Hungover Parliament

Politics. It’s a topic I rarely venture into. It’s not that I don’t have opinions about our country, the world and how it all fits together, but that it seems like a world so far removed from mine that it frustrates me to tackle topics which are in constant flux. I’m a very process driven soul you see. I enjoy seeing a point to my work. I love feeling that things are being done, achievements are being made and leaps forward are being taken, but I’ve never felt that from the political world. To me it’s become one step behind that of celebrity and scandal.

I suppose another key reason I don’t often paddle in the political pool is that I fear I’ll be seen as ignorant. My family were never particularly politically minded and didn’t ever reach for knowledge about the way they lived; life happened as it did and they dealt with it. I am very different to that but the way I tackle my annoyances, opinions, points of view and political ponderings is through my work, my films and my writing.

I need to change all that and I’ve begun on a crash course in political education (it helps that I’m seeing someone who works in parliament at the moment). I realise that one needs an even spread of the practical, the political and the creative to understand this world properly, so I intend on starting sooner rather than later, and who knows, I might change something one day!

I would like to mention though, my annoyance at voter apathy. It’s something that seems to be contagious in this day and age and although certain friends of mine are keenly on the political ball, many aren’t (including myself) however they don’t try to be. It annoys me that at the moment there’s a massive change in our government coming up and that will impact our country in a variety of ways, not all immediate, but all very prevalent and pertinent to the way we live, work and earn. It’s almost as though there’s a nationwide hangover and no one can be bothered to get off the sofa to put a cross in a box, I mean, what difference does it make anyway? Indeed.

On the other side of the argument though, I can understand the public’s point of view. With so much media bashing of politicians and so much corruption going on at our leadership level, it’s hardly a compelling case to get us flooding to the voting booths is it? Another point that compounds the argument is that politics is still steeped in so much traditional jargon that it’s been relegated to the top shelf of a very dusty cupboard to most of the youth who will one day be the country’s economic driving force. Very little genuine effort has been made to rally interest in our political system and even less in getting people to understand it.

I have no doubt that Gordon Brown, our current Prime Minister, is a waste of space. He’s done more harm than good and the whole concept of a ‘New Labour’ has long since been left in ruins like the burning embers of Rome. It’s no wonder he hasn’t made much of an attempt to rally interest in his activities, I mean would you?

I friend of mine, who is a fellow writer, feels very passionately about getting young people interested in politics and has taken it upon himself to create platforms to facilitate contemporary performance to that end. He’s met with Gordon Brown and Boris Johnson to discuss his ideas and it’s going really well. I’m very proud of him and wish him all the luck in the world. However I still think it’s a shame that this initiative isn’t coming from the top.

With all this talk of a hung parliament and the mess the country is (and has been in) economically it seems comical to ask people to be interested in such a massive problem, but I’d say it’s the perfect time to take responsibility for your surroundings and take part in your country’s system. Doctor Who hit the nail on the head in ‘The Beast Below’ with the concept of voting to ‘forget’ the last five years, hence seeing democracy in action. I don’t think that’s something we can afford to do any longer.

When we think of politics, voting, parliament or anything related to the running of state, it seems to have got to the point where we simply close our eyes and choose our favourite colour. One thing I know, mine isn’t Brown.