Archive for July 2011

Letters in the Shropshire Star

Here are some letters I’ve had printed in the Shropshire Star recently (italics are bits they edited out before printing) …

English are not to blame for turbines

For the last few weeks there have been a couple of letters a week complaining about the proposed new wind turbines to be erected in Wales “for the English”. The suggestion is that windmills shouldn’t be built in Wales for the benefit of “the English” and that “the English” shouldn’t have any input in planning decisions concerning them.

Not long ago, we had public consultations on the proposed reconfiguring of services at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital and Princess Royal Hospital. Of the seven consultations held, three were in Wales and the Shropshire Star letters page was full of letters from “the Welsh” complaining about how the proposed changes would be to their detriment.

Talk about double standards. I agree that wind turbines are a blight on the landscape and certainly wouldn’t want them in my back yard. It’s a shame so many of them blight the Welsh landscape as well but if “the Welsh” want someone to blame, it’s not “the English”, it’s their own government.

The Welsh Assembly is committed to onshore wind farms and it is the Welsh Assembly that makes strategic planning decisions in Wales. It’s not “the English” they should be complaining to, it’s “the Welsh”.

Wind turbines are the most inefficient and expensive form of renewable electricity, requiring vast amounts of taxpayers money to make them financially viable for the operators. Windmills are so expensive and ineffectual that operators can’t make back the cost of building and running them before they reach the end of their life.

We should all oppose the construction of windmills not for their unsightliness or because they’re being built to power another country but because they are a gross waste of taxpayers money and the justification for building them – global warming – is nothing more than a scam. Even NASA is predicting a period of global cooling because of a decline in sunspot activity (something the “scientists” who make millions from the global warming scam claim has no significant impact on the climate).

Councillor Stuart Parr
UKIP
Brookside

We must not deny the right to protest

I read with disbelief that Councillor Mike Ion is calling for the Home Secretary to ban a proposed march by the English Defence League in Wellington on the day of AFC Telford United’s first match of the season.

Here is a man who apparently cares so deeply about democracy that he went to the effort and expense of standing for election to the council but then starts a campaign to deny EDL members their right to peaceful protest – one of the cornerstones of modern democracy!

The 19th century author, Evelyn Hall, wrote “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it”. We may not agree with the EDL but that is not an excuse to deny them their rights.

Mike Ion and the other Labour councillors that are supporting his fascist campaign should hang their heads in shame. I believe in free speech and democracy and that sometimes means having to hear and accept things that you don’t agree with. Banning people from expressing contrary views is something you associate with repressive regimes in places like China or Burma, not England.

The EDL should be allowed to hold a peaceful protest in Wellington and if Unite Against Fascism wish to hold a peaceful counter-protest then of course they should be free to do the same. Personally, I despise the UAF thugs that drag these protest marches into violence but I certainly wouldn’t want them to be banned from protesting.

If Councillor Ion is successful in banning the EDL from marching in Telford not because of a risk of serious public disorder but because he disagrees with them, this will set a dangerous precedent. Who would be next? Would I be banned from criticising the EU because my views are contrary to those of the LibLabCon?

I would urge anyone who opposes the EDL to simply ignore them on the day rather than support an undemocratic, unconstitutional ban on their right to peaceful protest.

Councillor Stuart Parr
UKIP
Brookside

Dismayed by figures on child poverty

Like Councillor Davies (21/06), I am dismayed by the child poverty figures produced by the “End Child Poverty” campaign.

In my ward (Brookside) the figures show that 38% of children are living in poverty.

I disagree to some extent with the methodology the group uses. Poverty is defined by the group as a household income of 60% less than UK middle income of almost £26,000 but an average middle income in Telford is around £19,000.  Rent/mortgage payments are taken off household income even though most households with an income of just £10,000 would receive housing benefit.  The figures are also “adjusted” in an unspecified way as the only available data is 3 years old.

That doesn’t mean the figures don’t have any value – they may not be an accurate measure of poverty in Telford & Wrekin but they are a useful indicator of relative poverty in the borough and the fact that Brookside is in the top 5 most deprived wards in Telford & Wrekin only makes the borough council’s refusal to press ahead with much-needed generation on our estate all the more indefinsible.

The best way to tackle poverty is not with handouts but with jobs and support.  Brookside desperately needs some serious investment to create jobs and provide support to people who want to get off benefits and start working.

With the latest announcement of funding from the borough council, Woodside will have had £70m spent on regeneration whilst Brookside has had nothing – in fact, £2m of the £4m set aside for regeneration for Brookside was pillaged by the previous administration to pay for regeneration in Sutton Hill!

The owners of the businesses in the Brookside local centre have done their best to make the precinct more appealing to residents but with an open-ended promise of regeneration they aren’t going to make any serious investment when the whole thing could be knocked down within a couple of years.  We need a commitment to regeneration from the borough council with timelines so the residents of Brookside can hold the council to account if it doesn’t happen and so that those people that want to invest in Brookside can make plans for the future.

Cllr Stuart Parr (UKIP)
Brookside

Electorate following habits of parents

David Burton is incorrect in his response to Simon Rogers’ letter claiming last year’s general election was a referendum on our membership of the EU.

The general election was no more a referendum on the EU or UKIP than it was on foreign policy, the environment, devolution or any other subject that motivates the electorate at any other time.

Generations of voters have put their cross next to one of the europhile parties for no other reason than their parents voted for Labour, the Lib Dems or the Conservatives and last year they did exactly the same thing.

The vast majority of people want to free our country from the tyranny of the European Empire but the British government won’t listen.

The electorate are lied to, conned and stolen from by politicians from the LibLabcon but most people still vote for them.

Why would they listen if they know they can rely on the votes of people they cheat and deceive?  Kick them in the ballot box and they might start listening.

And while I’m on the subject of elections, can I remind the Shropshire Star that the Lib Dem, Liz Lynne, is not “the MEP for Shropshire” as she is routinely described?

She is just one of six MEPs – three Conservative, two UKIP and one Lib Dem – elected in the West Midlands euroregion in 2009.  None of the West Midlands MEPs (including Liz Lynee who is based in Stratford-upon-Avon) is based in the county which shows what a farce the EU’s regionalisation of England is.

Councillor Stuart Parr
(UKIP)
Brookside

Racist fees result in fewer Scottish university applications from England

SCOTTISH universities have received 5,000 fewer applications from students south of the Border wanting to take their degrees in Scotland amid claims that the recession and uncertainty over fees are causing undergraduates to stay closer to home.

That’s the Scotsman’s theory on why Scottish universities are seeing a drop in the number of English students looking to study in Scottish universities.

Nationality LotteryIt’s not the recession or uncertainty over fees that’s the problem, it’s the racial discrimination and high costs.  I appreciate that this will come as a shock to a lot of Scots and the BBC but English people haven’t been going to Scottish universities because they’re better, they’ve been going because the degrees are easier (4 years instead of 3) and because they’re cheaper.  Or they have been until the Scottish government decided to introduce racial discrimination into the Scottish education system by charging English students up to £9,000 per year for a degree in Scotland while every other “EU citizen” gets free university education largely thanks to EU laws.

If you have the choice of paying £9,000 a year for 3 years for a degree in England (thanks to tuition fees imposed on England by MPs elected in Scotland) or £9,000 a year for 4 years for the same degree with an extra year of expenses and you have to live in a hostile country where half the population hates you because of where you were born, which would you choose?

With a bit of luck Scottish universities will start running out of money soon now they’ve bitten the hand that feeds them because according to the Scottish Education Secretary an influx of Scottish students studying in English universities would bankrupt the country as the Scottish government pays the tuition fees of Scots in English universities as well.

Good luck to the English students challenging this racial discrimination in the courts.

Elected Police Commissioners … why?

The British government is graciously allowing the proles in England and Wales to vote for police commissioners.

We want the vote on the EU Constitution/Lisbon Treaty that we were promised and we get a vote on changing the voting system from one undemocratic system to another, marginally less undemocratic system.  We want a vote on devolved government for England and we get a vote on who fills out the race and faith diversity forms in our local police force.

Electoral and constitutional reform is worth bugger all unless it actually makes a change to peoples’ lives (for the better of course) and it’s something people actually want.

I wouldn’t wipe my arse on the Guardian

Kia Abdullah CommunistKia Abdullah, a Guardian columnist, has apologised for making fun of the death of three teenagers in a coach crash in Thailand.

The three boys – all educated at a state school – were taking a gap year and ended up in Thailand where they were involved in a bus crash that killed them instantly.

The well paid, wealthy left wing class warrior said:

Is it really awful that I don’t feel any sympathy for anyone killed on a gap year?

Erm, yes.

I actually smiled when I saw that they had double-barrelled surnames. Sociopath?

Sociopath?  “Another name for psychopath […] a person with an antisocial personality disorder”.  Erm, yes again.  Actually, combined with that natural hatred for society that seems part and parcel of being a Guardian writer I would say misanthropist is a more accurate description.  Or just “hateful bitch”, possibly.

Kia Abdullah is just another left wing hack turned out of the hateful Guardian mould.  They’re all toy soldiers in the war against society.  Anyone who criticises someone from an ethnic minority is a racist.  Anyone who criticises a religion other than Christianity is a fascist.  Anyone who thinks we should stop giving half our income to the state to pay for cheerleader development officers, diversity co-ordinators or simply just paying people not to work is an evil right wing baby-eating capitalist.  Anyone who thinks everyone should be treated equally rather than encouraging a culture of “positive discrimination” for any perceived minority is a sexist/racist/disablist/other -ist.

The Guardian is a hate-filled communist rag that I wouldn’t wipe my arse on and their writers are equally beyond redemption.  The tax-dodging Guardian is a rag for prehistoric trade unionists, champagne socialists, angry students and rich people with pictures of Ché Guevara on their walls who feel guilty about having lots of money but don’t feel guilty enough to give it away.  In other words, the ideal home for misanthropists and sociopaths like Kia Abdullah, Polly Toynbee and all the other horrible left wing hypocrites.