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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » Good night for LAB, bad one for the LDs in this week’s local by-elections
Alston Moor on Eden (Lib Dem defence) Result: Labour 407 (56%, no candidate last time), Conservative 253 (35% -10% on last time), Independent 57 (8%, no candidate last time), Green Party 13 (2%, no candidate last time) No Liberal Democrat candidate (-55%) Labour GAIN from Liberal Democrat with a majority of 154 (21%) on a notional swing of 33% from Conservative to Labour
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Firing up the player...
In my view.
Not sure the two LD losses are of great significance and both under slightly unusual circumstances but regrettable nonetheless.
There was a by-election on Wealden DC which the Conservatives held - Labour 2nd and the LDs 3rd - 349,185,120 and a 10% swing Con-Lab.
Also a contest on Shepway - another CON hold - complicated by a former CON Councillor running as an Independent and finishing a strong third with 27%. Swing of 7.5% Con-Lab.
It is one of these 74 MPs, and it ain't Byron Davies, Ben Howlett, Tania Mathias, James Berry or Flick Drummond because they lost, so it's actually one of 69.
http://www.conservativehome.com/parliament/2015/05/generation-2015-introducing-the-74-new-conservative-mps.html
Who?
https://twitter.com/TSEofPB/status/887320364589752321
It's almost as if it was an obsession for a tiny minority and the rest of the country has moved on.
https://www.cvce.eu/en/obj/address_given_by_winston_churchill_at_the_congress_of_europe_in_the_hague_7_may_1948-en-58118da1-af22-48c0-bc88-93cda974f42c.html
If you can get BF to list all of those names.
The circumstances of the two LD losses were unusual but that doesn't make the losses any more palatable. Not sure it was that good a night for the Conservatives with the big loss in Leek and some moderate results elsewhere (apart from Stockton which was good).
... though his tend to end in a car crash every so often.
The September 1946 speech "There is no reason why a regional organisation of Europe should in any way conflict with the world organisation of the United Nations. On the contrary, I believe that the larger synthesis will only survive if it is founded upon coherent natural groupings.
There is already a natural grouping in the Western Hemisphere. We British have our own Commonwealth of Nations. These do not weaken, on the contrary they strengthen, the world organisation. They are in fact its main support."
"Great Britain, the British Commonwealth of Nations, mighty America, and I trust Soviet Russia - for then indeed all would be well - must be the friends and sponsors of the new Europe and must champion its right to live and shine."
http://www.churchill-society-london.org.uk/astonish.html
It's clear he saw the UK as a flying buttress to support a united Europe, and one of its Sponsors, not immersed right at the heart of it.
Which, coincidentally, is the position of our current Foreign Secretary.
It was a poor night for the Conservatives, IMHO.
It's very clear from the speech I linked that he saw Great Britain as part of the Europe that should unify, every bit as much as the Iberian Peninsula, Scandinavia, or France and Germany themselves.
A North Wales AM has called Chuka Umunna a “f***ing coconut” during a foul-mouthed rant against him, Barack Obama and Tristram Hunt.
Michelle Brown, a regional Ukip AM, said the Labour MP for Streatham was “black on the outside, white on the inside” in a telephone conversation with Nigel Williams, who was her senior advisor at the time.
http://www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-ukip-am-calls-13368297.amp
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/jurisprudence/2017/07/no_matter_who_he_fires_or_pardons_trump_won_t_be_able_to_escape_state_attorneys.html
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/jul/21/diane-abbott-fires-back-after-itv-news-tweets-her-interview-stumble
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jul/21/isis-islamic-state-suicide-brigade-interpol-list
The Wile E Coyote of the Tory party.
Check out P.186-190:
https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=K42SDgAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=winston+churchill+myth+and+reality&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiR_M34k5vVAhXBnBoKHcIeAEMQ6AEIKDAA#v=onepage&q=winston churchill myth and reality&f=false
You are a master of selectively quoting facts and evidence that you think support your case.
Norway's likely to be one of the very last. It can contemplate the world with the comfort of knowing that it has almost $US 1 trillion of oil money in the bank.
The US took ~150 years to go from 13 to 50 states. Give it time.
I've never made national significance of local elections though they are useful as straws in the wind but that's all. As an example, last night's St Helier result suggests the Conservatives have very little chance of recapturing Merton next year but I wouldn't infer any more from it.
I can take "criticism" but David wasn't offering that.
I'd be genuinely interested in the views of Conservatives on Vince Cable's remarks - they surprised one or two but no one should doubt Cable's antipathy toward Corbyn-style socialism from his experiences as a Labour Councillor in the late 70s and early 80s. He is ferociously anti-Corbyn but not anti-Labour.
Still glad I did it though.
(Of course, so do some bust shit holes: Albania and Puerto Rico, for example.)
Half a year or so ago there seemed a genuine chance of a Brexit-propelled Lib Dem resurgence. There was even some talk of whether they could supplant a Labour party that was torn with parliamentary strife and seemed to be steaming away at full speed from the centre of the political battleground. The 48% strategy, added to greater clarity over the risks and costs of Brexit among the more regret-capable component of the 52% and the outpourings of Europhile support from young people, looked like it could be sculpted into a really serious political force.
But where is it now? It didn't seem to turn up at the GE. And while you can't read too much into local election results, they don't provide much evidence of a historic grassroots anti-Brexit revolt looming up in the shires post-GE.
(Perhaps this resurgence talk was all silly wishful thinking and really rather overblown in the first place, so it is not a sensible or constructive thing to.compare reality against such lofty expectations. And I know you have always tempered your feelings with more realism. But the fact the Lib Dems are not sweeping the council chambers and bedecking them with blue flags and yellow stars should really be taking some people by surprise, if they truly had believed their predictions from not so long ago, and may for that reason alone bear some reiteration. Albeit not to you, since you were already wise enough to that..)
But, he also enjoys drama a little too much.
Friends and sponsors of Europe - NOT a part of it!
Compared to the rest of the top-five Caribbean countries by population, they ain't doing too bad. (Bit of a fiddle though as Trinidad & Tobago, quite a long way behind in sixth place, has similar looking numbers to Puerto Rico.)
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jul/21/living-in-the-path-of-hs2-we-dont-matter-do-we
You lot still have not twigged it's not about the money really, have you? Of course we can't be Monaco or Norway. So what? I don't want to be a fucking "European". It's not my identity.
Really?? Can we just kill that myth please...
2008 rate = 28%; CT take = 3.28% of GDP
2016 rate = 20%; CT take = 2.36% of GDP
The existence of the English Channel has certainly played a huge role in forming our history, but it is hardly the only geographical barrier within Europe to have left its mark.
The second question is, do changes to the corporate tax rate affect the level of GDP through influencing firms' investment decisions? This is, of course, a much harder question to answer because the government's choices do not take place in a vacuum.
In raw figures (taking no account of inflation, population growth etc.)...
2008 CT take = £47.0bn
2016 CT take = £44.4bn
Source ukpublicrevenue.co.uk (from OBR)
http://www.ukpublicrevenue.co.uk/downloadsrs_ukgr.php?codes=CN445&units=b&group=&fy=2017
Angola?
Cape Verde?
Sao Principe?
East Timor?
Macau?
Imagine you are CFO of a company (as indeed I am). You have subsidiaries in a number of countries that contribute to whatever it is you do. Each of those subsidiaries does something that adds up to the finished product (or service), and you need to account for transactions between these entities. Transfer pricing is the act of working out what subsidiary A should pay subsidiary B; and corporates work to ensure that taxable profit falls in low tax countries.
Do CT rates affect the GDP level? Hard to prove as you point out. I might do an analysis of GDP growth versus CT rates and, given CT rates were very high during the 80s. I bet it would point to higher CT rates aligning with higher growth... but I don't claim there's a causative effect
However, I fail to understand why higher CT rates would inhibit investment, as is often claimed. It might impact some short-term inward foreign investment into the UK but for UK companies higher CT rates are actually an incentive to invest, since investment in assets and R&D are CT exempt. The higher the CT rate the more a company is incentivisec to invest in long-term growth, rather than pay tax on declared profits.
Labour have got this one right.
(And while I like JRM, I'm not sure what department I'd want to give him. Also, I'd worry that he might believe what his dad wrote in The Great Reckoning.)
The same goes for a huge chunk of Labour's current MPs. They'd go up in my estimation if they abandoned ship.
Investment in assets is not "CT exempt". If I buy a server, it is depreciated over time and this "capital allowance" is deducted against tax. Other countries are far more generous with their capital allowances, and that is a factor in our decisions.
I suspect JRM would be his worst nightmare...
But I honestly think this only operates for a few (admittedly high-profile) global players. The vast majority of UK businesses are not going to say "ooh CT rates are going up to 26%, let's run down our business" I agree raising CT rates might lead to more reinvestment or, dare I say, it higher wages as companies ease their recruitment issues, thus meaning the CT tax take doesn't go up pro rata, but up it will surely go.
The white working class vote (still exists in parts if London) is going back to Labour.