Why I'm voting for the Green Party: I don't want a 'Better Plan', I want a good plan

1. Because I don't want a 'Better Plan', I want a good plan, a plan for the Common Good.
2. Because I believe in a Living Wage. People working full time on the minimum wage should earn enough to support themselves and their family.
3. Because I believe in having a fair, humane, common sense approach to immigration.
4. Because nuclear weapons have no place in civilised society.
5. Because education shouldn't cost a life time of debt and should be accessible at any stage of life.
6. Because big investments in renewable energy are needed if we are to still have any hope of preventing the worst of climate change.
7. Because when I've had surgery and chemotherapy, I've known that my health has been the priority, not profit. 5% profit is 5% too much, when it comes to keeping people alive there should be no place for the profit motive.
8. Because public services should be in public hands, not making huge profits while providing bad service and taking government subsidies. Public transport should be affordable and easy.
9. Because I want a fair rental market. No excessive, unjustifiable fees, no worrying about where you're going to live every 6 months, no uncontrollable rents.
10. Because I don't want the return of fox hunting, or more badger culls that go against all evidence.
11. Because fracking is just plain bad.
12. Because I don't want to vote for a party that I disagree with slightly less than another party. I want to vote for something I can believe in.
13. Because everyone should pay their fair share of tax.
14. Because they are not bankrolled by corporations, unions, millionaires and billionaires. Which means they don't put the needs of the wealthy before the needs of the many.
15. Because no one else mentions climate change, and if we don't get serious about climate change now, no other policies will matter in the future.

Easter weekend reading

There's so little going on this weekend that the media has resorted to making up 4th-hand accounts of conversations. Here's some articles actually worth reading:

Opinion:

Politics was once about beliefs and society. Now it’s a worship of money - Armando Iannucci
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/08/armando-iannucci-money-at-heart-of-politics-general-election-2015?CMP=share_btn_fb

If parties are funded by big business instead of average people, who are they going to act in the interests of? (Not a problem the Green Party has..)

It’s a great time to push for change in politics - Armando Iannucci 
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/18/2015-general-election-enough-fatalism-push-for-change?CMP=share_btn_tw

'...now is the best time in a generation to go out and vote. With such a fragmented system on offer, nothing is inevitable....
No politician voted into office is going to take the number of people who didn’t vote into account; what they will do is heed the number who voted, but not for them, if that number is overwhelming.
This time round, the day after the election, party leaders are going to look at the numbers – how many voted and how many didn’t vote for them. If both those figures breach certain tipping points then, irrespective of the number of seats won, and regardless of the make-up of the new House of Commons, the political agenda will have changed utterly.'

I didn’t leave the Labour party – it left me - Jack Monroe
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/19/leave-labour-party-green-party

'In fact, I had quietly left some weeks beforehand, and run away to look for the living wage, the social housing, the repurposing of abandoned buildings, free education and the NHS. I had left the Labour party to find the values that I thought that it once stood for, and I found them, in the Greens.

Like greeting old friends, I embraced the importance placed on a national health service, on public transport, on sustainable energy, on fair pay for fair work. Here you were, all the time.'

Enough of the dry politics of numbers. We need to discuss values and vision -Will Hutton
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/22/britains-economic-recovery-end-obsession-with-debt-reduction?CMP=share_btn_fb

'Britain’s national debt is comfortably affordable today – even moderate, by historical standards. To present it as economic enemy number one is just wrong.'

Local news:

Library of Birmingham cuts weekend opening to six hours
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-32146016?SThisFB&fb_ref=Default

Spend almost £200m on building the biggest public library in Europe and less than 2 years later run out of money to run it, meaning halving of opening hours and staff. How has this been allowed to happen?

News:

Lords accuse Tories of ‘burying’ review that cleared EU of interference
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/28/lords-accuse-tories-burying-eu-powers-review?CMP=share_btn_fb

Government spend millions on investigating how far Brussels' powers really go into British life. Find out that they're not a problem. Try to hide the evidence.

The rise of DIY dentistry: Britons doing their own fillings to avoid NHS bill
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/apr/03/rise-of-diy-dentistry-britons-doing-own-fillings-to-avoid-nhs-bill?CMP=share_btn_tw

There's still NHS dentists around?

Costa Rica goes 75 days powering itself using only renewable energy
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/costa-rica-goes-75-days-powering-itself-using-only-renewable-energy-10126127.html

Proof of what's possible if you put the effort in.

France decrees new rooftops must be covered in plants or solar panels
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/20/france-decrees-new-rooftops-must-be-covered-in-plants-or-solar-panels?CMP=share_btn_fb

A fellow European country doing something sensible while we sit around in denial? Yep, sounds about right. Go France!

Virgin Care among firms with lucrative NHS deals and a tax haven status
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/mar/21/ow-lucrative--deals-go-to-firms-that-use-tax-havens?CMP=share_btn_fb

The biggest privatisation in NHS history: why we had to blow the whistle - Kate Godfrey
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/mar/16/nhs-privatisation-biggest-history-staffordshire-cancer?CMP=share_btn_fb

Just depressing. And why the Tories must be stopped and Labour kept a very close eye on. Screw 5%, there should be no profit made from cancer or end-of-life care.

Nigel Farage would axe 'much of' race discrimination law
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-31846453?fb_ref=Default

UKIP - not racist, they just want the option...