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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Some of the headlines after the big statement are not quite what Osborne must have been hoping for
When I first saw Osborne’s pre-sending review statement Tweet with a picture of himself at his desk eating a burger it looked like a mistake. It was just too contrived and in any case the Chancellor is always going to have a battle convincing us that he’s a man of the people.
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O/T but spare a thought for us folks here in Phoenix - temperatures are set to reach 48C (120 in old money) over the weekend... phew!
Plaid should be favourites because they hold the seat (at least in the Senedd) and they enjoyed relative success in the recent Council elections. They dont currently have a candidate, but with two strong potential candidates in Heledd Fychan and Rhun ap Iorwerth as well as a popular local councillor, but this should be sorted out later this week.
Labour are the obvious challenger but they are a bit of a disorganised shambles on the island at the moment, and again dont have a firm candidate. Conservatives are unlikley to do well unless they select Peter Rodgers, but even then that wont be enough. Nothing expected from LDs or UKIP.
My prediction: Plaid hold with around 9,500 votes - Labour second with around 6,500 - Conservatives, LD and UKIP all around 3,000 each (but with Peter Rodgers having potential to increase Con vote to around 6,000)
And Osborne's not the only one getting flak over trivia:
http://www.thesun.co.uk/scotsol/homepage/news/4985857/Alex-Salmond-is-blasted-for-sneaking-into-class.html
Last time the LibDems were ahead of UKIP was late March.
UKIP down, Labour up.
Coincidence, of course!
"Tim has posted 32,618 comments on PB since his first contribution in June 2005."
On balance, I'd say that George Osborne deserves what he got from this. And that the Sun also deserves to lose a few sales over this. So everyone's a winner.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/jun/27/uk-shale-gas-survey-fracking?CMP=twt_fd
R4 reporting now double previous estimates:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23069499
If posts within the same hour count as one, then I shudder to think what astronomical levels an accurate count of some poster's would achieve!
Number of pebbles in Wales comes to mind!
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jun/26/nato-taliban-india-pakistan
Forget Nato v the Taliban. The real Afghan fight is India v Pakistan
Afghanistan's old ethnic conflict has become a proxy war for the bitter feud between the region's two nuclear powers
http://www.independentaustralia.net/2013/politics/morgan-poll-shows-big-swing-to-alp-after-rudd-returned-as-leader/
Must have missed your GE 2015 call ? Lab maj nailed on ?
Those first few days should be spent looking for work, not looking to sign on.
We’re doing these things because we know they help people stay off benefits and help those on benefits get back into work faster."
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2013/06/george-osbornes-spending-round-2013-speech/
Jealousy will get you everywhere - failed farmer, failed wine merchant, - just a 24/7 smearer and sneerer - especially about other people's misfortunes and personal tragedies- pathetic!
Some on here might not like F1, but you have to like what it does for the UK: http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/formula1/23048643
I wonder how that compares to the Premier League?
People who have just been thrown out of work are looking to sign on instead of looking for new jobs. Because it is impossible to do both. In George's world as soon as you are made unemployed you become an idle scrounger. And all to create a dividing line. Lovely stuff.
It's great to see a son of privilege who has never had to worry about having to make ends meet telling those who have just lost their livelihoods that preventing them from claiming social security is good for them.
Plaid 9969
Con 7032
Lab 6307
LD 759
2013 local elections approx results
Plaid 9000
Lab 6300
Con 2700 ( 1 ward not fought )
LD 2350 ( only 3 wards fought )
UKIP 4500 ( 1 candidate in each ward )
Independents lots of votes
Much split voting which will overstate each parties vote but clearly Plaid hold favourites with Labour challengers
15,233 feature Osborne (man on a boat, man on a train, man gets out of a car, man cries at funeral). There are another 467 "man eats burger" to come
4,097 feature Jeremy Hunt's resignation(s)
2,220 feature the end of Michael Gove's career
3,350 feature Chris Huhne's next cabinet position
5,112 feature Samantha Cameron
9,206 features shrouds of various shades waving furiously
13,729 have been MODERATED
426 feature the rural idyll of the Cheshire farmer
12 feature bets, including "man will apologise for agreeing with opponent"
0 feature the merits of Ed Miliband, Ed Balls or any of Labours' programme for Government
http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2013/06/the-demise-of-julia-gillard/
http://www.mcdonalds.co.uk/ukhome/whatmakesmcdonalds/questions/food/delivery-service/why-dont-you-run-a-delivery-service-in-the-uk.html
I guess you'd rather be complaining about
- "Civil Servant and Government Driver sent to pick up Chancellor's Burger!"
Osborne could have framed this measure in any number of ways - regretful necessity, unavoidable, no choice etc - but he chose to do it in the way that he did.
Whether you agree or not all that stuff on welfare and public sector workers will be popular with many people. Right wing populism is just as discomfiting as left wing populism.
Mr. D, you have my sympathy. That sounds horrendous.
Mr. Tokyo, I suspect you're probably right. This is a pathetic move by the Sun. There's a lot of serious business regarding the spending decisions to praise or censure and instead they're bleating about someone spending a tenner on a meal (and that someone has a six figure salary) instead of ordering a cheaper version from somewhere that apparently doesn't deliver.
Mr. Jessop, those are tasty figures. F1 also provides a lot of direct high end engineering employments and probably tens of thousands of jobs for suppliers. More than half the teams are based in a little area of England (Oxfordshire, I think), which must be a significant boost to the local economy.
This certainly isn't omnishambles level coverage but you'd have to be some sort of mad swivel eyed loon not to realise it's hardly going to help since Osbrowne's own approval ratings are hilariously bad and reflect the fact that he's a toxic liabiilty.
That we have grown used to the out of touch public relations stupidity of Cammie and Osbrowne does not make it any less amusing.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/benedictbrogan/100223632/spending-review-george-osborne-has-made-cuts-the-new-normal/
This country still has a horrific deficit, a horrific debt burden, scarily thinly capitalised banks and a disastrous entitlements culture. If Ozzy is making a start in reshaping all our expectations here he is doing the whole country a big favour. We will need to run surpluses at some point. The austerity hasn't even started.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/23011804
That seems like utter tosh to me. Whilst obesity can sometimes be a symptom of other issues generally it's a symptom of pie-enthusiasm and cake-appreciation.
"Scotland's most senior civil servant is to be asked to investigate First Minister Alex Salmond's professional conduct over a school visit."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-23070207
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/410622/Brazen-Alex-Salmond-faces-probe-over-school-visit
http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/uk/scotland/article3801429.ece?CMP=OTH-gnws-standard-2013_06_26
Looks like the silly season is starting early......
I expect Ashcroft will publish his Boris Polling today....
http://lordashcroftpolls.com/
Osborne on R4 shortly.
You are suffering from wood-from-trees syndrome. Perhaps you should take a moment.
The overwhelming narrative will be that he was eating a burger. That will be the image people recall. Eating burgers, or more generally having lunch at our desks, as opposed to attending Bullingdon Club dinners or visiting Tuscan villas, or commenting 24/7 on a blog, is something that everyone can relate to.
And that will be the enduring message.
Since there's little to bet on right ow we talk politics. Is the state of our banks worth a thread? As per below I think Ozzy is doing a good job reshaping expectations - but I don't think he's really more than scratched the surface of our banking problems. Mainly their resilience to shock and the systemic threat of Too Big To Fail. Vickers needs to be implemented in full ASAP. If, as seems now all but inevitable, there is a global govt bond market collapse the UK banks are going to be trashed. And then all politics is off.
If there is one thing that would genuinely bring tumbleweed to our cities and cause us all to starve to death it will be the utter collapse of the global banking / payments system, and we're near the front of that queue.
Fascinating drama from Down Under. Be great if there are any students of Aussie politics lurking to do us a thread. I have a sneaky feeling Labor are going to win this thing now.
"Been in the US recently? Every time I go I come away thinking "I can put the diet off...""
We're getting close and it's much worse here than in other parts of Europe. I'd start treating the seriously obese in the same way smokers were treated a few years ago. I watched yesterday an enormous fat woman open a packet of chocolates and share them with her baby in a pram.
......Meanwhile SO agonises over the Labour front bench's acceptance of the 7 day sign on change - which I understand, if not agree with......looks like there might be trouble with the troops on this though....
He hasn't. It's no secret that I think the coalition should have been much more aggressive on spending cuts from Day 1. Spending not investment mind. But what we are clearly seeing is that the spending cuts which have happened are not translating into worse services or unemployment - the doomsday messages were wrong. This is a green light to push alot harder. The CSR was only a step in the right direction.
Meanwhile - here's a poser: has any government in history had more grocery-related cock-ups than this one? I can now count pasty-gate, burger-gate, wine-tax-gate.... And I know I have missed a few!
Maguire(Mirror) twittered all day yesterday that the PM was eating roast beef and drinking claret in the HOC dining room, showing his complete scorn for the starving masses..It is traditional for every PM, regardles of his politics, to have a roast beef lunch after PMQ's.A proper journo should know that.
He was having lunch. He chose a burger (no doubt that was workshopped first).
The burger legacy will be good for him.
It merely raises the tories toxicity since the frontman for this kind of pitiful posturing is an out of touch fop incapable of understanding that those who are put out of work and change jobs during this time of austerity are from all sectors of the economy and most definitely not from one small skew of the underclass. The great majority of voters will have family or friends who have changed jobs or been put out of work during these years of seemingly endless austerity. So Osbrowne continually trying to blame them for his own economic incompetence is about as wise as him doing so just before he and his fellow MPs will have to defend their own massive £10,000 pay rise.
As I've said before its going to be nothing more than a London-Birmingham commuter route with the northern extensions cancelled because of 'surprise' cost overruns.
The money then 'saved' will be spent on Crossrail 2.
If it was really designed to help northern England wouldn't they start building it in the north?
Have you been in a cave and missed all the coverage about the deterioration in A&E services?
And while we're in a generous mode another toe-curlingly awful performance from Ed Balls on 5Live. Put this man in charge of a welk stall ?!? - Fishing industry collapses !!.
" But this match also showed me that maybe a new cricket test is emerging.
The first signs of it came when England's Ravi Bopara came on to bowl. The 28-year-old was born in London. His parents settled in the capital after migrating from Punjab in India in the 1970s.
For some Indian fans in the crowd, that meant that he should be playing for India. So as he ran in to bowl, a group of young Indian fans began a chant of "traitor, traitor, traitor".
When he came out to bat there were pockets of fans booing and when he was dismissed there were huge celebrations in the ground.
While I was standing in the queue to get a drink, an elderly England fan turned to me and asked: "Why are you giving Bopara such a hard time?"
Before I could answer, a young Indian fan replied: "We hate him as he plays for England. He is a disgrace." He then quickly rushed off back to the match.
I mumbled to the England fan that not all Indian fans felt like that, and in fact the majority of us thought that he was a great role model and that we wanted to see more British Asians turning out for England. Confused, the England fan just smiled and walked back to his seat.
When I returned to mine, I noticed a Sikh fan wearing a turban a few rows ahead.
He was not wearing an Indian top or carrying India's flag. He was proudly wearing an England shirt with the name of his favourite player, Monty Panesar, on the back. Every time England took a wicket he jumped up from his seat to cheer.
That did not go down well with some of the Indian fans. About five moved to some seats closer to him and began chanting "spot the sell-out". Another shouted "coconut" - a derogatory term that means you are brown on the outside but white inside. "
When the authorites want Englishness/Britishness defined in as wishywashy terms as possible and simultaneously encourage immigrant communities to take pride in their 'own' culture it is probably inevitable that some within those immigrant communities will hate others who are more integrated for being more integrated.
Another failure for the multicultural industry.
And a society which feels itself split into numerous groups will struggle in the hard decades to come.
Yada yada.
A large number of people have left the public sector, alot have joined the private sector and alot of migrants and school leavers have joined the workforce. Overall effect - nothing much. It's not unemployment on the 'Labour Isn't Working' scale. Point is that we can and should cut at a steady pace and not worry about it causing mass unemployment.
Likewise on health. A&E is struggling but overall we are a much healthier bunch than, say, the Americans for alot less health spending. Trimming NHS spending is not causing mass deaths or disasters. The mass deaths arose on Labour's watch - eg Stafford - and this is now getting some sunlight.
You are a past master at seeking specific exceptions or failures to try to disprove a general trend.
More evidence this appalling government needs to get its comeuppance in 2015.
Small piece of advice since the PB tories just don't seem to grasp the politically obvious.
As little Ed and Balls are busy triangulating on tory policies perhaps you should consider the purpose of that triangulation before continually reinforcing their message at every turn.
If you still don't understand I can post a helpful reminder of the dangers of triangulation and the real reason why it's so stupid.
UN figures suggest investors seeing Britain as haven for their money amid eurozone crisis
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/26/foreign-investment-uk-rises-europe
I blame Osborne......
What should worry the Tories more is that the CSR has had so little positive coverage - if it had done anything worthwhile, we wouldn't be debating burgers. And Southam Observer is right about the despicable 7 day stuff, kicking people at precisely their most vulnerable moment. Ed Balls struck a good note with the reference to Wonga but Labour really needs to stop equivocating on this one and oppose it outright. I get that we are not committing to stuff until about April 30 2015, but mood music matters too.
Although dip, flat, dip is nothing to write home about (although Osborne will try to make something of it no doubt).
sun dried tomatoes in Islington.
Mr. Palmer, where's the lack of authenticity? He was eating a burger. He posted a picture of the burger.
Mr. L, the eurozone is inherently screwed due to the insanity of trying to form a single currency which includes countries as varied in cultural, economic and size terms as Germany, Greece, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Poland.
Edited extra bit: on Osborne, there's plenty of genuine grounds for criticism. This nonsense about a burger is not one of them.
But it wouldn't matter in the least if it was £20 - Osborne is clearly not short of a bob or too and I don't care if he spends his dosh on burgers or Burberry coats or gambles it away at Aspers. The stupidity is in Ozzy's office making a point of it.
I don't know how many times I have to mention the concept of 'capacity' before people get it. The current network has seen large (massive?) growth in the last two decades in both passenger and freight, and it is creaking.
There is only so much that can be done to the existing network to create more capacity (i.e. paths). It is made worse by the fact that freight trains mostly run at slower speeds (50/60/75 MPH) than passenger trains, meaning they use more paths. There are a few 100 MPH freight trains, but they have their own disadvantages in terms of track wear. A great deal of work was done at Derby in the 1960s/80s to work out the wheel/track dynamics for high-speed freight.
We also need more stopping passenger services, which get in the way of high-speed non-stop services.
A new high-speed route will free up many paths on the existing network for more freight and stopping passenger services. Failure to create more paths will lead to more local stations closing to make way for non-stop services, as happened after the ludicrously-handed WCML upgrade.
A different view for you to peruse:
http://hs2northwest.wordpress.com/
"Would you turn down the chance to make an ad for a burger chain, sweet manufacturer or fizzy drink company?"
No of course not. I only refuse ads for political reasons (South African Airways once and a hair ad in Israel). I would though do a pro bono anti obesity ad. Perhaps encouraging all fast food outlets to have smaller entrances so the grossly overweight can't get in......
Open on 20 stone woman trying to squeeze her way into Mcdonalds Party of schoolkids fall about laughing......Child's V.O Urghhhhh!
Ah .... bad news for NPEXMP .... sadly the latest ARSE projection has Broxtowe moving from "Too Close To Call" to "Lean" Conservative.
Think Oz Labour Nick - No Change, No Chance.
I'm always here for helpful advice Nick.
Nadine Dorries is to stop claiming personal parliamentary expenses to avoid being further ‘targeted’ by investigations.
Speaking exclusively to the Times & Citizen, the MP for Mid Bedfordshire revealed that she will forego around £3,040 a month in expenses including cash for Westminster accommodation, council tax, travel costs and meals.
She said: “For me the problem is the moment I put my head above the parapet and campaigned to have the abortion limit reduced from 24 weeks to 20 I became a target.”
She added: “Even though I’m completely innocent it’s tough for my office staff because they are the ones who are responsible for compliance.
http://www.bedfordtoday.co.uk/news/local/exclusive-nadine-i-ll-work-for-free-1-5226386
That is all very well. One is still left with the impression that AR is right insofar as if HS2 were about benefiting the north, then construction would not be set to start in the south.