As for negotiation, I'd simply tell the Conservatives - "if you want your Euro Refrendum, you can have it but you have to introduce STV for all elections without a Referendum".
I'd tell Labour "if you want your Mansion Tax, you can have it but you have to introduce STV for all elections without a Referendum."
That would at least have the advantage of keeping the negotiations short and not keeping Nicola Sturgeon waiting.
You and the LDs are not interested in government then, or the country - just in telling other people what to do. This dictatorial attitude is something I've noticed in LDs before.
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
Quite so.
Really?
271,000 people immigrated for work in the year ending September 2014, a statistically significant increase of 54,000 compared with a year earlier. This continues the rise since the year ending June 2012. The increase over the past year applied to both non-EU and EU (non-British) citizens, as well as British citizens. However, only the increase for non-EU citizens was statistically significant.
And ?
You said 'quite so' to a post suggesting Camerons defence should be to say he could do nothing about EU immigration
Apart from transitional arrangements Cameron has no power to restrict EU immigration which is a perfectly viable defence whilst the UK is a member of the EU.
Wasn't it the increase in non EU citizens that was statistically significant?
@Stodge I think a period of quiet reflection for the Lib Dems may well be best... I can well see them abstaining too.
If the Lib Dems take 30 seats and take the view of abstaining on confidence votes it would reduce the bar for a Tory majority to 308, or 300 + DUP.
Assuming some gains from the Lib Dems it would mean restricting losses to Labour to the region of 15 seats. This then means that seats like Bedford have to be held.
But SNP gains from Labour also need to factored in whereas there is only one Conservative seat in Scotland and there is potential for a few gains from the Scottish LibDems.
On balance will Labour have overall net losses on the night ?!?
Titter ....
I wouldn't be surprised to see net Labour losses on the night - but that could still result in a scenario where it is hard to Cameron to form a government, if @stodge is right and the Lib Dems do not have the appetite for continuing the Coalition.
It's interesting, though, that if stodge is correct about the Lib Dem position then it is possible for Cameron to increase his power as PM even while making a net loss of MPs. There are a lot of Liberal Democrat voters in play in Bedford. The game is afoot.
. Well yet anotrher year has gone by and your record needle is still stuck.
Break it up and move on, the taxpayer has been fleeced and will never get his money back.
Why haven't any of the big banks been broken up yet?
Osborne
TSB Williams & Glyn
Plus Shawbrook, Aldermore, Metro
LOL
we;ve thrown two deck chairs off the Titanic and expect it to refloat.
LOL and ha ha ha... RBS shares rose in early trading.
Last November the Competition and Markets Authority embarked on an investigation to the banks and I venture to suggest that after that we will see more break ups.
RBS it seems made a loss of £3.5bn thanks thanks largely to one-off items including a '£4bn fair-value adjustment'. I am sure somebody will tell me if that (and its other provisions future claims) involves real losses and real money or not. Its operating profit was £3.5bn. If you look at its size now compared with its size before the Brown Crash it has already broken itself up. But it still faces litigation costs for the activities carried out under the Brown Failed Regulation years
No doubt with the dark humour one finds everywhere in the banking sector (sarcasm alert) its plan to get out of its corporate mess is dubbed internally ''Project Brown''.
Fair Value adjustment means items on the balance sheet which are over valued - so writing down bullshit for which real money was paid.
When do one-offs stop being one-offs and become a permanent feature of trading, I'd have thought 7 years might have been enough.
You ommitted to mention the £2.2 bn fines which is now a given of RBS accounts
The shares have dropped 11 % this morning
I notice no-one's predicting a profit this time next year.
One wonders why Roger, who will be paid several k a day, is not traveling to the workers paradise of Cuba where he would be paid the same as a road sweeper.
Cameron has addressed non EU migration, Syria and Libya has certainly had a very negative effect. Of course such immigration I guess is neither identified or if it is it comes under EU as often they gain citizenship in say Sweden and then move here.
Has he?
Last time I checked, non-EU immigration (which he is in control of) was well over a net 100,000 a year, therefore breaching his target in and of itself.
It's hard to conclude anything other than he could take further measures, but has chosen not to.
I was being sarcastic! To be fair some measures (bogus students) have been implemented as the decline in South Asia flows show, more work to be done though, but the collapse of Libya undermines all that. Infinitely preferable to Labour and why if I was in a marginal I would still vote Conservative.
As for negotiation, I'd simply tell the Conservatives - "if you want your Euro Refrendum, you can have it but you have to introduce STV for all elections without a Referendum".
I'd tell Labour "if you want your Mansion Tax, you can have it but you have to introduce STV for all elections without a Referendum."
That would at least have the advantage of keeping the negotiations short and not keeping Nicola Sturgeon waiting.
You and the LDs are not interested in government then, or the country - just in telling other people what to do. This dictatorial attitude is something I've noticed in LDs before.
No he's interested in tit for tat, the usual process of negotiating.
Just an aside: people blithely assuming one side would win an EU referendum might recall Yes outperforming expectations and the defeat of the first effort at Lisbon in Ireland [which, alas, obediently rolled over the second time].
I would expect In to win, but Out would not be a dead duck of a campaign.
The fear I would have is that an In would be used as an excuse by EU-phile leftists to say that the British have given a green light to yet more surrendering of sovereignty.
You'd probably get a Scottish situation where "in" wins then everyone starts voting for UKIP, LOL!
I think I'd be very inclined to vote OUT if I was given the chance.
Voting OUT would have its charms if we knew we were voting into the EEA (but not Schengen). The difficulties of a referendum lie in knowing what we were voting out of and into. An EU of ever and clearly closing union dominated by the Euro would encourage an out vote unless we were clear about what our position would be in staying in. Either way IN or OUT the EU in some form would still be there as would the rest of the world, and if totally out we would be faced with endless negotiations with everybody over everything all over again. That would start with just how we might join the EEA. BTW - Do you think the best way of getting a good deal with the EU would be by staying in or walking out?
Was your sudden disappearance from PB a couple of weeks ago related to the release of Fifty Shades Of Grey at the flicks? :O
TSE opined that yourself and the Good Lady Jack went in expecting an historical biopic about Lady Jane Grey and were... Somewhat surprised... But I'm not buying it...
@Stodge I think a period of quiet reflection for the Lib Dems may well be best... I can well see them abstaining too.
If the Lib Dems take 30 seats and take the view of abstaining on confidence votes it would reduce the bar for a Tory majority to 308, or 300 + DUP.
Assuming some gains from the Lib Dems it would mean restricting losses to Labour to the region of 15 seats. This then means that seats like Bedford have to be held.
But SNP gains from Labour also need to factored in whereas there is only one Conservative seat in Scotland and there is potential for a few gains from the Scottish LibDems.
On balance will Labour have overall net losses on the night ?!?
Titter ....
I wouldn't be surprised to see net Labour losses on the night - but that could still result in a scenario where it is hard to Cameron to form a government, if @stodge is right and the Lib Dems do not have the appetite for continuing the Coalition.
It's interesting, though, that if stodge is correct about the Lib Dem position then it is possible for Cameron to increase his power as PM even while making a net loss of MPs. There are a lot of Liberal Democrat voters in play in Bedford. The game is afoot.
Clearly whether the LibDems enter another Coalition will be almost entirely dependent on bums on seats.
IMO a minimum of 320 will be necessary with the LibDems providing approx 30 and probably some supply and confidence from the DUP.
If Labour are becalmed on 250/60 seats then the viability of the Coalition is more assured.
The last ARSE had the Con/LibDems on a combined total of 336 and Labour on 262. The next ARSE will be published on Tuesday at 9:00am.
I don't think the Conservatives will be too harmed by the figures today.
They should be, but they won't. Because: 1) Those likely to jump ship will have done so already 2) Labour's criticism is essentially "Immigration's good, so, er, you're bad for having lots of it..." 3) The BBC and those on the left like immigration. The rightwing media probably won't want to give a proper battering to the blues in this pre-election period. So they won't get hammered
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
Quite so.
Really?
271,000 people immigrated for work in the year ending September 2014, a statistically significant increase of 54,000 compared with a year earlier. This continues the rise since the year ending June 2012. The increase over the past year applied to both non-EU and EU (non-British) citizens, as well as British citizens. However, only the increase for non-EU citizens was statistically significant.
And ?
You said 'quite so' to a post suggesting Camerons defence should be to say he could do nothing about EU immigration
Apart from transitional arrangements Cameron has no power to restrict EU immigration which is a perfectly viable defence whilst the UK is a member of the EU.
This would also be the same if we left the EU ans then sought a deal with it. The EU deal would include free movement of Labour. If we turned down that deal it would inevitably lead to the free export of our car industry.
Just an aside: people blithely assuming one side would win an EU referendum might recall Yes outperforming expectations and the defeat of the first effort at Lisbon in Ireland [which, alas, obediently rolled over the second time].
I would expect In to win, but Out would not be a dead duck of a campaign.
The fear I would have is that an In would be used as an excuse by EU-phile leftists to say that the British have given a green light to yet more surrendering of sovereignty.
You'd probably get a Scottish situation where "in" wins then everyone starts voting for UKIP, LOL!
I think I'd be very inclined to vote OUT if I was given the chance.
Voting OUT would have its charms if we knew we were voting into the EEA (but not Schengen). The difficulties of a referendum lie in knowing what we were voting out of and into. An EU of ever and clearly closing union dominated by the Euro would encourage an out vote unless we were clear about what our position would be in staying in. Either way IN or OUT the EU in some form would still be there as would the rest of the world, and if totally out we would be faced with endless negotiations with everybody over everything all over again. That would start with just how we might join the EEA. BTW - Do you think the best way of getting a good deal with the EU would be by staying in or walking out?
Ideally, as non Euro members, we'd be able to negotiate a much looser relationship with the EU and stay in that, but I'm not sure that's possible, so it's probably best we leave.
Why oh why did Cameron pander to his tabloid press backers and the xenophobe fringe with his tens of thousands pledge?
This morning Osborne could be out there linking the rise in immigration to the relative strength of the UK economy - certainly compared to the rest of the EU.
Yet they're both cowering in a bunker somewhere!
Such is the farce of the detetched-from-reality British debate on immigration and the years of Tory indulgence and irresponsibility on this issue, pandering to the worst of people's instincts.
And I'm aware Labour is no different. Its response today has been risible too.
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
I don't think that immigration controls between the UK and the rest of the EU are one of the things that David Cameron plans to negotiate for.
Thank god for that. Freedom for people to work for who they want, where they want should be the most fundamental of human freedoms.
It's not a right I'd claim for myself, so it's not a right I'd grant to other people.
An excellent point. I am myself strongly anti-emigrant, I think it is in most cases bloody bad manners. When posters here coyly divulge that they have a little place in Abroadland as if they deserved a medal for it, I think how much I would give for 5 minutes' quiet chat with their new neighbours. I suspect words quite similar to vainqueur, but not in French, would crop up quite often.
Also - Gordon Brown also encouraged a tremendous amount of lefties to vote Liberal Democrat.
Yes, it's a factor that Mike has mentioned and is worth keeping in mind. Gordon had fans who Ed doesn't reach (notably in Scotland) but the reverse is also true - Ed is particularly well-suited to appeal to Red Liberals (whereas Gordon wasn't really).
Why oh why did Cameron pander to his tabloid press backers and the xenophobe fringe with his tens of thousands pledge?
This morning Osborne could be out there linking the rise in immigration to the relative strength of the UK economy - certainly compared to the rest of the EU.
Yet they're both cowering in a bunker somewhere!
Such is the farce of the detetched-from-reality British debate on immigration and the years of Tory indulgence and irresponsibility on this issue, pandering to the worst of people's instincts.
And I'm aware Labour is no different. Its response today has been risible too.
Was your sudden disappearance from PB a couple of weeks ago related to the release of Fifty Shades Of Grey at the flicks? :O
TSE opined that yourself and the Good Lady Jack went in expecting an historical biopic about Lady Jane Grey and were... Somewhat surprised... But I'm not buying it...
Actually no.
I thought "Fifty Shades Of Grey" was a biopic on the political career of John Major whereas Mrs JackW thought it was a documentary about Earl Grey tea.
Imagine our surprise .... when it turned out to be a tame and dreary tale about events we both had forgotten about many decades ago !!
Just an aside: people blithely assuming one side would win an EU referendum might recall Yes outperforming expectations and the defeat of the first effort at Lisbon in Ireland [which, alas, obediently rolled over the second time].
I would expect In to win, but Out would not be a dead duck of a campaign.
The fear I would have is that an In would be used as an excuse by EU-phile leftists to say that the British have given a green light to yet more surrendering of sovereignty.
Today's Staggers makes interesting reading on that point
That interesting, a million people have a zero hours contract as a secondary income. No wonder when they have surveyed people who are actually employed using zero hours contracts, there are a significant % who actually like them and the flexibility they give, because by the looks of it they are using them as a way of topping up their money (if they should have to do that or not, is another matter).
I have to say I do think the fuss about them as something totally new in the past few years slightly weird. Putting aside the ones that demand exclusivity (which is IMO wrong, if the employer wants flexibility, the employee should also get it), I remember years ago as a student working through agencies. The deal was basically the same, you weren't guaranteed much, and in fact some people went to different places every week for different jobs...but the thing was if you didn't get work with an agency, you wouldn't stick with them and / or you would of course sign up with several until you got your foot in the door of something half decent. As far as I could tell that is kinda of how low skills agency work has always been, and that a lot of companies used them as basically as way to a) fill short term staffing gaps and b) kind of a "try before you buy" to employing full time staff.
. Well yet anotrher year has gone by and your record needle is still stuck.
Break it up and move on, the taxpayer has been fleeced and will never get his money back.
Why haven't any of the big banks been broken up yet?
Osborne
TSB Williams & Glyn
Plus Shawbrook, Aldermore, Metro
LOL
we;ve thrown two deck chairs off the Titanic and expect it to refloat.
LOL and ha ha ha... RBS shares rose in early trading.
Last November the Competition and Markets Authority embarked on an investigation to the banks and I venture to suggest that after that we will see more break ups.
RBS it seems made a loss of £3.5bn thanks thanks largely to one-off items including a '£4bn fair-value adjustment'. I am sure somebody will tell me if that (and its other provisions future claims) involves real losses and real money or not. Its operating profit was £3.5bn. If you look at its size now compared with its size before the Brown Crash it has already broken itself up. But it still faces litigation costs for the activities carried out under the Brown Failed Regulation years
No doubt with the dark humour one finds everywhere in the banking sector (sarcasm alert) its plan to get out of its corporate mess is dubbed internally ''Project Brown''.
Fair Value adjustment means items on the balance sheet which are over valued - so writing down bullshit for which real money was paid.
When do one-offs stop being one-offs and become a permanent feature of trading, I'd have thought 7 years might have been enough.
Isn't part of the problem the number of long maturity derivative contracts which people don't really know what they are worth until they mature, and often then find out (as in the case of MBS), the answer can be "nothing".
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
I don't think that immigration controls between the UK and the rest of the EU are one of the things that David Cameron plans to negotiate for.
Thank god for that. Freedom for people to work for who they want, where they want should be the most fundamental of human freedoms.
It's not a right I'd claim for myself, so it's not a right I'd grant to other people.
An excellent point. I am myself strongly anti-emigrant, I think it is in most cases bloody bad manners. When posters here coyly divulge that they have a little place in Abroadland as if they deserved a medal for it, I think how much I would give for 5 minutes' quiet chat with their new neighbours. I suspect words quite similar to vainqueur, but not in French, would crop up quite often.
If the USA or Australia decided they had sufficient lawyers and turned down my immigration application, I'd be disappointed, but I'd recognise that it was a decision they were entitled to make. It's their country, not mine.
I think the one for food banks will be more effective. Maybe they could use the photo from "Labour isn't Working" as long as too many of them aren't wearing flares
Just an aside: people blithely assuming one side would win an EU referendum might recall Yes outperforming expectations and the defeat of the first effort at Lisbon in Ireland [which, alas, obediently rolled over the second time].
I would expect In to win, but Out would not be a dead duck of a campaign.
The trick is to make the campaign out to be something nasty that it isnt. Many of the Irish EU referendum campaigns were dominated by abortion when in reality they had nothing to do with abortion. Much easier to vote no to a treaty you know nothing about if you think it's a vote to protect the unborn.
Just an aside: people blithely assuming one side would win an EU referendum might recall Yes outperforming expectations and the defeat of the first effort at Lisbon in Ireland [which, alas, obediently rolled over the second time].
I would expect In to win, but Out would not be a dead duck of a campaign.
The fear I would have is that an In would be used as an excuse by EU-phile leftists to say that the British have given a green light to yet more surrendering of sovereignty.
You'd probably get a Scottish situation where "in" wins then everyone starts voting for UKIP, LOL!
I think I'd be very inclined to vote OUT if I was given the chance.
Voting OUT would have its charms if we knew we were voting into the EEA (but not Schengen). The difficulties of a referendum lie in knowing what we were voting out of and into. An EU of ever and clearly closing union dominated by the Euro would encourage an out vote unless we were clear about what our position would be in staying in. Either way IN or OUT the EU in some form would still be there as would the rest of the world, and if totally out we would be faced with endless negotiations with everybody over everything all over again. That would start with just how we might join the EEA. BTW - Do you think the best way of getting a good deal with the EU would be by staying in or walking out?
Ideally, as non Euro members, we'd be able to negotiate a much looser relationship with the EU and stay in that, but I'm not sure that's possible, so it's probably best we leave.
There was an article in The Observer last Sunday (Iknow, I know) in which the Norwegian Minister for Europe said that Britian would be very ill-advised to leave, as it would have to comply with rules it had no part in framing. Inter alia he said that "Norwegian ministers and officials spent a lot of time – sometimes without success – trying to find out what was going on in EU meetings that would affect their country directly.”
Now I know it’s the Guardian etc etc, but I fear that the BBO-ters, if they win, might wake up to discover that we’ve got the worst of all possible worlds.
And so cameron has failed to honour his pledge over numbers that he could control,
Indeed. It was an unwise pledge and was bound to fail.
Rather like tuition fees.
Quite so, although the failure of the tuition fees pledge has more to do with the Coalition deal rather than the total nonsense of curbing EU immigration.
Apart from transitional arrangements Cameron has no power to restrict EU immigration which is a perfectly viable defence whilst the UK is a member of the EU.
This would also be the same if we left the EU ans then sought a deal with it. The EU deal would include free movement of Labour. If we turned down that deal it would inevitably lead to the free export of our car industry.
Agreed. On the doorstep I simply say "Opinion is divided about migration but we can't do much about it unless we want to leave Europe, which would in my opinion be disastrous for industry. Anyway I don't want to stop our kids getting foreign experience.". People generally say yeah, I see what you mean, it's difficult. Worries about European free movement are common but not in general especially deep (in my patch anyway).
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
I don't think that immigration controls between the UK and the rest of the EU are one of the things that David Cameron plans to negotiate for.
Thank god for that. Freedom for people to work for who they want, where they want should be the most fundamental of human freedoms.
It's not a right I'd claim for myself, so it's not a right I'd grant to other people.
An excellent point. I am myself strongly anti-emigrant, I think it is in most cases bloody bad manners. When posters here coyly divulge that they have a little place in Abroadland as if they deserved a medal for it, I think how much I would give for 5 minutes' quiet chat with their new neighbours. I suspect words quite similar to vainqueur, but not in French, would crop up quite often.
If the USA or Australia decided they had sufficient lawyers and turned down my immigration application, I'd be disappointed, but I'd recognise that it was a decision they were entitled to make. It's their country, not mine.
Is there anywhere which doesn’t have sufficient lawyers?
Just an aside: people blithely assuming one side would win an EU referendum might recall Yes outperforming expectations and the defeat of the first effort at Lisbon in Ireland [which, alas, obediently rolled over the second time].
I would expect In to win, but Out would not be a dead duck of a campaign.
The fear I would have is that an In would be used as an excuse by EU-phile leftists to say that the British have given a green light to yet more surrendering of sovereignty.
Today's Staggers makes interesting reading on that point
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
Quite so.
Really?
271,000 people immigrated for work in the year ending September 2014, a statistically significant increase of 54,000 compared with a year earlier. This continues the rise since the year ending June 2012. The increase over the past year applied to both non-EU and EU (non-British) citizens, as well as British citizens. However, only the increase for non-EU citizens was statistically significant.
And ?
You said 'quite so' to a post suggesting Camerons defence should be to say he could do nothing about EU immigration
Apart from transitional arrangements Cameron has no power to restrict EU immigration which is a perfectly viable defence whilst the UK is a member of the EU.
This would also be the same if we left the EU ans then sought a deal with it. The EU deal would include free movement of Labour. If we turned down that deal it would inevitably lead to the free export of our car industry.
Horseshit.
The EU has bilateral free trade agreements with both Korea which doesn't involve free movement on labour. The EU is working on a free trade agreement with ASEAN, are you suggestion that most of developing Asia is about to have free movement into the EU ?
Just an aside: people blithely assuming one side would win an EU referendum might recall Yes outperforming expectations and the defeat of the first effort at Lisbon in Ireland [which, alas, obediently rolled over the second time].
I would expect In to win, but Out would not be a dead duck of a campaign.
The fear I would have is that an In would be used as an excuse by EU-phile leftists to say that the British have given a green light to yet more surrendering of sovereignty.
You'd probably get a Scottish situation where "in" wins then everyone starts voting for UKIP, LOL!
I think I'd be very inclined to vote OUT if I was given the chance.
Voting OUT would have its charms if we knew we were voting into the EEA (but not Schengen). The difficulties of a referendum lie in knowing what we were voting out of and into. An EU of ever and clearly closing union dominated by the Euro would encourage an out vote unless we were clear about what our position would be in staying in. Either way IN or OUT the EU in some form would still be there as would the rest of the world, and if totally out we would be faced with endless negotiations with everybody over everything all over again. That would start with just how we might join the EEA. BTW - Do you think the best way of getting a good deal with the EU would be by staying in or walking out?
Ideally, as non Euro members, we'd be able to negotiate a much looser relationship with the EU and stay in that, but I'm not sure that's possible, so it's probably best we leave.
There was an article in The Observer last Sunday (Iknow, I know) in which the Norwegian Minister for Europe said that Britian would be very ill-advised to leave, as it would have to comply with rules it had no part in framing. Inter alia he said that "Norwegian ministers and officials spent a lot of time – sometimes without success – trying to find out what was going on in EU meetings that would affect their country directly.”
Now I know it’s the Guardian etc etc, but I fear that the BBO-ters, if they win, might wake up to discover that we’ve got the worst of all possible worlds.
That's the pitch that Norwegian politicians routinely make, in order to try to get their people to join the EU. They haven't persuaded them so far.
Why oh why did Cameron pander to his tabloid press backers and the xenophobe fringe with his tens of thousands pledge?
This morning Osborne could be out there linking the rise in immigration to the relative strength of the UK economy - certainly compared to the rest of the EU.
Yet they're both cowering in a bunker somewhere!
Such is the farce of the detetched-from-reality British debate on immigration and the years of Tory indulgence and irresponsibility on this issue, pandering to the worst of people's instincts.
And I'm aware Labour is no different. Its response today has been risible too.
Your dreaming.
The latest BES Social Attitude Survey had three quarters of the population wanting to reduce immigration, and half of it wanting to reduce it by "a lot". Its nothing to do with a "xenophobic fringe" and has been show to be a widely held view of the British public. Sorry about that.
Was your sudden disappearance from PB a couple of weeks ago related to the release of Fifty Shades Of Grey at the flicks? :O
TSE opined that yourself and the Good Lady Jack went in expecting an historical biopic about Lady Jane Grey and were... Somewhat surprised... But I'm not buying it...
Actually no.
I thought "Fifty Shades Of Grey" was a biopic on the political career of John Major whereas Mrs JackW thought it was a documentary about Earl Grey tea.
Imagine our surprise .... when it turned out to be a tame and dreary tale about events we both had forgotten about many decades ago !!
Just an aside: people blithely assuming one side would win an EU referendum might recall Yes outperforming expectations and the defeat of the first effort at Lisbon in Ireland [which, alas, obediently rolled over the second time].
I would expect In to win, but Out would not be a dead duck of a campaign.
The fear I would have is that an In would be used as an excuse by EU-phile leftists to say that the British have given a green light to yet more surrendering of sovereignty.
You'd probably get a Scottish situation where "in" wins then everyone starts voting for UKIP, LOL!
I think I'd be very inclined to vote OUT if I was given the chance.
... BTW - Do you think the best way of getting a good deal with the EU would be by staying in or walking out?
Ideally, as non Euro members, we'd be able to negotiate a much looser relationship with the EU and stay in that, but I'm not sure that's possible, so it's probably best we leave.
There was an article in The Observer last Sunday (Iknow, I know) in which the Norwegian Minister for Europe said that Britian would be very ill-advised to leave, as it would have to comply with rules it had no part in framing. Inter alia he said that "Norwegian ministers and officials spent a lot of time – sometimes without success – trying to find out what was going on in EU meetings that would affect their country directly.”
Now I know it’s the Guardian etc etc, but I fear that the BBO-ters, if they win, might wake up to discover that we’ve got the worst of all possible worlds.
Yes its the Guardian but it did not put words in the mouth of a Norweigan minister. This is the point about leaving the EU - it still might be the best but it will have its own problems of dealing with the EU. We could get the same trade deal in the EEA but that means still free movement of Labour, and Norway is in Schengen. And even if totally out - I do not see how we could expect different deals with say the USA and Canada that they negotiated with the EU.
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
Quite so.
Really?
271,000 people immigrated for work in the year ending September 2014, a statistically significant increase of 54,000 compared with a year earlier. This continues the rise since the year ending June 2012. The increase over the past year applied to both non-EU and EU (non-British) citizens, as well as British citizens. However, only the increase for non-EU citizens was statistically significant.
And ?
You said 'quite so' to a post suggesting Camerons defence should be to say he could do nothing about EU immigration
Apart from transitional arrangements Cameron has no power to restrict EU immigration which is a perfectly viable defence whilst the UK is a member of the EU.
This would also be the same if we left the EU ans then sought a deal with it. The EU deal would include free movement of Labour. If we turned down that deal it would inevitably lead to the free export of our car industry.
I don't think our bargaining position is as weak as you believe.
Just an aside: people blithely assuming one side would win an EU referendum might recall Yes outperforming expectations and the defeat of the first effort at Lisbon in Ireland [which, alas, obediently rolled over the second time].
I would expect In to win, but Out would not be a dead duck of a campaign.
The fear I would have is that an In would be used as an excuse by EU-phile leftists to say that the British have given a green light to yet more surrendering of sovereignty.
You'd probably get a Scottish situation where "in" wins then everyone starts voting for UKIP, LOL!
I think I'd be very inclined to vote OUT if I was given the chance.
Voting OUT would have its charms if we knew we were voting into the EEA (but not Schengen). The difficulties of a referendum lie in knowing what we were voting out of and into. An EU of ever and clearly closing union dominated by the Euro would encourage an out vote unless we were clear about what our position would be in staying in. Either way IN or OUT the EU in some form would still be there as would the rest of the world, and if totally out we would be faced with endless negotiations with everybody over everything all over again. That would start with just how we might join the EEA. BTW - Do you think the best way of getting a good deal with the EU would be by staying in or walking out?
Ideally, as non Euro members, we'd be able to negotiate a much looser relationship with the EU and stay in that, but I'm not sure that's possible, so it's probably best we leave.
There was an article in The Observer last Sunday (Iknow, I know) in which the Norwegian Minister for Europe said that Britian would be very ill-advised to leave, as it would have to comply with rules it had no part in framing. Inter alia he said that "Norwegian ministers and officials spent a lot of time – sometimes without success – trying to find out what was going on in EU meetings that would affect their country directly.”
Now I know it’s the Guardian etc etc, but I fear that the BBO-ters, if they win, might wake up to discover that we’ve got the worst of all possible worlds.
That's the pitch that Norwegian politicians routinely make, in order to try to get their people to join the EU. They haven't persuaded them so far.
a) He wasn’t making it to his “home crowd” and b) The votes are moving towards entry.
They are the ones that people are talking about, though, no? Low paid exclusive contracts with no guaranteed work. Miserable. I do a lot of agency work as a freelancer myself but its a purely mutually flexible arrangement and I get a decent rate. I dont think anyone is referring to that.
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
I don't think that immigration controls between the UK and the rest of the EU are one of the things that David Cameron plans to negotiate for.
Thank god for that. Freedom for people to work for who they want, where they want should be the most fundamental of human freedoms.
It's not a right I'd claim for myself, so it's not a right I'd grant to other people.
An excellent point. I am myself strongly anti-emigrant, I think it is in most cases bloody bad manners. When posters here coyly divulge that they have a little place in Abroadland as if they deserved a medal for it, I think how much I would give for 5 minutes' quiet chat with their new neighbours. I suspect words quite similar to vainqueur, but not in French, would crop up quite often.
If the USA or Australia decided they had sufficient lawyers and turned down my immigration application, I'd be disappointed, but I'd recognise that it was a decision they were entitled to make. It's their country, not mine.
The end result of EU 'trade deals' with Canada and the USA will be that lawyers and other workers will be able to move freely between the different countries. There is of course already widespread movement of workers between the UK and USA.
They are the ones that people are talking about, though, no? Low paid exclusive contracts with no guaranteed work. Miserable. I do a lot of agency work as a freelancer myself but its a purely mutually flexible arrangement and I get a decent rate. I dont think anyone is referring to that.
And yet they are far more common in charity and public sector work than in the private sector amongst those nasty capitalists... the pro-labour parts of the economy need to get their house in order first I would say.
It found that a third of voluntary sector organisations used zero-hours contracts, along with a quarter of public sector employers and 17% of private sector firms.
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
I don't think that immigration controls between the UK and the rest of the EU are one of the things that David Cameron plans to negotiate for.
Thank god for that. Freedom for people to work for who they want, where they want should be the most fundamental of human freedoms.
It's not a right I'd claim for myself, so it's not a right I'd grant to other people.
An excellent point. I am myself strongly anti-emigrant, I think it is in most cases bloody bad manners. When posters here coyly divulge that they have a little place in Abroadland as if they deserved a medal for it, I think how much I would give for 5 minutes' quiet chat with their new neighbours. I suspect words quite similar to vainqueur, but not in French, would crop up quite often.
I've never been coy about this subject. And the problem in rural Hungary is less that the neighbours are vulgar foreigners and more that no one wants to live there in the first place because there are no jobs or prospects. This village is about 35 miles from my Hungarian place:
Bet he doesn't pay his tv license or agree with the speed limit either
Daily Mail Online (@MailOnline) 26/02/2015 11:06 BREAKING NEWS: ISIS executioner Jihadi John 'identified as London man Mohammed Emwazi' dailym.ai/1vBsN0M pic.twitter.com/hCcIWfULj8
The interesting question, which no-one much seems to be asking, let alone answering, is why non-EU immigration has risen, despite the points system which Labour introduced at the end of their period in office, and the other measures which this government has introduced. Of course I understand that demand from would-be immigrants is likely to have risen given the UK's economic and jobs success, but various controls are supposed to control that. Does anyone know why they are not working?
They are the ones that people are talking about, though, no? Low paid exclusive contracts with no guaranteed work. Miserable. I do a lot of agency work as a freelancer myself but its a purely mutually flexible arrangement and I get a decent rate. I dont think anyone is referring to that.
I rarely hear the distinction from the likes of Labour, just Labour claiming these massive numbers without context nor shades of grey. That is actually my biggest complaint with Ed / Labour at the moment, everything is black and white. Zero Hours contracts bad, tax avoidance / planning bad, second jobs bad...
Do we actually have a figure for the number of exclusive minimum wage zero hour contracts?
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
I don't think that immigration controls between the UK and the rest of the EU are one of the things that David Cameron plans to negotiate for.
Thank god for that. Freedom for people to work for who they want, where they want should be the most fundamental of human freedoms.
It's not a right I'd claim for myself, so it's not a right I'd grant to other people.
An excellent point. I am myself strongly anti-emigrant, I think it is in most cases bloody bad manners. When posters here coyly divulge that they have a little place in Abroadland as if they deserved a medal for it, I think how much I would give for 5 minutes' quiet chat with their new neighbours. I suspect words quite similar to vainqueur, but not in French, would crop up quite often.
If the USA or Australia decided they had sufficient lawyers and turned down my immigration application, I'd be disappointed, but I'd recognise that it was a decision they were entitled to make. It's their country, not mine.
The end result of EU 'trade deals' with Canada and the USA will be that lawyers and other workers will be able to move freely between the different countries. There is of course already widespread movement of workers between the UK and USA.
The two are not remotely comparable.
TTIP Chapter IV, Articles 24 to 28 would allow free movement of business managers, and other employees of a corporation, for temporary work purposes among all countries party to the agreement.[26] Article 1(2) makes it clear, however, that no more general free movement of workers and citizens is allowed.
Why oh why did Cameron pander to his tabloid press backers and the xenophobe fringe with his tens of thousands pledge?
This morning Osborne could be out there linking the rise in immigration to the relative strength of the UK economy - certainly compared to the rest of the EU.
Yet they're both cowering in a bunker somewhere!
Such is the farce of the detetched-from-reality British debate on immigration and the years of Tory indulgence and irresponsibility on this issue, pandering to the worst of people's instincts.
And I'm aware Labour is no different. Its response today has been risible too.
Your dreaming.
The latest BES Social Attitude Survey had three quarters of the population wanting to reduce immigration, and half of it wanting to reduce it by "a lot". Its nothing to do with a "xenophobic fringe" and has been show to be a widely held view of the British public. Sorry about that.
Yet there is still the discrepancy in the polls between how people perceive immigration nationally (usually a problem to be dealt with), and how they perceive it in their local area (nowhere near as much of a problem).
The yawning perception gap is explained by the drivel served up in - particularly - the rightwing press.
The interesting question, which no-one much seems to be asking, let alone answering, is why non-EU immigration has risen, despite the points system which Labour introduced at the end of their period in office, and the other measures which this government has introduced. Of course I understand that demand from would-be immigrants is likely to have risen given the UK's economic and jobs success, but various controls are supposed to control that. Does anyone know why they are not working?
Somebody posted on Speccie blog that student numbers are up significantly. I don't know if that is true or not.
The big increase in the latest set of figures was driven by a "statistically significant" rise in immigrants arriving in the UK, according to the Office for National Statistics.
Sack me if we don't get net migration down to 100,000 - DC 2010
God bless our thrusting business leaders. The latest European patent statistics are out today and show that of the seven leading European economies, only Italy is below Britain, both in terms of patent filings per $USbillion of non-service Gross Domestic Product and per head of population.
No wonder we lose so many top class scientists and engineers. No wonder we lag behind so many of our competitors in terms of exports. Our management class is much too concerned about the next dividend and bonus to invest in invention and innovation.
The interesting question, which no-one much seems to be asking, let alone answering, is why non-EU immigration has risen, despite the points system which Labour introduced at the end of their period in office, and the other measures which this government has introduced. Of course I understand that demand from would-be immigrants is likely to have risen given the UK's economic and jobs success, but various controls are supposed to control that. Does anyone know why they are not working?
Its one of those imponderables, like I keep wondering how I read about various n'er-do-wells in The Rant on oodles of benefits such as this one on £50K
As for negotiation, I'd simply tell the Conservatives - "if you want your Euro Refrendum, you can have it but you have to introduce STV for all elections without a Referendum".
I'd tell Labour "if you want your Mansion Tax, you can have it but you have to introduce STV for all elections without a Referendum."
That would at least have the advantage of keeping the negotiations short and not keeping Nicola Sturgeon waiting.
You and the LDs are not interested in government then, or the country - just in telling other people what to do. This dictatorial attitude is something I've noticed in LDs before.
No he's interested in tit for tat, the usual process of negotiating.
Don't be silly ... those are 'demands' to preclude serious negotiations. He readily admits it by saying Sturgeon would not be kept waiting. Its all tit and no tat. He is saying the LDs are not interested in govt, with anybody.
They are the ones that people are talking about, though, no? Low paid exclusive contracts with no guaranteed work. Miserable. I do a lot of agency work as a freelancer myself but its a purely mutually flexible arrangement and I get a decent rate. I dont think anyone is referring to that.
And yet they are far more common in charity and public sector work than in the private sector amongst those nasty capitalists... the pro-labour parts of the economy need to get their house in order first I would say.
It found that a third of voluntary sector organisations used zero-hours contracts, along with a quarter of public sector employers and 17% of private sector firms.
The problem with zero-hours contracts is not their existence per se, but when they are exclusive. They’ve been used for years in the NHS and the catering trade, but, and this is the point, suche workers have always been able to say “I can’t work that shift (or whatever)" without penalty.
The interesting question, which no-one much seems to be asking, let alone answering, is why non-EU immigration has risen, despite the points system which Labour introduced at the end of their period in office, and the other measures which this government has introduced. Of course I understand that demand from would-be immigrants is likely to have risen given the UK's economic and jobs success, but various controls are supposed to control that. Does anyone know why they are not working?
Obviously the Government cant control emigration or EU immigration. It is possible to control non EU immigration. Looking at the stats they seem to have issued more work visas to non EU immigrants (the economy is prospering and businesses need skills), there are more non EU students (particularly from China, there seems to be a drop from India, we want non EU students to pay whopping fees to British Unis, dont we?). There is also a large increase in the number of no EU immigrants coming to accompany others (despite the rules changing to make this harder).
If the taxpayer via HMG is offering loans and guarantees ( currently we're on the hook for £1trn ) and is in effect their bank, then like any bank HMG can call in loans to protect its interest and force a restructuring. The shareholders just have to stand back and suck it up or come up with more money of their own.
The issue was simply a macro one. At a time when the banking sector was at risk of seizing up and the core national priority was to try and get credit flowing again, the last thing that everyone needed was complex restructuring.
There is a clear objective in place to separate risk-led banking from the utility banking and I think that is absolutely the right model to follow. There's also a case for some regional banks (although I'd rather than national banks with a hub in one or two regions - otherwise everyone is going to be chasing into London rather than focusing on their core). But these things take time.
The banking crisis hit in 2008.
The restructuring of banking hasn't taken place in 7 years. No other industry would get away with that timescale largely because the banks would force a restructuring,
Simply put it means bankers won't take their own medicine.
I agree with Alan! RBS are notorious for breaking up businesses with their own restructuring teams.
That particular bank should have been smashed into smaller pieces years ago. No one else would have been allowed to get away with those losses.
The long suffering Taxpayer has hosed £billions that could, and should have been spent on anything from Maritime Patrol Aircraft and Frigates, to Schools and Transport Infrastructure.
It's a complete disgrace.
@Alanbrooke: you've ignored my argument. Yes they need to be broken up. But you need to do it once the economy is stronger & credit is flowing. The challenge is maintaining the momentum, but (speaking personally rather than for anyone, for the avoidance of doubt) I will be disappointed if there has been no structural change by 2020.
@Watcher: most of the losses have already been made, it's just a question of when they are recognised. The operating businesses are profitable, and those without a USP or an attractive return on capital (eg Govetts or Coutts Intl) are progressively being sold or closed. The money the government has invested will be recovered in some form eventually - probably without much of a cash profit, but at least they'll get it back.
"Experts at Oxford University's Migration Observatory said net migration from outside the EU has not been less than 100,000 at any time during this parliament, meaning the target would have been missed with or without any rise in EU migration."
Why oh why did Cameron pander to his tabloid press backers and the xenophobe fringe with his tens of thousands pledge?
This morning Osborne could be out there linking the rise in immigration to the relative strength of the UK economy - certainly compared to the rest of the EU.
Yet they're both cowering in a bunker somewhere!
Such is the farce of the detetched-from-reality British debate on immigration and the years of Tory indulgence and irresponsibility on this issue, pandering to the worst of people's instincts.
And I'm aware Labour is no different. Its response today has been risible too.
Your dreaming.
The latest BES Social Attitude Survey had three quarters of the population wanting to reduce immigration, and half of it wanting to reduce it by "a lot". Its nothing to do with a "xenophobic fringe" and has been show to be a widely held view of the British public. Sorry about that.
Yet there is still the discrepancy in the polls between how people perceive immigration nationally (usually a problem to be dealt with), and how they perceive it in their local area (nowhere near as much of a problem).
The yawning perception gap is explained by the drivel served up in - particularly - the rightwing press.
No, it's explained by the fact that that the problems are localised. Or do you think you would find this "yawning perception gap" if you polled in Rotherham?
Go and look up the number of immigrants who think immigration is out of hand. Are they all fooled by the drivel in the rightwing press?
Tom Newton Dunn (@tnewtondunn) 26/02/2015 09:34 Net immigration up to 298,000 a year - close to record high under Blair of 320,000. Disaster for Cameron, last stats before #GE2015
Cameron didn't have the votes.
Blame the LibDems. Or those 50,000 Kippers who could have given us a Tory majority in 2010. Then you could have railed against Cameron. Coalition Govts. will ensure that this issue can never be addressed to your satisfaction.
What Conservative immigration proposals have the yellow peril blocked and what proportion of the 298,000 are from the EU ?
That's going to be the defense, I reckon. "We don't have control of our borders as a member of the EU. A vote for the Conservatives is the only way we can address this in the next parliament". It has the benefit of being true, but...
I don't think that immigration controls between the UK and the rest of the EU are one of the things that David Cameron plans to negotiate for.
Thank god for that. Freedom for people to work for who they want, where they want should be the most fundamental of human freedoms.
It's not a right I'd claim for myself, so it's not a right I'd grant to other people.
An excellent point. I am myself strongly anti-emigrant, I think it is in most cases bloody bad manners. When posters here coyly divulge that they have a little place in Abroadland as if they deserved a medal for it, I think how much I would give for 5 minutes' quiet chat with their new neighbours. I suspect words quite similar to vainqueur, but not in French, would crop up quite often.
I've never been coy about this subject. And the problem in rural Hungary is less that the neighbours are vulgar foreigners and more that no one wants to live there in the first place because there are no jobs or prospects. This village is about 35 miles from my Hungarian place:
God bless our thrusting business leaders. The latest European patent statistics are out today and show that of the seven leading European economies, only Italy is below Britain, both in terms of patent filings per $USbillion of non-service Gross Domestic Product and per head of population.
No wonder we lose so many top class scientists and engineers. No wonder we lag behind so many of our competitors in terms of exports. Our management class is much too concerned about the next dividend and bonus to invest in invention and innovation.
Short-termism is strangling the UK economy, it has been for 50+ years.
They are the ones that people are talking about, though, no? Low paid exclusive contracts with no guaranteed work. Miserable. I do a lot of agency work as a freelancer myself but its a purely mutually flexible arrangement and I get a decent rate. I dont think anyone is referring to that.
And yet they are far more common in charity and public sector work than in the private sector amongst those nasty capitalists... the pro-labour parts of the economy need to get their house in order first I would say.
It found that a third of voluntary sector organisations used zero-hours contracts, along with a quarter of public sector employers and 17% of private sector firms.
The problem with zero-hours contracts is not their existence per se, but when they are exclusive. They’ve been used for years in the NHS and the catering trade, but, and this is the point, suche workers have always been able to say “I can’t work that shift (or whatever)" without penalty.
I agree.
So what is all this wibbling we get from EdM about banning zero hours contracts ?
Why oh why did Cameron pander to his tabloid press backers and the xenophobe fringe with his tens of thousands pledge?
This morning Osborne could be out there linking the rise in immigration to the relative strength of the UK economy - certainly compared to the rest of the EU.
Yet they're both cowering in a bunker somewhere!
Such is the farce of the detetched-from-reality British debate on immigration and the years of Tory indulgence and irresponsibility on this issue, pandering to the worst of people's instincts.
And I'm aware Labour is no different. Its response today has been risible too.
Your dreaming.
The latest BES Social Attitude Survey had three quarters of the population wanting to reduce immigration, and half of it wanting to reduce it by "a lot". Its nothing to do with a "xenophobic fringe" and has been show to be a widely held view of the British public. Sorry about that.
Yet there is still the discrepancy in the polls between how people perceive immigration nationally (usually a problem to be dealt with), and how they perceive it in their local area (nowhere near as much of a problem).
The yawning perception gap is explained by the drivel served up in - particularly - the rightwing press.
No, it's explained by the fact that that the problems are localised. Or do you think you would find this "yawning perception gap" if you polled in Rotherham?
Go and look up the number of immigrants who think immigration is out of hand. Are they all fooled by the drivel in the rightwing press?
From 2011, the rise of ukip, and the fact that negativity about immigration was not confined to white people was obvious to anyone that read this from that right wing rag the guardian
"According to the survey, 39% of Asian Britons, 34% of white Britons and 21% of black Britons wanted all immigration into the UK to be stopped permanently, or at least until the economy improved. And 43% of Asian Britons, 63% of white Britons and 17% of black Britons agreed with the statement that "immigration into Britain has been a bad thing for the country". Just over half of respondents – 52% – agreed with the proposition that "Muslims create problems in the UK".
The more you think about it the more ridiculous Cameron's pledge was on every single level. Not just because he could never achieve it through his own actions but also because it could easily be completely against the national interest. I know we made fun of it at the time but he really should have been castigated for it more widely. It appears Labour is incapable of making the sensible, honest case against this madness.
Looking at the stats they seem to have issued more work visas to non EU immigrants (the economy is prospering and businesses need skills), there are more non EU students (particularly from China, there seems to be a drop from India, we want non EU students to pay whopping fees to British Unis, dont we?). There is also a large increase in the number of no EU immigrants coming to accompany others (despite the rules changing to make this harder).
Taking those in turn:
- The work visas are unlikey to be controversial
- The student numbers are very interesting: we were told, were we not, that the government was doing great damage by increasing fees and tightening up on student visas. The complaint now seems to be the opposite!
- However, the third category looks like the problematic one.
No he's interested in tit for tat, the usual process of negotiating.
Don't be silly ... those are 'demands' to preclude serious negotiations. He readily admits it by saying Sturgeon would not be kept waiting. Its all tit and no tat. He is saying the LDs are not interested in govt, with anybody.
Lord have mercy, I'm only a Party member. Trust some Tory halfwit like Flightpath to read far more into something than is there and make a cheap jibe.
Sean F, as usual, gets to the point.
I don't see an appetite for Coalition or even S&C within the Party - I may be wrong. Someone talked earlier about a "period of quiet reflection" which can be translated as "assessing the losses" or "counting the dead" if you prefer. That sounds reasonable.
Whether in the heat of a post-election deadlock that line will hold remains to be seen. For me, the critical question is whether LAB + SNP is greater than CON (+perhaps DUP).
"Experts at Oxford University's Migration Observatory said net migration from outside the EU has not been less than 100,000 at any time during this parliament, meaning the target would have been missed with or without any rise in EU migration."
I hope we will see a thousand or so new schools being built this year to educate their kids, and maybe a fifty odd new GP surgeries, two or three major hospitals, a university or two ? No ? 100,000 or so new houses at least then ?
They are the ones that people are talking about, though, no? Low paid exclusive contracts with no guaranteed work. Miserable. I do a lot of agency work as a freelancer myself but its a purely mutually flexible arrangement and I get a decent rate. I dont think anyone is referring to that.
And yet they are far more common in charity and public sector work than in the private sector amongst those nasty capitalists... the pro-labour parts of the economy need to get their house in order first I would say.
It found that a third of voluntary sector organisations used zero-hours contracts, along with a quarter of public sector employers and 17% of private sector firms.
The problem with zero-hours contracts is not their existence per se, but when they are exclusive. They’ve been used for years in the NHS and the catering trade, but, and this is the point, suche workers have always been able to say “I can’t work that shift (or whatever)" without penalty.
I agree.
So what is all this wibbling we get from EdM about banning zero hours contracts ?
I know Mr Indigo, I know! Can someone please direct me to a thought through Labour policy. I need at least one logical reason to vote for them, other than a general feeling that their heart’s in the right place.
God bless our thrusting business leaders. The latest European patent statistics are out today and show that of the seven leading European economies, only Italy is below Britain, both in terms of patent filings per $USbillion of non-service Gross Domestic Product and per head of population.
No wonder we lose so many top class scientists and engineers. No wonder we lag behind so many of our competitors in terms of exports. Our management class is much too concerned about the next dividend and bonus to invest in invention and innovation.
Short-termism is strangling the UK economy, it has been for 50+ years.
Could not agree more. It is the true British disease and we need to remember that before deifying the pronouncements of our business leaders.
Looking at the stats they seem to have issued more work visas to non EU immigrants (the economy is prospering and businesses need skills), there are more non EU students (particularly from China, there seems to be a drop from India, we want non EU students to pay whopping fees to British Unis, dont we?). There is also a large increase in the number of no EU immigrants coming to accompany others (despite the rules changing to make this harder).
Taking those in turn:
- The work visas are unlikey to be controversial
- The student numbers are very interesting: we were told, were we not, that the government was doing great damage by increasing fees and tightening up on student visas. The complaint now seems to be the opposite!
- However, the third category looks like the problematic one.
- Given the rules governing the awarding of visas you would want to be an idiot (or Cameron) to want to reduce these numbers.
- Given the value of these students to UK PLC you would want to be an idiot (or Cameron) to want to reduce these numbers.
- Given the rules that have to be satisfied to have a family members accompany you to the UK I fail to see the problem (or what any humane Government could reasonably do to reduce the numbers further).
Given the rules that have to be satisfied to have a family members accompany you to the UK I fail to see the problem (or what any humane Government could reasonably do to reduce the numbers further).
I would agree with this. Given that the test in essence is, can the breadwinner afford to support his or her dependants to the extent that they will not be a burden on the state, their numbers are largely irrelevant except as a counting exercise.
No he's interested in tit for tat, the usual process of negotiating.
Don't be silly ... those are 'demands' to preclude serious negotiations. He readily admits it by saying Sturgeon would not be kept waiting. Its all tit and no tat. He is saying the LDs are not interested in govt, with anybody.
Lord have mercy, I'm only a Party member. Trust some Tory halfwit like Flightpath to read far more into something than is there and make a cheap jibe.
Sean F, as usual, gets to the point.
I don't see an appetite for Coalition or even S&C within the Party - I may be wrong. Someone talked earlier about a "period of quiet reflection" which can be translated as "assessing the losses" or "counting the dead" if you prefer. That sounds reasonable.
Whether in the heat of a post-election deadlock that line will hold remains to be seen. For me, the critical question is whether LAB + SNP is greater than CON (+perhaps DUP).
Then what is the point of the Lib Dems as a political party if they have no interest in being in government? They might as well disband, if their remaining MP's simply wish to claw in expenses and perks whilst acting as a protest group.
- Given the rules governing the awarding of visas you would want to be an idiot (or Cameron) to want to reduce these numbers.
- Given the value of these students to UK PLC you would want to be an idiot (or Cameron) to want to reduce these numbers.
- Given the rules that have to be satisfied to have a family members accompany you to the UK I fail to see the problem (or what any humane Government could reasonably do to reduce the numbers further).
Yes, it may well be that there is actually nothing much more that can realistically or desirably be done. Politically it's certainly a self-inflicted wound from Cameron's point of view, of course.
- Given the rules governing the awarding of visas you would want to be an idiot (or Cameron) to want to reduce these numbers.
- Given the value of these students to UK PLC you would want to be an idiot (or Cameron) to want to reduce these numbers.
- Given the rules that have to be satisfied to have a family members accompany you to the UK I fail to see the problem (or what any humane Government could reasonably do to reduce the numbers further).
Yes, it may well be that there is actually nothing much more that can realistically or desirably be done. Politically it's certainly a self-inflicted wound from Cameron's point of view, of course.
Print this out and frame it, you will never get a sterner criticism of Cameron from Richard than this. A collector's item
It appears been missed opportunities with Mohammed Emwazi...and the Cageprisoners went into bat for him when he previously got picked up for having been "on safari"...Indy gave them a nice write up to.
Muhammad ibn Muazzam is in fact Mohammed Emwazi.
MI5 agents illegally interrogated British Muslims who were detained while on safari holidays in Africa, it was claimed yesterday.
The new allegations mirror cases first raised by The Independent last year in which the security service was accused of harassing and intimidating north London community workers who had returned from Somalia.
They are the ones that people are talking about, though, no? Low paid exclusive contracts with no guaranteed work. Miserable. I do a lot of agency work as a freelancer myself but its a purely mutually flexible arrangement and I get a decent rate. I dont think anyone is referring to that.
And yet they are far more common in charity and public sector work than in the private sector amongst those nasty capitalists... the pro-labour parts of the economy need to get their house in order first I would say.
It found that a third of voluntary sector organisations used zero-hours contracts, along with a quarter of public sector employers and 17% of private sector firms.
The problem with zero-hours contracts is not their existence per se, but when they are exclusive. They’ve been used for years in the NHS and the catering trade, but, and this is the point, suche workers have always been able to say “I can’t work that shift (or whatever)" without penalty.
I agree.
So what is all this wibbling we get from EdM about banning zero hours contracts ?
I know Mr Indigo, I know! Can someone please direct me to a thought through Labour policy. I need at least one logical reason to vote for them, other than a general feeling that their heart’s in the right place.
I don't think the problem is the placement of their heart, its the placement of the head, which appears to currently be where the sun doesn't shine!
Breaking news from the Beeb: "LATEST: IS militant known as 'Jihadi John', believed to have beheaded hostages, is Mohammed Emwazi from London, BBC learns"
i.e. someone has pointed them to the Washington Post article
No he's interested in tit for tat, the usual process of negotiating.
Don't be silly ... those are 'demands' to preclude serious negotiations. He readily admits it by saying Sturgeon would not be kept waiting. Its all tit and no tat. He is saying the LDs are not interested in govt, with anybody.
Lord have mercy, I'm only a Party member. Trust some Tory halfwit like Flightpath to read far more into something than is there and make a cheap jibe.
Sean F, as usual, gets to the point.
I don't see an appetite for Coalition or even S&C within the Party - I may be wrong. Someone talked earlier about a "period of quiet reflection" which can be translated as "assessing the losses" or "counting the dead" if you prefer. That sounds reasonable.
Whether in the heat of a post-election deadlock that line will hold remains to be seen. For me, the critical question is whether LAB + SNP is greater than CON (+perhaps DUP).
Then what is the point of the Lib Dems as a political party if they have no interest in being in government? Might as well disband.
That’s the trouble with the Tories. Always looking at the short-term and neglecting to do any planning. Time spent on reconnaissance is never wasted!
They are the ones that people are talking about, though, no? Low paid exclusive contracts with no guaranteed work. Miserable. I do a lot of agency work as a freelancer myself but its a purely mutually flexible arrangement and I get a decent rate. I dont think anyone is referring to that.
And yet they are far more common in charity and public sector work than in the private sector amongst those nasty capitalists... the pro-labour parts of the economy need to get their house in order first I would say.
It found that a third of voluntary sector organisations used zero-hours contracts, along with a quarter of public sector employers and 17% of private sector firms.
The problem with zero-hours contracts is not their existence per se, but when they are exclusive. They’ve been used for years in the NHS and the catering trade, but, and this is the point, suche workers have always been able to say “I can’t work that shift (or whatever)" without penalty.
I agree.
So what is all this wibbling we get from EdM about banning zero hours contracts ?
I know Mr Indigo, I know! Can someone please direct me to a thought through Labour policy. I need at least one logical reason to vote for them, other than a general feeling that their heart’s in the right place.
I don't think the problem is the placement of their heart, its the placement of the head, which appears to currently be where the sun doesn't shine!
Yup. Looks like I’m going to have to consider writing NOTA on the ballot paper.
Comments
This dictatorial attitude is something I've noticed in LDs before.
The quote that you said 'and?' To?
It's interesting, though, that if stodge is correct about the Lib Dem position then it is possible for Cameron to increase his power as PM even while making a net loss of MPs. There are a lot of Liberal Democrat voters in play in Bedford. The game is afoot.
When do one-offs stop being one-offs and become a permanent feature of trading, I'd have thought 7 years might have been enough.
You ommitted to mention the £2.2 bn fines which is now a given of RBS accounts
The shares have dropped 11 % this morning
I notice no-one's predicting a profit this time next year.
Quite so .... and again I say "and ?"
Either way IN or OUT the EU in some form would still be there as would the rest of the world, and if totally out we would be faced with endless negotiations with everybody over everything all over again. That would start with just how we might join the EEA.
BTW - Do you think the best way of getting a good deal with the EU would be by staying in or walking out?
So then, the question we're all waiting for.
Was your sudden disappearance from PB a couple of weeks ago related to the release of Fifty Shades Of Grey at the flicks? :O
TSE opined that yourself and the Good Lady Jack went in expecting an historical biopic about Lady Jane Grey and were... Somewhat surprised... But I'm not buying it...
IMO a minimum of 320 will be necessary with the LibDems providing approx 30 and probably some supply and confidence from the DUP.
If Labour are becalmed on 250/60 seats then the viability of the Coalition is more assured.
The last ARSE had the Con/LibDems on a combined total of 336 and Labour on 262. The next ARSE will be published on Tuesday at 9:00am.
They should be, but they won't. Because:
1) Those likely to jump ship will have done so already
2) Labour's criticism is essentially "Immigration's good, so, er, you're bad for having lots of it..."
3) The BBC and those on the left like immigration. The rightwing media probably won't want to give a proper battering to the blues in this pre-election period. So they won't get hammered
https://www.politicshome.com/economy-and-work/articles/story/ons-rebukes-labour-over-zero-hours-poster
made up figures.
If we turned down that deal it would inevitably lead to the free export of our car industry.
This morning Osborne could be out there linking the rise in immigration to the relative strength of the UK economy - certainly compared to the rest of the EU.
Yet they're both cowering in a bunker somewhere!
Such is the farce of the detetched-from-reality British debate on immigration and the years of Tory indulgence and irresponsibility on this issue, pandering to the worst of people's instincts.
And I'm aware Labour is no different. Its response today has been risible too.
I thought "Fifty Shades Of Grey" was a biopic on the political career of John Major whereas Mrs JackW thought it was a documentary about Earl Grey tea.
Imagine our surprise .... when it turned out to be a tame and dreary tale about events we both had forgotten about many decades ago !!
http://www.newstatesman.com/politics/2015/02/it-s-still-too-soon-write-ukip-it-could-thrive-after-election
I have to say I do think the fuss about them as something totally new in the past few years slightly weird. Putting aside the ones that demand exclusivity (which is IMO wrong, if the employer wants flexibility, the employee should also get it), I remember years ago as a student working through agencies. The deal was basically the same, you weren't guaranteed much, and in fact some people went to different places every week for different jobs...but the thing was if you didn't get work with an agency, you wouldn't stick with them and / or you would of course sign up with several until you got your foot in the door of something half decent. As far as I could tell that is kinda of how low skills agency work has always been, and that a lot of companies used them as basically as way to a) fill short term staffing gaps and b) kind of a "try before you buy" to employing full time staff.
"Zero Hours poster.
https://www.politicshome.com/economy-and-work/articles/story/ons-rebukes-labour-over-zero-hours-poster
made up figures."
I think the one for food banks will be more effective. Maybe they could use the photo from "Labour isn't Working" as long as too many of them aren't wearing flares
https://cdn.urbantimes.co/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/poster-21.jpg
See http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/feb/22/norway-urges-uk-dont-leave-eu
Now I know it’s the Guardian etc etc, but I fear that the BBO-ters, if they win, might wake up to discover that we’ve got the worst of all possible worlds.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/26/opinion/gail-collins-adieu-chris-christie-adieu.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=c-column-top-span-region®ion=c-column-top-span-region&WT.nav=c-column-top-span-region&_r=0
The EU has bilateral free trade agreements with both Korea which doesn't involve free movement on labour. The EU is working on a free trade agreement with ASEAN, are you suggestion that most of developing Asia is about to have free movement into the EU ?
It's funny because this is one of the more lunatic conspiracy theories chucked at Labour by the Right when migration was at similar levels.
The latest BES Social Attitude Survey had three quarters of the population wanting to reduce immigration, and half of it wanting to reduce it by "a lot". Its nothing to do with a "xenophobic fringe" and has been show to be a widely held view of the British public. Sorry about that.
https://twitter.com/MarkHopkins123/status/570901511011569665
And even if totally out - I do not see how we could expect different deals with say the USA and Canada that they negotiated with the EU.
I do a lot of agency work as a freelancer myself but its a purely mutually flexible arrangement and I get a decent rate. I dont think anyone is referring to that.
http://www.bbc.com/news/business-23573442
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/feb/25/entire-hungarian-village-for-rent-includes-horses-cows-and-a-bus-stop
Bet he doesn't pay his tv license or agree with the speed limit either
Daily Mail Online (@MailOnline)
26/02/2015 11:06
BREAKING NEWS: ISIS executioner Jihadi John 'identified as London man Mohammed Emwazi' dailym.ai/1vBsN0M pic.twitter.com/hCcIWfULj8
Do we actually have a figure for the number of exclusive minimum wage zero hour contracts?
TTIP Chapter IV, Articles 24 to 28 would allow free movement of business managers, and other employees of a corporation, for temporary work purposes among all countries party to the agreement.[26] Article 1(2) makes it clear, however, that no more general free movement of workers and citizens is allowed.
The yawning perception gap is explained by the drivel served up in - particularly - the rightwing press.
At the time of the 2010 election it was 252,000.
The big increase in the latest set of figures was driven by a "statistically significant" rise in immigrants arriving in the UK, according to the Office for National Statistics.
Sack me if we don't get net migration down to 100,000 - DC 2010
I agree with Dave
No wonder we lose so many top class scientists and engineers. No wonder we lag behind so many of our competitors in terms of exports. Our management class is much too concerned about the next dividend and bonus to invest in invention and innovation.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2913336/Supersize-benefits-family-claims-50-000-handouts-year-spend-cash-designer-trainers-mopeds.html
when we supposedly have a benefits cap of £25K.
Its all tit and no tat.
He is saying the LDs are not interested in govt, with anybody.
@Watcher: most of the losses have already been made, it's just a question of when they are recognised. The operating businesses are profitable, and those without a USP or an attractive return on capital (eg Govetts or Coutts Intl) are progressively being sold or closed. The money the government has invested will be recovered in some form eventually - probably without much of a cash profit, but at least they'll get it back.
Of particular note:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-31638174
"Experts at Oxford University's Migration Observatory said net migration from outside the EU has not been less than 100,000 at any time during this parliament, meaning the target would have been missed with or without any rise in EU migration."
Go and look up the number of immigrants who think immigration is out of hand. Are they all fooled by the drivel in the rightwing press?
I agree.
So what is all this wibbling we get from EdM about banning zero hours contracts ?
What a joke. Charity indeed.
"According to the survey, 39% of Asian Britons, 34% of white Britons and 21% of black Britons wanted all immigration into the UK to be stopped permanently, or at least until the economy improved. And 43% of Asian Britons, 63% of white Britons and 17% of black Britons agreed with the statement that "immigration into Britain has been a bad thing for the country". Just over half of respondents – 52% – agreed with the proposition that "Muslims create problems in the UK".
http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2011/feb/27/support-poll-support-far-right
- The work visas are unlikey to be controversial
- The student numbers are very interesting: we were told, were we not, that the government was doing great damage by increasing fees and tightening up on student visas. The complaint now seems to be the opposite!
- However, the third category looks like the problematic one.
Sean F, as usual, gets to the point.
I don't see an appetite for Coalition or even S&C within the Party - I may be wrong. Someone talked earlier about a "period of quiet reflection" which can be translated as "assessing the losses" or "counting the dead" if you prefer. That sounds reasonable.
Whether in the heat of a post-election deadlock that line will hold remains to be seen. For me, the critical question is whether LAB + SNP is greater than CON (+perhaps DUP).
So what is all this wibbling we get from EdM about banning zero hours contracts ?
I know Mr Indigo, I know! Can someone please direct me to a thought through Labour policy. I need at least one logical reason to vote for them, other than a general feeling that their heart’s in the right place.
- Given the value of these students to UK PLC you would want to be an idiot (or Cameron) to want to reduce these numbers.
- Given the rules that have to be satisfied to have a family members accompany you to the UK I fail to see the problem (or what any humane Government could reasonably do to reduce the numbers further).
"Short-termism is strangling the UK economy, it has been for 50+ years."
Lack of inward investment was always chronic, then an economic "genius" came along and sold it as a mantra.
Muhammad ibn Muazzam is in fact Mohammed Emwazi.
MI5 agents illegally interrogated British Muslims who were detained while on safari holidays in Africa, it was claimed yesterday.
The new allegations mirror cases first raised by The Independent last year in which the security service was accused of harassing and intimidating north London community workers who had returned from Somalia.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/british-muslims-on-safari-stopped-by-mi5-1959610.html
I don't think the problem is the placement of their heart, its the placement of the head, which appears to currently be where the sun doesn't shine!
i.e. someone has pointed them to the Washington Post article
Time spent on reconnaissance is never wasted!
SNP 43.8% (+0.5)
Labour 23.9% (-2.7)
Conservatives 17.4% (+0.8)
Liberal Democrats 6.9% (+1.3)
UKIP 4.5% (+1.1)
Greens 3.3% (-0.2)
Yup. Looks like I’m going to have to consider writing NOTA on the ballot paper.