Once again on the 19/20 October I attended the Battle of Ideas Festival from the Academy of Ideas in Church House near Westminster Abbey.
The event hosts almost 100 panels, interviews, and discussions on a range of topics with Free Speech and debate being are the core of it all.
The events started with an introduction from Baroness Fox of Buckley (Claire Fox) speaking about the importance of free speech and those who support it.
At a packed-out Battle of Ideas festival, @Fox_Claire opens the festival with a tribute to those brave enough to stand and support free speech and open debate.
The panels were as always excellent and were an opportunity to say hello to some people we’ve spoke with on Podcasts like Sam Bidwell and Dominic Frisby.
Good session today at #BattleFest talking about the importance of cash, & the dangers of a 'cashless society'.@DominicFrisby made an excellent case, which you can also read here: https://t.co/Z1sqg067ZK
But the battle isn’t just the debates, there are plenty of stalls around the events were stalls from the SDP, Reform UK, the Free Speech Union, Don’t Divide Us, #Together, The Freedom Association, and Politics in Pubs among many others.
The Battle of Ideas Festival is underway in London. It is one of the largest political-cultural free speech conferences in the world featuring dozens of simultaneous live debates.
Some of the controversial debate panels include topics on autism and transgenderism, immigration,… pic.twitter.com/an13H7XarH
In the hall I helped on our associates staff for Politics in Pubs.
We are delighted to have a stall again at the Battle of Ideas festival. So many great debates and speakers! If you're at #BattleFest this weekend and would like regular free-thinking discussions in your area come for at chat at our stall in the Assembly Hall. pic.twitter.com/fEQBa5UwW9
We happened to be placed next to the Communist Party of Britain Marxist-Leninist who despite our political differences were free speech believes and great chaps.
Just around the hall was our friends in the Freedom association accompanied by a leaflet we will soon be using to campaign for them in Redhill.
FIRE, The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression were also in the hall and we have a small goodie bag of their merchandise to give away at our Christmas drinks.
Paul Embery saw the irony of some of the groups together in the hall, but summed up the spirt of the event.
This is why the annual Battle of Ideas festival is such an excellent event. These two stalls literally within yards of each other! #BattleFest24pic.twitter.com/fzpOxtBh9U
“Instead of squeezing businesses they should scrap wasteful spending if they want to fix their finances.”
The Sun and Mail reported recently that Croydon Council is considering charging drivers to use their free company parking spaces.
The proposal is to implement the workplace parking levy in Croydon, and impose it on businesses with 11 or more privately owned spaces. The scheme is intended to reduce the use of private vehicles and raise revenue for our (de facto) bankrupt borough.
Benjamin Elks, of the TaxPayers’ Alliance summed this proposal up by saying “Instead of squeezing businesses they should scrap wasteful spending if they want to fix their finances.”
“Just as people are returning to offices the worst thing Croydon could do is put people off going back to the town centre with more tax”
As any visitor to Croydon town centre will be aware, the Whitgift Centre once the heart of the borough is hollowed out, and many offices have closed. Many people no longer visit the town centre due to the lack of shops and evening entertainment, and the ongoing problem of crime.
Just as people are returning to offices the worst thing Croydon could do is put people off going back to the town centre with more tax.
Perhaps as an alternative the council should have cut more unnecessary spending.
“There is no more expensive thing than a free gift”
Borough of Culture
As I’ve written about before between April 2023 and March 2024, Croydon was the London Borough of Culture. For which the council committed to spending £975,000, with £1,350,000 coming from the GLA, and £1,900,000 expected from Arts Council England and National Lottery Heritage.
Even for the money funded by other agencies this is still taxpayer funds being wasted away on what, posters at train stations? I can’t remember much else. Whether you prefer the Japanese proverb “There is nothing more expensive than something free” or French renaissance philosopher Michel de Montaigne’s, “There is no more expensive thing than a free gift”, you can be sure that Croydon council taxpayers picked up costs for events even when supposedly ‘funded’ by other agencies.
When you see your council tax rise 15%, flat income tax allowances erode your earnings, local services reduce and winter fuel payments for pensioners go, remember those posters about the Borough of Culture. You can also decide if these payments from the councils “Borough of Culture” cost centre were a good use of your taxes.
Total funds over £500 paid out by Croydon Council for “Borough of Culture” £2,527,404.02.
Table of vendors paid over £1000.
Vendor Name
Total Payments May22 – May24
Redacted
£428,787.70
Stanley Arts
£266,875.39
London Mozart Players
£145,762.50
Turf Projects_
£145,000.00
White Label Publishing Ltd
£136,468.60
Talawa Theatre Company
£136,000.00
Think Events (London) Ltd
£121,551.67
BH Live Ltd
£107,500.00
Savvy Theatre
£73,500.00
Four Communications Ltd
£65,597.66
The Brit School
£65,000.00
THE GREATEST SHOW ON EARTH LIMITED T/A The Circus
£60,628.00
Fashion Meets Music Collective C.I.C.
£50,750.00
Croydon Town Centre Bid
£45,000.00
Dance Umbrella
£45,000.00
Theatre – Rites
£42,000.00
Scanners Inc
£41,000.00
Zoo Co Theatre Ltd
£35,497.31
Apsara Arts
£32,475.00
Jen Kavanagh Ltd
£31,309.05
Boundless Theatre
£30,000.00
Contemporary Dance Trust LTD
£29,000.00
STRANGE CARGO ARTS COMPANY LIMITED
£28,410.00
CR34 t/a Mr Fox
£28,000.00
Achates Philanthropy Limited
£22,725.00
Croydon Pride Ltd
£20,000.00
Sound Intervention Limited
£13,920.00
Croydonites/CROYDONITES FESTIVAL OF NEW THEATRE CIC
£13,600.00
Llama Digital Ltd
£11,520.00
4 Wise Monkeys Ltd T/A Light Up Trails
£11,422.00
Bold Mellon Collective C.I.C.
£10,500.00
Profile Security Services Ltd
£10,395.52
Beeja
£10,000.00
YeahPod Music
£10,000.00
New Addington Peoples’ Carnival
£10,000.00
Designblock Studio Ltd
£9,895.00
Sysco Productions Ltd
£9,793.00
ATMA
£9,700.00
Premm Design Limited
£8,911.50
Jonathan Samuels T/A Samprojects
£8,475.40
The Young Urban Arts Foundation Limited
£7,790.00
Anglia Sign Casting ltd
£7,385.50
HURLYBURLY THEATRE
£6,750.00
Worldbeaters LTD
£6,690.00
CLUB SODA_
£6,590.00
Bureau Of Silly Ideas Limited
£6,000.00
Learn to Dream Ltd
£5,511.00
E-People.Com Ltd
£5,100.00
London Road Business Ltd
£5,000.00
Croydon with Talent Ltd
£5,000.00
Good Wolf People Ltd
£5,000.00
Tiny Productions
£4,760.00
LYNNEBEC COLLECTIVE CIC
£4,700.00
Norwood JunKAction
£4,500.00
Drum the Bass
£3,800.00
Cat and Hutch
£3,760.00
Tribal Entertainment Limited t/a the Romano Sidoli consultancy
£3,750.00
QWERKY ENTERTAINMENT LTD
£3,320.00
Finesse Foreva Ltd
£3,300.00
Pif-Paf Theatre Ltd
£3,290.00
BH Live Enterprises Ltd
£3,018.75
Hoggs Hospitality Ltd
£3,000.00
Graeme Miall t/a One Tree
£3,000.00
LadyLaird
£2,500.00
Digital Drama Productions Ltd
£2,250.00
ATELIER ARZU LIMITED
£2,120.00
Paul Hudson Associates
£2,100.00
The Enriched Kids CIC
£2,000.00
SDNA LTD
£2,000.00
Zip Design Ltd
£1,950.00
Rap Therapy
£1,950.00
Giant Cheese Limited
£1,847.00
Studio Scamps ltd
£1,650.00
Bainbridge Conservation Ltd.
£1,616.00
Autistic Community Hub CIC
£1,200.00
Vauxhall City Farm Limited
£1,188.50
Reaching Higher
£1,100.00
Clocktower Cafe Ltd
£1,084.00
“When you see your council tax rise 15%, flat income tax allowances erode your earnings, local services reduce and winter fuel payments for pensioners go, remember those posters about the Borough of Culture”
“What I’m saying is, I think only an idiot would vote for me.”
That could have been Rishi Sunak’s general election campaign strategy”
2024 was in many ways the ‘none of the above’ election. In the classic 1985 movie Brewster’s Millions, Richard Pryor’s character say’s
“I figure voting for Salvino or Heller is just as silly as them running for office, which is just as silly as me running for office. The only thing that’s silly is the power of the people’s vote. And I think the people should use it to vote for… None of the above.”
He’s asked, “Mr. Brewster, are we to understand that you actually don’t want anyone to vote for you?”
And answers, “What I’m saying is, I think only an idiot would vote for me.”
That could have been Rishi Sunak’s general election campaign strategy, and judging by voter turnout it could have also almost been Labour’s
It came as a surprise to me to learn that ‘none of the above’ is a popular international option, which includes ‘none of the above’ on ballots as a standard option, in Argentina, Belarus, Belgium, Bulgaria, Canada, Colombia, France, Greece, India, Indonesia, Mongolia, the Netherlands, Norway, Peru, Spain, Kazakhstan, Switzerland, Uruguay and the US state of Nevada.
“Comparing 2024 votes to the average of the previous three elections, the total votes were down 9%. The Labour’s vote was down 10%. The Tory vote was down 47%”
We should acknowledge that 54.7% of the vote went to the Conservatives and Labour. But in many ways the big winners of the election were anyone out of power. We saw in Scotland the SNP get pushed back, and across England and Wales the Greens, Reform and independent MPs doing particularly well.
We are Democrats. Labour won a stonking majority, and they now have a mandate to govern. But, it’s clear they’ve not gained a popular mandate. I’m hardly the first to say it, and although half the people here might not really remember it, this isn’t Labour’s win in 1997.
Comparing 2024 votes to the average of the previous three elections, the total votes were down 9%. The Labour’s vote was down 10%. The Tory vote was down 47% compared to the last three elections. Reform was up 6% on 2015. 2015 being the obvious comparison with UKIP. The Lib Dems were up 24% and the Greens were up 123%.
What happened locally? It’s hard to make a direct comparison in Croydon due to the constituency changes. Those that don’t know, Streatham came into Croydon North. and Croydon has increased in population. But roughly what’s happened? In 2015, 2019 and 2024, I’ve left out 2017, because it really was quite an anomaly. Elections have had virtually the same number of voters, despite big increases in population and for this last election adding Streatham into that mix.
“Reform’s vote is locally, back to the same level UKIP received in 2015. This was achieved with no ground game and barely visible candidates, which suggests there’s some room for growth”
Compared to the last election in 2019, the Conservative vote has dropped by 12.2%, but Labour’s has dropped by 1.2%, again despite adding Streatham, which is a predominantly Labour area. The LibDem vote was basically a wash between now and the last election. The big changes were the Greens up 27.6% on 2019 and Reform up 54.9%, of course Reform didn’t run in Croydon South in 2019.
Reform’s vote is locally, back to the same level UKIP received in 2015. This was achieved with no ground game and barely visible candidates, which suggests there’s some room for growth. Much as it pains me to say this, the real success story was the Greens, who basically achieved a 75% higher vote than they did in 2015.
I believe the Greens are the ‘none of the above’ vote for many people who don’t know what their actual policies are. The local elections were held in 2021, which included the delayed locals from 2020, where the first local elections in many areas since the high point of UKIP. In ward, after ward, after ward, the UKIP vote went down, basically because they didn’t stand a candidate, by exactly the same amount as the Green Party vote went up. Now, this may be because of a particular demographic change in the area. It may be because the people that wanted out of Europe also wanted net zero. It may also be because they were voting for ‘none of the above’ in 2015 and they were voting for none-of-the-above in 2021. In saying this I acknowledge as someone who stood for UKIP, many may have voted for the party, primarily as they represented at the time ‘none of the above’.
Croydon, though, is still largely a two-party town. 73% of the total vote. But these same two parties saw their vote go down by 23,000 over the last election, whilst other parties’ votes went up by 22,000.
“if you deliver on your promises you can win. This may have also been a dig at some senior people in his party, but it could be rather a positive sign of what we need politicians to do”
Fewer people are voting, more are tactically voting, and more are voting for smaller parties. I think it’s reasonable to assume people are voting with more knowledge rather than just voting for the traditional red or blue party.
Here in Croydon South, Chris Philp pulled out an unexpected result and won. His vote went down, and there looks like an awful lot of tactical voting, but still Chris prevails as a local Conservative. On the night, he put it down to delivering on his promises locally, which included DEMOC, and planning. On the night he also asked Mayor Jason Perry to commit to the Purley Pool. He said, basically, if you deliver on your promises you can win. This may have also been a dig at some senior people in his party, but it could be rather a positive sign of what we need politicians to do. Hopefully it catches on for the future.
“the first post-lockdown election, and I don’t actually remember anyone talking about the lockdown at all, despite it being perhaps the most significant thing since the war that’s happened in this country”
In August 2020, among one of many versions of lockdown, I wrote about the need for a political party to run on a ticket of liberty. My article started by saying the line, ‘Growing up in the 80s it was common to hear “I can say what I like, it’s a free country”’. But that’s really not felt true for some years now, has it?
Now, we’ve had an election, the first post-lockdown election, and I don’t actually remember anyone talking about the lockdown at all, despite it being perhaps the most significant thing since the war that’s happened in this country. I no longer think a freedom-focused party is the best way forward. People are used to voting for smaller parties, which was a really interesting point of note out of the election, but Reform has stepped up as the overwhelming front-runner among liberty-minded people.
You may not think of Reform as a libertarian party, but it is the standout party in that space. I don’t think there’s room for anyone else. The election has seen a rise in the enemies of freedom, the Green Party and independent candidates, who stand for the absolute antithesis of freedom. Of course, overall, it was a big win for Labour, and they now have a huge majority in government.
What’s the landscape we’re now facing? Well, there’s no money. We had the King’s speech today, and from what I could see they didn’t really plan to spend a lot of money in it. So, they’re going to focus on that other socialist passion – Control.
“There’s going to be a need for a freedom-focused campaign, because the socialist in power will want to control us, especially because they can’t spend any more of our money”
I wrote this before the King’s speech, and for those of you that have looked through what’s happening, it’s clear that Labour are focus on control. There’s going to be a need for a freedom-focused campaign, because the socialist in power will want to control us, especially because they can’t spend any more of our money, as there ain’t none. To build a campaign you need a bit of a gap in the market, you need an opportunity. You need people to think about the fact that freedoms important to them, and you need something that motivates them.
If there was a voter’s equivalent to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, it might start with economics and some basic safety. Blair got this right, there was no gap in the market to push back against some of Blair’s reforms, because frankly we were rich and safe under Blair’s government most of the time. He didn’t allow that gap in the market to exist. Sir Keir will allow that gap, we are not rich, and we are not safe. Indeed he’s already doing some things to ensure we will be less rich and less safe.
So that creates an incentive, a push, a drive, for people to say, what’s going wrong here, what can we do? Let’s look at what he is and isn’t doing:
he’s doing nothing on housing, which is for a certain generation at least, the single biggest impact in terms of wealth and concern for people,
he’s making Britain a clean energy superpower – which is going to make us poorer,
and of course he’s taking back our streets by releasing prisoners.
If you look at some of their plans for liberty, in their manifesto, they want to close the gender pay gap, that sounds fine in and of itself, but of course that means telling you how to run your business.
They’ve got a promise to introduce mandatory disability and ethnicity pay gap reporting, again telling you how to run your business, taking away your options and opportunity. They want to shift the negative attitudes around diversity, equity, and inclusion. Interesting timing as you may have seen that Microsoft are closing their in-house DEI department today.
Shifting negative attitudes, if you’ve made a manifesto commitment to that, I’m not sure that you’re talking about changing people’s attitude by doing something different. I think you might be talking about them forcing a change in people’s attitudes, again another massive impact on people’s freedom. They’re banning conversion therapy, the therapy is I think a rather ridiculous thing, but again it’s a freedom, it’s a choice, it’s people’s religious expression, it’s people’s right to air their personal views, that’s being taken away. We also know this Labour party was massively sympathetic to lockdowns and taking pretty much all our freedoms away, and they are very sympathetic to ID cards. Again, this creates an opportunity to campaign for freedom.
“What do we need to do? I think we need a minimum viable product for freedom”
What do we need to do? I think we need a minimum viable product for freedom, a minimum set of things that most of us can agree on and work towards. I would propose it to be:
free speech,
the rule of law,
democracy,
evolution of power from the centre,
and value for money from what the government does spend money on.
For the last one, no matter what you think the government should spend on or not, I’d hope we’d all agree we ought to get value for money from it.
On line’s important and useful, but it can’t be replaced by real world activity. If you want to grow a movement, sending people down the rabbit hole of clicking on the same links all of the time and getting the same things presented back is not the way to go. You need to get out to the real world and reach out to new people.
We need street stalls, leafleting at stations, leafleting at schools. I wrote back in 2000, 5,000 leaflets, colour double-sided, A5, decent weight of paper, it’s £100. This is not cheap, but it’s not generally unaffordable. Even cheaper is a press release which is free. All you need to do is write to your local democracy reporter. If it’s good enough for the pizza firm, it’s good enough for us.
Focus on local issues if you can, partner with national groups, but frankly do something. If we can’t partner with a national group, we will just do it ourselves. We will get our own things out, we will start putting something in people’s hands to say, do you want to be told what you can and can’t say? Do you want to be told what you can and can’t do? Two years ago, I’m not sure people would have listened to us, but that can change with the new government.
Mike Swadling opposed the motion, and below is his speech delivered to the society. As always with this friendly group the debate was good natured, very well proposed and drew out some great views from the audience.
“It’s my decision, it’s not your effort, it’s not your savings, it’s not the sacrifices you made, it’s not that you took that better paying job you didn’t like, it’s not the investment choices you made that decide what you earn… Does that seem fair?”
You may not have picked up this on the news but, in a stunning coup d’état earlier today, I became Supreme Leader of Price and Wages in the UK. I get to decide wages and pensions of everyone.
It’s my decision, it’s not your effort, it’s not your savings, it’s not the sacrifices you made, it’s not that you took that better paying job you didn’t like, it’s not the investment choices you made that decide what you earn. No, I do, I get to decide it. Does that seem fair? Are you happy with that? Because if you vote for this motion, that’s in effect what you are voting for.
Is that something you want? Or should there be another way of doing this perhaps? We all get to see the end product of these highly paid stars, but we don’t see the years of effort to get there.
I know two people whose sons are excellent footballers. One’s son is in the youth team at a Championship side, the other is aiming for a scholarship to an American University for soccer. We all talk about the high-end wages’ footballers get at the top, but most of these kids won’t make it. They are driving on a Thursday night, Wednesday night, most of the weekend, taking their kids away, taking them to across the country to play for their team. They are putting huge amounts of effort in for their family. These kids are also putting a huge amount of their own effort often whilst taking exams, to try and make it. We just see the end product, to which some will say “isn’t it unfair what they earn”, but we and they don’t see the effort.
Sir Steve Redgrave, the great Olympian, talking about his training said: “It’s all about endurance training. Our training sessions are long and boring. Probably the hardest part was the circuit training in the gym. There were 13-14 different exercises and you had so many reps on each exercise and the peak of that we’d be doing four circuits, so we had over an hour of continuous reps of medium-sized weights, but doing it as quickly as you could. That produced more lactic acid than anything else.”
These people have worked ridiculously hard and that is why they are an elite. They are not putting in a normal amount of effort.
On average, at Real Madrid, footballers train around four to five hours a day. Now, that doesn’t sound too bad as a job. But, they first get there and do 25 to 30 minutes of cardio, followed by some short, intense sprinting drills. That’s sprinting after they’ve done the cardio exercises. They do football tactical drills to improve their understanding with teammates. Then go to the gym for muscle development and strength.
I’m sure we all know of people that were good swimmers at a younger age. People that would be at the swimming pool at six o’clock in the morning before all the schools came in. A huge amount of sacrifice by them and their families. This is not a normal job. This is not a normal level of effort. That’s why these people can end up so well rewarded. And we enjoy their skills.
“The Premier League is big. It’s exported. It’s a fantastic product for our country. In the same season, there was an average of 527,000 viewers per match in the US”
The opening weekend of the Premier League in 2003 with five live matches drew in a total of eight million TV viewers. The Premier League is big. It’s exported. It’s a fantastic product for our country. In the same season, there was an average of 527,000 viewers per match in the US.
A survey in 2017 revealed that more than 40% of the population in Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas consider themselves to be soccer fans. Cricket is the world’s second most popular sport, followed by 2.5 million people. Basketball by 2.2 billion people. Tennis has an estimated fan base of a billion people in the world.
Rugby, not a sport you think of as being in that many places, has over 400 million fans worldwide. Basketball over 500 million. Gymnastics, not a sport I would think of as being a spectator sport, has over 100 million fans worldwide. That’s gymnastics. It’s the smaller of one of the big sports, yet still has more people following it across the globe than the populations of Iran, Turkey or Germany.
Sports are huge and the people at the top of them get rewarded to reflect that. But that’s the people that follow it. Who goes along? The average Formula 1 race has over 279,000 people at it. The NFL in America has 69,000, Bundesliga, 42,000, Premier League, averages over 40,000 people in attendance, Major League Basketball, 29,000, Rugby League in Australia, 19,000 and the European Rugby Champions Cup, club rugby, 16,000. These are people that are willing to physically attend and pay and turn up.
Even if their average ticket was £30 (and it will be more), that means the average Formula 1 event brings in £8.3 million. The average club at Rugby Union, which is at the lower end, brings in half a million pounds. This is a huge amount of money.
Of course, the real money is in TV. The Super Bowl gets 124 million viewers, and Champions League, 380 million. The Women’s FIFA World Cup, 1.1 billion. Women’s football, wasn’t well known 10 years ago, and 1.1 billion people watched their world cup. The Men’s World Cup will have over 3 billion viewers. That’s a lot of people turning on their TVs, and that, of course, generates a lot of revenue.
“There are 380 matches in an English Premier League season. It generates £3.2 billion in TV income. Assuming ticket prices are only £30, average matchday income in this country between TV and attendance, is £8.2 million”
The current Premier League TV deal, brings in £1.57 billion in domestic TV rights and £1.64 billion in overseas TV rights. Our Premier League, with all these overpaid stars, or supposedly overpaid stars, is generating £1.6 billion in external revenue for this country. Wimbledon, the tennis, brings in $44 million in UK TV and $53 million in US TV, and, of course, there are other markets. The Tokyo Olympics brought in $3.1 billion in TV income. IPL cricket in India brings in over £1 billion per year in TV.
All these viewers, all these people turning up, all this income, where should the money go if it’s not the performers? Who should get that money if it’s not the people generating that entertainment?
There are 380 matches in an English Premier League season. It generates £3.2 billion in TV income. Assuming ticket prices are only £30, average matchday income in this country between TV and attendance, is £8.2 million. Assuming 40 players, now there are only 22 on the field, but you’ve got subs, you’ve got a coach, you’ve got a manager, you talk about the people actually providing that entertainment, that’s £206,000 per person.
The average EPL salary works out at £94,000 per match. If anything, you might argue, these players are underpaid. There’s £206,000 each they’re bringing in, but they’re only paid £94,000 of it. Where does the other £112,000 go? It goes to youth teams, reserve teams, women’s football, all subsidised by the men’s game. Less than half goes to the people who actually provide the entertainment. I’ve not included sponsorship and not added other matchday income. Even more money not going to the players.
If you think elite sportsmen and women are grossly overpaid, with all the income that these sports generate, I want to ask you, why do you think that tennis star Coco Gauff didn’t deserve her $6.7 million in winnings last year? Why do you think that Simone Biles, the gymnast, didn’t deserve her $8.5 million in sponsorship and endorsements. Why did she not deserve that? You’ve got to be able to answer that question. Who should have got the $1.4 million in prize money that golfer Nelly Korda raised if it wasn’t her?
Why do you want to deny all of these elite female athletes, after all their years of sacrifice, with the hundreds of millions of people that view, and the hundreds of millions of income that comes in, their fair share?
I also wonder what it is about sports that people object to. Top models shift clothes. The highest paid model of last year was Kendall Jenner, who generated $40 million worth of income. Chrissy Teigen generated $39 million. They shifted clothes. Someone decided to pay them. Why shouldn’t they get paid for it if they generate someone else’s revenue?
The top musicians last year, Taylor Swift, played 56 shows and earned $305 million. Beyonce, 46 shows, earning $145 million. Ed Sheeran, 41 shows, earning $110 million. If these people pay to sold out venues for people who want to pay, and nobody’s forcing anyone to be there, why shouldn’t the artists get the reward if they’re the reason people turn up? I ask again, if they don’t get it, who should?
Elon Musk has made $250 billion through his businesses and inventions; Henry Ford would have been worth over $200 billion in today’s money. James Dyson, has made $22 billion. If they didn’t get the money for what they invented, and few people would deny inventors earning the benefit of their craft, of their ideas, then who should? If you think they should get it, what is it about sports people that you want to deny from their toil? Why are they less deserving of their income than, say, academics, surgeons, actors or entrepreneurs? What makes them less deserving than anyone else?
“When you artificially hold down a price, you create problems. You create problems with investment. You don’t satisfy the demand, and through lower prices you may create more demand”
As with anything, if you cap the price, you simply get more demand, with the profit to be made by the touts who will suck up the tickets in between. They will be making the profit rather than the sports stars. What is it about the touts that you think is more deserving than the people playing on the field? This isn’t just true in sports. Scotland introduced rent controls for two years. They’re just about rolling off now. It led to a reduction in supply of rented accommodation, and a reduction in investment in properties, and basically increased the time it took to get a new property from 12 to 16 weeks.
When you artificially hold down a price, you create problems. You create problems with investment. You don’t satisfy the demand, and through lower prices you may create more demand, but someone makes a profit that isn’t the person that’s renting out the property, or indeed the person that wants to rent it in the first place. In New York, you famously have rent-controlled apartments. All too often the official tenant sublets. A middleman, not the landlord, not the actual tenant. Someone who does very little, and who doesn’t deserve it is making the money.
When you have an artificially low price, the money doesn’t go to the fans, because the fans still want to go. In fact, if you hold the price down, more fans want to go, and the tickets will be sold on the black market, and that will be more money for middlemen.
To quote the economist Milton Friedman, “We economists don’t know much, but we do know how to create a shortage. If you want to create a shortage of tomatoes, for example, just pass a law that retailers can’t sell tomatoes for more than two cents per pound. Instantly you’ll have a tomato shortage.”
And to paraphrase him, ‘Price ceilings, which prevent prices from exceeding a certain maximum, cause shortages. Price floors, which prohibit prices below a certain minimum, cause surpluses, at least for a time.’
What happens with that surplus? What happens with that shortage? As the economist Thomas Sowell says, “Price controls almost invariably produce black markets, where prices are not only higher than the legally permitted prices, but also higher than they would be in a free market, since the legal risks must also be compensated. While small-scale black markets may function in secrecy, large-scale black markets usually require bribes to officials to look the other way.”
“This is what the motion calls for, if we don’t pay the players, if we hold down prices artificially as a means of not paying the players, you just make touting more widespread”
If anyone has brought tickets from a tout, they are not normally what you would describe as nice people. They’re not people that make you think, ‘I’m happy doing business with them’.
While small-scale black markets may function in secrecy, large-scale black markets usually require bribes for officials to look the other way. As an example, anyone knows anything about getting tickets to the FA Cup final, will know there are a huge number of tickets given away to people involved in football. They all too often get sold on the black market.
There are always touts around the game, otherwise they wouldn’t do this. This is what the motion calls for, if we don’t pay the players, if we hold down prices artificially as a means of not paying the players, you just make touting more widespread.
“When football had a maximum wage, it wasn’t the working-class heroes who received the money. No, those lads, had second jobs”
When Rugby Union was an amateur sport, players had a habit of getting great jobs. We used to have players not being fairly paid but they often got great jobs in the city, and people always wondered why.
When football had a maximum wage, it wasn’t the working-class heroes who received the money. No, those lads, had second jobs. The club owners got the money, or the people with good connections got the money. The people that knew how to make the system work for them, they got the money.
To quote Thomas Sowell again, “there are no solutions, only trade-offs”.
“after years of hard work and sacrifice, the sports stars provide the entertainment and inspiration. Why do you here think you should pass judgement on how much these sports stars should earn?”
In the tens of thousands people attend, in the hundreds of millions they watch, billions are generated in revenue. I make this challenge to you, after years of hard work and sacrifice, the sports stars provide the entertainment and inspiration. Why do you here think you should pass judgement on how much these sports stars should earn?
Summary
Sports brings people together as Nelson Mandela once said, “Sport has the power to change the world, it has the power to inspire.” “It has the power to unite people in a way that little else does. Sport can create hope where once there was only despair.”
We’ve spoken about the sacrifices elite sports people make. They are different, that’s why they are elite. Martina Navratilova clarifies the difference in mentality they need to have in saying, “Whoever said, ‘It’s not whether you win or lose that counts,’ probably lost”.
Finally, to quote Muhammad Ali, “It’s just a job. Grass grows, birds fly, waves pound the sand. I beat people up.”
And why I ask you, shouldn’t he get well paid for it?
“the world’s largest democracy and country, India is going to the ballot box”
With a 20 mile stretch of golden sand, a shallow continental shelf allowing you to walk far into the Arabian Sea, a dry heat and beach bars every few hundred yards my spot in Goa wasn’t a place to be thinking about politics.
However, go about a mile inland and flags, boards and posters start to pop up for the Aam Aadmi Party, the Revolutionary Goans Party, Congress, a selection of BJP candidates, and even graffiti about the Portuguese (Goa used to be a Portuguese colony). As well as a likely general election in the UK and the Presidential election in the US, the world’s largest democracy and country, India is going to the ballot box.
No signs of revolution on the beach as long as the Peoples Lager kept flowing.
“The Indian National Congress is the traditional party of power in India having held the position of Prime Minister for 54 of the 77 years since independence”
The election is dominated by two main groups the BJP led ‘National Democratic Alliance’ and Congress led ‘Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance’. The Indian National Congress is the traditional party of power in India having held the position of Prime Minister for 54 of the 77 years since independence. The Bharatiya Janata Party (Indian People’s Party) was formed in 1980 and is the current party of power being led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Whilst no Pakistani PM has ever completed a full-term, India has had many peaceful transitions of power. Not that India has been devoid from political violence, far from it. But this is a nation of 780 spoken languages (23 official), from four major language families, with 1.4 billion people, and 5 religions with over 8 million followers, it is amazing India functions as a democracy at all. For all its challenges function it does.
Not often you see anti-Portuguese graffiti.
I turned to Nimit Shishodia to explain some of the main differences between the main party’s:
BJP
Right-wing ideology: Aligned with Hindutva, a Hindu nationalist ideology, emphasizing cultural nationalism and a strong central government.
Economic focus: Leans towards privatization and economic liberalization, attracting support from sections of the middle class and business community.
Social positions: Often takes conservative stances on social issues, appealing to traditional values and rural communities.
Congress
Centre-left ideology: Advocates for secularism and social welfare programs, historically drawing support from diverse groups, including minorities and lower-income populations.
Economic approach: Promotes a mixed economy with government intervention in key sectors, appealing to working-class voters and some sections of the middle class.
Social positions: Generally, takes more progressive stances on social issues, aligning with urban and younger demographics.
Important Caveats:
Both parties have diverse internal factions with varying viewpoints.
Their policies and stances evolve over time and in response to political realities.
There’s significant overlap in their voter bases, with both parties drawing support from various social and economic groups.
Nimit’s last point that “There’s significant overlap in their voter bases, with both parties drawing support from various social and economic groups” is perhaps the most significant. Functioning democracies require people to be able to change who they are voting for, not just vote based on identity.
“Modi is widely expected to win again”
The election will take place between April and May to elect 543 members of the Lok Sabha (House of the People) each coalition has 20+ party’s. The country has 8 recognised national parties, 55 state parties, and 2,597 unrecognised parties. It’s fair to say everyone has a point of view. Modi is widely expected to win again. I wrote briefly about a debate at the Battle of Ideas on Indian Politics, giving lots of background in an easily digestible way, you can listen to it at: Understanding Modi’s India – Battle of Ideas.
“I want the 5th biggest economy, and most populous country to be democratic and free”
“the people of India benefit from that basic enabler of liberty the ability to ‘kick the buggers out’”
Why does all this matter? Democracy’s support and advance human freedom, something we should all want. Democracies promote general economic growth and their citizens wellbeing, and democracies don’t tend to ever go to war with each other. In a world reverting to a more multi polar state, quite apart from the benefits to its own people, I want the 5th biggest economy, and most populous country to be democratic and free.
We should all be thankful this massive country and significant power is a democracy and the people of India benefit from that basic enabler of liberty the ability to ‘kick the buggers out’ when the party of power no longer meets the people’s needs.
Trials are underway across the country of Live Facial Recognition technology allowing Police to scan crowds for known criminals. These trials have taken place in Croydon town centre among other places. The MP just across the border in Croydon South is Chris Philp the Minister of State for Crime, Policing and Fire, and my local MP wrote to residents about the trials.
Chris’ note describes how the software works.
“LFR starts with a “watchlist” of images of people who are wanted for serious offences or who are wanted by the Court for failing to attend a criminal hearing. A camera is then set up by Police in a location with high footfall, and advanced facial recognition software is used to see if anyone walking past matches one of the images on the watchlist”
“I admit to having been in some conflict, not losing too much sleep over the criminal arrests, but worrying of the civil liberty implications”
According to a Croydon Guardian article of the 10th February, the software has led to 45 arrests. As someone who has seen the sharp increase in crime in Croydon, and people staying away from the town centre in recent years, what’s not to like? Well…
A couple of friends recently ask my thoughts on the civil liberties implications and if it is just an extension of CCTV cameras everywhere. I admit to having been in some conflict, not losing too much sleep over the criminal arrests, but worrying of the civil liberty implications and how the technology might be used in the future.
“Is it the same as a Police Officer walking down the street and recognising a known criminal or is it more like a house search?”
The obvious point with any new technology is once we have it, we can’t uninvent it. Whishing it would go away isn’t realistic, so the best option is to work out how we use it. How to use Live Facial Recognition? I believe we should look at how we police today and see what template the technology best fits into. Is it the same as a Police Officer walking down the street and recognising a known criminal or is it more like a house search?
We have templates for these. In the case of a Police officer recognising you in the street, to arrest you they must meet the following criteria.
“To arrest you the police need reasonable grounds to suspect you’re involved in a crime for which your arrest is necessary. The police have powers to arrest you anywhere and at any time, including on the street, at home or at work.”
Whereas the power to search your house (although with some time specific exceptions), requires additional judicial sign-off.
“If the police want to search a property, they must usually get a search warrant from the court first. In the application, the police must prove to the court that there are reasonable grounds for the warrant.”
Stop and Search powers lie somewhere in between these. The interpretation of the law changes and the way stop and search has been carried out in recent years, has seen wildly varying numbers of searches.
Number of stop and searches performed by the police in England and Wales from 2001/02 to 2022/23
Likewise in the UK wiretapping requires judicial approval.
“Without a warrant, the police cannot listen to a person’s phone conversations, unless one of the parties to a phone conversation consents to the use of a wiretap. Any information they gather without a warrant and without consent cannot be used against a defendant in a criminal trial.”
“scanning peoples faces to see if they match a watchlist goes a significant step further than seeing you acting suspiciously”
So where does Live Facial Recognition fit within these templates. Clearly this is a matter of opinion, but it does seem to me that scanning peoples faces to see if they match a watchlist goes a significant step further than seeing you acting suspiciously or having reasonable grounds to suspect you’re involved in a crime.
As a general view it seems the use of Live Facial Recognition is more akin to a search. Therefore, if it is used in the street a judge should be needed to sign it off for a specific purpose. Examples could be, Police think there will be trouble at a specific football match, and it is used to search only for known football hooligans, or there has been increased gang violence in an area and it is used to search only for known gang members wanted for crimes. This would mean not giving Police the power to just use the technology in a given high street on the off chance that they can arrest some people.
However, it does seem reasonable that it is used in some places you would expect Police to act. This could be in Police stations to identify suspects, in courts, at the border, where you should be carrying a passport already, the systems could permanently run.
“we should panic, a bit, not overly so, but it is reasonable to assume the Police will abuse this power without some constraint”
What about all the criminals that won’t be caught? Chief Superintendent Andy Brittain, is quoted to have said people “don’t need to panic”. In the last couple of weeks we have seen police tell a “Christian singer on Oxford Street that she is ‘not allowed’ to perform ‘church songs outside of church grounds’”, only a few years ago police had to “ apologise for telling family they weren’t allowed in their own front garden”, whilst elsewhere there were using drones to “chase Peak District ramblers”. Police have in recent times treated different groups protesting in central London very differently, so much so that the then Home Secretary Suella Braverman wrote as summarised in Spiked that the “Metropolitan Police must be ‘even-handed’ in their approach to protests. She warned that there is now a ‘perception that senior police officers play favourites’”. In short, yes we should panic, a bit, not overly so, but it is reasonable to assume the Police will abuse this power without some constraint.
We don’t today allow police to search people without cause, search homes or wiretap without a warrant, we restrain police powers to protect our freedoms, and there is no reason why Live Facial Recognition should be any different.
In November we held our 3rd My tuppenceworth event giving you the opportunity to speak to those assembled on an issue that really matters to you.
Mike Swadling gave an update on Croydon Council and his speech is below.
“Croydon is 29th on the list of highest real terms increase at 114%. We are paying well over double the real terms rate we were 1993″
We are the Croydon Constitutionalists. Constitutionalists signifies that we believe in the principles of English constitutional government through electoral politics, and the Croydon part is self-evident we are a local organisation. So, 18 months into a new Croydon council led by a new executive mayor what’s happening in our town?
Firstly, let’s take a little step back in time. The Taxpayers’ Alliance (TPA) has published data showing that of the 450 local authorities that have continually existed since the Council Tax was first introduced in 1993, Croydon is 29th on the list of highest real terms increase at 114%. We are paying well over double the real terms rate we were 1993. We are still de facto bankrupt and we are paying through the nose for it.
“Croydon was one of 47 councils, about 10%, who failed to submit accounts on time. I get that this is doing less, but can it really be called better?”
In an interview in August Croydon’s chief executive, Katherine Kerswell, gave some encouraging words when she said: “Our ambition is to become an efficient council – to deliver essential services well, offer value for money, to listen to the people of Croydon, and simply do what we say we will do. So how do we get there? We must do less, better”
Fine words, but what have we seen in practice. To quote: “Croydon council in South London paid 21 staff six-figure salaries last year. Its top earner was chief executive Katherine Kerswell on £192,474.”
I took this information from a June article in the Daily Express. Not able to take it from the TPA’s Town Hall Rich list report as Croydon was one of 47 councils, about 10%, who failed to submit accounts on time. I get that this is doing less, but can it really be called better?
I tried to verify this data on the council’s website as I should be able to. If anyone cares to search it and can find a decent list, please send me the link. Eventually I found a list of job titles listed in an unclear format in a PDF file on the site which is I suppose meeting their statutory requirement.
Again, I get that this is Croydon Council doing less but is it really doing it better? Worse still whist 21 is down on the 29 roles paid over £100K the council had last year; it is up on the 19 roles the year before. Last year was a year of transition and I believe not all these roles overlapped, so it appears, and the lack of clear publications make this hard to see, that top end spending at the council is back on the increase.
“spending public funds on arts that are not viable commercially or via voluntary donations as the council has been doing for years, is no less of a waste of money when it comes from someone else’s funding stream”
Croydon is the London Borough of Culture for 2023. As part of this they are committed to spending £522,500 in 2022/23, and £452,500 in 2023/24. Additionally, £1,350,000 will come from the GLA, and £1,900,000 is expected from Arts Council England and National Lottery Heritage.
I believe spending public funds on arts that are not viable commercially or via voluntary donations as the council has been doing for years, is no less of a waste of money when it comes from someone else’s funding stream.
“Of the £623,000 spent on the London Borough of Culture in that time, £34K went to Redacted, what are they hiding from us?”
As part of this in the last 4 months Croydon Council has published figures of Borough of Culture spending which include £113K that went to Think Events (London) Ltd, £75K went to Stanley Arts, £67K to White Label Publishing Ltd, £42K to Theatre – Rites, and £39K to London Mozart Players, I could go on and on. Of the £623,000 spent on the London Borough of Culture in that time, £34K went to Redacted, what are they hiding from us?
“in 4 months £623,000 of taxpayers’ money spent not feeding needy families, not boosting our town centre, not providing social services for the most vulnerable, but on painted Giraffes and non-commercially viable arts”
May I remind you this is in the last 4 months that data has been published for, May to July. This is 4 months, not one year, not over the two-year programme. That is in 4 months £623,000 of taxpayers’ money spent not feeding needy families, not boosting our town centre, not providing social services for the most vulnerable, but on painted Giraffes and non-commercially viable arts.
Yes, things are better than 18 months ago. We are no longer haemorrhaging money through Brick by Brick, and we are slowly unwinding the commercial property failures of the last administration. But when it comes to transparency and wise use of public funds, it’s hard to argue they are doing things better at Croydon Council.
In November we held our 3rd My tuppenceworth event giving you the opportunity to speak to those assembled on an issue that really matters to you.
Mike Swadling spoke on the issue of housing and his speech is below.
“with so much of our housing stock built between the wars it’s seems likely the number of homes in need of replacement will increase rapidly in the next couple of decades”
At the recent Battle of Ideas, I attended a panel on ‘Housing Britain: Yimbys vs Nimbys’. For a contentious topic there was a surprising degree of unanimity among the panel and audience on the need to build, and even what to build. Most disagreement came on the process of how to get it done.
I am firmly of the belief we need to build housing, and we need to build lots of it. There is a general consensus to meet current levels of demand we need to build around 300,000 new homes per year. In 2022 we built 232,000 new homes.
In checking the data for this I found numbers for new build and net new homes seemingly used interchangeably. This may be in part because of property conversions, but clearly these are not the same thing. However, it does strike me that with so much of our housing stock built between the wars it’s seems likely the number of homes in need of replacement will increase rapidly in the next couple of decades.
All this has led to a growing number of concealed households”, now believed to total 1.6 million potential households of people who would like to be in their own home but can’t because of shortages. We are believed to have about 260,000 long-term empty homes in England but even if somehow these were magically all brought back into use they would solve little of the overall problem. Even second home ownership lies at about 3% and is little changed in decades.
Whatever the reasons behind it, we have a problem today with a lack of houses. We have a problem with a younger generation feeling increasingly disengaged from our society when they can’t leave home and build their own lives. We also have a problem with rising costs for care as an increasingly aging population often face a choice between staying in their own home or being in a care home, with little suitable middle ground alternatives. In short, we need to build baby build.
“People will more willingly accept hosing built in their area if they believe we have control of our borders and if local people from the community the homes are built in are given priority”
Necessary Pre-requisites
There are however some necessary prerequisites to oversee a largescale increase in housebuilding. People need to believe these are houses for their families, their community, not just to be brought by overseas property speculators or used to house the worlds migrants coming to our shores. People will more willingly accept hosing built in their area if they believe we have control of our borders and if local people from the community the homes are built in are given priority to fill them.
“At the battle of ideas panel on housing one member of the audience was simultaneously praising the green belt and complaining about the intensification of building in the city”
At the battle of ideas panel on housing one member of the audience was simultaneously praising the green belt and complaining about the intensification of building in the city. As someone who lives on the doorstep of the green belt and has seen 157 flats go up next to my home, I can’t help but wonder if one or two of the farmers’ fields in the green belt near me could be used to provide 157 houses rather than have flats built on what was my town’s main car park.
Don’t worry about us running out of land, it would take about 5 football pitches to build 157 homes at 4 bedrooms (these flats are not 4 bedrooms), that would use 7 of the 17.2 million hectares of farmland we have in the UK. (This would provide 385 million homes, with currently about 30million in the UK).
The green belt lovely though it maybe, ensures we live in ever more crowded cities, rather than expand them as the need for housing expands. We are in Croydon, a Surrey market town built out to accommodate the expanding population of London, why are we insisting that future generations live in ever more cramped environments rather than in new suburbs or towns further out.
“Can anyone cite examples where cramping people into tighter spaces gives good outcomes?”
Can anyone cite examples where cramping people into tighter spaces gives good outcomes? A hundred years ago we were clearing out the slums. The high rise post war blocks of flats were generally seen as a disaster in my youth. I wonder why we are intent on recreating them.
What to do
So, what are we to do? I say we need to build bigger, build beautiful, build better, and build for everyone. What would this mean in practice.
Build beautiful – At last year’s Battle of Ideas, Ike Ijeh the architect, and 2019 Brexit Party candidate, spoke about how he had seen developers have success getting acceptance from the local community for new builds through well laid out design. Beautiful well laid out communities, which could well include a mixture of flats and houses are more likely to be approved than throwing another box of 9 flats on a previous 1 home plot.
“We all benefit from better high-end homes; we all get the chance to move up the market and we will free up what used to be called starter homes”
Build bigger – I was impressed by an article I read last year on ‘how building expensive homes can help people on low incomes’. The article proposes we should focus on building more £5million homes rather than £120,000 ones. To quote the article “adding homes that are better quality than the existing stock allows people to move out of the existing stock into better homes, and frees up existing stock for suppressed households.” We all benefit from better high-end homes; we all get the chance to move up the market and we will free up what used to be called starter homes. Few communities would object to an estate of £5million homes being build on the edge of town, and few property developers would sit on this planning permission.
Build better – We need to build new estates with services, shops, schools, transport, and things that people want. We can’t build just based on environmentalist dreamlands, where someone after a hard day’s work will somehow pick-up the kids from the childminder and pop to the shops on a push bike.
We are not going to build everything we need just on the edge of cities and as much as I don’t believe it should be sacred the green belt has a purpose. After the war we built new towns in Crawley, Hemel Hempstead, Welwyn Garden City, Milton Keynes, Peterborough, Northampton, and many other places. These might not make it to your bucket list of destinations to visit but they are good places for work and to raise families.
“Coming into land at Gatwick airport on a sunny day you can see from Croydon to Brighton and view the miles of greenery in between”
Local to us Crawley houses 118,500 people. Coming into land at Gatwick airport on a sunny day you can see from Croydon to Brighton and view the miles of greenery in between. Only the airport and Crawley stand out as major developments. 3 more airports and Crawley’s in the view and it would still be overwhelmingly green, 6 more and you would still think you are viewing the countryside. We could build 2 more Crawley’s in the area of the A22 to A24 corridors and hardly notice.
Croydon has a 10 year housing target from the Mayor of London of 20,790 new homes (2019 – 2028). This on top of the thousands of new homes already built in the borough in recent years. One new Crawley built with the industrial estates, shopping centres, office blocks, schools, doctors and everything else needed to form a community could at this rate supply 60 years of growth needed in Croydon and over a third of our annual UK wide rate of new homes growth.
“with about a quarter of the country having less than £500 worth of savings it is reasonable to assume many will never buy their own home”
Build for everyone – There are not many times I believe government can help, but I increasingly believe we need to build more social housing, and government will need to play a part in this. As someone who was born into the Regina Road Estate council blocks now being pulled down by Croydon Council, I have little faith in their ability to provide property. However, with about a quarter of the country having less than £500 worth of savings it is reasonable to assume many will never buy their own home. We can argue how much government provided housing is needed, who should run it and what right to buy schemes we should have. But, we do need to provide something for the taxpayer and for renters that is not just busting budgets to pay for private rents.
“Why not offer what I might call free ports of housing. Designated areas with council tax holidays for new development or major upgrades to a generation of remote workers keen to get on the housing ladder, encouraged to less fashionable parts of the country”
Some of the problems I have described are local or they are a southeast problem. We have a whole country much of which is not so expensive to live in and could do with attracting more young people. Why not offer what I might call free ports of housing. Designated areas with council tax holidays for new development or major upgrades to a generation of remote workers keen to get on the housing ladder, encouraged to less fashionable parts of the country by an influx of similar people and tax breaks. Let’s level up the country by helping to spread the wealth and helping people better their lives.
We build properties not just for now but for use 100 years from now, we have a changing population, with greater demand and desires. Why not build better, bigger homes, why not let people have second homes, whilst also catering for those who need help. We have the land let’s make use of it, whilst also encouraging people to move across the country. This does require some government action but is best achieved by them laying foundations and then getting out of the way whilst we build baby build.
