Millionaires’ reign: UK’s rulers ‘out of touch’ with common folk
Britain’s new political elite is an assortment of multi-millionaires who studied at exclusive universities. But down on the streets there is a growing sentiment that those running the country are detached from those they lead.
The latest example of how a few careless words by a millionaire
in power triggers anger from the people affected by his
governmental decisions comes from Work and Pensions Secretary Iain
Duncan Smith. On Monday, he claimed in a live radio talk show that
if he had to he could live on 53 pounds (US$80) a week.
That’s the sum that one of the callers said is left to survive
on after the government’s latest housing welfare cuts. Starting
this week, some 2.4 million households are facing a rise in taxes, averaging 138 pounds ($210)
per year.
Hours later an astonishing 97,000 people signed an online
petition on the change.org website calling on Duncan Smith to prove
his words. The text challenged him to “live on this budget for
at least one year” instead of spending his salary, which is
almost 50 times higher.
At a time when the UK is facing painful public cuts, many feel
the authorities are detached from those suffering from the measures
being taken, reports RT’s Sara Firth from London.
“They’ve got no idea what it’s like, they’re making all these
attacks and they’ve never been unemployed people living on 56
pounds a week,” Helen, a protesting public worker, told RT.
“They’ve no idea what it’s like to be a hard-working person
wanting to do well when you’re having your pay cut, yours hours
attacked. They get tax cuts we get tax increases. It’s
disgraceful.”
While the ordinary citizens have to cope with less benefits and
higher costs, Britain’s 13,000 top earners are receiving a
100,000-pound tax cut, the Labour Party claims.
While Labour might be accused of scoring political points by
waging class warfare, they don’t escape harsher criticism. Ed
Miliband and his wealthy counterparts have been dubbed ‘champagne
socialists’ by critics.
With Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne having just
delivered his budget for 2013 amid a coalition-tailored climate of
austerity, the question stands: can the political elite really
understand what the cuts mean for ordinary voters?
Conservatives are not looking far to explain how it’s not their
fault that the situation is gloomy.
“You can always come up with things that have gone wrong.
With the bad economic situation that we inherited it was almost
inevitable that we were going to lose our AAA rating,”
Conservative MP Geoffrey Clifton-Brown told RT.
UK unemployment is up, growth is down and ordinary British
people feel unrepresented. And the resurgence of the toffs to some
is an indicator of a much greater malaise.
“There is a problem with
the political class in general. It is actually out of touch with
the general population. They don’t really understand how a lot of
families are suffering now with rising basic costs. And of course
it’s very much this top-down elites’ policies that is driving these
costs up,” Richard Wellings from the Institute of Economic
Affairs told RT.
2013-04-02 09:52:04
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