MASTERING THE ARGUMENT

kileyrae: “Boss hug.” - @BarackObama

Tue, 06 Nov 2012 06:39:42 -0500

“Boss hug.” - @BarackObama

Photo

Tue, 06 Nov 2012 06:39:32 -0500

My Speech to Save our NHS rally 2- 22/9/12

Tue, 25 Sep 2012 14:52:30 -0400

It should be noted that I did not give the whole speech because I was speaking after Lord Prescott who was far better than me! I spoke to around 500 protesters in central Hull.

First off, I want to say thank you for attending the second rally of the save our NHS campaign, and thank you to all the volunteers, including Unison who have made this event happen. This is why Hull is a wonderful city, because it is full of wonderful people like you, who do wonderful things like this!

In 1984 the poorest city in the country stood up to a vile Tory government by taking to the streets and got a rebate, that city was Liverpool, and we in 2012 we should take heart from our cousins down the M62. For in 2012, we, the people of one the of the most economically deprived cities of the UK, stand up the government to demand a rebate on our NHS cut.

One of my good friends said to me this week “why are you bothering, you wont win and the reforms arnt that bad.” I simply said- “listen stupid, this is about health care, free for all regardless of your income, background or job.” If for nothing else to save the poorest from having to pay or wait longer.

Why should the poorest people have to suffer for government cuts, from a banking crises they had no part in! Did they borrow the money for the mortgages, did they cause a banking crises, no! Why should we have to suffer for a sector that received a bail out and caused a 5 year recession that still pays billions in bonuses!

This government don’t get it, they are too well off to get it. It simply isn’t fair, and this effects the middle class as well as the poorest- there economic policy is cutting our services and at the same time isn’t giving the us the economic growth for the jobs we need for the prosperity they promised. They are taking with both hands, and those who are lucky to be able to afford to go private should never forget the poorest who can’t.

We stand here today to fight for the best of British. The NHS sets the UK apart as the most sithistaciated and advanced nations in the world and we should be proud of it. Our grandparents died for it in the war, now it is our turn, we must fight for it so we can pass it onto our children as well.

Government legislation and cuts will mean that by 2017 we will have to pay for anything above basic health care provision and that private companies can cherry pick the bits they want. Leaving the underfunded public sector to pick up the pieces. In addition we will see huge closures in wards, beds and services at Hull Royal and Castle Hill!

Politician have failed to make the argument of what this will mean. So we must tell them loudly what we want. We want them to take our document which argues against the £99million cut, it calls for a rebate. It calls for a rebate because of the unique social and economic and health challenges facing Hull and East Yorkshire and because our cuts are simply disproportionate to the rest of the UK.

David Cameron said he would cut the deficit and not the NHS- well listen loud and clear David Cameron and Jeremy Hunt, we are the big society and we say no to your cuts. So I tell you the people of Hull, lobby your politicians, tell your MPs what you want. Make everyone you know sign the petition calling for the rebate against this £99 million cut and we will march on London and tell Jeremy Hunt- not now, not never and not in Hull!

Remember- we are all NHS patients, just some of us haven’t checked in yet!

Protest in 2012

Tue, 25 Sep 2012 14:45:30 -0400

Why people protest against government cuts, because society is becoming so unequal and because there is a two tear society developing in which the people that caused this 5 year recession are doing really well and the rest of us are still picking up the pieces. We chose to protest so that those who made the decisions would hear that why are not happy and that we want a plan B. The arguments are simple.

Remember we are all NHS patients, just some of us haven’t checked in yet

Thu, 30 Aug 2012 08:17:30 -0400

When my good pal Dermot and I started a little campaign six weeks ago against NHS reorganisation in our area, including government cuts, legislation and local management we had no idea what we were letting ourselves in for. Since then we have managed to untangle a web of miscommunication and lack of understanding about the transition from NHS to national health provision.

Realistically I would say we have played the first quarter of the campaign and the preliminary results are in.

1) That we the public are under educated about what the how the health and social care act will change our health care provision

2) that politicians have failed to make the arguments of what will happen, including the likely need for private for those who can afford it provision from 2017

3) that the £99million cut to our local NHS budget is unsustainable (it started at £90m 6 weeks ago)

4) That the cuts are disproportionate in comparison and that due to the unique challenges faced Hull & East Yorkshire such as inequalities in social, financial, employment and health we should make the argument for a reduction in the £99m government cut, or a rebate, to allow us to continue to face our own unique challenges

5) That there are serious failures inside the local NHS, specifically in communication which have stifled the debate about the need for required reforms, leading to discontent in staff and ensuring that best practice and a debate about alternative reorganisation and cuts may have been missed.

From this basic analysis I am now more convinced than ever that a two pronged approach is what is needed for the campaign. Firstly, we must educate the local public about the reforms which are taking place in local health care, from cuts, reorganisation and health care provision. We must then get the public to support us in the second part of the campaign, which will involve making a direct argument through our Parliamentarians to the Secretary of State. We must argue that due to the unique difficulties we face we must see a reduction in our unfair, unproportionate cut in health care budget. We must go the Secretary of State directly and call for a rebate. Just as Thatcher did for Britain, we must now go with the best interests of our people to the powers that be and say “we the ordinary public, the big society, do not accept this level of health care cut, think again.” No matter what your politics, it is the role of the state to help and support the needy, this cut, is a direct attack on the needy.

Remember we are all NHS patients, just some of us haven’t checked in yet.

On Friday I started my own little company

Mon, 27 Aug 2012 15:56:33 -0400

On Friday I started my own little company… I made the promise to myself that I would do it whilst under going chemotherapy. I have had the idea for about a year and the time has come to start, if not now, then never! What is the idea? I can’t tell you that, I am not going to give away my big ideas, but it does surround ethical trading. Today I am doing the paper work, logo, social media ect.

I am going to blog with updates. I have several reasons for starting my organisation, firstly I am dyslexic and getting a high paid role is hard enough but doing it with confidence and fitting into the culture has always been an extra hard challenge.

Like many dyslexics I am about getting up each morning and making things happen, I don’t know many 25 year old’s who have written a book, stood for parliament, and have a degree and half an MA despite being semi literate.

I don’t see this as an easy, it aint, I could get a fairly well paid job tomorrow doing something I don’t love in a risk free world. Knowing that eventually the day my disability catches up with me and I make a mistake is lurking. This is a huge challenge and I am way out of my comfort zone.

But hey, I want to change the world. I am already doing it in my own little way- so why don’t I go a little bit further….

On Libertarianism

Fri, 24 Aug 2012 08:11:39 -0400

Short, because each word mattered to me

I suppose most of us don’t bother to worry about our liberty until it is impinged. This can be the smallest thing, such as the desire to keep some our lives private from prying eyes to the freedom of to be tried by jury. There is a growing argument in the UK that many of these basic rights are being impinged and the politics of the United States is based around the ideals of the freedom.

The idea of freedom was used to fight the cold war, an argument that we all of course simply have to agree with. But this casual link between freedom and liberalism leaves us with one of the most complex questions which faces contemporary politics. For example, surely the ends of liberalism and equality of opportunity are almost identical, as are the end of economic liberalism and equality under the definition of liberalism according to Milton Freedman. Yet despite this, many pure or neo liberals, or right wing Tories as we would call them in the UK, simply define equality as the state taking a step too far. That the state is interfering with our everyday activities and thus our liberties impinged.

The argument is far more complex, but in the UK we must also consider that the UKs three main political parties have already cherry picked the best bits of liberalism. Furthermore because liberalism is such a diverse subject, just because one form of liberalism is essential does not mean others offer the best form of theory for its specific subject area. This was best defined yesterday by Elisabeth Murdoch, daughter of the world’s leading market libertarian, Ruprort when she challenged the assertion that “The only reliable, durable and perpetual guarantor of independence is profit” continuing that “Profit without purpose is a recipe for disaster.”

maybe the British people should listen to this too, if only Toby...

Fri, 24 Aug 2012 05:18:41 -0400

maybe the British people should listen to this too, if only Toby Blair could say this to help Ed…

Speech on understanding economics of government reform

Tue, 21 Aug 2012 10:14:10 -0400

“It is essential that modern political campaigners understand the challenges of government in the post 2010 world. At the 2010 general election you could barley force a cigaret paper between the three political parties. You could argue that a consensus had emerged with the politics of personality dominating. However following the creation of the coalition government, there agenda no longer advocates the consensus that the public voted for, especially floating liberals and conservatives and moderate labour voters. This void between manifestos and coalition programme has left Britain with a political programme unsuited to its needs and challenges.

As a result political campaigners need to be acutely aware of the specific position this leaves them in, whilst many of us are campaigning for the consensus, the governments restructuring for the past. By the past I mean expensive and wasteful reorganisations preparing many parts of government to do less and being tendered to competition. When I speak to local political campaigners I stress the importance of the economic policy which under pins the government restructure. When looking at economic policy we must consider the following three key things-

1) that the coalition government is a neo liberal, supply side government, they believe in a smaller state and lower taxation.

2) that is economic theory has been tried and tested, and every time you get the same results, increased deficits, further compounded by consistent over prediction in economic performance which damages confidence, investment and growth when we fail their predicted objectives.

3) this government has no intention of reducing the deficit, the deficit allows the government to build in a constitution wall against big government, forcing lower taxation and supply side economic to encourage growth.

These three points leave a perfect circle, a never ending circle. In the words of BillClinton, “We are in the grips of failing economic experiment, wrong on the theory, wrong on the arithmetic.”

It is within this context that we have to fight government cuts. My current campaign, save our NHS, Hull has bought together the progressive majority to fight against cuts. But to do this we need a deeper understanding of why the government and local pen pushers are cutting. Understand the economic theory that underpins the government will allow us to do this. ”

I forgot to say happy birthday to 42nd President of the United...

Mon, 20 Aug 2012 17:10:00 -0400

I forgot to say happy birthday to 42nd President of the United States-My hero- Bill Clinton

Celebrity culture and the decline of Britain Saturday 18 August...

Sat, 18 Aug 2012 07:54:04 -0400

Celebrity culture and the decline of Britain

Saturday 18 August 2012

Whilst promoting his new documentary and campaign for abstinence for drug and alcohol addiction, Russell Brand once again linked the lack of spirituality and the vacuous celebrity culture and addiction. I have posted a youtube video where Brand speaks to Jeremy Paxman in which he states that no one cares about great ideas or spiritualism and it is replaced by a vacuous consumerism and celebrity culture. He describes his own experience of fame as initially thrilling and then tiring, describing how the thrill of fame and money is replaced by a desire to regain and fiercely guard his privacy.

Celebrity culture, which has been with us now for over a decade, from the creation of reality TV, the commercialisation of the arts, especially main stream music. For me, this means that many people have the appearance of being extremely dull, music in 2012 is appalling. Every part of British life seems to have been swept up by this obsession with celebrity culture and easy money. This is part of a wider decline of Britain, past rescissions have caused great music movements, the best music of the 70s and 80s came from unemployed young men with too much time on their hands. Today they are too busy working in call centres and reading copies of OK magazine, shopping in Primark, nursing a hangover, watching box sets to do anything creative with their time.

This ties in perfectly with a sentiment that is currently passing through parts of the UK media as today marks the new Premier League football season. In which over paid footballers who have lost touch with reality will, sulk, cheat and lack charisma. There are no heroes or role models in football, gone are the days of Eric Cantona, Alan Shearer and Roy Keane, they have been replaced by serial adulterates, money chasers, womanisers, and Ferrari crashers. This in contrast with the Olympics which inspired a nation. The footballers tie in with celebrity culture, vacuous, cheap, disposable, driven by money whilst the Olympians symbolise something more honest, they symbolise those who struggle for their art, like the music movements that came from the previous generation.

Notice of NHS meeting: on-line post

Wed, 15 Aug 2012 06:49:04 -0400

Dear NHS supporter,

I would like to invite you to the third SAVE OUR NHS HULL AND EAST YORKSHIRE meeting, 6 PM on Monday 20th August at the Unison Building on Alfred Gelder Street, Hull. We will be discussing our action plan for the coming campaign.

Our campaign group is a mixture of all of the best campaign talents in Hull and East Yorkshire, brought together to fight the £94m cut in our NHS trust budget. In our last meeting we called for a rebate against the £94m cut, due to the unique social and economic challenges facing Hull and East Yorkshire.

It has become clear that under government legislation and cuts, by 2017 the NHS in our area will be unsustainable, leaving the door wide open to private health care under the Health and Social Care Act. I ask you not to think if you and your family can afford health insurance, but how the poorest in society and the chronically ill will fare in 2017. In Ireland health care insurance cost £100 a month, ask anyone who has worked for minimum wage, there was nothing left at the end of the month, never mind £100 to cover health care insurance.

We will be reserving the first 5 minutes of the meeting for someone to talk about their positive experience of the NHS or negative experience of the cuts, if you are interested in speaking to us please email me at dannymarten@hotmail.co.uk

The first two meetings have been lively and full of debate; so far over 50 people have attended representing 20 community organisations. Please pass this email on to anyone who may be interested, all are welcome.

Remember, if health care workers speak out they put their livelihoods in danger, if we don’t speak out now- then no one will and we face losing our NHS for good.

Daniel Marten

Co-Chair Save our NHS Hull and East Yorkshire

Groups Represented: Haltemprice and Howden Constituency Labour Party, East Hull Constituency Labour Party, Hull Trades Council, Hull Socialist Workers Party, Hull Communist Party, GMB, Unison, UCL, Hull & East Yorkshire Green Party, The Co-op Party, Hull City Council Labour Group, NUT, Unite, Hull West and Hessle Constituency Labour Party, UCU, Hull Fabians, ALPC.

Why I am calling for a rebate

Tue, 14 Aug 2012 06:38:35 -0400

14 August 2012

Save our NHS- Hull and East Yorkshire

Over the past few weeks I have been part of a team of 30+ running a campaign in Hull to fight against £94m of government cuts in NHS services. Of course, the cuts go far wider and deeper than just these £94m but, given the reforms that the coalition have legislated for which will allow competition and thus privatisation we have decided to start with our local NHS trust.

It started with a petition stall, which turned into a full scale rally with over 200 in attendance, a vote of confidence for the NHS. Following the rally we called a meeting, we asked for “all the campaigning talents of Hull” to attend. So far 50 people have attended the first two meetings representing 20 organisations.

In addition we have also had the local media onside, including the Hull Daily Mail and Radio Humberside, from interviews we have conducted we secured a meeting with the Chief Executive of the NHS trust and the medical director. The meeting, which took place on Friday morning, answered a number of questions we had and set a clear direction for our campaign.

Over the next few weeks we will be looking to put together a number of arguments, which will argue that the cuts in our health service are unjust, heavy handed and unsustainable. We will argue that these cuts are just the beginning and will ultimately result in reduction in healthcare outcomes. But ultimately, we will argue, and I will call for a rebate for our NHS trust, due to the unfair nature of the cuts and the specific social and economic challenges which is faced by our NHS trust.

Extracts from my speech to Save our NHS rally in Hull

Mon, 06 Aug 2012 09:22:00 -0400

Picture take from http://martindeane.wordpress.com/ (thanks)

6 August 2012

“Firstly I should say thank you to you all for coming, on what seems like the only sunny day of the year, what started out as a little stall on Saturday morning has turned into a full scale rally with so many people, and this is a vote of confidence, and a vote of popularity on for the NHS.

It says a lot about the state of things when ordinary people have to take the streets to protest, it says a lot about the failure of management, but ultimately this is a failure of politicians. The fact of the matter is, the NHS is part of British life, it is part of what it is to be British, and it is a corner stone of our community.

And because it is a corner stone of our community, because what it says to have an NHS shows the type of society the vast majority of us want, a society where we look after our ill and vulnerable, we must protect it.

Now I know I don’t speak exclusively to Labour members, however we in the Labour Party have a responsibility to fight to save the NHS from cuts and privatisation, it was our party that introduced it and we are now seeing that we are the only party that still truly believes in the NHS, and we should be proud of ourselves for that.

So let’s make this clear, the local NHS trust wants to close 300 beds, from 1500 to 1200 and despite the media and us kicking up a fuss the issue has been almost ignored, including the cardiac ward, a move described as dangerous, that’s NHS speak for putting lives in danger.

Now iv spent a lot of time in hospital recently, iv spent 33 days in one since April, and let me tell you this, there aren’t many beds going free, and believe me, it isn’t because the quality of the food, but we will leave the culinary complaints I have for another day.

So when the hospitals are running under severe pressure in the winter, what will they do when 300 beds are gone? Are we back to the days of waiting on beds in corridors, massive waiting lists and increased mortality rates, yes!

At the 2010 general election, Nick Clegg and David Cameron promised an increase in NHS spending, they promised more of the same, more of what Labour was doing, and I spoke to packed halls at the general election and promised cuts and privatisation in the health service, was I listened to, no? Did the public believe me, no!

Well now is the time to expose the coalition for their true colours. We should remind them of where the NHS came from, it was part of a package of reforms that came about after a long, war, where many died. Those who sacrificed did not want to return to the poverty and struggle of pre war Britain, no, only the current government are selfish enough to want that, our grandparents died for it, now it is our job to protect it, so we can pass it on to our children, because once we have lost it, and we are close to losing the NHS, we will never get it back.

…………….

Just as the coalition are starting their campaign to be re-elected in 2015, those of us who oppose the coalition and there cuts must begin our election campaigns as well. We have a duty to make as many people as possible know about government cuts and specifically those within our NHS.

Remember the NHS is paid for by the people, our taxes pay for it, we should have a say when we are not happy by the way it is being run, we must protect it, because if we don’t no one else will, we must send a long loud message to Phil Morley, we simply says, this is another example of cuts going too far and too fast, these cuts will undermined the service and pave the way for privatisation poor health outcomes and so go back to the drawing board and think again, because we say no.”

Yes it is hard working and having a family life, but MPs have it easier than most

Mon, 06 Aug 2012 09:13:00 -0400

6th August 2012

Well I have not blogged properly since April. I have had testicular cancer with some secondary lymphoma to boot. I have had an operation and some killer chemotherapy which I will complete in two weeks. Add to that a sad relationship breakdown and well who needs to blog? The last blog got hundreds of hits a day, this one was reaching the 100 a week barrier, so I will work to build that readership again!

Today I have been enraged by the simplicity of the arguments surrounding the resignation of Louise Mensch MP. Mensch is talented, and controversial. She admitted to using class a A drug, (cocaine, once) an admission by its own right which will be another step towards having an open grown up conversation about drug use in modern UK. However what I think I admire most about her is that she a successful career before entering parliament, something which sadly, many of our politicians have no experience off. Today I don’t wish to get into the debate as to whether Miss Mensch was any good as an MP or not, but the fact this isn’t just an argument about gender and feminism but also about class, opportunity, poverty and prosperity.

Before we examine the arguments, we need some background on the resignation. This morning the BBC reporting that -

“The MP for Corby is moving to New York with her three children to be with her husband of a year, Peter Mensch, who is manager of rock band Metallica. Her decision to quit will trigger a by-election in the Northamptonshire constituency, a marginal seat.”

The reason looks as if it’s the family/ work life balance. Of course it must be hard keeping to careers going under one house, and the decision for Miss Mensch must be heart breaking, she is quoted as saying -

“As you know, I have been struggling for some time to find the best outcome for my family life, and have decided, in order to keep us together, to move to New York. With the greatest regret, I am thus resigning as a MP.”

However I don’t wish to criticise Miss Mensch for biting off more than she can chew or for sacrificing her career for that of her family, but the outpouring of sympathy from politicians to politicians was simply sickly, one said

“Best of luck to @LouiseMensch. Reminder that maintaining family life is tough in the world of Westminster.” – this is one of many I have picked on, randomly.

Erm…. Making family life is hard in any job, many parents work long hours and away from home, it is part of the British culture and psyche and anyone involved in British politics who thinks that MPs have it bad are deluded and frankly out of touch with

However this twitter statement is more in tune with the debate we should be having “If a high-flying, millionaire, self-identifying feminist MP still has the career / family dilemma, what hope is there for ordinary women?” It is sad that a talented young woman has had to change job in order to keep her family together. To explore this further we must consider if income came into the equations, I suspect the manager of the world biggest rock band (her husband) gets paid slightly more than her. If this is the reason then that would be a shame, however could she be changing her role in order to save a marriage, that would also be shocking but done by many people before her. The simple fact is that we don’t know the dynamic of the relationship, however she isn’t a special example just because she is an MP.

The point I really want to make is if a powerful, successful, wealthy woman has to leave her job, what hope has a full time single mum got of pushing her way through life. Having said that, maybe we should be happy that in this day and age Mensch is empowered enough to make this decision, again I suspect a working class single mum, or lower middle class family would not be afforded the same opportunities. This isn’t just an issue about gender, feminism it’s also about class, poverty and prosperity.

Why I am voting John Prescott for Police and Crime Commissioner

Fri, 18 May 2012 19:21:00 -0400

John Prescott on Prescott Express addresses crowd of Haltemprice and Howden Labour members and voters in support of my General Election campaign

18 May 2012

I have blogged at length about the Conservative Party being obsessed by implementing American ideas in the UK, so when David Cameron mentioned the idea of police and crime commissioners I didn’t believe they would come to fruition. When the bill passed, Labour were not interested and they where a waste of money.

When it became clear that Labour would stand candidates, the gravitas of the challenge became apparent and this excited me immensely. This was a great opportunity to fight an American scale election and really make a difference to policing, and social policy in our area. I originally said I would support another candidate, Paul, a successful businessman from the south bank who had run a good local election campaign in 2011. However it became clear, early that the selection process would be rather messy and I suggested Paul step aside and I dropped the idea.

Early this year I was approached by the Prescott team to help assist in the campaign. I was instantly impressed by what they had to say, John instantly talked about tough issues and it become obvious that he had a firm grasp on policing matters. As preparation continued and he polished up on policing and social policy, it became apparent that John Prescott is by far the outstanding candidate for the Labour Party.

John Prescott has already visited a number of Labour members, launched a website and has got stuck into the policing debate. In recent weeks he has already had an incredibly positive response from members, especially young members who have come forward in their droves, not just to vote for John Prescott, but to actively support his campaign.

Over the coming weeks I will blog on the Prescott campaign and our incredible and vast campaign team.

The UK economic managment is now criminal

Wed, 04 Apr 2012 09:02:45 -0400

4 April 2012

During my research in China I discovered that 50% of graduate’s can’t find a job on leaving uni, part of China’s future problems but then I was a tweet from Diana Johnson MP (one should point out she is my old boss) about finding work in Hull. From my experience finding work in Hull is hard, I know graduates in call centres and as a region we are being hit with multiple factory closers and public sector cuts. Some examples include BAE, Commit which was started in Hull and the 20% tax on caravans levied recently a sector which employed 1,000 Hull workers. Whilst to their credit local politicians have not towed the government line of relying on the market to attract work but used their office, this even includes the odd Conservative but mainly Labour.

So let’s look at two statistics, graduation employment and work in Hull. On the graduate front 70 people now apply for each job, with a decrease of 7% in jobs available, the vast majority now insist on a 2.1 and some work experience, when I looked at graduate jobs in Hull just 14 came up on the search and most of them didn’t really look like you needed a degree. Then if we look at the number of people fighting for each job in Hull, we are the top in the whole country with 80 people fight for each post, this is almost a freak, most of the top ten worst have between 25-40 people for each role, only stoke comes near us with 73 per role.

I don’t have the stats to hand, but when I ran for parliament I put together a briefing note on to my campaign team and I remember writing that in the constituency I ran in unemployment was about 2.5%, however I suspect this has gone up.

Political economy, the power of China

Tue, 03 Apr 2012 08:56:00 -0400

In 1970 and the same city in 2010…..

3 April 2012

This is the ancient Chinese city of Shenzhen, on the South East coast of China and dates back as far as 5000BC. In 1979 this small fishing city about the size of Leicester had a population of 350,000 however in 1980 it was granted special economic zone status and with government support, by 2010 had grown to a population the size of 10 million people, the 5^th biggest in China and 29^th in the world.

Between 1980-1997 growth averaged at around 15% and since then has steadied at an impressive 5% (we would kill for that in the UK right now.) In 2009 the City has a GDP of $130bn meaning this city has an economy comparable to New Zealand or Hungary. Its close links with Hong Kong allows the city to have a vast trading and financial sector as well as manufacturing and high tech. However from the UK perspective the largest growing sector is service industry, which of course the UK is dependent on, more evidence that the UK needs to diversity as developing states develop their own service industry.

However the city does have some problems, high unemployment for example, however the city has been given every chance it needs with high speed rail, sound road networks, air links and higher education. It is said the 20% of Chinas PHD holders have worked in Shenzhen, can you think of any UK city that comes near any of this? Thought not.

Coalition policies in Hull Part 1: Student Life

Wed, 28 Mar 2012 11:18:00 -0400

28 March 2012

This is the first in series of blogs aimed at considering how the polices of the government may affect Hull and East Yorkshire. I will place them on my blog www.masteringtheargument.tumblr.com in conjunction with @HullRePublic. As an aspiring political economist I think it is important to understand how government policies from London change our local social and economic landscape.

Please suggest future themes, the next one will of course be on economics but the first will attempt to examine the effects of student life on the City of Hull. This blog will argue that the changes are bad for social mobility, bad for business and will exaggerate the downsides of having a student population in a city. Hull has over 22,000 students, the vast majority are based at the North Hull campus and much the surrounding area has adapted to cater for student life, including housing and the local economy. Whilst this has caused work it also has downsides including the appearance of being rundown.

Firstly- I shall deal with the most obvious change, the increase in student fees, which will reduce the number of students from Hull attending the University, will reduce social mobility, reduce the skills of Hulls workers and will change the lifestyle of Hull based students. The government policy will see average graduate debt increase from £18,000 to £36-40,000- (before you say ‘Labour started this’- I stood for parliament on a grad tax platform.) Firstly, lets address the skills base argument, Hull caters for an above average proportion of local students, these people go through university to improve their career prospects and to improve their skills sets, the younger ones are the city’s future leaders and manager, by increasing fee’s these Hull based people may not bother with higher education and Hull will have a reduced skills base. Tony Blair wanted to get 50% of people through a higher education qualification, the reason being to create a high skilled well educated workforce to compete with the likes of India and China. This policy was sound but lacked definition, when Tony Blair said “50% through higher education” people saw students who were not capable doing three year courses at 10 hours a week doing David Beckham studies, for this policy to work this means higher education qualification courses in conjunction with work and including diverse degrees. So an increase in fees and the abandonment of the high participation mark is likely to damage cities like Hull more than most as getting local people through university increases the cities competitiveness. If Hull produces 100 Hull based engineers each year from inner city areas, they will be able to make a good life for the themselves and attract business to the city, which in itself creates more work through supply chain.

Secondly- the change in legislation will reduce social mobility as those from poor backgrounds may not have the means to attend university, this includes in further education where EMA has been scrapped. As mentioned, Hull Uni caters for Hull people as well as national and international students and takes more than its fair share of local students. To reduce social mobility, to reduce skills will reduce innovation and wealth creation in the city. This dynamism is essential to create an expansion in the work force which will see people get the jobs they crave. Essentially to target higher education in this way will slow social mobility to all none graduates.

Thirdly- the changes in will see the end of student life as we know it, when you add in inflation and poor economic performance of the UK I predict that students will opt to spend 4 years at university and will look to work in the city of choice all year round. The government have suggested that degrees may take place over two years, well this is workable at Oxbridge (where most of the government attended) due to masses of books and one on one tutorials, but at smaller universities you can’t rush through a degree in two years. I also suspect students will look to take placements and MA’s to make them more employable, and to fund this I suspect a significant proportion of students will look to work in their city of choice, all year round. However will a city like Hull be able to fund the appetite for jobs? Students require low skill, part time flexible work and because of the UKs poor economic performance this will put them in direct rivalry with natives looking for work. At a time when we have graduates working in the cities call centres what hope do we have of a job for everyone in Hull? Finally, if a student studies and works, he/she will have to blow off steam or enjoy the finer things in life, it’s only fair. But for the students the finer things in life include drinking to oblivion and then eating take out on the way home. As students knuckle down for a year round debt, study, work, ride fuelled by drink expect the excesses of student life to take the most extreme form. This means more low end student friendly bars, more junk food shops, and my pet hate, more student houses, perfectly fine houses divided to fit as many students in as possible, ghettoising massive areas of the city, as the streets get rammed with cars and become targets for crime. This could be the end of student life as we know it. You could argue that this is good thing, that students have had it too good for too long and the lifestyle isn’t sustainable and maybe I would agree, but as an area we should be prepared for the changes

Danny Marten (25) stood for parliament in 2010 for the Labour Party. He is studying for a post graduate degree in political economy and lives with his fiancé and step daughter in Hull. His book ‘The Labour Party, where did it come from and where does it go from here?’ is due for publication by the end of the year.

27 March 2012 Staff motivation is an issue in many companies,...

Tue, 27 Mar 2012 08:10:00 -0400

27 March 2012

Staff motivation is an issue in many companies, not in the White House, Obama style

Not blogged in a while, have been very busy writting essays on China, economic grwoth, trade and aid in Africa and anti globalisation and wallstreet protests. In addition I have been completing my book with Dermot entitled ‘Labour, where did it come from and where does it go from here?’

And I am also assisting on an amazing campaign…. which I cant really say much about until we get alot further along other than to say it will be national. (uk)