Public Enemy Number One

-

The public should be aware that a dangerous radical is on the loose in the halls of our government, spouting political propaganda and threatening the stability of our country. This man and his fellow conspirators would have the economy throttled and the wealth of the people sequestered to the party coffers and its benefit. Big state at its most heinous? Stalin's Russia? Orwellian dystopia? Nope, it's the Tories, yet again proving that they really do only care for and consider their own welfare and prosperity: 'The Natural Party of Government™' feeding the Great Lie of equality of opportunity to its electorate: a drip-feed of mendacity so constant - aided by the Tory media - that it has seemed for too long to be the natural narrative of British politics.

Steve Barclay, Health Secretary: for 'tis he pictured and fram-ed, continues to exhibit hubris, effrontery and obnoxiousness in equal measure in his frankly insulting, and I would argue libellous and therefore actionable, pronouncements on current industrial action within the health service. To put things in some sort of monetary perspective, the average ambulance driver in the UK earns around £20k; a paramedic around the mid £30k region after two years, and a nurse averages around £35k, depending on experience and level of skilling. Steve Barclay argues that the current pay demands by these healthcare professionals cannot be met by the government, and that those demands are in fact blackmail, taking the lives of patients hostage in their pursuit.

This from a government minister who earns £155k+ annually, paid for by us. In case you're wondering, that's about the same per day as I used to earn per week as a fully-qualified telecoms engineer: around six-hundred quid. Or just under three-grand a week, or thirteen grand a month: more than an awful lot of people in the UK earn per year. And paid for by us. Public money. Who on earth does this slimeball think he is, to accuse people who actually work hard in the service of the public on a fraction of the pay he is paid, from those self-same public funds? I'd have him strung up by his nadgers, were it up to me. You can invent your own form of medieval punishment for such outrageous crassness...


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Of Feedback & Wobbles

-
Image
Many years ago I came up with an analogy for poorly damped feedback loops. The feedback loop that prompted this frankly tart analogy was indeed a horror. Anyone who remembers shame-faced their first attempts at clutch control resulting in the good old kangaroo launch across the lights only to stall in the middle of the crossroads will have some idea of the kind of data transfer lag involved in said system. The analogy I made was that of a large blancmange. Untouched, a model of stasis and eminently stable and predictable; but prod the bugger and the resultant chaotic behaviour needs a very complex physical model and some very decent computing horsepower to predict its outputs, if at all. The system in question was a large and complex audio-visual display at what eventually became 'The Electric Mountain' in Llanberis. We were ultimately contracted to maintain the thing having been witness to and peripherally involved in its installation. Certainly not involved in its des...
Read more

A Time of Connection

-
Image
I was just reflecting on the vacuum of continuity that's left behind when someone dies: that sudden sense of disjoint, of fracture, in one's personal history that takes one completely by surprise at the oddest moments. These pinch-points in memory can often yield some surprising revelations of fact about periods in one's past. One such occurred to me tonight, tending my rather lazy meal of pizza in its journey from shrink-wrap to mouth via the oven. Al's recent demise still catches me out from time to time: the space he left bounded by forty plus years of friendship. But the thing that struck me tonight was just how much change was happening on a personal and social level in the very early years of our acquaintance. Between moving here from Birmingham in September 1980 and our buying our first proper house eighteen months later, all manner of things occurred that would chart the course of our lives to the present day. At around the time of our meeting Alan & Irene [...
Read more

Sister Ray

-
Image
Ray Keats - aka Ann Key - local artist & family friend, died this morning. She'd been ill for some years, but never let it get in the way of her work or of tending to the massive network of friends, colleagues and fans she had accumulated over the decades. Her house on the High Street of Rachub, just below where we live - a former cockle factory(!) - bought many years ago when she and her late husband Ronald moved here from Manchester to set up home in Yr Achub, is currently still home to her paintings and drawings, and the front window displays her work, including the last drawing she made in hospital, just days before she died. Her good friend Colin has been a diamond in her latter years, looking out for her and just being there when she needed him. She will be much missed by this tiny community of ageing bohemians up here in the hills, but suffice it to say, George, her cat, will be well looked after now she's gone.
Read more