Huw Merriman visit
Scanning through The Vine’s last issue I was surprised by the headline ‘Conservative MP appeals to the youth vote at HCC’. Perhaps it’s my own views which caused me to be taken back by this bold statement however I was also amongst the audience with Huw Merriman (Conservative MP for Bexhill & Battle) and I can say with great confidence that he did not appeal to me, and a fair few others for that matter.
His liberal views on the legalisation of marijuana and same sex marriage are causes that wouldn’t seem out of place at a Labour or Green party conference but I’d urge everyone to look at Mr Merriman’s parliamentary voting record which some could argue that it engulfs his ‘liberal’ agenda in a black cloud of Thatcherism.
It appears Merriman is focused on minimising the welfare state to its minimum. He has voted in line with cutting around £12 billion in welfare spending and voted against increasing the support that impoverished ill and disabled people receive. He echoes the absurd reasoning that parliament’s resident dragon Iain Duncan-Smith, Minister for the Department for Work & Pensions, drones on about as he suggests that disabled people can simply work themselves out of poverty.
However Mr Merriman contributed to reducing the rate of tax multi-billion pound corporations pay to the government – a treat for those unaccountable, unelected CEOs so many of whom happen to fund the Conservative party. In addition, Merriman voted against any measure to control climate change (he also happens to advocate fracking in the Sussex Downs) and for the renewal of Trident - Britain’s ‘’nuclear deterrent’’, despite its £100 billion drain on tax payers’ money. Magnificently expensive nuclear deterrents seem like a brilliant idea until you realise the only time it would be used is in retaliation, in which case, it would not have been a deterrent.
All in all Merriman, in my opinion, simply orchestrated a discussion based on the demographic who stared eagerly back at him. Oh, those typical teenage activities of sitting around, smoking pot and ignoring the inner workings of MPs like himself who dismantle social security for the poor through dangerous and regressive parliamentary legislation. It may have worked for some, but it didn’t fool me.
Olivia Sass, Year 13. December Issue 2015
His liberal views on the legalisation of marijuana and same sex marriage are causes that wouldn’t seem out of place at a Labour or Green party conference but I’d urge everyone to look at Mr Merriman’s parliamentary voting record which some could argue that it engulfs his ‘liberal’ agenda in a black cloud of Thatcherism.
It appears Merriman is focused on minimising the welfare state to its minimum. He has voted in line with cutting around £12 billion in welfare spending and voted against increasing the support that impoverished ill and disabled people receive. He echoes the absurd reasoning that parliament’s resident dragon Iain Duncan-Smith, Minister for the Department for Work & Pensions, drones on about as he suggests that disabled people can simply work themselves out of poverty.
However Mr Merriman contributed to reducing the rate of tax multi-billion pound corporations pay to the government – a treat for those unaccountable, unelected CEOs so many of whom happen to fund the Conservative party. In addition, Merriman voted against any measure to control climate change (he also happens to advocate fracking in the Sussex Downs) and for the renewal of Trident - Britain’s ‘’nuclear deterrent’’, despite its £100 billion drain on tax payers’ money. Magnificently expensive nuclear deterrents seem like a brilliant idea until you realise the only time it would be used is in retaliation, in which case, it would not have been a deterrent.
All in all Merriman, in my opinion, simply orchestrated a discussion based on the demographic who stared eagerly back at him. Oh, those typical teenage activities of sitting around, smoking pot and ignoring the inner workings of MPs like himself who dismantle social security for the poor through dangerous and regressive parliamentary legislation. It may have worked for some, but it didn’t fool me.
Olivia Sass, Year 13. December Issue 2015