The election campaign begins.

The 2015 General Election campaign officially began today.

One noticeable initial theme is the deep uncertainty which comes with either potential governing party.

The Consevative Party will bring the rampant uncertainty of an In/Out EU referendum and unexplained deep cuts to welfare. A series of prominent Conservative MPs have appeared in the media over the past few days speaking of their giant cuts to the welfare budget, which may potentially be reasonable but do not cover the details of where those cuts will fall, hence rendering it impossible to gauge the fairness of their plans, and leaving people with no option but to suspect those cuts may deeply hurt the most vulnerable in society.

The Tories are not talking much about their EU referendum, even though EU membership is arguably the biggest issue in this general election. If Labour becomes the lead governing party then there will be the safety and security of no EU referendum; if the Conservatives win, then we enter into the dangerous lottery of an EU referendum. One would hope that the polling is correct and Britain would sensibly vote to remain in the EU. However, there is the very real danger that a coalition of right wing Tories, UKIP, the Daily Mail, The Sun, and the Daily Express would whip Britain into the economic suicide of an EU exit.
Hopefully the skilled people that created a powerful grassroots movement for a big surge in support for scottish independence will bring their skills to drive the pro-EU campaign (though with more positive results, as it will start from a better polling base).

The deep uncertainty that comes with a Labour government is how they would go about reducing the deficit. They have announced a handful of costed plans, though most of those costings are heavily-disputed. It's either that Labour can't actually face up to the cuts that they would make or that they dont want to admit the tax rises they would make. It's unclear where the truth is on Labour's deficit reduction methods. The key part of Labour deficit reduction seems to be to raise certain taxes, but those tax raises don't seem to gather enough cash to back up their plans. Various Labour MPs have been grilled on these matters, but nobody has yet been able to glean sufficient detail and clarity on their plans.

In this century, voters are far more sceptical and demand truth and clarity from their MPs, far more so than in the past. The Iraq war and the MP expenses scandal has removed any sense of deference from the electorate to the elected.
The smart thing for a potential government to do is surely to be as open and clear as possible about their plans for governance, chip away at that scepticism and encourage trust.

Unity

Delighted that Scotland has stayed part of the UK. 

A triumph for rational thought over emotion. 

The UK needs a genuine federal system of governance now. Needs strong devolved parliaments throughout the UK with consistent equal powers (inclined to think England should be split into regions), a stripped down British Parliament, and proportional representation throughout. 

Everybody can learn a lot from the Yes campaign. Yes demonstrated how to genuinely engage everybody in politics. The No campaign was an absolute shower from top to bottom. It's regrettable that some of the emotion got a little out of hand once or twice (primarily, on the Yes side). Yes showed what can be done with genuine engagement, plain-speaking, passion, and strong organisation. Hopefully everybody throughout the UK will learn from Yes.... The No leaders were too top-down and bland in their approach, and No supporters were too quiet and shy. Really hope that the great work of the Yes campaign and the huge turnout create a revolution in how everyone does politics in the UK, hope it wakes everybody up. British politics is crying out for more honesty, emotion, engagement, activism, participation. The three main british parties need leaders and front benches that speak their minds in plain English. Hopefully we'll see these recent record-breaking  levels of engagement at future elections and referenda (particularly any potential EU referendum). 

It's interesting that the only places to vote Yes were Greater Glasgow and Dundee: probably the two scottish cities with the highest unemployment and welfare dependancy, and hence the cities the most desperate for change (perhaps change of any kind?). Britain needs to focus more on creating jobs and better living environments in our poorest cities. 

It's wonderful that in the last few days of the campaign that Gordon Brown brought the focus of the No campaign (and maybe many of the Undecideds) onto the positives of the UK. We all need to focus more on the positives of the great country that we live in. The UK is amongst the most free, liberal, fair, democratic, prosperous, educated, inclusive, multicultural, open countries in the world... We need to embrace those positives, reject notions of separation and exclusion, and pour our energies into improving equality, universal prosperity, and harmony. 

Vote 'No'

My reasons for voting 'No' are twofold:

1. Philosophical. 

The world should be more joined-up, interlinked, and less separate.

In the democratic, free, liberal parts of the world we should make the most of this and have as few borders and as little separation as possible. The world should be less tribal and more harmonious. Creating more national boundaries would go against this.

2. Practical.

The idea of living in a country without a genuine viable currency petrifies me. Currency is the absolute bedrock of an economy. Without a stable formalised viable currency, a country is permanently teetering on the brink of economic and hence social implosion. 

The UK should stay together; but the UK should have  a constitutional convention to create genuine consistent federalism across the UK.

We are all Better Together, let's not ruin one of the most prosperous, harmonious, peaceful, inclusive countries in the world.

Vote 'No'.