@Mick_Pork - The truth is, the SNP has probably blown it.
Given that the PB tories are always wrong and the PB tories never learn I'm delighted you think that.
There's something called a ground campaign and members in a party which is kind of the point of a conference. I know, I know, we can't all have a party of "swivel-eyed loons" as Cammie's inner circle would call the dwindling tory activist base - but when it comes to GOTV and actually delivering in an election or referendum campaign then enthusing the activists counts for quite a bit more than the out of touch views of a few comical Cameroonian spinners.
The truth is scottish labour were just as complacent in 2011 as you and so many of the PB tories are. After all, the polls were all on their side many months out from the actual vote.
It's a bit of a worry that the Chancellor has only just realised China's a pretty serious economic proposition. Hopefully his real views are slightly more considered than those he has expressed to the Telegraph. Our sense of ambition. Hmmmm. In the private sector that's too often based around hitting quarterly targets and shaving costs. That's one of the reasons that on a per head count our patent filings in China and other key markets are so much lower than almost all our competitors.
@Mick_Pork - The truth is, the SNP has probably blown it.
Given that the PB tories are always wrong and the PB tories never learn I'm delighted you think that.
There's something called a ground campaign and members in a party which is kind of the point of a conference. I know, I know, we can't all have a party of "swivel-eyed loons" as Cammie's inner circle would call the dwindling tory activist base - but when it comes to GOTV and actually delivering in an election or referendum campaign then enthusing the activists counts for quite a bit more than the out of touch views of a few comical Cameroonian spinners.
Of course, how silly of me. How could I have forgotten that Alex Salmond and the army of SNP activists had a practice run. The 2011 GOTV triumph in, let's see, Edinburgh Central and Glasgow Kelvin (out of how many counting districts?) shows that.
And that was without being up against Labour fighting tooth and nail against you.
Somewhere the God of Political Irony is sipping ambrosia and smirking.
At Cameron's own Cast Iron referendum we must presume? I'm afraid the idea of not being prepared is rather too amusing to take considering Cameron doesn't have a clue whether he supports IN or OUT for his own Cast Iron EU referendum.
If Salmond campaigned and promised a referendum on independence and claimed he didn't know which side he supported he would be laughed out of politics. If Clegg campaigned and promised a referendum on AV and claimed he didn't know which side he supported he would be laughed out of politics. If little Ed campaigned and promised a referendum on a living wage and claimed he didn't know which side he supported he would be laughed out of politics.
And we're supposed to take Cammie's referendum seriously while it's the SNP who are supposedly the ones who are unprepared ??? LOL No f***ing chance.
'Britain has lost its sense of ambition and optimism and has allowed “the bits that were great” to wither, George Osborne has said as he called on the country to “up our game” '
Hopefully he'll get hold of the bloke who devised a political strategy based on stopping Heathrow expansion and extra flights to China, the prioritisation of inherited over earned wealth for tax cuts and an iditiotic immigration pledge that relied on keeping foreign students out. He'll be so angry with whichever Baronet ran a Tory election campaign based on such a scared backward agenda
The way things are going, I don't think there will be much dignity in work for the majority of people before long. No sense of being valued. Not the best position for creating an 'all in it together for the greater good put your shoulder to the wheel' climate imo.
It's a little premature to call the result of the Scottish referendum, isn't it? I reckon it's far from a done deal. What a Yes vote offers is a chance to start again. That could be a pretty powerful message, as opposed to more of the same.
@SeanT - That may well be true, but it doesn't alter the fact that they've had over two years since Cameron called their bluff.
Maybe they don't want to win.
As I said, it's a pity. An independent Scotland - once it had absorbed the Thatcherite shock of having to stand on its own two feet, and regained the entrepreneurial flair it used to have - would do very well. It's a very diverse economy, they've got great universities, medical schools and so on; they need to fix their schools, but that's doable with a bit of Govian rigour.
'Britain has lost its sense of ambition and optimism and has allowed “the bits that were great” to wither, George Osborne has said as he called on the country to “up our game” '
Hopefully he'll get hold of the bloke who devised a political strategy based on stopping Heathrow expansion and extra flights to China, the prioritisation of inherited over earned wealth for tax cuts and an iditiotic immigration pledge that relied on keeping foreign students out. He'll be so angry with whichever Baronet ran a Tory election campaign based on such a scared backward agenda
The way things are going, I don't think there will be much dignity in work for the majority of people before long. No sense of being valued. Not the best position for creating an 'all in it together for the greater good put your shoulder to the wheel' climate imo.
That was pretty much the conclusion of Alan Milburn's report published yesterday.
@SeanT - That may well be true, but it doesn't alter the fact that they've had over two years since Cameron called their bluff.
Maybe they don't want to win.
As I said, it's a pity. An independent Scotland - once it had absorbed the Thatcherite shock of having to stand on its own two feet, and regained the entrepreneurial flair it used to have - would do very well. It's a very diverse economy, they've got great universities, medical schools and so on; they need to fix their schools, but that's doable with a bit of Govian rigour.
@Mick_Pork - The truth is, the SNP has probably blown it.
Given that the PB tories are always wrong and the PB tories never learn I'm delighted you think that.
There's something called a ground campaign and members in a party which is kind of the point of a conference. I know, I know, we can't all have a party of "swivel-eyed loons" as Cammie's inner circle would call the dwindling tory activist base - but when it comes to GOTV and actually delivering in an election or referendum campaign then enthusing the activists counts for quite a bit more than the out of touch views of a few comical Cameroonian spinners.
Of course, how silly of me. How could I have forgotten that Alex Salmond and the army of SNP activists had a practice run. The 2011 GOTV triumph in, let's see, Edinburgh Central and Glasgow Kelvin (out of how many counting districts?) shows that.
And that was without being up against Labour fighting tooth and nail against you.
Oh dear god you aren't seriously trying to claim the 2011 election was somehow a terrible result for the SNP are you? Just how out of touch can the Cameroonian spinners get? It was a landslide majority in a system designed to prevent that.
Cammie is only PM because Clegg and the lib dems are propping him up in a coalition under FPTP. What part of that don't you understand?
Cammie is as terrified and scared of debating with Salmond as he is of Farage. He's a lightweight out of touch public relations PM who will have "we're all in this together" as his ironic political epitaph.
Oh dear god you aren't seriously trying to claim the 2011 election was somehow a terrible result for the SNP are you? Just how out of touch can the Cameroonian spinners get?
You don't seem to know much about your recent referendum history.
Remind me, apart from Edinburgh Central and Glasgow Kelvin, how many other counting districts voted to follow the SNP when they urged voters to change the status quo?
It's a bit of a worry that the Chancellor has only just realised China's a pretty serious economic proposition. Hopefully his real views are slightly more considered than those he has expressed to the Telegraph. Our sense of ambition. Hmmmm. In the private sector that's too often based around hitting quarterly targets and shaving costs. That's one of the reasons that on a per head count our patent filings in China and other key markets are so much lower than almost all our competitors.
Recruiting a man to run the Tory strategy who based his reputation on the detestation of foreigners and gloried in a campaign persuading the Australians that Asians deliberately killed their children doesn't quite fit in this brave new ambitious country.
It's pretty hard not to be awestruck when you first go to China. It is undoubtedly hugely dynamic. Opportunities are potentially huge. But after a bit of time there you get to understand it is very complicated and that the Communist party controls the keys to everything. You have to have your eyes wide open to have any chance of success. And they really don't like the British. Stuff we've hardly heard of gets hammered home relentlessly in schools. I think I did five minutes on the Opium Wars in 11 years of history at secondary school and university. They get terms and terms of it and how the British laid China low. First time I went there was in early November 2007 and I wearing a poppy. Bad mistake!
Oh dear god you aren't seriously trying to claim the 2011 election was somehow a terrible result for the SNP are you? Just how out of touch can the Cameroonian spinners get?
You don't seem to know much about your recent referendum history.
Remind me, apart from Edinburgh Central and Glasgow Kelvin, how many other counting districts voted to follow the SNP when they urged voters to change the status quo?
ROFL
You're not trying to claim Clegg's comical AV referendum is somehow the fault of the SNP are you? Oh this is priceless stuff now. The toxic Clegg is on the side of NO against the independence referendum in case you had forgotten. The Devolution referendum is just a tiny bit more relevant and doesn't chime with your sweeping assertion that the status quo always wins either.
This is desperate, desperate stuff but hugely amusing at least.
It's a bit of a worry that the Chancellor has only just realised China's a pretty serious economic proposition. Hopefully his real views are slightly more considered than those he has expressed to the Telegraph. Our sense of ambition. Hmmmm. In the private sector that's too often based around hitting quarterly targets and shaving costs. That's one of the reasons that on a per head count our patent filings in China and other key markets are so much lower than almost all our competitors.
Recruiting a man to run the Tory strategy who based his reputation on the detestation of foreigners and gloried in a campaign persuading the Australians that Asians deliberately killed their children doesn't quite fit in this brave new ambitious country.
It's pretty hard not to be awestruck when you first go to China. It is undoubtedly hugely dynamic. Opportunities are potentially huge. But after a bit of time there you get to understand it is very complicated and that the Communist party controls the keys to everything. You have to have your eyes wide open to have any chance of success. And they really don't like the British. Stuff we've hardly heard of gets hammered home relentlessly in schools. I think I did five minutes on the Opium Wars in 11 years of history at secondary school and university. They get terms and terms of it and how the British laid China low. First time I went there was in early November 2007 and I wearing a poppy. Bad mistake!
'Britain has lost its sense of ambition and optimism and has allowed “the bits that were great” to wither, George Osborne has said as he called on the country to “up our game” '
Hopefully he'll get hold of the bloke who devised a political strategy based on stopping Heathrow expansion and extra flights to China, the prioritisation of inherited over earned wealth for tax cuts and an iditiotic immigration pledge that relied on keeping foreign students out. He'll be so angry with whichever Baronet ran a Tory election campaign based on such a scared backward agenda
The way things are going, I don't think there will be much dignity in work for the majority of people before long. No sense of being valued. Not the best position for creating an 'all in it together for the greater good put your shoulder to the wheel' climate imo.
Supply and demand is like gravity. It always operates no matter how many economists get paid to say it doesn't.
As an employee of a Japanese company I feel this issue is overblown. Yes the Chinese government likes to rile up tensions every so often but it's pretty much the same as when Argentina and Spain rile up their population of the Falklands or Gibraltar, i.e. a distraction from grim economic news.
There are literally millions of Chinese jobs that depend on good relations with Japan (and South Korea) the assembly of electronic goods takes place almost exclusively in China, for example we are building 80% of PS4s in China rather than in Japan, on a productivity aligned basis Chinese labour costs less than half that of Japanese labour. There is currently a labour shortage for the type of stuff we need built, if it wasn't for that we would be making 100% of our units in China. Low margin electronics such as TVs, games consoles, laptops, and cheap tablets are a mainstay of Chinese employment, and Sony, Panasonic, Toshiba, Hitachi, Sharp and Pioneer are all massive employers, both directly and indirectly in the country. Part of the reason the Chinese government talked down the protesters boycotting Japanese goods earlier this year was that enough of the products made by Japanese companies in Chinese factories are destined for the domestic market, stop buying them and the economy takes a hit.
It's a bit of a worry that the Chancellor has only just realised China's a pretty serious economic proposition. Hopefully his real views are slightly more considered than those he has expressed to the Telegraph. Our sense of ambition. Hmmmm. In the private sector that's too often based around hitting quarterly targets and shaving costs. That's one of the reasons that on a per head count our patent filings in China and other key markets are so much lower than almost all our competitors.
Short-termism and being a cash cow for greedy investors has always held back British companies. I don't see how that will change in the future. I mean look at Vodafone. They just sold a significant part of their business for $130bn, they should leverage that money (after selling their stake in Verizon Communications) to buy the totality of AT&T, but instead they are returning $80bn to shareholders and possibly more. The $50bn they hold in the bank will not keep them off the table for very long. One of Britain's most powerful companies is going to be picked off piece by piece because of short termism and greedy shareholders. To his credit Gordon Brown created the foreign assets sale CGT relief, but Vodafone seem to be pissing away their gain to placate shareholders who have done nothing but whine ever since Gent stood down and leadership was given to lesser men (Sarin who was a disaster, and Callao who are been immensely disappointing).
Honestly Vodafone is a prime example of a company that had a long term plan being handed over to the same tired executive thinking that wants nothing more than to raise the shareprice by becoming a cash cow. Vodafone should have made something better of their Japanese division and they shouldn't return $80bn to shareholders but invest the proceeds from the sale of the shares of VC to purchase AT&T which is better aligned to their business portfolio than VZW ever was. It won't happen though, if anything AT&T will probably buy Vodafone's European business, Telmex will buy Vodacom and it will all fall apart. All because of greedy shareholders. Which is the root cause of short termism in the British economy.
I think I've got a few £1 coins minted in the 1940s, I'll have to go trade them in at the bank.
That's how that works right?
What are they made of? I know a Japanese hard money nut who holds a bunch of silver (actual silver) 100 yen coins. (100 yen is about 1 USD.) He has some amazing tax avoidance theory about it.
Comments
There's something called a ground campaign and members in a party which is kind of the point of a conference. I know, I know, we can't all have a party of "swivel-eyed loons" as Cammie's inner circle would call the dwindling tory activist base - but when it comes to GOTV and actually delivering in an election or referendum campaign then enthusing the activists counts for quite a bit more than the out of touch views of a few comical Cameroonian spinners.
The truth is scottish labour were just as complacent in 2011 as you and so many of the PB tories are. After all, the polls were all on their side many months out from the actual vote.
Some of remember what happened next though.
"The AA says petrol prices have recorded their biggest fall since 2008, taking the average cost to 132.16p a litre."
And that was without being up against Labour fighting tooth and nail against you.
I'm afraid the idea of not being prepared is rather too amusing to take considering Cameron doesn't have a clue whether he supports IN or OUT for his own Cast Iron EU referendum.
If Salmond campaigned and promised a referendum on independence and claimed he didn't know which side he supported he would be laughed out of politics. If Clegg campaigned and promised a referendum on AV and claimed he didn't know which side he supported he would be laughed out of politics. If little Ed campaigned and promised a referendum on a living wage and claimed he didn't know which side he supported he would be laughed out of politics.
And we're supposed to take Cammie's referendum seriously while it's the SNP who are supposedly the ones who are unprepared ??? LOL No f***ing chance.
Maybe they don't want to win.
As I said, it's a pity. An independent Scotland - once it had absorbed the Thatcherite shock of having to stand on its own two feet, and regained the entrepreneurial flair it used to have - would do very well. It's a very diverse economy, they've got great universities, medical schools and so on; they need to fix their schools, but that's doable with a bit of Govian rigour.
It was a landslide majority in a system designed to prevent that.
Cammie is only PM because Clegg and the lib dems are propping him up in a coalition under FPTP. What part of that don't you understand?
Cammie is as terrified and scared of debating with Salmond as he is of Farage. He's a lightweight out of touch public relations PM who will have "we're all in this together" as his ironic political epitaph.
Remind me, apart from Edinburgh Central and Glasgow Kelvin, how many other counting districts voted to follow the SNP when they urged voters to change the status quo?
ROFL
You're not trying to claim Clegg's comical AV referendum is somehow the fault of the SNP are you? Oh this is priceless stuff now. The toxic Clegg is on the side of NO against the independence referendum in case you had forgotten. The Devolution referendum is just a tiny bit more relevant and doesn't chime with your sweeping assertion that the status quo always wins either.
This is desperate, desperate stuff but hugely amusing at least.
*chortle*
There are literally millions of Chinese jobs that depend on good relations with Japan (and South Korea) the assembly of electronic goods takes place almost exclusively in China, for example we are building 80% of PS4s in China rather than in Japan, on a productivity aligned basis Chinese labour costs less than half that of Japanese labour. There is currently a labour shortage for the type of stuff we need built, if it wasn't for that we would be making 100% of our units in China. Low margin electronics such as TVs, games consoles, laptops, and cheap tablets are a mainstay of Chinese employment, and Sony, Panasonic, Toshiba, Hitachi, Sharp and Pioneer are all massive employers, both directly and indirectly in the country. Part of the reason the Chinese government talked down the protesters boycotting Japanese goods earlier this year was that enough of the products made by Japanese companies in Chinese factories are destined for the domestic market, stop buying them and the economy takes a hit.
£1 in 1945 would have been worth £36.54 in 2012.
http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/education/Pages/inflation/calculator/flash/default.aspx
Honestly Vodafone is a prime example of a company that had a long term plan being handed over to the same tired executive thinking that wants nothing more than to raise the shareprice by becoming a cash cow. Vodafone should have made something better of their Japanese division and they shouldn't return $80bn to shareholders but invest the proceeds from the sale of the shares of VC to purchase AT&T which is better aligned to their business portfolio than VZW ever was. It won't happen though, if anything AT&T will probably buy Vodafone's European business, Telmex will buy Vodacom and it will all fall apart. All because of greedy shareholders. Which is the root cause of short termism in the British economy.
That's how that works right?