Well this morning I woke up as did almost 1.8 million others to find an email from Tony Blair in my inbox regarding the governments proposed road charging scheme. If you didn’t sign it, the full email is now on the BBC news website as well as the petitions.pm.gov.uk website, the PM’s website doesn’t seem to be able to handle the current demand and so reading it on the BBC website is certainly a better choice unless you wish to be reminded of what 28k dial-up internet was like.
I couldn’t’ help but laugh at the start of the fourth paragraph in the reply “But let me be clear straight away”, you can just see his gesticulations and the well practiced frank expression on his face when reading that (yes I’m typically a critic of the government). Without me picking it apart any more the reply makes for useful reading, the key point made throughout which I’m sure all would agree with is the fact that congestion is an issue and one that needs to be dealt with. Unfortunately in my view, public transport is really not at a stage where it offers a credible alternative for most people.
The continued increases in price for bus and rail tickets above and beyond inflation as well as infrequent and inflexible travel options mean it is hardly surprising that many people choose the car. More investment in public transport infrastructure with the capacity for long term growth would be a major step in the right direction. From my own point of view I’d be happy to take public transport for most of the work I do, suffice to say driving home at 2 in the morning is not preferable but unavoidable.
I do in many ways resent that fact that the governments only response to most major problems is to tax said problem until use of it abates. It would be interesting to see a graph of general taxation level against public opinion of government, would be nice to see how it correlates. From my point of view as a ‘young voter’ the increased taxation alongside the pathetic level of insult throwing which takes place across the house of commons on a daily basis is what frustrates me most about the political climate in this country. Watching PM’s question time is a prime example of how childish the entire thing is, dialogue from one speaker is typically rebuffed with a response starting with “But under the previous government…”, which is usually followed with a list of carefully selected statistics chosen to better reflect the respondents party and belittle the opponents, whilst having little or no relevance to the wider and more important picture. At the point when I see a lead politician who takes a genuine and grown-up approach to politics, and who’s interests are genuinely those of the voters then politics may become more than the farce it appears to be to so many younger voters.
I suppose on the positive side if the PM is going to ignore petitions like this as I’m sure he will at least he’s emailing people to tell them he’s ignoring them!
Leave a Reply