LUCY AND ESTHER TAKE ON THE ELECTION: BRIAN HEATLEY, GREEN PARTY CANDIDATE, RESPONDS TO 'ESTHER AND LUCY TAKE ON THE ELECTION'

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

BRIAN HEATLEY, GREEN PARTY CANDIDATE, RESPONDS TO 'ESTHER AND LUCY TAKE ON THE ELECTION'

This is the text of an email I have received from Brian Heatley. Brian is the Green Party Parliamentary Candidate for South Dorset.

I’ve taken a look at your blog and I found it fascinating. One of the things you quickly discover as a candidate is that people’s views don’t all cluster around the narrow centre as defined by the media, but are much more diverse.

Some of the things you suggest would of course be quite expensive. We have issued a manifesto (you can find it at http://www.greenparty.org.uk/policies.html) where we have not been inclined to use that as an excuse not to do things, but we do propose a hefty programme of taxation to pay for it all. True things like ending Trident will save some money, but that is not enough by itself.

I particularly liked your ideas about public loos (an absolutely basic public service that sadly has declined in recent years), not raising the school leaving age (though there I disagree with my party) and some of your ideas about benefits. We have a radical plan to simplify and reform the benefits system called Citizen’s Income and here is a link to a note about ithttp://policy.greenparty.org.uk/policypointers/ppcitizensincome.pdf . I’d be interested to know what you think.

Brian

Brian Heatley

Green Party parliamentary candidate for South Dorset

2 comments:

Karen Hall said...: Cool to have a comment by Brian - sorry, Mrs Grumpy doesn't "do" politics - but this Manifesto is rather good - and might change her mind.
K; April 21, 2010 at 6:34 PM
Lucy Corrander said...: Hello Karen.

Pleased you have found your way here!

Any thoughts you'd like to leave will be welcomed with interest.

(You don't have to agree with things!); April 22, 2010 at 8:36 AM

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We, in Britain and Ireland, are having an election. We're having two elections; one for the government, one for our local councils.

For much of the time, I'm sitting up in bed, recovering from an operation. For much of the time, my neighbour, Esther, is languishing around the place because she's a general weed and . . . well, I won't bother you with the list of things wrong with her but she's certainly not going out on the campaign trail.

Not that she'd know which one to go on. Nor would I. There isn't a party we identify with. It would be nice to say we agree with a bit of a policy here and a bit from there but we'd be pushed, even to say that.

So . . . as our contribution to the General Election, this is our blog. If we were to write a Manifesto, these are some of the things we would put in it. We haven't done the costings - but neither have the major political parties been able to do theirs properly and it doesn't put them off! At the same time, we know that whoever forms the next government will have to bear in mind that there won't be a lot of money to splash around.

We don't really think, that detailed financing is crucial in an election manifesto either. If I were to ask you "What would you do if you had a million pounds to spare?" and, if you answered seriously, and with thought, I'd learn something of your hopes and dreams. This is what we (Lucy and Esther) need to know of our politicians before before we vote - what are their hopes and dreams for the country? What kind of society would they work towards if they could?

It's become a fashion for politicians to say they are interested in the kind of policies ordinary people would like to have put in place. They are, they say, 'listening to us'. Yet, when they come knocking on our doors, what do we say? We say, "Hello." Not much more than that. We may say we don't like the war in Iraq. We may say we don't like taxes. We may say "Go away!" But that's it. We are taken on the hop. The kettle's boiling, the saucepan's bubbling, the phone's ringing and we are tongue tied.

So we, Lucy and Esther, are using this blog as an opportunity to say something a bit more considered.

We know we aren't representative of the populace as a whole - but who is? We are certainly on the left side of politics but that means different things to different people so be very vague when you try to interpret that. Perhaps just think to yourselves "They definitely aren't right-wing."

Our regular readers will know we use our other blogs for our imaginations. You can't always believe what we say. (Within reason, that is. If there's a picture of a plant, we try to be accurate when we name it. We are out to entertain, not mislead.)

But this blog is different. There are no jokes. We are serious about all the things we suggest. If you decide any of them are a bit odd - it will simply be that you disagree, not that we are trying to pop in something silly.

There are just two more things to say.

1.) Although these elections are particular to our part of the world, please don't think you are excluded from commenting if you are in North America, or India, or France, or anywhere else. Not everything will be of relevance to you where you live but there will be parallels; and, if not parallels, you may have interesting insights to contribute that only an 'outsider' would notice.

2.) As we mentioned before, there are two kinds of election running simultaneously. However, we have a real struggle with the local ones. Newspaper and television journalists, politicians themselves, often use these to measure public opinion about national politics. We don't think this is right.

We hope you enjoy this blog. We look forward to everything you have to say. Don't feel you have to be brief! (But don't feel you have to say anything either!)

Best wishes.

Vote Well!

Lucy Corrander and Esther Montgomery

ESTHER'S BORING GARDEN BLOG

Says it all, really. A boring blog about gardening, housework, politics and poetry; now branching into book reviews!

Esther has a small, rather tatty garden which she pretends is big and elegant; she hardly ever does any housework; her knowledge of poetry is limited and her approach to politics opinionated rather than profound.

Sometimes, people don't realise she is married to a Martian, has children whose ages vary from day to day and once made a brief study of the flora of Pluto.

Never mind. She never claims to be anything other than boring.