I think there's very little doubt that Margaret Thatcher, were she alive today, would be in favour of withdrawal from the EU, as presently constituted.
The point I was trying to make (which some seem to have missed) is that there is a good argument to be made that Margaret Thatcher ("our" great leader) was the 1st UKIP Prime Minister. Or, if you prefer, the UKIP-sympathetic leader of a UKIP-Conservative alliance that commanded substantial C1/C2 support. And consequently won three decisive election victories.
There are many similar facets and aspects, and (were it not for her age and historic partisan loyalty, like Tebbit) she might well be a member of UKIP today.
So there's no point in Conservatives and Conservative-UKIP defectors throwing rocks and abuse each way, and tearing chunks out of each other.
We've worked together in the past, and we can work together in the future.
"Nigel Lawson, Thatcher's Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1983 to 1989, listed the Thatcherite ideals as:
"Free markets, financial discipline, firm control over public expenditure, tax cuts, nationalism, 'Victorian values' (of the Samuel Smiles self-help variety), privatisation and a dash of populism."
Well you keep saying that, but I can think of any socialist policies from UKIP
Don't bother with the WAG VAT its not a policy and never was.
So what are they?
Low tax Out of EU Low Immigration Grammar Schools Less foreign aid No green subsidies
None of this seems Socialist to me
The welfare state was certainly a lot more generous back then that it was under either the last Labour government or the current Coalition. As a student I got a full grant and had my fees paid, I got housing benefit and I got to sign on in the summer. Later when I was unemployed I got my mortgage paid and was never forced into taking a job I did not want to do. The State invested in me and it has been paid back pretty handsomely. Good old State.
And how many years of retirement did it pay for?
I also suspect that the living standard of people on welfare is better now, as it hasn't fallen with technological progress. Would you have been able to afford a high speed phone line then?
And using a supercharger, you can get 150 miles range in 20 minutes. That means you can go 450 miles (London to Edinburgh) with one comfort stop.
I don't think so. According to the site you pointed me to, 20 minutes on a supercharger, if there is one available (there are only 75 in the whole of Europe), will give half a full charge or about 134 miles (though they claim 170 miles worth of charge in half an hour). The type of charger found at motorway service stations will give, again according to the Telsa site, 68 miles per hour of charge).
Though with the upgraded battery Telsa claim a range of 306 miles (244 on the standard battery pack), they are silent on what conditions are necessary for that to be achieved. The Nissan Leaf for example has a range of about 100 miles when it is warm, dry and in daylight. When its cold, wet and dark the range drops to about 48 miles. I see no reason why such a drop should not also apply to the Telsa.
So a practical serious car? Would you spend £50,000 on car that you couldn't guarantee to take you to Birmingham and back with finding somewhere to plug it in for an hour or two?
As a small business owner, I noticed in previous recessions that my industry - web databases / digital marketing - felt the first shivers of the downturns months before everyone else. It was easy to notice because people and companies became much harder to get money out of. They stretched their payment cycles and many of my competitors went bust.
It is starting to feel like that again. Some of the competition has gone again and over the last few weeks money has dried up. Bills stay stubbornly unpaid unless we threaten to withdraw online services in which case some money appears, but not all. Accounts Receivable is starting to show more bad debt than for the previous two years.
If it stays like this for another few weeks then I wil be convinced that another downturn is on the way and next spring is going to be very bad... right before the election.
You are not the first small business owner that I have heard this from in recent weeks. Training is an area that gets cut very early when things start to look dicey and a chum's training company has had a batch of programmes cancelled. Of course it may be just down to ordinary business fluctuations, but it may not be.
At the other end of the scale, I see that Rolls Royce has just said its revenues will be dropping and has issued its first profit warning in more than a decade.
Going into a downturn with a £100bn p.a. deficit, more than £1tn debt and an unreformed banking sector could be interesting. Let us hope and pray it doesn't come to that.
We've just been told that we have to cut the budget for our department by 15%. This will mean redundancies. Gloom.
Best wishes to Mike K - I hope all gets sorted in the end - and quickly.
Well I sincerely hope the good citizens of Solihull, Colne Valley and Battersea vote true blue but I wouldn't mind seeing the good burgers of Broxtowe electing Nick Palmer as their MP - heck I even hope that Eastleigh remains a Lib Dem stronghold...
As for myself, well my vote won't particularly matter compared to others ^_~
Why? He is undoubtedly a gentleman and would give added kudos to pb. But, why?
So he can renege on manifesto commitments (viz Lisbon referendum in 2005). Or so he can prioritise immigrants for social housing as he happily admitted a few days ago. But I presume that won´t make it to his manifesto.
So he can happily import more third world immigrants to pad up the Labour vote? Will he at least come clean and tell his constituents why more immigration is good for them? Perhaps mention the Somali restaurants and the Afghan music scene. At least he´ll be getting brownie points for honesty.
The worrying thing is I do believe he passionately believes in these things. Despite being an intelligent man (a war gamer!!), how can he believe such tosh? How exactly does Muslim immigration benefit Britain? Curries aside.
Italjai - I try not to debate policy here, since almost nobody is open to persuasion and we're all too busy: it's primarily a forum for discussing what we think will happen (with betting implications for those who bet), rather than what we'd like to happen.
But for the record, I don't favour "prioritising immigrants for social housing". I favour prioritising social housing for people who need it most. I'm against adding a clause "unless they're immigrants". If we want to reduce immigration, we should reduce it by tweaking the points system to require more points - it's unfair to let immigrants come in and then zap them with special discriminatory rules. Don't you agree, really?
And I favour the points system for non-European immigration and I'd accept that we might have introduced it earlier. As for free movement in Europe, I can see pros and cons, but I do think EU or at least EEA membership is essential for our long-term prosperity and influence (we might disagree on that, but it's an honest view), and free movement is a condition for that which I believe most members consider non-negotiable. Since it only needs one country to veto a change, it won't happen, and Mr Cameron is just kidding you when he says he'll try really hard or whatever.
Oh, and UKIP are digging themselves even further into the Lodge Hill hole:
Chris Irvine, Reckless’s election agent, denied that the lawmaker had switched his position this year because he knew he would be fighting a by-election.
“It’s one possible interpretation of events, but in all honesty, Mark went away, reviewed his position and listened to local residents,” he said in a telephone interview. “A lot changed when it was declared a site of special scientific Interest. Mark looked at it again.”
Which would be a pretty feeble line at the best of times, but especially since Reckless himself complained about the fact that it had already been declared an SSI in the 2013 speech I quoted a few moments ago.
I wouldn't mind particularly - all parties jump on local bandwagons when they're in opposition - but will Kippers kindly desist from claiming to be honest or different from other parties? The sanctimonious hypocrisy is getting a bit much.
Well I sincerely hope the good citizens of Solihull, Colne Valley and Battersea vote true blue but I wouldn't mind seeing the good burgers of Broxtowe electing Nick Palmer as their MP - heck I even hope that Eastleigh remains a Lib Dem stronghold...
As for myself, well my vote won't particularly matter compared to others ^_~
Why? He is undoubtedly a gentleman and would give added kudos to pb. But, why?
So he can renege on manifesto commitments (viz Lisbon referendum in 2005). Or so he can prioritise immigrants for social housing as he happily admitted a few days ago. But I presume that won´t make it to his manifesto.
So he can happily import more third world immigrants to pad up the Labour vote? Will he at least come clean and tell his constituents why more immigration is good for them? Perhaps mention the Somali restaurants and the Afghan music scene. At least he´ll be getting brownie points for honesty.
The worrying thing is I do believe he passionately believes in these things. Despite being an intelligent man (a war gamer!!), how can he believe such tosh? How exactly does Muslim immigration benefit Britain? Curries aside.
Italjai - I try not to debate policy here, since almost nobody is open to persuasion and we're all too busy: it's primarily a forum for discussing what we think will happen (with betting implications for those who bet), rather than what we'd like to happen.
But for the record, I don't favour "prioritising immigrants for social housing". I favour prioritising social housing for people who need it most. I'm against adding a clause "unless they're immigrants". If we want to reduce immigration, we should reduce it by tweaking the points system to require more points - it's unfair to let immigrants come in and then zap them with special discriminatory rules. Don't you agree, really?
And I favour the points system for non-European immigration and I'd accept that we might have introduced it earlier. As for free movement in Europe, I can see pros and cons, but I do think EU or at least EEA membership is essential for our long-term prosperity and influence (we might disagree on that, but it's an honest view), and free movement is a condition for that which I believe most members consider non-negotiable. Since it only needs one country to veto a change, it won't happen, and Mr Cameron is just kidding you when he says he'll try really hard or whatever.
Why do you think that EEA membership is so much better than a CETA-like deal so as to be "essential" for our long-term prosperity? How poor do you think we would get with just a CETA-like deal?
I think there's very little doubt that Margaret Thatcher, were she alive today, would be in favour of withdrawal from the EU, as presently constituted.
Doesn't seem a million miles away from UKIP to me
snip
Modernise to appeal to those who will never vote Tory - the trendy "values-driven" metropolitan elite.
At the same time everyone else knows elections are won with the lower mc and upper wc. Say the C1C2 of old? How many votes does wittering on about climate change, gay marriage and lentil burgers win with them?
Not many. But it's worse than that - many modernising Tories are now starting to self-identify with that group, and (bizarrely) claim that *they* are the abused ones.
I pointed out this problem. TSE (a fellow Tory, who I disagree with on this) decided to attack me for it rather than engage with the argument.
And that *is* the problem. This is what is driving the party apart.
What do you think is driving this behaviour. I'd self identify as a LMC product of WWC/LMC stock. We lived above the shop literally, I was sent to public school to escape it all. I'd consider myself to be wet Tory who will side with the Blue Team when I think it's all gone pear shaped/the threat of pears is clear and present. On my electoral holidays, I flirted about with Tony The Tory/Paddy The Action Man.
Sorry for delay, Plato. My phone is playing up.
I guess you could write a whole thesis on this. Fundamentally, I think we've all tried to be much too clever. We've carved up everyone into segments and groups with attributes, rather than viewing us all as one cohesive society. The breakdown of traditional class identifiers and the ever-growing services sector in some ways has provided a bit of justification for this as it's no longer clear where the 'voters' really sit. It's all a bit confusing, so we've hyper-targeted instead, which has created unnecessary artificial divisions.
Partly that's the fault of the advertisers and marketeers, but it's something our politicians have eagerly lapped up as well.
Much is made of Thatcher closing thousands of Grammar schools and only saving a few hundred but much of it is taken out of context. I have dug out some old info on Thatcher's view of Grammar Schools and her time as Education Secretary. It's worth a read. For example Thatcher said this in 1966:
"We would welcome experiments and new policies", she said, "but we are against closing Grammar schools for a kind not yet proved. These schools are not being closed because they are bad, but because they are good."
"We believe that grammar schools should continue to be a vital part of education and that secondary modern schools should offer opportunities for non-academic children, as long as there is an easy transfer to the grammar school. There must be a freedom of choice".
Reality is she was a staunch supporter of Grammar Schools.
As Education Secretary the problem Thatcher had , other than being a woman in a male cabinet was that 'comprehensivtisation' was already established government policy and the Tories had not committed to reverse it in their manifesto only 'slow it down'. She had no backing in the Educational establishment to save Grammar Schools and also had no backing in Cabinet to take on the Educational establishment. Add to that all decisions were supposed to be made locally by councils with the Education Secretary effectively just validating and rubber stamping them. So every time she blocked a proposal and there were not many she could justify blocking the papers were all over it like a rash and after the Thatcher Milk Snatcher affair she did not have a massive amount of political capital to back her up. In fact her attempts to save Grammar schools resulted in her being accused repeatedly of abusing her powers as Education Secretary. She had little power to stop it even though she went out on a limb time and again. Local councils were intent on getting rid and they did. That any have survived at all seemingly was a miracle.
Thatcher Vol. 1 The Grocer's Daughter (from about page 220 discusses her time as education secretary)
But for the record, I don't favour "prioritising immigrants for social housing". I favour prioritising social housing for people who need it most. I'm against adding a clause "unless they're immigrants".
Interesting - not what alot of Labour voters would effectively say I reckon. Still at least you're honest.
“It’s one possible interpretation of events, but in all honesty, Mark went away, reviewed his position and listened to local residents,” he said in a telephone interview. “ when it was apparent it might lose him votes in the by election, Mark looked at it again.”
Unusually (mainly) sensible answer! Do I notice contrition for what happened before. How will you redress this. As you know, saying sorry, does not by itself solve anything.
One quibble:
" I favour prioritising social housing for people who need it most."
I immigrate here with my family for economic reasons and should be eligible to social housing because of my needs. This, despite the fact I have a house in my country of origin. Which I may or not be renting out.
Would you still say my needs are higher?
In any case any sensible points based immigration system would not allow in those who cannot support themselves and so should surely curtail access to assorted benefits.
' Since it only needs one country to veto a change, it won't happen, and Mr Cameron is just kidding you when he says he'll try really hard or whatever. '
We heard exactly the same stuff when Thatcher was negotiating the UK EU rebate.
' Since it only needs one country to veto a change, it won't happen, and Mr Cameron is just kidding you when he says he'll try really hard or whatever. '
We heard exactly the same stuff when Thatcher was negotiating the UK EU rebate.
I think there's very little doubt that Margaret Thatcher, were she alive today, would be in favour of withdrawal from the EU, as presently constituted.
Doesn't seem a million miles away from UKIP to me
snip
Modernise to appeal to those who will never vote Tory - the trendy "values-driven" metropolitan elite.
At the same time everyone else knows elections are won with the lower mc and upper wc. Say the C1C2 of old? How many votes does wittering on about climate change, gay marriage and lentil burgers win with them?
Not many. But it's worse than that - many modernising Tories are now starting to self-identify with that group, and (bizarrely) claim that *they* are the abused ones.
I pointed out this problem. TSE (a fellow Tory, who I disagree with on this) decided to attack me for it rather than engage with the argument.
And that *is* the problem. This is what is driving the party apart.
What do you think is driving this behaviour. I'd self identify as a LMC product of WWC/LMC stock. We lived above the shop literally, I was sent to public school to escape it all. I'd consider myself to be wet Tory who will side with the Blue Team when I think it's all gone pear shaped/the threat of pears is clear and present. On my electoral holidays, I flirted about with Tony The Tory/Paddy The Action Man.
Sorry for delay, Plato. My phone is playing up.
I guess you could write a whole thesis on this. Fundamentally, I think we've all tried to be much too clever. We've carved up everyone into segments and groups with attributes, rather than viewing us all as one cohesive society. The breakdown of traditional class identifiers and the ever-growing services sector in some ways has provided a bit of justification for this as it's no longer clear where the 'voters' really sit. It's all a bit confusing, so we've hyper-targeted instead, which has created unnecessary artificial divisions.
Partly that's the fault of the advertisers and marketeers, but it's something our politicians have eagerly lapped up as well.
A kind of Marxist dialectic has resulted in the government and the opposition being almost identical... And some people don't like the result
The policies and world views discarded by both parties have been picked up by someone else and some people are finding that coalition of policies more attractive
' Since it only needs one country to veto a change, it won't happen, and Mr Cameron is just kidding you when he says he'll try really hard or whatever. '
We heard exactly the same stuff when Thatcher was negotiating the UK EU rebate.
"Prime Minister, I served with Maggie Thatcher. I knew Maggie Thatcher. Maggie Thatcher was a friend of mine. Prime Minister, you're no Maggie Thatcher!"
Mark Reckless is clearly trying to out-Labour Labour in hypocrisy and rewriting of history:
2014: Mark Reckless, the RSPB and many local residents petitioned the government to “call in” the decision and have it reconsidered by a planning inspector. This is justified because the country’s whole system for protecting the environment will be undermined if building is allowed in this Site of Special Scientific Interest that is home to the UK’s largest nightingale colony.
2013: Earlier this month, Natural England declared Ministry of Defence land at Lodge Hill in my constituency to be a site of special scientific interest. In numerous plans over 18 years, the site has been clearly designated for 5,000 homes and for employment opportunities for 5,000 people. A total of £35.5 million has been spent to get to the point of planning consent being granted. After all this time and money, the council is concerned, to put it mildly, to be thwarted at the last hurdle by Natural England, which does not consider the economic impacts...The reason for this, we are told by Natural England, is that a study of some description has discovered that 84 nightingales might use the site. The comparison to be drawn is between those 84 nightingales and homes for 12,000 people and jobs for a further 5,000 people. ... It is not surprising that council leaders in the area say that we need to end the absurd situation of a non-elected Government agency dictating to national and local government on how to run things. Medway is an example of a council that is pro-development, that wants to support the Minister and that wants to show that it is open for business. Will the Minister assure me that our local council will be able to decide where it is best for development to go, not Ministers or their inspectors, and still less these quangos?
And Kippers complain about Cameron and say he can't be trusted! You really couldn't make it up.
Well this Kipper is none too impressed with 'former Tory' Mark Reckless at this point either. He having now seen the light though one can only hope his rehabilitation will move forward apace and we do not see another example of such double standards now he has returned to the light!
“When plunder becomes a way of life for a group of men living together in society, they create for themselves in the course of time a legal system that authorizes it and a moral code that glorifies it”
― Frederic Bastiat
Never better said about our Westminster betters and their unending thirst for ever increasing taxes to keep their trough well stocked.
I've got £60 on betfair sitting there at 4.3 and it's been there all day
I'd recommend asking for slightly better odds than you're offering! I'm on at 4.5, and I think there are enough people misreading this to get at least that, maybe more.
I've got £60 on betfair sitting there at 4.3 and it's been there all day
I'd recommend asking for slightly better odds than you're offering! I'm on at 4.5, and I think there are enough people misreading this to get at least that, maybe more.
I've got £60 on betfair sitting there at 4.3 and it's been there all day
I'd recommend asking for slightly better odds than you're offering! I'm on at 4.5, and I think there are enough people misreading this to get at least that, maybe more.
I'm laying!
Yes, I know. I'm saying others will lay at better (for the backer) prices, if a potential backer is patient.
And using a supercharger, you can get 150 miles range in 20 minutes. That means you can go 450 miles (London to Edinburgh) with one comfort stop.
I don't think so. According to the site you pointed me to, 20 minutes on a supercharger, if there is one available (there are only 75 in the whole of Europe), will give half a full charge or about 134 miles (though they claim 170 miles worth of charge in half an hour). The type of charger found at motorway service stations will give, again according to the Telsa site, 68 miles per hour of charge).
Though with the upgraded battery Telsa claim a range of 306 miles (244 on the standard battery pack), they are silent on what conditions are necessary for that to be achieved. The Nissan Leaf for example has a range of about 100 miles when it is warm, dry and in daylight. When its cold, wet and dark the range drops to about 48 miles. I see no reason why such a drop should not also apply to the Telsa.
So a practical serious car? Would you spend £50,000 on car that you couldn't guarantee to take you to Birmingham and back with finding somewhere to plug it in for an hour or two?
Looks to me like the sort of car someone buys to show they're both green and loaded. If I had that sort of cash to spend on a car it's definitely not what I'd buy.
Who picks up the bill for the infrastructure to recharge the bloody things? How is the energy generated to recharge them? Electric cars at the moment are as much use as a one legged man at an arse kicking party.
I've got £60 on betfair sitting there at 4.3 and it's been there all day
I'd recommend asking for slightly better odds than you're offering! I'm on at 4.5, and I think there are enough people misreading this to get at least that, maybe more.
I'm laying!
Yes, I know. I'm saying others will lay at better (for the backer) prices, if a potential backer is patient.
Oh right... Well it's never worth laying bigger than you need to on betfair... If you're front of queue you're in at the best price
Well I sincerely hope the good citizens of Solihull, Colne Valley and Battersea vote true blue but I wouldn't mind seeing the good burgers of Broxtowe electing Nick Palmer as their MP - heck I even hope that Eastleigh remains a Lib Dem stronghold...
As for myself, well my vote won't particularly matter compared to others ^_~
.
Italjai - I try not to debate policy here, since almost nobody is open to persuasion and we're all too busy: it's primarily a forum for discussing what we think will happen (with betting implications for those who bet), rather than what we'd like to happen.
But for the record, I don't favour "prioritising immigrants for social housing". I favour prioritising social housing for people who need it most. I'm against adding a clause "unless they're immigrants". If we want to reduce immigration, we should reduce it by tweaking the points system to require more points - it's unfair to let immigrants come in and then zap them with special discriminatory rules. Don't you agree, really?
And I favour the points system for non-European immigration and I'd accept that we might have introduced it earlier. As for free movement in Europe, I can see pros and cons, but I do think EU or at least EEA membership is essential for our long-term prosperity and influence (we might disagree on that, but it's an honest view), and free movement is a condition for that which I believe most members consider non-negotiable. Since it only needs one country to veto a change, it won't happen, and Mr Cameron is just kidding you when he says he'll try really hard or whatever.
Point of order on a technicality. I believe from the 1st November migration issues move from requiring unanimity to Qualified Majority Voting. However the conclave of poor southern and eastern European nations is sufficient to block any attempts to control migration if they so wish.
Of course the reverse of this is that we can no longer veto migration issues which work against us (e.g. say the abolition of transitional bans on migration). The UK would need to create an alliance in Brussels itself to stop negative migration issues from harming us
Mark Reckless is clearly trying to out-Labour Labour in hypocrisy and rewriting of history:
2014: Mark Reckless, the RSPB and many local residents petitioned the government to “call in” the decision and have it reconsidered by a planning inspector. This is justified because the country’s whole system for protecting the environment will be undermined if building is allowed in this Site of Special Scientific Interest that is home to the UK’s largest nightingale colony.
2013: Earlier this month, Natural England declared Ministry of Defence land at Lodge Hill in my constituency to be a site of special scientific interest. In numerous plans over 18 years, the site has been clearly designated for 5,000 homes and for employment opportunities for 5,000 people. A total of £35.5 million has been spent to get to the point of planning consent being granted. After all this time and money, the council is concerned, to put it mildly, to be thwarted at the last hurdle by Natural England, which does not consider the economic impacts...The reason for this, we are told by Natural England, is that a study of some description has discovered that 84 nightingales might use the site. The comparison to be drawn is between those 84 nightingales and homes for 12,000 people and jobs for a further 5,000 people. ... It is not surprising that council leaders in the area say that we need to end the absurd situation of a non-elected Government agency dictating to national and local government on how to run things. Medway is an example of a council that is pro-development, that wants to support the Minister and that wants to show that it is open for business. Will the Minister assure me that our local council will be able to decide where it is best for development to go, not Ministers or their inspectors, and still less these quangos?
I've got £60 on betfair sitting there at 4.3 and it's been there all day
I'd recommend asking for slightly better odds than you're offering! I'm on at 4.5, and I think there are enough people misreading this to get at least that, maybe more.
I'm laying!
Laying Reckless?
I think I'd prefer to go to bed (and wake up) with either of the two Tory candidates instead.
A strange set of local results this week. Some good gains for the LDs in Rutland and York, UKIP was a bit of a curate's egg and it's Labour who seem to have spectacularly underperformed...
If an actual Scottish poll confirmed that Con>Lab figure, then it's easy enough to construct an explanatory narrative for it. (Not, of course, that the narrative would necessarily be accurate!)
Oldnat Indeed, we need a Scottish poll to confirm, but astonishing nonetheless, I don't believe the Tories have ever had a bigger lead in Scotland than the rest of the UK over Labour? Entirely due to Labour procrastinating over EVEL and holding up devomax it would seem
I've got £60 on betfair sitting there at 4.3 and it's been there all day
I'd recommend asking for slightly better odds than you're offering! I'm on at 4.5, and I think there are enough people misreading this to get at least that, maybe more.
I'm laying!
Laying Reckless?
I think I'd prefer to go to bed (and wake up) with either of the two Tory candidates instead.
Nah I'm laying the Tory girls!
On a serious note, I just can't see anything that is a positive for the Tories, other than they really want to win.... But so do ukip
Euros Constituency poll National Polls Momentum Incumbent MP
Against what?
All the news reports I have seen have only found people who say they're voting ukip' and the hustings which seated 240, wasn't even full
Sunil The trend was clear from the beginning of the week, but after telling me throught the referendum campaign that if Scotland stayed the Tories were doomed I am not surprised you would express some scepticism and we will await further figures to see if the trend is there
Con on 20% in Scotland with Labour on 19% should return about half a dozen Tory MPs from north of the border (albeit only just north of the border mainly). And lots of SNP ones.
HYUFD - Scottish subsamples are notoriously dubious!
Nope. They're notoriously variable - which in itself suggests that people may be reconsidering how they vote. Up until a couple of years ago, Scottish crossbreaks were no more variable than other geographic ones.
Why do you think that EEA membership is so much better than a CETA-like deal so as to be "essential" for our long-term prosperity? How poor do you think we would get with just a CETA-like deal?
CETA's useful as far as it goes, but IMO it's going to be essential for our prosperity to be part of the political and economic association of the continent where we live. I also think it's desirable, because it seems to me that we have a great deal in common with other European countries and we magnify the differences absurdly. Obviously I'm influenced by having knocked around on the Continent for a long time.
Unusually (mainly) sensible answer! Do I notice contrition for what happened before. How will you redress this. As you know, saying sorry, does not by itself solve anything.
One quibble:
" I favour prioritising social housing for people who need it most."
I immigrate here with my family for economic reasons and should be eligible to social housing because of my needs. This, despite the fact I have a house in my country of origin. Which I may or not be renting out.
Would you still say my needs are higher?
In any case any sensible points based immigration system would not allow in those who cannot support themselves and so should surely curtail access to assorted benefits.
I agree that global assets, not just what you have here, should be taken into account in any means test. Going into exactly what the points system should do would take more time and expertise than I have, but my main point is that the test (whatever it is) should be made at the point of admission, and thereafter people should be treated equally according to need (and needs can vary over time). Similarly, I wouldn't reverse previous admissions - if we allow people to come, we can't suddenly send them away again. Not sure we really disagree on that?
Got to go out for the evening, so signing off for now.
MS SD Maybe, but when in history did the Tories lead Labour north of the border?
Oldnat Agreed
As Sunil said, subsamples are notoriously volatile. I wouldn't be overly surprised if there hadn't been another putting the Tories ahead in Scotland at some point this parliament, and if not this one, then last time when the Cons had a 20+ point national lead and the SNP were riding high in Scotland (yes, I know there was a swing to Labour in Scotland come 2010 but that was when the Tories had a much smaller national lead).
" Eagle tried to make everyone feel outraged, but instead the audience turned against her, accusing the MP of distorting Freud’s words for party political gain; it was like watching the crowd turn against Ceausescu in Bucharest, and the first time I’ve ever seen a QT crowd react like this. I think I may have to move to Newbury: If that’s what their Question Time audience is like, imagine how sensible the population as a whole must be."
" Eagle tried to make everyone feel outraged, but instead the audience turned against her, accusing the MP of distorting Freud’s words for party political gain; it was like watching the crowd turn against Ceausescu in Bucharest, and the first time I’ve ever seen a QT crowd react like this. I think I may have to move to Newbury: If that’s what their Question Time audience is like, imagine how sensible the population as a whole must be."
"CETA's useful as far as it goes, but IMO it's going to be essential for our prosperity to be part of the political and economic association of the continent where we live."
With all respect Nick, that's just restating your view. It's not giving a reason. What is so huge a difference between CETA and the EEA that we would have prosperity with the latter but not the former?
< Point of order on a technicality. I believe from the 1st November migration issues move from requiring unanimity to Qualified Majority Voting. However the conclave of poor southern and eastern European nations is sufficient to block any attempts to control migration if they so wish.
Of course the reverse of this is that we can no longer veto migration issues which work against us (e.g. say the abolition of transitional bans on migration). The UK would need to create an alliance in Brussels itself to stop negative migration issues from harming us
I wonder if this assumption is actually true that eastern and southern european nations would seek to block a restriction on immigration. Currently it seems to me they lose out because they lose their brightest and best to it while their own unemployables remain behind to swell the unemployment stats
"CETA's useful as far as it goes, but IMO it's going to be essential for our prosperity to be part of the political and economic association of the continent where we live."
With all respect Nick, that's just restating your view. It's not giving a reason. What is so huge a difference between CETA and the EEA that we would have prosperity with the latter but not the former?
I suspect it's not about the economics, it's about the politics. If so, I would agree.
On, topic, the irony of the AV campaign is palpable. I remember at the time saying that I'd not now vote for any party that opposed it and later asked for my vote 'to keep x out'.
In 1876 the great voting theorist C.L. Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) lamented a system of voting "which makes an election more of a game of skill than a real test of the wishes of the electors...It is better for elections to be decided according to the wish of the majority than of those who happen to have most skill in the game..."
Lots of typically sober and sensible @JosiasJessop points. ... All in all, I'm intrigued. Although I'm preparing myself for a fall.
Well, this is the thing that I don't quite get. They seem to be asking for money to develop this and the reputational damage if they can't do what they say they will be able to do would surely be pretty large.
Yet, personally, if I were a Lockheed Martin board member and I was confident that my scientists had cracked the fusion problem, I'd want to keep the development in-house and therefore reap the full benefit of the profits in future decades.
They must have some pretty large and expensive hurdles to pass before it becomes commercially practical, so it's probably quite safe to conclude that they have probably misjudged the difficulty of those remaining hurdles - just as many fusion researchers have done before them.
Their main point (as far as I can tell) is that the reactor is viable as a small unit, therefore the remaining steps to be solved can be iterated through much faster.
If you only need to rebuild something the size of a truck each time you solve the next problem, then the end result will be achieved a lot faster than having to rebuild something the size of a small town.
Good news for Tesla, Lockheed Martin, consumers generally, (and probably quite good for utilities in the short term, at least), energy importers (Europe, China)
Bad news for big oil, traditional car companies, the Saudi Arabian government, Russia
" Eagle tried to make everyone feel outraged, but instead the audience turned against her, accusing the MP of distorting Freud’s words for party political gain; it was like watching the crowd turn against Ceausescu in Bucharest, and the first time I’ve ever seen a QT crowd react like this. I think I may have to move to Newbury: If that’s what their Question Time audience is like, imagine how sensible the population as a whole must be."
It's 450 miles for my journey from Exeter to Edinburgh, but from London it's less than 400...
Even better - you could (almost) go from Exeter to Edinburgh.,
See 300 mile base range... plus one brief stop to add 150 miles or so... means you can do London to Edinburgh without stress.
Except, of course, that the UK only has about five supercharger stations right now. But the network's growing all the time. (Not clear why you need three in London, of which two are within five minutes drive of each other in East London)
" Eagle tried to make everyone feel outraged, but instead the audience turned against her, accusing the MP of distorting Freud’s words for party political gain; it was like watching the crowd turn against Ceausescu in Bucharest, and the first time I’ve ever seen a QT crowd react like this. I think I may have to move to Newbury: If that’s what their Question Time audience is like, imagine how sensible the population as a whole must be."
A strange set of local results this week. Some good gains for the LDs in Rutland and York, UKIP was a bit of a curate's egg and it's Labour who seem to have spectacularly underperformed...
There is a palpable lack of enthusiasm for Labour. Lets hope for some LD returners. At least the LDs look like a party fit to govern.
" Eagle tried to make everyone feel outraged, but instead the audience turned against her, accusing the MP of distorting Freud’s words for party political gain; it was like watching the crowd turn against Ceausescu in Bucharest, and the first time I’ve ever seen a QT crowd react like this. I think I may have to move to Newbury: If that’s what their Question Time audience is like, imagine how sensible the population as a whole must be."
Re: QT. There were so many lefties on the panel that I did not bother watching as expected the usual Labour supporting audience, But Newbury actually had (from the clip) some people with common sense. Still the Eagle sisters are part of Ed's "wonderful" team along with Ms Thornberry....
We live in strange times. Labour could have anywhere from 230 to 350 MPs after the GE.
A strange set of local results this week. Some good gains for the LDs in Rutland and York, UKIP was a bit of a curate's egg and it's Labour who seem to have spectacularly underperformed...
There is a palpable lack of enthusiasm for Labour. Lets hope for some LD returners. At least the LDs look like a party fit to govern.
A strange set of local results this week. Some good gains for the LDs in Rutland and York, UKIP was a bit of a curate's egg and it's Labour who seem to have spectacularly underperformed...
There is a palpable lack of enthusiasm for Labour. Lets hope for some LD returners. At least the LDs look like a party fit to govern.
" Eagle tried to make everyone feel outraged, but instead the audience turned against her, accusing the MP of distorting Freud’s words for party political gain; it was like watching the crowd turn against Ceausescu in Bucharest, and the first time I’ve ever seen a QT crowd react like this. I think I may have to move to Newbury: If that’s what their Question Time audience is like, imagine how sensible the population as a whole must be."
Labour's insincerity and crass exploitation of this delicate matter has been utterly nauseating. Gutter politics from Miliband's crew.
I hope Hughtim was squirming realizing what the public really think rather than what the Left want us to think.
Then again he is so thick it probably went straight over his head.
He isn't stupid. He knew his mantra was partisan bike and spin, it is a choice to vent the spleen or listen, consist and think. He takes the unworthy choice on occasions like that.
< Point of order on a technicality. I believe from the 1st November migration issues move from requiring unanimity to Qualified Majority Voting. However the conclave of poor southern and eastern European nations is sufficient to block any attempts to control migration if they so wish.
Of course the reverse of this is that we can no longer veto migration issues which work against us (e.g. say the abolition of transitional bans on migration). The UK would need to create an alliance in Brussels itself to stop negative migration issues from harming us
I wonder if this assumption is actually true that eastern and southern european nations would seek to block a restriction on immigration. Currently it seems to me they lose out because they lose their brightest and best to it while their own unemployables remain behind to swell the unemployment stats
Chances are their brightest and best would qualify through immigration points systems for numerous countries anyway. They would still largely leave. Those who couldn't would be those with lesser skills.
" Eagle tried to make everyone feel outraged, but instead the audience turned against her, accusing the MP of distorting Freud’s words for party political gain; it was like watching the crowd turn against Ceausescu in Bucharest, and the first time I’ve ever seen a QT crowd react like this. I think I may have to move to Newbury: If that’s what their Question Time audience is like, imagine how sensible the population as a whole must be."
" Eagle tried to make everyone feel outraged, but instead the audience turned against her, accusing the MP of distorting Freud’s words for party political gain; it was like watching the crowd turn against Ceausescu in Bucharest, and the first time I’ve ever seen a QT crowd react like this. I think I may have to move to Newbury: If that’s what their Question Time audience is like, imagine how sensible the population as a whole must be."
"CETA's useful as far as it goes, but IMO it's going to be essential for our prosperity to be part of the political and economic association of the continent where we live."
With all respect Nick, that's just restating your view. It's not giving a reason. What is so huge a difference between CETA and the EEA that we would have prosperity with the latter but not the former?
I suspect it's not about the economics, it's about the politics. If so, I would agree.
Comments
Never mind the Sun - it will be Nige wot won it (for Ed).
I also suspect that the living standard of people on welfare is better now, as it hasn't fallen with technological progress. Would you have been able to afford a high speed phone line then?
Best wishes to Mike K - I hope all gets sorted in the end - and quickly.
But for the record, I don't favour "prioritising immigrants for social housing". I favour prioritising social housing for people who need it most. I'm against adding a clause "unless they're immigrants". If we want to reduce immigration, we should reduce it by tweaking the points system to require more points - it's unfair to let immigrants come in and then zap them with special discriminatory rules. Don't you agree, really?
And I favour the points system for non-European immigration and I'd accept that we might have introduced it earlier. As for free movement in Europe, I can see pros and cons, but I do think EU or at least EEA membership is essential for our long-term prosperity and influence (we might disagree on that, but it's an honest view), and free movement is a condition for that which I believe most members consider non-negotiable. Since it only needs one country to veto a change, it won't happen, and Mr Cameron is just kidding you when he says he'll try really hard or whatever.
Chris Irvine, Reckless’s election agent, denied that the lawmaker had switched his position this year because he knew he would be fighting a by-election.
“It’s one possible interpretation of events, but in all honesty, Mark went away, reviewed his position and listened to local residents,” he said in a telephone interview. “A lot changed when it was declared a site of special scientific Interest. Mark looked at it again.”
Which would be a pretty feeble line at the best of times, but especially since Reckless himself complained about the fact that it had already been declared an SSI in the 2013 speech I quoted a few moments ago.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-10-17/ukip-defector-reckless-opposes-houses-he-backed-as-tory.html
I wouldn't mind particularly - all parties jump on local bandwagons when they're in opposition - but will Kippers kindly desist from claiming to be honest or different from other parties? The sanctimonious hypocrisy is getting a bit much.
'And Kippers complain about Cameron and say he can't be trusted! You really couldn't make it up.'
I had Reckless down as many things,but an idiot wasn't one of them,he really believed that this would go unnoticed.
Again!
@rcs1000
Much is made of Thatcher closing thousands of Grammar schools and only saving a few hundred but much of it is taken out of context. I have dug out some old info on Thatcher's view of Grammar Schools and her time as Education Secretary. It's worth a read. For example Thatcher said this in 1966:
"We would welcome experiments and new policies", she said, "but we are against closing Grammar schools for a kind not yet proved. These schools are not being closed because they are bad, but because they are good."
"We believe that grammar schools should continue to be a vital part of education and that secondary modern schools should offer opportunities for non-academic children, as long as there is an easy transfer to the grammar school. There must be a freedom of choice".
http://www.margaretthatcher.org/document/101466
Reality is she was a staunch supporter of Grammar Schools.
As Education Secretary the problem Thatcher had , other than being a woman in a male cabinet was that 'comprehensivtisation' was already established government policy and the Tories had not committed to reverse it in their manifesto only 'slow it down'. She had no backing in the Educational establishment to save Grammar Schools and also had no backing in Cabinet to take on the Educational establishment. Add to that all decisions were supposed to be made locally by councils with the Education Secretary effectively just validating and rubber stamping them. So every time she blocked a proposal and there were not many she could justify blocking the papers were all over it like a rash and after the Thatcher Milk Snatcher affair she did not have a massive amount of political capital to back her up. In fact her attempts to save Grammar schools resulted in her being accused repeatedly of abusing her powers as Education Secretary. She had little power to stop it even though she went out on a limb time and again. Local councils were intent on getting rid and they did. That any have survived at all seemingly was a miracle.
Thatcher Vol. 1 The Grocer's Daughter (from about page 220 discusses her time as education secretary)
http://tinyurl.com/q34d6eo
One quibble:
" I favour prioritising social housing for people who need it most."
I immigrate here with my family for economic reasons and should be eligible to social housing because of my needs. This, despite the fact I have a house in my country of origin. Which I may or not be renting out.
Would you still say my needs are higher?
In any case any sensible points based immigration system would not allow in those who cannot support themselves and so should surely curtail access to assorted benefits.
' Since it only needs one country to veto a change, it won't happen, and Mr Cameron is just kidding you when he says he'll try really hard or whatever. '
We heard exactly the same stuff when Thatcher was negotiating the UK EU rebate.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Senator,_you're_no_Jack_Kennedy
None of which says that Cameron can be trusted!
― Frederic Bastiat
Never better said about our Westminster betters and their unending thirst for ever increasing taxes to keep their trough well stocked.
I even asked my wife to order some kippers for me when she was doing the online shop on Ocado this week. She laughed.
http://www.smmt.co.uk/2014/10/september-2014-ev-registrations/
Of course the reverse of this is that we can no longer veto migration issues which work against us (e.g. say the abolition of transitional bans on migration). The UK would need to create an alliance in Brussels itself to stop negative migration issues from harming us
My wife hates the smell of them (the fish, that is, not the supporters of the political party)
The Tories are on 20%, Labour on 19%, UKIP on 6% and the SNP on 41%. Could this now mean that Scotland will ensure EdisnotPM? Could it lead to the SNP supporting Cameron remaining in Downing Street on a pact over devomax and EVEL?
http://cdn.yougov.com/cumulus_uploads/document/dmv27pn9yn/YG-Archive-Pol-Sun-results-161014.pdf
I think I'd prefer to go to bed (and wake up) with either of the two Tory candidates instead.
Entirely due to Labour procrastinating over EVEL and holding up devomax it would seem
On a serious note, I just can't see anything that is a positive for the Tories, other than they really want to win.... But so do ukip
Euros
Constituency poll
National Polls
Momentum
Incumbent MP
Against what?
All the news reports I have seen have only found people who say they're voting ukip' and the hustings which seated 240, wasn't even full
F1: if Button leaves McLaren he may move to endurance racing.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/29660644
Oldnat Agreed
Got to go out for the evening, so signing off for now.
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2014/10/we-may-have-reached-peak-manufactured-outrage-over-freud/
"CETA's useful as far as it goes, but IMO it's going to be essential for our prosperity to be part of the political and economic association of the continent where we live."
With all respect Nick, that's just restating your view. It's not giving a reason. What is so huge a difference between CETA and the EEA that we would have prosperity with the latter but not the former?
http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/text/france.html
'Eagle tried to make everyone feel outraged'
Yes,a truly repulsive woman who managed to unite the audience against her.
Really rather heartening that the shrieking Eagles got her wings clipped in short order.
See 300 mile base range... plus one brief stop to add 150 miles or so... means you can do London to Edinburgh without stress.
Except, of course, that the UK only has about five supercharger stations right now. But the network's growing all the time. (Not clear why you need three in London, of which two are within five minutes drive of each other in East London)
Then again he is so thick it probably went straight over his head.
http://politicalhumor.about.com/library/images/blpic-frenchmilitaryvictories.htm
We live in strange times. Labour could have anywhere from 230 to 350 MPs after the GE.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MT2s8ba4ig&list=PLfYUcenVtXMajSCmcQeA8lAsltehEgp64&index=8
"I never heard a man tell so many lies" Its Mr Reckless.
Ciao
Didn't stop her continuing to pretend to be outraged of course, probably as that's all she knows how to do.
"It would be nice to think we had seen the last of the seriously repulsive Hugh, after his performance on Wednesday over this."
It ill behoves someone who wished Tony Blair be assasinated to describe anyone as repulsive.
And is there similar for Wales, Scotland etc. too?
http://www.englishelections.org.uk/england/lby/