What difference will it make?

We are now in the earliest stages of a general Election. It is vitally important that we all cast our vote because it is something which has been won at great cost and over a long period.

However, when we look at what difference it will make if one party or another wins outright, it is difficult to say what difference the outcome will make.

Look at the National Health Service. At its inception it was heralded as health care for all, no matter who or what you are. Described like this it becomes the envy of the world. Like all great institutions it comes at a huge cost to the taxpayer. The patients who receive such a good service are often heard voicing their appreciation. Some do not because they find themselves living in the wrong area to get the treatment or service they need. I think that probably those who rub their hands together and bless the NHS most are the drug companies who work hard to rob the NHS as they sell them effective drugs. Much cash is spent on senior administrators who have the task of management and have to liaise with the medical staff each day. These are the ones who see only costs and lose sight of the patients who are the customers. Each political party points to their pet areas of the NHS and promise change & improvement. Yet each government finds it can never achieve its aim!

Then there is Education which is available to all and has benefitted countless members of the population. Ever since I can remember there have been so-called experts who have advocated new methods of educating children and adults alike. Every few years we hear how what was the latest thing has been condemned to the waste bin to be replaced by another latest thing. A few years later - guess what happens! Dead right!! No one has yet come up with a method that works as well as they say it will. On and on they go - tinkering away with an engine that works!

Local Government was once a target of the politicians and so they began cutting and chopping away at it. They didn't seem to learn from their mistakes either. I used to be a rating officer, then a poll tax officer, and finally a council tax officer. So I have personal experience of successive governments supposedly "improving" the way we are governed locally and charged for the service. The introduction of the Community Charge ended in disaster for Margaret Thatcher who was stupid enough to stick her neck out and change the basis for payment. It was quickly consigned to oblivion because what she did not realise was that it is easy to charge people based on where they live but well-nigh impossible to charge them as individuals if they managed to disappear!

So, the parties will all tell us why their policies are best and get us to place our ballot papers suitably inscribed to their benefit. But what real difference will it make? The current task is to get the country back onto an even keel in financial terms. Each method advanced will work to a degree, so does it matter which person lives in 10 Downing Street for the next 5 years? Some years ago I remember Lord Wilson (Harold Wilson) commenting that when he was prime minister 85% of the decisions would have been the same regardless of which party was in power. I doubt that this has changed a lot.

So, my advice is go out and vote, but don't expect to be positively affected by the winning party and their policies. This way you can only be pleasantly surprised if it goes your way!