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Post by Godo on Aug 4, 2008 8:16:58 GMT
The World is now run for and by the multinational companies. The Neo-Con’s have won. People have been dumbed-down, de-politicised and turned from thinkers into consumers. In the UK there are no conviction politicians just career politicians who, like their American counterparts, are bought and paid for. Despite some of the debate on here about the relative merits of Labour and Conservative, not forgetting the irrelevance that is the Liberal party, in reality arguing about the difference between our two main political parties is as ridiculous as two bald men fighting over a comb.
We are facing 35% increases in Gas prices because British Gas/Centrica is run for the benefits of it’s executives and share holders. The boss of Centrica, Jake Ulrich, has said that the solution to the problem is for British Consumers to wear two jumpers this winter. Brown’s Government, in thrall to the free market, has proved to be as ineffective as usual in responding to this situation. What they should be demanding is that British Gas increases it’s storage capacity so that like consumers in France and Germany, who face NO price rises this winter due to the storage capacity in those countries, we are not ripped off. Whilst prices were low we were sending our surplus North Sea Gas to the continent for them to store. We had no capacity to do so. Additionally the Government should be taking a hands on approach like they have in Italy, apparently run by a very right wing Berlusconi not a supposed socialist like Brown, where the Governments sets the level of fuel price increases and where there has been no increase. Ulrich is comfortably immune to criticism because he is keeping his shareholders happy, has his £1million a year salary and his £23 million pension to look forward to.
Despite all of this we do have an instrument of mass communication available to us all that should have enabled people to fight back against the “Free Market is best” Murdoch controlled world view, namely the internet. We should be using the internet to co-ordinate a protest to this by organising a co-ordinated switch over to another gas supplier. Imagine the impact if every British Gas consumer switched over night? The present Government might be ineffectual, and certainly a Cameron Government will be even cosier with big business, but WE have the opportunity to rise above our usual apathy and to make some of these large companies acknowledge that they have some social responsibility. It needs someone like Martin Lewis, Channel 5 consumer champion, to co-ordinate a massive switch over to another company. We either sit back and keep letting these things happen to us or we take some action and let these companies - and we could do it just as effectively by boycotting petrol companies, TV channels, products etc etc - know that there are consequences to their actions.
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