‘All Scotland Pensioners Group’ Manifesto for 2011

A -Abolish Pensioner poverty by giving Senior Citizens an index linked Pension of £180.00p per week.

B- Banish Means-testing which is demeaning and intrusive and very costly to operate.

C- Council tax to be replaced by a fairer system linked to the ability to pay as an interim step- reduce Council Tax for all pensioners by 50%.

D-Demand an end to the sale of Pensioners homes to pay for residential care!

In order to raise the priority of who we represent and to pay for our proposals we will distribute the national wealth in a fairer manner like removing Trident nuclear and non elected guango’s (house of lords) and a taxation on bankers bonuses and illegal wars.

  There are countless other problems facing Pensioners and as     well as pursuing the above we will also actively campaign on the following issues:-

Health and Social care.

We want realistic hospital waiting lists that are not dressed up or doctored. Reduce the time waiting for appointments. More patients centred as we are hearing more and more that the patients feel they are just lumps of meat.

Free travel by Rail Ferries and Trams.

This is a must as it is a way of getting out and combating loneliness and isolation.

Benefits generally but Carers in particular including respite.

We will fight for better benefits and carer respite. It is huge stress on relationships when one is caring for someone.

An end to Age discrimination and compulsory retirement.

If a person feels they can carry on working then in our opinion they should be allowed to carry on. When some people are forced to retire they feel they are thrown on the scrap heap and lose interest in life in general. When they do retire we would like to see programmes set up for the transition from working to retirement.

Housing and Fuel Poverty.

Improvement of housing adapted to a persons needs should be a priority as they spend most of their lives in them. The price of fuel is making us isolated as the cost is rocketing and reducing our visits to family, outings etc and adding to our isolation.

Law and Order.

Attendance at clubs and places of entertainment or interest are dropping because of the fear of attack at night with the increase in gangs. Most of us are wary about opening our door at night for fear of gangs. We must start at the bottom of this one. Children should be treated right and kept in a family environment and not force adopted or snatched from parents so they can grow up happy and content. The motive for authorities is to reduce cost but in the long run the cost is multiplied as being taken away from their family destroys their self esteem and leaves them with no respect for older people. They are aggressive hard to handle and when they grow up they choose gangs for that family feeling they were robbed of when they were young.

Student Fees (Theses are our Grandchildren)

Free student fees, free prescriptions. We would love this to be realistic but we need to point this out to that you all the financial experts are telling us that this cannot possibly be maintained and that it is being used just to win  election. Open minded people would rather believe the experts as SNP are well known for failed promises

My personal Goal is to make Family Law fairer and pursue the legislation of ‘The Charter for Grandchildren’

A huge fortune is made in family lay and massive savings will be made when this is sorted out. The government has lots of lawyers and they are members of the Scottish Law Society and their first oath they take is to fellow lawyers.

The Scottish Law Society advices the government on varies policies and every time the do it is always for the benefit of their members. Family law in Scotland is such a mess and it is to the benefit of lawyers who are making a fortune from the misery caused to families. it would not suit lawyers for the family laws to change. The mainstream of problems is for contact with children. The criteria is for the best interests of the children but it often turns out to be they best interests of lawyers, social services and other professionals who deal in the welfare of children. Grandparents Apart UK due to their constant lobbying convinced the Scottish that something needed to be done. The executive created the Charter for Grandchildren with a stakeholders group with Grandparents Apart UK as part of it. The Charter was intended for all to look more closely at the role grandparents can play in s child’s live rather than forced adoption or fostering or care but is was made advisory and now it needs to be mandatory as it is not being complied with as it is.

     Children can be used as weapons in relationships and Grandparents Apart UK policy is that the best interests of a child would be served by both parents being relevant provided there is no proven violence in the relationship and grandparents and extended family should have a say in a family group conference to resolve disputes again centred on the real best interests of the child/ren.

Stop paying Brussels £45million a day.

Regain control of immigration and our borders.

Pull out of the Common Agricultural Policy, which costs every family in Britain £950 a year.
Safeguard Britain's armed services from being absorbed into the so called 'European Army'.
Save UK businesses up to £120 billion a year (estimated cost of complying with thousands of EU laws), and avoid paying in the future for unfunded EU pensions.

Scrap the Human Rights Act (the 'criminal's charter' preventing us expelling terrorists back to

their own country).
End the obsession with wind farms, which only work at 30% efficiency, and are secretly subsidised by everyone's domestic fuel bills.
Pull out of the Common Fisheries Policy, the ecological disaster where thousands of perfectly good fish are thrown back to die in the sea.
Give the British people a right to binding local and national referenda on major issues.
Stop paying £billions to bail out the collapsing eurozone, when we are making huge cutback here at home.