Alternatively back them both to win which pays about 6/5. (Effectively taking 4/11 on Labour winning). Together with 22/1 Zac Goldsmith you should be fine...
It's a bit reminiscent of last time, when you could back Ken Livingstone at very good odds long after it became clear that no-one else could get the Labour nomination.
The disparity isn't as favourable this time, but stilll...
Mr Felix I'm not sure of your point. Cameron has repeatedly stated he will campaign to stay in a reformed EU, when it becomes obvious there is no such thing his credibility on the subject is in tatters.
You need more respect for the voters and their choices. As for Cameron's credibility - well he has decisively trounced Labour in 2 elections - clearly the voters have no problem with it. You need to get real and move on.
In one election he was short of majority by 18, in the other above majority by 7.
Is "trounce" the most appropriate word ? What will you have used if his majority was 166 ?
What is his majority over Labour ?
Labour gained four seats (net) from the Tories, in spite of a growing economy and Ed as leader. It was much less than the polls suggested, but it was a net gain nevertheless.
Labour also gained 1.5% vote share in spite of the SNP and UKIP incursions into their vote. They weren't "trounced". That is a Tory Story.
The Tory majority is entirely based on their 28 gains from the LibDems (less their four losses to Labour). It was the LibDems who were trounced.
It is also true that Labour was trounced by the SNP. But that had nothing to do with the Tories.
If I had told you in April that by late May you'd be going nur-nur-ne-nur-nurr because Labour ACTUALLY made net gains of four seats off the Tories, you would have said THAT would have been a Tory story!
The actual result was a big surprise to all of us - even the Tory optimists. That was because of the polls which totally misled us.
But it was still a puzzle at the time. Why were the polls so good for Labour when the fundamentals were so bad (booming economy, Ed as leader etc). We now know the answer. The polls were wrong.
But it would be foolish for the Tories to kid themselves that they trounced Labour. They would draw the wrong conclusions. So would Labour. Labour was trounced by the SNP and the LibDems were trounced by the Tories. The fightback by Labour (and LibDems) needs to recognise that fact.
Labour has a mountain to climb (99 seats) and can only do that with a substantial contribution from the SNP and LibDems. I don't think Labour can outflank the SNP. It needs to cooperate with it. Similarly the LibDems need to position themselves left of centre again to succeed in the LibDem Tory marginals and gain back the disaffected 2010 LibDem voters. The departure of Clegg and the reappearance of the Tory Nasty Party will help.
Right, I've placed a nominal sum (all my bets are nominal, I have no disposable income to speak of) on Jowell or Khan winning the nomination @1.32.
SkyBet would give you a combined 1.61
I will consider an account, in that case; I don't have one at the moment. Surely 1.61 must be value...
Better hurry, I expect they'll wake up soon.
Alternatively back them both to win which pays about 6/5. (Effectively taking 4/11 on Labour winning). Together with 22/1 Zac Goldsmith you should be fine...
I considered it, but it will be a longer payout time and I don't have a particularly strong feeling on whether say 1.4 is a good price for a Labour win given the longer period for uncertainty.
The date of the referendum is to be appointed by the Secretary of State, not later than 31 December 2017. The question is "Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union?". The franchise is parliamentary roll, peers and, in Gibraltar, commonwealth citizens entitled to vote in European Parliamentary elections.
The date of the referendum is to be appointed by the Secretary of State, not later than 31 December 2017. The question is "Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union?". The franchise is parliamentary roll, peers and, in Gibraltar, commonwealth citizens entitled to vote in European Parliamentary elections.
Alternatively back them both to win which pays about 6/5. (Effectively taking 4/11 on Labour winning). Together with 22/1 Zac Goldsmith you should be fine...
It's a bit reminiscent of last time, when you could back Ken Livingstone at very good odds long after it became clear that no-one else could get the Labour nomination.
The disparity isn't as favourable this time, but stilll...
To my mind Tessa looks like an absolutely dreadful throwback candidate. But none of the candidates particularly inspire - you couldn't rule out an independent victory (only 12/1 in the Winning Party market) but no-one comes to mind.
The date of the referendum is to be appointed by the Secretary of State, not later than 31 December 2017. The question is "Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union?". The franchise is parliamentary roll, peers and, in Gibraltar, commonwealth citizens entitled to vote in European Parliamentary elections.
THe fudge, if there is one, will be to have it the same day as every other election imaginable, thus closing down debate, and encouraging a yes because of cognitive dissonance, since all the party leaders will be in favour and most parties official position will be too.
To my mind Tessa looks like an absolutely dreadful throwback candidate. But none of the candidates particularly inspire - you couldn't rule out an independent victory (only 12/1 in the Winning Party market) but no-one comes to mind.
Certainly none of the Labour wannabes are anything special. If Zac were to stand, he would be a much more colourful candidate, but otherwise it does look rather dull.
Still, business is business, and the Labour candidate being one of Sadiq or Tessa looks as certain as these things ever can be.
Genuine question to PBers of all hues - beyond simply leaving, what would you change about the EU to improve it? What are the fundamental problems you see with it?
As an instinctive IN-er, but with a pragmatic understanding of its shortcomings, the two major issues for me are inefficiency and lack of democracy. I'm much less bothered about free movement.
Reform of the CAP (and related, Fishing Rights/Issues). Scrap the waste of money that is Strasbourg (Parliament should have a single seat not 2 - utterly pointless waste of money). Increase Democracy (which effectively means boosting the power of the EU Parliament over the Commission / Individual Ministers - this also requires people to actually vote in the EU Elections on the basis of who they want in the EU Parliament, rather than as a 'hit the Government' etc. so there is an element of chicken / egg about this one...
It looks like you could well get what you want. The last one will come about over time, and the first two just need the French to elect Marine Le Pen and leave the EU.
The date of the referendum is to be appointed by the Secretary of State, not later than 31 December 2017. The question is "Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union?". The franchise is parliamentary roll, peers and, in Gibraltar, commonwealth citizens entitled to vote in European Parliamentary elections.
THe fudge, if there is one, will be to have it the same day as every other election imaginable, thus closing down debate, and encouraging a yes because of cognitive dissonance, since all the party leaders will be in favour and most parties official position will be too.
Alternatively back them both to win which pays about 6/5. (Effectively taking 4/11 on Labour winning). Together with 22/1 Zac Goldsmith you should be fine...
It's a bit reminiscent of last time, when you could back Ken Livingstone at very good odds long after it became clear that no-one else could get the Labour nomination.
The disparity isn't as favourable this time, but stilll...
To my mind Tessa looks like an absolutely dreadful throwback candidate. But none of the candidates particularly inspire - you couldn't rule out an independent victory (only 12/1 in the Winning Party market) but no-one comes to mind.
The key issues this time are housing, housing and housing. An issue on which both Labour and the Tories lack credibility, but so will an outsider.
Mr Felix I'm not sure of your point. Cameron has repeatedly stated he will campaign to stay in a reformed EU, when it becomes obvious there is no such thing his credibility on the subject is in tatters.
You need more respect for the voters and their choices. As for Cameron's credibility - well he has decisively trounced Labour in 2 elections - clearly the voters have no problem with it. You need to get real and move on.
In one election he was short of majority by 18, in the other above majority by 7.
Is "trounce" the most appropriate word ? What will you have used if his majority was 166 ?
What is his majority over Labour ?
It is also true that Labour was trounced by the SNP. But that had nothing to do with the Tories.
If I had told you in April that by late May you'd be going nur-nur-ne-nur-nurr because Labour ACTUALLY made net gains of four seats off the Tories, you would have said THAT would have been a Tory story!
The actual result was a big surprise to all of us - even the Tory optimists. That was because of the polls which totally misled us.
But it was still a puzzle at the time. Why were the polls so good for Labour when the fundamentals were so bad (booming economy, Ed as leader etc). We now know the answer. The polls were wrong.
But it would be foolish for the Tories to kid themselves that they trounced Labour. They would draw the wrong conclusions. So would Labour. Labour was trounced by the SNP and the LibDems were trounced by the Tories. The fightback by Labour (and LibDems) needs to recognise that fact.
Labour has a mountain to climb (99 seats) and can only do that with a substantial contribution from the SNP and LibDems. I don't think Labour can outflank the SNP. It needs to cooperate with it. Similarly the LibDems need to position themselves left of centre again to succeed in the LibDem Tory marginals and gain back the disaffected 2010 LibDem voters. The departure of Clegg and the reappearance of the Tory Nasty Party will help.
Labour's fight is with the Tories. There are very few LibDems for Labour to unseat. There are only two Scottish seats in Labour's top 60 targets. Your hope is that the Nasty Party will rise up now it has a Parliamentary majority. I'm not seeing that. What you see as "nasty", the electorate sees as "quite right too, should have been sorted out long ago..."
Labour has to broaden out from what is popular with Polly Toynbee to what is popular with the guys and gals working in call centres.... All too often they are mutually exclusive.
The date of the referendum is to be appointed by the Secretary of State, not later than 31 December 2017. The question is "Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union?". The franchise is parliamentary roll, peers and, in Gibraltar, commonwealth citizens entitled to vote in European Parliamentary elections.
THe fudge, if there is one, will be to have it the same day as every other election imaginable, thus closing down debate, and encouraging a yes because of cognitive dissonance, since all the party leaders will be in favour and most parties official position will be too.
Genuine question to PBers of all hues - beyond simply leaving, what would you change about the EU to improve it? What are the fundamental problems you see with it?
As an instinctive IN-er, but with a pragmatic understanding of its shortcomings, the two major issues for me are inefficiency and lack of democracy. I'm much less bothered about free movement.
My primary concern probably won't make the top 10 issues in the debate. It is that as the EZ inevitably integrates further (if only to stay together) they will start to use their combined voting power with QMV to reshape the market in ways favourable to their interests. This may be blatant (such as requiring financial institutions offering services to the EZ to have their head office in the EZ or imposing financial transaction style taxes that are basically being imposed on London for their benefit) or more subtle (such as increasing the proportion of "investments" made in the EZ bloc effectively requiring our tax payers to subsidise theirs.
Stopping this and providing us with sufficient protections as by far the largest and most significant non EZ member is going to be difficult. I think the definition of QMV will need to be changed to reflect the ins and the outs requiring some sort of majority on both. But if we cannot protect our essential national interests that would be a compelling argument to leave.
My understanding is that is one of the UK's key renegotiation demands. Protections for non-eurozone countries for QMV carried by the eurozone voting as a bloc, and a 'red card' ( which I presume is a veto) for national parliaments.
Quite big changes that I can't see requiring anything less than a treaty change.
Mr Putin could be about to discover that the European and American teams can't be bothered to go to his precious tournament, and that Gazprom are the only sponsor left as the others all pull out in the face of public boycotts. No-one but the wealthy diehard and corporate freeloader was going to go to Qatar anyway, whatever time of year they hold it.
Genuine question to PBers of all hues - beyond simply leaving, what would you change about the EU to improve it? What are the fundamental problems you see with it?
As an instinctive IN-er, but with a pragmatic understanding of its shortcomings, the two major issues for me are inefficiency and lack of democracy. I'm much less bothered about free movement.
My primary concern probably won't make the top 10 issues in the debate. It is that as the EZ inevitably integrates further (if only to stay together) they will start to use their combined voting power with QMV to reshape the market in ways favourable to their interests. This may be blatant (such as requiring financial institutions offering services to the EZ to have their head office in the EZ or imposing financial transaction style taxes that are basically being imposed on London for their benefit) or more subtle (such as increasing the proportion of "investments" made in the EZ bloc effectively requiring our tax payers to subsidise theirs.
Stopping this and providing us with sufficient protections as by far the largest and most significant non EZ member is going to be difficult. I think the definition of QMV will need to be changed to reflect the ins and the outs requiring some sort of majority on both. But if we cannot protect our essential national interests that would be a compelling argument to leave.
My understanding is that is one of the UK's key renegotiation demands. Protections for non-eurozone countries for QMV carried by the eurozone voting as a bloc, and a 'red card' ( which I presume is a veto) for national parliaments.
Quite big changes that I can't see requiring anything less than a treaty change.
Oh I agree the government is alert to it. I just don't see it registering with the man in the street, let alone the man who reads the Daily Express.
But for me it is the key of whether the EU can work for us in the medium term.
Mr Felix I'm not sure of your point. Cameron has repeatedly stated he will campaign to stay in a reformed EU, when it becomes obvious there is no such thing his credibility on the subject is in tatters.
You need more respect for the voters and their choices. As for Cameron's credibility - well he has decisively trounced Labour in 2 elections - clearly the voters have no problem with it. You need to get real and move on.
In one election he was short of majority by 18, in the other above majority by 7.
Is "trounce" the most appropriate word ? What will you have used if his majority was 166 ?
What is his majority over Labour ?
It is also true that Labour was trounced by the SNP. But that had nothing to do with the Tories.
If I had told you in April that by late May you'd be going nur-nur-ne-nur-nurr because Labour ACTUALLY made net gains of four seats off the Tories, you would have said THAT would have been a Tory story!
The actual result was a big surprise to all of us - even the Tory optimists. That was because of the polls which totally misled us.
But it was still a puzzle at the time. Snip
Labour has a mountain to climb (99 seats) and can only do that with a substantial contribution from the SNP and LibDems. I don't think Labour can outflank the SNP. It needs to cooperate with it. Similarly the LibDems need to position themselves left of centre again to succeed in the LibDem Tory marginals and gain back the disaffected 2010 LibDem voters. The departure of Clegg and the reappearance of the Tory Nasty Party will help.
Labour's fight is with the Tories. There are very few LibDems for Labour to unseat. There are only two Scottish seats in Labour's top 60 targets. Your hope is that the Nasty Party will rise up now it has a Parliamentary majority. I'm not seeing that. What you see as "nasty", the electorate sees as "quite right too, should have been sorted out long ago..."
Labour has to broaden out from what is popular with Polly Toynbee to what is popular with the guys and gals working in call centres.... All too often they are mutually exclusive.
Their problem is that reaching out to current Tory voters makes most Labour Party members throw up a bit of sick into their mouths.
But they need to get past that if they want to win.
The date of the referendum is to be appointed by the Secretary of State, not later than 31 December 2017. The question is "Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union?". The franchise is parliamentary roll, peers and, in Gibraltar, commonwealth citizens entitled to vote in European Parliamentary elections.
THe fudge, if there is one, will be to have it the same day as every other election imaginable, thus closing down debate, and encouraging a yes because of cognitive dissonance, since all the party leaders will be in favour and most parties official position will be too.
It is also true that Labour was trounced by the SNP. But that had nothing to do with the Tories.
If I had told you in April that by late May you'd be going nur-nur-ne-nur-nurr because Labour ACTUALLY made net gains of four seats off the Tories, you would have said THAT would have been a Tory story!
The actual result was a big surprise to all of us - even the Tory optimists. That was because of the polls which totally misled us.
But it was still a puzzle at the time. Snip
Labour has a mountain to climb (99 seats) and can only do that with a substantial contribution from the SNP and LibDems. I don't think Labour can outflank the SNP. It needs to cooperate with it. Similarly the LibDems need to position themselves left of centre again to succeed in the LibDem Tory marginals and gain back the disaffected 2010 LibDem voters. The departure of Clegg and the reappearance of the Tory Nasty Party will help.
Labour's fight is with the Tories. There are very few LibDems for Labour to unseat. There are only two Scottish seats in Labour's top 60 targets. Your hope is that the Nasty Party will rise up now it has a Parliamentary majority. I'm not seeing that. What you see as "nasty", the electorate sees as "quite right too, should have been sorted out long ago..."
Labour has to broaden out from what is popular with Polly Toynbee to what is popular with the guys and gals working in call centres.... All too often they are mutually exclusive.
Their problem is that reaching out to current Tory voters makes most Labour Party members throw up a bit of sick into their mouths.
But they need to get past that if they want to win.
I agree that's how people think of it, but they shouldn't. What Labour need to do is think about the country's problems, moving the focus away from state control and into the countyr can get more, better jobs, more, better housing, and more, better schools. Needn't be policies party members disagree with.
The significant omissions from the European Union Referendum Bill seem to be as follows: (1) There is no provision requiring an exit if there is a "No" vote. That means the outcome of the referendum will not bind the government. (2) The Bill is not expressed to take effect notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972. That means the European Commission (and anyone else acting under EU law) will have a free hand to avoid all campaign regulation, since the Act will take effect subject to EU law (see section 2(4) of the 1972 Act).
The date of the referendum is to be appointed by the Secretary of State, not later than 31 December 2017. The question is "Should the United Kingdom remain a member of the European Union?". The franchise is parliamentary roll, peers and, in Gibraltar, commonwealth citizens entitled to vote in European Parliamentary elections.
THe fudge, if there is one, will be to have it the same day as every other election imaginable, thus closing down debate, and encouraging a yes because of cognitive dissonance, since all the party leaders will be in favour and most parties official position will be too.
OT Did anyone watch The Island with Bear Ghrylls? I'd forgotten I'd recorded it and what a bunch they ended up with. Not sure I'd have been better company - but it was jolly good telly. And I don't normally watch reality TV like this.
Mr Felix I'm not sure of your point. Cameron has repeatedly stated he will campaign to stay in a reformed EU, when it becomes obvious there is no such thing his credibility on the subject is in tatters.
You need more respect for the voters and their choices. As for Cameron's credibility - well he has decisively trounced Labour in 2 elections - clearly the voters have no problem with it. You need to get real and move on.
In one election he was short of majority by 18, in the other above majority by 7.
Is "trounce" the most appropriate word ? What will you have used if his majority was 166 ?
What is his majority over Labour ?
It is also true that Labour was trounced by the SNP. But that had nothing to do with the Tories.
If I had told you in April that by late May you'd be going nur-nur-ne-nur-nurr because Labour ACTUALLY made net gains of four seats off the Tories, you would have said THAT would have been a Tory story!
The departure of Clegg and the reappearance of the Tory Nasty Party will help.
Labour's fight is with the Tories. There are very few LibDems for Labour to unseat. There are only two Scottish seats in Labour's top 60 targets. Your hope is that the Nasty Party will rise up now it has a Parliamentary majority. I'm not seeing that. What you see as "nasty", the electorate sees as "quite right too, should have been sorted out long ago..."
Labour has to broaden out from what is popular with Polly Toynbee to what is popular with the guys and gals working in call centres.... All too often they are mutually exclusive.
Their problem is that reaching out to current Tory voters makes most Labour Party members throw up a bit of sick into their mouths.
But they need to get past that if they want to win.
The significant omissions from the European Union Referendum Bill seem to be as follows: (1) There is no provision requiring an exit if there is a "No" vote. That means the outcome of the referendum will not bind the government. (2) The Bill is not expressed to take effect notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972. That means the European Commission (and anyone else acting under EU law) will have a free hand to avoid all campaign regulation, since the Act will take effect subject to EU law (see section 2(4) of the 1972 Act).
There's a delicious irony in the very first page needing to make a declaration under the HRA that the referendum bill is compatible with the ECHR.
Last week I published a brisk blogpost on The Spectator’s site in which I said that the Labour party should recognise that Unite was its enemy. The cliché that Labour and the unions were in a marriage was apt, I said: they fight all the time and don’t have sex. But few marriages survive adultery — and McCluskey’s eyes were always wandering.
My understanding is that is one of the UK's key renegotiation demands. Protections for non-eurozone countries for QMV carried by the eurozone voting as a bloc, and a 'red card' ( which I presume is a veto) for national parliaments.
Quite big changes that I can't see requiring anything less than a treaty change.
The Eurozone one is tricky to put in a treaty long-term because you don't know who will end up being outside the Eurozone. While it's 19 countries in and 9 countries out you could probably add an extra non-Eurozone blocking minority without anybody being particularly bothered, but there may be a period when everyone is a member except the UK, and there's no way the UK's getting any new veto power after the way Cameron dicked everyone around when they were trying to prevent the economy from collapsing.
Maybe the solution is to say something like "a measure can be blocked by 6 non-Eurozone members", or some population-weighted equivalent. The rest of the EU won't be bothered because this will probably never happen as the Eurozone grows, and the British will assume the blocking minority will remain long-term because they won't be able to believe anybody could actually still want to join the Euro.
Obviously you can't enact this until the next treaty whenever that happens and getting unanimous agreement may be tough, but you could do an end-run around that with a similar move to the Popular Vote Interstate Compact: Get a QMV blocking minority worth of countries to agree to vote against anything that the super-majority of non-Euro countries say no to.
The significant omissions from the European Union Referendum Bill seem to be as follows: (1) There is no provision requiring an exit if there is a "No" vote. That means the outcome of the referendum will not bind the government. (2) The Bill is not expressed to take effect notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972. That means the European Commission (and anyone else acting under EU law) will have a free hand to avoid all campaign regulation, since the Act will take effect subject to EU law (see section 2(4) of the 1972 Act).
The first of those points does not seem to me to be a major one. I can't really see any Government arguing that leaving we should not leave the EU in the case of an OUT vote because the vote was not binding.
The second point is more serious and I would hope would be amended during the passage through Parliament. The idea that the EU Commission or its agents should be able to ignore campaign regulations which apply to everyone else seems ludicrous.
That's a nonsense chart. According to the article/blog it comes from
"Some of these numbers (like Sochi's) are third-party estimates, others (like Beijing's) are based on official numbers that are almost certainly an undercount. And it's tough to do an apples-to-apples comparison here, since the Qatar estimates include the deaths of all migrant workers after the announcement of Qatar's successful bid in 2010, while other countries' figures may only include deaths directly related to, say, stadium construction."
It's illustrative. The numbers could be 50% off and the effect would be the same.
Without knowing the number of migrant workers in Qatar and what would be "normal" death rate, it's illustrative of absolutely nothing. The other figures measure totally different things, and thus do nothing to help us.
I don't like coming across as if I'm supporting Qatar, because some of the actual reporting of migrant workers conditions sounds horrible. But the chart is gibberish propaganda and nothing more.
That's a nonsense chart. According to the article/blog it comes from
"Some of these numbers (like Sochi's) are third-party estimates, others (like Beijing's) are based on official numbers that are almost certainly an undercount. And it's tough to do an apples-to-apples comparison here, since the Qatar estimates include the deaths of all migrant workers after the announcement of Qatar's successful bid in 2010, while other countries' figures may only include deaths directly related to, say, stadium construction."
It's illustrative. The numbers could be 50% off and the effect would be the same.
Without knowing the number of migrant workers in Qatar and what would be "normal" death rate, it's illustrative of absolutely nothing. The other figures measure totally different things, and thus do nothing to help us.
I don't like coming across as if I'm supporting Qatar, because some of the actual reporting of migrant workers conditions sounds horrible. But the chart is gibberish propaganda and nothing more.
That's a nonsense chart. According to the article/blog it comes from
"Some of these numbers (like Sochi's) are third-party estimates, others (like Beijing's) are based on official numbers that are almost certainly an undercount. And it's tough to do an apples-to-apples comparison here, since the Qatar estimates include the deaths of all migrant workers after the announcement of Qatar's successful bid in 2010, while other countries' figures may only include deaths directly related to, say, stadium construction."
It's illustrative. The numbers could be 50% off and the effect would be the same.
Without knowing the number of migrant workers in Qatar and what would be "normal" death rate, it's illustrative of absolutely nothing. The other figures measure totally different things, and thus do nothing to help us.
I don't like coming across as if I'm supporting Qatar, because some of the actual reporting of migrant workers conditions sounds horrible. But the chart is gibberish propaganda and nothing more.
Come on!
What sort of normal do you want?
London 2012 Olympics involved stadiums of every description, transport links, etc. etc, and involved the death of one employee (we can be confident of that figure).
The world is full of deeply misleading charts that do nothing to further their own causes. But in this particular instance there is value in the comparison.
In one election he was short of majority by 18, in the other above majority by 7.
Is "trounce" the most appropriate word ? What will you have used if his majority was 166 ?
What is his majority over Labour ?
It is also true that Labour was trounced by the SNP. But that had nothing to do with the Tories.
Labour has a mountain to climb (99 seats) and can only do that with a substantial contribution from the SNP and LibDems. I don't think Labour can outflank the SNP. It needs to cooperate with it. Similarly the LibDems need to position themselves left of centre again to succeed in the LibDem Tory marginals and gain back the disaffected 2010 LibDem voters. The departure of Clegg and the reappearance of the Tory Nasty Party will help.
Labour's fight is with the Tories. There are very few LibDems for Labour to unseat. There are only two Scottish seats in Labour's top 60 targets. Your hope is that the Nasty Party will rise up now it has a Parliamentary majority. I'm not seeing that. What you see as "nasty", the electorate sees as "quite right too, should have been sorted out long ago..."
Labour has to broaden out from what is popular with Polly Toynbee to what is popular with the guys and gals working in call centres.... All too often they are mutually exclusive.
I don't think Labour can achieve a majority in the foreseeable future whether they appeal to guys and gals working in call centres or not. They are contrained from the economic left by SNP, from the social conservative WWC right by UKIP and by Tories coming onto their turf. They need alliances to deny the Tories a majority. But I agree their main fight is with the Tories.
I don't think the problem for Labour was the broadness of their appeal. Many of their policies were popular according to the polls :-).
I think they had two problems. 1)- the politically correct agenda (eg proposed laws against Islamophobia) which not only repelled WWC but many middle of the road voters. They need to reduce this sort of stuff even if they lose a segment. 2) - the difficulty they had telling a vivid convincing story. The Tories excel at this. Labour needs a leader who can tell appealing stories. Such a leader would not have let the Tories away with successfully labelling the 2008 recession as the "Great Labour Recession". I don't know whether any of the current contenders for the Labour leadership would be good at this. Ed and Ed were hopeless.
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
Labour has a mountain to climb (99 seats) and can only do that with a substantial contribution from the SNP and LibDems. I don't think Labour can outflank the SNP. It needs to cooperate with it. Similarly the LibDems need to position themselves left of centre again to succeed in the LibDem Tory marginals and gain back the disaffected 2010 LibDem voters. The departure of Clegg and the reappearance of the Tory Nasty Party will help.
Labour's fight is with the Tories. There are very few LibDems for Labour to unseat. There are only two Scottish seats in Labour's top 60 targets. Your hope is that the Nasty Party will rise up now it has a Parliamentary majority. I'm not seeing that. What you see as "nasty", the electorate sees as "quite right too, should have been sorted out long ago..."
Labour has to broaden out from what is popular with Polly Toynbee to what is popular with the guys and gals working in call centres.... All too often they are mutually exclusive.
I don't think Labour can achieve a majority in the foreseeable future whether they appeal to guys and gals working in call centres or not. They are contrained from the economic left by SNP, from the social conservative WWC right by UKIP and by Tories coming onto their turf. They need alliances to deny the Tories a majority. But I agree their main fight is with the Tories.
I don't think the problem for Labour was the broadness of their appeal. Many of their policies were popular according to the polls :-).
I think they had two problems. 1)- the politically correct agenda (eg proposed laws against Islamophobia) which not only repelled WWC but many middle of the road voters. They need to reduce this sort of stuff even if they lose a segment. 2) - the difficulty they had telling a vivid convincing story. The Tories excel at this. Labour needs a leader who can tell appealing stories. Such a leader would not have let the Tories away with successfully labelling the 2008 recession as the "Great Labour Recession". I don't know whether any of the current contenders for the Labour leadership would be good at this. Ed and Ed were hopeless.
Among the bodies on a battlefield, it is always difficult to see where a success might come from. But we could be here in 2020 saying how well Labour did to peel away a smaller number of seats from each of the SNP, Tories and others. Say 10 gains from the SNP, 10 in London, 5 in Wales, 15 in the South, 10 in the West Midlands, and 20 in the North. A lab-led government would be back on the agenda.
Labour trying to pretend that the scale of the 2008/2009 crash was nothing to do with them, is akin to the Tories pretending that Black Wednesday was beyond their control.
It's simply not credible. And fighting a decade old war isn't convincing anyone that isn't already part of the 30% Labour vote.
Labour needs to swallow the pill and move on. The longer they deny what most people think - the worse it gets for them.
I don't think Labour can achieve a majority in the foreseeable future whether they appeal to guys and gals working in call centres or not. They are contrained from the economic left by SNP, from the social conservative WWC right by UKIP and by Tories coming onto their turf. They need alliances to deny the Tories a majority. But I agree their main fight is with the Tories.
I don't think the problem for Labour was the broadness of their appeal. Many of their policies were popular according to the polls :-).
I think they had two problems. 1)- the politically correct agenda (eg proposed laws against Islamophobia) which not only repelled WWC but many middle of the road voters. They need to reduce this sort of stuff even if they lose a segment. 2) - the difficulty they had telling a vivid convincing story. The Tories excel at this. Labour needs a leader who can tell appealing stories. Such a leader would not have let the Tories away with successfully labelling the 2008 recession as the "Great Labour Recession". I don't know whether any of the current contenders for the Labour leadership would be good at this. Ed and Ed were hopeless.
The proposed referendum question looks quite similar to the 1975 one, which was: " Do you think that the United Kingdom should stay in the European Community (The Common Market)?"
Welcome back Mr Disraeli I think you were posting way back .
Interesting point and sort of plays towards the Labour position of lowering the voting age I suppose.
I was unable to vote in that referendum as I ws 17 and just a few months short of being eligible. I have though had to live with the consequence of that vote for the last 40 years. I wanted to vote no at the time. My company were trading with New Zealand Australia etc. The markets were pretty much destroyed overnight... Well a few months to a year anyway.
I know a cut off line is required and my single vote would have made bugger all difference really. I still feel perhaps at that time I did not have a full grp of all the facts and the experience to make an informed decision but still.
I am now just utterly sick of Europe and the politics of Europe, the commission the parliament the petty rules and regulations and fed up with being told my unelected faceless bueracrats what we can and can't do so again .....probably I am being forced into the BOO camp. I just cannot see myself ever voting yes or BOI . We tried that and tested it to destruction it dosent work.
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
No surprise some people think the EU is fine as it is. Equally there will be many who will campaign for Out no matter what Cameron gets. Only a small number will ever change their minds.
Cameron himself will get what he can, and call it success. But the first half of that is not fatally undermined by the second.
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
My understanding is that is one of the UK's key renegotiation demands. Protections for non-eurozone countries for QMV carried by the eurozone voting as a bloc, and a 'red card' ( which I presume is a veto) for national parliaments.
Quite big changes that I can't see requiring anything less than a treaty change.
The Eurozone one is tricky to put in a treaty long-term because you don't know who will end up being outside the Eurozone. While it's 19 countries in and 9 countries out you could probably add an extra non-Eurozone blocking minority without anybody being particularly bothered, but there may be a period when everyone is a member except the UK, and there's no way the UK's getting any new veto power after the way Cameron dicked everyone around when they were trying to prevent the economy from collapsing.
Maybe the solution is to say something like "a measure can be blocked by 6 non-Eurozone members", or some population-weighted equivalent. The rest of the EU won't be bothered because this will probably never happen as the Eurozone grows, and the British will assume the blocking minority will remain long-term because they won't be able to believe anybody could actually still want to join the Euro.
Obviously you can't enact this until the next treaty whenever that happens and getting unanimous agreement may be tough, but you could do an end-run around that with a similar move to the Popular Vote Interstate Compact: Get a QMV blocking minority worth of countries to agree to vote against anything that the super-majority of non-Euro countries say no to.
What a surprise. EiT doesn't think renegotiation goal is practical or possible - shock!
There will be a red-card for the UK on any matters of vital interest to it, e.g. financial services, or else an opt-out from regulatory measures agreed through QMV. It will not be linked to the number of non-eurozone countries at the moment.
What the EU - and the treaties - need to recognise is that the single market has to work for countries who are *never* going to join the Euro.
If they won't play ball, we leave. It really is that simple.
That's a nonsense chart. According to the article/blog it comes from
"Some of these numbers (like Sochi's) are third-party estimates, others (like Beijing's) are based on official numbers that are almost certainly an undercount. And it's tough to do an apples-to-apples comparison here, since the Qatar estimates include the deaths of all migrant workers after the announcement of Qatar's successful bid in 2010, while other countries' figures may only include deaths directly related to, say, stadium construction."
It's illustrative. The numbers could be 50% off and the effect would be the same.
Without knowing the number of migrant workers in Qatar and what would be "normal" death rate, it's illustrative of absolutely nothing. The other figures measure totally different things, and thus do nothing to help us.
I don't like coming across as if I'm supporting Qatar, because some of the actual reporting of migrant workers conditions sounds horrible. But the chart is gibberish propaganda and nothing more.
A quick scan suggests c.1,200 worker deaths from the World Cup in Qatar. Whilst clearly an exaggeration there's no doubt in my mind that worker conditions out there are truly appalling.
My parents weren't interested in politics and when I was 9yrs old - I remember seeing the pro-con literature turn up in our post - and tried to convince them to vote.
I've no idea if they bothered - I suspect not. I suspect my inner geek was on display from a very early age. We never talked politics in our house = ever. That'll teach parents to leave their young offspring in front of the TV for 10 hrs a day. I also became an expert on horse-racing form!
The proposed referendum question looks quite similar to the 1975 one, which was: " Do you think that the United Kingdom should stay in the European Community (The Common Market)?"
Welcome back Mr Disraeli I think you were posting way back .
Interesting point and sort of plays towards the Labour position of lowering the voting age I suppose.
I was unable to vote in that referendum as I ws 17 and just a few months short of being eligible. I have though had to live with the consequence of that vote for the last 40 years. I wanted to vote no at the time. My company were trading with New Zealand Australia etc. The markets were pretty much destroyed overnight... Well a few months to a year anyway.
I know a cut off line is required and my single vote would have made bugger all difference really. I still feel perhaps at that time I did not have a full grp of all the facts and the experience to make an informed decision but still.
I am now just utterly sick of Europe and the politics of Europe, the commission the parliament the petty rules and regulations and fed up with being told my unelected faceless bueracrats what we can and can't do so again .....probably I am being forced into the BOO camp. I just cannot see myself ever voting yes or BOI . We tried that and tested it to destruction it dosent work.
The SNP are complaining about a 'Tory Veto' in the Scotland Bill - do they mean this?
The Scottish Ministers may not exercise the function of making regulations to which this section applies unless—
(a) they have consulted the Secretary of State about the practicability of implementing the regulations, and
(b) the Secretary of State has given his or her agreement as to when any change made by the regulations is to start to have effect, such agreement not to be unreasonably withheld.
Seems reasonable enough to me.....file under 'good governance' vs 'I'll do it if I want to!'
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
Ideally, the No campaign should not be fronted by UKIP. But, UKIP are the only political party that's committed to No. If prominent politicians from other parties are willing to campaign for No, they should lead it. If it's only a relatively small number of backbenchers, then I think it inevitably becomes a UKIP campaign.
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
Ideally, the No campaign should not be fronted by UKIP. But, UKIP are the only political party that's committed to No. If prominent politicians from other parties are willing to campaign for No, they should lead it. If it's only a relatively small number of backbenchers, then I think it inevitably becomes a UKIP campaign.
I'm not sure how serious it is - but I've certainly seen some stuff on Twitter etc. about Kate Hoey potentially taking a significant leadership type role in the Out Campaign.
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
The SNP are complaining about a 'Tory Veto' in the Scotland Bill - do they mean this?
The Scottish Ministers may not exercise the function of making regulations to which this section applies unless—
(a) they have consulted the Secretary of State about the practicability of implementing the regulations, and
(b) the Secretary of State has given his or her agreement as to when any change made by the regulations is to start to have effect, such agreement not to be unreasonably withheld.
Seems reasonable enough to me.....file under 'good governance' vs 'I'll do it if I want to!'
Only a plonker like you could imagine having to ask that single Tory moron Mundell for permission to do something as being acceptable.
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
What utter tosh. Philip Hollobone will no doubt be campaigning for No, whatever the outcome of the negotiations. So what? Some Conservative MPs are committed to In, some are committed to Out. Most are somewhere in between, and above all want to see reform to the EU.
The proposed referendum question looks quite similar to the 1975 one, which was: " Do you think that the United Kingdom should stay in the European Community (The Common Market)?"
Welcome back Mr Disraeli I think you were posting way back .
Interesting point and sort of plays towards the Labour position of lowering the voting age I suppose.
I was unable to vote in that referendum as I ws 17 and just a few months short of being eligible. I have though had to live with the consequence of that vote for the last 40 years. I wanted to vote no at the time. My company were trading with New Zealand Australia etc. The markets were pretty much destroyed overnight... Well a few months to a year anyway.
I know a cut off line is required and my single vote would have made bugger all difference really. I still feel perhaps at that time I did not have a full grp of all the facts and the experience to make an informed decision but still.
I am now just utterly sick of Europe and the politics of Europe, the commission the parliament the petty rules and regulations and fed up with being told my unelected faceless bueracrats what we can and can't do so again .....probably I am being forced into the BOO camp. I just cannot see myself ever voting yes or BOI . We tried that and tested it to destruction it dosent work.
If you think many UK rules and regulations will be reversed if we leave the EU, think again..
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
Ideally, the No campaign should not be fronted by UKIP. But, UKIP are the only political party that's committed to No. If prominent politicians from other parties are willing to campaign for No, they should lead it. If it's only a relatively small number of backbenchers, then I think it inevitably becomes a UKIP campaign.
Tory MP 'openly admitting' that he will vote to stay in on the current terms or better. I can't see any problem with that MP doing exactly that. I've also no problem with UKIP leading the BOO campaign - an 85% to 15% winning margin for IN will do nicely.
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
If, against the odds, BOO are to win, they cannot afford to get less than 40% of sizeable cross sections of the public like (a) Scotland or (b) Labour voters. So it would be vital to find a non-UKIP leader of the campaign, Hoey seems like a decent choice.
Hello white rabbit .... It does not matter how many seats labour take from the SNP they will not contribute to reducing a tory majority. Tories could capture seats as well.
The significant omissions from the European Union Referendum Bill seem to be as follows: (1) There is no provision requiring an exit if there is a "No" vote. That means the outcome of the referendum will not bind the government. (2) The Bill is not expressed to take effect notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972. That means the European Commission (and anyone else acting under EU law) will have a free hand to avoid all campaign regulation, since the Act will take effect subject to EU law (see section 2(4) of the 1972 Act).
The first of those points does not seem to me to be a major one. I can't really see any Government arguing that leaving we should not leave the EU in the case of an OUT vote because the vote was not binding.
I wouldn't say it's likely, but it's just about conceivable that they might try to get a do-over, either: 1) "Now we showed we're serious about leaving the other EU members have offered us X, Y and Z, let's put that to the voters." or more controversially: 2) "We've negotiated our exit deal, we'll ask the voters to sign off", then who knows what if they say no. (I think they may have to hold off pulling the TEU Article 50 cord for this to be an option, but in theory they could do that.)
My ward party (one of the largest in London, part of Islington North) chewed it over last night. Christian Wolmar is a member and well liked so might get a nomination, but otherwise it was pretty clear that Jowell and Khan were co-favourites. Abbott got a bit of credit by actually mentioning some policies in her pitch - otherwise there was a bit too much of the "My second cousin was a tube driver" stuff in the statements - but her willingness to have a go at the party as part of her TV pundit role hasn't done her any favours.
An issue was that few of the dozens of members present - including some of the most politicised voters in the country,I'd think - had a really clear idea of the scope of the Mayor's powers beyond the "bully pulpit" role - it's hard to know what to demand of candidates without having a realistic view. Is there an elegant synopsis somewhere? As I've been preoccupied with Nottingham affairs I don't have a clear picture either.
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
Ministers will be required to campaign for Yes.
It's high risk. If a bunch of ministers resign, that harms the government, whatever the outcome.
Hello white rabbit .... It does not matter how many seats labour take from the SNP they will not contribute to reducing a tory majority. Tories could capture seats as well.
If, against the odds, BOO are to win, they cannot afford to get less than 40% of sizeable cross sections of the public like (a) Scotland or (b) Labour voters. So it would be vital to find a non-UKIP leader of the campaign, Hoey seems like a decent choice.
Is she committed to leaving the EU? If so, i'd agree.
A May 2016 Referendum will also coincide with Police and Crime Commissioner elections. The Queen's Speech is vague about further reform measures on policing governance so it seems fair to assume that these elections will go ahead. There will thus be "local" elections at the same time as the referendum throughout the UK.
My ward party (one of the largest in London, part of Islington North) chewed it over last night. Christian Wolmar is a member and well liked so might get a nomination, but otherwise it was pretty clear that Jowell and Khan were co-favourites. Abbott got a bit of credit by actually mentioning some policies in her pitch - otherwise there was a bit too much of the "My second cousin was a tube driver" stuff in the statements - but her willingness to have a go at the party as part of her TV pundit role hasn't done her any favours.
An issue was that few of the dozens of members present - including some of the most politicised voters in the country,I'd think - had a really clear idea of the scope of the Mayor's powers beyond the "bully pulpit" role - it's hard to know what to demand of candidates without having a realistic view. Is there an elegant synopsis somewhere? As I've been preoccupied with Nottingham affairs I don't have a clear picture either.
If, against the odds, BOO are to win, they cannot afford to get less than 40% of sizeable cross sections of the public like (a) Scotland or (b) Labour voters. So it would be vital to find a non-UKIP leader of the campaign, Hoey seems like a decent choice.
Is she committed to leaving the EU? If so, i'd agree.
The significant omissions from the European Union Referendum Bill seem to be as follows: (1) There is no provision requiring an exit if there is a "No" vote. That means the outcome of the referendum will not bind the government. (2) The Bill is not expressed to take effect notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972. That means the European Commission (and anyone else acting under EU law) will have a free hand to avoid all campaign regulation, since the Act will take effect subject to EU law (see section 2(4) of the 1972 Act).
The first of those points does not seem to me to be a major one. I can't really see any Government arguing that leaving we should not leave the EU in the case of an OUT vote because the vote was not binding.
The second point is more serious and I would hope would be amended during the passage through Parliament. The idea that the EU Commission or its agents should be able to ignore campaign regulations which apply to everyone else seems ludicrous.
Crying 'foul' before the kick off is already becoming tiresome. Almost as tiresome as complaining about the game being played.
The SNP are complaining about a 'Tory Veto' in the Scotland Bill - do they mean this? ... Seems reasonable enough to me.....file under 'good governance' vs 'I'll do it if I want to!'
Clause 25 of the Bill is a tortuous provision. How can the same statutory power (Social Security Administration Act 1992, s. 5(1)(i)) be exercisable in Scotland by both governments at the same time? Bear in mind that where an Act of Parliament confers a power to make regulations, it includes an implied power to amend or revoke subordinate legislation made under that power (Interpretation Act 1978, s. 14). So clause 25 of the Bill would appear to allow the Scottish Ministers to amend or revoke legislation made by the Secretary of State under s. 5(1)(i) of the 1992 Act, and vica versa, which is a recipe for chaos if the two governments disagree about what the content of the regulations ought to be. "Tory veto" or not, that clause should be not able to withstand serious parliamentary scrutiny (which will likely be absent).
The arch-Europhile Damian Green MP (Con, Ashford) announces he will be campaigning for "Yes" in the referendum. This just goes to show how serious Cameron's renegotiation will be. Conservative MPs are openly admitting they will campaign to stay in on any terms.
Ministers will be required to campaign for Yes.
And rightly so - objectors should grow up and accept the principle of collective responsibility in the cabinet.
That's what was said on here about LibDem ministers opposed to the tuition fees rise, anyway.
The significant omissions from the European Union Referendum Bill seem to be as follows: (1) There is no provision requiring an exit if there is a "No" vote. That means the outcome of the referendum will not bind the government. (2) The Bill is not expressed to take effect notwithstanding the European Communities Act 1972. That means the European Commission (and anyone else acting under EU law) will have a free hand to avoid all campaign regulation, since the Act will take effect subject to EU law (see section 2(4) of the 1972 Act).
The first of those points does not seem to me to be a major one. I can't really see any Government arguing that leaving we should not leave the EU in the case of an OUT vote because the vote was not binding.
The second point is more serious and I would hope would be amended during the passage through Parliament. The idea that the EU Commission or its agents should be able to ignore campaign regulations which apply to everyone else seems ludicrous.
Crying 'foul' before the kick off is already becoming tiresome. Almost as tiresome as complaining about the game being played.
I'd want to know more before concluding it was a recipe for disaster, but at the same time, best to get the rules of the game straight before you start to play it.
Last week I published a brisk blogpost on The Spectator’s site in which I said that the Labour party should recognise that Unite was its enemy. The cliché that Labour and the unions were in a marriage was apt, I said: they fight all the time and don’t have sex. But few marriages survive adultery — and McCluskey’s eyes were always wandering.
A May 2016 Referendum will also coincide with Police and Crime Commissioner elections. The Queen's Speech is vague about further reform measures on policing governance so it seems fair to assume that these elections will go ahead. There will thus be "local" elections at the same time as the referendum throughout the UK.
My ward party (one of the largest in London, part of Islington North) chewed it over last night. Christian Wolmar is a member and well liked so might get a nomination, but otherwise it was pretty clear that Jowell and Khan were co-favourites. Abbott got a bit of credit by actually mentioning some policies in her pitch - otherwise there was a bit too much of the "My second cousin was a tube driver" stuff in the statements - but her willingness to have a go at the party as part of her TV pundit role hasn't done her any favours.
An issue was that few of the dozens of members present - including some of the most politicised voters in the country,I'd think - had a really clear idea of the scope of the Mayor's powers beyond the "bully pulpit" role - it's hard to know what to demand of candidates without having a realistic view. Is there an elegant synopsis somewhere? As I've been preoccupied with Nottingham affairs I don't have a clear picture either.
Why have Ladbrokes suspended bets for Jowell for the election?
Labour trying to pretend that the scale of the 2008/2009 crash was nothing to do with them, is akin to the Tories pretending that Black Wednesday was beyond their control.
It's simply not credible. And fighting a decade old war isn't convincing anyone that isn't already part of the 30% Labour vote.
Labour needs to swallow the pill and move on. The longer they deny what most people think - the worse it gets for them.
I don't think Labour can achieve a majority in the foreseeable future whether they appeal to guys and gals working in call centres or not. They are contrained from the economic left by SNP, from the social conservative WWC right by UKIP and by Tories coming onto their turf. They need alliances to deny the Tories a majority. But I agree their main fight is with the Tories.
I don't think the problem for Labour was the broadness of their appeal. Many of their policies were popular according to the polls :-).
I think they had two problems. 1)- the politically correct agenda (eg proposed laws against Islamophobia) which not only repelled WWC but many middle of the road voters. They need to reduce this sort of stuff even if they lose a segment. 2) - the difficulty they had telling a vivid convincing story. The Tories excel at this. Labour needs a leader who can tell appealing stories. Such a leader would not have let the Tories away with successfully labelling the 2008 recession as the "Great Labour Recession". I don't know whether any of the current contenders for the Labour leadership would be good at this. Ed and Ed were hopeless.
As you know, Labour was not the cause of the 2008/2009 crash which was worldwide and started in the US subprime market. I didn't say Labour had nothing to do with it. But they were not the cause.
I agree that it is now water under the bridge. The Tory Story has stuck. As you say, most people believe it. It should have been tackled robustly in 2010 when the economy was beginning to recover until it was struck down by Osborne. Anyway, I agree we should move on. Other stories to tell.
And rightly so - objectors should grow up and accept the principle of collective responsibility in the cabinet.
That's what was said on here about LibDem ministers opposed to the tuition fees rise, anyway.
The doctrine of collective responsibility can be suspended when necessary. It was during the 1975 and 2011 referendum campaigns. There is no constitutional reason why it should not be so suspended during the EU referendum.
What utter tosh. Philip Hollobone will no doubt be campaigning for No, whatever the outcome of the negotiations. So what? Some Conservative MPs are committed to In, some are committed to Out. Most are somewhere in between, and above all want to see reform to the EU.
The idea there is going to be serious reform is fairly fanciful,but the chances of it diminish further still when it emerges that many Tory MPs are ideologically committed to subservience to Brussels, Strasbourg and Luxembourg whatever the terms.
I have always been fascinated by politics. When I was 15, I sat up with a torch under the bedclothes listening to the 1974 election results, and the first campaign I was ever involved with was the European Community referendum in 1975. I delivered leaflets saying ‘Vote yes’. Whether or not I still would today is another matter.
Both Gove and Hammond have said they might vote to leave the EU. The latter has recanted.
I think the BOOers in cabinet are IDS and John Whittingdale
Of course it's not just about Cabinet ministers. I'd be surprised if Cameron isn't forced to allow ministers to campaign for Out, to be honest. The BOOers are a large chunk of the party (a minority, probably, but a substantial one).
So it looks like there's going to be an electoral petition against Carmichael - here's a nice summary of its chance of succeeding. Short answer: thin but not zero.
Comments
Sorry I've just noticed that.
The disparity isn't as favourable this time, but stilll...
But it was still a puzzle at the time. Why were the polls so good for Labour when the fundamentals were so bad (booming economy, Ed as leader etc). We now know the answer. The polls were wrong.
But it would be foolish for the Tories to kid themselves that they trounced Labour. They would draw the wrong conclusions. So would Labour. Labour was trounced by the SNP and the LibDems were trounced by the Tories. The fightback by Labour (and LibDems) needs to recognise that fact.
Labour has a mountain to climb (99 seats) and can only do that with a substantial contribution from the SNP and LibDems. I don't think Labour can outflank the SNP. It needs to cooperate with it. Similarly the LibDems need to position themselves left of centre again to succeed in the LibDem Tory marginals and gain back the disaffected 2010 LibDem voters. The departure of Clegg and the reappearance of the Tory Nasty Party will help.
Anyway topped up, now exposed to the grand total of £15 or so! I considered it, but it will be a longer payout time and I don't have a particularly strong feeling on whether say 1.4 is a good price for a Labour win given the longer period for uncertainty.
http://i51.tinypic.com/ib9v1v.jpg
Still, business is business, and the Labour candidate being one of Sadiq or Tessa looks as certain as these things ever can be.
Labour has to broaden out from what is popular with Polly Toynbee to what is popular with the guys and gals working in call centres.... All too often they are mutually exclusive.
http://img.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2007/11_01/thatcherMS0311_468x777.jpg
Quite big changes that I can't see requiring anything less than a treaty change.
No-one but the wealthy diehard and corporate freeloader was going to go to Qatar anyway, whatever time of year they hold it.
But for me it is the key of whether the EU can work for us in the medium term.
But they need to get past that if they want to win.
As someone who prefers IN ONLY if we can get a good deal - but is regularly seduced by the BOOers - I'm really looking forward to this referendum.
I genuinely have no idea how I'll vote.
https://twitter.com/Untie4Len/status/600615253114810368
Maybe the solution is to say something like "a measure can be blocked by 6 non-Eurozone members", or some population-weighted equivalent. The rest of the EU won't be bothered because this will probably never happen as the Eurozone grows, and the British will assume the blocking minority will remain long-term because they won't be able to believe anybody could actually still want to join the Euro.
Obviously you can't enact this until the next treaty whenever that happens and getting unanimous agreement may be tough, but you could do an end-run around that with a similar move to the Popular Vote Interstate Compact: Get a QMV blocking minority worth of countries to agree to vote against anything that the super-majority of non-Euro countries say no to.
The second point is more serious and I would hope would be amended during the passage through Parliament. The idea that the EU Commission or its agents should be able to ignore campaign regulations which apply to everyone else seems ludicrous.
Without knowing the number of migrant workers in Qatar and what would be "normal" death rate, it's illustrative of absolutely nothing. The other figures measure totally different things, and thus do nothing to help us.
I don't like coming across as if I'm supporting Qatar, because some of the actual reporting of migrant workers conditions sounds horrible. But the chart is gibberish propaganda and nothing more.
What sort of normal do you want?
London 2012 Olympics involved stadiums of every description, transport links, etc. etc, and involved the death of one employee (we can be confident of that figure).
The world is full of deeply misleading charts that do nothing to further their own causes. But in this particular instance there is value in the comparison.
I don't think the problem for Labour was the broadness of their appeal. Many of their policies were popular according to the polls :-).
I think they had two problems. 1)- the politically correct agenda (eg proposed laws against Islamophobia) which not only repelled WWC but many middle of the road voters. They need to reduce this sort of stuff even if they lose a segment. 2) - the difficulty they had telling a vivid convincing story. The Tories excel at this. Labour needs a leader who can tell appealing stories. Such a leader would not have let the Tories away with successfully labelling the 2008 recession as the "Great Labour Recession". I don't know whether any of the current contenders for the Labour leadership would be good at this. Ed and Ed were hopeless.
It's simply not credible. And fighting a decade old war isn't convincing anyone that isn't already part of the 30% Labour vote.
Labour needs to swallow the pill and move on. The longer they deny what most people think - the worse it gets for them.
Interesting point and sort of plays towards the Labour position of lowering the voting age I suppose.
I was unable to vote in that referendum as I ws 17 and just a few months short of being eligible. I have though had to live with the consequence of that vote for the last 40 years. I wanted to vote no at the time. My company were trading with New Zealand Australia etc. The markets were pretty much destroyed overnight... Well a few months to a year anyway.
I know a cut off line is required and my single vote would have made bugger all difference really. I still feel perhaps at that time I did not have a full grp of all the facts and the experience to make an informed decision but still.
I am now just utterly sick of Europe and the politics of Europe, the commission the parliament the petty rules and regulations and fed up with being told my unelected faceless bueracrats what we can and can't do so again .....probably I am being forced into the BOO camp. I just cannot see myself ever voting yes or BOI . We tried that and tested it to destruction it dosent work.
Cameron himself will get what he can, and call it success. But the first half of that is not fatally undermined by the second.
There will be a red-card for the UK on any matters of vital interest to it, e.g. financial services, or else an opt-out from regulatory measures agreed through QMV. It will not be linked to the number of non-eurozone countries at the moment.
What the EU - and the treaties - need to recognise is that the single market has to work for countries who are *never* going to join the Euro.
If they won't play ball, we leave. It really is that simple.
I've no idea if they bothered - I suspect not. I suspect my inner geek was on display from a very early age. We never talked politics in our house = ever. That'll teach parents to leave their young offspring in front of the TV for 10 hrs a day. I also became an expert on horse-racing form!
The Scottish Ministers may not exercise the function of making regulations to
which this section applies unless—
(a) they have consulted the Secretary of State about the practicability of implementing the regulations, and
(b) the Secretary of State has given his or her agreement as to when any change made by the regulations is to start to have effect, such agreement not to be unreasonably withheld.
Seems reasonable enough to me.....file under 'good governance' vs 'I'll do it if I want to!'
I do love you!
Ditto the same thing applied in the gay marriage vote.
I've also no problem with UKIP leading the BOO campaign - an 85% to 15% winning margin for IN will do nicely.
http://www.thelocal.dk/20150527/what-you-need-to-know-about-denmarks-election
1) "Now we showed we're serious about leaving the other EU members have offered us X, Y and Z, let's put that to the voters."
or more controversially:
2) "We've negotiated our exit deal, we'll ask the voters to sign off", then who knows what if they say no. (I think they may have to hold off pulling the TEU Article 50 cord for this to be an option, but in theory they could do that.)
An issue was that few of the dozens of members present - including some of the most politicised voters in the country,I'd think - had a really clear idea of the scope of the Mayor's powers beyond the "bully pulpit" role - it's hard to know what to demand of candidates without having a realistic view. Is there an elegant synopsis somewhere? As I've been preoccupied with Nottingham affairs I don't have a clear picture either.
[p.s. RichardN quite correctly pointed me to the considerably better SkyBet odds earlier for those interested.]
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2015/may/26/eu-referendum-kate-hoey-gets-backing-to-head-no-campaign
If she weren't in favour of No, at the very least, I think she would have said by now.
That's what was said on here about LibDem ministers opposed to the tuition fees rise, anyway.
@faisalislam: LibDems call on Sepp Blatter to resign: http://t.co/ZNrb2FXEYg
I agree that it is now water under the bridge. The Tory Story has stuck. As you say, most people believe it. It should have been tackled robustly in 2010 when the economy was beginning to recover until it was struck down by Osborne. Anyway, I agree we should move on. Other stories to tell.
I think the BOOers in cabinet are IDS and John Whittingdale
I think that's the position of many people, isn't it? Nothing against the EU, if we can get the right deal.
I have always been fascinated by politics. When I was 15, I sat up with a torch under the bedclothes listening to the 1974 election results, and the first campaign I was ever involved with was the European Community referendum in 1975. I delivered leaflets saying ‘Vote yes’. Whether or not I still would today is another matter.
http://www.johnwhittingdale.org.uk/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=1&Itemid=3
http://schooloflaw.academicblogs.co.uk/2015/05/28/the-people-versus-carmichael-what-would-have-to-be-proven-for-legal-action-to-succeed/