Whilst it seems probable that the Tories will win the June election in the UK, it is extraordinary that they have a one line slogan which they hope will be enough to carry them to victory.

This is brought about  because the opposition parties are so hopeless.  This seems to me a hapless state for British politicss which seems to have transmogrified into a one party state.  All this is in the shadow of Brexit which a small majority of Brits voted for almost a year ago.  This is democracy at its worst.  Although I voted to leave for what I think are cogent reasons, including anti federalism and rule by the unelected, I think the majority of my fellow brexiteers voted for the wrong reasons.  I don’t want to sound eletist nor know it all, but listening to interviews with the “man in the street” I hear a sizeable majority banging on about immigration which maybe an issue but it is a modest one compared with trade, the Euro and the Brussels elite.

Having said that, I find it unfortunate that Theresa May who claims a mantra of helping those who are “just getting by” following the herd and emphasising the impossible target of tens of thousands of immigrants by the end of the next parliament.  She has also set herslf up as the focal point of the UK’s Brexits negotiators almost to the exclusion of everyone else.  I don’t like the cult of personality as a substitute for policy.  Nor should the voters.

Whilst Corbyn and Farron are weak, they have ideas which are not entirely without merit, even appealing.  However they do promulgate some daft ideas which instantly disqulify them from being elected. The Libdems want to relive the Brexit referendum after the negotiations are concluded and then see if we like the outcome or not?  Labour wants to nationalise the railways and rise corporation tax and screw the rich.  All very attractive to the poor but the consequences would be dire for the whole econony.

They all agree on increasing the funding of the NHS and Social care, with the Tories passing the buck and the burden to the individual middle class voter whilst those who are poorer will somehow be looked after by ?????!

What a futile exercise, the politically ignorant voting for the narrow minded egoists. We get the government we deserve, of course and I fear the general ignorance will come home to haunt the UK.  It all goes back to Cameron and his puerile choice to go for a referendum to sort out the belligerent Tory right. He didn’t foresee that the whole thing would be seized upon by the Ukippers of this world, assuming that the electorate would shy away from a break with Europe.  How wrong he was.

His submarine Home Secretary at the time, knew a thing or two about aspiration and changed from Arch-Remainer to leading Brexiteer in a trice, suddenly driven to lead a “strong and stable” (gag – gag) government against the bureaucrats of Brussels.  What a conversion, next best thing to St Paul at Tarsus.

Still nature abhors a vacuum, so the May followers have it.

The UK election is showing that at last the population is not tied so much to dogma as to ideas.  Hoorah for that!  It in some ways reflects the more radical responses from the American and French elections wher Trump and Macron are no establishment figures.

Theresa May in UK is carefully picking her way through, firstly establishing the ‘dominant idea’ that ‘strong and stable’ leadership are key to the now non-political fact that UK is leaving the EU.  She may be completely the wrong person to actually lead the UK but the ‘dominant idea’ will prevail because she simply sticks to the simple ‘strong and stable’ rhetoric time and time again.  The average man in the street has no idea what Brexit entails, he/she has only the vaguest veiw of why they voted as they did, many of them would change their minds (both ways) if they had been better informed.

In sticking to her message Mrs May is also cleverly avoiding the thorney issues of public services particularly the NHS and Social Care.  The traditional socialist voter has been brainwashed into the ‘Strong and Stable’ camp to the complete dimishing of other key policies especially the health/social care agenda.

May is also hijacking traditional labour policies in order to apease those teetering on the brink of leaving a lifetime in labour.  She assumes a landslide victory and everyone seems to agree.  If and when she gets what we wants, we can be sure that the Brexit negotiations will be tough and unpredictable, and that the NHS/Social Care issues will not have gone away.  Strong majority and stable Tory government will then revert to its usual mode of ancient v modern arguments and quite likely water down the ‘leftist’ workers rights proposals in the Conservative manifesto.

The consequent mood in parliament will therefore be much more radical with the internal strife or perhaps innovative thinking in the Tory ranks being as bitter as ever but the ground will shift toward the centre.  The left will be all but eliminated and no doubt we shall see a resurgence of the centre left by either the Lib-dems or maybe even a new grouping.

The Scots in the meantime have also fallen for the ‘strong and stable’ mantra and will, I have no doubt, return more Tories to the fold.

Let’s hope that Mrs May really is ‘Strong and Stable’ in government but let’s hope that she is more flexible and imaginative as well.

Why do poilticians avoid the truth?  In the UK right now Theresa May is thumping the tub on one issue and one issue only: She’s the leader to take the UK through the Brexit negotiations.  Well, she’ll win,  she does seem the only coherent option, good for her.

But what about the other elephants in the room?  Not least the NHS and Social care. We all know that politicians bang on about “the NHS is afe with us, we’ll support it ad infinitum.”  Nonsense the NHS cannot go on with exponential demand and a finite budget.  Social care is grinding to a very inelegant stop as the population creeps toward 20% of it being over 70.  These issues are huge and evryone knows they are huge and the problem is unlikely to be solved by simply throwing money (not enough money) at them.

May should use her enormous political capital to do something which is a game changer, it is not appropriate to hide her intentions over these very important issues and hope that with a big parliamentary majority she can then undertake some radical and what will certainly be unpopular actions.  A very large proportion of the electorate will support changes if they can see the objective and understand its aim.

I fear that conservative dogma will limit her choices, which would be sad.  She says she is a woman of deep Christian principles, which enshrines giving, sharing and caring.  This could conceivably mean the taxing of the rich to give to the poorer, but that sounds like Mr Corbyn.  OK then, how about voluntary payments toward the NHS? Obsolute sacrilege, I hear them say.  How about a cross party development task force to come up with proposals before the end of her term of tenure.  She can hang up her boots if the report looks frantically unpopular, or she can wash her hands and say that the English committee cannot agree and the recommendtions will never be clear. Not her fault! The devolved administrations of Scotlad, Wales and NI are in even more parless situations, no matter which politcal party is in power.

Why don’t all of us admit that these problems are not easily solved.  At least admit they are problems and that things simply cannot go on in the same old way.  We cannot expect free healthcare at the point of issue, we cannot expect social care for seniors to be availbale for all, when we know that exponential demand both from population demographics and scientific advance will never decelerate.

Even Mrs May must see no single person or government will ever solve these porblems satisfactorily.  It’s beyond her, beyond her party, any party.  Surely there must be a cross party approach to these interminable problems.  Polititical kant is completely inappropraite.  Come on Theresa, show us what you really think.