Rejecting Buggins' Turn

The British political ‘establishment’ (Lib-Lab-Con) are having a collective nervous breakdown this May bank holiday weekend. Frantic attempts to placate, to say they have listened and heard, follows the United Kingdom Independent Party’s (UKIP) success in last week’s local authority elections. The frenzy is generated by the media, bless them.

It’s probably true that a part of the electorate hanker for a Britain of the 1950s. It is also true that mid-term local elections provide an opportunity for ‘protest’ about government policies. One elderly male who had secured a local council seat asked why he had fought in the WWII and his father before him in the first world war, only to have the country come to ‘this’. 

But what is this ‘this’ about Britain that he wishes to reject? Those who voted for UKIP are characterised by the media as predominantly working class, older and with lower education attainment. The political establishment believe it’s about immigration, and specifically Eastern Europeans making a beeline for the UK. All political parties are falling over themselves to reassure the population that they have plans to fix it.

What about those for who access to higher education and getting on the housing ladder have become impossible? What about those who cannot find jobs to match their educational attainment? What about ordinary households for whom a reasonable level of heating in winter is increasingly becoming a luxury? How about ordinary households who now need to use savings and loans, or borrow from friends and relations to feed their family on a weekly basis?

Talking of ‘protest’, whatever happened to the global ‘Occupy' movement? I hope that, having been shoved off the forecourt of St Paul’s Cathedral, they have become political activists, engaged in rejecting the “Buggins’ Turn” system of British politics: first past the post, two-party system where fudge, mudge, hedge, spin and downright dishonesty is the order of the day. An indicator of rejecting Buggins surfaced in the General Election of 2010 when the parties scrambled to form a coalition government.

Does UKIP's local success herald a major shift in British politics? Yes and No. No it does not in terms of the establishment of a major 4th party; yes it does in terms of disrupting "Buggins' Turn". Let me make a prediction for 2015: No one party will win outright. We can expect yet another coalition. We still do not trust a political system that fiddled expenses on a massive scale and insist on bailing out greed at the expense of ordinary people.

Related Post: Farce, Absurdity and the Three Princes - 12 Dec 2012

Comments

  1. Carole Pluckrose9 May 2013 at 22:10

    Who is Buggins - what is she?

    ReplyDelete
  2. AJ10 May 2013 at 15:49

    Lol Carole ...

    By the way Amari ... Who da heck is she??!!!!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. amariblaize.blogspot.com23 May 2013 at 14:58

      Lol to you too Mya and Carole. There is obviously a hole in your bucket of quintessential British terms, so google it dear liza, dear liza, google it!

      Delete

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