Christmas Dreams and Fears

Do you dream of bright wrapped boxes
Full of expensive gifts?
Or do you fear your kids going without
If you don't get those extra shifts?

Do you dream of that after dinner feeling
Contented and well fed?
Or do you fear for another Christmas
Without a roof over your head?

Do you dream of seeing the family
How your nephews have all grown?
Or do you fear that your help won't come
Elderly and all alone?

Do you dream of falling snow
A blanket cold and white?
Or do you fear for rising seas
A world ready to ignite?

Do you dream of getting Brexit done
A nation strong and free?
Or do you fear for the vulnerable
Cast aside like human debris?

Reform

Our voting system
Where the few choose the result
Has unfair bias

Bunches of safe seats
A handful of marginals
Most left powerless

Reform is required
To enfranchise the country
Make politics just

Bereft

Is it a victory
For greed; Unlikely,
Since standards of living
Have dropped; More like giving
Away your rights
To free healthcare; And nights
In a home you own.
For the unknown
Cuts that will emerge,
For rich and poor to diverge
Into separate entities,
Divides within cities,
For nature and a social left,
Eroded; Shorn; Bereft.

Farage

He's a cheeky chappie is Nigel
With a pint of beer in his hand
Just a common or garden normal bloke
Not part of the political band.

Let's forget his city trader history
And his public school education
Just ponder the closing of our borders
Of an EU separation.

And leave the foreigners to help themselves
Despite being in need of our aid
Walling up our island shores
In an anti-immigrant crusade.

Clegg

Credibility for Clegg has passed away
On the U-turn for tuition fees
With forgiveness unlikely regardless
Of the number of his apologies.

Look left, look right, and cross they say
But in the coalition juggernaut
They've been routinely run over by Tory cuts
When they really should have fought.

If he keeps his seat in Sheffied
It will be down to a Tory tactical vote
But betrayal will surely see many seats
Jettisoned from the commons boat.

Milliband

Milliband seems an awkward soul
In a party torn in two
From market neo-liberalism
To removing power from the few.

Public bids for rail franchises
Controls on a rent increase
When they need renationalisation
And more than just a three year lease.

As for the stone carved pledges
That smack of a PR stunt
A sign of desperation perhaps
When he knows he should be out in front.

Cameron

Cameron is a class above
Or at least he thinks it so
By virtue of birth and education
Looking down on those below.

The shirkers and the workshy
Or the unlucky to be poor
The disabled with an extra bedroom
Used as an equipment store.

Let them be grateful for a food bank
While the cash ones refuse to lend
Where only living standards for the rich
Are showing an upward trend.

Stone

All they do is mock
When a man sets out to achieve
While they remain in hock
To corporations
Without clause to leave

It’s easier to berate
To say where another is incorrect
Than to put forth in debate
An alternative
Which can be checked

They keep them hidden away
Policies they haven’t shown
But his will forever stay
Etched out
In a slab of stone

Stances

We'll all skip around as springtime is here,
Wave coloured flags so our party is clear,
Celebrate that you can't separate our stances,
Erecting a non-polish pole for our dances.

Stink

The phrase 'All in it together'
Begins to smell more and more
Like an aging sewer.

While the policy of austerity
Begins to rot the heart of society
The stinking, filthy rich get richer.

Ideas of fair taxation
And wealth distribution
 Decompose on the compost heap.

And the poor are provided
Modest scraps from the food banks.

Amid the reek of zero hours,
Bedroom taxes and benefit sanctions
Ordinary lives get flushed away.

But the rich still benefit from raised noses
And fresh perfumed posies
Of tax breaks and loopholes.

http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/apr/26/recession-rich-britains-wealthiest-double-net-worth-since-crisis

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/apr/27/life-at-the-sharp-end-five-families-hit-by-five-years-of-austerity