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The Conservatives, a right-wing political party in the UK, are running on a platform of introducing national service - that is, obligatory, unpaid work for 18-year olds.
Rishi Sunak says this will 'foster service' and boost security. Because nothing fosters public spirit in young people like being
forced to work at the weekend for free.
I propose that all members of the Conservative Party be required to perform two consecutive days of unpaid work per month.
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//Why not all government officials?//
Because it's not government officials that are proposing it but the Conservative Party...in a desperate attempt to swing votes away from the Reform Party (a wholly owned subsidiary of Nigel Farage).
//obligatory, unpaid work for 18-year olds//
Well, most working people already do one day a week of free work for the government so what's another couple of years, eh? |
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Not sure what "conservative" means in England, the terms liberal and conservative seem to have flipped since the Maggie Thatcher days. (She was anti-conscription) Conserving the serf system where the elites get money for no work and the poor get work for no money I guess. |
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If the "Consevatives" want to sell slavery, I mean, public service, they should sit down and have tea with their commie buddies on the other side of the aisle or whatever the seating arrangement is over there. Learn to apply the buzzword terms they use to get the people to comply with the will of their sovereigns. |
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Tell them they need to follow any instructions given in order to be "principled, upstanding, righteous and commendable", and to avoid being called "deplorable, contemptable, disgusting, reprehensible and offensive". |
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Think getting the proles to submit to the decrees of their overlords isn't as simple as calling names? |
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[+] For the idea by the way. |
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Small problem; the less you pay your legislators, the more dependent they are on bribes. (The same goes for police, judges, examination markers and anyone else to whom the public delegates some kind of authority). |
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It is my experience that the opposite is true. The more money someone has or is paid, the greedier they are &, thus, the more susceptible to corruption. That's not to say that people without money aren't also vulnerable to financial temptation. |
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That doesn't seem like an entirely accurate description of the national service plan. You can either join the military, which WOULD be a paid full time position, OR volunteer one weekend a month. |
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Note: that's not to be taken as an endorsement of the plan. I'm against forced conscription except in times of defensive war. Not defense of allies, defense of one's OWN country against invasion. |
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That work should consist of using small nets on the end of bamboo rods to fish turds out the UK's rivers and waterways. |
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//The more money someone has or is paid, the greedier they are// |
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You might have cause and effect the wrong way around, there. |
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There is some merit in the broader suggestion that a political party's manifesto should also become its rules of membership and for so long as you are a member you have to comply with its rules as if they were law. |
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//That doesn't seem like an entirely accurate description of the national service plan. You can either join the military, which WOULD be a paid full time position, OR volunteer one weekend a month.// |
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Partly true, but mainly false.
Presumably you can opt out of military service, but not in. Only limited placements are supposed to be available, and they're intended to be selective.
How selective? Well, google says this:
::According to the 2020 estimate (published in June 2021) there are 717,252 people aged 18 years old in England and Wales::
They want 30,000 military placements, so that's space for about one in 24. (A BBC article starts from a higher population of 18-year-olds and gets one in 26, so it's about that ball-park.) |
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Secondly, what is the pay for actually doing military service? Is it minimum wage? The conservatives haven't said. Funny that. |
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The Tories estimate the scheme would cost £2.5bn
If that was spent /entirely/ on the military section, that would be a total spend per candidate of £83,333 uk pounds.
Which wouldn't be a bad salary - if it were all salary. But of course it wouldn't be. I think the typical expectation is that costs are about 4 times salary, so the maximum feasible salary is £16,666. Which isn't a great salary, but it's certainly not awful.
But wait! What about the 687,000-odd people not in military service? How are we going to pay for slave-drivers with the zero pound budget we've got left over? Does no-one else in the system even get to claim expenses? |
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In practice even jurors get paid expenses. They may not even get to claim minimum wage, but they can claim expenses. And obviously everyone else in the system gets at least minimum wage. |
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So realistically, the military peeps are getting food (low quality) and lodging (a bed in a barrack) and maybe a few quid a day. OR, the Conservatives are lying about how much it would cost. Maybe both. |
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//If you won't defend your allies, you won't have any.// |
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21 Quest isn't saying not to defend them. He's saying people shouldn't be conscripted to defend them.
Most countries have a paid military which can help out with that. |
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Conscription has been so abused for profit we need to stick with the volunteer model that's worked so well for decades. |
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As an aside, I'll take this opportunity to point out that the right wing/left wing paradigm, comforting as it might be, is dead. I'm not saying we should all stop hating each other, hate away, but those old lines are now as artificial as gerrymandered voting districts. It's just a tool to divide and control. |
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Loris, well said. That was indeed what I meant. |
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Not unconditionally. I think sometimes we have not only a right but a responsibility to tell our allies they need to knock off what they're doing, and if they don't heed our warning they can face the consequences without us. For instance, if you vote to bring an already embattled country into this alliance without my support, and that country's enemies attack you, I'm not sending my soldiers to die for you. You brought that on yourself. |
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Right now we're at such a point, I think, regarding Ukraine and the Palestinians. No, I'm not going to fight and die for either of them and I don't care how strongly our allies try to drag us into it. |
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//You might have cause and effect the wrong way around, there.//
Well, I see it as more of a negative feedback loop than cause & effect. After all, it's possible to be greedy without being wealthy.
Back on topic, the whole scheme, as proposed, is a ludicrous sham. "National Service", as it has been described thus far (there is no detailed policy document as yet), will be voluntary with no legal sanctions (at least no criminal ones apparently) for failure to comply. So, essentially, they are just re-describing our already existing weekend volunteers, the Territorial Army & dressing it up in a dramatic new name for shock effect. |
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I don’t know why everyone’s going on about conscription. Surely it’s obvious that it’s not a real policy?
Why would a political party announce a controversial policy in the run-up to an election they’re expected to lose, as opposed to introducing it in the preceding 14 years when they actually had the ability to implement it? All it is is a ‘wedge’ issue to stir up arguments and to stop people talking about anything important. In terms of populism it’s designed to appeal to people too young to have actually done National Service and understand what a waste of time it is, and too old to actually have to do it themselves. |
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//Surely it’s obvious that it’s not a real policy?//
The problem is, that now it has been proposed, you have to take it seriously. In evidence, I give you David Cameron's obvious disbelief that anyone outside of the Brexit Party would take Brexit seriously. Hence his political ploy of committing to a referendum which came back to bite him, & most of the rest of us, squarely on the arse. |
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That is true. Perhaps the answer is for politicians to float ever-more bonkers policies, in the general vein of Brexit, sending people you don’t like to Rwanda, selling Royal Mail to some foreign private equity firm, and compulsory conscription, and then the other side would have to take them seriously and respond. You could say “If elected we will re-introduce gladiatorial combat for convicted criminals. If it was good enough for the Romans it’s good enough for us! Vote for me!”, and your opponents would have to do some detailed analysis to show how difficult it would be to procure enough lions. |
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Ah, I do miss the days of the Monster Raving Looney Party. RIP Screaming Lord Sutch. |
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You're not tempted to switch your allegiance to Count Binface? He has some excellent policies. |
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He/She/They does/do. However, for an alien who espouses inter-galactic politics, his/her/their actual policies seem to be very London-centric. |
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Interesting - maybe London really *is* the centre of the galaxy |
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I'm not sure you can reach from Brighton. |
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Not even with a very long stick? |
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Snagged on the Downs, usually. |
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