I am not an underclass

The Old Left hear, “The minimum wage is too low. Raise it with new legislation!”

The New Left hear, “The minimum wage is too low. Raise it by restricting low skilled immigration!”

This is why you hear so much about the problems and so little about the solutions when parties are campaigning. The problem alienates no one whereas the choice of solution may.

I’m the kind of poor Alfred Doolittle warned you about

The Conservatives recently published a cheeky little league table that “ranks constituencies according to the proportion of working-age adults receiving incapacity, lone parent or jobseeker benefit”. One hundred and eight-nine of the 200 seats with highest rates of adults on benefits for being incapacitated, unemployed or single-parents are held by labour, only four by the conservatives. It was accompanied by the Theresa May soundbite I’ve just mentioned. Though the right wing press cheerfully pounced on the idea that Labour was in power thanks to the “Welfare Vote”, actual Conservative statements seem to have left this very carefully unmentioned.

Here’s a tip: if you genuinely think a particular selection of the electorate has control of a particular seat, it might be a good idea to not insult them during the run up to a general election. If not, then you have no right to use the association with them as a smear against your political rivals. This “nod and a wink” politics is extremely annoying. A smear inferred is no less a smear, particularly if not especially, when it’s against you as a person.

If Mr Cameron really believes that there is a “welfare vote”, then how about publicly acknowledging the electoral significance of that section of the British electorate in receipt of State Benefits in a positive way? After the party conference rhetoric where Tories claimed to be the “party of the poor” I’d rather hoped this would be the new direction they were taking but that might be the residual middle-class expectation of fairness showing.

I receive benefits because I can’t work full-time not because I lack the education, intelligence or skills I had when working full-time as a journalist (though sure, the ability to walk and remain upright is pretty much a goner at this stage). I may be overweight and live in social housing but the accent is unmistakeable.

Universal suffrage is a bitch and so am I

SL always says that her “libertarian exception” is compulsory voting. Having grown up in Australia she has decided that it discourages politicians from demonising any particular minority group by making them pay at the ballot box and that it is unfortunate this mechanism isn’t available in the UK. But Britain got rid of Census Suffrage and the property qualification in 1918 for men and 1928 for women, so I’d like to end my post with this timely reminder for Mr Cameron and other politicians of whatever party.

We listen.
We remember.
We vote.