This ladies dad, ex Chancellor Lord Nigel Lawson has stated publicly 'we need out of the European Union'. Obviously I agree but the timing is interesting. Less that a week after UKIP's taking of 25% of the votes at local elections, the Tories have got in a panic, phone calls have been made, and Lawson has been chosen as the man to wrestle the issue back from Nigel Farage & Co. Next up, Euro fanatic Nick Clegg in an even bigger panic, makes the bog standard claim that 3.5 million British jobs depend on our staying in, which is 'A' false, and 'B' amounts to a threat of what will be done to us if we leave, which is no way to run any sort of a relationship worth being in.

How about we come at this so called threat to our jobs from another angle... How many German jobs do we support bearing in mind that country dominates the marketplace for high-end engineered products and a great deal more? It's my guess that 3 million or so German jobs rely upon what they sell us. How many French jobs likewise? Italian? Spanish? Lets grow up, bury this specious argument and accept that the Germans and French etc are not going to cut off their noses to spite their own faces on the matter of jobs; lets get real. If on the other hand some of the jobs in question are those of the tier upon tier of bureaucrats come to blight business and daily life over the 40 year long period during which this failed experiment has been allowed to run; those we would be better off without. 

As regards the picture accompanying this posting, I was going to include a snap of Lord Lawson but he's no oil painting, his daughter though is. Bet she's glad her mum provided the genes for her looks.

Don't tolerate failure, fix it.

If the system you live under is broken don't tolerate it, fix it.

Plainly we have a big problem with a ruling political elite that doesn't listen to the electorate, couldn't care less about our hopes and fears, and will continue to serve its own wants and demands until made to do otherwise. The dismissal of this unworthy breed has to be the most desirable option, but in order to do so at a ballot ideally sooner rather than later, a workable alternative must become available.

Very often I am struck whilst observing conversations and occasionally partaking on social media, that weather a contributor comes from a left-wing or right-wing point of view and perspective, we generally all want the same thing ultimately. Stability, peace of mind and an absence of fear is what nearly all want, so that we can get on with the job of bringing our kids up to fulfil their potential and enjoy a reasonable quality of life. If I'm right (and I'll eat Bernard Manning's pants if I'm wrong) agreeing to cooperate and having the intelligence to meet on the common ground to the benefit of the majority, is the best option we ought to aim for. Some will disagree and insist that until the country is run exactly as they want it to be, prejudices and all, they'll continue to jump up and down and make a lot of noise. I reckon their sorts are a minority that will never go away entirely, but that in a stable and refocused country will become such an insignificant minority, they can be safely ignored. Agreeing to cooperate is the key.

  

Sheep No More and how ordinary people like myself might go about fixing 'Broken Britain' may have dominated my thoughts for a number of years now, but the events of the past couple of months and the last week in particular, make it feel as though a significant beginning is upon both me and the country I care about. Other than a minority of overly insulated from reality twits atop the pecking order, individuals whose attitudes highlight them as being central to 'the problem' and therefore irrelevant to the cure to its many ailments the country needs, most of us know we cannot carry on as we are but must find a way out of the mess we're in. Obviously I agree wholeheartedly with the sentiment, and searching for sensible answers to our many problems is what SNM exists to do. Of course we can get ourselves out of the mess bad leadership has allowed us all to sink into. 'More of the same' is not acceptable when we're capable of so much better.

Two months ago I was asked to consider standing for a seat at the County Council election held last week and agonised as to what to do for the best. I really would have liked to have given it a shot, but in the end decided no, because of the time and effort needing to be invested. Had I stood and enough of the electorate placed their trust in me, promoting SNM would have been forced to take third place to earning a living and serving on the council and to be frank, promoting this project is where my heart is and where the contribution to society I can make has the most potential, provided that is, the formula is correct and can be made to work. Only time will tell on that score.

On the Isle of Wight where I live, Independent Candidates have made a massive breakthrough taking almost half of the seats and have broken the stranglehold, bog standard, self-serving, jobsworth, mainstream politicians held, abused, and have messed the Island up with. I take my hat off to the sorts of women and men coming forward and getting involved in politics now, people who refuse to put up with and more crap, think for themselves, and wont be whipped. Good on you guys! Nationally UKIP have frightened the wits out the political establishment by taking 25% of all the votes cast. I'm not a UKIP supporter but I understand entirely where they are coming from as regards the EU and open borders, two major problems requiring the will of the people to be listened to and acted upon.

I have just completed a new booklet to compliment this project and that is currently being proofread, the community I am a member of has a spring in its step following the election result, Cameron is shitting a brick as a result of UKIP's surge and I am now ready to start pushing hard this project. Interesting times!

Mrs Thatcher's funeral

Yesterday the nation said goodbye to Mrs Thatcher and her fan club spent the day glorying in her life's work and 'achievements' as they occupied the news airwaves pretty much wall-to-wall. It had been my intention to ignore the TV and listen to the Radio 4 coverage whilst keeping my nose to the grindstone and working normally but in the event, I did give in and put on the TV up to the point at which the hearse drove away from St Paul's. I'm glad the service went off ok and without incident. Today the sun is out, and after many a good and telling conversation both in person and across social media since her passing was announced, I've a very positive feeling about what lays ahead as it seems many amongst us are not willing to settle for 'more of the same' but are prepared to put in the effort to identify a sensible way forward. The architect of Britain's disastrous monetarism has left the stage, her followers have lost their icon, the philosophy they've followed like sheep is bankrupt, and it's time to bury it alongside its champion and move constructively on.  

Passing of Margaret Thatcher

On Monday 8th April around midday, news of Mrs Thacher's passing was made public and resulted in saturation media coverage. Tributes from the 'great' and the 'good' poured over the airwaves and proved, as if we needed it; our political masters live in a different universe to the rest of us. The 'greatest' peacetime Prime Minister ever, and 'saviour' of Britain was claimed by politicians past and present and made me for one wonder, if those uttering the words are incapable of viewing reality? I don't doubt that she was a patriot and believed she was doing the right thing for the country; but it is the legacy that speaks volumes about the monetarism she unleashed and put her name to, and which has shaped the country we live in now. Her philosophy made the rich richer whilst the rest of us would be expected to lump it whilst the heart and soul of our nation was ripped out and trampled all over. It's my perception that 'Broken Britain' has been the result of a third of a century of continuous monetarism, which sorry to say, is the actual legacy the lady leaves behind. As for all the gushing tributes from the likes of Cameron and the previous generation of grandees; to my mind the strangely fascinating display serves perfectly to illustrate how insulated from the reality of their own creation such socially destructive people are, and therefore how vast is the gulf between the people and their political masters. RIP Mrs T, I've no doubt you actually did believe you were right.

A long and slow burner

The story so far...
The title Sheep No More came to mind more than a decade ago and before a word of the story itself had actually been written. The first attempt was crude and amateurish and was followed by 5 or 6 rewrites, none of which were good enough although each was thankfully better than its predecessor. In 2010, I stood as an independent candidate at the General Election of that year and was beaten by the Tory by some 30,000 votes! What those people thought they were voting for I really don't know, but what they got was more of the same. The very next day after the vote, I set to work on Sheep No More and spent the next 18 months getting it right at last. It was self published on Amazon and Feed-A-Read in 2012, which marks the first significant milestone of this project passed.
Several attempts were made at a website but the material was never right; until now. A new version of the website is now live, I'm very pleased with it, and its activation marks the second important milestone passed safely by. My next task is to promote the project and get the message that we ought to be capable of putting Britain back to rights out there. There's lots to do, and now that I feel the book and website are both sorted, there's no reason to hang back.

The picture by the way depicts what Britons need to do. Stop tolerating bad leadership, failure, abuses and affronts, get our heads up and fight our corner for the sake of future generations. A positive and cooperative attitude is required and can only do the country and us all a power of good.

No longer messing about, the time has come to get serious about promoting Sheep No More. It was uploaded to Amazon as an eBook in 2012 and can be obtained from Feed-A-Read in conventional paper and ink format, I have though not been in a position to promote it due to the pressures of everyday life, attempting to make a living etc. Time meanwhile, has been marching on.

Now a plan has been formulated that I will work my way through as necessary. Yesterday (Tuesday 19th) I visited web designer Netguides of Cowes and took with me a whole host of material to revamp the website. The emphasis will change from my banging on about 'the problem' to instead concentrate on practical solutions, which is what the final chapter of my book seeks to do. A constructive criticism of the present website made by a number of well-wishers, is that it is too wordy with nothing to break up the monotony of endless text. So now there will be pictures and artwork included to make it more attractive and all the wording will change, so I'm grateful for the practical advice readers put forward. As soon as the new site goes live, I shall start placing small adds in newspapers and in-house magazines for various trades and industries. In addition, a few hard copies of the book will be sent to people of influence with the aim of gaining their interest. There is a business plan to go with the book and project, the ultimate aim of which is to generate some decent quality, creative jobs for our young people, and it won't take that much momentum to earn the credibility needed in order to go looking for funding.

The picture is of yours truly presenting famous journalist and war correspondent Martin Bell with a copy of Sheep No More. He was on the Isle of Wight at the invitation of Independent Councillors to give a talk and see the beauties of the place and I was fortunate enough to be introduced.