence about the inheritance tax cut issue. You'd think someone would try to justify it, but perhaps they don't because it's not justifiable?

true the Tories have some nutters. But Labour are the biggest hypocrites, they pretend they care about us, they pretend they are the listening party. To be stabbed in the back by the party that the poor people rely on, to have the leader of that party describe a grandmother, who has worked in the council all her life, and whose union official father was proud to sing the Red Flag, must make all her Labour ancestors turn in their grave. She said she was ashamed to say she was Labour, and she was right, but the current crop of parvenus are nothing to do with Labour. Labour voters are waking up to the painful truth that their party has been hijacked by Mandelson et al., for their own purposes and stuff the people.

Blair was no Labour man, and nor are half of the privileged cabinet, with their private school educated children. They are charlatans who climb to power on the back of the people and then laugh at their voters and call them misguided bigots.

Why give tax breaks to the rich????

Tax the rich fgs- they have enough to go round. They won't struggle.

It's amazing how the rich in this country have the most problem with taxation. Because it goes to those damned poor people!

It's greed - pure and simple.

How does the whole volunteer thing work then ? I am imagining that it will be a case of you do a long days work and then have to go to your local hospital and clean it for free. Because they aren't going to pay cleaners any more and if you don't do it all the poor people will get infections and die. They don't care though because they will be in a lovely clean private hospital. Oh and on your way past the park pick up that dog shit as well and plant a few flowers.

If we ignore history we are are condemned to repeat it. Throughout the twentieth century the Conservative Party opposed every move to improve the conditions of working people. In each case following the implementation of the progressive policy and its popularity the Conservative opposition became support, but the party has never been innovative or pro-active in improving the conditions of the great majority of the British public.

Old Age pensions were introduced by the Liberal Government elected in 1906 and their introduction was delayed by vehement opposition from the Conservatives. The National Health Service thought up by a Liberal and implemented by the 1945 Labour Government was strongly opposed by the Conservative Party. The minimum wage introduced by the 1997 Labour Government was strongly opposed by the Conservatives. There is no reason to think that 'the stupid party' has changed in the twenty first century.
In fact they continue to hate EU social legislation which gives evryone an entitlement to paid leave and protection against being forced to work excessive hours by exploitative employers. As the great Winston Churchill (yes a Tory) said about employment legislation, it's needed to protect good emplyers from bad employers and bad employers from the even worse.

Labour or Lib Dem or Green, - I don't care but please do not vote Conservative for a return to the 1980s!