A plague on both their houses

The government proposes that cash machines routinely give customers the opportunity to donate to charity, or not.  The government proposes that 'giving' should be made a new social norm without saying how exactly they would achieve this.  The government proposes a number of different things to make into a reality the fuzzy, farcical notion of Cameorn's 'Big Society', but stressing that this should be done by persuasion not coercion.  It is certainly striking that 8% of the population contributes more than 50% of the charitable donations.  However, a friend of mine would always argue that charitable donation undermines the social and moral responsibilities of government.  Giving money to good causes allows the government to reduce its own spending or eliminate it altogether.   And isn't this precisely what is happening?  Isn't the slew of ideas from the think-tank green paper simply a political tool to rationalise, post hoc, the decision to reduce public spending?  A decision that is totemic.  A decision taken more for reasons of political ideology than economic necessity, whatever the buggers in the Coalition Government say.  (Petition #1 for 2011.  No more with 'Coalition Govenrment'.  Let's call it 'A Plague on Both their Houses').