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Why are Remainers so convinced that staying in the European Union is what is best for the UK?

I was going to have a long winded rant about the EU and how much I think it stinks but frankly ex Marines Commando Matt Taylor has said it all before and is pretty much on the mark. Ergo, I’ve recreated the article below and hope he doesn’t mind me “lifting” it wholesale, I am crediting him here after all !!

There’s some offensive language in here but frankly I think it’s needed when referring to the EU and our current state of British Politics, I myself have probably sworn more since June 23rd 2016 than in the rest of my many years on this planet put together. So if offensive language offends you either “suck it up” or read some sort of milquetoast sort of mainly liberal orientated opinion such as right here or even here.

So without further ado, I give you Matt Taylor’s views on remainers and the EU and his answer to “Why are Remainers so convinced that staying in the European Union is what is best for the UK?”:

“Because they think that the world revolves around money, because the burden of dealing with endless growth and inexhaustible labour hasn’t been shared, and because the rich don’t live in the real world.

I wanted to lay off politics and write comedy for a while, but after seeing working class people get slurred for weeks, I feel I have to dip a toe back in.

And honestly, this shit is fucking funny.

You have a bunch of middle and upper class lefties telling 18 million working class people that they should trust the very people that have been fucking ignoring them for twenty five years!

They also seem to be making the argument that a people that spawned one of the largest empires in human history, couldn’t run a piss up in a brewery without the assistance of fucking Belgium!

Aye they did a much better job in the Congo than the British did with Zimbabwe.

They also say that workers rights, women’s rights, and equality and social justice are under threat, like the concepts were invented by the EU.

Sorry lads, but we all went to Secondary School, such shameless attempts to rewrite history both amuse and annoy me.

Go tell that shit to John Locke and the fucking Levellers.

Go tell the likes of Fawcett, Newton, Bacon, Hume and Pankhurst they have the Germans to thank for freedom of expression.

Tell them that the continent that spawned more dictators in the last hundred years than Britain did in a thousand, has the European Commission to thank for democracy.

Tell them that with a straight face while I piss myself laughing.

“And then Hitler, Stalin, Mussolini, Franco, Napoleon, Salazar, Petain, Tito and Vidkun Quisling all held hands and pissed on John Locke’s grave…… finally the tyrant was gone!”

Best of all, none of the Remain voters actually like the EU anyway!

Even the most ardent remain voter starts every argument with “Oh well, of course the EU needs reform…”

So what, is a lack of money and confidence the only good reason for staying in a ridiculous overbearing institution that nobody likes?

And I’ll also say this to start, the economic argument is a long way down the list for many working class people.

There is a great story here around 41:00 minutes in told by the brilliant Niall Ferguson (a staunch Remainer) regarding the matter. He explains how the owner of the largest chain of off-licenses in Wales was introduced to him, told him that Lithuanian and Polish beer is their best seller, and then proceeded to tell him why he was not a Remainer when Ferguson naively assumed he would be.

Why?

Because the working classes accepted a possible economic hit and made the decision anyway. They didn’t care, they said “This may cost us, but do it anyway. We are a proud people and we don’t want to be a federal state in the United States of Europe.”

That should have been the end of the matter.

There are dozens of arguments against the EU that I prefer that don’t revolve around cash, and I can point at the lack of accountability for openers.

The inability of ordinary citizens to indulge in the simple pleasure of going to the town hall and shouting at the twat that lauds it over you.

Nobody gets to shout at Jean Claude Juncker do they?

And remember that hilarious time when the EU’s top court backed the European Commission and boosted pay for EU staff by 3.7%, instead of the smaller increase that the member states wanted?

“Judges ruling on their own pay rise in one of the most obscene displays of judicial misconduct in human history? Endless hilarity Mr Verhofstadt!”

What about the top-down nature of the European Commission, the draconian censorship laws, the continuing taxation without proper representation, the ridiculous overbearing laws that reek of old-school communism from the Eastern Bloc.

And don’t even start me on internet freedom and Articles 11 and 13 or the European Court of Justice.

I could go on all day, but as every Remainer answer seems to concentrate purely on coin, I shall address that issue thoroughly now.

If you live in a house you don’t own, work for someone else, have ever needed to use state-funded services, or even just worried about paying a bill… ask yourself this one question.

Do you benefit from an endless supply of cheap labor?

Look at the “top answer” in here, what is he, a Ph.D from Cambridge? (he’s referring to someone who answered in the original thread on Quora).

Yeah cheers mate.

Oxbridge types with expensive degrees, MPs, the heads of giant conglomerates, BBC writers and Guardian journalists, I’m sure they all had a mega hard time competing with Romanian laborers and Polish bricklayers when the EU collapsed 28 borders and 5 million people moved to the UK.

“Hey we had to compete with the working classes of Eastern Europe to get on a train once, its basically the same as living in a sink estate in Hull!”

Yes, I bet John Snow suffered through an ordeal trying to get a council house.

The well off probably struggled to find a place at a shite state school for their kids.

And I bet they have an absolute nightmare seeing a doctor or a dentist.

While my dad was sitting in a packed waiting room with 30 foreigners waiting 4 hours for an appointment, I’m sure he was thinking “I pity the middle-class Guardian readers that use BUPA!”

The wealthy have a hard time too. That’s why they all say “Pah, just educate yourself and be a better job candidate you loser.”

I don’t think we have to cede the economic argument by the way, there are several groups of wealthy educated types that do make a good case for leaving the EU, but they are much more rare.

Not because it’s a tough argument, but because integrity is rare.

The elites are purely motivated by self interest. Look at the middle-classes in the likes of London and Manchester. They want to keep house prices nice and high, so they can rent them out for extortionate rates while they go backpacking in Asia for a “year out” with Tarquin.

They want to keep importing third-world labour so they can pay Polish blokes under the table at their businesses, keep rents high, and keep feathering their nests.

The rich, the middle and upper-classes, the MPs and the like, they all want to stay in the EU because they know which side their bread is buttered.

Most amusingly of all, despite the fact that the overwhelming majority of billionaires, millionaires, oligarchs, Brussels elites, bankers, big corporations and hedge fund managers are all pro EU (obviously) they point at the tiny fraction of wealthy Leave supporters like Dyson and Jacob Rees Mogg and say “Look! The rich want to leave Europe!”

“Quick get a picture, its one of those rare-as-rocking-horse-shit elites that supports leaving the EU!”

I didn’t actually vote for Brexit, but the last few years have swayed me because frankly, they insult my intelligence. How stupid do they think we are?

They insult our intelligence, their betters.

And we are their betters.

Do you think someone is a bastion of morality because they can get themselves elected to high office or build a global company?

It is the exact opposite.

“To summarize the summary of a summary, I wouldn’t believe an MP’s radio!”

The people, the producers, the working classes, are both the backbone and the moral compass of Britain.

We care about hearth and home, about family and friendship and community.

The elites care only for coin.

And when a rare wealthy man of integrity stands up and points out that rent would be lower and wages would be higher if we had a sensible, managed process for immigration, they fall back to “racism and xenophobia”

Here! In one of the most friendly, welcoming, and least racist nations in Europe.

We, the backbone of Britain are being slandered by the elites because of their own shortsightedness and greed. We aren’t prejudiced, we simply know a broken system when we see it.

The EU has fucked Europe. The outsourcing of labour in pursuit of endless growth with no thought for tomorrow has totally fucked both Europe and the world.

Just to build their own wealth, they fuck the working poor. Brussels has strip-mined labour from economically struggling parts of the world, taking all of their young go-getters and thus, keeping poor nations in the doldrums perennially.

This is why they are pissed off in both Britain and France.

The French are even more Eurosceptic than the British are, why do you think they let us vote on the matter? Entirely because Cameron and our lot were all absolutely convinced we would vote to Remain!

Emmanuel Macron: French would ‘probably’ vote to leave EU

French are ‘even more anti-EU than the Brits’

French and Greeks like the EU even less than Brits

The big worry in Berlin is now France and its Eurosceptic voters | Hans Kundnani

France is more euro-sceptic than Britain, survey shows

Citi says the majority of French voters want a ‘Frexit’ referendum

Do you think Paris has been on fire for 6 months because France is a nation of pyromaniacs?

“I am so ‘appy they won’t let us vote for Frexit, I ave been setting Fiat Punto’s on fire every weekend for six months!”

The jig is up folks. Working peasants are much more sensible than the elites think they are. This is why so many of them think that the sun needs to set on the “Empire of the Good” that the European Commission is so desperate to build.

“Not scary at all.. I would trust this creepy MP with my life old chap!”

The elites in the likes of Britain, Germany, and France will do everything they can to stop Brexit, Frexit, and any other mechanism that the working people of Europe may use to return power to the democratically elected leaders of Europe.

We must continue to fight them, and our friends in Europe (the citizenry, not the Commission) will thank us for it come the end.

We will ensure the people of Europe remain free.

I’ll leave you with a nice quote from Mr Verhofstadt, who did a better job of talking me into leaving the EU in 30 seconds here than anything Farage has ever said!”

Steve with much thanks to Matt Taylor, a man who I don’t know from Adam but hell he says what I wanted to say.

Is it time for our next Prime Minister’s “Churchill moment”?

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So here we are, the 22nd of July 2019, the day before we know who our new Prime Minister is to be here in Great Britain. It is pretty clear that this will be Boris Johnson (if it’s Jeremy Hunt then there will have been some major league “stitch up” occurred). Let’s face it, bookmakers are usually “right” about such things and as of 10.00 GMT 22/07/2019 the odds on Boris winning are 1.01 and on Jeremy Hunt 65 (if you’re not familiar with “decimal odds” basically the lower the number, eg closer to “1” the more likely to “win”), the gap between 1.01 and 65 is “pretty damn big”. However, if you stick a tenner on Jeremy Hunt and he wins you’d make a lot of profit and yes I put money on Boris, long before the odds went down to 1.01 as they are now.

Alas United Kingdom is a divided nation as far as the populace is concerned now, with the populace and our politicians arguing (still) over “Brexit”. Without trying to make too many generalisations (but it holds roughly “true”) on the remain side we have remainers, people who voted remain (fair play to them to be fair, we had a vote and whilst many are displeased with the result they accept it, they understand the concept of “vox populi” and respect the majority vote of 2016’s referendum). Then we have leavers (who arguably have “right” on their side as no matter how you slice and dice it 52% > 48% and a majority ruling for “leave”). Then we come to the “discontented”, the so called “remoaners” who are doing everything they can to BACK the status quo and force the United Kingdom to remain in the European Union (hereafter referred to as the EU).

Of course the most vocal remoaners of all are mostly Members Of Parliament, which of course where most of the attempts to block our EU departure happen, which is understandable and has come about due to the efforts of Gina Miller who took the United Kingdom Government court to ensure a “meaningful vote” was held on our EU departure terms. Gina Miller did this because she knew it would obfuscate the process and keep us tied to the EU in the process, presumably in the hope the government would just “give up” concluding it was easier to just remain an EU member? Ironically though Gina Miller did leave a favour because the “deal” our Prime Minister came back from Brussels (the so called Withdrawal Agreement Bill) was truly atrocious, more of a surrender to the EU and not much of a so called “deal” to be seen. Our MPs rightly rejected it three times in Parliament, so they’re not totally incompetent.

We’ve gone beyond what MPs want now though. No matter how you present the numbers the aforementioned 52% in favour of leave is still greater than 48% to remain. The arguing has to stop, the so called remoaners are tearing the United Kingdom apart with the constant battles to halt our withdrawal from the EU, especially the remoaners in the Houses Of Parliament, people like David Gauke, Keir Starmer and Philip Hammond to name but a few. I understand and respect Parliamentary sovereignty, HOWEVER, we had a referendum and the majority said “leave”, there was no mention of a “deal”, no mention of single markets, customs unions or anything else. We were asked “leave or remain” and the majority said “leave”. After 3 years of obfuscation, delaying tactics, sheer “bloody mindedness” and remoaner based manipulation it’s time to “bite the bullet” and leave.

Boris Johnson needs to address exactly that spirit, quickly and affirmatively. Clearly it’s no longer the 1930s or 1940s but what we need is more “Churchill spirit” and a lot less “Chamberlain meh but spirit” now. Leaving with “no deal” isn’t going to be easy, but it’s clear the EU is unlikely to offer us a real “deal” as oppose to Theresa May’s surrender and the leave date being 31st of October 2019 is far too close for anything to actually change anyway (I mean come on, it’s taken Conservatives a month just to decide who’s going to be the next Prime Minister, so set up a trade agreement in 3 months? Good luck with that idea). It’s time for a “Churchill moment”, let’s just hope Boris can deliver one. Boris himself knows this, hence this Daily Telegraph article. I know my support accounts for “diddley squat” in the greater scheme of things but I’m behind him and wish for his success.

Steve

The 23rd of June and the betrayal of the British people.

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So here we are, the 23rd of June. Memorable for certain reasons, firstly for “hell I was basting in my own sweat this time last year, where’s the damn summer gone?” but most importantly for being the 3rd anniversary of Great Britain’s Referendum on EU membership in which it was announced (on the 24th naturally) that the people of Great Britain had voted “leave” by 52%.

Yet we have been betrayed by our political “elite” ever since that day. I’m used to people arguing about results of elections/referendums/votes, after all who can forget Charlotte Church screaming down the Tories after the 2015 General Election? Yet these sort of demonstrations usually fade away and life goes on and the vote is respected. Not so with the EU Referendum alas, it has been a 3 year onslaught of constant betrayals, remainer spin, media bias and a never-ending attempt to derail what was, a majority vote, eg the “vox populi”.

Academically my background is primarily psychology, in particular mental health and psychology of religion (a sort of unknown nobody version of Jordan Peterson, lol!) but it wasn’t always so. Before returning to university, despite having more than adequate qualifications to go straight into university, I did opt to go back to college for a year just to be sure I “was ready” for it and I’m glad I did, for I studied a range of disciplines including politics and economics. The history of politics is fascinating and in this particular scenario the history of democracy.

Basically we have the Greeks to thank for it and the word democracy itself comes from Greek and means “rule by people”. In modern democracy we elect people to represent us and they follow the will of the people (aka the “vox populi“, a Latin phrase meaning “voice of the people”). Now pragmatically our elected leaders (Parliament in the case of the United Kingdom) can’t keep going to the public and saying “do we do this or that or something else?” so we only give those “people” a voice for the really “big stuff”, be it via the opportunity to elect new leaders (a General Election) or on important issues via a referendum. “Do we stay in the EU yes/no?” certainly comes under “big stuff”, ergo a referendum was held and rightly so.

Some facts to consider:

Before the referendum we were constantly assured our vote “counts”.

June 2015 our MPs voted in support of the referendum by 544 to 43.
Every single eligible voter was sent a card (I believe the government called it a referendum leaflet or something like that).
In the 2017 General Election both Conservative and Labour stood on manifesto COMMITMENTS to implement the Brexit referendum result and leave the EU and all its associated “stuff” such as the Customs Union and the Single Market etc.
Jeremy Corbyn’s Labour promised “to respect the result of the referendum” and that “the freedom of movement would end once we leave the EU”.
Our Prime Minister (then, she is soon to be a mere blip in history) said she would negotiate hard with the EU, she would be “that difficult woman”, she also said “no deal is better than a bad deal”, she said “Brexit is Brexit” (whatever that’s supposed to impute).
Theresa May publicly declared we are leaving the EU no less than 108 times.
March 29th 2019, the “leave the EU” deadline came and went, still no Brexit ….
The “deal” Theresa May did bring forward was a disgrace, an embarassment, a surrender to the EU.

This has been betrayal after betrayal, a constant barrage of defeat snapped from the jaws of victory if you will. We now have a “deadline” of October the 31st (Halloween and the day after my birthday!).

I make no secret of the fact I voted to leave, for a number of reasons, some not the usual reasons of the MAJORITY, some in common with the majority. But EVEN if I had voted remain I would be pushing for us to leave. Why? Because this is not about “nobody voted to be poorer”, this is not about “but the economy”, this is not about “but British Aerospace jobs”. This is about everything our political system is built on, the very democratic foundation of the way the country is run. Let’s be honest, despite being a democracy, the people’s voices aren’t “heard”, the people are, for the most part, ignored by the “elites” in Parliament. To not enact the will of a majority vote of the people is just totally and utterly WRONG, on so many levels and one step towards a dictatorship. Think I’m exaggerating? Hardly, in a dictatorship the “leaders” get to do what they want and “sod everyone else”, are we not edging ever closer to that if we ignore the referendum result?

It’s time now to be “blunt”, the United Kingdom needs to “sh*t and get off the pot” and just leave the EU and be done with it.

Steve

Theresa May’s “resignation” and the dreaded “compromise”.

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So our Prime Minister has finally announced her resignation and yes I’m glad. But do I feel any empathy for her? Do I feel any sympathy for her? Well, yes and no really.

I do empathise with her situation, she had a difficult job to do. It was never going to be easy with the EU’s bullying tactics and their desire to “make an example of the United Kingdom” so no other state would want to leave the EU. However, her “error” (in my eyes) was revealed glaringly in her resignation speech when she uttered that one word …. You know the one: “compromise” and that has been her downfall all along.

When the United Kingdom runs an election (or indeed in this scenario a referendum) there is a clear “winner”. This is because the United Kingdom is a democratic state and as such referendums and elections are held when deemed necessary to “listen” and enact the “vox populi” (voice of the people). Now obviously a democratic government can’t have a referendum on every single aspect of the state’s “running” so we have a system whereby we elect a political party that best represents what we stand for to enact the running of the state as they see fit, in the United Kingdom’s case: according to their manifesto (snigger). However, big “important” stuff we have a referendum and so we should; you know, stuff like “leaving the EU yes/no”. It’s not rocket science after all?

Therein lies the problem. Theresa May has been trying to “compromise”, she’s tried to keep leave (52%) happy and she’s tried to keep remain (48%) happy. This is instead of thinking “ok 52% is bigger than 48% so let’s go with that because it’s a majority”. Oh no, instead she’s tried to keep everybody happy and in the process annoyed virtually everybody. You can’t have a compromise in these scenarios and that’s where the state is going wrong. Leave won so just LEAVE. And what does Theresa May waffle on about in her resignation speech? “Compromise” …. Sigh.

I do sympathise with her, I know it’s not easy but that comes with the job. If you don’t want “grief”, if you don’t want “difficulty”, if you don’t want “abuse” then my advice is “don’t become a Public Servant”, because (let’s not forget this, it’s important) that’s what an MP (especially the Prime Minster) is, a PUBLIC SERVANT. Elected by the people to do a job, an MP is still, at the end of the day, a Public Servant.

Yes I feel some sympathy, it’d be heartless not to feel a little twinge of sympathy for her but it’s over now and like I say that’s the price you pay for that job, be it right or wrong you’re going to get grief.

I just hope now we can move on, a Brexiteer MP will become Prime Minster and does what Theresa May should have done and showed some backbone when dealing with the Eurocrats instead of basically rolling over and surrendering. Make no mistake, that’s what Theresa May’s Withdrawal Agreement Bill was: a surrender treaty. It certainly wasn’t a “deal”.

Steve

“But muh deal” & The Theresa May Conspiracy Theory

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First up I have to tell you I am no conspiracy theorist. I have no patience with the idea of chemtrails, CIA/SIS (MI6) mind control or manipulating the weather via HAARP etc. The idea that a state government could organise a social engineering program on its populace is often ludicrous, simply because most of them couldn’t organise a booze-up in an off licence (liquor store if you’re not British). Let’s face it, if government was competent then we’d really be in the crap right?

Anyway, enough of the disclaiming (is that a real word?) and on to my “point”. Our illustrious political leader (snigger) has “negotiated” a deal with the behemoth that is the European Union and, to be frank, it’s a “well polished pile of you know what”, well in my opinion at least. So I put forward to you two possible “perspectives”:

The Prime Minister has done a superb job and considering the complexities of Brexit etc the deal is well done and about as “good as it’s going to get”. Ergo, we should applaud her wondrous diplomatic negotiations and get behind her and so on.

Now like I said above I am no conspiracy theorist but let’s consider the following:

The Prime Minister doesn’t really care about the whole thing because she’s the fall guy. She’s been an MP for several years but never really “shined” or been put forward for “greater things”, as her time as in the Home Office indicates.

She’s coming up for retirement age and she was “put forward” (with other candidates standing aside one at a time, Andrea Leadsom etc) for Prime Minister with the intention of wrecking the negotiation, because the government wants us to stay in the EU.

It wrecks her career essentially but she’s over 60, up for retirement and so on. As a former Prime Minister she’ll get a yearly allowance of £148,500 per annum and a £65,000 pension per annum (no state pension £120 a week here); she’s probably been offered a peerage; and also her husband is a multi-millionaire. All this money is worth wrecking your career over, heck most of us would gladly wreck their career for that sort of income !

As my friend (who inspired this post) also pointed out: This is why she’s “thick skinned” about the whole business, it makes no odds to her because she’s far better off AFTER the whole business when she can retire, probably prompted by some sort of health scare (possibly diabetes related).

You know what? Conspiracy theorist or not the second scenario sounds far too plausible.

Steve

All that’s needed is “opportunity” REAL “opportunity” and society will thrive.

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I’ve had to give this blog post a lot of thought. I kind of “knew” what I wanted to say but wasn’t entirely sure how to word it properly, so even the most “radical” lefts (or rights for that matter) would, hopefully, see my point.

There’s much talk these days of “lefties/liberals/libtards/Corbynistas” and then “racists/alt-rights/republicans/Conservatives” and so on. I thought about myself in this context and at first glance I would indeed appear to be one of the so called “right”, purely on appearance only. But then I started thinking more carefully about it and I realised the world simply isn’t that simple, especially as we live in a multiphrenic society where people tend to “pick and mix” the best bits from ideologies, lifestyles and politics that they like.

So, let’s break this down a little more. Am I “right”, well at first glance yes. But there again I don’t agree with the death penalty, period, regardless of the crime, that’s pretty “left” if you ask me. I agree with social welfare (aka “benefits”) and fair housing and all the rest of it, again pretty “left”. So where am I going with this? Well, it occurs to me to our society has not exactly mirrored the people within it from this perspective, our society, our government, our “establishment” (Police, media, council staff etc) don’t tend to be that varied and therein, I think, lies the modern dilemma.

We live in an age where information can be spread (be it true or fake) at lightning speed. We have more access to more information than ever before and this is likely to increase. However, politically we (I’m referring mainly to the United Kingdom here but I suspect you can find parallels if you live elsewhere) “swing” from left to right, back again, then back again. Labour’s in and they do a bunch of stuff some people like, a bunch of stupid stuff, a bunch of stuff nobody likes. Then Conservatives come along and they undo it and do some stuff some people like, some stupid stuff and some stuff nobody likes. Then a few years down the line and Labour comes in and on and on and on. This has been going on now for what, 50+ years?

Neither party is that “great” if you think about it, because no matter what they do (or don’t do) it’s going to piss somebody off, somewhere down the line. One party is somewhat “left”, the other is somewhat “right” and we don’t stop to think “hang on a minute we need the good stuff from both sides”, they just charge ahead with their own ideologies regardless. Think about it, you become prime minister tomorrow, surely you’re not naive enough to think what YOU think is right is the ONLY WAY? Now ok, proportional representation, it’s not going to happen. But would we want it to? Hell no, all we’d get is constant disagreement and nothing would actually get done, it’s be like postmodernism for politics, it’d be totally “meh, can’t be arsed”.

The problem we have, as I see it, is we’re being offered one way or the other way (the United Kingdom is essentially a two party system after all, Lib Dems? Hahahaha). Instead of actually listening to people and helping them (which let’s face it is what they are supposed to do) they just storm ahead with their ill thought ideas instead. I mean, fox hunting? Just grow up, we have far more important things to think about right now.

If government was actually accountable and acted upon the wishes of the people and “looked out” for them then maybe, just maybe, we wouldn’t think they were all just useless overpaid …. You get the idea. This is why Theresa May nearly lost the general election. We know she’s busy, we know about Brexit, BUT the vast majority of us are still in “da shite” from 2008/2009 (except the bankers and CEOs) and what did she offer those people, the “JAMs” (Just About Managing) as she called them? I’ll tell you what, sod all. She didn’t have to do a lot, just a few tweaks here and there to say “I haven’t forgotten you, this isn’t much but it’s a start”, stuff such as banning unpaid internships (much discussed but what’s happened about it?), capping utility bills and banning letting agent fees (EDIT: Letting Agent fees now finally “gone” since I first wrote this, so she managed that at least). Theresa May has been prime minister for over 2 years now and has done NONE of these, it’s just all “talk talk talk” and no “action action action”.

Anyway, the crux of society’s modern “ills”. Interestingly enough I mentioned unpaid internships above and that’s part (a small part but still relevant) of the problem. Socialism doesn’t work, people take advantage and virtually everybody ends up with “sod all”, history bears witness to this, time and time again. Capitalism sucks, big time and don’t even start me on the “trickle down theory”. Neither extreme is ideal but what I think is lacking, for most of society, isn’t money, benefits or ideology but OPPORTUNITY. Government needs to remove and dismantle the blocks to opportunity, such as banning unpaid internships which only certain people can “afford” to put up with and consequently get “the job” at the end of it; JUST ONE EXAMPLE.

I’ve done my hardest to “improve my lot” you know, I did all the “right things”, went to university and when I left university all I got when trying to find “decent” employment was barriers, more barriers, prejudice, discrimination (age mainly as I was a mature student). Think I’m paranoid? No I have proof, I’ve kept emails and recorded phone calls that shouldn’t have been made etc. University itself, yet more barriers; I got to pick 6 universities on my UCAS form (bear in mind I had 3 A Levels at A+, a BTEC with 17 distinctions and more at the time) and Oxford, Cambridge, University College London and Birmingham all rejected me without even seeing me (there goes the myth of “white privilege” out of the window, wooosh).

These are the problems we face. We’re being given the message “study hard, work hard and you’ll be a success” but it’s largely nonsense. It mostly comes down to who you know, what school you went to, where you interned (is that a real word?) I got a job at Arthur Andersen, impressive stuff you may think, but ONLY because my ex-wife (well common law wife, obviously we were still on good terms) worked there and “got me in” so to speak.

This is what needs “fixing” in our society, we need to break down the barriers to “opportunity” (real opportunity that is, not MLM or Utility Warehouse sales scams) so that people who do study hard then work hard will do well, will succeed. I bet if we got to that stage the colleges and universities would suddenly be bombarded with people wanting to “better themselves” and who could blame them? If I knew that going back to university right now meant that I would 99% get a £30,000+ a year (bearing in mind I’d be studying at postgraduate level) job afterwards I’d be there in a shot. Who is going to study and/or “work their rear off” when all they’re likely to get is “meh” at the end of it?

That’s what Theresa May needs to do, show us you’ve “got our backs”, don’t go mad (no Corbyn style bankruptcy thank you), then break down those barriers and when more and more people “do well” watch how much better a country to live in this will be, for the many, not just for the few. Finally, before anyone says “but there are opportunities”, try thinking of others for a minute not just yourself, sure there’s opportunities for you with your MSc from Cambridge and membership of the Masons etc but think of others for a change.

Steve