Freedom is hard won, but so easily lost.

The 100^th anniversary of the beginning of the Great War will lend an extra poignancy to Remembrance Sunday this year. I urge everybody in our town, young and old, to attend this very solemn and touching event, always observed so beautifully in Nantwich.

I never fail to be impressed and incredibly proud, of the young people representing our youth organisations and local schools who lay wreaths so respectfully. Whilst our thoughts are naturally with those who gave their lives in the past so that we might be free today, this aspect of the ceremony gives me cause think about our future with optimism and hope.

I am proud that it is our country, and our people that have done so much to advance the cause of Personal Freedom throughout the centuries, for ours is the land of Trial by Jury, Freedom of Speech, Democracy and Habeas Corpus, the country of Magna Carta and The Universal Franchise, that abolished slavery and fought Fascism and Communism.

Sometimes we take for granted the freedoms we enjoy today, but we must never forget the sacrifices of those in past and be vigilant to new threats to our liberty; Religious Extremism, Twisted Political Ideology or Cultural Intolerance. To question and confront those who would seek to take our freedom is the greatest tribute we can pay those who laid down their lives all those years ago.

Freedom is hard won, but so easily lost.

Labour Hypocrites

Letter to the Nantwich Guardian 6/10/14

I never cease to be amazed by the hypocrisy of the Labour Party. The last edition of your newspaper contained letters from the Labour Party PPC for Crewe and a Labour Borough Councillor bemoaning the high cost of housing and low levels of wages. Their failure to acknowledge the role of the Labour Party in causing these issues and the discredited solutions they offered are typical of Labour, who are more concerned with imposing their Political Ideology than the best interests of those they claim to represent.

Since Labour embraced EU Immigration Policy and opened our borders to 500 million people in 2004, net immigration has soared to around 250,000 per year (that we know about), making England the second most crowded country in Europe. Clearly, this puts incredible stress on our housing supply, thus increasing demand and prices.

This influx of predominantly low or unskilled labour has also caused ‘wage compression’. Excess supply will always cause prices to go down. I suggest that Labour Councillors and PPCs buy a basic A-Level Economics Book and look up ‘Supply and Demand’.

Their solutions? More borrowing – lumbering our children and grandchildren with even more debt. Much like Ed Milliband in his widely derided ‘Leader’s’ speech, they fail to mention the existing £1.5 trillion national debt run up by Gordon Brown’s deficit, gold sell-off, and the £120bn in PFI liabilities created by the man regarded by many economists as ‘The Worst Chancellor in History’.

The doctors, nurses, scientists and engineers we desperately need would be welcomed into our country under the points-based, Australian-style immigration policy proposed by UKIP. Building of affordable housing in our inner city areas by private developers should be encouraged by Development Zones, and controlled by locally accountable Planning Committees and Officers.

The real tragedy is that this Labour-induced triple-whammy of wage-compression, high cost of resources and high-demand on our Public Services hits those at the bottom of our society the hardest. Shame on Labour.

Cllr. Stuart Hutton CEng MIET.

UKIP Crewe and Nantwich.

Crewe's Miracle Merlin - Letter to the Crewe Chronicle.

Crewe's Miracle Merlin - Letter to the Crewe Chronicle.

It was with delight that I glimpsed two Avro Lancaster Bombers pass over Nantwich en-route to the Southport Air Show last Saturday, as part of the Battle of Britain Memorial Flight. The thrill of hearing – and feeling - the hum of 8 Rolls-Royce Merlin Engines was a stark reminder of the important part that Crewe played in the defence of our country in its darkest hour, and in the defeat of fascism in Europe.

The performance and reliability of the Rolls-Royce Merlin Engine gave the RAF a key advantage over the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain, thus preventing German Arial Supremacy and forcing Hitler to abandon his invasion plans. I sincerely hope that all school children in Crewe are taught about the 15,000 Merlin Engines built in their town and are proud of this important contribution to the freedoms we enjoy today.

The Rolls-Royce Merlin Engine and the wonderful aircraft it powered should also serve as reminder of the vital importance of science, technology and engineering to our freedom and prosperity.

British Technical Developments like Alan Turing’s ‘Colossus’ decoding machine, Watson-Watt’s Radar and Randall and Boot’s Cavity-Magnetron not only turned the tide of the war, but also shape many aspects of modern world we take for granted, like Satellite Navigation, Mobile Communications and the Computing Revolution.

I hope that our young people are inspired by the stories of these engineering marvels (as I was) and consider entering the Technical Professions our country needs so much. I am extremely encouraged by the news of the new University-Technical College planned for Crewe - but how about naming it after Crewe’s most famous V12 engine?

Stuart Hutton CEng MIET

UKIP Crewe and Nantwich.

Scathing Attack - Letter to the Crewe Chronicle 25/09/14

Thanks to Mick Roberts for his letter of 24/09/14, ‘Help for Masses, not just Rich Few’.

First he criticised the government for ‘privatising the NHS’. The NHS was effectively privatised under the last Labour government when it was sold down the river to ‘Private Finance Initiatives’, the debts for which now cripples our Health Service. Indeed, the debt burden of these arrangements is forcing 22 NHS Trusts across the country into huge deficit, necessitating bailouts from the taxpayer.

 

A recent report from the National Audit Office revealed that the repayments on these PFI deals made under Labour will total £8.6bn next year alone. Many of these loans extend for between 30 and 60 years. Perhaps even more scandalously, the report showed that the £121bn outstanding on these loans is for projects worth only £52bn to the taxpayer. We are literally paying twice, thanks to Labour’s ‘cooking the books’ and profligacy with our children's and grandchildren’s money.

 

I find it incredulous to hear Mr Roberts, and his party’s health spokesman, Andy Burnham MP (who signed over 220 PFI agreements as Health Minister) now criticise others for ‘privatisation by stealth’ of the NHS.

 

Mr Roberts also criticises the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) agreement. He is right to do so. However, the enforced privatisation of the NHS should be the least of his worries about the TTIP. The ‘Investor-State Dispute Settlement’ clause gives big corporations carte blanche to sue democratically elected governments for policies which they believe their hinder their business, whether or not they are in the best interests of the electorate. It is an affront to democracy.

 

The TTIP agreement is being imposed on us by the EU, (as usual without any sort of consultation or vote in our parliament). Through his membership of the Labour Party, which is unequivocal in its support for the EU, Mr. Roberts embraces the TTIP and all its clauses without question.

 

He then goes on to bemoan low wages and the huge numbers of young people without work. Again, he is right to do so, albeit short-sighted in laying the blame. Rates for labour - or anything for that matter - are not set by the government; they are the subject of market forces – the ‘gravity’ of economics. 

The uncontrolled oversupply of (largely unskilled) labour from Europe as a result of Peter Mandelson’s ‘search parties’ has depressed wages and deprived our young of the service sector jobs which traditionally provide a first step on the employment ladder.

 

I bear Mr Roberts no ill, but I hope that in pointing out just some of the many ways in which Labour has betrayed British Working People, he and others will reconsider their misguided support for this disgraceful outfit.

Stuart Hutton CEng MIET

UKIP Crewe and Nantwich

Labour - Stealing Christmas and Taking our Liberty.

Cllr Kevin Hickson, the Leader Grinch  of Crewe Town Council has demanded that Nantwich Town Council produce evidence that they own the lights caught up in the ‘Fairylightsgate’ scandal. 

http://thenantwichnews.co.uk/2014/07/11/crewe-councillors-threaten-legal-action-nantwich-christmas-lights-row/

Unfortunately for Cllr. Hickson, in this country the burden of proof is on the prosecution, not the accused. This is one of the essential freedoms of our country, written in Magna Carta, that have underwritten our laws, and protected the innocent for centuries.

It’s also one of the hard fought freedoms that he and his EU-mad Labour Cronies want to sacrifice in their support for adopting the EU Arrest Warrant, under which Foreign Police Forces can arrest, extradite and hold British Subjects in Foreign Jails, for unspecified periods, with no proof of their guilt whatsoever. Shame on them.

Vote UKIP in 2015.

Another Red Riposte - Letter to the Crewe Chronicle 10/7/14

In his recent letter, Labour PPC Dr Adrian Heald claimed that EU Membership was important for UK Manufacturing. Once again, he has demonstrated a complete lack of understanding of both Economics and Manufacturing. As a Chartered Engineer, engaged in manufacturing for the entirety of my working life, I will explain why, with fact and figures, he is totally wrong.

Dr. Heald infers that if the UK were not a member of the EU, manufacturers would not be able to sell products into this market. This is nonsense. The UK would remain within the EEA (the European Economic Area) and rejoin EFTA (the European Free Trade Area), giving full access to this market.

The UK currently has a trade deficit of around £60bn per annum with the rest of the EU. We are the EU’s biggest export market. Hence, the imposition of anything other than a Free Trade Agreement post UK-exit would actually hurt the EU more and is hence extremely unlikely.

He quoted the EEF and CBI. These are the people that predicted a disaster for the UK if we didn’t join the Single Currency back in 1999.

The EU ‘green’ taxes levied on our energy make it extremely difficult for heavy industries to operate here, causing most to relocate to emerging economies, where energy is produced from the dirtiest coal-fired power stations, as opposed to the relatively clean gas we burn here in the UK.

The EU provides grants (from our taxes) for companies here in the UK to move their manufacturing to Eastern Europe, costing thousands of jobs. The huge amount of unnecessary regulation imposed on UK Manufacturers makes it uncompetitive to operate here, compared with economies outside the EU.

The high-tech manufacturing sector has a terrible skills-shortage, which holds us back. The skilled and qualified engineers we need, from India, China, the US, etc. are discriminated against and deterred from coming here because of the unfair EU immigration policy the government has adopted.

The restrictive and complex tendering rules for large, public projects with which the UK is forced to comply are rarely adhered to on the continent, where almost every train, ambulance and police car is manufactured in those states. This has caused the near disappearance of our Rail Industry.

In 2005, the EU banned the UK government from extending a credit line to MG-Rover to help it find a buyer before it fell into receivership, at the cost of 6,000 jobs. In 2013, the French Government pumped around €5bn in to Renault, completely unchallenged, and continues to do so.

Of all the major world economies, only the EU, held back by over-regulation and the disaster of the Euro, has a shrinking share of global GDP. As part of this protectionist block, the UK is deterred from trading with growth economies around the world. The UK currently exports more to Ireland and Belgium than it does to China. The EU actively bans the UK from entering into Trade Agreements of our own with these new, global economic powerhouses.

By leaving the EU, we can return to being an outward looking, internationalist trading country, and trade with our natural markets, all around the world.

The truth is that the EU is a massive hindrance to British Industry. Please don’t be taken in by the uninformed, unreasoned scare stories of people like Dr. Adrian Heald. Just consider the facts and figures for yourself.

Cllr. Stuart Hutton CEng (UKIP Crewe and Nantwich).

Glastonbury - A Wonderful Celebration of *Righty* Politics.

I didn't make it to Glastonbury this year. As a father to two young children, if I want to spend the weekend spaced-out, sleep-deprived and contending with other people’s faeces amid a cacophony of noise, I can just stay at home. Which is from where Sally and I enjoyed as much of the television coverage as possible from the relative comfort of our toy-strewn sofa.

My mild melancholy at not being among those glorious, rolling Somerset Hillsides was eased by the freely-available strong tea and, hot marmalade-y toast from our nearby kitchen. Inevitably, smugness prevailed and discussion soon turned to the negative aspects of the world’s greatest festival with which we did not have to contend. Predictably, the pricey tickets, questionable lavatorial arrangements and unreliable weather came up, as did the overcrowded camping and poor view of the acts. I've never bumped into Jean Paul Sartre skulking outside the John Peel Stage, and we know what he thought of other people.

But one factor sits above all this, atop my list personal Glastonbury bug-bears– the outward leftyism and seemingly constant revulsion of almost everything I stand for as a fair-minded, reasonable righty.

Whether it’s Greenpeace celebrating the fact that they disrupted production at Land Rover, one of the UK’s most important manufacturing assets, Oxfam’s outwardly party-political advertising, or the unbalanced musings from the likes of Billy Brag and Baby-Marxists The Manic Street Preachers, I've always been given the distinct impression I was ‘one of the enemy’ whenever I've paid homage to those muddy fields.

Well, sorry to disappoint you, my deluded socialist chums (I am not sorry), but Glastonbury is actually as great a celebration of everything that’s wonderful about small-state, free market, individual-loving rightyism as it’s possible to be. Please allow me to explain. No seriously, please allow me, I am normally shouted down in a hail of vitriol whenever I try to explain anything to the sort of left-wing authoritarians I occasionally encounter on the high streets and doorsteps of Cheshire when campaigning for UKIP.

Take a look around the Glastonbury site – there’s little obvious police presence, no-one bossing you around, just a very basic infrastructure. People are free to do what they like (as long as it doesn't harm others), they are allowed to get on with it. And they do so, swimmingly.

And what wonderful individuals! From the Lizard-Man and his ‘Cranial Corkscrew’, to the English National Ballet, everyone is valued for who they are, and what they can bring to the party. If you’re wonderful at something, the adoring audience enjoy, applaud and encourage. They don’t moan or demonise because they can’t do the same. I certainly didn't hear anyone decrying the fact they were not able to operate a Cranial Corkscrew or lift a beer-barrel with their ear-lobes with quite the same aplomb as the Lizard-Man.

Everyone pays the same, basic rate to get in. If you want to pay a bit more and upgrade to a tepee, yurt or a pre-erected tent, you can. You pay’s you money, and you take’s your choice. And the money from those tickets  goes to pay for the people and capital equipment that make it all possible, and yes - a reasonable profit - for the bands, their road-crews, the organisers, and the people that empty the loos, because without the notion of a profit, it simply couldn't happen.

And haven’t things got so much better since the security fence went up? – The festival crime-rate immediately plummeted, and armed with the certainty of how many people will turn up, the organisers can install the appropriate amount of infrastructure.  Now everyone pays their fair share for a ticket, the money raised can be used to pay for better facilities, and more performers. It’s amazing what you can achieve when you control your borders.

The ‘soundtrack’ of Glastonbury is not the socialist drivel of Mr Bragg emanating from some tent or other, it is the sweet hum of a thousand Aggreko (LON:AGK, 1651.22, thank you very much) Generators keeping the lights on, the amps buzzing, and the falafels hot. If the festival had to rely solely on wind power, as so many of its attendance think we all should, it would just be an acoustic festival. And that means more Billy Bragg - or perhaps that's what they want...

And finally, do you know what happens to those free copies of The Guardian they hand out? Do you? Let’s just say it’s quite appropriate. You certainly wouldn't want to do the crossword in a borrowed copy.

So there you have it; Glastonbury - a great, British institution of which we can be proud, and a wonderful example of the benefits of right-wing principles. Long may it continue. Lefties; if you still believe Glastonbury is a celebration of all your lunatic theories, I can only suggest you've been operating your Cranial Corkscrew incorrectly.

Right on, man.

Stuart Hutton.