If Labour is at 31% in opinion polls then they are streets ahead of any other party. They are certainly not dead and buried. That will only happen if Tories can keep to about 39% and UKIP rise. It won't be Tories going to 45%, country is that Tory. If UKIP hits 20% then Labour will suffer. Lib Dems shows no signs of life. Farron is charisma free, no chance. Greens are effign mental. So, only a UKIP rise will dent Labour.
How did Farron ever become LibDem leader?
Oh yes of course, I'd forgotten, the party only had 1.6 London Cabs full* to choose from.
I don't think Labour supporters would argue that things are going well, and that's reflected in the polls. But we didn't elect Corbyn *primarily* to do well, but to represent our views consistently - it's a revisit of the "leadership that you support or leadership with no particular views who might win?" debate, which the leadership ballot decisively answered. If he also when and if things settle down manages to do well, that's a bonus. I know it's not the typical view here, or among professionals generally, who feel it's all about winning and making whatever shifts necessary, but it's what most members think.
It is all very well having a desire to feel 'represented' (though NP didn't seem to show any previous inclination towards a Corbynist agenda in the past) - but the point of political parties is surely to strive to win enough votes to stand a chance of implementing their policies.
Purity .
Labour's focus on purity of thought may well end up with them facing electoral oblivion. FPTP has a nasty cliff edge as the LibDems discovered.
The state of the Lib Dems will probably save a lot of Labour seats.
I think someone on a previous thread reckoned Labour had to drop to around 14% before they would no longer be the official opposition, so electorally they have a luxury similar to a student from a wealthy family discovering himself in the Far East for 4 years and then returning to set up an online ethnic wares business that makes no money.
If a single third party became all conquering, like the SNP in Scotland, that could change the dynamic, but there is no evidence of either UKIP or the Lib Dems being able to do that.
Any jolt back if Corbyn does fail can only come from within the Labour party. Many Corbynistas may be patient electorally and want a decently leftist agenda, but Corbyn still needs to do things better, as I don't believe there is infinite patience even amongst Corbyn's supporters for being the fourth best run anti-austerity party in the UK.
Perhaps a good poll question for those who support an anti-austerity platform would be - who best represents the cause of anti-austerity in the UK (Labour/Nationalists/Green/Other).
About 14% was what Labour would have to fall to on Electoral Calculus to go below 100 seats. A lot depends on where those votes go to instead of course.
Mind you it looks as if Jezza is determined to test there formula!
Ydoaether asked earlier if there was anything that Jezza was good at. I still cannot think of anything.
On the electoral register, that 400,000 reduction in London's voter count is a disaster for Labour in seats since that will mostly be in inner London and quite possibly every single notional seat lost by consequential seat count reductions will be a notional Labour seat.
The govt knew exactly what they were doing when they made sure the boundary review would be carried out on the new individual voter registrations.
The ferrets in the sack as all the North London Labour MPs fight to be selected in seats under the new boundaries will be hilarious to watch. Half the shadow cabinet will be infvolved in it!
The real problem we have to solve is that we still have a structural deficit of the best part of £100bn. By this point in the economic cycle we really should have been paying down debt for some time. Instead we are going to borrow about £80bn in this FY.
So the services that we complain about and claim are being cut in "unacceptable" ways already cost about £100bn more than we are prepared to pay in taxes. That is a truly massive gap and it strikes me as hugely optimistic that growth is going to close the circle any time soon.
We face a choice. Either we pay a lot more in taxes (and this will undoubtedly involve very significant reductions in generous allowances like tax relief on pension contributions) or we start finding things that the State does that we do not want them to do anymore. Big things. Bigger than the education and defence budget put together.
Osborne is tiptoeing to higher taxes whilst seeking to restrain the growth in public spending but I continue to have real doubts that this paring approach can succeed. Rather than thinking about new and expensive services that the State can offer we need to think about what has to stop. And if we want our grannies properly looked after we better start coming around to the idea that we will be doing it ourselves.
I agree, and Osborne has wildly seesawed between the two.
Barely 18 months ago he was gearing up for 'the lowest government spending since the 1930s', and it looked like the State would be small indeed in 2020 focussed on health, pensions, and aid. But that got a bad press.
Now, Osborne is about saving tax credits, no more big departmental cuts and ramping up taxes on pensions and begging a few corporations for scraps. And that's getting a bad press.
It really is impressive pivoting. The only consistency is his target to balance the books within 5 years...somehow.
But balancing the books is not enough. Not nearly enough. It will have taken us an entire cycle of record borrowing to get back to zero. If we then have a recession, as is more than likely, the borrowing will simply soar again.
I am not sure that Osborne has wildly seesawed. His first step was to increase taxes, specifically VAT. He has done his best to keep the cap on spending despite the huge bias to ever greater expenditure built in by that idiot Brown. The lack of inflation and the lack of the tax on bankers bonuses has caused tax revenues to disappoint making squaring the circle ever harder. I think it is inevitable that he will return to tax increases as cuts get ever harder to find.
Andrew Neil @afneil 45m45 minutes ago OECD warns many English graduates too low-skilled to earn above the threshold to start repaying their loans.
Andrew Neil @afneil 45m45 minutes ago OECD rated English teenagers aged 16 to 19 the worst of 23 developed nations in literacy and 22nd of 23 in numeracy.
What a debt laden mess.
Disappointing that 5 years of Tory government still haven't managed to correct teenagers poor skills. Certainly by 2020 we need to see some improvements.
It's not just schools that are failing England, the Higher Education system is broken too.
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
LEAVE's best argument is that we can only have a realistic negotiation over the EU from a position of strength where the population has already voted to leave in a referendum.
Once we have voted to leave, we can start negotiations again and tackle real issues like 50% of the EU budget being spent on the Common Agricultural Policy when agriculature is only 2% of Europe's GDP.
Russian Embassy UK German government threw their country under feet of migrants like a rug, now try wipe their crimes under carpet. https://t.co/VLFUIguyqk
"The review reflects mounting concerns in Washington over Moscow’s determination to exploit European disunity in order to undermine Nato, block US missile defence programmes and revoke the punitive economic sanctions regime imposed after the annexation of Crimea....
“It really is a new Cold War out there,” the source said, “Right across the EU we are seeing alarming evidence of Russian efforts to unpick the fabric of European unity on a whole range of vital strategic issues.”
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
LEAVE's best argument is that we can only have a realistic negotiation over the EU from a position of strength where the population has already voted to leave in a referendum.
Once we have voted to leave, we can start negotiations again and tackle real issues like 50% of the EU budget being spent on the Common Agricultural Policy when agriculature is only 2% of Europe's GDP.
Just to inform all her fans...the Venerable Helen has resurfaced in Derbyshire. She's currently the spokeswoman of the winner of Labour PCC selection according to the local paper
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
I don't think Labour supporters would argue that things are going well, and that's reflected in the polls. But we didn't elect Corbyn *primarily* to do well, but to represent our views consistently - it's a revisit of the "leadership that you support or leadership with no particular views who might win?" debate, which the leadership ballot decisively answered. If he also when and if things settle down manages to do well, that's a bonus. I know it's not the typical view here, or among professionals generally, who feel it's all about winning and making whatever shifts necessary, but it's what most members think.
Purity .
Labour's focus on purity of thought may well end up with them facing electoral oblivion. FPTP has a nasty cliff edge as the LibDems discovered.
The state of the Lib Dems will probably save a lot of Labour seats.
I think someone on a previous thread reckoned Labour had to drop to around 14% before they would no longer be the official opposition, so electorally they have a luxury similar to a student from a wealthy family discovering himself in the Far East for 4 years and then returning to set up an online ethnic wares business that makes no money.
If a single third party became all conquering, like the SNP in Scotland, that could change the dynamic, but there is no evidence of either UKIP or the Lib Dems being able to do that.
Any jolt back if Corbyn does fail can only come from within the Labour party. Many Corbynistas may be patient electorally and want a decently leftist agenda, but Corbyn still needs to do things better, as I don't believe there is infinite patience even amongst Corbyn's supporters for being the fourth best run anti-austerity party in the UK.
Perhaps a good poll question for those who support an anti-austerity platform would be - who best represents the cause of anti-austerity in the UK (Labour/Nationalists/Green/Other).
About 14% was what Labour would have to fall to on Electoral Calculus to go below 100 seats. A lot depends on where those votes go to instead of course.
Mind you it looks as if Jezza is determined to test there formula!
Ydoaether asked earlier if there was anything that Jezza was good at. I still cannot think of anything.
I can't really see Jezza driving the Labour vote below 25%. That's a terrible score, but easily enough for Labour to remain official Opposition.
Russian Embassy UK German government threw their country under feet of migrants like a rug, now try wipe their crimes under carpet. https://t.co/VLFUIguyqk
"The review reflects mounting concerns in Washington over Moscow’s determination to exploit European disunity in order to undermine Nato, block US missile defence programmes and revoke the punitive economic sanctions regime imposed after the annexation of Crimea....
“It really is a new Cold War out there,” the source said, “Right across the EU we are seeing alarming evidence of Russian efforts to unpick the fabric of European unity on a whole range of vital strategic issues.”
I don't think Labour supporters would argue that things are going well, and that's reflected in the polls. But we didn't elect Corbyn *primarily* to do well, but to represent our views consistently - it's a revisit of the "leadership that you support or leadership with no particular views who might win?" debate, which the leadership ballot decisively answered. If he also when and if things settle down manages to do well, that's a bonus. I know it's not the typical view here, or among professionals generally, who feel it's all about winning and making whatever shifts necessary, but it's what most members think.
Purity .
Labour's focus on purity of thought may well end up with them facing electoral oblivion. FPTP has a nasty cliff edge as the LibDems discovered.
The state of the Lib Dems will probably save a lot of Labour seats.
I think someone on a previous thread reckoned Labour had to drop to around 14% before they would no longer be the official opposition, so electorally they have a luxury similar to a student from a wealthy family discovering himself in the Far East for 4 years and then returning to set up an online ethnic wares business that makes no money.
If a single third party became all conquering, like the SNP in Scotland, that could change the dynamic, but there is no evidence of either UKIP or the Lib Dems being able to do that.
Any jolt back if Corbyn does fail can only come from within the Labour party. Many Corbynistas may be patient electorally and want a decently leftist agenda, but Corbyn still needs to do things better, as I don't believe there is infinite patience even amongst Corbyn's supporters for being the fourth best run anti-austerity party in the UK.
Perhaps a good poll question for those who support an anti-austerity platform would be - who best represents the cause of anti-austerity in the UK (Labour/Nationalists/Green/Other).
About 14% was what Labour would have to fall to on Electoral Calculus to go below 100 seats. A lot depends on where those votes go to instead of course.
Mind you it looks as if Jezza is determined to test there formula!
Ydoaether asked earlier if there was anything that Jezza was good at. I still cannot think of anything.
I can't really see Jezza driving the Labour vote below 25%. That's a terrible score, but easily enough for Labour to remain official Opposition.
Eight million voters is probably Labour's floor methinks.
Not read it yet, but I'm guessing the answer to the URL is "because he can"...
It is a good piece. A question about the Lifetime Allowance - what happens if someone stops paying in at e.g. £800k and the pot then grows to £1m+ through an increase in fund prices? Are they still liable for the punitive tax rate?
Just to inform all her fans...the Venerable Helen has resurfaced in Derbyshire. She's currently the spokeswoman of the winner of Labour PCC selection according to the local paper
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
He has done his best to keep the cap on spending despite the huge bias to ever greater expenditure built in by that idiot Brown.
Really? whatever happened to bonfire of the quangos? Osborne likes his pet projects and spending on friends as much as his mentor Brown. His last budget illustrated that amply. Chote gave him 26 billion and he promptly spent it.
On the electoral register, that 400,000 reduction in London's voter count is a disaster for Labour in seats since that will mostly be in inner London and quite possibly every single notional seat lost by consequential seat count reductions will be a notional Labour seat.
Where does this number come from? I can't find it. Do you know?
Just to inform all her fans...the Venerable Helen has resurfaced in Derbyshire. She's currently the spokeswoman of the winner of Labour PCC selection according to the local paper
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
Andrew Neil OECD rated English teenagers aged 16 to 19 the worst of 23 developed nations in literacy and 22nd of 23 in numeracy.
New Labour's children.
Good morning all. As you know, New Labour are a favourite whipping boy of mine (has there been a more morally bankrupt, hypocritical administration in our country's history?), however, parents cannot be absolved of blame.
You can't let the State be the sole source of education for your children; not can you blame the State when your child leaves school as an innumerate, illiterate numpty. As parents, our children's welfare is (or should be) our highest priority, and how they turn out, is largely down to us, uncomfortable as that may be.
If Labour is at 31% in opinion polls then they are streets ahead of any other party. They are certainly not dead and buried. That will only happen if Tories can keep to about 39% and UKIP rise. It won't be Tories going to 45%, country is that Tory. If UKIP hits 20% then Labour will suffer. Lib Dems shows no signs of life. Farron is charisma free, no chance. Greens are effign mental. So, only a UKIP rise will dent Labour.
How did Farron ever become LibDem leader?
Oh yes of course, I'd forgotten, the party only had 1.6 London Cabs full* to choose from.
* Come back Martin Day.
Technically they only had 1.0 cabfulls of candidates as Clegg didn't want it and two of their number were under somewhat of a cloud.
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
LEAVE's best argument is that we can only have a realistic negotiation over the EU from a position of strength where the population has already voted to leave in a referendum.
Once we have voted to leave, we can start negotiations again and tackle real issues like 50% of the EU budget being spent on the Common Agricultural Policy when agriculature is only 2% of Europe's GDP.
Never understood this line of argument – if we vote to leave, we leave. – At that point the EU would simply say the UK has no influence over EU policy or future changes to CAP etc.
On the electoral register, that 400,000 reduction in London's voter count is a disaster for Labour in seats since that will mostly be in inner London and quite possibly every single notional seat lost by consequential seat count reductions will be a notional Labour seat.
Is this not the equivalent of 4 seats? I seem to recall the average seat has just over 100K electorate.
As I have posted here on a number of occasions..I think the leave vote will be about 57%
With Scotland, Wales and Ireland solid in Remain and David Cameron's personal recommendation, if he does, for Remain I would reverse those figures, indeed it could be as high as 60-40 Remain
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
LEAVE's best argument is that we can only have a realistic negotiation over the EU from a position of strength where the population has already voted to leave in a referendum.
Once we have voted to leave, we can start negotiations again and tackle real issues like 50% of the EU budget being spent on the Common Agricultural Policy when agriculature is only 2% of Europe's GDP.
Never understood this line of argument – if we vote to leave, we leave. – At that point the EU would simply say the UK has no influence over EU policy or future changes to CAP etc.
Well it has £15 billion gross contributions to the EU funding (about 10%). It gets half back (and the EU are going to pull out all the stops with how much money the UK gets from the EU, when it is merely part of our own money being returned.)
Could the EU survive with losing 10% of its funding, when it is in such a state?
But balancing the books is not enough. Not nearly enough. It will have taken us an entire cycle of record borrowing to get back to zero. If we then have a recession, as is more than likely, the borrowing will simply soar again.
The cap for a developed, modern, industrialised economy of Debt to GDP is well over 200%. The UK has quite some room for maneuver.
The whole ideological argument from Osborne is based on the ridiculous myth that government debt ever has to be repaid. It doesn't, that's one of its great attractions.
There are lots of good arguments for Fiscal prudence and running low tax, low spend public finances. But the idea that it's not affordable is simply economic illiteracy.
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
I assume this is one of the phone polls which were previously giving Remain an enormous lead.
Is there anyway in which Osborne's reforms are also a stealth way of recouping some of the benefits public sector final salary pensioners obtain?
Yes, but only at the top end - those with a £50k plus p.a. inflation-linked pension. In fact the lifetime allowance method is disproportionately favourable to those with defined benefit pensions as it uses a multiple of just 20 to assess the present value of the pension commitment.
It is a good piece. A question about the Lifetime Allowance - what happens if someone stops paying in at e.g. £800k and the pot then grows to £1m+ through an increase in fund prices? Are they still liable for the punitive tax rate?
"Angela Merkel is a 'narcissist' whose refusal to curb immigration may be a sign of a 'mental breakdown, according to a celebrated German psychiatrist. The German Chancellor has been heavily criticized over her 'open border' policy, which resulted in 1.1million refugees and migrants entering Germany last year. German psychiatrist Hans-Joachim Maaz said in an analysis that Mrs Merkel is so determined not to admit that she was wrong about her migration policy that she has 'lost touch with reality'."
That's why the US two term rule is so important. After a decade in power insanity is near inevitable. Merkel, of course, is stark mad and should be removed from office immediately.
You forgot "raving".
We try to maintain a high standard of cliché here...
It is a good piece. A question about the Lifetime Allowance - what happens if someone stops paying in at e.g. £800k and the pot then grows to £1m+ through an increase in fund prices? Are they still liable for the punitive tax rate?
Yes
Thought so, thanks. At least it's not 55% on the whole lot
Over-indulged children have become over-demanding teenagers, who expect their demands to be constantly satisfied. Don't like the politics of a visiting speaker? Well, then, just no-platform them. Worried about rude passages in a classic novel? Demand trigger warnings that certain scenes may cause offence.
What a hypersensitive, unsophisticated, uneducated attitude to the world. One of the crucial lessons of life is to deal calmly with things you disagree with. Who knows? You might even change your mind. Or, even if you don't, you might at least accept the other person in the argument has a valid view, too.
Over-indulged children have become over-demanding teenagers, who expect their demands to be constantly satisfied. Don't like the politics of a visiting speaker? Well, then, just no-platform them. Worried about rude passages in a classic novel? Demand trigger warnings that certain scenes may cause offence.
What a hypersensitive, unsophisticated, uneducated attitude to the world. One of the crucial lessons of life is to deal calmly with things you disagree with. Who knows? You might even change your mind. Or, even if you don't, you might at least accept the other person in the argument has a valid view, too.
It's already been used, but it's worth repeating:
"Nothing matters very much and few things matter at all"
People who spend their lives on the outrage bus must be exhausted by all that emoting.
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
LEAVE's best argument is that we can only have a realistic negotiation over the EU from a position of strength where the population has already voted to leave in a referendum.
Once we have voted to leave, we can start negotiations again and tackle real issues like 50% of the EU budget being spent on the Common Agricultural Policy when agriculature is only 2% of Europe's GDP.
Never understood this line of argument – if we vote to leave, we leave. – At that point the EU would simply say the UK has no influence over EU policy or future changes to CAP etc.
It's analogous to the Nats thinking they would get to dictate the terms of the separation - it'll be "Here's your hat where's your hurry, and the door's over there"
He has done his best to keep the cap on spending despite the huge bias to ever greater expenditure built in by that idiot Brown.
Really? whatever happened to bonfire of the quangos? Osborne likes his pet projects and spending on friends as much as his mentor Brown. His last budget illustrated that amply. Chote gave him 26 billion and he promptly spent it.
It's a little mean to characterise him as Brown, at least with Osborne the numbers are moving in the right direction, but it's true that he tries to make every decision with a party-political angle that needn't be there.
With the opposition in complete disarray the next budget should be the most radical in a generation, thinking the unthinkable about what the State actually does. For some examples what does DCMS do that couldn't be 90% handed straight to the Lottery? Offering tax breaks for private health insurance would stimulate growth in both insurance and providers of healthcare, while reducing demand in the NHS. For a really big one, merge income tax and NI, throw hundreds of pages of complicated tax code in the bin and replace them with half a dozen, meaning that the average small businessman doesn't need lawyers and accountants just to fill in his tax return or run a simple payroll.
But balancing the books is not enough. Not nearly enough. It will have taken us an entire cycle of record borrowing to get back to zero. If we then have a recession, as is more than likely, the borrowing will simply soar again.
The cap for a developed, modern, industrialised economy of Debt to GDP is well over 200%. The UK has quite some room for maneuver.
The whole ideological argument from Osborne is based on the ridiculous myth that government debt ever has to be repaid. It doesn't, that's one of its great attractions.
There are lots of good arguments for Fiscal prudence and running low tax, low spend public finances. But the idea that it's not affordable is simply economic illiteracy.
High debt is very closely linked to low growth and poor performance. Also the room for manoeuvre only exists if people are willing to lend the money. Greece didn't quite get to 200% but I think it would be fair to say that their flexibility was somewhat curtailed. http://www.tradingeconomics.com/greece/government-debt-to-gdp
There is nothing ideological about having the State live within its means. It is common sense. Of course this allows expenditure to rise as GDP rises and encourages politicians to find growth.
But balancing the books is not enough. Not nearly enough. It will have taken us an entire cycle of record borrowing to get back to zero. If we then have a recession, as is more than likely, the borrowing will simply soar again.
The cap for a developed, modern, industrialised economy of Debt to GDP is well over 200%. The UK has quite some room for maneuver.
The whole ideological argument from Osborne is based on the ridiculous myth that government debt ever has to be repaid. It doesn't, that's one of its great attractions.
There are lots of good arguments for Fiscal prudence and running low tax, low spend public finances. But the idea that it's not affordable is simply economic illiteracy.
All government debt is for a fixed term (5,10 20 years etc). So there comes a point where is has to be repaid and refinanced.
Whilst Japan has a very high debt to GDP ratio and is still able to refinance their debt, other countries like Greece have found that they can not refinance their debt at a 100% ratio of debt to GDP.
The UK has been prudent by borrowing over relatively long term periods and so defers refinancing a long time into the future. However, we can not afford to have a mismanaged economic at that future point because will will not be able to refinance the debt other than going to the IMF for a rescue. The IMF would then impose tight conditions on government spending.
As I have posted here on a number of occasions..I think the leave vote will be about 57%
With Scotland, Wales and Ireland solid in Remain and David Cameron's personal recommendation, if he does, for Remain I would reverse those figures, indeed it could be as high as 60-40 Remain
Wales is pretty much evenly divided. I expect that in the end, a very large majority of Unionists in Northern Ireland will vote for Leave, albeit, still leaving Remain ahead by c.55-45% in eh Province.
But balancing the books is not enough. Not nearly enough. It will have taken us an entire cycle of record borrowing to get back to zero. If we then have a recession, as is more than likely, the borrowing will simply soar again.
The cap for a developed, modern, industrialised economy of Debt to GDP is well over 200%. The UK has quite some room for maneuver.
The whole ideological argument from Osborne is based on the ridiculous myth that government debt ever has to be repaid. It doesn't, that's one of its great attractions.
There are lots of good arguments for Fiscal prudence and running low tax, low spend public finances. But the idea that it's not affordable is simply economic illiteracy.
High debt is very closely linked to low growth and poor performance. Also the room for manoeuvre only exists if people are willing to lend the money. Greece didn't quite get to 200% but I think it would be fair to say that their flexibility was somewhat curtailed. http://www.tradingeconomics.com/greece/government-debt-to-gdp
There is nothing ideological about having the State live within its means. It is common sense. Of course this allows expenditure to rise as GDP rises and encourages politicians to find growth.
Greece is not and never was a developed, modern, industrialisd economy, hence it could not handle a high Debt to GPD ratio.
The impact of high debt (well implied high spending without the necessary tax base) on productivity is certainly an argument for low tax, low spend but it's not entirely straight forward.
But it's not an argument based on "affordability". Talking about it in terms of "common sense" and "living within our means" just indicates an ignorance over the matter and an underlying belief that there is some sort of equivalence between National Debt and personal credit. There isn't.
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
LEAVE's best argument is that we can only have a realistic negotiation over the EU from a position of strength where the population has already voted to leave in a referendum.
Once we have voted to leave, we can start negotiations again and tackle real issues like 50% of the EU budget being spent on the Common Agricultural Policy when agriculature is only 2% of Europe's GDP.
Never understood this line of argument – if we vote to leave, we leave. – At that point the EU would simply say the UK has no influence over EU policy or future changes to CAP etc.
Well it has £15 billion gross contributions to the EU funding (about 10%). It gets half back (and the EU are going to pull out all the stops with how much money the UK gets from the EU, when it is merely part of our own money being returned.)
Could the EU survive with losing 10% of its funding, when it is in such a state?
He who pays the piper calls the tune.
Yes, but it pays back half of that to the UK. So the rest of the EU has to find c. 7.5bn.
But, of course, just like with Switzerland and Norway we'll pay something for access to the single market. Say, making up numbers, it'll be 3.75bn.
That leaves the EU with a 3.75bn hole. Which is not very big in the general scheme of things; it's equivalent to a couple of non-working destroyers, for example.
Yes, massive fraud, perpetrated by Labour and their followers from a certain banana republic.
Not necessarily fraud, just loads of double and tripe-counting, as people move very frequently in big cities, and students were often registered to vote both at home and in the constituency they were living in.
It will have a significant impact on boundary reviews, though. Hackney and Islington should go down to three seats, for example.
There are three separate phenomena here, in fact: 1. People who move to a new address (either from an old UK address or, less frequently, from abroad) and don't re-register as a priority. 2. People who don't delete their former registration but just let it expire in due course. 3. Fraud.
1 is a genuine loss of voters and changing boundaries to reflect it does discriminate against urban voters in a big way - people shift around in cities in a way that dwarfs rural areas. 2 is an anomaly which probably doesn't change actual voting (few will bother to vote in both places), but which could reasonably be deterred by better communication between seats - it could be a prerequisite for registering that any former location is notified. 3 is a crime, though one which seems to be concentrated in a few areas (notably Tower Hamlets and some Birmingham seats).
That's still a fair-sized lead for Remain with MORI, albeit narrowing. 57-43%, excluding don't knows. I think the huge lead in June was definitely an outlier.
LEAVE's best argument is that we can only have a realistic negotiation over the EU from a position of strength where the population has already voted to leave in a referendum.
Once we have voted to leave, we can start negotiations again and tackle real issues like 50% of the EU budget being spent on the Common Agricultural Policy when agriculature is only 2% of Europe's GDP.
Never understood this line of argument – if we vote to leave, we leave. – At that point the EU would simply say the UK has no influence over EU policy or future changes to CAP etc.
In the past the EU hasn't accepted the outcome of country referendum votes but goes back to negotiate better terms for the country and which then has another referendum eg Ireland.
The report, based on 2012 data, said although half a million students had started degrees last autumn, money would be better spent cutting the number of undergraduates and investing in basic education.
About one in five young university graduates could manage basic tasks, but struggled with more complex problems. The report concluded: "University teaching gives limited attention to low levels of literacy and numeracy. Graduates with low basic skills gain modest returns from their qualifications and will often not be able to repay their student debts. England has a large university system relative to a poorly skilled pool of potential entrants."
The study concluded that 7% of 20 to 34-year-old graduates in England have numeracy skills below level two, while 3.4% have literacy skills below this level. This means that they struggle to estimate how much petrol is left in a tank from looking at the gauge, or have difficulty understanding instructions on an aspirin bottle.
I don't understand why they haven't included Scotland and Wales in their choice of comparison countries.
Thanks. To be honest the Scottish comparator was one of the things I was looking for. As you say, disappointing.
It would be illuminating to see the outcome based upon English regions and cities.
The number of people with "English Spoken as an Other Language" is likely to act regressively on the performance measures for literacy, and as these youngsters are disproportionately based in England it is bound to have an impact.
The university outcome is entirely predictable. There was never a realistic need in the jobs market for 50% to undertake a university education.
How many graduates does the UK economy really need?
Comments
Oh yes of course, I'd forgotten, the party only had 1.6 London Cabs full* to choose from.
* Come back Martin Day.
Mind you it looks as if Jezza is determined to test there formula!
Ydoaether asked earlier if there was anything that Jezza was good at. I still cannot think of anything.
The ferrets in the sack as all the North London Labour MPs fight to be selected in seats under the new boundaries will be hilarious to watch. Half the shadow cabinet will be infvolved in it!
I am not sure that Osborne has wildly seesawed. His first step was to increase taxes, specifically VAT. He has done his best to keep the cap on spending despite the huge bias to ever greater expenditure built in by that idiot Brown. The lack of inflation and the lack of the tax on bankers bonuses has caused tax revenues to disappoint making squaring the circle ever harder. I think it is inevitable that he will return to tax increases as cuts get ever harder to find.
https://www.tes.com/news/further-education/breaking-news/send-more-students-fe-instead-university-says-oecd
Sounds like what one part of the UK is already switching to.
Once we have voted to leave, we can start negotiations again and tackle real issues like 50% of the EU budget being spent on the Common Agricultural Policy when agriculature is only 2% of Europe's GDP.
Leave is Leave.
Will Owen Patterson lose his seat !
Really? whatever happened to bonfire of the quangos? Osborne likes his pet projects and spending on friends as much as his mentor Brown. His last budget illustrated that amply. Chote gave him 26 billion and he promptly spent it.
You can't let the State be the sole source of education for your children; not can you blame the State when your child leaves school as an innumerate, illiterate numpty. As parents, our children's welfare is (or should be) our highest priority, and how they turn out, is largely down to us, uncomfortable as that may be.
Tory calls for debate on setting limits to halt 'Megalopolis'
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/london-population-forecast-to-hit-13m-by-2050-a3168091.html
http://metro.co.uk/2016/01/29/germany-confirms-five-zika-virus-cases-5651280
Half the Lib Dems, just like that.
Could the EU survive with losing 10% of its funding, when it is in such a state?
He who pays the piper calls the tune.
The whole ideological argument from Osborne is based on the ridiculous myth that government debt ever has to be repaid. It doesn't, that's one of its great attractions.
There are lots of good arguments for Fiscal prudence and running low tax, low spend public finances. But the idea that it's not affordable is simply economic illiteracy.
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/jan/01/eu-referendum-polling-results-depend-methods
I don't understand why they haven't included Scotland and Wales in their choice of comparison countries.
"Nothing matters very much and few things matter at all"
People who spend their lives on the outrage bus must be exhausted by all that emoting.
With the opposition in complete disarray the next budget should be the most radical in a generation, thinking the unthinkable about what the State actually does. For some examples what does DCMS do that couldn't be 90% handed straight to the Lottery? Offering tax breaks for private health insurance would stimulate growth in both insurance and providers of healthcare, while reducing demand in the NHS. For a really big one, merge income tax and NI, throw hundreds of pages of complicated tax code in the bin and replace them with half a dozen, meaning that the average small businessman doesn't need lawyers and accountants just to fill in his tax return or run a simple payroll.
http://www.tradingeconomics.com/greece/government-debt-to-gdp
There is nothing ideological about having the State live within its means. It is common sense. Of course this allows expenditure to rise as GDP rises and encourages politicians to find growth.
All government debt is for a fixed term (5,10 20 years etc). So there comes a point where is has to be repaid and refinanced.
Whilst Japan has a very high debt to GDP ratio and is still able to refinance their debt, other countries like Greece have found that they can not refinance their debt at a 100% ratio of debt to GDP.
The UK has been prudent by borrowing over relatively long term periods and so defers refinancing a long time into the future. However, we can not afford to have a mismanaged economic at that future point because will will not be able to refinance the debt other than going to the IMF for a rescue. The IMF would then impose tight conditions on government spending.
The impact of high debt (well implied high spending without the necessary tax base) on productivity is certainly an argument for low tax, low spend but it's not entirely straight forward.
But it's not an argument based on "affordability". Talking about it in terms of "common sense" and "living within our means" just indicates an ignorance over the matter and an underlying belief that there is some sort of equivalence between National Debt and personal credit. There isn't.
But, of course, just like with Switzerland and Norway we'll pay something for access to the single market. Say, making up numbers, it'll be 3.75bn.
That leaves the EU with a 3.75bn hole. Which is not very big in the general scheme of things; it's equivalent to a couple of non-working destroyers, for example.
1. People who move to a new address (either from an old UK address or, less frequently, from abroad) and don't re-register as a priority.
2. People who don't delete their former registration but just let it expire in due course.
3. Fraud.
1 is a genuine loss of voters and changing boundaries to reflect it does discriminate against urban voters in a big way - people shift around in cities in a way that dwarfs rural areas. 2 is an anomaly which probably doesn't change actual voting (few will bother to vote in both places), but which could reasonably be deterred by better communication between seats - it could be a prerequisite for registering that any former location is notified. 3 is a crime, though one which seems to be concentrated in a few areas (notably Tower Hamlets and some Birmingham seats).
The point is, whoever is right, why did we need to create the argument?
The number of people with "English Spoken as an Other Language" is likely to act regressively on the performance measures for literacy, and as these youngsters are disproportionately based in England it is bound to have an impact.
The university outcome is entirely predictable. There was never a realistic need in the jobs market for 50% to undertake a university education.
How many graduates does the UK economy really need?