AM I alone in being chilled by the irrelevance of the current political debate in this election?

The country collectively is now more indebted than before the crisis in 2008.

52 per cent of people receive more out of the system than they pay in. Interest rates area artificially low. 

We cannot forever live beyond our means.

Quantitative Easing is just a posh term for printing money, i.e. debasing what money we do have. Are we financially illiterate?

Do the media/chattering classes not realise that we are now in the different world of the C21st? 

Europe is just the North West extremity of the Eurasian landmass - we all have to cope with global activity and challenges, even in Somerset!

For this we need to equip ourselves with high level skills and expertise to provide niche products and quality services. 

This requires an educational system that delivers on numeracy and literacy, sound analytical thinking, and a good range of technical skills. 

While many jobs can be digitalised, those involving manual and craft skills cannot. Does our current educational ideology recognise this and really cater for both linear and lateral thinkers? 

The anti-elite rhetoric denies this reality.

The NHS is not a sacred cow. It is on the point of implosion. It was designed 60 years ago for a different population with different health priorities and it has been very successful. 

The problem is we are all living a great deal longer and expecting to be kept going with one or more chronic conditions. 

The NHS is said to the third largest organisation in the world. It is centrally micro-managed by the Department of Health with its numerical targets and initiatives. 

This requires managers and creates bureaucracy.

The doctors (some of the brightest and most extensively educated people in the country) are treated as technicians. There is no effective system of governance or lines of accountability. 

We need to cut the jargon and have a sensible and honest conversation about what we can reasonably expect to receive and the NHS to deliver and how we can best deliver it.

The intellectual dishonesty of the political correctness that permeates the public services is not recognised in our prevailing culture. 

The agenda of multiculturalism and anti-discrimination has produced a sense of victimhood and ghettoes.

What level of population can this densely populated country reasonably sustain? What are our real moral obligations and to whom? What do we need for a healthy, well balanced and socially integrated society?

For the last 70 years or so since the war the general political consensus has been to seek the top down state solution. 

For swathes of the population this has not delivered. 

This was their message in the 2015 election and Brexit. 

It is now a bottom up world which needs us to be flexible and innovative in order to survive. 

Our liberal values depend on freedom of speech and a respect for the truth. 

It is time to cut the clich́es and have those difficult and honest discussions about the hard reality and actual facts now facing us. 

Let’s get real!

D BRADLEY
Kingston St Mary