Socialholic

I have put my head above the parapet on something and it seems from my inbox that I am not alone on it!

Over the past few weeks, a campaign has been running to raise money for the Christmas lights in Exeter City Centre. The main focus of the campaign is to get money out of city centre businesses – and, in particular, the banks.

On Twitter, the City Centre Manger, John Harvey (who, I want to put it on record, I like a lot) has been attacking various targets for not putting money in to the pot.

Due to the deficiencies of Twitter (140 characters and all that), it’s not easy for me to put my point across on this and I feel a bit like I’m talking in soundbites. So I thought a blog might be in order to put some flesh on the bones. So, here we go…

This year, for various reason, there is no money for Christmas lights. Traditionally, this was something paid for out of the Council’s budget and it appears to cost somewhere in excess of £50,000 to put on. The lights are lovely.

Exeter City Council is, at the moment, making some big cuts to services. The pressures are coming at them from all angles – losing money in Icelandic banks, general Government cuts, spending on failed unitary bids and so on. But, at the same time, they are also writing off over £600,000 of unpaid rent and Council Tax. So they are obviously in no position to put their hands in their pockets.

Neither is Devon County Council. They are under pressure too.

So, the campaign is targeting the city centre businesses.

Now, maybe I’m looking at this a bit too simplistically but, if the Councils have no more money, why go after the businesses? Why assume they have money? Or that we are somehow entitled to it? Given how difficult it is to walk through Exeter without getting attacked by dozens of chuggers, it is possibly not surprising that they same tactics are being used now against the city’s businesses.

The level of vitriol being directed to these companies is simply wrong. They have already paid what has been asked of them. They have put in their contribution and now they are under attack.

I also do have a problem with a non-elected, predominantly publicly funded person attacking private companies for not donating money to something – whatever it is. It is their decision and they are not required to donate – respect that and don’t call them out. To read “Unacceptable that other #HighStreet banks haven’t yet come forward to support” on Twitter from the City Centre Manager is, I think, really unacceptable.

It is not right that organisations in Exeter do not feel they can speak out about this for fear of getting cast as the bad guy or somehow mean-spirited. And trust me, from the contacts that I have had that is exactly how they feel. They should feel free to speak and feel free not to contribute without fear of retribution.

I am now going to say something really unpopular but I hope that the illustration I give makes the point:

It is not mean-spirited to say that we have priorities and, when times are hard, maybe a few Christmas lights aren’t that important.

We are in the middle of an economically difficult period – possibly the worst there has ever been – and there is not an awful lot of money floating about. If we cannot afford Christmas lights, it will not kill us to go without them until there is enough money to pay for them. And if we can afford them, in the circumstances, maybe giving the money to one of the many organisations who are facing cuts that protect and support the most vulnerable in society would be a better use of it.

In fact, wouldn’t not having the lights and giving the money to the most vulnerable be in the real spirit of Christmas?

—

This attack on Exeter businesses has been very public so far and, therefore, I think it is only right that this discussion of the counterpoint is in the public domain too. I would welcome your contributions to this – especially from you, John! This is a discussion and I hope that you will take it in the manner in which it is meant. Your right of reply is absolute!

Leaving aside the merits (or demerits in this case) of the AV system as opposed to various other systems that are actually proportional, there is one very simple and entirely undemocratic reason why I will be voting No to AV – I really don’t like racists.  I know that that is entirely unfair of me but at least I am honest enough to stand up, say that I do not like them and that is why I do not want AV.

The way I see it, I have one vote and each racist in the country has one vote.  If I vote for a candidate in one of the ‘normal’ parties that vote is worth one vote.  If my candidate loses, I have to live with that because I understand that elections are a choice and sometimes my candidate will get less votes than someone else who is more popular – as grumpy as it makes me, that’s life.  It’s not a perfect system but it is simple to understand and put into action.

Let’s take another person and give him a fictional name – we’ll call him Mr White.  Mr White is a racist so he wants to vote BNP.  Clearly he’s an idiot but he has a vote and can exercise it.  He has spent ages trying to work out how to draw an X and what their symbol looks like so he can put his X next to the picture of the BNP logo.  He has one vote. Fortunately, there aren’t too many idiots knocking about so the BNP candidate does not win.  Yaay!

Right, so that is how first past the post works.

In AV, Mr White gets an extra vote because the racist parties like the BNP are more likely than any other to come last. It is not the sensible people like you and I who get the extra vote – it’s the hate mongers at the bottom of the pile.  Our candidates, towards the top of the pile, do not get their votes redistributed because our candidates are unlikely to get eliminated. The greatest fallacy of this whole debate is to suggest that votes for the main three parties are going to get redistributed – it will happen so rarely that it is not even worth thinking about.

So, what’s the effect of this?  Simply put, the mainstream parties will have to pander to the likes of the BNP/EDL/National Front and other assorted dross in the hope that they can pick up their second preference vote and I do not like the idea of that.

I can’t put it much clearer than that.  AV supports the views of extremists.  First Past the Post doesn’t.

It’s just that nobody else seems brave enough to point that out!