Osborne’s Election (and
Hopefully Last) National Budget
Last Wednesday George Osborne (UK Chancellor of the Exchequer)
announced his sixth and last budget of this term of parliament. In the spectre
of austerity, Osborne had the audacity to stand up and declare ‘Britain walking
tall again.’ Read: white, middle class men in the private sector are walking
tall on the backs of everyone else! Including women. This was of course, the
election budget, so it was full of ‘gimmicks and giveaways’ such as yet another
penny off the average pint. There was absolutely no mention of the 200,000
signatures strong petition delivered to parliament last week to lobby the
government to stop taxing tampons as ‘luxury goods.’ As far as I’m concerned there
is nothing ‘luxury’ a tampon – sign said petition here. In
fact, there was not a single mention of women in the entire speech, despite the
fact that many journalists have
attributed his so-called growth to women’s labour whilst austerity has been
proven to have disproportionately disadvantaged women. For instance whilst
unemployment for men increased by only 0.32% from 2009-2013, it increased by
20% for women – this is largely a result of women being in disposable positions
or that the public sector (where most of these cuts have targeted) is two
thirds women. For more on this see this great article. Remember these are the budgets that closed down pretty much all
shelters, legal aid and support for rape victims in the UK. Need I say more?
As is evident for the statistics in this fantastic piece, women
have literally been excluded from any kind of economic growth. Whilst Osborne
stands tall and talks of employment being at an all time high since the crisis,
what he really means is men’s employment. The women’s rate still remains 10%
beneath said figure. The hypocrisy here leaves me dumbfounded, Osborne has cut
local authority budgets by up to 60% and still requires a rigorous Equally
Impact Assessment on all local authority budgets. Yet when it comes to his own
NATIONAL budget where he is dismantling public services piece by piece, it is
believed, he has not run a single EIA on all 5 of his previous budgets. That
has been left to academics and journalists once measures have been put in
place! For instance, this time around the fiscal dimension of Osborne’s budget
is being heralded by some as a success because of the
personal allowance increase: women will pay less income tax because they tend
to be in lower paying jobs. HURRAH! That is not a win for me. That is not
Osborne standing up a denouncing the very idea of women being paid 19.7% less
than a man. That is justifying the pay gap by saying OOH but they’ll pay a
penny or two less tax! The Women’s Budget Group will
post their analysis of this years budget soon and we will see the full extent
of the damage for women. This budget was once again targeted at the ‘male, pale
and stale’ private sector worker who is the only unit of analysis in the
Conservatives ‘long term economic plan.’ It keeps the rich rich and the poor poor
and even increases this gap alongside the gap between men and women. One must
appeal to one’s electorate I guess.
General Election 2015
Television Debates
Along a similar tangent, the dates for this years general election
campaign television debates have finally been announced after all the antics.
The British political system has changed drastically over the last 5 years and
we are absolutely no longer a 3-party state. Indeed, one of the election
debates will include all 7 of the biggest political party leaders. Including 3
women! Nicola Sturgeon (SNP), Natalie Bennett (the Green Party) and Leanne Wood
(Plaid Cymru) will appear alongside Cameron, Milliband, Clegg and Farage on 2
April. Personally, I am not sure of the relevance of Plaid Cymru or the SNP’s
presence because as an English constituent I cannot vote for either of them.
Nevertheless, the almost gender balance is refreshing and I really hope the
debate for the women will be more than what they’re wearing? It will be very
interesting to see what questions are targeted at these women. All three of
these leaders are continuously sexualised or demonised by the media, simply
because they are women and I am sure there is more of that to come. For
example, last week the BBC 3 talk show often described as ‘young persons
question time’ featured a Q&A with Surgeon, Wood and Bennett. I understand
why Sturgeon and Wood were grouped together but why Bennett? It seems to me
because she is also a woman? This bizarre sexism suggests a kind of ‘loose
women’ chat show appeal whilst all 4 of the other leaders will be scrutinised
separately and seriously on this show. I’ll leave you with a delightful cartoon
the repugnant Daily Mail released last week upon the announcement of a possible
Labour/SNP coalition. Just in case you thought the General Election could be
exempt from sexism:
Jeremy Clarkson
I really think I might have missed something here. I cannot
understand why and how this is a national news story and not simply a tabloid
feature. This man has been sexist, racist, homophobic and every other offensive
under the sun and yet it takes him to physically assault another man and/or threaten BBC profits for it to become a news
headline. I have very little else to say on this matter. I cannot understand
why it is even a story and I don’t wish to give it anymore wasted airtime than
it has already received! Get rid of him. Replace him with someone who isn’t
famous for being a bigot. Job done.
ISIS Propaganda takes more
Foreign Lives: British Women killed in Tunis Attack
23 people were gunned down by an attack on the Bardo museum in
Tunis, Tunisia last week. ISIS is claiming responsibility for this attack and
therefore furthering their demonization in the press. Why change an extremely
effective recruitment strategy? Attacking a museum in a tourism hub is a
strategic move to send shockwaves throughout the world. 20 of those who lost
their lives were foreign tourists. All of those countries will now be running
stories on this attack when they might not otherwise have. In the UK, it was a
woman who was killed: a wife and a mother. This is exactly what ISIS would’ve
wanted because it serves to further demonise them. After all, white female
lives are worth more to the West than the hundreds of others dying in the
Middle East everyday. The protection myth will once again be trotted out here
as further justification for air strikes to protect ‘women and children’. Air
strikes are clearly not working! Something different needs to be done. This is
upon the background of fears that 9 medics from London have recently travelled
to Syria to work for ISIS. Unbelievably the gender of said medics has not been
analysed by the press: IF they arrive in ISIS territory the likelihood of different
and disastrous treatment for the 5 women seems inevitable. The threat of
expansion into Yemen and Tunisia will scare foreign policy departments
worldwide. As it should: Tunisia is a mere 1800km from Paris, geographically
this is way too close to comfort. A different tact seems necessary, but what? I
am no advocate for further military intervention – the narrative on extremism
needs to change. With this change will hopefully bring a solution. Our thoughts
are with the family and friends of all lives being lost in this catastrophe.
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