Tom hates Bob. Ed doesn’t have much faith in Iain. Tim has a political tin ear. Anna’s the fixer who doesn’t fix it. Greg is in exile and behaving like it. Torsten wants discipline but puts the Shadow Cabinet’s backs up.
Nobody is quite sure what Jon’s up to, particularly when he’s “thinking” in his new place in the West of Ireland. And there aren’t enough hours in the day for Stewart to sort it all out. When in doubt, they blame the Blairites.
Welcome to Ed Miliband’s inner circle, the group who must now hold the ring for what is shaping up to be a fractious five-day Labour family gathering by the seaside, starting today...In recent months, the adjectives about Mr Miliband’s operation have started to echo those used about Gordon Brown’s Downing Street team, with talk of “guerrilla warfare” between some shadow ministerial offices and “decision-making malaise”. http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politics/conference/article3875246.ece
Plato,the way you started your post,it reminded me of the American tv soap series ;-)
You lose your benefits if you turn down enough jobs, but it's not illegal to turn down jobs.
There is an Act of Parliament that states that a condition of claiming Jobseekers' Allowance is that you are "available for and actively seeking" work. Moreover there is a direct connection between claiming JSA and being unemployed, so it can be seen as reasonable and proportionate to require JSA claimants to look for work. You don't get your Income Support or ESA stopped for turning down jobs, because they are awarded on a different basis.
Tom hates Bob. Ed doesn’t have much faith in Iain. Tim has a political tin ear. Anna’s the fixer who doesn’t fix it. Greg is in exile and behaving like it. Torsten wants discipline but puts the Shadow Cabinet’s backs up.
Nobody is quite sure what Jon’s up to, particularly when he’s “thinking” in his new place in the West of Ireland. And there aren’t enough hours in the day for Stewart to sort it all out. When in doubt, they blame the Blairites.
Welcome to Ed Miliband’s inner circle, the group who must now hold the ring for what is shaping up to be a fractious five-day Labour family gathering by the seaside, starting today...In recent months, the adjectives about Mr Miliband’s operation have started to echo those used about Gordon Brown’s Downing Street team, with talk of “guerrilla warfare” between some shadow ministerial offices and “decision-making malaise”. http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politics/conference/article3875246.ece
Plato,the way you started your post,it reminded me of the American tv soap series ;-)
I adore SOAP! - its by far the best comedy series to come out of the USA in decades, that the Moral Majority wanted it banned spoke volumes. I couldn't get it on the right DVD region anywhere so bought a new player just to watch it again a few yrs ago. Worth every penny.
"'Learn English or lose your benefits': Osborne introduces tougher new jobseeker rules"
I seem to remember the PB Tories supporting that. Yet not being able to speak English isn't a crime.
Yes, I support that. Failing to learn English drastically restricts your ability to find a job. Moreover I would go further. It should be deemed to make you "unavailable for work". It should also be a precursor of being allowed to settle permanently in the UK that you have a reasonable level of English. People who wish to move to the UK should be busy learning English before they leave their homeland.
You lose your benefits if you turn down enough jobs, but it's not illegal to turn down jobs.
There is an Act of Parliament that states that a condition of claiming Jobseekers' Allowance is that you are "available for and actively seeking" work. Moreover there is a direct connection between claiming JSA and being unemployed, so it can be seen as reasonable and proportionate to require JSA claimants to look for work. You don't get your Income Support or ESA stopped for turning down jobs, because they are awarded on a different basis.
Grandiose has referenced the legal principle of a need for a "rational connection".
I guess there are also legal issues related to forcing a medical intervention on benefit claimants when the same intervention is not forced on non-claimants (RN's point).
The NHS sees the barbarity that is FGM on a daily base and yet Labour' Armed-Wing refuses to enforce the law against the Labour-funded terrorist-wing that practices such illegalities. So how does Wee-Timmy expect the MMR-tax to work...?
"'Learn English or lose your benefits': Osborne introduces tougher new jobseeker rules"
I seem to remember the PB Tories supporting that. Yet not being able to speak English isn't a crime.
Yes, I support that. Failing to learn English drastically restricts your ability to find a job. Moreover I would go further. It should be deemed to make you "unavailable for work". It should also be a precursor of being allowed to settle permanently in the UK that you have a reasonable level of English. People who wish to move to the UK should be busy learning English before they leave their homeland.
Presumably it's OK if you can speak Welsh instead of English?
So rich labour luvvies don't have to give their children the MMR vaccine but can use single vaccine while poor people are coerced to give their children the MMR.
Very Marie Antoinette / Animal Farm. Typical 'do as I say don't do what I do' from the marxists. But on the other hand fantastic for UKIP as they use the politics of fear to scoop up the working poor from labour. Firstly apprenticeships going to foreigners, now you'll be forced to give nasty injections to your children.
All probably illegal under the ECHR which the labour government introduced into legislation. Really you can't make it up !
In any case, why withdraw benefits? Why not simply make it illegal and prosecute? In my view, the Government has no right discriminating against people for doing something that is not illegal.
That's true. Either it's a legal obligation on parents, or it's not. Ed Miliband seems to want to make it a de-facto obligation on any parent not rich enough to be able to tell him where to stuff his MMR jab. That's completely bonkers.
You lose your benefits if you turn down enough jobs, but it's not illegal to turn down jobs. Why should the state subsidise people who are deliberately putting their children, and other peoples children at risk?
I really do think this would be defeated in a human rights court,is it just me who thinks this is a bonkers idea.
Bonkers? – that rather depends on whether Miliband locks up those conscientious objectors - or merely fines them.
You lose your benefits if you turn down enough jobs, but it's not illegal to turn down jobs.
There is an Act of Parliament that states that a condition of claiming Jobseekers' Allowance is that you are "available for and actively seeking" work. Moreover there is a direct connection between claiming JSA and being unemployed, so it can be seen as reasonable and proportionate to require JSA claimants to look for work. You don't get your Income Support or ESA stopped for turning down jobs, because they are awarded on a different basis.
Grandiose has referenced the legal principle of a need for a "rational connection".
I guess there are also legal issues related to forcing a medical intervention on benefit claimants when the same intervention is not forced on non-claimants (RN's point).
There's a perfectly rational connection between state subsidised childcare (a universal benefit) and not putting other children in that nursery at risk. You want to put other children at risk you don't get the cash.
I'm not a lawyer but I wouldn't want to finance litigation on that argument.
Why not simply make the vaccination compulsory (with exemptions on defined and reasonable medical grounds)?
Merkel is in a majority position (so-to-speak) at the moment but 7 of the 22 seats to come are from Berlin which is probably going to be worse than average for her.
So rich labour luvvies don't have to give their children the MMR vaccine but can use single vaccine while poor people are coerced to give their children the MMR.
Very Marie Antoinette / Animal Farm. Typical 'do as I say don't do what I do' from the marxists. But on the other hand fantastic for UKIP as they use the politics of fear to scoop up the working poor from labour. Firstly apprenticeships going to foreigners, now you'll be forced to give nasty injections to your children.
All probably illegal under the ECHR which the labour government introduced into legislation. Really you can't make it up !
"'Learn English or lose your benefits': Osborne introduces tougher new jobseeker rules"
I seem to remember the PB Tories supporting that. Yet not being able to speak English isn't a crime.
Yes, I support that. Failing to learn English drastically restricts your ability to find a job. Moreover I would go further. It should be deemed to make you "unavailable for work". It should also be a precursor of being allowed to settle permanently in the UK that you have a reasonable level of English. People who wish to move to the UK should be busy learning English before they leave their homeland.
That was one of the suggestions in Peter Whittle's "Beyond Multiculturalism" speech at the UKIP Conference.
Renate Voß and Renate Gisela Schmidt of the Marxist-Leninist Party of Germany got 544 and 544 votes respectively in the constituencies of Rostock and Zollernalb-Sigmaringen respectively in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Baden-Wurttemberg respectively.
Tom hates Bob. Ed doesn’t have much faith in Iain. Tim has a political tin ear. Anna’s the fixer who doesn’t fix it. Greg is in exile and behaving like it. Torsten wants discipline but puts the Shadow Cabinet’s backs up.
Nobody is quite sure what Jon’s up to, particularly when he’s “thinking” in his new place in the West of Ireland. And there aren’t enough hours in the day for Stewart to sort it all out. When in doubt, they blame the Blairites.
Welcome to Ed Miliband’s inner circle, the group who must now hold the ring for what is shaping up to be a fractious five-day Labour family gathering by the seaside, starting today...In recent months, the adjectives about Mr Miliband’s operation have started to echo those used about Gordon Brown’s Downing Street team, with talk of “guerrilla warfare” between some shadow ministerial offices and “decision-making malaise”. http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/news/politics/conference/article3875246.ece
Plato,the way you started your post,it reminded me of the American tv soap series ;-)
I adore SOAP! - its by far the best comedy series to come out of the USA in decades, that the Moral Majority wanted it banned spoke volumes. I couldn't get it on the right DVD region anywhere so bought a new player just to watch it again a few yrs ago. Worth every penny.
Coalition policy is to give childcare benefits up to £300k earning couples, we aren't talking about harshly means tested benefits here.
I don't know why you are talking about nursery places and schooling. The Times headline refers to benefits.
It'll be child benefit and/or subsidised childcare benefits which are nursery/childminder linked
You might be getting closer to a workable policy if the benefits withdrawal was limited to any subsidy provided for nursery places, but any widening of the scope of withdrawal would be difficult.
You would still have to answer to a charge of discrimination if parents, who paid in full and received no connected state subsidy, were permitted to place a non-vaccinated child at the same nursery.
"'Learn English or lose your benefits': Osborne introduces tougher new jobseeker rules"
I seem to remember the PB Tories supporting that. Yet not being able to speak English isn't a crime.
Yes, I support that. Failing to learn English drastically restricts your ability to find a job. Moreover I would go further. It should be deemed to make you "unavailable for work". It should also be a precursor of being allowed to settle permanently in the UK that you have a reasonable level of English. People who wish to move to the UK should be busy learning English before they leave their homeland.
There have been a bunch of guys installing solar panels in my street recently. I greeted one with an "all right?" - then it became apparent he didn't speak English. So long as their foreman was bi-lingual, lack of English didn't seem to be a problem. (I would guess they were Polish)
A couple of last bits of telling data to leave you with...
First of all, our own Wolfgang Blau points to some crunchy data from ARD showing how voters migrated from one party to another. I think the jaw-dropping number is the 2.2m FDP voters who drifted into the CDU camp.
Tom hates Bob. Ed doesn’t have much faith in Iain. Tim has a political tin ear. Anna’s the fixer who doesn’t fix it. Greg is in exile and behaving like it. Torsten wants discipline but puts the Shadow Cabinet’s backs up.
Nobody is quite sure what Jon’s up to, particularly when he’s “thinking” in his new place in the West of Ireland. And there aren’t enough hours in the day for Stewart to sort it all out. When in doubt, they blame the Blairites.
Plato,the way you started your post,it reminded me of the American tv soap series ;-)
I adore SOAP! - its by far the best comedy series to come out of the USA in decades, that the Moral Majority wanted it banned spoke volumes. I couldn't get it on the right DVD region anywhere so bought a new player just to watch it again a few yrs ago. Worth every penny.
On reading further, the application of the rational connection limb has been (generally) been restricted to showing that the means adopted would contribute to the aim pursued. More challenging is the third limb (necessary connection is the second) "the means used to impair the right or freedom are no more than is necessary to accomplish the objective". That means considering if less rights-infringing methods would work just as well (Bank Mellat v Her Majesty's Treasury (No 2) (SC)). That has always been the ECHR's problem with blanket bans in all sorts of areas. The policy, if it's going to stand up, is going to have to be a lot more limited than "lose your benefits" would suggest.
Coalition policy is to give childcare benefits up to £300k earning couples, we aren't talking about harshly means tested benefits here.
I don't know why you are talking about nursery places and schooling. The Times headline refers to benefits.
It'll be child benefit and/or subsidised childcare benefits which are nursery/childminder linked
You might be getting closer to a workable policy if the benefits withdrawal was limited to any subsidy provided for nursery places, but any widening of the scope of withdrawal would be difficult.
You would still have to answer to a charge of discrimination if parents, who paid in full and received no connected state subsidy, were permitted to place a non-vaccinated child at the same nursery.
I suspect that we'll go down the US/Canadian/Australian route and make nurseries responsible for checking immunisation status There's some sort of "conscientious objector" status for the hippies and lunatics who end up home schooling in log cabins.
You haven't commented on compulsory vaccination.
I have no agenda in asking and haven't really considered the issue before.
Are there any medical interventions made compulsory by statute?
Sunny Hundal @sunny_hundal Actually a good headline for Ed Miliband (undercuts 'weak' narrative) - "Why my friend Ed knifed me" pic.twitter.com/QueQewEAok
If Lab really is proposing 'use it or lose benefits' MMR policy, it's the most stupid thing I've ever heard in a decade of party conferences
Don't start me on that conspiracy loon
"MMR fears gain support By JAMES CHAPMAN, Daily Mail The safety of the MMR vaccine was again called into question yesterday after American research appeared to back the British doctor who first linked it to autism and bowel disease. Dr Andrew Wakefield was vilified after claiming to have identified a combined syndrome of autism and bowel disease in children who had been given the measles, mumps and rubella injection." http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-124886/MMR-fears-gain-support.html
A Wakefield disciple and fully paid up health risk
New questions on MMR by JENNY HOPE & JAMES CHAPMAN, Daily Mail
Concern: the Daily Mail investigation raises worrying questions about MMR Disturbing new questions about the safety of the MMR jab are raised today by a devastating Daily Mail investigation. Award-winning writer Melanie Phillips exposes links between vaccine manufacturers and key government advisers. Follow the link at the bottom of the page to read Melanie's damning investigation.
I'm guessing that because FDP (and AfD) won't make the cut, the number of overhang mandates is reduced, so the Bundestag size won't be increased as much as was thought originally.
While I was going through the constituency results, I noticed a party called "Die PARTEI" which, upon investigation, looks interesting. Starting from its philosophically-inspired name and acronym,
"PARTEI" is an acronym for ... Party for Work, Rule-of-Law, Protection of Animals, Advancement of Elites, and Grassroot-Democratic Initiative... Usage of the definite article ("die PARTEI") is evocative of totalitarian parties ... and is therefore a tongue-in-cheek reference to the totalitarian ambitions of the founders of "Die PARTEI". This is exploited and parodied in advertising in which the [East German party song], 'The Party is always right' ("Die Partei hat immer Recht") is played.",
it was beginning to look like a good idea, until I read further down and discovered that it has a policy of launching an aggressive war of democratisation against Liechtenstein.
Not sure how you'd do it though but removing automatic child related benefits from the reckless is a sensible step. The research shows very few people are philosophically opposed, mostly it's a logistics issue , and linking benefits to responsibility is a good thing isn't it?
"Not sure how you'd do it though but removing automatic child related benefits from the reckless is a sensible step".
It's a strange step. Child benefit is based on need, not desert. I don't think anything came of proposals to make child benefit truancy related did they? That also had an alternative enforcement mechanism.
Not sure how you'd do it though but removing automatic child related benefits from the reckless is a sensible step. The research shows very few people are philosophically opposed, mostly it's a logistics issue , and linking benefits to responsibility is a good thing isn't it?
We need Dr. Sox who would probably help here.
There are statutory requirements such as pasteurisation of milk (and associated exemptions) but regulating foodstuffs is widespread.
It is a different matter regulating medical treatment of humans.
And no majority (whether by poll or plebiscite) can justify a majority infringing a human right of a minority, so I am not sure you can rely on polling results for justification.
If you allowed schools and nurseries to exclude non-vaccinated pupils you then have to provide for the education of children whose parents are 'conscientious objectors'.
Difficult.
We need an expert here rather than try to re-invent the legal wheel.
Grandiose has certainly helped on legal principle but we need practical examples.
The future, not the past, is the mantra for Ed Miliband’s “cost of living” conference. He wants to explain to the nation why whatever economic recovery there may be is not benefiting ordinary people and to promise that a future Labour government will make sure it does. Instead, the clammy hands of corpses that were sent to sleep with the fishes are bobbing up to the surface and are threatening to pull the fresh-faced Labour team back to its murky past...
The victims were mostly Labour cabinet ministers from Tony Blair down. Like a true Jesuit, McBride takes no blame for making them face the consequences of the peccadillos that he passed on to the press. When he finally quit government it was because he had been caught manufacturing outright lies about prominent Conservative politicians in cahoots with Derek Draper, a disgraced new Labour braggart.
Miliband is insisting this was in the past — another country — and besides the Grinch is dead to politics. (Brown has spoken in parliament rarely this year.) But Ed was also a capo in the court of King Brown, sharing with McBride the coffee-making duties. McBride knifed people and Miliband is still most famous for knifing his own brother — with the active support of Brown, we now know from the book...I never had much to do with McBride, because for me the great mystery of modern politics was why so many felt that Brown was entitled to take over the premiership without a fight. Once McBride realised I was not one of his, there was not much point in us talking. The commonplace duty of a press officer to brief non-partisan journalists never seemed to cross his mind.
Labour's contempt for their core electorate is on display over #MMR4benefits - no attempt to explain or persuade, straight to naked force
Exactly,don't worry,it's under consideration ;-)
Straight to naked force would be compulsory vaccination, which has majority support among Labour, Con and Lib Dem voters. The denials that its in the review make me think it won't happen, file under drugs policy and politicians too weedy to do the right thing, hope I'm wrong
Graeme Cowie @woodstockjag So @labourpress say #jabtax is "not part of the policy review"; John Cruddas says it's "an example of the sort of measure we want to see".
Graeme Cowie @woodstockjag So @labourpress say #jabtax is "not part of the policy review"; John Cruddas says it's "an example of the sort of measure we want to see".
So it's under consideration,make your bloody mind up labour.
And no majority (whether by poll or plebiscite) can justify a majority infringing a human right of a minority, so I am not sure you can rely on polling results for justification.
Of course it can. Virtually the whole of politics is about making judgements about balancing the rights (call them "human rights" if you like) of minorities (or "individuals") against those of the collective better interests of the majority / society / the common good (etc.) and the various methods of compulsion and incentives which can be used to change /affect / influence / achieve / modify / stop (etc) the behaviour of individuals and collectives in order to attain the desired objectives.
Sky: tabloids claiming a white English female convert to Islam was the mastermind behind the Nairobi attack....
It was a Mirror scoop until the Sun stole it.
She is the widow of a 7/7 London bomber. Brought up in the home counties in a white middle class family, converted to Islam and now living in Kenya. She is named in the Mirror article.
The Mirror are alleging she was the organiser of the Nairobi attack.
There'll be trouble about that... Two parties with 2m votes each unrepresented. Around 7m in total unrepresented. Largest number ever in the history of Germany.
Plus Merkel would have a majority if the FDP had made the cut...
Sky: tabloids claiming a white English female convert to Islam was the mastermind behind the Nairobi attack....
It was a Mirror scoop until the Sun stole it.
She is the widow of a 7/7 London bomber. Brought up in the home counties in a white middle class family, converted to Islam and now living in Kenya. She is named in the Mirror article.
The Mirror are alleging she was the organiser of the Nairobi attack.
Wow. I'm guessing this is not the lady who wanted to be a part of the 7/7 victim's commission?
Good to see the anti-Euro people and the anti-renewables "liberal" party doing badly, but these 5% thresholds are really stupid. You go to all the trouble of making a proper proportional voting system, then cripple it on purpose. That reduces the diversity of opinion the parliament represents and brings back all the arbitrariness and tactical shenanigans that you were supposed to be getting rid of.
This is going to be the worst possible result in my opinion.
The former Communists could end up in power if the SPD and Greens get fed up with Merkel.
Whatever. Even Merkel herself did agitprop for the FDJ. What is it about Germany that makes it unacceptable there to have anything to do with "the former Communists"? In almost every other East European country, former Communists have had major roles in govt since 1989 but this seems to go largely unnoticed
This is going to be the worst possible result in my opinion.
The former Communists could end up in power if the SPD and Greens get fed up with Merkel.
Whatever. Even Merkel herself did agitprop for the FDJ. What is it about Germany that makes it unacceptable there to have anything to do with "the former Communists"? In almost every other East European country, former Communists have had major roles in govt since 1989 but this seems to go largely unnoticed
What do you mean "whatever"?
A lot of Linke voters are elderly people in East Germany brainwashed after 40 years of Communism.
"'Learn English or lose your benefits': Osborne introduces tougher new jobseeker rules"
I seem to remember the PB Tories supporting that. Yet not being able to speak English isn't a crime.
Yes, I support that. Failing to learn English drastically restricts your ability to find a job. Moreover I would go further. It should be deemed to make you "unavailable for work". It should also be a precursor of being allowed to settle permanently in the UK that you have a reasonable level of English. People who wish to move to the UK should be busy learning English before they leave their homeland.
Don't be silly. When I went to live abroad, no-one checked whether I could speak the language; what mattered was whether I could do the job. What I do object to however is the way some authorities and organisations in the UK bend over backwards to accommodate the language needs of immigrants. When I was abroad, if the people I needed to speak to didn't speak English, that was my problem, not theirs.
Good to see the anti-Euro people and the anti-renewables "liberal" party doing badly, but these 5% thresholds are really stupid. You go to all the trouble of making a proper proportional voting system, then cripple it on purpose. That reduces the diversity of opinion the parliament represents and brings back all the arbitrariness and tactical shenanigans that you were supposed to be getting rid of.
Best economic solution for Europe might be for Germany to leave the Euro. I wouldn't write them off entirely. Surprised any party in Germany would be anti-renewables.
Why Merkel encouraged all her supporters to vote the same way on both votes is a bit of a mystery. If just a few had voted FDP on the second vote she'd have beeen able to continue with her preferred coalition.
Comments
http://politicshome.com/uk/article/85292/the_sun_monday_23rd_september_2013.html
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Er7GcFSRZO0
I guess there are also legal issues related to forcing a medical intervention on benefit claimants when the same intervention is not forced on non-claimants (RN's point).
Linke has now passed the Greens in second votes
CDU/CSU 0.3% ahead of SPD/Linke/Green now
http://politicshome.com/uk/article/85288/the_daily_mail_monday_23rd_september_2013.html
http://www.bundeswahlleiter.de/en/bundestagswahlen/BTW_BUND_13/ergebnisse/wahlkreisergebnisse/l05/wk120/index.html
The former Communists could end up in power if the SPD and Greens get fed up with Merkel.
Very Marie Antoinette / Animal Farm. Typical 'do as I say don't do what I do' from the marxists. But on the other hand fantastic for UKIP as they use the politics of fear to scoop up the working poor from labour. Firstly apprenticeships going to foreigners, now you'll be forced to give nasty injections to your children.
All probably illegal under the ECHR which the labour government introduced into legislation. Really you can't make it up !
(edited for typo)
Why not simply make the vaccination compulsory (with exemptions on defined and reasonable medical grounds)?
CDU/CSU 0.3% ahead of the rest-.
CDU/CSU 0.1% behind the rest
Linke back ahead of Greens
Now its reaching the stage where I'd believe Labour were saying Elvis is Alive as a credible position.
http://youtu.be/8__KC93unB0
Nicknamed the "white widow" she is a British born middle class white convert to Islam.
You would still have to answer to a charge of discrimination if parents, who paid in full and received no connected state subsidy, were permitted to place a non-vaccinated child at the same nursery.
First of all, our own Wolfgang Blau points to some crunchy data from ARD showing how voters migrated from one party to another. I think the jaw-dropping number is the 2.2m FDP voters who drifted into the CDU camp.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/sep/22/germany-election-results-merkel-live-updates?commentpage=1#block-523f61cbe4b09e440159ac69
CDU/CSU: 41.9%
SPD: 25.6%
Linke: 8.4%
Green: 8.3%
FDP: 4.8%
AfD: 4.7%
Others: 6.3%
Combined left parties: 42.3%
If Lab really is proposing 'use it or lose benefits' MMR policy, it's the most stupid thing I've ever heard in a decade of party conferences
Berlin-Charlottenburg - Wilmersdorf
Berlin-Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg - Prenzlauer Berg Ost
Berlin-Lichtenberg
Bremen II - Bremerhaven
Hamburg-Eimsbüttel
Hamburg-Mitte
Hochtaunus
Wiesbaden
Duisburg II
Erzgebirgskreis I
I have no agenda in asking and haven't really considered the issue before.
Are there any medical interventions made compulsory by statute?
Sunny Hundal @sunny_hundal
Actually a good headline for Ed Miliband (undercuts 'weak' narrative) - "Why my friend Ed knifed me" pic.twitter.com/QueQewEAok
For those not following the German elections on the Guardian blog:
What's the difference between the FDP and a Smart Car?
The Smart car has two seats.
We Germans have a sense of humour. Ja?
Maybe it will be 606?
"PARTEI" is an acronym for ... Party for Work, Rule-of-Law, Protection of Animals, Advancement of Elites, and Grassroot-Democratic Initiative... Usage of the definite article ("die PARTEI") is evocative of totalitarian parties ... and is therefore a tongue-in-cheek reference to the totalitarian ambitions of the founders of "Die PARTEI". This is exploited and parodied in advertising in which the [East German party song], 'The Party is always right' ("Die Partei hat immer Recht") is played.",
it was beginning to look like a good idea, until I read further down and discovered that it has a policy of launching an aggressive war of democratisation against Liechtenstein.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Die_PARTEI
But not as quick as ze Germans!
Isn't Australia still counting?
yes, ZDF is predicting a 606 parliament
Michael Savage @michaelsavage
RT @elliotttimes: MMR vaccination a condition of child benefit under active consideration by Labour's policy chief
James Chapman (Mail) @jameschappers
Labour source insists 'give your kids MMR or lose benefits' proposal 'not part of the policy review' #lab13
Labour's contempt for their core electorate is on display over #MMR4benefits - no attempt to explain or persuade, straight to naked force
Exactly,don't worry,it's under consideration ;-)
"Not sure how you'd do it though but removing automatic child related benefits from the reckless is a sensible step".
It's a strange step. Child benefit is based on need, not desert. I don't think anything came of proposals to make child benefit truancy related did they? That also had an alternative enforcement mechanism.
There are statutory requirements such as pasteurisation of milk (and associated exemptions) but regulating foodstuffs is widespread.
It is a different matter regulating medical treatment of humans.
And no majority (whether by poll or plebiscite) can justify a majority infringing a human right of a minority, so I am not sure you can rely on polling results for justification.
If you allowed schools and nurseries to exclude non-vaccinated pupils you then have to provide for the education of children whose parents are 'conscientious objectors'.
Difficult.
We need an expert here rather than try to re-invent the legal wheel.
Grandiose has certainly helped on legal principle but we need practical examples.
Come in Dr. Sox!
The future, not the past, is the mantra for Ed Miliband’s “cost of living” conference. He wants to explain to the nation why whatever economic recovery there may be is not benefiting ordinary people and to promise that a future Labour government will make sure it does. Instead, the clammy hands of corpses that were sent to sleep with the fishes are bobbing up to the surface and are threatening to pull the fresh-faced Labour team back to its murky past...
The victims were mostly Labour cabinet ministers from Tony Blair down. Like a true Jesuit, McBride takes no blame for making them face the consequences of the peccadillos that he passed on to the press. When he finally quit government it was because he had been caught manufacturing outright lies about prominent Conservative politicians in cahoots with Derek Draper, a disgraced new Labour braggart.
Miliband is insisting this was in the past — another country — and besides the Grinch is dead to politics. (Brown has spoken in parliament rarely this year.) But Ed was also a capo in the court of King Brown, sharing with McBride the coffee-making duties. McBride knifed people and Miliband is still most famous for knifing his own brother — with the active support of Brown, we now know from the book...I never had much to do with McBride, because for me the great mystery of modern politics was why so many felt that Brown was entitled to take over the premiership without a fight. Once McBride realised I was not one of his, there was not much point in us talking. The commonplace duty of a press officer to brief non-partisan journalists never seemed to cross his mind.
Toby Young ✔ @toadmeister
So if a family on benefits neglects to get the MMR jab and child gets measles Labour will cut their benefit. Who's the nasty party now?
First vote
1) Green 2) SPD 3) Linke
Second vote
1) Linke 2) SPD 3) Greens
Berlin-Charlottenburg - Wilmersdorf
Berlin-Lichtenberg
Bremen II - Bremerhaven
Hamburg-Mitte
0.9% deficit for CDU-CSU compared to the other 3.
-3 constituencies to go
So @labourpress say #jabtax is "not part of the policy review"; John Cruddas says it's "an example of the sort of measure we want to see".
http://www.bundeswahlleiter.de/en/bundestagswahlen/BTW_BUND_13/ergebnisse/wahlkreisergebnisse/l04/wk055/index.html
2 to go
She is the widow of a 7/7 London bomber. Brought up in the home counties in a white middle class family, converted to Islam and now living in Kenya. She is named in the Mirror article.
The Mirror are alleging she was the organiser of the Nairobi attack.
CSU 7.4
SPD 25.7
Greens 8.4
Linke 8.6
FDP 4.8
AfD 4.7
Graeme Cowie @woodstockjag
Seems to me that #jabtax could only have been thought up in this kind of meeting
Total votes: 43,702,474
FDP: 2,082,305
AfD: 2,052,372
FDP: 4.76%
AfD: 4.70%
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0At91c3wX1Wu5dGhKQzRRMEwzNUdqQjlyUjVWcHlNTEE#gid=0
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/no_warming_means_cooling_in_greens_support/
Plus Merkel would have a majority if the FDP had made the cut...
Electoral reform beckons? [3% threshold ;-) ]
CDU/CSU: 41.55%
SPD: 25.74%
Linke: 8.59%
Green: 8.44%
FDP: 4.76%
AfD: 4.70%
Pirates: 2.19%
SPD/Linke/Green: 42.77%
AfD: 5.73%
FDP: 2.87%
Former West Germany:
FDP: 5.24%
AfD: 4.44%
A lot of Linke voters are elderly people in East Germany brainwashed after 40 years of Communism.
Do we have an exact seat breakdown yet?
Or are there overhangs and list seats to come?
FPTP alone...
http://www.faz.net/op900/event/bundestagswahl/live/#/votingDistricts-vote1-s99-wk055