Al-Britanis are not being brainwashed, but we need to challenge the political and spiritual narratives at source.

Konika Dhar, sister of Siddhartha, aka Abu Rumaysah al-Britani, the baby and gun-toting IS recruit, says that he was brainwashed and pleads for an opportunity to persuade him to come home.  This made me wonder what is meant, in this context, by brainwashing?     

In a fictional, Hollywood world (or Pinewood, if you think of Michael Cane as the insubordinate British Spy in The Ipcress File) brainwashing consists of imprisonment, subjugation to extensive re-education, and torture.  Not so extreme, but perhaps more effective in the real world, re-education camps were established by former communist regimes in the Far East to teach intellectuals the errors of their ways.  But this was not the case with Siddartha.  His entered into his “re-education” into quite voluntarily. 

Attending prayers, reading religious and political texts, listening to speeches and having debates with like-thinking people is not brainwashing, is it?  It is a process that a lot of people go through as they hone their political views and social world-view.  How is this different from students signing up to the Socialist Society at Fresher's week and gradually drifting towards The Socialist Workers Party?  The same applies to The Conservative Party or even an Alpha course by the way, because the exact politics is not important.  I can see a difference where there is deliberate intent on the part of the leaders and teachers to mislead and to subvert their subjects surreptitiously, but this is more akin to criminal activity, such as sex-trafficking, where a good prospect is held out to a young person until it is too late and they find they are trapped into something quite different. 

So what if it happens to be a banned group such as al-Muhajiroun, or one of its yet-to-be-banned successors?   Generally the leaders of these organisations do not disguise their views or their intentions, though the ultimate implications may not be apparent to the less acute acolyte until he or she has been drawn far enough that extreme outcomes are simply a small 'logical' step away.  But can a reasonable and intelligent person really be manipulated until they find the warped and extreme views make perfect sense?  Are the alternatives not still available, so ultimately the extreme path remains a personal decision?  The person concerned may simply be inquisitive, seeking more information, but they may also be insecure or lonely and vulnerable to appeals to comradeship and a sense of belonging. 

When everyone around you shares the same view, it is difficult to 'break out' of the pattern and view the world objectively.  It is well known that the new world of social media means most people too often only communicate with like minded others.  It is all-the-more-difficult in the worlds of secretive and manipulative cults and political movements, and even before the arrival of twitter, think of the growth of Nazism.  A large number, probably the majority, of Germans supported the abhorrent Nazi cause before and during the Second World War.  If they were not members of the Nazi party, they were sympathisers who were happy to take advantage of the benefits offered or even just turned a blind eye and hoped for a quite life.   I don't think all Germans at the time were evil, but it did not stop the Allied powers fighting a war against them and in the process killing a lot of them, civilians as well as military personnel.  We did not excuse them because they had been "brainwashed".

Abu Rymaysah al-Britani clearly came under the influence of people with extreme, and I would say evil, ideas.  But he was not brainwashed, a term which surely implies no free will was involved.  Unfortunately for us, there is an unknown number of people who may be sympathetic towards similar world views and from these will be drawn the next round of foreign fighters who choose to join Da'esh or, worse for us, to carry out attacks in the west. 

Killing Al-Britanis in Syria will not solve the problem, but if anyone chooses to voice an existentialist threat to the West, including the UK, or to endorse the actions of an organisation as brutal and murderous as Da'esh, then it seems to me that they put their lives at risk.  Unfortunately killing rather a lot of Da'esh fighters might be part of any solution in the end, because Jeremy Corbyn's plan to negotiate with them will not work any better than Neville Chamberlain's plans to negotiate with Hitler would have prevented his invasion of Poland.  Not that I am advocating outright military action right now; first we would have to find the right political framework to both support such an Acton and also to ensure peace when the fighting finishes, and I cannot for the life of me see what that would look like right now.   

Yes we need to address the situation on the ground in Syria, and the situation of refugees in Europe.  But we also need to challenge the political, and spiritual, narratives that encourage future Al-Britanis, and their fellow-travellers, and those who turn a blind eye to the activities of people who promulgate extreme views in our community.  That is not brainwashing; that is just ensuring that legitimate debate takes place as it should in the free, liberal democracy that I hope is the UK today.

Cameron's victory was stunningly unexpected, but his party represents less than 25% of the people

The Conservative’s victory in last Thursday’s general election came as a surprise to many and is described by Owen Patterson (MP for North Shropshire) in the Sunday Times today as “a stunning victory”.  Although Mr Cameron has a 12 seat majority in Parliament, he only had just under 37% of the votes cast.   Furthermore while not all non-voters will be of the plague-on-all-your-houses persuasion, it is reasonable to assume that most of them, if not completely apathetic, are antipathetic to the options that were put in front of them.  And that is not even taking into account the unregistered fans of Mr Russell Brand (at least before his recent damascene conversion to realpolitik after his late night sojurn with Mr Milliband), many of whom have very strong views on issues, even if they chose not to register to vote this time round.  

So the best that one can say that Conservatives have the support of somewhere between 25% and 35% of the electorate and an even smaller proportion of the population that are of voting age.  And while the right (if I may characterise it as such) fared rather better if you include UKIP (12%) and the DUP and UUP (1%), bringing the share of the vote to just over 50%, compared with 44% taking Labour, SNP, Plaid Cymru and the smaller socialist parties together, this is far from a majority of adults in the UK. 

Finally, we are pretty certain that there are many, mostly former Lib Dem votes, who voted tactically, to “keep Labour and the Scottish Nationalists out” (just as there are many who voted Labour "to keep the Tories out”).  These votes are certainly not an endorsement of the Conservative manifesto.    

So the conservative victory may have been stunning both in that it was not predicted by many, and in the sense that it was absolute according to the rules of the game, which is rigged anyway.  But it is certainly not an outright endorsement of Conservative policy by the people of this country, let alone the red-in-tooth-and-claw tory policies that are already coming to the fore in the new governments statements of intent.  Indeed, given that the conservative vote encompasses a range of tactical votes from anti-socialist Liberal Democrats through to tactically-voting UKIPpers, as well as a core vote, we could be talking of 15-20% who have given wholehearted support to Mr Cameron’s manifesto.

This was not intended as a piece about the unfairness of First Past the Post; that is apparent to all and there are many others who will address this (in an earlier blog I published election data for 1945-2010 that amply supports this view).  It is about how I think politicians should interpret and respond to the outcome of elections under this flawed system.  Once elected they say that they represents everyone, including those who did not vote for them (Nicola Spurgeon pompously said this in a speech yesterday, but at least in Scotland the majority of those who voted against her probably share her anti-austerity ideas).  

In the coming 12 - 24 months I think the British electorate will come to understand, and appreciate, the influence that Lib-Dems wielded in the last government, ensuring that the extremes of Tory policy were mitigated. This influence is no longer there but Mr Cameron would do well to temper his policies to reflect the mood of the country, and not pander to the extremes in his own party, which he will be tempted to do in order to sustain his majority in Parliament.  If he does not then he may see democracy take to the streets and that, if it gets out of hand, will be unfortunate.

Should we be worried about another £30bln of National Debt?

The National Debt is approximately £1,560bln.  The IFS estimates that it would increase by £90bln more under a Labour Government than under a Tory government.  That is nearly 6% over a 5 year period but it is hardly "rocketing", as The Times describes it.  Indeed with inflation running at say 2% National Debt will still fall in real terms.  

Although a lot has been made recently of the current level of National Debt, it is in fact quite low relative to GDP, compared with historic levels (see chart 1 below), though particularly high levels arose out of financing various wars, including the Napoleonic wars, World War I and World War II. The IFS provides data series for Government budgets, National Debt and GDP and, in the 66 years since 1948 (first year when GDP measured on a consistent basis) the UK Government ran a budget deficit in all but 9 years. Despite this, National Debt fell as a percentage of GDP  in every year until 1967 and in 15 of the 47 years since then.  

 

Chart 1: data "UK GDP" by Chris55 - Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons - http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:UK_GDP.png#/media/File:UK_GDP.png

Of course interest rates are particularly low at present (chart 2, below), but if they were to increase then the burden on the public purse would increase significantly.  Governments would then have to consider reducing spend in order to pay the interest which would be disastrous if that spend became a more substantial part of overall economic activity.  

 
Chart 2:  Chris55 ibidem. http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:UK_National_Debt_interest.png#/media/File:UK_National_Debt_interest.png.

Playing down the size of the national debt is not an excuse for using debt to finance revenue expenditure on a routine basis, or indeed to consistently run budget deficits even to pay for capital expenditure.  Governments are not corporate entities where assets can be used as collateral for debt (there is unlikely to be a secondary market for motorways or military installations that is consistent with an acceptable public policy).  But providing they are responsible and reliable, they seem to be able to borrow more easily and more cheaply than the average family (or business).  

So if it does not become unsustainable, governments should be able to borrow and indeed run a budget deficit for periods of time.  What they should not do is carry debt that the nation cannot afford. This means keeping the ratio to GDP at a reasonable level and ensuring that there is head room to allow for an increase in interest rates, as is inevitable at some point in the future.  Gordon Brown’s adage of “balancing the books over the cycle”, which he consummately failed to do, is worth reconsidering, thus allowing for expansive spending during the bottom of the cycle, and surpluses at the peak. Whether Governments, of any hue, can be persuaded to constrain themselves in this way in reality, is another matter.
 
In conclusion, the arguments that the major parties are having over £30bln increase in National Debt seem to be fairly inconsequential in the bigger scheme of things (how much more so the £6bln that featured in the 2010 election).   What is much more important to the electorate is what they are going to do with the money they have at their disposal.  We hear a lot about what they are going to spend, but they seem less keen to elaborate upon where that money is going to come from.