This is a hoot to watch, we now have Catholic priests coming out in favour of the DUP
“Catholics have started to support Peter Robinson’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP)…the most consistently pro-life and pro-traditional marriage party in Northern Ireland.”
Blimey.
We will soon have Pink Order marches being routinely re-routed away from predominantly homophobic communities!
On topic the above graph shows just how much Labour has to do.
Labour will do OK. But the counties really are the toughest set of results for us. To regain all the seats we lost in 2009 we would have to do as well as the day when we won a general election. Which is almost impossible
Pretty desperate expectations management there.
For Labour to recover all the seats it lost in 2009 it would only have to achieve a 2005 type result ie a lead of 3% over the Conservatives.
If Labour can't get that in mid term opposition they need a new leader.
In comparison 3 years after 1997 the Conservatives won the local elections by 8%, 3 years after 2001 the Conservatives won the local elections by 10% and 3 years after the 2005 the Conservatives won the local elections by 19%.
This is a hoot to watch, we now have Catholic priests coming out in favour of the DUP
“Catholics have started to support Peter Robinson’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP)…the most consistently pro-life and pro-traditional marriage party in Northern Ireland.”
Blimey.
We will soon have Pink Order marches being routinely re-routed away from predominantly homophobic communities!
The Orange Order have updated their routines for these new times
This is a hoot to watch, we now have Catholic priests coming out in favour of the DUP
“Catholics have started to support Peter Robinson’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP)…the most consistently pro-life and pro-traditional marriage party in Northern Ireland.”
Blimey.
We will soon have Pink Order marches being routinely re-routed away from predominantly homophobic communities!
Shapps is a genius. Warsi had a great set of elections and destroyed AV when Cameron demanded it. She also did the country a massive favour when she took out Nick Griffin in front of 8 million people.
And yet the Tory members couldn't stand her because she was Asian. And now they have a useless over promoted white public school boy.
ComRes’s monthly telephone poll for the Independent is out tonight, and has topline figures of CON 32%(+4), LAB 38%(nc), LDEM 9%(-3), UKIP 13(-1). Changes are from the last ComRes telephone poll at the end of March, before the death of Margaret Thatcher and before the recent narrowing in the polls which this poll obviously reflects to some extent.
ComRes’s monthly telephone poll for the Independent is out tonight, and has topline figures of CON 32%(+4), LAB 38%(nc), LDEM 9%(-3), UKIP 13(-1). Changes are from the last ComRes telephone poll at the end of March, before the death of Margaret Thatcher and before the recent narrowing in the polls which this poll obviously reflects to some extent.
"Damian Lyons Lowe, chief executive of pollsters Survation, said that Ukip could win up to 100 seats – by mostly winning over previous Conservative voters."
Recent posts have focused on recent counter offensives by Assad’s forces, particularly in Damascus and in the central region of Homs along the strategic north south artery, pushing out rebels threatening this route and relieving a number of besieged garrisons. Two things of note was the prominence of Hizbollah who threw a couple of thousand troops into the central region and whether Assad's forces, unable to hold vast tracts of the country could hold onto to these gains on a more permanent basis.
So far he is holding them as the rebels, who fell victim to a mix of bad co-ordination and facing a much more capable, concentrated, coherent and laden with firepower force, yielded ground fairly quickly.
The rebels appear, however, to have adjusted quickly and have struck against that offensive in the Homs region and Hizbollah in particular. The Lebanese group has long had 2-3 000 troops in Syria but the appearance of such a large supplement of around 2000 in the Homs area undoubtedly told. Losses for Hizbollah have been reported at about 5-6 a week but in the last 24 hours they and the Syrian forces lost scores of forces in a massive rebel ambush.
Reinforced themselves with Lebanese counterparts and with suspiciously shiny new light multiple rocket launch systems they pounded the Hizbollah/Assad forces and may well have stopped the sharp end of the offensive in its tracks. Hizbollah’s head honcho who has been doing a lot of recent trips to Tehran and talking to the Russians is reportedly due to make a very short notice speech on Tuesday.
If the recent successes for Assad in these key areas have their momentum firmly halted, he may not get another chance.
In a classic military shift of focus they have also redoubled attacks on airfields and launching areas for Assad’s heavy rockets (the notorious SCUDS) in what looks a well informed set of operations to degrade Assad’s heaviest range weapons. If they manage it, it will eventually tell. It also stretches Assad's forces again, limiting his ability to concentrate his mobile forces on any area for a long time.
Today there were other notable events:
-A failed assassination attempt on the Syrian Prime Minister in Damascus
-The reported firing of surface to air missiles (note plural) at a transiting Russian airliner. Whilst we await for confirmation of both the attack (your average shoulder launched system doesn’t have a hope against an airliner cruising in excess of 30 000 feet) and also whether the shooters had full comprehension of exactly what they were aiming at.
For the 3rd parties with interests in the conflict there has also been much movement. The Russians whilst still backing Assad’s forces whilst they have fight left have long covered their rear by stating they are not hooked to Bashar's own wagon. Their reported assessment is that the prospect of ever greater spillover to neighboring countries and the chemical weapons issue believe that external intervention is close to inevitable.
Washington is doing its best to prove that wrong by reading the information about chemical weapons use then running away from it as unreliable. Preparations for a buildup of forces in Jordan, both as a defensive move against any Assad based threat and a possible fighting force continues to go on quietly.
The White House is somewhat bugged by the Israeli rhetoric on chemical weapons use which continues to get louder. The Israelis probably have the best intelligence of all and are both embarrassing the President and trying to nudge a response. More significantly they are also preparing the ground to do whatever they see fit to protect their interests. The appearance of piloted Israeli aircraft over Syrian is a statement that they'll not sit still.
With yet more reports of the use of dispersant munitions today, the Assad regime has been testing the chemical waters for a while via a mix of small scale and ‘less lethal’ agent use. The White House’s apparent passivity has been noted. Chances are the calculation is that unless they make a large scale lethal agent attack they may well get away with it.
What on earth is a living wage? Sounds just like fair trade, everyone thinks it really means something else like free trade. More platitudinous sound bite nonsense from Ed M and his unfeasibly large economically illiterate backers, did he clear it with Ed Balls?
How is it worked out, what criteria are used to judge living wages?
This is a hoot to watch, we now have Catholic priests coming out in favour of the DUP
“Catholics have started to support Peter Robinson’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP)…the most consistently pro-life and pro-traditional marriage party in Northern Ireland.”
Blimey.
We will soon have Pink Order marches being routinely re-routed away from predominantly homophobic communities!
The Orange Order have updated their routines for these new times
History A-level can be very demanding. Just watching "Pointless" and a Law Student at U. of York has just been challenged on "Countries which were members of the Warsaw Pact". Answer = Japan!
Maybe he was referring to the Kurile Islands!
Anyway, Japan was occupied by Anglo-American forces 1945-1952. Also, the Japanese drive on the left too!
I had the pleasure of driving in Japan for a year. Sometimes Japanese were very careless drivers: I recall seeing a women driving in the city centre with a pooch on her lap.
I think it's fair to say that Ed Miliband is having a seriously sh*t 2013. Of course, Miliband's failings were obvious from the outset. Where he got lucky was that a number of right-wing pundits, in order to look like mavericks and free thinkers, heaped unwarranted praise early on. (The reception given to the One Nation stuff is a prime example.) That fad has now passed, Farage is the new darling of the Right, and Ed is looking increasingly irrelevant. He needs to come up with a big announcement and soon. I'd suggest making Tony Blair a peer and appointing him Shadow Chancellor. That would get tongues wagging!
@IOS "And yet the Tory members couldn't stand her because she was Asian. And now they have a useless over promoted white public school boy"
All the prejudices you mention might be true and I agree that Shapps isn't very impressive but Warsi was much much worse. By a mile the weakest cabinet minister and embarrassingly over promoted. I think you are misremembering. Did they ever sort out her trip to Pakistan with a business partner/chum?
This is a hoot to watch, we now have Catholic priests coming out in favour of the DUP
“Catholics have started to support Peter Robinson’s Democratic Unionist Party (DUP)…the most consistently pro-life and pro-traditional marriage party in Northern Ireland.”
Blimey.
We will soon have Pink Order marches being routinely re-routed away from predominantly homophobic communities!
No, the Pink Order do exist, they come from Nudistan:
And the most hard-line of hard-line factions within Nudistan's Pink Order call themselves 'The Spirit of Bumcree', after their stance during the confrontation with the homophobic residents of the village of Portaloo. Only the presence of heavily armed soldiers of the Bed Army prevented the Spirit of Bumcree from leading their fellow Pinkmen down the road from the Lesbyterian lodge at the top of Bumcree village through the predominantly homophobic residential area of Garducky Road.
FPT @SeanT This comment after your article is a keeper. minerva Today 02:22 PM
Since Sean Thomas only looks about thirty, he's hardly qualified to have a valid opinion about Britain 'back in the day'; as he would no doubt say in the Americanised argot of his (young) generation.
FPT @SeanT This comment after your article is a keeper. minerva Today 02:22 PM
Since Sean Thomas only looks about thirty, he's hardly qualified to have a valid opinion about Britain 'back in the day'; as he would no doubt say in the Americanised argot of his (young) generation.
@toadmeister: Mili on #wato: "People are asking, Are our problems so deep that nobody can make a difference to them? My emphatic answer is yes." #SaveEd
It's a site to discuss politics. That's why I am discussing it. I am over joyed that the Tories are screwing up their next general election campaign.
Crosby is making a strategic mistake in thinking he can dog whistle like Australia. This isn't AV. It's FPTP. Why would you (when the dog whistle says its so so important) want the weak Tory brand when you could have the real UKIP brand.
So when Crosby goes the wrong direction hapless compounds it by spending the last weekend attacking them and making UKIP voters MORE determined to stay with their party. If Shapps had any organisational nuance he would have spent all those man hours on making sure targeted leaflets go to the key voters.
@Andrew_ComRes: ComRes/Independent: Lab's "time for a change" message is more popular than Tories' "let us finish what we started" http://t.co/OybPV0MEaN
The real story is that UKIP are now regularly hitting the early / mid teens. And they show no sign of slowing down. If they get a boost out of May then they could even begin to threaten the 20's.
And if they do that then suddenly the possibility that they will get some MPs elected becomes very very real.
FPT @SeanT This comment after your article is a keeper. minerva Today 02:22 PM
Since Sean Thomas only looks about thirty, he's hardly qualified to have a valid opinion about Britain 'back in the day'; as he would no doubt say in the Americanised argot of his (young) generation.
This is a magnificent piece by Sean Thomas, one of the world's most elegant and perceptive writers.
We are lucky to be able read his opinions on this government and politics in general.
That's a valid contribution to the DT Mr Eagles, it reminds me of an Irish manager friend in a heated negotiation " Things looked as if the were getting out of control so I got out the whiskey just to calm things down".
It's a site to discuss politics. That's why I am discussing it. I am over joyed that the Tories are screwing up their next general election campaign.
Crosby is making a strategic mistake in thinking he can dog whistle like Australia. This isn't AV. It's FPTP. Why would you (when the dog whistle says its so so important) want the weak Tory brand when you could have the real UKIP brand.
So when Crosby goes the wrong direction hapless compounds it by spending the last weekend attacking them and making UKIP voters MORE determined to stay with their party. If Shapps had any organisational nuance he would have spent all those man hours on making sure targeted leaflets go to the key voters.
Useless.
It is beginning to look as if it is all over for Ed.
What is the talk in Brewers Green, IOS?
Who is next up? Rachel Reeves? Chuka Umunna? Or do you think Labour will go for a more established figure to shore up their core support? Alastair Darling or Alan Johnstone perhaps?
Peter Kellner has done an Ed is Crap piece in tomorrow's Times
he concludes with this
However, for Mr Miliband to be seen as a true contender, he must sound like a future Prime Minister. Yesterday he failed that harsh but vital test. And what should really terrify him is this: if he has difficulty fending off the courteous if persistent Martha Kearney on World at One, how can he hope to dodge the daggers that even now Lynton Crosby, the Tories’ Wizard of Oz, is doubtless planning to hurl at him when the election campaign proper gets under way?
Peter Kellner has done an Ed is Crap piece in tomorrow's Times
he concludes with this
However, for Mr Miliband to be seen as a true contender, he must sound like a future Prime Minister. Yesterday he failed that harsh but vital test. And what should really terrify him is this: if he has difficulty fending off the courteous if persistent Martha Kearney on World at One, how can he hope to dodge the daggers that even now Lynton Crosby, the Tories’ Wizard of Oz, is doubtless planning to hurl at him when the election campaign proper gets under way?
Time for Ed Balls to stop being so shy and retiring, he is the future face of Labour.
Google “UKIP” and the first sentence you read — the one they have prepared especially to explain what they are — runs as follows: “Libertarian, non-racist party seeking Britain’s withdrawal from the European Union.”
A bit of that jars slightly, doesn’t it? I mean, look, I’ll take their word for it. But constantly having to explain that you aren’t a racist is a bit like constantly having to explain that you don’t play the trumpet. As in, mystifying if it happens only once or twice, but probably your fault if it happens much more. Possibly you carry around a trumpet all the time, for example. Something like that.
We should not, though, get bogged down by UKIP and racism. People do, and I think it’s a mistake. Certainly a handful of their candidates are avowedly racist, and I suspect quite a few more would need to rely on the old taxi-driver disclaimer of being “not racist, but . . .”
UPDATE: The Sun have also tweeted tonight’s YouGov poll, which has topline figures of CON 30%, LAB 39%, LD 11%, UKIP 14%. The UKIP score is the highest that YouGov have yet shown for the party. As ever, one shouldn’t read too much into a single poll but given the publicity that UKIP have received over the last few days it would not surprise me to see an increase. I would not expect lots of publicity about a handful of loony council candidates for UKIP to do them much harm to what is largely an anti-immigration, anti-government, anti-establishment and protest vote – people are sending a message, not picking a government. If anything the coverage of them, and the implication that other parties are taking them seriously enough to bother attacking them, could well help.
Wishful thinking, tim.
When a candidate appears on the front page of The Mirror making a Nazi salute, it is really all over for the party.
Fascinating Com Res poll. UKIP hardly budging - Labour unmoved - but the Tories possibly taking support from the Lib Dems??
Calamitous for Clegg, encouraging for Cameron.
I wonder if this is the Ed Miliband effect. People are looking again at Red and deciding No Way - and this is driving centrist, floating, undecided voters towards the Tories, in despair of the likely alternative?
It always seems to be a few weeks before events start to affect the polls, not just the next day unless it is something catastophic. I think this is the Thatcher effect.
The other effect of the rise of UKIP is to shift Dave to the sensible middle ground, with the LibDems being rather irrelavent. The whole of politics is shifting rightwards.
I haven't heard it like 99.5% of the population. It won't shift the polls. It won't change any votes. The fact that everyone here is getting so excited about it shows just how desperate they are for something to cling on to.
Todays random response to UKIP seems to be to ignore them. And this is the real story. Not some here today gone tomorrow interview.
City AM referencing a "ComRes/4th agenda poll" on public attitudes to gov't fiscal behaviour.
"78 per cent of the public agree that “politicians are too reckless about how they spend taxpayers’ money”; just 12 per cent disagree, according to a poll by ComRes for the 4th Agenda."
The "living wage" is just one way of trying to give everyone a stake in society, rather than just the property-owning classes.
Another approach would be to try to reduce living costs, so that the current minimum wage would be a "living wage". Housing costs would be the obvious place to start.
Conservatives used to see the sense in this sort of thing, as being a reasonable price to pay in return for social peace. Nowadays they mostly insist that those who inevitably end up at the bottom of the pile have only themselves to blame, and deserve to receive a pittance in return for their labour, so as to encourage them.
I haven't heard it like 99.5% of the population. It won't shift the polls. It won't change any votes. The fact that everyone here is getting so excited about it shows just how desperate they are for something to cling on to.
Todays random response to UKIP seems to be to ignore them. And this is the real story. Not some here today gone tomorrow interview.
I afraid ios,the run up to the GE,ed will be in the spot light and his training so far = lol
The Tories have messed up the timing of this UKIP stuff, far too close to Election Day to work They were obviously distracted by the Philpott funeral, and that other one.
I fear the Tories had neither choice nor influence. Shapps may have saved lazy journalists research time, but he can't instruct or even persuade the press to run the stories.
The press were only going to give two weeks of time to attacking UKIP and that had to be the runup to the council elections.
At all other times stopping Leveson was much more important than protecting Cameron and his party.
With the rise of any party you move from stage I: show no recongition, dismiss; to stage II: attempt to show they are unsuitable for senior positions, attack; eventually to stage III: denigrate their record in government and suggest they are not allowed to govern.
The Tories re UKIP have moved from stage I to stage II, but not before time. They'd been at the fruitcakes, etc. stage but at some point you have to switch over, for worse is to be behind the curve. When Wells says " If anything the coverage of them, and the implication that other parties are taking them seriously enough to bother attacking them, could well help." it reflects the necessity of making the jump. It's difficult at this stage to gauge whether it would have been best left till after the election or not.
The Faslane Peace Camp, which for more than 30 years has defiantly opposed the presence in the Clyde of Britain’s nuclear deterrent, is facing closure because of a lack of activists.
During the last three decades, campaigners have lived next to the Gare Loch in Argyll under the threat of eviction, and various attempted blockades of the military base have led to many arrests.
But a shortage of people willing to pitch tent on the often wet and windy west coast is making the dwindling number who remain make plans to leave.
Arrangements are being made for the last four residents to start dismantling the camp next month and replace it with a garden in time for the 31st anniversary on June 12.
"The Faslane Peace Camp, which for more than 30 years has defiantly opposed the presence in the Clyde of Britain’s nuclear deterrent, is facing closure"
Well, there won't be much need for it soon anyway.
The Faslane Peace Camp, which for more than 30 years has defiantly opposed the presence in the Clyde of Britain’s nuclear deterrent, is facing closure because of a lack of activists.
During the last three decades, campaigners have lived next to the Gare Loch in Argyll under the threat of eviction, and various attempted blockades of the military base have led to many arrests.
But a shortage of people willing to pitch tent on the often wet and windy west coast is making the dwindling number who remain make plans to leave.
Arrangements are being made for the last four residents to start dismantling the camp next month and replace it with a garden in time for the 31st anniversary on June 12.
I used to pass the Atomic Weapons Establishment (Aldermaston) on my way to the supermarket. On summer weekend afternoons you get mini-hippy camps there. They set up tents, rainbow flags, then take photos of one another, pack up, and go home.
How are you getting on with house price inflation in Middlesbrough?
Here is a table to give you some clues:
Region Monthly change Annual change Avg. price (since Feb 2013) (since Mar 2012) (Mar 2013)
London 2.5% 9.6% £374,568 Yorkshire & The Humber 1.1% -0.8% £117,192 East 1.0% 1.1% £174,753 West Midlands 1.0% 0.4% £130,276 East Midlands 0.3% -0.7% £122,795 South East -0.3% 1.2% £208,479 South West -0.5% 0.0% £170,110 Wales -0.9% 1.2% £116,174 North East -1.8% -5.5% £ 97,033 North West -2.5% -4.9% £106,537
"I used to pass the Atomic Weapons Establishment (Aldermaston) on my way to the supermarket. On summer weekend afternoons you get mini-hippy camps there. They set up tents, rainbow flags, then take photos of one another, pack up, and go home."
If only the children incinerated in Hiroshima had had the chance to spend weekends like that.
My impression FWIW is that the UKIP bandwagon is speeding up slightly - today was in a predominantly Tory division (Nuthall) and there was notably more UKIP support than in similarly Tory Toton a week ago. They are finally managing to put out a few leaflets, but the main driver is obviously press coverage about attacks by others, which at this stage comes under the "any publicity is good publicity" heading. Labour vote seems in fair shape, as does the LibDem vote in their seats.
Overall there is more interest in the elections than in the borough election in 2011.
"The Faslane Peace Camp, which for more than 30 years has defiantly opposed the presence in the Clyde of Britain’s nuclear deterrent, is facing closure"
Well, there won't be much need for it soon anyway.
Quite - only 4 saddos left - when the last one leaves the camp can be cleaned away.
Comments
The press will certainly strain every sinew to help the Tories at the next election, there's no doubt about that.
For Labour to recover all the seats it lost in 2009 it would only have to achieve a 2005 type result ie a lead of 3% over the Conservatives.
If Labour can't get that in mid term opposition they need a new leader.
In comparison 3 years after 1997 the Conservatives won the local elections by 8%, 3 years after 2001 the Conservatives won the local elections by 10% and 3 years after the 2005 the Conservatives won the local elections by 19%.
Ahem Upminster
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQ-SaqUYJZw
YouGov/Sun poll tonight: UKIP hit a record high of 14%, taking support off Labour and Tories. CON 30%, LAB 39%, LD 11%, UKIP 14%.
http://www.belfastpride.com/
YouGov/The Sunil:
Governing Coalition: 41%
Team Ed: 39%
And yet the Tory members couldn't stand her because she was Asian. And now they have a useless over promoted white public school boy.
The Tories really do deserve everything they get.
http://ukpollingreport.co.uk/blog/archives/7351
Evidence ? or your just smearing.
Though he may have been given his A level results because of who he knew.
Tories +4
UKIP -1
Interesting.
Huzzah for Grant Shapps?
Fair enough if he isn't a public school boy. He still is a dreadful choice to run CCHQ. An empty talking suit.
At least one of these three needs to be fired:
Osborne
Crosby
Shapps.
They all have different strategies and it is just coming across as confused.
http://news.uk.msn.com/uk/local-elections-2013-how-will-ukip-perform-nigel-farage-271058
Recent posts have focused on recent counter offensives by Assad’s forces, particularly in Damascus and in the central region of Homs along the strategic north south artery, pushing out rebels threatening this route and relieving a number of besieged garrisons. Two things of note was the prominence of Hizbollah who threw a couple of thousand troops into the central region and whether Assad's forces, unable to hold vast tracts of the country could hold onto to these gains on a more permanent basis.
So far he is holding them as the rebels, who fell victim to a mix of bad co-ordination and facing a much more capable, concentrated, coherent and laden with firepower force, yielded ground fairly quickly.
The rebels appear, however, to have adjusted quickly and have struck against that offensive in the Homs region and Hizbollah in particular. The Lebanese group has long had 2-3 000 troops in Syria but the appearance of such a large supplement of around 2000 in the Homs area undoubtedly told. Losses for Hizbollah have been reported at about 5-6 a week but in the last 24 hours they and the Syrian forces lost scores of forces in a massive rebel ambush.
Reinforced themselves with Lebanese counterparts and with suspiciously shiny new light multiple rocket launch systems they pounded the Hizbollah/Assad forces and may well have stopped the sharp end of the offensive in its tracks. Hizbollah’s head honcho who has been doing a lot of recent trips to Tehran and talking to the Russians is reportedly due to make a very short notice speech on Tuesday.
If the recent successes for Assad in these key areas have their momentum firmly halted, he may not get another chance.
In a classic military shift of focus they have also redoubled attacks on airfields and launching areas for Assad’s heavy rockets (the notorious SCUDS) in what looks a well informed set of operations to degrade Assad’s heaviest range weapons. If they manage it, it will eventually tell. It also stretches Assad's forces again, limiting his ability to concentrate his mobile forces on any area for a long time.
Today there were other notable events:
-A failed assassination attempt on the Syrian Prime Minister in Damascus
-The reported firing of surface to air missiles (note plural) at a transiting Russian airliner. Whilst we await for confirmation of both the attack (your average shoulder launched system doesn’t have a hope against an airliner cruising in excess of 30 000 feet) and also whether the shooters had full comprehension of exactly what they were aiming at.
For the 3rd parties with interests in the conflict there has also been much movement. The Russians whilst still backing Assad’s forces whilst they have fight left have long covered their rear by stating they are not hooked to Bashar's own wagon. Their reported assessment is that the prospect of ever greater spillover to neighboring countries and the chemical weapons issue believe that external intervention is close to inevitable.
Washington is doing its best to prove that wrong by reading the information about chemical weapons use then running away from it as unreliable. Preparations for a buildup of forces in Jordan, both as a defensive move against any Assad based threat and a possible fighting force continues to go on quietly.
The White House is somewhat bugged by the Israeli rhetoric on chemical weapons use which continues to get louder. The Israelis probably have the best intelligence of all and are both embarrassing the President and trying to nudge a response. More significantly they are also preparing the ground to do whatever they see fit to protect their interests. The appearance of piloted Israeli aircraft over Syrian is a statement that they'll not sit still.
With yet more reports of the use of dispersant munitions today, the Assad regime has been testing the chemical waters for a while via a mix of small scale and ‘less lethal’ agent use. The White House’s apparent passivity has been noted. Chances are the calculation is that unless they make a large scale lethal agent attack they may well get away with it.
How is it worked out, what criteria are used to judge living wages?
The irony - you've got an empty suit as party leader.
Evidence please on tory membership couldn't stand warsi because she was Asian.
http://www.london.gov.uk/sites/default/files/living-wage-2012.pdf
Must be the cause of the week.
"And yet the Tory members couldn't stand her because she was Asian. And now they have a useless over promoted white public school boy"
All the prejudices you mention might be true and I agree that Shapps isn't very impressive but Warsi was much much worse. By a mile the weakest cabinet minister and embarrassingly over promoted. I think you are misremembering. Did they ever sort out her trip to Pakistan with a business partner/chum?
And the most hard-line of hard-line factions within Nudistan's Pink
Order call themselves 'The Spirit of Bumcree', after their stance
during the confrontation with the homophobic residents of the village
of Portaloo. Only the presence of heavily armed soldiers of the Bed
Army prevented the Spirit of Bumcree from leading their fellow Pinkmen
down the road from the Lesbyterian lodge at the top of Bumcree village
through the predominantly homophobic residential area of Garducky
Road.
Cons 32% (+4); Labour 38% (no change); UKIP 13% (-1); Lib Dems 9% (-3) http://www.comres.co.uk/
In the 2011 elections. The Tories Gained seats.
That shows just how thick Toby Young is.
@SeanT
This comment after your article is a keeper.
minerva
Today 02:22 PM
Since Sean Thomas only looks about thirty, he's hardly qualified to have a valid opinion about Britain 'back in the day'; as he would no doubt say in the Americanised argot of his (young) generation.
Vote UKIP! (from a disillusioned Scottish Tory)
The Screaming Eagles
Today 09:06 PM
This is a magnificent piece by Sean Thomas, one of the world's most elegant and perceptive writers.
We are lucky to be able read his opinions on this government and politics in general.
It's a site to discuss politics. That's why I am discussing it. I am over joyed that the Tories are screwing up their next general election campaign.
Crosby is making a strategic mistake in thinking he can dog whistle like Australia. This isn't AV. It's FPTP. Why would you (when the dog whistle says its so so important) want the weak Tory brand when you could have the real UKIP brand.
So when Crosby goes the wrong direction hapless compounds it by spending the last weekend attacking them and making UKIP voters MORE determined to stay with their party. If Shapps had any organisational nuance he would have spent all those man hours on making sure targeted leaflets go to the key voters.
Useless.
Neil Henderson @hendopolis 1m
Mirror: Ugly face of UKIP #tomorrowspaperstoday #BBCpapers pic.twitter.com/IEzsNp1FNX
The real story is that UKIP are now regularly hitting the early / mid teens. And they show no sign of slowing down. If they get a boost out of May then they could even begin to threaten the 20's.
And if they do that then suddenly the possibility that they will get some MPs elected becomes very very real.
' He needs to come up with a big announcement and soon'
We had that to-day,6 policy announcements,did you miss it?
What is the talk in Brewers Green, IOS?
Who is next up? Rachel Reeves? Chuka Umunna? Or do you think Labour will go for a more established figure to shore up their core support? Alastair Darling or Alan Johnstone perhaps?
https://twitter.com/hendopolis/status/328983924216844288/photo/1
Are UKIP a threat to Labour?
Surely not.
he concludes with this
However, for Mr Miliband to be seen as a true contender, he must sound like a future Prime Minister. Yesterday he failed that harsh but vital test. And what should really terrify him is this: if he has difficulty fending off the courteous if persistent Martha Kearney on World at One, how can he hope to dodge the daggers that even now Lynton Crosby, the Tories’ Wizard of Oz, is doubtless planning to hurl at him when the election campaign proper gets under way?
All this coverage is boosting UKIP. The Mirror is simply trying to help them along in an attempt to undermine the Tories.
We can see how much of a threat UKIP are to Labour then shall we.
When a candidate appears on the front page of The Mirror making a Nazi salute, it is really all over for the party.
The other effect of the rise of UKIP is to shift Dave to the sensible middle ground, with the LibDems being rather irrelavent. The whole of politics is shifting rightwards.
http://images2.corriereobjects.it/Primo_Piano/Politica/gallery/2013/04/letta_enrico/fiducia/img_fiducia/fiducia_00_941-705_resize.jpg?v=20130429160006
I haven't heard it like 99.5% of the population. It won't shift the polls. It won't change any votes. The fact that everyone here is getting so excited about it shows just how desperate they are for something to cling on to.
Todays random response to UKIP seems to be to ignore them. And this is the real story. Not some here today gone tomorrow interview.
"78 per cent of the public agree that “politicians are too reckless about how they spend taxpayers’ money”; just 12 per cent disagree, according to a poll by ComRes for the 4th Agenda."
http://www.cityam.com/article/british-public-slowly-becoming-more-fiscally-conservative
Another approach would be to try to reduce living costs, so that the current minimum wage would be a "living wage". Housing costs would be the obvious place to start.
Conservatives used to see the sense in this sort of thing, as being a reasonable price to pay in return for social peace. Nowadays they mostly insist that those who inevitably end up at the bottom of the pile have only themselves to blame, and deserve to receive a pittance in return for their labour, so as to encourage them.
http://blog.paddypower.com/2013/04/29/guido-fawkes-bring-on-the-clowns-why-im-tipping-ukip-to-take-50-seats-in-thursdays-local-elections/
Avery knows this. What I don't understand why he insists on arguing things he doesn't believe in which will change nothing or no ones mind.
On another places, they found out who Menodora is
www.southwarknews.co.uk/00,news,20731,11009,00.htm
The press were only going to give two weeks of time to attacking UKIP and that had to be the runup to the council elections.
At all other times stopping Leveson was much more important than protecting Cameron and his party.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1286627/Ed-Balls-forgets-Tory-Oxford-dressed-Nazi.html
lol,he as a point.
http://liberalconspiracy.org/2013/04/29/do-benefits-for-rich-pensioners-preserve-universal-support-for-welfare/
I think he's right on this one, both for Labour and for the country. I suggest that Labour needs to be bolder than Sunny Hundal on this subject also.
The Tories re UKIP have moved from stage I to stage II, but not before time. They'd been at the fruitcakes, etc. stage but at some point you have to switch over, for worse is to be behind the curve. When Wells says " If anything the coverage of them, and the implication that other parties are taking them seriously enough to bother attacking them, could well help." it reflects the necessity of making the jump. It's difficult at this stage to gauge whether it would have been best left till after the election or not.
Shapps should have made sure that those staff members were bothering to actually run the Tories local election campaign.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QQV3UHsZ_u4
Not every day that a politician gets savaged by Martha Kearney.
The Faslane Peace Camp, which for more than 30 years has defiantly opposed the presence in the Clyde of Britain’s nuclear deterrent, is facing closure because of a lack of activists.
During the last three decades, campaigners have lived next to the Gare Loch in Argyll under the threat of eviction, and various attempted blockades of the military base have led to many
arrests.
But a shortage of people willing to pitch tent on the often wet and windy west coast is making the dwindling number who remain make plans to leave.
Arrangements are being made for the last four residents to start dismantling the camp next month and replace it with a garden in time for the 31st anniversary on June 12.
Well, there won't be much need for it soon anyway.
Shapps just isn't the man to lead a bureaucracy. Cameron put him there because he thought he would be good on TV.
You are mistaking Oxford for its fenland rival whose support fro totalitarian regimes was positively apostolic.
How are you getting on with house price inflation in Middlesbrough?
Here is a table to give you some clues:
If only the children incinerated in Hiroshima had had the chance to spend weekends like that.
Overall there is more interest in the elections than in the borough election in 2011.
Yes, the path will need to be cleared to allow Trident to leave Scotland in 2016.