Mike Meredith

UKIP’s Solution To Every Problem Is To Blame Foreigners

Apr 052015

It's a bit of a slow reaction to the leader's debate, and most of the debate was fairly predictable – the Tories want to cut public spending to pay off the deficit, Labour want to spend and hope the deficit will go away of it's own accord (and according to the historical record, Labour actually have a good track record of reducing the deficit!), and the Liberals want to fit themselves in the middle. The Greens made some interesting points, and the nationalist parties also had some interesting (if nationalistic) points to make.

But Farage (representing UKIP) was unbelievably simple-minded. Just about any problem could be dealt with by getting rid of the dirty foreigner.

Farage wants to cut the deficit by stopping sending money to those dirty foreigners. Their total saving on the foreign aid budget and the EU subscription would amount to £17 billion per year; even ignoring the fact the deficit is growing at about £100 billion a year, it will take approximately 88 years to pay off. Failure number 1.

Farage has a solution to the housing crisis – stop all the dirty foreigners coming in and taking over our houses. It seems like an obvious problem, but is not the whole story (see this article for an analysis of what may be wrong with the housing market).

On the question of the NHS, Farage has a solution to increase the NHS budget – stop treating all those dirty foreigners and let them die in the streets. Concentrating on figures for the moment, stopping treating foreigners may cut NHS costs by £2billion which sounds like a great deal, but it is a drop in the ocean compared with the overall NHS budget of £116 billion. What has not been mentioned is that the NHS is not very good at recovering costs from foreign health insurance schemes which is something worth looking at.

Personally I am quite willing to see the NHS spend 1.7% of it's budget on treating foreigners, because sick people need treatment. What kind of society would we be if we let those who don't qualify for treatment die in the streets?

Farage and UKIP seem to have only one answer to all the problems the next government will face – blame foreigners. No problem is so simple that there is just one solution to it, and even if you believe that immigration is too high then you should at least agree with me that a party whose only answer is to blame foreigners is not worth considering.

Defeating the Right Of First Refusal

General No Responses »

Apr 042015

As an introduction to this, I'm writing this from the point of view of a freeholder wishing to evade the right of first refusal but for the record this is more or less what happened to me as a flat leaseholder. Obviously certain details have been changed and the relevant names left out.

One of the things they don't say when someone buys a leasehold flat is that when the freehold changes hands, the leaseholder should normally have the right of first refusal. The existing (and prospective) freeholder should formally notify the relevant leaseholders that the freehold is due to change hands, and offer the freehold on exactly the same terms.

There are certain exceptions to this right of first refusal which can be basically summed up as various forms of inheritance, so probably won't be of much use in helping out.

The first decision to make – long before the freehold changes hands – is whether it is worth defending. If the freehold is purely residential it is probably not worthwhile trying to defend it, and some of the options below are not available. If however there is commercial element to the freehold such as the shops in a mixed use block, then it is may well be worth defending.

You can of course split off the valuable part of the freehold into a leasehold so that the freehold becomes a lot less valuable; even if you do lose it, you still retain the commercial and profitable part of the property. It also allows you to 'fiddle" the price of the freehold so that when you sell the freehold and the leasehold together, you charge far more for the freehold than it is actually worth.

And don't tell the leaseholders about their right of first refusal. Sure that's illegal, but it turns out nobody really cares about that. Most leaseholders won't be aware of their right of first refusal, and even if they are aware, they will be too concerned with the expense to take it any further. Unless you have managed to annoy them in some way.

And whilst you are ignoring the right of the leaseholders to be informed of their right of first refusal, you can keep yourself busy by merging the previous leasehold of shops with the freehold. Making a fundamental change to the value of the freehold will complicate the right of first refusal if it ever comes up.

If the leaseholders do make an attempt at enforcing their right of first refusal, delay at every opportunity. Unless you give up at the first hurdle, the issue is going to court and any court action is a game of chicken where the loser is the first to blink at the escalating legal costs.

As usual, justice in this country favours the rich.

Why Aren’t You Voting?

Politics No Responses »

Mar 212015

Today's little ramble was brought about by a little off-hand remark about the last election. Aparently the Tories got 10 million votes whereas the apathetic (those who didn't vote) numbered 16 million!. So why do all those people fail to vote?

Apathy

On first appearances there is not a great deal that can be done about those who are too apathetic to vote. By their nature the apathetic are very difficult to persuade into action.

But we can make voting easier.

Postal voting already exists, but still takes a bit of effort to arrange and get sorted. It is rather too late to arrange it for the election this time around, but it is time we had some form of secure online voting. Previous attempts at electronic voting have not been entirely successful, so any online voting mechanism should be slowly are carefully worked out. It is not the sort of thing you hive off to the lowest bidder and let them solve all of the problems.

But probably the one thing I'm keenest on is to review the archaic and ridiculous habit of insisting on voting taking place on a Thursday. There is no reason for it other than convenience for the politicians (it gives them a long weekend to sort out the new government). It is nothing more than a historical custom. Setting the election for a day at the weekend would allow those who are only partialy apathetic more of a chance to get their vote in.

Many of us work, and voting on a Thursday involves disruption to a routine which may not have much available flexibility. In the morning, you're too busy getting the kids to school and yourself to work to take time out to vote (I vote in the mornings and it's amazing how quiet the polling booths are), and after a bad day at work it is all too easy to slump down on the sofa and "forget" about voting.

Safe Seats

With our current electoral system, the result of an election is determined by the result in a handful of marginal seats; in the majority of seats the result is almost a foregone conclusion (with the occasional surprise often assisted by the presence of a particularly odious politician).

If you happen to live within a safe seat, there is relatively little pressure to vote – your individual vote is unlikely to make a difference one way or another.

Given the result of the referendum for the last attempt at electoral reform, it is unlikely that any serious attempt at change will be made in the forseeable future. But our current electoral system definitely discourages voter turnout.

It would be nice if we could change the system in some way to make a direct connection between our vote and the person who was elected – so most of us could say that we were one of the 100,000 that voted for Fred and that's why she's an MP.

The Repugnant Political Establishment

There is an old joke about just how repugnance lawyers are :-

A grade school teacher was asking students what their parents did for a living. Timmy stood up and said, "My mom is a doctor!" Sarah stood up and said, "My father is a professor!" Little Johnny stood up and said, "My dad is a piano player in a whorehouse!"

The teacher couldn't believe what she's had just heard, so she made a point of calling Little Johnny's father that evening to discuss the situation. Little Johnny's father explained, "Actually, I'm a law attorney, but how am I supposed to explain that to a seven year old kid!"

And this goes doubly so for politicians (many of whom are or were either solicitors or barristers). Let's be honest: The best of them slither around the place, and you need to keep a tight grip on your wallet whenever a politician is around. How many stories about corrupt politicians have we had in the last 10 years?

It seems to many of us that although the political establishment gives lip service to the will, wishes and needs of the people, it in fact serves only it's own interests and those of it's specially favoured friends (who always seem to be rich and get richer). Whether or not you believe this, there is a significant proportion of the population who do believe it.

Amongst those who do believe, there are also plenty of those who believe that it is best to ignore the political establishment and try and achieve something outside it. Working outside the political establishment is a laudible aim, and something to be encouraged.

But it is not an exclusive choice – you can still work outside the political establishment, and still vote.

Cannot decide which of the rancid reptiles you like best? Just vote for the one you dislike the least; any vote cast for any candidate that opposes UKIP is worthwhile.

My Vote Won't Make A Difference

Statistically that is entirely correct as a single vote does not make a difference.

But collectively we do make a difference; a small difference as the political establishment has stacked the deck, but a difference none the less.

USA: The Last Bastion Of Pre-Metric Metrics?

General No Responses »

Mar 142015

If you ask someone from the US what measurement system they use, they will probably come up with a phrase something like the US Customary Units which was "standardised" at a time just before the British Imperial system was overhauled. Which for most of the 20th century lead to the ridiculous situation where a gallon wasn't necessarily a gallon in international trade (the old pre-Imperial system had three different gallons depending on what liquid you were measuring!). And a pound wasn't necessarily a pound, and a foot wasn't necessarily a foot.

The numbers have disappeared into the background, but there were six different weights for a pound at various times.

Aaah! And this is just two systems evolved from the same origin. If every country in the world resorted to it's traditional measurement system, the world would be in chaos.

With the exception of the USA, Mynamar, and Liberia, the world has reluctantly agreed on using the metric system to avoid the cost and confusion of dealing with multiple different systems of measurement.

Except that is not quite true. If you look at the formal definition of the US system, you will see that it is defined in terms of the metric system, and has been since 1893. Which is rather amusing – assuming that you aren't an American. If you are, it must be galling to realise that when you stubborning stick to your traditional measurement system, the rest of the world sees you rather pathetically clinging on to something that is little more than a thin veneer over what the rest of the world uses.