UK Border Control, Austerity and the French and UK local elections.

I watched BBC question time again last night, and the thing I noticed was the way that the politicians are slowly twisting the facts about the financial collapse, credit crunch, call it what you will. Ian Duncan Smith (Tory) Harriet Harman (Labour) and Menzies Campbell (Lib Dem) are all starting to mention "personal debt" as being the cause of the financial crisis. The bankers are not even being mentioned by name any more, and people are even starting to forget the names of the banks we actually bailed out. Ian Duncan Smith only fleetingly mentioned the blame attached to the previous Labour government. Austerity was only mentioned in connection with the Eurozone, not with us in the UK. They started with the shambles that is the UK border agency and their inability to cope with passengers arriving at the various airports that serve London. Only Mark Serwotka, leader of the PCS. Public and Commercial Services Union mentioned the massive job cuts that are creating the huge queues at the airports. The first thing that Ian Duncan Smith said was "It is not my responsibility" typical Tory. Chaos in the run up to the Olympics was mentioned with horror, but, not because it would affect people arriving for the Olympics, but because it would look bad for the UK and the government. As usual, they have their priorities round the wrong way.
Rupert Murdoch was next. Only Mark Serwotka said that he agreed with the report produced by the parliamentary select committee that said that Rupert Murdoch was not fit to run a company. It stands to reason that the boss should know about the actions of his employees. The rest of the panel hedged their bets about the report.
The French presidential elections took center stage next with Harriet Harman and Mark Serwotka siding with the socialist candidate, Francois Hollande, and Ian Duncan Smith and Dragons Den participant Theo Paphitis opted for Sarkozy stating that there would be chaos in Europe if Hollande won. Theo Paphitis said "we live in a free market economy" If he thinks this is a "free market" then he is deluding himself. They went on to talk about the austerity measures that are in force throughout Europe. Ian Duncan Smith said that "austerity is a good thing." The man is an idiot. Paphitis said that "there is only so much money to go round." Wrong. The Bank of England, when there are signs that the banks are in trouble again just go ahead and print money. This was the point where the panel, apart from Mark Serwotka, focused on "personal debt" rather on national debt. Worrying.
On to yesterdays local elections and the fact that both the Tories and Lib Dems recieved an absolute battering from the electorate. The results are not all yet in but it is a disaster for the ConDem coalition.
That is all for now.