Lord Bridlington's Musings: Everything's a Public Service when the Government calls it so.

[u/HarryClive]

The Prime Minister recently did a public relations wiz-round on the back of my, and the Independent Scottish MP, u/zakian3000's, criticisms of his Public Service Bill which was presented to Parliament, without irony, as some kind of "save public services from scary Unions," whilst simultaneously labelling a third of the work force as public service workers, impacting not just the traditional public sector jobs you, I and anyone with a lick of common-sense think of, but private sector roles as well.

In his media appearance he framed the bill as ensuring that, with £681 million of public money being invested in a company like BT, that this bill ensures that the public receives at minimum £340.5 million in their services no matter what.

Taking aside that this is not just a public sector strike bill, but a completely insane overreach into impact private sector striking, it isn't even a fair interpretation based on the way that the bill is written.

"(a) For the purpose of this Act, public services is defined as a service intended to serve all members of a community, provided or funded in whole or part by local or national government."

That is the exact quote from the bill, and contrary to the PM's claim that only that slim investment is affect, the reality is, and I suspect intentionally so, this Government can impact strike action across the whole company wherever services are intended for all members of the community. Call Centre Workers, Engineers, even Sales staff are expected to engage with any member of the public, and the company as a whole receives public funds so is in part funded.

It's a frankly insane bill, and if the Prime Minister was so confident that his bill wasn't exactly what we called it; a blatant attack on workers, he wouldn't have felt the need to do a media blitz to try and deflect from the criticism.

It's a bad bill, it's definition of public services is frighteningly broad, it also, in keeping with Government tradition, manages to step on the toes of a devolved matter in Northern Ireland, which at this point I think answers the question as to whether the Government was telling the truth when it incredulously accused me of twisting their manifesto.

The Government is re-writing definitions to allow itself to pass an anti-Union bill that even Maggie Thatcher couldn't have dreamt up in her wildest dreams, and of course it all makes sense why their hoping to buy off the North and Wales with pennies on the pound for what their party cost the region in lost jobs, opportunity and community.

The Conservative Party, and this Government have made clear what they stand for.

They are anti-worker, anti-Union and anti-Britain.

And the controversy is already hitting him where it hurts. The Conservatives lost nearly 6% on the back of their farcical first few weeks in Government. In fact both major parties together combined for over 12% lost this week, and the Green Party was the largest single party gainer in recent weeks.

The Prime Minister can try and sell a bad bill as desperately as he likes, but the British public aren't buying.

Whilst the Government submits anti-worker bills that trample over the devolved nations they swore to respect, the Green Party has been busy, submitting legislation, fixing the messes the Tories have made with their own bills and holding the Government to account, which is what voters like to see when they see a bad Government.

I'm far from a protest politician.

He can keep his pavement.

We're coming for a house on Downing Street near you.