You've met people who think you should be put to death for not being a Sunni or a cradle Catholic?
I can understand you being cautious about going to Syria ... but going round to your local bring and buy sale at the Church isn't usually fraught with terror. I've often been to the Catholic Church and I've yet to meet a Jihadi priest with a beheading sword. Perhaps I move in the wrong circles.
How about two elections in short order with no definitive outcome so they all agree to change the rules to PR or AV for the 3rd election held a month later and Farage then wins by a landslide.
You have to admit that would make a thread header interesting on so many levels that even TSE's head might explode.
looks around nervously.... *I mentioned an AV thread........ I think I got away with it*
Really quite scary Miliband denying Labour overspending. We can't let these clowns near the levers of power again! I don't really buy the current narrative from the tories about how they have got everything going great again, but they are at least not living in complete la-la land like Miliband seems to be.
What a fool. People aren't going to let him be in charge ...are they? Please...?
If Ed believes that there was no overspending in the Blar Brown era, just needed investment in infrastructure then he is certain to repeat the process. Particularly with the SNP egging him on.
I do not like Dave much, and find much of the Conservative agenda scary. I would not want to see a Conservative government with a working majority.
I would quite like to see a continuity coalition, but the LDs look to be losing too many seats for that to be tenable.
It is all going to be quite a mess in a weeks time.
The audience did a much better job than most journalist interviewers of laying bear just how Ed Miliband would just repeat the same mistakes of the last 13 years if he got into power once more. We need a lot more of these events, as journalists these days seem far too friendly with the politicians. Some of them have even been former girlfriends of the people they're interviewing!
How about two elections in short order with no definitive outcome so they all agree to change the rules to PR or AV for the 3rd election held a month later and Farage then wins by a landslide.
You have to admit that would make a thread header interesting on so many levels that even TSE's head might explode.
looks around nervously.... *I mentioned an AV thread........ I think I got away with it*
There's a thread header saved for emergencies/when I'm suffering from writers' block entitled
"Was opposing AV Dave's greatest strategic blunder of this parliament?"
. I fully expect the Tories to win the national vote share. The national polls point to Ed (In aggregate) being ahead on seats or it being too close to call. The likely distribution from the models (UKElect, FIsher, Hanretty) points to a Tory lead on votes and seats. BUT Here is the thing... Con + LD + DUP must equal 323. In order for Ed to NOT become PM he musty abstain the Conservative Queen speech. SNP, PC, SDLP, Green voting it down is even more sure than the Labour party. No doubt if it really is Labour 260, Tories 285 he will give it serious consideration. But then he will put forward a Labour Queen speech and DARE the SNP to vote it down. There will be some Labour rebels who will be expelled, Danczuk, Mann, perhaps one or two others.
The SNP will vote it through.. And thus as Rod Crosby has pointed towards in his constitutional musings Ed is PM. I expect him to remain in post till Holyrood 2016. Past that the SNP may well pull the plug.
My book is well enough balanced that the final betting consequences of either Ed or Dave (Or other) should be fine for me. But this is my prediction.
I'm not so sure. The longer game would be to not vote down the Tories speech then dangle them on a string for 6 months whilst they fight like rats in a sack. Once half a dozen have defected to UKIP bring them down. Labour knows that with a hostile press it has much More to lose from governing weakly.
Will 'half a dozen defect to UKIP' after they've seen an election in which UKIP didn't break through, Farage only just/didn't get elected, Reckless only just/didn't get elected.
I feel further defections to UKIP will depend more on the behaviour of the Conservative leadership than the last election result.
Generally speaking I think journalists engage in too much clever dickery and nitpicking. The audience last night were plain speaking and got to the heart of the matter. In the case of Evan Davies, he loves the sound of his own opinions.
Really quite scary Miliband denying Labour overspending. We can't let these clowns near the levers of power again! I don't really buy the current narrative from the tories about how they have got everything going great again, but they are at least not living in complete la-la land like Miliband seems to be.
What a fool. People aren't going to let him be in charge ...are they? Please...?
If Ed believes that there was no overspending in the Blar Brown era, just needed investment in infrastructure then he is certain to repeat the process. Particularly with the SNP egging him on.
I do not like Dave much, and find much of the Conservative agenda scary. I would not want to see a Conservative government with a working majority.
I would quite like to see a continuity coalition, but the LDs look to be losing too many seats for that to be tenable.
It is all going to be quite a mess in a weeks time.
The audience did a much better job than most journalist interviewers of laying bear just how Ed Miliband would just repeat the same mistakes of the last 13 years if he got into power once more. We need a lot more of these events, as journalists these days seem far too friendly with the politicians. Some of them have even been former girlfriends of the people they're interviewing!
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Roger, the voters have no problem with "hurting my feelings"! But after 40 years of doorstepping, you get a fair feel for who is polite and who is perplexed....
Agreed. A useful self-test is what "undecideds" say closer to the election and even more what they say after they've cast a postal vote (when they take a certain relish in telling you if they voted the other way). If you thought people like that were genuinely doubtful, you need to adjust your sceptimeter.
But we differ on the number of doubtfuls. Not finding many at all, while MM is finding lots. What are others encountering?
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
If you run a deficit of 2% and GDP grows by 2.1% then hey presto "the debt is falling" (as a %age of GDP). But is this prudent?
This goes right to the heart of Labour's economic idiocy. If your defict is 2% of GDP and GDP growth, WHICH INCLUDES PUBLIC SPENDING, is 2.1% then what you're really saying is that there is only 0.1% of real growth of non-debt fueled spaying it up the wall. The real economy is essentially flat while the absolute debt rises by 2% a year. Keep that shit up for a decade and hey presto when an inevitable downturn comes along you find you have added hugely to the debt but the real GDP to pay for it isn't there any more. This is economics 1.0 for for dummies. Brown, Balls and clearly Miliband simply don't recognise that borrowed growth is not real. The GDP growth of the Labour years was a chimera. They borrowed to spend. The real economy didn't really grow. The public sector did. They massively overspent. Miliband 'does not accept that'. Because he's an effwit.
How's that different from Osborne ?
Because under Osborne the deficit has been falling and growth rising. The real economy has been growing as witnessed by millions more private sector jobs.
That's just total crap. Take out Osborne's borrowing and what's left ? He has done next to bugger all on economic reform and his "growth" is as dependent on government borrowing as Brown's was. Look at out balance of payments if you want to see the effects.
Osborne is simply Brown in slow motion.
This is innumerate nonsense. In 2014 the deficit was reduced by 2.6% of GDP which GDP was growing faster than any other major western nation. Name the last time Brown reduced the deficit so considerably.
Yes. In terms of GDP the deficit has been reduced by more than half. In terms of spending Osborne has met his targets. As the Eurozone economy affected our own, Osborne wisely extended his deficit timetable rather than screw the economy just to meet a noy=tional target. Our balance of payments is also affected by investors from overseas repatriating profits from a growing economy - ours. Our own overseas investments have been subject to a depressed world economy and have no been as strong.
In the circumstances where Ed Miliband has approx 260-265 seats the question is his own responsibility for the loss of Scotland for a generation and little improvement on 2010. Rather than talking of a minority government he should look at himself and do the honourable thing and resign.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
I've been searching for the value bet this election. I missed out on the SNP seats and first debate winner with Sturgeon, but Tory minority Govt at 6's looks great value considering Ed's comments last night, the fact that Labour probably will under perform the polling aggregate and there just will not be an appetite for another LD/Tory coalition.
Cameron lost out big time on QT last night. Not to Miliband or Clegg, but to the luck of the draw - he ended up battling Emmerdale on the other side, whereas the other two did not have the same competition. Whilst I doubt the programme will have rated that highly overall, perhaps 4m averaged over the 90 minutes, I reckon Clegg's section will easily have been the most watched. It would be fascinating to see if the "breakdown" of viewing gets reported today.
At least with a proper debate over 90 mins or 2 hours, viewers get to see a bit of everyone in the bit they choose to view. But then, it's karma for Cameron because he was the one who insisted on the sequence of debates we ended up with.
I thought he did the best of the three, but continues to frustrate with his evasiveness and inability to actually confront the guff he gets confronted with on, eg, food banks, bedroom tax. I am beginning to think that as well as being lazy, he's actually not that bright.
But I guess he's history anyway in a week, sadly.
I think you make good points especially on the Food Banks, I suspect he is advised to play safe and avoid sounding callous.
I believe Cameron will get a credible result next week bearing in mind the hand he was dealt, with a seat lead over Labour of 25 to 30, it won't be good enough for him long term, I would expect him to stand down and let someone else have a go. If it goes the way I think it will be another election with new leaders. I can't see any of the 3 leaders getting a result acceptable enough to justify staying in their exalted positions.
With an indecisive election result it would be daft to change leaders if you were still in power. Even if you thought it wise it would still be daft to do so before you knew what the opposition were doing. There is no evidence that a new leader would domor be able to do anything different, or be more popular. Why cannot people stop thinking there is a magic wand for leaders to wave around?
Well - Ozzy has clearly tried and half succeeded at getting rid of the deficit.
I've been thinking about this "half" that the Coalition campaign on. This is, I think, the cut in the headline budget deficit, from £160bn ish to £80bn ish.**
However, if you accept that the budget deficit can be decomposed into two components, a structural budget deficit and a cyclical budget deficit, then you might expect that the cyclical budget deficit would actually be returning to a surplus around about now, given that we have had two years of solid growth and very large increases in employment.
This would further imply that the structural part of the budget deficit has actually been cut by less than half, which is a pathetic record given the stated aims of the Coalition. And you can't blame the Eurozone crisis for this, because if you accept the concept of a structural budget deficit then the Eurozone crisis would only have affected the cyclical component of the budget deficit.
So somehow the Coalition have delivered less than half of what they promised on deficit reduction, and they aren't being challenged on that half as much as they ought to be during this election campaign.
** The actual figures from the ONS are a peak of £154bn in 2009/10 and a decline to £87bn in 2014/15, which is a cut of 44%, which is four-ninths, rather than one-half.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
For some reason the 30 odd Labour MPs who voted for the No Confidence motion seem to be glossed over in history.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
The "not a deal" will presumably involve quiet chats along the lines of "XXX and YYY are going to be in the QS, what will your response be?". May take a few iterations.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
I've had a good think about that, yes I think they will.
Well probably if i stopped in Sparkbrook on the way home I could find a couple of Jihadi nutters offering me an early death too. But in truth it's easy to find disturbed people anywhere. Parts of Glasgow would quite happily offer you an early exit from this earth just for being Catholic.
Video exclusive: ‘Green activists’ in Brighton Pavilion rip off UKIP advertisements
B & H Independent @BrightonIndy 11h11 hours ago Supposing Green activists had burned @UKIP adverts: http://bit.ly/1EUvtLe ? Non-story? Or central to free democracy?
Demonstrating their love of democracy and free speech.
I've got news for Mr Kevin Smith, UKIP candidate for Hove. No one ever joined UKIP who wasn't a racist, although few of them are much good at looking into their own souls. And with souls like theirs, who can blame them?
What a pathetic post.
ALL parties have racists and other undesirables, even the "progressives"
In the circumstances where Ed Miliband has approx 260-265 seats the question is his own responsibility for the loss of Scotland for a generation and little improvement on 2010. Rather than talking of a minority government he should look at himself and do the honourable thing and resign.
I think that result is perfect for Ed. Let the Tories do the cutting and wait 2 years for another shot.
I once hated the thought of Ed hanging on once defeated, but after seeing his performance through the election I am quite warming to the idea.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
For some reason the 30 odd Labour MPs who voted for the No Confidence motion seem to be glossed over in history.
In the circumstances where Ed Miliband has approx 260-265 seats the question is his own responsibility for the loss of Scotland for a generation and little improvement on 2010. Rather than talking of a minority government he should look at himself and do the honourable thing and resign.
I think that result is perfect for Ed. Let the Tories do the cutting and wait 2 years for another shot.
I once hated the thought of Ed hanging on once defeated, but after seeing his performance through the election I am quite warming to the idea.
I've been searching for the value bet this election. I missed out on the SNP seats and first debate winner with Sturgeon, but Tory minority Govt at 6's looks great value considering Ed's comments last night, the fact that Labour probably will under perform the polling aggregate and there just will not be an appetite for another LD/Tory coalition.
Agree with you. I simply don't think the LibDems will allow Clegg to go in another Coalition with the Conservatives - and come to that nobody should assume that David Cameron's MP's will allow him to have another Coalition either.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
If that were to happen then I think Labour and LDs would be involved in a leadership election. May want to let a Con minority pass a Queens speech, though opt to oppose individual bills, then go for a motion of No Confidence and a second election fairly quickly when something controversial comes up.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
For some reason the 30 odd Labour MPs who voted for the No Confidence motion seem to be glossed over in history.
Who were these 30 odd Labour MPs?
Aren't all Labour MPs odd ? I don't think the number just stops at 30.
I have a theory re difference between online and telephone polling. With online polling, people sign up to take part in polling on various and not just politics. Yougov ask about political indentification, newspaper, how they voted in 2010 and they apply weighting to get a result that meets with the model sample used. With telephone polling it is about politics only, the samples are generally smaller and most calls will be to landline numbers, not mobile numbers. A lot of younger people will no longer have landline numbers and just use mobiles, so their opinion will not be sampled as much.
Not saying that telephone polling will be proved to be less accurate, but I wonder whether the smaller samples, less work done on who they poll and phone calls mostly to landline numbers, would find out the true positions across the country.
UK equity funds saw a net retail outflow of £963m in March, the largest net outflow ever recorded by The Investment Association, which releases monthly figures on the fund management sector.
Experts believe investors are taking money out of UK markets such as the FTSE 100 amid uncertainty over the political landscape after the election next Thursday.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
Depending on the no. of seats, Labour might keep a Tory govt in power; the strategy, albeit risky, would be convincing Scotland the seduction of the SNP has brought nothing but Conservative rule.
Labour needs something to halt the SNP and ensure it does not continue on to Holyrood. Keeping Tories in power might benefit them in the short term.
Will it work though? I'm not sure. I honestly believe Scotland is on the path to independence and nothing is doing to stop it. Plus, a minority Labour govt (with significantly less seats than the Tories) might end up destroying the party.
Well probably if i stopped in Sparkbrook on the way home I could find a couple of Jihadi nutters offering me an early death too. But in truth it's easy to find disturbed people anywhere. Parts of Glasgow would quite happily offer you an early exit from this earth just for being Catholic.
Alan, you would not even need to be a catholic in some parts
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
If that were to happen then I think Labour and LDs would be involved in a leadership election. May want to let a Con minority pass a Queens speech, though opt to oppose individual bills, then go for a motion of No Confidence and a second election fairly quickly when something controversial comes up.
I very much doubt it, we'll see nothing sensible from the Tories until Osborne is moved even then what will replace him. The Tories under Cameron haven't the guts for reform.
Well - you may be right. I actually quite like Ozzy (alot more than I like Dave). Getting to a surplus is a necessary first step and will in and of itself wash some of the crap out of our economy. Will he go full Maggie and push deep supply side reform? Maybe not. Maybe half. Certainly he is the only potential occupant of No.11 that will even try. Trying to get major supply side reform past an entitlements mindset electorate is a bit of a hospital pass for any prospective chancellor though, however much they may wish for it (or not, in the case of Ed Balls).
You are spot on to summarise the choice as a bit shite vs totally shite economic management. We are a democracy, however, in which the economic opinion of the electorate ranges from a bit shite to totally shite. I earnestly wish for a party and a leader and a chancellor who might take public opinion with them in the direction of sound money.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
So the years 2000-10 saw the size of the state soar from 34pc to 50pc – a rise of 16 points. This is a faster rise than any other country, over any other postwar decade. ......And even now, Miliband can’t bring himself to recognise what he did. As the lady from the Question Time audience so beautifully put it, if he can’t, why should voters let him do it again?
Fraser's graph shows that public spending fell between 2005 and 2007, and then soared following the crash. I, for one, am very glad that it did. God knows would have happened if it had not.
It was the same in 2005 and 2007. The only falling it did was between 2006-2007 and 2009-2010
Fair enough, it was falling at the time of the crash. And then, thankfully, rose again.
The problem wasn't the immediate aftermath when spending rose (I assume you have adjusted for the consolidation of RBS).
The problem was that Brown let rip during the noughties because he believed tax income was sustainable. When it proved a mirage he absolutely refused to do anything to address the structural spending gap. It's the structural deficit that's the issue.
Economist David Smith of the Times pointed out that between 2000 and 2010 spending rose 50% in real terms. Despite economic growth the deficit rose in that time. He points out the economic crisis did not make much difference to this rate of increase. We did not have the economy able to sustain that spending and that's even before you consider whether it was wise spending. The structural economy was not as big as Brown believed. The banks' revenues crumbled.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
For some reason the 30 odd Labour MPs who voted for the No Confidence motion seem to be glossed over in history.
Who were these 30 odd Labour MPs?
Aren't all Labour MPs odd ? I don't think the number just stops at 30.
Cameron lost out big time on QT last night. Not to Miliband or Clegg, but to the luck of the draw - he ended up battling Emmerdale on the other side, whereas the other two did not have the same competition. Whilst I doubt the programme will have rated that highly overall, perhaps 4m averaged over the 90 minutes, I reckon Clegg's section will easily have been the most watched. It would be fascinating to see if the "breakdown" of viewing gets reported today.
At least with a proper debate over 90 mins or 2 hours, viewers get to see a bit of everyone in the bit they choose to view. But then, it's karma for Cameron because he was the one who insisted on the sequence of debates we ended up with.
I thought he did the best of the three, but continues to frustrate with his evasiveness and inability to actually confront the guff he gets confronted with on, eg, food banks, bedroom tax. I am beginning to think that as well as being lazy, he's actually not that bright.
But I guess he's history anyway in a week, sadly.
The person that lost out last night was Nigel Farage, who didn't get broadcast until several hours after the program when everyone has gone to bed.
Did anyone watch Farage? Did he go all BBC bias again at the audience?
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
I've been tipping Con Minority for ages
I know you TSE have (and also Casino)- by you, I was referring to the wider pb community. But the penny has only dropped with me. I've had my first eureka moment during this campaign.
If you run a deficit of 2% and GDP grows by 2.1% then hey presto "the debt is falling" (as a %age of GDP). But is this prudent?
This goes right to the heart of Labour's economic idiocy. If your defict is 2% of GDP and GDP growth, WHICH INCLUDES PUBLIC SPENDING, is 2.1% then what you're really saying is that there is only 0.1% of real growth of non-debt fueled spaying it up the wall. The real economy is essentially flat while the absolute debt rises by 2% a year. Keep that shit up for a decade and hey presto when an inevitable downturn comes along you find you have added hugely to the debt but the real GDP to pay for it isn't there any more. This is economics 1.0 for for dummies. Brown, Balls and clearly Miliband simply don't recognise that borrowed growth is not real. The GDP growth of the Labour years was a chimera. They borrowed to spend. The real economy didn't really grow. The public sector did. They massively overspent. Miliband 'does not accept that'. Because he's an effwit.
How's that different from Osborne ?
For a start the Tories are cutting the public sector.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
Moving average chart of the 100 most recent YouGov polls. The blue upward trend continues notwithstanding last night's 1 point deficit due to the nature of the moving average. Click to enlarge...
YouGov's methology changed at data point number 77 and took 5 days to fully impact upon the moving average.
Looking at Gadfly's graph, the thing that strikes me is the 3 point fall in the Tories score immediately following the methodology change at data point 77.
Was there anything in the wider world to account for it. Did other pollsters register a similar fall?
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
I've been tipping Con Minority for ages
Et moi aussi. Which may give a few folk pause to think :-)
I'm taking Millibands comments wrt a SNP deal the same way I took Clegg's wrt the DUP: using the word deal to rule out a coalition, which of course was never on the cards.
Post-election, they say "it's not a deal, there's no formal agreement". Plenty wriggle room.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
I've been tipping Con Minority for ages
I know you TSE have (and also Casino)- by you, I was referring to the wider pb community. But the penny has only dropped with me. I've had my first eureka moment during this campaign.
There's a big difference between a Tory minority government which depends on the goodwill of LD, DUP and UKIP, and one which depends on the abstention of the official opposition.
On election night 2010 I seem to remember a special page was set up for PB comments because it was decided that the usual thread wouldn't be able to cope with the volume of traffic. Is that likely to happen this time or has the technology improved? (I remember in particular NP's "close but no cigar" comment).
I thought that Ed Miliband came across better. But the point he should have made re overspending pre 2008, is that up to December 2007, Cameron backed Labour spending levels. The country was crying out for investment in schools, NHS, transport etc. In hindsight had Labour known about the risks Banks were taking, they would have applied more regulation and been more cautious with spending given reliance on financial service related tax receipts, as well wider benefit to the economy.
Labour have had problems dealing with the Tory accusations re overspending and the Liam Byrnes note re no money left. The should have found a way to explain the situation better, so the public could understand the situation more. There are some excellent articles online that explain where Labour could have made different decisions in hindsight and what the Tories were signed up to before the Banking crash. The Tories only changed their minds on spending, when they could see the effect of the Banking crash and a massive deficit coming up.
I'm taking Millibands comments wrt a SNP deal the same way I took Clegg's wrt the DUP: using the word deal to rule out a coalition, which of course was never on the cards.
Post-election, they say "it's not a deal, there's no formal agreement". Plenty wriggle room.
That's a very sensible way to look at it - which part of Edinburgh are you in again, many posters up. Is there a feeling of an election in the air ?
You're only safe in England's part of this Sceptred Isle. How does the song go ... "The English, the English, the English are best. I wouldn't give you tuppence for all of the rest."
Cameron lost out big time on QT last night. Not to Miliband or Clegg, but to the luck of the draw - he ended up battling Emmerdale on the other side, whereas the other two did not have the same competition. Whilst I doubt the programme will have rated that highly overall, perhaps 4m averaged over the 90 minutes, I reckon Clegg's section will easily have been the most watched. It would be fascinating to see if the "breakdown" of viewing gets reported today.
At least with a proper debate over 90 mins or 2 hours, viewers get to see a bit of everyone in the bit they choose to view. But then, it's karma for Cameron because he was the one who insisted on the sequence of debates we ended up with.
I thought he did the best of the three, but continues to frustrate with his evasiveness and inability to actually confront the guff he gets confronted with on, eg, food banks, bedroom tax. I am beginning to think that as well as being lazy, he's actually not that bright.
But I guess he's history anyway in a week, sadly.
The person that lost out last night was Nigel Farage, who didn't get broadcast until several hours after the program when everyone has gone to bed.
Did anyone watch Farage? Did he go all BBC bias again at the audience?
I saw a bit of it. Just going through the motions. Neither Nigel or the audience particularly animated.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
I've been tipping Con Minority for ages
I wrote a guest thread tipping it a 10/1 back in October. You never published it, you naughty boy!
I've been searching for the value bet this election. I missed out on the SNP seats and first debate winner with Sturgeon, but Tory minority Govt at 6's looks great value considering Ed's comments last night, the fact that Labour probably will under perform the polling aggregate and there just will not be an appetite for another LD/Tory coalition.
Agree with you. I simply don't think the LibDems will allow Clegg to go in another Coalition with the Conservatives - and come to that nobody should assume that David Cameron's MP's will allow him to have another Coalition either.
Its hard to see the majority numbers adding up anyway. But equally what you will not see is any euphoria at being in or retaining government like we did last time. This time there is no relief that Brown is finally out of Downing Street. What an appalling period that was.
Cameron lost out big time on QT last night. Not to Miliband or Clegg, but to the luck of the draw - he ended up battling Emmerdale on the other side, whereas the other two did not have the same competition. Whilst I doubt the programme will have rated that highly overall, perhaps 4m averaged over the 90 minutes, I reckon Clegg's section will easily have been the most watched. It would be fascinating to see if the "breakdown" of viewing gets reported today.
At least with a proper debate over 90 mins or 2 hours, viewers get to see a bit of everyone in the bit they choose to view. But then, it's karma for Cameron because he was the one who insisted on the sequence of debates we ended up with.
I thought he did the best of the three, but continues to frustrate with his evasiveness and inability to actually confront the guff he gets confronted with on, eg, food banks, bedroom tax. I am beginning to think that as well as being lazy, he's actually not that bright.
But I guess he's history anyway in a week, sadly.
The person that lost out last night was Nigel Farage, who didn't get broadcast until several hours after the program when everyone has gone to bed.
Did anyone watch Farage? Did he go all BBC bias again at the audience?
I saw a bit of it. Just going through the motions. Neither Nigel or the audience particularly animated.
10.50pm graveyard slot. Feel a bit sorry for him tbh. Not sure Dan Hodges gets anything right but this idea that Farage is losing his mojo does seem to have a bit of cred.
Unimpressed by Dave, but then again she'll never vote for him in a million years.
Thought Ed was doing quite well until he ruled out a deal with the SNP. Echoed the audience thoughts of him playing us for fools on that one. She quite likes the SNP (Has no financial interest in it *cough*) -just likes the left wing line.
Labour have had problems dealing with the Tory accusations re overspending and the Liam Byrnes note re no money left.
There was a big cheer when that guy made the point about Brown flogging off our gold reserves @ rock bottom price. No idea why tories don't make more of that 'cos you still hear it mentioned.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
I've been tipping Con Minority for ages
I wrote a guest thread tipping it a 10/1 back in October. You never published it, you naughty boy!
Blame Mark Reckless.
Yours was scheduled to go up at 3pm on Saturday the 27th of September.
TPD defecting at 2:27pm that day was annoying.
About 5 mins earlier Everton scored an injury time equaliser in the Merseyside derby.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
For some reason the 30 odd Labour MPs who voted for the No Confidence motion seem to be glossed over in history.
Who were these 30 odd Labour MPs?
I am a moron ignore my idiocy, got completely confused about everything.
Moving average chart of the 100 most recent YouGov polls. The blue upward trend continues notwithstanding last night's 1 point deficit due to the nature of the moving average. Click to enlarge...
YouGov's methology changed at data point number 77 and took 5 days to fully impact upon the moving average.
Looking at Gadfly's graph, the thing that strikes me is the 3 point fall in the Tories score immediately following the methodology change at data point 77.
Was there anything in the wider world to account for it. Did other pollsters register a similar fall?
That's when they started weighting undecideds back to January polls rather than 2010. Which I think gave an initial boost to Ukip at the expense of the Conservatives just when other polls were starting to show the reverse.
Not if it means the speech failing to get through. Which it probably will, so they won't abstain.
Will the SNP really vote to express confidence in a government intent on pursuing "austerity" and renewing Trident (both which they have been campaigning vociferously against in North Britain)? It must be doubted. The best that can be hoped for Labour is that they will abstain. The Daily Mail report that Ms Sturgeon has said Miliband will not get a budget through the House of Commons unless "he compromises".
Moving average chart of the 100 most recent YouGov polls. The blue upward trend continues notwithstanding last night's 1 point deficit due to the nature of the moving average. Click to enlarge...
YouGov's methology changed at data point number 77 and took 5 days to fully impact upon the moving average.
Looking at Gadfly's graph, the thing that strikes me is the 3 point fall in the Tories score immediately following the methodology change at data point 77.
Was there anything in the wider world to account for it. Did other pollsters register a similar fall?
From what I can see, other pollsters did not show a fall.
Yougov changed their method, because they were moving to daily polls over a whole week and they could not just rely on everyone within their polling group completing the polls. They selected people who had been reliable in completing polls in Jan and Feb, so they always had a decent sample size. This has meant that the daily polls now appear to meet Yougovs representative sample model and they are not having to apply the same weighting.
So I think the Tory reduction picked up by Yougov may be down to the changed method and it is has now settled down showing a result that is in line with average poll of polls.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
For some reason the 30 odd Labour MPs who voted for the No Confidence motion seem to be glossed over in history.
Who were these 30 odd Labour MPs?
I am a moron ignore my idiocy, got completely confused about everything.
It's ok. We all have these days.
One of the best things I've seen at the theatre was This House. About the Lab whips that night and the days and years leading up to it.
Plus the actions of Bernard Weatherall that night.
He'd have been a gent but the Tory party would have viewed him the same way I view Mark Reckless
Despite all the argument about PC and SNP not supporting the Tories, I am not convinced.
PC did support a Rainbow Coalition of Con Lib, PC after 2007 Welsh Assembly elections. It was the Welsh LibDem conference that refused to endorse it.
SNP did run Scotland with the support of the Scottish Conservatives in Holyrood in 2007.
Ultimately, both PC and SNP are in competition with Labour for the same voters. Their campaigning position is to categorically deny any support for the Tories.
After the election, I expect they will look for the very best deal for Wales & Scotland.
Well - Ozzy has clearly tried and half succeeded at getting rid of the deficit.
...if you accept that the budget deficit can be decomposed into two components, a structural budget deficit and a cyclical budget deficit...
I don't really. Nobody knows for sure what is structural and what is cyclical. Politicians hide behind resolving one part whilst failing to address the other. Meanwhile we borrow whatever we spend in excess of tax. The only important number is the absolute defict and eliminating it. We need a surplus. For years. Brown clearly grossly mis-estimated the underlying economy and therefore the structural bit. Whoever is chancellor will have to internalise the need for deep reform if we are ever to halt a slide towards Greece. We've probably made the easy cuts already - now come the real ones. Or not. Is the electorate ready for that? I see no evidence. Are the parties? 5 out of 7 expressly wish to go the other way.
I've been searching for the value bet this election. I missed out on the SNP seats and first debate winner with Sturgeon, but Tory minority Govt at 6's looks great value considering Ed's comments last night, the fact that Labour probably will under perform the polling aggregate and there just will not be an appetite for another LD/Tory coalition.
Agree with you. I simply don't think the LibDems will allow Clegg to go in another Coalition with the Conservatives - and come to that nobody should assume that David Cameron's MP's will allow him to have another Coalition either.
Its hard to see the majority numbers adding up anyway. But equally what you will not see is any euphoria at being in or retaining government like we did last time. This time there is no relief that Brown is finally out of Downing Street. What an appalling period that was.
I think we will see a very very short honeymoon for whoever wins.
Not if it means the speech failing to get through. Which it probably will, so they won't abstain.
Will the SNP really vote to express confidence in a government intent on pursuing "austerity" and renewing Trident (both which they have been campaigning vociferously against in North Britain)? It must be doubted. The best that can be hoped for Labour is that they will abstain. The Daily Mail report that Ms Sturgeon has said Miliband will not get a budget through the House of Commons unless "he compromises".
Correct me if I'm wrong but aren't the Queens' speech and the budget are two different things ?
Once Ed is in, the FTPA keeps him in. He'd have to bring himself down by recommending a vote of No Confidence to his own party !
I'm just saying Ed gets there. I make no firm predictions about his miserable life once there.
One of the most disappointing things is the way the SNP were able to get their way regarding postponing the Holyrood election from 2015 to 2016 just because that's what they wanted so that's what better happen.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
I've been tipping Con Minority for ages
I wrote a guest thread tipping it a 10/1 back in October. You never published it, you naughty boy!
Blame Mark Reckless.
Yours was scheduled to go up at 3pm on Saturday the 27th of September.
TPD defecting at 2:27pm that day was annoying.
About 5 mins earlier Everton scored an injury time equaliser in the Merseyside derby.
Not the best 10mins of my life.
Not all bad news. It did lead me to start my own blog, so I could independently publish in future. Haven't regretted it since.
The problem that Labour would have with a second best minority government (ie Conservatives being the biggest party) is that they have to get SNP etc voting for them, and not just abstaining.
Mr. Palmer, do you not think that would have a seriously negative long-term impact against Labour in England? UKIP could clean up your WWC voters, getting many seats themselves and letting the Conservatives in through the middle elsewhere.
If Scotland crushes Labour, and England rejects Labour, and Labour's leader becomes PM, that won't go down well.
The question that should be asked of Cameron/Miliband is 'Do you rule out a deal with Labour/Tories?'
I'm coming to the view that a Grand Coalition could suit them both. It's the perfect defence against whatever happens whilst they're in coalition, EM avoids being tainted in E&W with the SNP and Cameron gets to be PM for another 2 years before 'spending more time with his family' which I suspect is his personal timetable. No instability (beyond grumbling backbenchers) and everyone gets 5 years to reset themselves before we do it all again.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
I've been tipping Con Minority for ages
Et moi aussi. Which may give a few folk pause to think :-)
I will only start worrying if Rogerdamus starts predicting it.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course. 0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
Yes, Burnham sounded very confident on the Radio this morning. Labour will put forward a Queen's speech and dare the SNP to vote it down.
They won't.
Does anyone know if the SNP have any history of toppling Labour governments?
*Innocent Face*
What ?
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
But you're missing the first thing that needs to happen.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
No- they won't. They'd be stupid too. Get on the Tory minority on betfair, it seems to me a real possibility after thinking through the most probable scenarios- i.e. Tories comfortably most seats and most votes and the LD's needing to regroup outside Govt.
I've been tipping Con Minority for ages
I wrote a guest thread tipping it a 10/1 back in October. You never published it, you naughty boy!
Blame Mark Reckless.
Yours was scheduled to go up at 3pm on Saturday the 27th of September.
TPD defecting at 2:27pm that day was annoying.
About 5 mins earlier Everton scored an injury time equaliser in the Merseyside derby.
Not the best 10mins of my life.
Not all bad news. It did lead me to start my own blog, so I could independently publish in future. Haven't regretted it since.
Unimpressed by Dave, but then again she'll never vote for him in a million years.
Thought Ed was doing quite well until he ruled out a deal with the SNP. Echoed the audience thoughts of him playing us for fools on that one. She quite likes the SNP (Has no financial interest in it *cough*) -just likes the left wing line.
You're only safe in England's part of this Sceptred Isle. How does the song go ... "The English, the English, the English are best. I wouldn't give you tuppence for all of the rest."
You are having a giraffe, daily we see murder , rape and pillage in the news from England, and that is without terrorists and Jihadi's.
I would imagine the Highlands of Scotland would be the place to be or some of the less populated parts of England.
I'm taking Millibands comments wrt a SNP deal the same way I took Clegg's wrt the DUP: using the word deal to rule out a coalition, which of course was never on the cards.
Post-election, they say "it's not a deal, there's no formal agreement". Plenty wriggle room.
I don't think so. Miliband was as clear as he could be about this last night. He said he wouldn't barter away parts of his manifesto. He said he would put forward his Queen Speech and let the other parties decide whether they wanted to vote for it. As clear as day that means no horse-trading, no deals in dark rooms, everything out in the open in the Commons.
It means that when Labour propose a vote on an austerity measure, or Trident, that the SNP will vote against he is daring the Tories to vote with the SNP. It means that when Labour propose a measure on increasing taxes, scrapping non-doms or zero-hours contracts, etc, that the Tories will vote against that he is daring the SNP to vote with the Tories.
Maybe a Miliband government would fall on something like his removal of the winter fuel allowance from higher rate tax paying pensioners, but I doubt it. I think there are enough things where the SNP wouldn't dare to vote with the Tories, and the Tories wouldn't dare to vote with the SNP, that a minority Labour government could get a reasonable amount of business through the House.
It will be fraught and dramatic. A bloody close run thing almost every week. But if Miliband holds his nerve there is a course to be charted.
Stupid of Ed to have waited this long to rule out a deal with the SNP.
If he had done so earlier,could have slowed the mass hysteria north of the border.
Would have made no difference and we know he will be back if and when power beckons
Nicola will be Ed's poodle voting for him as he brings in cuts.
We will see who the poodle is
I very much agree with you Malcolm (Tory though I am!) This idea that somehow Miliband has called the SNP's bluff doesn't stack up to me. If Labour are say 20-30 seats behind the Tories then they will need the SNP in order to win a vote in the HOC. The SNP won't go with an austerity package - they daren't, but in return for something for Scotland from Labour they could be brought on board. Whether it's up front or a back door deal, Miliband will have to have a deal of sorts with them even if it is publicly denied.
Comments
You have to admit that would make a thread header interesting on so many levels that even TSE's head might explode.
looks around nervously....
*I mentioned an AV thread........ I think I got away with it*
"Was opposing AV Dave's greatest strategic blunder of this parliament?"
@AStjohnstone
If Ed is not PM:
@JackW.
These two posters have been the most vociferous in their positions through the whole campaign, neither changing or hedging.
I hope Ed puts him in back in his box for that.
Probably after he has taken the Mirror to task over phone hacking.
Burnham being helpful as ever on R5: BBC: " there will have to be dialogue, won't there? Yes or no? [with SNP] Andy Burnham: Of course.
0 retweets 0 favorites
So thats the fact of it... there WILL be deals with the SNP to get support.
But we differ on the number of doubtfuls. Not finding many at all, while MM is finding lots. What are others encountering?
They won't.
In terms of GDP the deficit has been reduced by more than half.
In terms of spending Osborne has met his targets. As the Eurozone economy affected our own, Osborne wisely extended his deficit timetable rather than screw the economy just to meet a noy=tional target.
Our balance of payments is also affected by investors from overseas repatriating profits from a growing economy - ours. Our own overseas investments have been subject to a depressed world economy and have no been as strong.
*Innocent Face*
Before they've started ?
Ed Miliband is our next PM - I've twisted in the wind and wriggled and withed and hedged more than a bipolar wotsit, but the SNP won't vote down a Labour Queens' speech.
AStjohnstone has convinced me.
"I have, they mostly vote Sinn Fein."
Fair enough, I should have stated GB.
Why cannot people stop thinking there is a magic wand for leaders to wave around?
However, if you accept that the budget deficit can be decomposed into two components, a structural budget deficit and a cyclical budget deficit, then you might expect that the cyclical budget deficit would actually be returning to a surplus around about now, given that we have had two years of solid growth and very large increases in employment.
This would further imply that the structural part of the budget deficit has actually been cut by less than half, which is a pathetic record given the stated aims of the Coalition. And you can't blame the Eurozone crisis for this, because if you accept the concept of a structural budget deficit then the Eurozone crisis would only have affected the cyclical component of the budget deficit.
So somehow the Coalition have delivered less than half of what they promised on deficit reduction, and they aren't being challenged on that half as much as they ought to be during this election campaign.
** The actual figures from the ONS are a peak of £154bn in 2009/10 and a decline to £87bn in 2014/15, which is a cut of 44%, which is four-ninths, rather than one-half.
If the Tories have won the popular vote, and are comfortably ahead of Labour on seats, will Labour vote down a Tory Queen's Speech?
Are there any lists of public models? Kinda fancy logging them all.
http://ponyonthetories.blogspot.co.uk/
ALL parties have racists and other undesirables, even the "progressives"
I once hated the thought of Ed hanging on once defeated, but after seeing his performance through the election I am quite warming to the idea.
GE 2017 - Ed vs Boris!
I have a theory re difference between online and telephone polling. With online polling, people sign up to take part in polling on various and not just politics. Yougov ask about political indentification, newspaper, how they voted in 2010 and they apply weighting to get a result that meets with the model sample used. With telephone polling it is about politics only, the samples are generally smaller and most calls will be to landline numbers, not mobile numbers. A lot of younger people will no longer have landline numbers and just use mobiles, so their opinion will not be sampled as much.
Not saying that telephone polling will be proved to be less accurate, but I wonder whether the smaller samples, less work done on who they poll and phone calls mostly to landline numbers, would find out the true positions across the country.
Experts believe investors are taking money out of UK markets such as the FTSE 100 amid uncertainty over the political landscape after the election next Thursday.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/markets/11575805/Investors-pull-record-1bn-out-of-UK-markets-amid-general-election-fears.html
Labour needs something to halt the SNP and ensure it does not continue on to Holyrood. Keeping Tories in power might benefit them in the short term.
Will it work though? I'm not sure. I honestly believe Scotland is on the path to independence and nothing is doing to stop it. Plus, a minority Labour govt (with significantly less seats than the Tories) might end up destroying the party.
God forbid this happens. What a mess!
In such a situation, you should claim to be an atheist. As long as you're not a black Proddy.
For the others, I should emphasis that 'black' is nothing to do with skin colour.
Well - you may be right. I actually quite like Ozzy (alot more than I like Dave). Getting to a surplus is a necessary first step and will in and of itself wash some of the crap out of our economy. Will he go full Maggie and push deep supply side reform? Maybe not. Maybe half. Certainly he is the only potential occupant of No.11 that will even try. Trying to get major supply side reform past an entitlements mindset electorate is a bit of a hospital pass for any prospective chancellor though, however much they may wish for it (or not, in the case of Ed Balls).
You are spot on to summarise the choice as a bit shite vs totally shite economic management. We are a democracy, however, in which the economic opinion of the electorate ranges from a bit shite to totally shite. I earnestly wish for a party and a leader and a chancellor who might take public opinion with them in the direction of sound money.
We did not have the economy able to sustain that spending and that's even before you consider whether it was wise spending.
The structural economy was not as big as Brown believed. The banks' revenues crumbled.
But the penny has only dropped with me. I've had my first eureka moment during this campaign.
I'm referring to the Tory top table - not Top Gear!
When Ed Milliband says no deal with SNP
Labour already "clarifying" Ed's remarks so that no means errr yes.
Was there anything in the wider world to account for it. Did other pollsters register a similar fall?
Post-election, they say "it's not a deal, there's no formal agreement". Plenty wriggle room.
Labour have had problems dealing with the Tory accusations re overspending and the Liam Byrnes note re no money left. The should have found a way to explain the situation better, so the public could understand the situation more. There are some excellent articles online that explain where Labour could have made different decisions in hindsight and what the Tories were signed up to before the Banking crash. The Tories only changed their minds on spending, when they could see the effect of the Banking crash and a massive deficit coming up.
You're only safe in England's part of this Sceptred Isle. How does the song go ... "The English, the English, the English are best. I wouldn't give you tuppence for all of the rest."
But equally what you will not see is any euphoria at being in or retaining government like we did last time. This time there is no relief that Brown is finally out of Downing Street. What an appalling period that was.
Unimpressed by Dave, but then again she'll never vote for him in a million years.
Thought Ed was doing quite well until he ruled out a deal with the SNP. Echoed the audience thoughts of him playing us for fools on that one. She quite likes the SNP (Has no financial interest in it *cough*) -just likes the left wing line.
"That's a stupid thing to say"
Yours was scheduled to go up at 3pm on Saturday the 27th of September.
TPD defecting at 2:27pm that day was annoying.
About 5 mins earlier Everton scored an injury time equaliser in the Merseyside derby.
Not the best 10mins of my life.
So, no.
Yougov changed their method, because they were moving to daily polls over a whole week and they could not just rely on everyone within their polling group completing the polls. They selected people who had been reliable in completing polls in Jan and Feb, so they always had a decent sample size. This has meant that the daily polls now appear to meet Yougovs representative sample model and they are not having to apply the same weighting.
So I think the Tory reduction picked up by Yougov may be down to the changed method and it is has now settled down showing a result that is in line with average poll of polls.
One of the best things I've seen at the theatre was This House. About the Lab whips that night and the days and years leading up to it.
Plus the actions of Bernard Weatherall that night.
He'd have been a gent but the Tory party would have viewed him the same way I view Mark Reckless
PC did support a Rainbow Coalition of Con Lib, PC after 2007 Welsh Assembly elections. It was the Welsh LibDem conference that refused to endorse it.
SNP did run Scotland with the support of the Scottish Conservatives in Holyrood in 2007.
Ultimately, both PC and SNP are in competition with Labour for the same voters. Their campaigning position is to categorically deny any support for the Tories.
After the election, I expect they will look for the very best deal for Wales & Scotland.
Once Ed is in, the FTPA keeps him in. He'd have to bring himself down by recommending a vote of No Confidence to his own party !
I'm just saying Ed gets there. I make no firm predictions about his miserable life once there.
This means deals (albeit backroom).
If Scotland crushes Labour, and England rejects Labour, and Labour's leader becomes PM, that won't go down well.
I'm coming to the view that a Grand Coalition could suit them both. It's the perfect defence against whatever happens whilst they're in coalition, EM avoids being tainted in E&W with the SNP and Cameron gets to be PM for another 2 years before 'spending more time with his family' which I suspect is his personal timetable. No instability (beyond grumbling backbenchers) and everyone gets 5 years to reset themselves before we do it all again.
ponyonthetories.blogspot.co.uk is mine
I would imagine the Highlands of Scotland would be the place to be or some of the less populated parts of England.
It means that when Labour propose a vote on an austerity measure, or Trident, that the SNP will vote against he is daring the Tories to vote with the SNP. It means that when Labour propose a measure on increasing taxes, scrapping non-doms or zero-hours contracts, etc, that the Tories will vote against that he is daring the SNP to vote with the Tories.
Maybe a Miliband government would fall on something like his removal of the winter fuel allowance from higher rate tax paying pensioners, but I doubt it. I think there are enough things where the SNP wouldn't dare to vote with the Tories, and the Tories wouldn't dare to vote with the SNP, that a minority Labour government could get a reasonable amount of business through the House.
It will be fraught and dramatic. A bloody close run thing almost every week. But if Miliband holds his nerve there is a course to be charted.