If we throw up political walls within England we'll have bickering assemblies very quickly. England's one land. It needs one Parliament. If it's good enough for Scotland, it's good enough for England.
It's only considered "one land" because of ancient historical boundaries that happen to lump most of the United Kingdom into one of the "nations". Devolution should be based on what is suitable for the local population today, not maps in history textbooks.
I don't understand how anyone likes Ed Miliband in Doncaster. Doncaster is one of the very worse off English towns - A £1 billion investment in a gas turbine generator is to be built there, and Ed Miliband pops up to say he will de carbonise power if he becomes PM in the life time of the next parliament. Surely the Doncaster people have noticed...
If I was to write a constitution from scratch, I would make it so that any PPC had to have lived in the constituency, or a neighbouring one (*), for five years before the election they were standing in. That way they would have at least some knowledge of the local issues, it would weaken party's abilities to parachute people in, and the MP's might actually care for their constituents. They may also have been involved in local politics for some time.
I think I'm in a minority of one in wanting this, however.
(*) To allow for boundary changes.
I might suggest it be for less than five years, so that a PPC need not be chosen essentially immediately after the last election, when you might want some time to consider options. 3 years maybe. There are restrictions like this for local elections isn't there? You have to live within the area/ or own land within it, or work in it, for 12 months?
In some cases it is live or work within the boundary, in other instances (Parish) it is to live within 1 mile of the boundary.
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
Yes the Lib Dems had a once in a lifetime chance to really put the boot into Labour for the state they left the country in and position themselves as a sensible and liberal centre-left party that isn't financially incompetent.
Instead they have been acting like a second opposition in government whilst giving Labour an easy ride for ruining the economy meaning they've been losing their left leaning votes to Labour and their right-leaning ones to the Tories.
How can anyone like Labour? What exactly is likeable about them?
I don't get it.
The ratings for the people who run Labour are always much worse than the ratings for Labour itself, as if the entity is completely detached from the people who run it.
I consider there is very little likeable about Labour, as well. But, your and my views don't count for much. It's the average voter that counts, and they (for some reason) find Labour likeable.
This is offset by the fact that such voters also fear Labour is incompetent.
Is there any evidence that the people of England actually want the country divided up into regions?
If not then it is a complete non-starter.
ComRes last week
Giving more decision making powers on issues such as tax, education and policing to big cities and regions in England and Wales Support-48% Oppose-25% DK-27%
I wonder how much of the support for that was on the back of the Scottish vote with people thinking that why should the Scots get to decide these things and we shouldn't.
I expect that a poll saying "would you want England to be split up into smaller devolved regions?" would yield a completely different result.
Of course symbols matter a lot in politics, but the fundamental problem Labour have - which goes back to Gordon Brown's 'Labour investment vs Tory cuts' - is that they are trying to walk a tightrope in the symbolism. A large chunk of their support comes precisely from people who don't want to hear about economic reality,
Economic "reality" on planet Tory is desperately claiming as a success a strategy that caused the worst recovery in 300 years, a double dip recession, £200bn of extra borrowing and 5 years of falling real wages.
We didn't have a double dip recession and that borrowing is substantially less than was forecast by the OBR before their strategy was implemented.
Wishful thinking I'm afraid.
On old terms (pre Sept-14 readjustment) Q42011 to Q22012 was a recession.
And the extra £200bn of borrowing is versus OBR's dizzily optimistic 2010 forecasts.
How can anyone like Labour? What exactly is likeable about them?
I don't get it.
The ratings for the people who run Labour are always much worse than the ratings for Labour itself, as if the entity is completely detached from the people who run it.
I consider there is very little likeable about Labour, as well. But, your and my views don't count for much. It's the average voter that counts, and they (for some reason) find Labour likeable.
This is offset by the fact that such voters also fear Labour is incompetent.
Which is why perversely Labour did better in the boom time elections of 1997, 2001 and 2005 than the recession hit ones of 1992 and 2010. When people are more comfortable they feel they can risk Labour again (only to have their hopes cruelly dashed when the bill arrives).
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
The Lib Dems should never have entered a a full coalition with the Conservatives, or at least not on the terms that they did. They should have been supply and confidence partners at most.
The probably with regional powers is that the regional press is far too weak to give politicians the level of scrutiny they need.
Yup - sorry to people who have seen this before when I posted it at the arse-end of a previous thread but from the US, where they do actually have reasonably local media:
"The political scientist Steve Rogers recently studied state legislative elections and found something disheartening and, if you think about it, utterly unsurprising. Since 1910, state house elections almost perfectly track U.S. House elections. The correlation, to be precise about it, is 0.96. Which is to say virtually none of us—even those of us who bother to vote—form judgments of any kind regarding our state legislators. We respond to the national mood, which is shaped by our response to Washington, mainly the president, whose party we punish or reward depending upon national conditions. This means that state legislators operate almost entirely free of any practical accountability from their constituents. Their good deeds will not be rewarded, and only their most flamboyant corruption or illegality will be punished. Their only electoral incentive lies in belonging to the right national political party. The operating conditions of a state legislature are likely to create good government only by accident, if at all. Predatory government functions that would stand little chance of survival in the sustained glare of national politics thrive at the state and local levels."
Of course symbols matter a lot in politics, but the fundamental problem Labour have - which goes back to Gordon Brown's 'Labour investment vs Tory cuts' - is that they are trying to walk a tightrope in the symbolism. A large chunk of their support comes precisely from people who don't want to hear about economic reality,
Economic "reality" on planet Tory is desperately claiming as a success a strategy that caused the worst recovery in 300 years, a double dip recession, £200bn of extra borrowing and 5 years of falling real wages.
We didn't have a double dip recession and that borrowing is substantially less than was forecast by the OBR before their strategy was implemented.
On old terms (pre Sept-14 readjustment) Q42011 to Q22012 was a recession.
A
People can pick which way they wish to measure it on a pretty arbitrary basis,. so quibbling about it seem pointless As I recall though, the Tories did not really take a particular hit from going double dip (that came later), in much the same way that they have no seen much improvement yet from improved figures - people never felt we had come out of recession regardless of the figures, so dipping back in or not did not matter, things felt the same anyway and by and large have since, although confidence does seem to be higher now.
Just seen the interview between Eamon Holmes and Ed Balls on Sky. Holmes was very dismissive of Balls and actually got to the heart of how tiny the cuts Balls was talking about are. Holmes said "neither here nor there" a "piddling cut". When someone apolitical such as Holmes lays into your plans it is not a good sign. Holmes was more direct and tougher than R4 Today programme was.....
Is there any evidence that the people of England actually want the country divided up into regions?
If not then it is a complete non-starter.
ComRes last week
Giving more decision making powers on issues such as tax, education and policing to big cities and regions in England and Wales Support-48% Oppose-25% DK-27%
I wonder how much of the support for that was on the back of the Scottish vote with people thinking that why should the Scots get to decide these things and we shouldn't.
I expect that a poll saying "would you want England to be split up into smaller devolved regions?" would yield a completely different result.
Quite and especially when people start to think about what those regions would actually be.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
My theory is that Labour are far better than the other parties of demonising their opponents whilst promoting their brand. They're also far better at using the media.
The phone hacking scandal is a recent example where the fact that it was done by a Labour supporting paper with full knowledge of the then Labour government was pretty much entirely forgotten. It was pinned pretty much 100% on the Tories by the Labour spin machine. It was actually very impressive.
Until the Tories get a similar spin machine in operation then they are going to have a much worse image than the Labour party.
Of course the BBC having such a large proportion of the news media makes it more difficult for the Tories to do the same.
Paranoia writ large.
The Tories are widely loathed for their wholly negative impact on the lives of the vulnerable and less well off.
Bedroom Tax, benefit cuts, shovelling temporarily out of work people into failing jobfare schemes to massage dole figures, the inhumane rhetoric that Tories employ to describe such people. Then the economic incompetence to add to that.
Let's not forget the happy fact that Sun, Mail and Express headlines against vulnerable people which seem to favour the Tories actually alienate far more people.
The BBC doesn't indulge such language (although its coverage is bent by the rightwing press whinge and smear machine).
Given the overhelming drone of Tory claptrap in the press, the Tories ought to win hearts and minds, but their nefarious actions trump the propaganda, hence why they're hated.
The first stage solution is easy. Just stop Scottish, Welsh & NI MP's voting on England only matters such as education, NHS & welfare. Why is that hard given the SNP voluntarily don't vote on English matters now. Enact it in parallel to Scottish changes
Then separately do a full on review including House of Lords.
Simple, clean and easy to understand.
If Labour want to change the NHS etc in England, they need to get a majority in England as they have had in the past. If Labour can not see the logic in this, they are even more unfit to govern under Miliband than i thought they were.
Labour my well see the logic, but will counter with the three main arguments:
1. It is wrong to have two classes of MP
2. It is almost impossible to differentiate a bill that applies to England only
3. Because of the "Barnett Consequentials" all most all bills involve spending and therefore affect all MPs constituents.
Now you may think those arguments are a load of dingoes' kidneys (the SNP manage to voluntarily work out solutions to them all) and Labour's real objection is fear that a future general election may not give them a majority in England. However, they were from memory the arguments they used last time this came up and they worked then.
The current situation has created 3 types already
Scottish MP's who cannot vote on issues in their own country
Scottish MP's who can vote on England only issues
English MP's who's majority votes can be overturned by non English MP's
Should be easy to make bills England specific eg NHS England, English schools
Barnett is supposed to automate the resource allocations where it applies thereby removing the need for debate.
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
The Lib Dems should never have entered a a full coalition with the Conservatives, or at least not on the terms that they did. They should have been supply and confidence partners at most.
Lib Dems had ben saying for 30+ years how wonderful; coalitions would be for the country... They could hardly walk away after espousing that.... well maybe after the tuition fee pledge!
The probably with regional powers is that the regional press is far too weak to give politicians the level of scrutiny they need.
Yup - sorry to people who have seen this before when I posted it at the arse-end of a previous thread but from the US, where they do actually have reasonably local media:
"The political scientist Steve Rogers recently studied state legislative elections and found something disheartening and, if you think about it, utterly unsurprising. Since 1910, state house elections almost perfectly track U.S. House elections. The correlation, to be precise about it, is 0.96. Which is to say virtually none of us—even those of us who bother to vote—form judgments of any kind regarding our state legislators. We respond to the national mood, which is shaped by our response to Washington, mainly the president, whose party we punish or reward depending upon national conditions. This means that state legislators operate almost entirely free of any practical accountability from their constituents. Their good deeds will not be rewarded, and only their most flamboyant corruption or illegality will be punished. Their only electoral incentive lies in belonging to the right national political party. The operating conditions of a state legislature are likely to create good government only by accident, if at all. Predatory government functions that would stand little chance of survival in the sustained glare of national politics thrive at the state and local levels."
Interesting. That is certainly not true of the Scottish and Welsh legislatures - the NI case is arguably too extreme to be considered, but suggests the answer, which is that there are parties which happen to be specific to those areas and to some extent the legislatures. Presumably there is, for example, no Californian party to the same extent as the SNP at Holyrood?
How can anyone like Labour? What exactly is likeable about them?
I don't get it.
The ratings for the people who run Labour are always much worse than the ratings for Labour itself, as if the entity is completely detached from the people who run it.
I consider there is very little likeable about Labour, as well. But, your and my views don't count for much. It's the average voter that counts, and they (for some reason) find Labour likeable. This is offset by the fact that such voters also fear Labour is incompetent.
Interesting how the SNP are viewed in Scotland as more competent than SLAB, according to a few reports I heard (sorry no polling stats to refer to).
Is there any evidence that the people of England actually want the country divided up into regions?
If not then it is a complete non-starter.
ComRes last week
Giving more decision making powers on issues such as tax, education and policing to big cities and regions in England and Wales Support-48% Oppose-25% DK-27%
I wonder how much of the support for that was on the back of the Scottish vote with people thinking that why should the Scots get to decide these things and we shouldn't.
I expect that a poll saying "would you want England to be split up into smaller devolved regions?" would yield a completely different result.
Quite and especially when people start to think about what those regions would actually be.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
Yes devolution can be done successfully but it has to be to local entities people can relate to. 10 years ago the referendum to set up a "North East region" was defeated by 4 to 1. Regional assemblies are a rubbish idea
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
Yes the Lib Dems had a once in a lifetime chance to really put the boot into Labour for the state they left the country in and position themselves as a sensible and liberal centre-left party that isn't financially incompetent. Instead they have been acting like a second opposition in government whilst giving Labour an easy ride for ruining the economy meaning they've been losing their left leaning votes to Labour and their right-leaning ones to the Tories.
A massive strategic blunder which lost them a large % of support to Labour and a bit to the Conservatives. But their 2/3 lefty activists feel better about themselves when they see it done. Still they have 1 MEP left.
My theory is that Labour are far better than the other parties of demonising their opponents whilst promoting their brand. They're also far better at using the media.
The phone hacking scandal is a recent example where the fact that it was done by a Labour supporting paper with full knowledge of the then Labour government was pretty much entirely forgotten. It was pinned pretty much 100% on the Tories by the Labour spin machine. It was actually very impressive.
Until the Tories get a similar spin machine in operation then they are going to have a much worse image than the Labour party.
Of course the BBC having such a large proportion of the news media makes it more difficult for the Tories to do the same.
Paranoia writ large.
The Tories are widely loathed for their wholly negative impact on the lives of the vulnerable and less well off.
Bedroom Tax, benefit cuts, shovelling temporarily out of work people into failing jobfare schemes to massage dole figures, the inhumane rhetoric that Tories employ to describe such people. Then the economic incompetence to add to that.
Let's not forget the happy fact that Sun, Mail and Express headlines against vulnerable people which seem to favour the Tories actually alienate far more people.
The BBC doesn't indulge such language (although its coverage is bent by the rightwing press whinge and smear machine).
Given the overhelming drone of Tory claptrap in the press, the Tories ought to win hearts and minds, but their nefarious actions trump the propaganda, hence why they're hated.
If the Tories were as 'nefarious' as you claim, they would never have won an election before, or been largest party in 2010 (failure though it was). And for one, people support benefit cuts.
I've never voted Tory in my life, though being surrounded by them in the shires I imagine I am generally more well disposed to them than I might be otherwise, but while the astonishment at why Labour, which like the Tories is just a not very ideologically defined political party full of professional out of touch wonks, is liked can be overdone, the descriptions of why the Tories are so hated is even more overdone, as it make sit seem like no rational human being could ever support them, when millions upon millions, including those in poorer areas(even if they don't win a majority in many of those), do.
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
Yes the Lib Dems had a once in a lifetime chance to really put the boot into Labour for the state they left the country in and position themselves as a sensible and liberal centre-left party that isn't financially incompetent.
Instead they have been acting like a second opposition in government whilst giving Labour an easy ride for ruining the economy meaning they've been losing their left leaning votes to Labour and their right-leaning ones to the Tories.
Oh come on, at the moment the lib dems signed up to the coalition agreement they totally destroyed any chance they may have had at being about to mount an effective attack on Labour.
Is there any evidence that the people of England actually want the country divided up into regions?
If not then it is a complete non-starter.
ComRes last week
Giving more decision making powers on issues such as tax, education and policing to big cities and regions in England and Wales Support-48% Oppose-25% DK-27%
I wonder how much of the support for that was on the back of the Scottish vote with people thinking that why should the Scots get to decide these things and we shouldn't.
I expect that a poll saying "would you want England to be split up into smaller devolved regions?" would yield a completely different result.
Quite and especially when people start to think about what those regions would actually be.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
Lots of other politicians got a hard time from yes protesters, none of them had to be hustled away from an environment preselected as being "warm, dry and controlled", fleeing - the story suggests - the media as much as the protesters. How on earth is he going to stand up to a GE campaign?
I guess he may have to do what Cameron did in Scotland during the referendum campaign and only attend stage managed events with friendly audiences.
I'd be careful, SO. Some may construe that as a 'visceral hatred' of Cameron.
Chortles.
I am sure they would. And as I have said on here many times my principle political position these days is an anti-Tory one. If people want to see that as a dislike of what Cameron stands for I am not that bothered and will not waste time denying it when there are so many more interesting things to talk about.
So you have the same flaw you accused me of having last night, except directed in the opposite direction?
Well, at least you admit it. Perhaps you should be slower when insulting other posters in the future, especially if you share the same flaw ...
I think the difference between us is that I am happy to accept I have a visceral dislike of Cameron's politics. It no doubt is a flaw, but it is one that I know I have and I try to factor that into my thinking on issues - ie, am I just saying that this is crap because I dislike Cameron and the Tories?
Heh, and that makes it sound as if I don't factor that into my thinking.
You really are a smearer of the first order, SO.
The sad thing is that we both seem to agree on Miliband's problem: he detect problems well, but his answers to those problems are almost always awful and poorly thought out. I'm pretty sure I've never attacked Miliband personally - on looks, mannerisms etc; only on policy. (I hope!)
I am not sure how talking about me equates to smearing you, but there you go.
Your paragraph starts: "I think the difference between us ..."
I might as well say: "I think the difference about us is that I'm not a criminal / a nasty person / an idiot ..." or somesuch. You're immediately making a comparison.
The first stage solution is easy. Just stop Scottish, Welsh & NI MP's voting on England only matters such as education, NHS & welfare. Why is that hard given the SNP voluntarily don't vote on English matters now. Enact it in parallel to Scottish changes
Then separately do a full on review including House of Lords.
Simple, clean and easy to understand.
If Labour want to change the NHS etc in England, they need to get a majority in England as they have had in the past. If Labour can not see the logic in this, they are even more unfit to govern under Miliband than i thought they were.
Labour my well see the logic, but will counter with the three main arguments:
1. It is wrong to have two classes of MP
2. It is almost impossible to differentiate a bill that applies to England only
3. Because of the "Barnett Consequentials" all most all bills involve spending and therefore affect all MPs constituents.
Now you may think those arguments are a load of dingoes' kidneys (the SNP manage to voluntarily work out solutions to them all) and Labour's real objection is fear that a future general election may not give them a majority in England. However, they were from memory the arguments they used last time this came up and they worked then.
The current situation has created 3 types already
Scottish MP's who cannot vote on issues in their own country
Scottish MP's who can vote on England only issues
English MP's who's majority votes can be overturned by non English MP's
Should be easy to make bills England specific eg NHS England, English schools
Barnett is supposed to automate the resource allocations where it applies thereby removing the need for debate.
Eat the elephant a slice at a time.
There should be no representation without taxation.
Just seen the interview between Eamon Holmes and Ed Balls on Sky. Holmes was very dismissive of Balls and actually got to the heart of how tiny the cuts Balls was talking about are. Holmes said "neither here nor there" a "piddling cut". When someone apolitical such as Holmes lays into your plans it is not a good sign. Holmes was more direct and tougher than R4 Today programme was.....
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
The first stage solution is easy. Just stop Scottish, Welsh & NI MP's voting on England only matters such as education, NHS & welfare. Why is that hard given the SNP voluntarily don't vote on English matters now. Enact it in parallel to Scottish changes
Then separately do a full on review including House of Lords.
Simple, clean and easy to understand.
If Labour want to change the NHS etc in England, they need to get a majority in England as they have had in the past. If Labour can not see the logic in this, they are even more unfit to govern under Miliband than i thought they were.
Labour my well see the logic, but will counter with the three main arguments:
1. It is wrong to have two classes of MP
2. It is almost impossible to differentiate a bill that applies to England only
3. Because of the "Barnett Consequentials" all most all bills involve spending and therefore affect all MPs constituents.
Now you may think those arguments are a load of dingoes' kidneys (the SNP manage to voluntarily work out solutions to them all) and Labour's real objection is fear that a future general election may not give them a majority in England. However, they were from memory the arguments they used last time this came up and they worked then.
The current situation has created 3 types already
Scottish MP's who cannot vote on issues in their own country
Scottish MP's who can vote on England only issues
English MP's who's majority votes can be overturned by non English MP's
Should be easy to make bills England specific eg NHS England, English schools
Barnett is supposed to automate the resource allocations where it applies thereby removing the need for debate.
Eat the elephant a slice at a time.
There should be no representation without taxation.
I know what you mean, I think. But I presume you are not advocating giving the franchise only to those who pay tax!
Just seen the interview between Eamon Holmes and Ed Balls on Sky. Holmes was very dismissive of Balls and actually got to the heart of how tiny the cuts Balls was talking about are. Holmes said "neither here nor there" a "piddling cut". When someone apolitical such as Holmes lays into your plans it is not a good sign. Holmes was more direct and tougher than R4 Today programme was.....
Not a great day to be interviewed by Holmes after the Man Utd debacle yesterday.
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
Yes the Lib Dems had a once in a lifetime chance to really put the boot into Labour for the state they left the country in and position themselves as a sensible and liberal centre-left party that isn't financially incompetent.
Instead they have been acting like a second opposition in government whilst giving Labour an easy ride for ruining the economy meaning they've been losing their left leaning votes to Labour and their right-leaning ones to the Tories.
Oh come on, at the moment the lib dems signed up to the coalition agreement they totally destroyed any chance they may have had at being about to mount an effective attack on Labour.
Why? Labour left the economy in a parlous state etc etc... Lib Dems stepped in and with the Conservatives said they would sort out the mess. It therefore follows that they were in a great position to dump buckets of sh*t on Labour' s record and Labour's policies. But, people such as Vince were unwilling to attack Labour.
@kle4 To step into the realms of fantasy.. Instead of the division lobby we could make them decide it on a game of five asides? (Balls the "Butcher" would be sure to elbow his way into the team/cabinet?)
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
The Lib Dems should never have entered a a full coalition with the Conservatives, or at least not on the terms that they did. They should have been supply and confidence partners at most.
Supply and Confidence would have meant a short-lived parliament. In 2010 the economy needed stability. What happened was the only real option for the country.
Just seen the interview between Eamon Holmes and Ed Balls on Sky. Holmes was very dismissive of Balls and actually got to the heart of how tiny the cuts Balls was talking about are. Holmes said "neither here nor there" a "piddling cut". When someone apolitical such as Holmes lays into your plans it is not a good sign. Holmes was more direct and tougher than R4 Today programme was.....
Not a great day to be interviewed by Holmes after the Man Utd debacle yesterday.
Very good point. The start this season is "worst ever", worst than last year when Moyes had a more difficult set of fixtures against all the top teams. Van Gaal has also had 3x the spending Moyes had at the start.
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
Yes the Lib Dems had a once in a lifetime chance to really put the boot into Labour for the state they left the country in and position themselves as a sensible and liberal centre-left party that isn't financially incompetent.
Instead they have been acting like a second opposition in government whilst giving Labour an easy ride for ruining the economy meaning they've been losing their left leaning votes to Labour and their right-leaning ones to the Tories.
Oh come on, at the moment the lib dems signed up to the coalition agreement they totally destroyed any chance they may have had at being about to mount an effective attack on Labour.
Why? Labour left the economy in a parlous state etc etc... Lib Dems stepped in and with the Conservatives said they would sort out the mess. It therefore follows that they were in a great position to dump buckets of sh*t on Labour' s record and Labour's policies. But, people such as Vince were unwilling to attack Labour.
It also didn't help that the LDs had an opt out from the student fees issue, then got involved and voted for it.
The first stage solution is easy. Just stop Scottish, Welsh & NI MP's voting on England only matters such as education, NHS & welfare. Why is that hard given the SNP voluntarily don't vote on English matters now. Enact it in parallel to Scottish changes
Then separately do a full on review including House of Lords.
Simple, clean and easy to understand.
If Labour want to change the NHS etc in England, they need to get a majority in England as they have had in the past. If Labour can not see the logic in this, they are even more unfit to govern under Miliband than i thought they were.
Labour my well see the logic, but will counter with the three main arguments:
1. It is wrong to have two classes of MP
2. It is almost impossible to differentiate a bill that applies to England only
3. Because of the "Barnett Consequentials" all most all bills involve spending and therefore affect all MPs constituents.
Now you may think those arguments are a load of dingoes' kidneys (the SNP manage to voluntarily work out solutions to them all) and Labour's real objection is fear that a future general election may not give them a majority in England. However, they were from memory the arguments they used last time this came up and they worked then.
The current situation has created 3 types already
Scottish MP's who cannot vote on issues in their own country
Scottish MP's who can vote on England only issues
English MP's who's majority votes can be overturned by non English MP's
Should be easy to make bills England specific eg NHS England, English schools
Barnett is supposed to automate the resource allocations where it applies thereby removing the need for debate.
Eat the elephant a slice at a time.
There should be no representation without taxation.
I know what you mean, I think. But I presume you are not advocating giving the franchise only to those who pay tax!
@kle4 To step into the realms of fantasy.. Instead of the division lobby we could make them decide it on a game of five asides? (Balls the "Butcher" would be sure to elbow his way into the team/cabinet?)
And for the Lords, they can compete in Fencing instead. Would get rid of those who are non-working, too.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
You must really hate the idea of counties...
Not so Mr fire. - there is a vast difference between the two, not that I expect you to appreciate that, given the somewhat unusual views you expressed up thread, of what England is and why.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
You must really hate the idea of counties...
Also mostly in existence for a very long time indeed, not anywhere near as artificial.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
You must really hate the idea of counties...
No because Counties have in the main (aside from Heath's nonsense reforms) been around as long, if not longer, than England. They are an ancient construct that people can and do identify with.
In fact the Heath reforms provide a nice example to my point he abolished some ancient counties (e.g. Rutland) and created false new ones (e.g. Avon). Neither of those examples commanded local support and the changes have since been unwound.
Creating a new region in which are lumped counties that have no obvious connection other than, sometimes, geography and a bureaucrats pen (e.g. the present South East Region) is not a human-scale solution. Milton Keynes really has very little in common with Dover.
Labour leadership's ineptness really makes me tear my hair out. "Vote Labour for Tory cuts delivered with half the competence!" is simply NOT going to win elections.
All this talk of "independence" and "EVFEL" is of course arrant nonsense. Logically, it puts the cart before the horse. You need to define what problems you want the system to solve, then work from there. If it is only equality of voting, then fair enough, but the problems we face go way beyond that, and into what we think our "country" should be.
How would Scotland react if Dave and Nick deliver devoplus/max with Labour opposition and leave EV4EL until after the election? Would Scottish voters turn their backs on Labour?
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
The Lib Dems should never have entered a a full coalition with the Conservatives, or at least not on the terms that they did. They should have been supply and confidence partners at most.
Lib Dems had ben saying for 30+ years how wonderful; coalitions would be for the country... They could hardly walk away after espousing that.... well maybe after the tuition fee pledge!
When the Scottish Lib Dems negotiated with Sottish Labourback in 1999 for the coalition government in Holyrood they drove a hard bargin and got a fantastic deal out of it for them - the only thing of any note they had to give up was their pledge on tution fees.
When UK Lib Dems negotiated with the Conservatives at Westminster they got less than nothing out of it and the had to give up their pledge on tution fees.
County Cricket seems to work reasonably well as far as loyalty is concerned! In that connection in a Members meeting a year or so ago at the County Club to which I belong there was a demand for “more success” and the Chair somewhat unwisely said that something to this effect "if all you want is success (as opposed to bringing on potential England players) why don’t you go and support another team!” To which he got a furious chorus of “we’re ....., not anywhere else”
As far as the LibDems are concerned, if we look back to April/May 2010, then the economy was still in dire straits, the Labour leadership was fighting among themselves and the election resulted in a “Hung Parliament”. I’m sure no-one here would disagree that “confidence and supply” wasn’t really an option, given the state of the markets and indeed the economy. That Clegg managed to make a total b***ls of the Tuition fees situation, followed by the chaos of the AV vote doesn’t alter the fact that he was right to go into coalition in the first place!
Is there any evidence that the people of England actually want the country divided up into regions?
If not then it is a complete non-starter.
No, but there are well-founded suspicions that it's being raised by Labour to derail the process, make it complicated enough to spill beyond the GE, and create red fiefdoms in their heartlands. 'Cos that worked soooo well north o' the border.
Just as well-founded as the suspicions that the Tories want EV4EL to create a blue fiefdom. As I said over the weekend, it's very easily to select a subset of constituencies and claim they are being treated "unfairly".
Apart from the fact that most other subsets are subject to the same laws and decisions, good point.
Mr. Me, better to lose the union than carve England into shitty regional assemblies.
England is not the possession of today's political pygmies, to be cut into little political fiefdoms to benefit this party or that. It's one land, and has been for over a thousand years.
Devolution can lead to disintegration. We've seen that already with Scotland, which very nearly left the UK. Do we want to foster division, and not merely foster it but institutionalise it within England? That is short-sighted and foolish in the extreme. English devolution must be for all England, not meaningless regional assemblies or slapdash city regions. All England must have a Parliament.
English votes for English laws is a reasonable stopgap.
And if the Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish are so offended at the prospect of England having equal standing and the English having the same rights as the Scottish, they're free to stay, or to leave. I'd sooner lose the UK than England, if it came to it.
England is already "divided" into piddling little counties, without it threatening the cohesiveness of the country as a whole.
England can survive a sensible layer of government that creates about ten, roughly Scotland population sized, assemblies.
Socrates is right to worry about the ability of the local press to put the spotlight of scrutiny on this proposed layer of politicians. I don't have an easy answer to that.
If you want to have equal population sizes, why Scotland sized? Why not Northern Ireland sized and split Scotland into three different regions?
All this talk of "independence" and "EVFEL" is of course arrant nonsense. Logically, it puts the cart before the horse. You need to define what problems you want the system to solve, then work from there. If it is only equality of voting, then fair enough, but the problems we face go way beyond that, and into what we think our "country" should be.
Fair enough, Mr Smarmeron, but as I think Mrs. C, lady of this parish, said the other day "We should not let perfection stand in the way of good".
We could argue from now until the cows come home about the ideal. However, that should not stop us making progress on obvious problems.
How would Scotland react if Dave and Nick deliver devoplus/max with Labour opposition and leave EV4EL until after the election? Would Scottish voters turn their backs on Labour?
Scotland would be pleased, England would be furious as would the rest of the Tory party and Labour will still get in and refuse to ever deal with EV4EL or the lopsided boundaries (in fact they'd gerrymander even more, perhaps giving more power to cities and not the suburbs).
If Cameron agrees to that then he deserved to be blasted off into space.
The first stage solution is easy. Just stop Scottish, Welsh & NI MP's voting on England only matters such as education, NHS & welfare. Why is that hard given the SNP voluntarily don't vote on English matters now. Enact it in parallel to Scottish changes
Then separately do a full on review including House of Lords.
Simple, clean and easy to understand.
If Labour want to change the NHS etc in England, they need to get a majority in England as they have had in the past. If Labour can not see the logic in this, they are even more unfit to govern under Miliband than i thought they were.
Labour my well see the logic, but will counter with the three main arguments:
1. It is wrong to have two classes of MP
2. It is almost impossible to differentiate a bill that applies to England only
3. Because of the "Barnett Consequentials" all most all bills involve spending and therefore affect all MPs constituents.
Now you may think those arguments are a load of dingoes' kidneys (the SNP manage to voluntarily work out solutions to them all) and Labour's real objection is fear that a future general election may not give them a majority in England. However, they were from memory the arguments they used last time this came up and they worked then.
The current situation has created 3 types already
Scottish MP's who cannot vote on issues in their own country
Scottish MP's who can vote on England only issues
English MP's who's majority votes can be overturned by non English MP's
Should be easy to make bills England specific eg NHS England, English schools
Barnett is supposed to automate the resource allocations where it applies thereby removing the need for debate.
Eat the elephant a slice at a time.
There should be no representation without taxation.
I know what you mean, I think. But I presume you are not advocating giving the franchise only to those who pay tax!
No, but I've heard some express that, on here and elsewhere!
I'm talking at the MP level. Basically, if an MP's constituents are not going to pay for something, they should have little or no say on it.
On matters like education, where the taxes are allocated in Scotland from a Scottish budget, English MPs should not have a say on how that money is spent. Likewise, Scottish MPs should have little say over how English education is run.
Although as discussed last night that breaks slightly on projects such as HS2, where Scotland will get a benefit in the form of reduced journey times.
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
Yes the Lib Dems had a once in a lifetime chance to really put the boot into Labour for the state they left the country in and position themselves as a sensible and liberal centre-left party that isn't financially incompetent.
Instead they have been acting like a second opposition in government whilst giving Labour an easy ride for ruining the economy meaning they've been losing their left leaning votes to Labour and their right-leaning ones to the Tories.
Oh come on, at the moment the lib dems signed up to the coalition agreement they totally destroyed any chance they may have had at being about to mount an effective attack on Labour.
Why? Labour left the economy in a parlous state etc etc... Lib Dems stepped in and with the Conservatives said they would sort out the mess. It therefore follows that they were in a great position to dump buckets of sh*t on Labour' s record and Labour's policies. But, people such as Vince were unwilling to attack Labour.
It also didn't help that the LDs had an opt out from the student fees issue, then got involved and voted for it.
The most stupid aspect of the student fees story is that the solution they came up with was pretty much exactly the graduate tax that they'd proposed in the first place. If they'd just renamed it as such then they would have got away with it.
How would Scotland react if Dave and Nick deliver devoplus/max with Labour opposition and leave EV4EL until after the election? Would Scottish voters turn their backs on Labour?
I'd have thought it was the least they'd expect, to the extent that they believed the leaders. They won't get particular credit for doing what the voters think they promised, and Labour won't lose support for being in opposition when that happened.
The opportunity Cameron missed was that when he could have done a big Unity thing following up on his campaign rhetoric, he instead came right out of the gate looking like he was holding them hostage to English issues. Even if he doesn't ultimately insist on that linkage, he's already given the impression that he regards Scottish voters as the enemy.
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That's 1% of the Scottish electorate, roughly.
No idea what the comparable figures are for Labour, LDs and Tories in Scotland, but SLAB don't seem to publish anyway.
HoC Library report on party membership says 0.3% for Cons, O.4% for Lab and 0.1% for LDs as percentages of UK electorate in 2013.
And 40K almost as much as the LD membership for the whole UK, and possibly more than UKIP (depending on current figures - I'm using 2013 ones from the report).
It is easy to place Ed bottom of a competence or likeability poll while still giving Labour support in an opinion poll.
Will an election be different when a question with real ramifications is asked?
And first, which is easy from LA.
Which part of LA are you in? Going down south?
A somewhat late response, I have a meeting in Pomona this morning, then drive to Bakersfield for meetings on Tuesday and Wednesday in that region, and back to LA wednesday night for meetings in Passadena and San Marino and home on Friday.
All this talk of "independence" and "EVFEL" is of course arrant nonsense. Logically, it puts the cart before the horse. You need to define what problems you want the system to solve, then work from there. If it is only equality of voting, then fair enough, but the problems we face go way beyond that, and into what we think our "country" should be.
Yes, and that's what I always rant about on here: first you define a problem, and then you look at possible solutions, including the positives and negatives of each one. Then you pick the best of the possible solutions. It may even be that the status quo is best.
Sadly, it's rare for politicians to do this. Instead they come up with a favoured solution: e.g. "Nationalisation!", "Privatisation!" and try to make the problem fit that solution. For the obvious reason, it is rarely the best of all the possible options.
Paradox and cognitive dissonance are the essential elements of being human so accept and celebrate it.It is a question of coming to terms with what is human.Paradox and humanity are part of life's duopoly.I think it was Spinosa who understood that.
@HurstLlama Temporary fixes to one part of the structure may work, but if it masks the underlying faults in the rest, it is dangerous. We are papering over cracks while our foundations crumble.
Paradox and cognitive dissonance are the essential elements of being human so accept and celebrate it.It is a question of coming to terms with what is human.Paradox and humanity are part of life's duopoly.I think it was Spinosa who understood that.
I think Baruch Spinoza spelt his name with a 'z' - unless there is a duopoloy of them...
@HurstLlama Temporary fixes to one part of the structure may work, but if it masks the underlying faults in the rest, it is dangerous. We are papering over cracks while our foundations crumble.
So you fix the leaky roof with a couple of felt patches while drawing up plans to replace the whole thing. Better than spending 2 years arguing if slate or terracotta is best while your house sprouts fungus and mould.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
You must really hate the idea of counties...
No because Counties have in the main (aside from Heath's nonsense reforms) been around as long, if not longer, than England. They are an ancient construct that people can and do identify with.
In fact the Heath reforms provide a nice example to my point he abolished some ancient counties (e.g. Rutland) and created false new ones (e.g. Avon). Neither of those examples commanded local support and the changes have since been unwound.
Creating a new region in which are lumped counties that have no obvious connection other than, sometimes, geography and a bureaucrats pen (e.g. the present South East Region) is not a human-scale solution. Milton Keynes really has very little in common with Dover.
The current regions, as used in the Euro elections are a nonsense, but we have the rough outlines of a regional breakdown of England already, from the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms of the Heptarchy. Make a few adjustments to account in particular for the rise of London and I think these would be perfectly sensible regions that people could relate to.
@HurstLlama Temporary fixes to one part of the structure may work, but if it masks the underlying faults in the rest, it is dangerous. We are papering over cracks while our foundations crumble.
If you go for the big picture fix everything come up with the ideal solution the process will take so long that by the time you come down from the mount with your solution the world has changed and what you are proposing is out of date anyway.
Big bang revolutions where the ideas of a few are forced through do not have a good history of success (See 18th century France, Russia, China, Cambodia and so on, the list is long).
Perhaps the better way is the British Way where we fix one problem at a time and evolve to meet changing conditions and ideas.
How would Scotland react if Dave and Nick deliver devoplus/max with Labour opposition and leave EV4EL until after the election? Would Scottish voters turn their backs on Labour?
I'd have thought it was the least they'd expect, to the extent that they believed the leaders. They won't get particular credit for doing what the voters think they promised, and Labour won't lose support for being in opposition when that happened.
The opportunity Cameron missed was that when he could have done a big Unity thing following up on his campaign rhetoric, he instead came right out of the gate looking like he was holding them hostage to English issues. Even if he doesn't ultimately insist on that linkage, he's already given the impression that he regards Scottish voters as the enemy.
"I'm going to increase powers to Scotland and at the same time increase powers for England"
"I'm going to increase powers to Scotland, but will resist it if new powers for England are included."
Only one of these statements makes a nation seem like the enemy.
@HurstLlama Temporary fixes to one part of the structure may work, but if it masks the underlying faults in the rest, it is dangerous. We are papering over cracks while our foundations crumble.
If you go for the big picture fix everything come up with the ideal solution the process will take so long that by the time you come down from the mount with your solution the world has changed and what you are proposing is out of date anyway.
Big bang revolutions where the ideas of a few are forced through do not have a good history of success (See 18th century France, Russia, China, Cambodia and so on, the list is long).
Perhaps the better way is the British Way where we fix one problem at a time and evolve to meet changing conditions and ideas.
Quite right. The main problem with Big Bang changes is that there are always unforeseen (and perhaps unforeseeable) consequences. Incremental change may look the poorer option on paper - or to a starry-eyed idealist - but they cause a lot, lot less harm.
@HurstLlama Can Neo Capitalism evolve?, according to it's adherents it is the pinnacle of thought, and the panacea for all ills. Same thing with the communist dictatorships. Dogma trumps reality.
The UK party that could attract the biggest % of current Labour supporters is the Lib Dems. To achieve that they would have to focus more on attacking Labour's image than the Conservatives. However, the LDs strategy for the past 4 years has been to primarily attack the image of the Conservatives. This has rebounded on the LDs by tarnishing their own image as untrustworthy partners. Meanwhile the LD 2010 voters have stuck with Labour as they see no reason to leave Labour and return to the LDs. If only the LDs understood that they should have spent more time on nurturing the image of coalitions as a good thing. But it is too late as the damage has been done.
The Lib Dems should never have entered a a full coalition with the Conservatives, or at least not on the terms that they did. They should have been supply and confidence partners at most.
Lib Dems had ben saying for 30+ years how wonderful; coalitions would be for the country... They could hardly walk away after espousing that.... well maybe after the tuition fee pledge!
They walked away from an offered coalition with the SNP in 2007, with hindsight perhaps one of their most momentous and self-harming recent decisions. If they had taken it up, no SLD implosion, 2011 SNP majority, referendum etc.
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That's 1% of the Scottish electorate, roughly.
No idea what the comparable figures are for Labour, LDs and Tories in Scotland, but SLAB don't seem to publish anyway.
HoC Library report on party membership says 0.3% for Cons, O.4% for Lab and 0.1% for LDs as percentages of UK electorate in 2013.
And 40K almost as much as the LD membership for the whole UK, and possibly more than UKIP (depending on current figures - I'm using 2013 ones from the report).
Hmm, interesting.
If the SNP can get the backing of most of the 45% who supported independence, they could sweep the board in May 2015.
Mr. Me, better to lose the union than carve England into shitty regional assemblies.
England is not the possession of today's political pygmies, to be cut into little political fiefdoms to benefit this party or that. It's one land, and has been for over a thousand years.
Devolution can lead to disintegration. We've seen that already with Scotland, which very nearly left the UK. Do we want to foster division, and not merely foster it but institutionalise it within England? That is short-sighted and foolish in the extreme. English devolution must be for all England, not meaningless regional assemblies or slapdash city regions. All England must have a Parliament.
English votes for English laws is a reasonable stopgap.
And if the Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish are so offended at the prospect of England having equal standing and the English having the same rights as the Scottish, they're free to stay, or to leave. I'd sooner lose the UK than England, if it came to it.
England is already "divided" into piddling little counties, without it threatening the cohesiveness of the country as a whole.
England can survive a sensible layer of government that creates about ten, roughly Scotland population sized, assemblies.
Socrates is right to worry about the ability of the local press to put the spotlight of scrutiny on this proposed layer of politicians. I don't have an easy answer to that.
If you want to have equal population sizes, why Scotland sized? Why not Northern Ireland sized and split Scotland into three different regions?
"roughly"
How convenient that the population ratios are just rough enough to keep every home nation together in one region except England.
Suffice to say that if the Tory Party ever comes to a position where it wants an English Parliament, English First Minister and English Government, then that basically means the break-up of the Union, and I won't support that in a million years. I'd much rather the status quo than that.
Lets get this straight -
So you would rather the English people like me been second class citizens to keep Scotland/wales and N Ireland happy.
Don't worry about the break up,it will happen with your kind of views.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
You must really hate the idea of counties...
No because Counties have in the main (aside from Heath's nonsense reforms) been around as long, if not longer, than England. They are an ancient construct that people can and do identify with.
In fact the Heath reforms provide a nice example to my point he abolished some ancient counties (e.g. Rutland) and created false new ones (e.g. Avon). Neither of those examples commanded local support and the changes have since been unwound.
Creating a new region in which are lumped counties that have no obvious connection other than, sometimes, geography and a bureaucrats pen (e.g. the present South East Region) is not a human-scale solution. Milton Keynes really has very little in common with Dover.
The current regions, as used in the Euro elections are a nonsense, but we have the rough outlines of a regional breakdown of England already, from the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms of the Heptarchy. Make a few adjustments to account in particular for the rise of London and I think these would be perfectly sensible regions that people could relate to.
Mr. Me, I agree that the ancient kingdoms are based on regions that people could relate to. I especially like the idea of keeping Kent separate (with preferable a big wall built around it). However, in terms of population equivalence, which is a big thing these days, I am not sure it would work.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
You must really hate the idea of counties...
No because Counties have in the main (aside from Heath's nonsense reforms) been around as long, if not longer, than England. They are an ancient construct that people can and do identify with.
In fact the Heath reforms provide a nice example to my point he abolished some ancient counties (e.g. Rutland) and created false new ones (e.g. Avon). Neither of those examples commanded local support and the changes have since been unwound.
Creating a new region in which are lumped counties that have no obvious connection other than, sometimes, geography and a bureaucrats pen (e.g. the present South East Region) is not a human-scale solution. Milton Keynes really has very little in common with Dover.
The current regions, as used in the Euro elections are a nonsense, but we have the rough outlines of a regional breakdown of England already, from the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms of the Heptarchy. Make a few adjustments to account in particular for the rise of London and I think these would be perfectly sensible regions that people could relate to.
Mr. Me, I agree that the ancient kingdoms are based on regions that people could relate to. I especially like the idea of keeping Kent separate (with preferable a big wall built around it). However, in terms of population equivalence, which is a big thing these days, I am not sure it would work.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
You must really hate the idea of counties...
No because Counties have in the main (aside from Heath's nonsense reforms) been around as long, if not longer, than England. They are an ancient construct that people can and do identify with.
In fact the Heath reforms provide a nice example to my point he abolished some ancient counties (e.g. Rutland) and created false new ones (e.g. Avon). Neither of those examples commanded local support and the changes have since been unwound.
Creating a new region in which are lumped counties that have no obvious connection other than, sometimes, geography and a bureaucrats pen (e.g. the present South East Region) is not a human-scale solution. Milton Keynes really has very little in common with Dover.
The current regions, as used in the Euro elections are a nonsense, but we have the rough outlines of a regional breakdown of England already, from the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms of the Heptarchy. Make a few adjustments to account in particular for the rise of London and I think these would be perfectly sensible regions that people could relate to.
Mr. Me, I agree that the ancient kingdoms are based on regions that people could relate to. I especially like the idea of keeping Kent separate (with preferable a big wall built around it). However, in terms of population equivalence, which is a big thing these days, I am not sure it would work.
Doubtful it's Alexander, though. The body was claimed by Ptolemy and kept in Egypt for a while, before being moved to Rome. I think from there it went missing.
Understandable the locals want it to be Alexander.
And this line bloody annoyed me: "Became king of ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon at age 20"
Mr. Me, better to lose the union than carve England into shitty regional assemblies.
England is not the possession of today's political pygmies, to be cut into little political fiefdoms to benefit this party or that. It's one land, and has been for over a thousand years.
Devolution can lead to disintegration. We've seen that already with Scotland, which very nearly left the UK. Do we want to foster division, and not merely foster it but institutionalise it within England? That is short-sighted and foolish in the extreme. English devolution must be for all England, not meaningless regional assemblies or slapdash city regions. All England must have a Parliament.
English votes for English laws is a reasonable stopgap.
And if the Scots and Welsh and Northern Irish are so offended at the prospect of England having equal standing and the English having the same rights as the Scottish, they're free to stay, or to leave. I'd sooner lose the UK than England, if it came to it.
England is already "divided" into piddling little counties, without it threatening the cohesiveness of the country as a whole.
England can survive a sensible layer of government that creates about ten, roughly Scotland population sized, assemblies.
Socrates is right to worry about the ability of the local press to put the spotlight of scrutiny on this proposed layer of politicians. I don't have an easy answer to that.
If you want to have equal population sizes, why Scotland sized? Why not Northern Ireland sized and split Scotland into three different regions?
"roughly"
How convenient that the population ratios are just rough enough to keep every home nation together in one region except England.
We have a different view on this, but you have a horrible way of behaving as though opposing views to your own are illegitimate.
Is it me or are the pollsters having a very hard time gauging the level of UKIP support.
Yesterday 23%, today 12%.
1) Yesterday's Survation poll with 23% was a England & Wales only poll, not a GB wide one, so you'd expect UKIP to do better in E&W only polls
2) Survation, have had historically the highest shares for UKIP, Populus, on the other hand, have the UKIP shares at the lower end, so effectively you're comparing the extreme ends of the scale.
@HurstLlama Can Neo Capitalism evolve?, according to it's adherents it is the pinnacle of thought, and the panacea for all ills. Same thing with the communist dictatorships. Dogma trumps reality.
Mr. Smarmeron, you are now taking me beyond a point where I can comment. I have no idea what Neo-Capitalism means.
@isam Their coaches all read the same book, it becomes fun spotting all the little affectations they have been taught. If you look and listen l carefully, there is always something slightly "unnatural" about them.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
You must really hate the idea of counties...
No because Counties have in the main (aside from Heath's nonsense reforms) been around as long, if not longer, than England. They are an ancient construct that people can and do identify with.
In fact the Heath reforms provide a nice example to my point he abolished some ancient counties (e.g. Rutland) and created false new ones (e.g. Avon). Neither of those examples commanded local support and the changes have since been unwound.
Creating a new region in which are lumped counties that have no obvious connection other than, sometimes, geography and a bureaucrats pen (e.g. the present South East Region) is not a human-scale solution. Milton Keynes really has very little in common with Dover.
The current regions, as used in the Euro elections are a nonsense, but we have the rough outlines of a regional breakdown of England already, from the Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms of the Heptarchy. Make a few adjustments to account in particular for the rise of London and I think these would be perfectly sensible regions that people could relate to.
Mr. Me, I agree that the ancient kingdoms are based on regions that people could relate to. I especially like the idea of keeping Kent separate (with preferable a big wall built around it). However, in terms of population equivalence, which is a big thing these days, I am not sure it would work.
Also Mr Woolie, gent of this parish, would be up in arms (I suspect literally) if Norwich were to be governed from Winchester.
And Northumbria would get Edinburgh, and Strathclyde most of Cumbria and Glasgow. Leaving Scotland with some beautiful scenery and a few midges ...
City of London, Kent/Essex, Wessex, Cornwall, Mercia, Northumberland, East Anglia with Lindsey either going it alone or the Northern part joining Northumberland and the Southern section (Kestevan basically) joining East Anglia. Simples.
Comments
Today I will have the first interview with the London City worker who bet £900,000 on a Scottish “No” - and won this:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/ByIPatTIQAAlHxg.jpg
Instead they have been acting like a second opposition in government whilst giving Labour an easy ride for ruining the economy meaning they've been losing their left leaning votes to Labour and their right-leaning ones to the Tories.
This is offset by the fact that such voters also fear Labour is incompetent.
I wonder how much of the support for that was on the back of the Scottish vote with people thinking that why should the Scots get to decide these things and we shouldn't.
I expect that a poll saying "would you want England to be split up into smaller devolved regions?" would yield a completely different result.
Jones said he favoured “not just home rule for Scotland, but home rule all round”.
On old terms (pre Sept-14 readjustment) Q42011 to Q22012 was a recession.
And the extra £200bn of borrowing is versus OBR's dizzily optimistic 2010 forecasts.
The argument that a country that has existed as an entity for a thousand years can be broken up into artificial regions decided by a remote committee for reasons of political expedience unrelated to the wishes and loyalties of the population is to ignore the lessons of history and human nature. A technocrat's solution and doomed to failure.
The Tories are widely loathed for their wholly negative impact on the lives of the vulnerable and less well off.
Bedroom Tax, benefit cuts, shovelling temporarily out of work people into failing jobfare schemes to massage dole figures, the inhumane rhetoric that Tories employ to describe such people. Then the economic incompetence to add to that.
Let's not forget the happy fact that Sun, Mail and Express headlines against vulnerable people which seem to favour the Tories actually alienate far more people.
The BBC doesn't indulge such language (although its coverage is bent by the rightwing press whinge and smear machine).
Given the overhelming drone of Tory claptrap in the press, the Tories ought to win hearts and minds, but their nefarious actions trump the propaganda, hence why they're hated.
Scottish MP's who cannot vote on issues in their own country
Scottish MP's who can vote on England only issues
English MP's who's majority votes can be overturned by non English MP's
Should be easy to make bills England specific eg NHS England, English schools
Barnett is supposed to automate the resource allocations where it applies thereby removing the need for debate.
Eat the elephant a slice at a time.
Interesting. That is certainly not true of the Scottish and Welsh legislatures - the NI case is arguably too extreme to be considered, but suggests the answer, which is that there are parties which happen to be specific to those areas and to some extent the legislatures. Presumably there is, for example, no Californian party to the same extent as the SNP at Holyrood?
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/international/england-demands-english-votes-for-french-laws-2014092290899
I've never voted Tory in my life, though being surrounded by them in the shires I imagine I am generally more well disposed to them than I might be otherwise, but while the astonishment at why Labour, which like the Tories is just a not very ideologically defined political party full of professional out of touch wonks, is liked can be overdone, the descriptions of why the Tories are so hated is even more overdone, as it make sit seem like no rational human being could ever support them, when millions upon millions, including those in poorer areas(even if they don't win a majority in many of those), do.
I might as well say: "I think the difference about us is that I'm not a criminal / a nasty person / an idiot ..." or somesuch. You're immediately making a comparison.
@ChrisGiles_: The contribution of capping child benefit at 1% to deficit reduction http://t.co/xTjTxn5DHJ
You must really hate the idea of counties...
But, people such as Vince were unwilling to attack Labour.
To step into the realms of fantasy.. Instead of the division lobby we could make them decide it on a game of five asides?
(Balls the "Butcher" would be sure to elbow his way into the team/cabinet?)
This is almost the only time, I think, we've ever agreed on something historical. Hmm.
Got to say the Three Cities episode last night did make me feel yet sadder Byzantium was lost forever. Bloody Fourth Crusade.
It also didn't help that the LDs had an opt out from the student fees issue, then got involved and voted for it.
In fact the Heath reforms provide a nice example to my point he abolished some ancient counties (e.g. Rutland) and created false new ones (e.g. Avon). Neither of those examples commanded local support and the changes have since been unwound.
Creating a new region in which are lumped counties that have no obvious connection other than, sometimes, geography and a bureaucrats pen (e.g. the present South East Region) is not a human-scale solution. Milton Keynes really has very little in common with Dover.
Logically, it puts the cart before the horse.
You need to define what problems you want the system to solve, then work from there. If it is only equality of voting, then fair enough, but the problems we face go way beyond that, and into what we think our "country" should be.
When UK Lib Dems negotiated with the Conservatives at Westminster they got less than nothing out of it and the had to give up their pledge on tution fees.
As far as the LibDems are concerned, if we look back to April/May 2010, then the economy was still in dire straits, the Labour leadership was fighting among themselves and the election resulted in a “Hung Parliament”. I’m sure no-one here would disagree that “confidence and supply” wasn’t really an option, given the state of the markets and indeed the economy. That Clegg managed to make a total b***ls of the Tuition fees situation, followed by the chaos of the AV vote doesn’t alter the fact that he was right to go into coalition in the first place!
We could argue from now until the cows come home about the ideal. However, that should not stop us making progress on obvious problems.
If Cameron agrees to that then he deserved to be blasted off into space.
I'm talking at the MP level. Basically, if an MP's constituents are not going to pay for something, they should have little or no say on it.
On matters like education, where the taxes are allocated in Scotland from a Scottish budget, English MPs should not have a say on how that money is spent. Likewise, Scottish MPs should have little say over how English education is run.
Although as discussed last night that breaks slightly on projects such as HS2, where Scotland will get a benefit in the form of reduced journey times.
The opportunity Cameron missed was that when he could have done a big Unity thing following up on his campaign rhetoric, he instead came right out of the gate looking like he was holding them hostage to English issues. Even if he doesn't ultimately insist on that linkage, he's already given the impression that he regards Scottish voters as the enemy.
Peter Murrell @PeterMurrell · 1h
Mega drum roll... @theSNP now has 40,000 members. Big welcome to all 14,358 newbies. Join too and make a difference: https://my.snp.org/join
Peter Murrell @PeterMurrell · 2h
Thu 5pm @theSNP membership was 25,642. Mon 10am there's 14,051 extra new members. Join us too and make a difference https://my.snp.org/join
That's 1% of the Scottish electorate, roughly.
No idea what the comparable figures are for Labour, LDs and Tories in Scotland, but SLAB don't seem to publish anyway.
HoC Library report on party membership says 0.3% for Cons, O.4% for Lab and 0.1% for LDs as percentages of UK electorate in 2013.
And 40K almost as much as the LD membership for the whole UK, and possibly more than UKIP (depending on current figures - I'm using 2013 ones from the report).
Hmm, interesting.
Populus @PopulusPolls · 1m
Latest Populus VI: Lab 37 (+1), Con 33 (+1), LD 9 (=), UKIP 12 (-3), Oth 8 (=). Tables here: http://popu.lu/s_vi140922
Latest Populus VI: Lab 37 (+1), Con 33 (+1), LD 9 (=), UKIP 12 (-3), Oth 8 (=)
Sadly, it's rare for politicians to do this. Instead they come up with a favoured solution: e.g. "Nationalisation!", "Privatisation!" and try to make the problem fit that solution. For the obvious reason, it is rarely the best of all the possible options.
Temporary fixes to one part of the structure may work, but if it masks the underlying faults in the rest, it is dangerous.
We are papering over cracks while our foundations crumble.
"Is Cameron the most hated Prime MInister of all time? How does he compare to Blair/Brown?"
......this and other questions answered in the latest edition of 'News From Uranus'
Low Tory-LD Switch number = High Labour AB number = High Labour London number.
Once every five or six polls.
Whatever downing street says....
Big bang revolutions where the ideas of a few are forced through do not have a good history of success (See 18th century France, Russia, China, Cambodia and so on, the list is long).
Perhaps the better way is the British Way where we fix one problem at a time and evolve to meet changing conditions and ideas.
"I'm going to increase powers to Scotland, but will resist it if new powers for England are included."
Only one of these statements makes a nation seem like the enemy.
Can Neo Capitalism evolve?, according to it's adherents it is the pinnacle of thought, and the panacea for all ills.
Same thing with the communist dictatorships. Dogma trumps reality.
"Is that anything to do with JackW’s ARSE?"
...Cheeky!
Suffice to say that if the Tory Party ever comes to a position where it wants an English Parliament, English First Minister and English Government, then that basically means the break-up of the Union, and I won't support that in a million years. I'd much rather the status quo than that.
Lets get this straight -
So you would rather the English people like me been second class citizens to keep Scotland/wales and N Ireland happy.
Don't worry about the break up,it will happen with your kind of views.
A story that might be of interest to Mr Dancer of this parish:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-29239529
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heptarchy#mediaviewer/File:Anglo-Saxon_Heptarchy.jpg
Also Mr Woolie, gent of this parish, would be up in arms (I suspect literally) if Norwich were to be governed from Winchester.
Yesterday 23%, today 12%.
Balls is doing it now a bit. Farage does it too to be fair.
Voting for Scottish devomax with nothing for England?? LOL
Doubtful it's Alexander, though. The body was claimed by Ptolemy and kept in Egypt for a while, before being moved to Rome. I think from there it went missing.
Understandable the locals want it to be Alexander.
And this line bloody annoyed me:
"Became king of ancient Greek kingdom of Macedon at age 20"
Macedon wasn't bloody Greek.
2) Survation, have had historically the highest shares for UKIP, Populus, on the other hand, have the UKIP shares at the lower end, so effectively you're comparing the extreme ends of the scale.
Talking of nether regions (devolved) I note Ball's speech going down a storm in Downing Street. Very muted in the conference hall.
........................................................................
Have a great holiday Mike.
Their coaches all read the same book, it becomes fun spotting all the little affectations they have been taught.
If you look and listen l carefully, there is always something slightly "unnatural" about them.
Simples.