You were further away with your crossover prediction than Avery was!
Much further.
I was reported by Bobafrett as claiming 24th December but it has arrived just over seven months early!
Avery you seem to have forgotten your predicted crossover dates of January 2013, April 2013, June 2013, October 2013, December 2013......ssssshhhh no one else noticed them.
So we're agreed - most of Avery's crossover predictions were more accurate than yours!
You originally stated "You were further away with your crossover prediction than Avery was!". It depends which Avery one you want to take. Unlike Avery, my prediction didn't move every few months. In fact he gave up after so many failures when December 2013 went crashing.
Avery is like Caesar, 'pouter:
I could be well moved if I were as you. If I could pray to move, prayers would move me. But I am constant as the northern star, Of whose true-fixed and resting quality There is no fellow in the firmament.
You were further away with your crossover prediction than Avery was!
Much further.
I was reported by Bobafrett as claiming 24th December but it has arrived just over seven months early!
Avery you seem to have forgotten your predicted crossover dates of January 2013, April 2013, June 2013, October 2013, December 2013......ssssshhhh no one else noticed them.
So we're agreed - most of Avery's crossover predictions were more accurate than yours!
You originally stated "You were further away with your crossover prediction than Avery was!". It depends which Avery one you want to take. Unlike Avery, my prediction didn't move every few months. In fact he gave up after so many failures when December 2013 went crashing.
Avery is like Caesar, 'pouter:
I could be well moved if I were as you. If I could pray to move, prayers would move me. But I am constant as the northern star, Of whose true-fixed and resting quality There is no fellow in the firmament.
Was Caesar crap at making and remembering predictions also?
It is not until Wednesday that we will find out that unemployment has fallen by another 100K and that real wages are now growing across the economy. No doubt Yougov will have Labour up to a fairly safe lead by then.
O/T Wigan have really blown this, they should have been 2 or 3 up in the first half hour. Another success for Harry though.
Real wages growing is a load of tosh frankly. No one I know has had anything significant in the way of pay rises for several years now and that is across a range of industries and our outgoing have all risen by far more than CPI indicates.
We didnt benefit from the boom in the Brown years and we aren't benefitting from this so called return to growth.
The only people making increases are homeowners and the senior management. The rest of us especially the single amongst us are getting shafted and have been all this century
It is not until Wednesday that we will find out that unemployment has fallen by another 100K and that real wages are now growing across the economy. No doubt Yougov will have Labour up to a fairly safe lead by then.
O/T Wigan have really blown this, they should have been 2 or 3 up in the first half hour. Another success for Harry though.
The only people making increases are homeowners and the senior management. The rest of us especially the single amongst us are getting shafted and have been all this century
To be serious - the polls of the last few days have been all over the place - but it seems that the continuing good economic news combined with the dreadful ideas vacuum within the left may be accelerating the inevitable shift back to the government. I'm not sure that Ed has anything much to offer beyond a kind of dumbed down Michael Foot style class war and I doubt if that can win an election in the 21st century.
"Given what we know of how quickly postal voters generally act and the level of turnouts that these elections attract it is not too dramatic an assumption to say that getting on for half of all the votes have now been cast.
I, myself, voted last Saturday so there’s no chance of a late change of mine. The vote is in and that’s it.
This makes this weekend’s polling rather odd because part will be an exit survey.
Another consequence is that the opportunity for the parties to influence the outcome is much less than it was. Maybe only 15-20% of likely voters are left.
All this is probably good news for Ukip which has been riding high."
That bit about Miliband and the NHS on the news before was a perfect example of what is so badly wrong with Labour at the moment.
EM: "The NHS is in a terrible state. Something needs to change."
Nick Robinson: "Will you raise taxes to pay for improvements in the NHS?"
EM: "No, I won't...we'll lay out our plans at the election...in these tough times, we need to stretch out the resources as far as possible."
There is NO POINT complaining about a problem if you're not going to promise a way of fixing it. Yet again, this all goes back to their irrational phobia of promising government spending (because of their overestimation of how much people care about the deficit). The only way of improving public services and helping poor people is by spending money -- and if Labour's not about improving public services and helping poor people, then it's not anything, and there's no reason to vote for them over the Tories.
It is not until Wednesday that we will find out that unemployment has fallen by another 100K and that real wages are now growing across the economy. No doubt Yougov will have Labour up to a fairly safe lead by then.
O/T Wigan have really blown this, they should have been 2 or 3 up in the first half hour. Another success for Harry though.
Real wages growing is a load of tosh frankly. No one I know has had anything significant in the way of pay rises for several years now and that is across a range of industries and our outgoing have all risen by far more than CPI indicates.
We didnt benefit from the boom in the Brown years and we aren't benefitting from this so called return to growth.
The only people making increases are homeowners and the senior management. The rest of us especially the single amongst us are getting shafted and have been all this century
Simply not true. Those on average wages and below have already been ahead in real terms as a result of the increase in personal allowances. The better paid have been squeezed and I would not dispute that the best paid have done best of all.
You also need to take account of the massive reductions in housing costs arising from rock bottom mortgage rates over the last few years. The combination of these factors is why consumption has held up in real terms.
The electorate are never known for being particularly grateful but is it a coincidence that the ICM poll is after the great British public received their wage packets with their new personal allowances for the first time?
Evening all, how long until we hear that Labour is starting to crank up its party workers in Morley and Outwood. When that day comes we will know Labour is shit scared about GE2015 regardless of what they say in public. That Enfield Southgate moment is getting closer for Ed Balls
That bit about Miliband and the NHS on the news before was a perfect example of what is so badly wrong with Labour at the moment.
EM: "The NHS is in a terrible state. Something needs to change."
Nick Robinson: "Will you raise taxes to pay for improvements in the NHS?"
EM: "No, I won't...we'll lay out our plans at the election...in these tough times, we need to stretch out the resources as far as possible."
There is NO POINT complaining about a problem if you're not going to promise a way of fixing it. Yet again, this all goes back to their irrational phobia of promising government spending (because of their overestimation of how much people care about the deficit). The only way of improving public services and helping poor people is by spending money -- and if Labour's not about improving public services and helping poor people, then it's not anything, and there's no reason to vote for them over the Tories.
Every time Labour has governed they have spent masses of money. The result has always been economic calamity. Chucking money around like a man with no arms has never worked before, won't work now. It will NEVER EVER work.
Pim Fortuyn's murderer was recently released. The media should be careful with their coverage, Fortuyn warned his opponents before an immigration activist murdered him that his blood would be on their hands.
"Chucking money around like a man with no arms".....err a man with no arms wouldn't be able to chuck money around. That is like saying tap dancing like a man with no legs.
Real wages growing is a load of tosh frankly. No one I know has had anything significant in the way of pay rises for several years now and that is across a range of industries and our outgoing have all risen by far more than CPI indicates.
We didnt benefit from the boom in the Brown years and we aren't benefitting from this so called return to growth.
The only people making increases are homeowners and the senior management. The rest of us especially the single amongst us are getting shafted and have been all this century
Simply not true. Those on average wages and below have already been ahead in real terms as a result of the increase in personal allowances. The better paid have been squeezed and I would not dispute that the best paid have done best of all.
You also need to take account of the massive reductions in housing costs arising from rock bottom mortgage rates over the last few years. The combination of these factors is why consumption has held up in real terms.
The electorate are never known for being particularly grateful but is it a coincidence that the ICM poll is after the great British public received their wage packets with their new personal allowances for the first time?
Show me the money.
Sorry David it simply is true, my experience and all the people I know which is a wide section of jobs ranging from the semi skilled to the the lower professional like myself are finding that when looking for new jobs that the wages on offer pretty much havent moved since the early 2000's.
I would agree that minimum wage jobs have seen their pay rise by around 2% a year and I know some people are a bit peeved that all of a sudden they find themselves on minimum wage because it has caught up to them while they havent received a payrise.
As to massive reductions in housing costs....well I did say home owners have done pretty well. Those of us who rent though haven't as our rent has continued to rise even though the mortgage rate hasnt, and no milibrands scheme won't do anything for us before the labour trolls chime in as I expect my rent to rise even faster under his scheme because all the landlords will be raising it by the maximum.
I looked for a job in 97,02,07 and 14. The only periods on which the pay on offer rose was 97 to 02. Apart from that the wage for what I do has remained around the average 38 to 42k a year. Work out for yourself why I may just feel that all this growth is passing me by and why I really don't give a crap about all this yellow box trumpeting from either side. Most of us little people from my experience of talking to them feel pretty much the same and frankly we have had enough of it.
That bit about Miliband and the NHS on the news before was a perfect example of what is so badly wrong with Labour at the moment.
EM: "The NHS is in a terrible state. Something needs to change."
Nick Robinson: "Will you raise taxes to pay for improvements in the NHS?"
EM: "No, I won't...we'll lay out our plans at the election...in these tough times, we need to stretch out the resources as far as possible."
There is NO POINT complaining about a problem if you're not going to promise a way of fixing it. Yet again, this all goes back to their irrational phobia of promising government spending (because of their overestimation of how much people care about the deficit). The only way of improving public services and helping poor people is by spending money -- and if Labour's not about improving public services and helping poor people, then it's not anything, and there's no reason to vote for them over the Tories.
Wrong, in my world.
You say: 'The only way of improving public services and helping poor people is by spending money'
Those are not linked.
Help poor people by creating a society in which they can earn enough not to be poor. Then existing resources will be more than adequate to help the remaining (smaller number) of poor.
Spending taxpayers money isn't always an efficient way to help the poor.
That bit about Miliband and the NHS on the news before was a perfect example of what is so badly wrong with Labour at the moment.
EM: "The NHS is in a terrible state. Something needs to change."
Nick Robinson: "Will you raise taxes to pay for improvements in the NHS?"
EM: "No, I won't...we'll lay out our plans at the election...in these tough times, we need to stretch out the resources as far as possible."
There is NO POINT complaining about a problem if you're not going to promise a way of fixing it. Yet again, this all goes back to their irrational phobia of promising government spending (because of their overestimation of how much people care about the deficit). The only way of improving public services and helping poor people is by spending money -- and if Labour's not about improving public services and helping poor people, then it's not anything, and there's no reason to vote for them over the Tories.
Every time Labour has governed they have spent masses of money. The result has always been economic calamity. Chucking money around like a man with no arms has never worked before, won't work now. It will NEVER EVER work.
Have you seen the size of the deficits the current government has been running?
"Chucking money around like a man with no arms".....err a man with no arms wouldn't be able to chuck money around. That is like saying tap dancing like a man with no legs.
Really it isn't, this is the thing with English same word multiple meanings, here arms isn't limbs but that heraldic thing some people have. The phrase is about the nouveau riche who used to spend their way into favour but didn't have heraldry so were men without arms. It's upper class snobbery.
Evening all, how long until we hear that Labour is starting to crank up its party workers in Morley and Outwood. When that day comes we will know Labour is shit scared about GE2015 regardless of what they say in public. That Enfield Southgate moment is getting closer for Ed Balls
Balls losing would be even funnier. Could he cope with the loss of expenses?
Simply not true. Those on average wages and below have already been ahead in real terms as a result of the increase in personal allowances. The better paid have been squeezed and I would not dispute that the best paid have done best of all.
You also need to take account of the massive reductions in housing costs arising from rock bottom mortgage rates over the last few years. The combination of these factors is why consumption has held up in real terms.
The electorate are never known for being particularly grateful but is it a coincidence that the ICM poll is after the great British public received their wage packets with their new personal allowances for the first time?
Show me the money.
Sorry David it simply is true, my experience and all the people I know which is a wide section of jobs ranging from the semi skilled to the the lower professional like myself are finding that when looking for new jobs that the wages on offer pretty much havent moved since the early 2000's.
I would agree that minimum wage jobs have seen their pay rise by around 2% a year and I know some people are a bit peeved that all of a sudden they find themselves on minimum wage because it has caught up to them while they havent received a payrise.
As to massive reductions in housing costs....well I did say home owners have done pretty well. Those of us who rent though haven't as our rent has continued to rise even though the mortgage rate hasnt, and no milibrands scheme won't do anything for us before the labour trolls chime in as I expect my rent to rise even faster under his scheme because all the landlords will be raising it by the maximum.
I looked for a job in 97,02,07 and 14. The only periods on which the pay on offer rose was 97 to 02. Apart from that the wage for what I do has remained around the average 38 to 42k a year. Work out for yourself why I may just feel that all this growth is passing me by and why I really don't give a crap about all this yellow box trumpeting from either side. Most of us little people from my experience of talking to them feel pretty much the same and frankly we have had enough of it.
As I have said several times before, one of the unintended consequences if the minimum wage is to drag the wages of those who were earning minimum plus 40% or so down to the minimum wage. The minimum wage has set a benchmark to which employers can work to the detriment of millions of workers.
Huge boost for Cameron today, not only has he taken the lead in 2/3 polls (and in the other only trails by 1%) but the fact that the UKIP vote is well over 10%, and a plurality of them are ex Tories, means if he can win them back he will expand the Tory lead further
Huge boost for Cameron today, not only has he taken the lead in 2/3 polls (and in the other only trails by 1%) but the fact that the UKIP vote is well over 10%, and a plurality of them are ex Tories, means if he can win them back he will expand the Tory lead further
No.
Great strategy by Ed 'n Ed to get the Cons to move forward and peak too soon.
What do we think would happen if BoE put up interest rates before the GE? After all they are suppose to make this decision independently and it is looking like the housing market could do with a bit of weight attached to stop it spiriting away too fast.
When you luck runs out, it really runs out. I saw a tweet last night noting that Ed Miliband's team had decided not to brief the contents of his NHS speech to journalists the evening before as tends to be the norm these days. The speech was apparently carefully timed to catch and hopefully lead the 6pm news tonight, I bet Miliband's advisers are now wishing they had briefed the speech last night to gain the maximum media coverage available before the polls from ICM and Lord Ashcroft hit the news.
What do we think would happen if BoE put up interest rates before the GE? After all they are suppose to make this decision independently and it is looking like the housing market could do with a bit of weight attached to stop it spiriting away too fast.
Unlikely, with inflation still below target and the Eurozone flirting with deflation.
So if the Tories come top in the Euro elections poll and the Lib Dems come fifth losing all their MEPs, what happens to Clegg? Surely a combination of those two things could see him defenestrated? Beware of national polling numbers at the time of the Euro elections......
As I have said several times before, one of the unintended consequences if the minimum wage is to drag the wages of those who were earning minimum plus 40% or so down to the minimum wage. The minimum wage has set a benchmark to which employers can work to the detriment of millions of workers.
While that is undoubtedly true that is not the problem with my wages. It is easy to see why my wages have stayed static. Over those years the offices I work in have become increasingly continental in the make up of the work force which has acted as a drag on wage inflation.
I accept this is going to happen as part of globalisation however and that globalisation means that wages are going to move towards an average over the next 50 to 100 years until the going rate for any job is the same wherever you are in the world. What I find I am really peeved about however is that corporations are trying to have their cake and eat it aided and abetted by governments.
They want globalisation to reduce wage costs but they don't want globalisation to reduce the price we have to pay for their products and this is one (of the many but a huge one) part of my extreme dislike of the EU. It protects corporate prices while at the same time doing everything it can to lower the cost of labour.
If prices had fallen because I could now buy any product from any country without the protectionism then I would not be that unhappy because the cost of living wouldn't have risen so much in comparison to my wages. Instead the corporations with the connivance of governments such as ours (of both colours) have acted against the interests of the british consumer and closed our routes to buying cheaper goods at every opportunity
Huge boost for Cameron today, not only has he taken the lead in 2/3 polls (and in the other only trails by 1%) but the fact that the UKIP vote is well over 10%, and a plurality of them are ex Tories, means if he can win them back he will expand the Tory lead further
No.
Great strategy by Ed 'n Ed to get the Cons to move forward and peak too soon.
Sorry David it simply is true, my experience and all the people I know which is a wide section of jobs ranging from the semi skilled to the the lower professional like myself are finding that when looking for new jobs that the wages on offer pretty much havent moved since the early 2000's.
I would agree that minimum wage jobs have seen their pay rise by around 2% a year and I know some people are a bit peeved that all of a sudden they find themselves on minimum wage because it has caught up to them while they havent received a payrise.
As to massive reductions in housing costs....well I did say home owners have done pretty well. Those of us who rent though haven't as our rent has continued to rise even though the mortgage rate hasnt, and no milibrands scheme won't do anything for us before the labour trolls chime in as I expect my rent to rise even faster under his scheme because all the landlords will be raising it by the maximum.
I looked for a job in 97,02,07 and 14. The only periods on which the pay on offer rose was 97 to 02. Apart from that the wage for what I do has remained around the average 38 to 42k a year. Work out for yourself why I may just feel that all this growth is passing me by and why I really don't give a crap about all this yellow box trumpeting from either side. Most of us little people from my experience of talking to them feel pretty much the same and frankly we have had enough of it.
As I have said for the lower paid (and you are not obviously at £38K) this understates the increase in real terms as personal allowances are rising much faster than inflation and also faster than wages.
I agree that there is a group in the middle that have really suffered the consequences of this recession with increased taxes and falling real incomes. If you are renting as well that is a double penalty.
In the early years of the recession the last government continued to push through public sector wage increases to keep their supporters onside and wages in the private sector were basically frozen. In recent times, however, the private sector has been increasing wages faster than the public sector and this looks like continuing.
The moves in the polls today are fairly extraordinary. I have trouble identifying a cause better than a lot of people getting more wages in their pocket at the start of the month but I am open to offers. It seems a lot more likely than a really stupid PEB that almost no one will have watched, for example.
If Labour have to turn to Mandelson for a third in an attempt to rescue their political fortunes, they might as well run up the white flag as the public will know they are screwed.
As I have said several times before, one of the unintended consequences if the minimum wage is to drag the wages of those who were earning minimum plus 40% or so down to the minimum wage. The minimum wage has set a benchmark to which employers can work to the detriment of millions of workers.
While that is undoubtedly true that is not the problem with my wages. It is easy to see why my wages have stayed static. Over those years the offices I work in have become increasingly continental in the make up of the work force which has acted as a drag on wage inflation.
I accept this is going to happen as part of globalisation however and that globalisation means that wages are going to move towards an average over the next 50 to 100 years until the going rate for any job is the same wherever you are in the world. What I find I am really peeved about however is that corporations are trying to have their cake and eat it aided and abetted by governments.
They want globalisation to reduce wage costs but they don't want globalisation to reduce the price we have to pay for their products and this is one (of the many but a huge one) part of my extreme dislike of the EU. It protects corporate prices while at the same time doing everything it can to lower the cost of labour.
If prices had fallen because I could now buy any product from any country without the protectionism then I would not be that unhappy because the cost of living wouldn't have risen so much in comparison to my wages. Instead the corporations with the connivance of governments such as ours (of both colours) have acted against the interests of the british consumer and closed our routes to buying cheaper goods at every opportunity
Electronics, Clothes, Cars (I suspect), for starters. There are a lot of consumer products that are cheaper now, he said typing on a computer that would have cost a lot more 10 years ago, sending a free text etc..
Rand Paul (R) 38.4% Hillary Clinton (D) 35.8% Unsure 25.8%
Hillary Clinton (D) 36.5% (37.1%) Chris Christie (R) 34.4% (32.3%) Unsure 29.0% (30.6%)
Hillary Clinton (D) 38.3% Mike Huckabee (R) 36.2% Unsure 24.4%
Hillary Clinton (D) 42.1% Jeb Bush (R) 32.2% Unsure 34.4%
New Hampshire is a famously libertarian state (e.g. Live Free or Die), so it's not surprising he's more competitive there. But the place has very few electoral votes. The place that Republicans need to make up ground in is Florida, as without that, they're ####ed.
Electronics, Clothes, Cars (I suspect), for starters. There are a lot of consumer products that are cheaper now, he said typing on a computer that would have cost a lot more 10 years ago, sending a free text etc..
Making a free text is nothing to do with globalisation or even improved technology. That's merely competition bringing it down to its cost to the provider, which is negligibly small.
Possibilities fascinating too from these polls, if UKIP win a seat or 2, Tory-UKIP coalition? Greens holding onto their Caroline Lucas's seat in Brighton, perhaps even overtaking the LDs in voteshare?
If Labour have to turn to Mandelson for a third in an attempt to rescue their political fortunes, they might as well run up the white flag as the public will know they are screwed.
Electronics, Clothes, Cars (I suspect), for starters. There are a lot of consumer products that are cheaper now, he said typing on a computer that would have cost a lot more 10 years ago, sending a free text etc..
Making a free text is nothing to do with globalisation or even improved technology. That's merely competition bringing it down to its cost to the provider, which is negligibly small.
Sure it's negligibly small. Why is that, do you think?
Hint: Look at the first item in philiph's list, and ask yourself where all that cheap kit is manufactured.
Rand Paul (R) 38.4% Hillary Clinton (D) 35.8% Unsure 25.8%
Hillary Clinton (D) 36.5% (37.1%) Chris Christie (R) 34.4% (32.3%) Unsure 29.0% (30.6%)
Hillary Clinton (D) 38.3% Mike Huckabee (R) 36.2% Unsure 24.4%
Hillary Clinton (D) 42.1% Jeb Bush (R) 32.2% Unsure 34.4%
New Hampshire is a famously libertarian state (e.g. Live Free or Die), so it's not surprising he's more competitive there. But the place has very few electoral votes. The place that Republicans need to make up ground in is Florida, as without that, they're ####ed.
(R) should go with whoever polls best in Ohio and Florida.
What do we think would happen if BoE put up interest rates before the GE? After all they are suppose to make this decision independently and it is looking like the housing market could do with a bit of weight attached to stop it spiriting away too fast.
Unlikely, with inflation still below target and the Eurozone flirting with deflation.
No chance of any meaningful hike, house prices actually fell slightly last month fwiw.
If Labour have to turn to Mandelson for a third in an attempt to rescue their political fortunes, they might as well run up the white flag as the public will know they are screwed.
No chance of any meaningful hike, house prices actually fell slightly last month fwiw.
I think they might do something specifically targetted at house prices in London, but, yes, you are right: the market as a whole is not really booming. Raising interest rates would be too blunt an instrument.
Sorry neither I nor anyone I know cares what your statistics say. We know our situations and we know our friends situations. We know how much we spend on things and how much greater our costs have risen than your inflation figures. We aren't eating the bullshit anymore.
This is not about the recession either this has been happening all through the last boom as well.
Also for all your talk about personal allowances frankly we may be little people and unimportant but we aren't stupid. We can work out how much tax we are really paying other than just looking at the income tax figure and our taxes have risen despite the allowance by the time you take into account all the green taxes and other indirect shit you lot try to hide your larceny with.
In 2000 I could afford to run a car, now I cant justify that and walk 3.5 miles to work and then back . In 2000 I could afford to go to a restaurant once a week, now once a month I treat myself to a chinese take away.
In 2000 I had a tv and a sky subscription now I have neither because the tv license is money I can spend elsewhere.
In 2000 I could afford to pay into a pension fund 200£ a month now I pay nothing in
In 2000 despite earning around the same I had around 1200 a month disposable income. (My take home was also about 100£ higher incidentally looking up old payslips)
now despite all my cutbacks after rent, bills,council tax is a mere 600 pounds of which I use 250 to help my son through university (In 2000 I used to pay his mother 300 in child support so even this figure is cut back)
Tell me again how good the countries growth has been for people like me, go on I might believe you and realise that all these bills I have to find the money for are really figments of my imagination
(before you ask I am also living in the same house as I was in 2000 nothing fancy a 2 up 2 down midterrace with a room size of 10' by 10' in a dilapidated part of slough and I consider myself lucky because my landlord has been actually pretty moderate with rent rises compared to most of those I know)
After days of biblical storms it's turning steamy in Hong Kong. Unbelievable humidity and the temperature is rising. Sticky is the word!
On these new polls - it's exactly what Labour deserves. They have failed to engage positively, have taken the anti-Tory vote for granted and have not begun to develop policies fit for the 21st century. They lost my vote a while back for all those reasons. Keeping Dave and George out is just not a good enough reason to back EdM's uninspiring, lazy approach.
Without question the happiest political leader today will be Alex Salmond!
So if the Tories come top in the Euro elections poll and the Lib Dems come fifth losing all their MEPs, what happens to Clegg? Surely a combination of those two things could see him defenestrated? Beware of national polling numbers at the time of the Euro elections......
Re Clegg I suppose it depends how well the party has prepared its few remaining supporters for a wipeout in the Euros, which they have openly acknowledged as a real possibility presumably at least in part to make retaining any at all look like a small victory in comparison.
I've always felt Clegg would 'stand aside' at some point prior to 2015, though not with total confidence at times, but even the LDs have limits, surely, andwith little parliamentary business (apparently) to mess up, and a total wipeout on the cards, surely the LDs could switch leaders without forcing an early election. A year feels like too far out to switch, but returning 0 MEPs on top of yet more council losses seems like the clearest moment they could have that his hail mary of debating Farage didn't work and something else is needed, such as a change in leader.
A few days ago I tipped Brendan Rodgers for Manager of the Year at 5-1, saying I thought he was value instead of Pulis.
Twitter seems to be suggesting that Rodgers won manager of the year, but Pulis won Premier League manager of the year. Honestly confused as to whether I won my bet or not.
A few days ago I tipped Brendan Rodgers for Manager of the Year at 5-1, saying I thought he was value instead of Pulis.
Twitter seems to be suggesting that Rodgers won manager of the year, but Pulis won Premier League manager of the year. Honestly confused as to whether I won my bet or not.
They're different awards, so it depends on the specific bet you made.
Rand Paul (R) 38.4% Hillary Clinton (D) 35.8% Unsure 25.8%
Hillary Clinton (D) 36.5% (37.1%) Chris Christie (R) 34.4% (32.3%) Unsure 29.0% (30.6%)
Hillary Clinton (D) 38.3% Mike Huckabee (R) 36.2% Unsure 24.4%
Hillary Clinton (D) 42.1% Jeb Bush (R) 32.2% Unsure 34.4%
New Hampshire is a famously libertarian state (e.g. Live Free or Die), so it's not surprising he's more competitive there. But the place has very few electoral votes. The place that Republicans need to make up ground in is Florida, as without that, they're ####ed.
(R) should go with whoever polls best in Ohio and Florida.
Would certainly save us all a great deal of time. I had some fun with the american elections, but it wore me out in the end I have to say.
Philip Almost all winning opposition leaders, Cameron, Blair, Thatcher, Wilson etc had big leads a year before polling day. The exception was Heath at a time when the government had to devalue the pound, and the economy is doing rather better than that now, so the best Ed can hope for is the economy to turn south and be another Ted Heath!
A few days ago I tipped Brendan Rodgers for Manager of the Year at 5-1, saying I thought he was value instead of Pulis.
Twitter seems to be suggesting that Rodgers won manager of the year, but Pulis won Premier League manager of the year. Honestly confused as to whether I won my bet or not.
They're different awards, so it depends on the specific bet you made.
I'm honestly not sure which market the bookies were offering odds on, think it was the overall MOTY. Not exactly best practise as a punter to be searching the T&Cs of a bet after you place it...
So if the Tories come top in the Euro elections poll and the Lib Dems come fifth losing all their MEPs, what happens to Clegg? Surely a combination of those two things could see him defenestrated? Beware of national polling numbers at the time of the Euro elections......
Re Clegg I suppose it depends how well the party has prepared its few remaining supporters for a wipeout in the Euros, which they have openly acknowledged as a real possibility presumably at least in part to make retaining any at all look like a small victory in comparison.
I've always felt Clegg would 'stand aside' at some point prior to 2015, though not with total confidence at times, but even the LDs have limits, surely, andwith little parliamentary business (apparently) to mess up, and a total wipeout on the cards, surely the LDs could switch leaders without forcing an early election. A year feels like too far out to switch, but returning 0 MEPs on top of yet more council losses seems like the clearest moment they could have that his hail mary of debating Farage didn't work and something else is needed, such as a change in leader.
Ironic the LDs are looking at a vastly disproportional loss of MEPs under PR, than they would do with MPs under FPTP.
Reasons?
i) small 'house' size for the Euros ii) relatively small district magnitude in Euro constituencies iii) D'Hondt
Remember the other day when you were asking how UKIP would target a place like Doncaster? When you kept saying how it was white working class & immigration wasn't a factor etc?
"If Doncaster North is Miliband-land, it doesn’t feel much like it. The Labour vote here collapsed from 34,000 in 1992 to 19,000 in 2010. In Doncaster's three seats, Labour has lost 40,000 votes since 1992.
Graham is nearing retirement age and has “always been Labour”. No longer. “I don't vote for them any more – I think they've let us down.” All politicians “p*ss in the same pot – they’re all being tarred now by the same brush because they've been fiddling bucks. They’re just getting an 11 per cent pay rise? I’ve had a four per cent pay rise in five years and I work 55 hours a week.”
In this year’s European elections, Graham will cast his ballot for Ukip. “I’m not Conservative – I couldn’t vote Conservative – and they’re the only party left.” Anti-Tory feeling – a quarter of all Northerners don’t know anyone who votes Conservatives – has extended to the Liberal Democrats as a result of the Coalition and cuts. This leaves Ukip ready to pounce on those who are fed up with Labour.
Graham wants “to send a message” about immigration. “They've just got to stop them at the border. Even the lads I know who are Polish, they’re worried about Romanians coming in, they don't like them.”
Such feelings are common in Doncaster. In Mr Miliband’s seat in 2010, 16.3 per cent of voters supported anti-European, anti-immigration parties – Ukip, the BNP or the English Democrats. With the BNP and English Democrats having collapsed since, Ukip should expect to mop up those voters disgusted with the “LibLabCon”.
Mr Miliband is not about to lose his seat, but “Ukip could easily harness deep-seated discontent among the large pool of struggling blue collar voters to secure 25 per cent or more of the vote, and second place”"
As I have said several times before, one of the unintended consequences if the minimum wage is to drag the wages of those who were earning minimum plus 40% or so down to the minimum wage. The minimum wage has set a benchmark to which employers can work to the detriment of millions of workers.
While that is undoubtedly true that is not the problem with my wages. It is easy to see why my wages have stayed static. Over those years the offices I work in have become increasingly continental in the make up of the work force which has acted as a drag on wage inflation.
I accept this is going to happen as part of globalisation however and that globalisation means that wages are going to move towards an average over the next 50 to 100 years until the going rate for any job is the same wherever you are in the world. What I find I am really peeved about however is that corporations are trying to have their cake and eat it aided and abetted by governments.
They want globalisation to reduce wage costs but they don't want globalisation to reduce the price we have to pay for their products and this is one (of the many but a huge one) part of my extreme dislike of the EU. It protects corporate prices while at the same time doing everything it can to lower the cost of labour.
If prices had fallen because I could now buy any product from any country without the protectionism then I would not be that unhappy because the cost of living wouldn't have risen so much in comparison to my wages. Instead the corporations with the connivance of governments such as ours (of both colours) have acted against the interests of the british consumer and closed our routes to buying cheaper goods at every opportunity
Electronics, Clothes, Cars (I suspect), for starters. There are a lot of consumer products that are cheaper now, he said typing on a computer that would have cost a lot more 10 years ago, sending a free text etc..
I never denied some goods have come down in price. That however does not mean that we are not still paying over the odds for them. Electronics have in general fallen in price it is true but they are still cheaper to buy in many countries round the world.
Try buying them cheaper and bringing them in for resale and see how quickly the big corporations get up in arms about it.
I seem to remember this was the issue some of our supermarkets had when for example trying to sell cheap Levi Jeans which they had purchased abroad.
This is why the price of sugar as someone mentioned the other day is twice as much per ton in the EU as it can be bought elsewhere.
I am fine with globalisation and happy to compete in the global labour market if the companies are happy to let their goods do the same.
Important information is that although UKIP are standing in Northern Ireland this year for the Euros elections, as far as betting is concerned any votes they receive there won't count because the bookies are working on a GB basis.
I can't see how you can have capital controls during the negotiation period. Scotland would still be part of the UK for many months, so of course people could move funds around. Why would anyone take the risk of leaving their money in Scotland whilst Salmond tried to get the UK to agree to currency union (which in itself would be unlikely to succeed)?
It would be a zero-cost, zero-risk option to move your money out, no downside and potentially some upside. At worst, you've lost nothing. As a general rule of thumb, people take such an option.
Important information is that although UKIP are standing in Northern Ireland this year for the Euros elections, as far as betting is concerned, any votes they receive there won't count because the bookies are working on a GB basis.
Remember the other day when you were asking how UKIP would target a place like Doncaster? When you kept saying how it was white working class & immigration wasn't a factor etc?
"If Doncaster North is Miliband-land, it doesn’t feel much like it. The Labour vote here collapsed from 34,000 in 1992 to 19,000 in 2010. In Doncaster's three seats, Labour has lost 40,000 votes since 1992.
Graham is nearing retirement age and has “always been Labour”. No longer. “I don't vote for them any more – I think they've let us down.” All politicians “p*ss in the same pot – they’re all being tarred now by the same brush because they've been fiddling bucks. They’re just getting an 11 per cent pay rise? I’ve had a four per cent pay rise in five years and I work 55 hours a week.”
In this year’s European elections, Graham will cast his ballot for Ukip. “I’m not Conservative – I couldn’t vote Conservative – and they’re the only party left.” Anti-Tory feeling – a quarter of all Northerners don’t know anyone who votes Conservatives – has extended to the Liberal Democrats as a result of the Coalition and cuts. This leaves Ukip ready to pounce on those who are fed up with Labour.
Graham wants “to send a message” about immigration. “They've just got to stop them at the border. Even the lads I know who are Polish, they’re worried about Romanians coming in, they don't like them.”
Such feelings are common in Doncaster. In Mr Miliband’s seat in 2010, 16.3 per cent of voters supported anti-European, anti-immigration parties – Ukip, the BNP or the English Democrats. With the BNP and English Democrats having collapsed since, Ukip should expect to mop up those voters disgusted with the “LibLabCon”.
Mr Miliband is not about to lose his seat, but “Ukip could easily harness deep-seated discontent among the large pool of struggling blue collar voters to secure 25 per cent or more of the vote, and second place”"
According to the last census Doncaster is over 90% white. And of that population around 94% is white British. Maybe it's changed dramatically since then, but that doesn't explain the 2010 votes. So it could be that something different is at play.
So if the Tories come top in the Euro elections poll and the Lib Dems come fifth losing all their MEPs, what happens to Clegg? Surely a combination of those two things could see him defenestrated? Beware of national polling numbers at the time of the Euro elections......
Re Clegg I suppose it depends how well the party has prepared its few remaining supporters for a wipeout in the Euros, which they have openly acknowledged as a real possibility presumably at least in part to make retaining any at all look like a small victory in comparison.
I've always felt Clegg would 'stand aside' at some point prior to 2015, though not with total confidence at times, but even the LDs have limits, surely, andwith little parliamentary business (apparently) to mess up, and a total wipeout on the cards, surely the LDs could switch leaders without forcing an early election. A year feels like too far out to switch, but returning 0 MEPs on top of yet more council losses seems like the clearest moment they could have that his hail mary of debating Farage didn't work and something else is needed, such as a change in leader.
Ironic the LDs are looking at a vastly disproportional loss of MEPs under PR, than they would do with MPs under FPTP.
Reasons?
i) small 'house' size for the Euros ii) relatively small district magnitude in Euro constituencies iii) D'Hondt
I imagine Levi is a company quite happy to take full advantage of the global labour market but not so happy about consumers having the option to use globalisation
Well, seems tory poll leads are a bit like buses .......
Kudos to Rod Crosby and perhaps now Labour might think about making a sensible economic offering to the electorate rather than taking us back to the 70's with stupid policies already utterly discredited.
Comments
I could be well moved if I were as you.
If I could pray to move, prayers would move me.
But I am constant as the northern star,
Of whose true-fixed and resting quality
There is no fellow in the firmament.
Was Caesar crap at making and remembering predictions also?
We didnt benefit from the boom in the Brown years and we aren't benefitting from this so called return to growth.
The only people making increases are homeowners and the senior management. The rest of us especially the single amongst us are getting shafted and have been all this century
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Rm7NmIsjsk
Here's my UKIP joke for the third time (as it's been such an interesting day)
Today programme: And now on the Today programme, Ukip
Me, Gf and the unemployed: Okay!
The footage of the girls today was absolutely heartbreaking
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2014/05/12/rolf-harris-creepy-hugs-trial_n_5308537.html?utm_hp_ref=uk
I, myself, voted last Saturday so there’s no chance of a late change of mine. The vote is in and that’s it.
This makes this weekend’s polling rather odd because part will be an exit survey.
Another consequence is that the opportunity for the parties to influence the outcome is much less than it was. Maybe only 15-20% of likely voters are left.
All this is probably good news for Ukip which has been riding high."
http://www1.politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2014/05/10/chances-are-that-for-half-of-all-the-votes-will-have-been-cast-by-monday/
[hyper-ventilating into paper bag]
EM: "The NHS is in a terrible state. Something needs to change."
Nick Robinson: "Will you raise taxes to pay for improvements in the NHS?"
EM: "No, I won't...we'll lay out our plans at the election...in these tough times, we need to stretch out the resources as far as possible."
There is NO POINT complaining about a problem if you're not going to promise a way of fixing it. Yet again, this all goes back to their irrational phobia of promising government spending (because of their overestimation of how much people care about the deficit). The only way of improving public services and helping poor people is by spending money -- and if Labour's not about improving public services and helping poor people, then it's not anything, and there's no reason to vote for them over the Tories.
You also need to take account of the massive reductions in housing costs arising from rock bottom mortgage rates over the last few years. The combination of these factors is why consumption has held up in real terms.
The electorate are never known for being particularly grateful but is it a coincidence that the ICM poll is after the great British public received their wage packets with their new personal allowances for the first time?
Show me the money.
UKIP/Con/Lab: 7/1
Con/UKIP/Lab: 12/1
Lab/Con/UKIP: 25/1
Con/Lab/UKIP: 25/1
http://sports.ladbrokes.com/en-gb/politics/european-parliament-elections/2014-uk-euro-parliamentary-elections-e216727842
Bring on the Quiet Bat People!
A theme to unite Eurovision and today's polls.
The Prelude to Te Deum Laudamus by Marc-Antoine Charpentier.
Suitable for a Sun King or Etonian PM.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EmsamVgLVC8
I would agree that minimum wage jobs have seen their pay rise by around 2% a year and I know some people are a bit peeved that all of a sudden they find themselves on minimum wage because it has caught up to them while they havent received a payrise.
As to massive reductions in housing costs....well I did say home owners have done pretty well. Those of us who rent though haven't as our rent has continued to rise even though the mortgage rate hasnt, and no milibrands scheme won't do anything for us before the labour trolls chime in as I expect my rent to rise even faster under his scheme because all the landlords will be raising it by the maximum.
I looked for a job in 97,02,07 and 14. The only periods on which the pay on offer rose was 97 to 02. Apart from that the wage for what I do has remained around the average 38 to 42k a year. Work out for yourself why I may just feel that all this growth is passing me by and why I really don't give a crap about all this yellow box trumpeting from either side. Most of us little people from my experience of talking to them feel pretty much the same and frankly we have had enough of it.
You say: 'The only way of improving public services and helping poor people is by spending money'
Those are not linked.
Help poor people by creating a society in which they can earn enough not to be poor. Then existing resources will be more than adequate to help the remaining (smaller number) of poor.
Spending taxpayers money isn't always an efficient way to help the poor.
(Innocent Face)
UKIP 5-10% 2s from 7/4
UKIP 15-20% 5s from 11/2
http://www.oddschecker.com/politics/british-politics/next-uk-general-election/ukip-vote-percentage
He has the least negative i.e doing a bad job, than all other options. That's a long way from the Olympic booing.
http://www.oddschecker.com/politics/british-politics/barking/winning-party
Rand Paul (R) 38.4%
Hillary Clinton (D) 35.8%
Unsure 25.8%
Hillary Clinton (D) 36.5% (37.1%)
Chris Christie (R) 34.4% (32.3%)
Unsure 29.0% (30.6%)
Hillary Clinton (D) 38.3%
Mike Huckabee (R) 36.2%
Unsure 24.4%
Hillary Clinton (D) 42.1%
Jeb Bush (R) 32.2%
Unsure 34.4%
Great strategy by Ed 'n Ed to get the Cons to move forward and peak too soon.
Absolute masterstroke.
What do we think would happen if BoE put up interest rates before the GE? After all they are suppose to make this decision independently and it is looking like the housing market could do with a bit of weight attached to stop it spiriting away too fast.
I accept this is going to happen as part of globalisation however and that globalisation means that wages are going to move towards an average over the next 50 to 100 years until the going rate for any job is the same wherever you are in the world. What I find I am really peeved about however is that corporations are trying to have their cake and eat it aided and abetted by governments.
They want globalisation to reduce wage costs but they don't want globalisation to reduce the price we have to pay for their products and this is one (of the many but a huge one) part of my extreme dislike of the EU. It protects corporate prices while at the same time doing everything it can to lower the cost of labour.
If prices had fallen because I could now buy any product from any country without the protectionism then I would not be that unhappy because the cost of living wouldn't have risen so much in comparison to my wages. Instead the corporations with the connivance of governments such as ours (of both colours) have acted against the interests of the british consumer and closed our routes to buying cheaper goods at every opportunity
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/10806655/Labour-lead-cut-to-one-point-as-Telegraph-opinion-poll-exposes-UKs-North-South-divide.html
As I have said for the lower paid (and you are not obviously at £38K) this understates the increase in real terms as personal allowances are rising much faster than inflation and also faster than wages.
I agree that there is a group in the middle that have really suffered the consequences of this recession with increased taxes and falling real incomes. If you are renting as well that is a double penalty.
In the early years of the recession the last government continued to push through public sector wage increases to keep their supporters onside and wages in the private sector were basically frozen. In recent times, however, the private sector has been increasing wages faster than the public sector and this looks like continuing.
The moves in the polls today are fairly extraordinary. I have trouble identifying a cause better than a lot of people getting more wages in their pocket at the start of the month but I am open to offers. It seems a lot more likely than a really stupid PEB that almost no one will have watched, for example.
In other news, I see UKIP are accusing the SNP of anti-English racism again.
Hint: Look at the first item in philiph's list, and ask yourself where all that cheap kit is manufactured.
Did you read that Telegraph piece about Doncaster? Immigration seems to be a bigger issue there than you thought
http://www.vote-2012.proboards.com/post/158618/thread
This is not about the recession either this has been happening all through the last boom as well.
Also for all your talk about personal allowances frankly we may be little people and unimportant but we aren't stupid. We can work out how much tax we are really paying other than just looking at the income tax figure and our taxes have risen despite the allowance by the time you take into account all the green taxes and other indirect shit you lot try to hide your larceny with.
In 2000 I could afford to run a car, now I cant justify that and walk 3.5 miles to work and then back
.
In 2000 I could afford to go to a restaurant once a week, now once a month I treat myself to a chinese take away.
In 2000 I had a tv and a sky subscription now I have neither because the tv license is money I can spend elsewhere.
In 2000 I could afford to pay into a pension fund 200£ a month now I pay nothing in
In 2000 despite earning around the same I had around 1200 a month disposable income. (My take home was also about 100£ higher incidentally looking up old payslips)
now despite all my cutbacks after rent, bills,council tax is a mere 600 pounds of which I use 250 to help my son through university (In 2000 I used to pay his mother 300 in child support so even this figure is cut back)
Tell me again how good the countries growth has been for people like me, go on I might believe you and realise that all these bills I have to find the money for are really figments of my imagination
(before you ask I am also living in the same house as I was in 2000 nothing fancy a 2 up 2 down midterrace with a room size of 10' by 10' in a dilapidated part of slough and I consider myself lucky because my landlord has been actually pretty moderate with rent rises compared to most of those I know)
On these new polls - it's exactly what Labour deserves. They have failed to engage positively, have taken the anti-Tory vote for granted and have not begun to develop policies fit for the 21st century. They lost my vote a while back for all those reasons. Keeping Dave and George out is just not a good enough reason to back EdM's uninspiring, lazy approach.
Without question the happiest political leader today will be Alex Salmond!
I've always felt Clegg would 'stand aside' at some point prior to 2015, though not with total confidence at times, but even the LDs have limits, surely, andwith little parliamentary business (apparently) to mess up, and a total wipeout on the cards, surely the LDs could switch leaders without forcing an early election. A year feels like too far out to switch, but returning 0 MEPs on top of yet more council losses seems like the clearest moment they could have that his hail mary of debating Farage didn't work and something else is needed, such as a change in leader.
Twitter seems to be suggesting that Rodgers won manager of the year, but Pulis won Premier League manager of the year. Honestly confused as to whether I won my bet or not.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/10826058/Scotland-faces-risk-of-capital-flight-warns-Deutsche.html
EDIT: Well they've paid out. Wahey!
Reasons?
i) small 'house' size for the Euros
ii) relatively small district magnitude in Euro constituencies
iii) D'Hondt
Remember the other day when you were asking how UKIP would target a place like Doncaster? When you kept saying how it was white working class & immigration wasn't a factor etc?
"If Doncaster North is Miliband-land, it doesn’t feel much like it. The Labour vote here collapsed from 34,000 in 1992 to 19,000 in 2010. In Doncaster's three seats, Labour has lost 40,000 votes since 1992.
Graham is nearing retirement age and has “always been Labour”. No longer. “I don't vote for them any more – I think they've let us down.” All politicians “p*ss in the same pot – they’re all being tarred now by the same brush because they've been fiddling bucks. They’re just getting an 11 per cent pay rise? I’ve had a four per cent pay rise in five years and I work 55 hours a week.”
In this year’s European elections, Graham will cast his ballot for Ukip. “I’m not Conservative – I couldn’t vote Conservative – and they’re the only party left.” Anti-Tory feeling – a quarter of all Northerners don’t know anyone who votes Conservatives – has extended to the Liberal Democrats as a result of the Coalition and cuts. This leaves Ukip ready to pounce on those who are fed up with Labour.
Graham wants “to send a message” about immigration. “They've just got to stop them at the border. Even the lads I know who are Polish, they’re worried about Romanians coming in, they don't like them.”
Such feelings are common in Doncaster. In Mr Miliband’s seat in 2010, 16.3 per cent of voters supported anti-European, anti-immigration parties – Ukip, the BNP or the English Democrats. With the BNP and English Democrats having collapsed since, Ukip should expect to mop up those voters disgusted with the “LibLabCon”.
Mr Miliband is not about to lose his seat, but “Ukip could easily harness deep-seated discontent among the large pool of struggling blue collar voters to secure 25 per cent or more of the vote, and second place”"
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timwigmore/100254439/why-labour-should-be-terrified-of-ukip-2/
Try buying them cheaper and bringing them in for resale and see how quickly the big corporations get up in arms about it.
I seem to remember this was the issue some of our supermarkets had when for example trying to sell cheap Levi Jeans which they had purchased abroad.
This is why the price of sugar as someone mentioned the other day is twice as much per ton in the EU as it can be bought elsewhere.
I am fine with globalisation and happy to compete in the global labour market if the companies are happy to let their goods do the same.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Ireland_(European_Parliament_constituency)#2014
It would be a zero-cost, zero-risk option to move your money out, no downside and potentially some upside. At worst, you've lost nothing. As a general rule of thumb, people take such an option.
iv) no obvious incumbency effect
Knew I remembered correctly here is a link about the levi jeans thing I mentioned and a prime example of what I am talking about
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/1261829.stm
I imagine Levi is a company quite happy to take full advantage of the global labour market but not so happy about consumers having the option to use globalisation
Doncaster stats here:
http://www.doncastertogether.org.uk/Images/Ethnicity and National Identity in England and Wales - Final_tcm33-102184.pdf
Kudos to Rod Crosby and perhaps now Labour might think about making a sensible economic offering to the electorate rather than taking us back to the 70's with stupid policies already utterly discredited.
Not going to happen is it?
In Halton, the Kingsway ward in 2010 was contested by Con, LD, Green. The result was LD 907, Green 793, Con 480.
This time the candidates are Lab, UKIP. Bit of a change.