POLITICS: Show action, not words

I think the terms ‘by the people’ and ‘for the people’ have long since gone out of the window.

The current, effectively, two-party system has today given us a Government that appears to be run by the elite, for the elite.

Remember the last election and the Prime Minister’s promise to encourage and protect the wealth creators?

Who exactly do these fat cats create wealth for? Themselves, of course.

Well, Mrs May, you got your way. It has been widely reported that the individual who was paid the most last year, over £200million, was the chief executive of an internet gambling company.

You could argue that such a company serves no useful purpose to the country whatsoever and possibly obtains its income from the despair and misery of lots of people and their families.

Mind you, I am not saying the other party is any better. Vote it in and I believe we would have government by an Islington dinner party set for the socialist ideals of the few.

Unfortunately, there is no hope whatsoever of the system being changed because all the politicians seem able to do is set up committees to talk about things, and ultimately do nothing but maintain the status quo.

I sometimes wonder if politicians can do anything other than tinker with things to make it look like they have our interests at heart.

The NHS is in crisis, with 50,000 routine operations cancelled and waiting time in A&E almost being measured in days, not hours.

What do the politicians do? Pledge to give it a bit more money and have a chat about it.

Then there is the continuing problem of landfill waste. How do they propose to tackle it? Charge 25p tax on any take-out coffee cup that cannot be recycled, payable by the customer of course, not the wealth-creating retailer or manufacturer.

The words ‘drop’ and ‘in the ocean’ spring immediately to mind.

Takeaway containers are a problem.

I am lucky enough to live in a beautiful part of the country, where after a few minutes’ walk you are in open countryside and within an hour can be in splendid isolation. Yet one day, when miles from anywhere, I not only came across a coffee cup from a burger chain 20-plus miles away, but a pizza box.

Surely, if someone goes to the trouble of carrying a pizza in a box that far, they can just as easily take it home with them when it is empty.

The only other thing I can think is that the box and cup manufacturers have programmed them to fly away when empty to avoid littering town and city centres.

Cups and boxes are just a small part of a huge problem. Our local small supermarket has a delivery by a large lorry most mornings. After unloading all the cages that carry the replacement stock, the driver then reloads the lorry with cages full of packing material. All that packing material is before the stock is put on the shelves.

I try to buy loose produce wherever I can, but even so, I spend an inordinate amount of time trying to rip open plastic wrapping and emptying plastic trays.

Why do they have to use cellophane that is so strong that you are in danger of losing a fingernail when opening it?

Come on politicians, sort things out with actions not words.

I digress. What is wrong with the two-party, first-past-the-post electoral system?

Just look at the United States of America and see who they elected as President.

Just in case you don’t think that could happen here, there is a possibility that Boris Johnson could be our next Prime Minister. Scary.

Mel Shaw,

Church Street,

Wooler