Also, does ANYONE really give a f*ck abut some old mines in Scotland?
1. It's Scotland
2. It's Scotland, we've always plundered it, then shut it down as and when, it's a colony, that's what they're for
3. Something else
4. Oh yes. Mines. These are coal mines, Horrid things. They weren't closing beautiful gardens in the Hebrides
Yes Jim, we feel the love.
Well 55% of Scots agreed with Jim not you
Jim was so clever. He asked Scots to vote No so that Scotland would stay in the EU. He was a fine, upstanding chap. Really honest. Played a straight game.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
I'm pretty sure the GINI coefficient was remarkably good in Pol Pot's Cambodia. No one had anything, equality was total
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
My family were Warwickshire miners who bitterly hated the union bosses and supported Thatcher. The strike was much more a struggle between parliamentary democracy and unaccountable union power than it was about class war.
Which would still see a hung parliament on the UK Survation numbers and PM Starmer propped up by the SNP and LDs, the SDLP, PC, Alliance and Greens despite another Tory majority in England.
The DUP would not support the Tories again unless they removed the Irish Sea border
Err… yes. Thanks. Hate to be a pain, but I repeat my question:
Scottish figures are largely irrelevant to the UK total unless the SCons take the lead as the SNP will prop up Labour anyway, so your Scottish subsample demand is also largely irrelevant.
However the Scottish figures are SNP 39%, Tories 22%, Labour 19%, Greens 5%, LDs 4%
Nope. Now you’re answering a question I did not ask. I know it’s terribly old-fashioned, but could you give a straight answer to a straight question? Please inform us where you got the figures you pumped in to Martin Baxter’s ElectoralCalculus calculator:
For unless the Scottish Conservatives take the lead in Scotland whether the SNP lead or SLab lead it makes no difference, their MPs will both make Starmer PM
Nope, you are still obfuscating. The link you provided does not contain the numbers you yourself pumped into Baxter’s calculator.
Please inform us where you got the figures you entered in to the ElectoralCalculus calculator:
Nope Nats like you have got to realise not all polls revolve around you, I have now given you both the UK and Scottish Survation figures both of which would make Starmer PM with minor parties support, exactly as the 2019 Scottish numbers would.
You are Labour's little helpers at Westminster so obviously we don't give a toss precisely how many little Nationalists there are at Westminster as you will all be making Starmer PM anyway. Unless the SCons make significant gains in Scotland, Scottish figures are therefore irrelevant for UK elections
BritNats like you have got to realise that folk can see through all your huffing and puffing. Behind the bravado you’re shitting it.
Everybody can clearly see how you are allocating figures to the Scottish parties, so it is you that is clearly obsessed with Scottish electoral behaviour.
Fascinatingly, you are predicting the following Unionist losses:
SNP gains from SCon: Aberdeenshire West and Kincardine Dumfries and Galloway (Alister Jack, Secretary of State for Scotland) Moray (Douglas Ross, Leader of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party)
SNP gains from SLD: Caithness Sutherland and Easter Ross Edinburgh West North East Fife Orkney and Shetland (Alistair Carmichael, former Secretary of State for Scotland)
That bumps M5S a couple of points - he is personally quite popular. Likely to be close to a genuine 4 way tie now between individual parties.
My feeling is that M5S have been far more comfortable when dealing with the left these last few years, they are broadly a strange mix of a number of non Social Democratic leftist tribes - in UK terms a mix of Lexiteer, traditionalist, direct democracy, green, anti-corruption, and slightly conspiracist. I think their eventual destiny may be close to the main left grouping, but their founding principals put up big barriers to that and it will take some years before they are able to admit it and act on it. Which is a shame because it would make the next election far more competitive.
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
I agree voters are more concerned about the migrant crossings overall.
However while Red Wall voters could switch to Labour over Boris' mine comments, voters most concerned about immigration are hardly going to switch from the Tories to Labour who are even more pro migration (they may have gone to Farage but the BXP and UKIP have near disappeared and he has a media career now).
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Johnson really does put his foot in it when he goes to Scotland. He is so obviously a fish out of water there that he cannot resist saying something daft to gain attention.
This climate conference is going to be popcorn time. 🍿
12 days I'd a long time for a conference. Plenty of time for things to go wrong.
We've got a stand inside the inner (Red) zone, but I can't say I'm expecting a popcorn feast. The timetable is mapped out in great detail, so e.g. on the Saturday each delegation in turn can give us their thoughts on Nature. It will wrap up with a number of resolutions stressing the need for carbon reductions, a package of assistance for the worst-affected countries, and working groups to study further measures - something like that. Alok Sharma will open it, and I'm not expecting Johnson to be much involved, except for some sort of celebratory speech.
I'll be pleased to be proved wrong - I hope it's a huge success. But spare the popcorn.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
My family were Warwickshire miners who bitterly hated the union bosses and supported Thatcher. The strike was much more a struggle between parliamentary democracy and unaccountable union power than it was about class war.
Mugs. Them and the UDM stooges got shafted by the Tories just the same as the NUM lads.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
My family were Warwickshire miners who bitterly hated the union bosses and supported Thatcher. The strike was much more a struggle between parliamentary democracy and unaccountable union power than it was about class war.
It was about all sorts of things, depending on whom you ask, and in most cases emotion still outweighs analysis, I think.On both sides of the divide. In this particular case I still tend to be sympathetic with Thatcher, but not unreservedly so. The baby got thrown out with the bath water.
Thing is with BJ one can fall into a trap (which I've done myself) of thinking that the tin eared, gormless, self interested, shameless liar thing is a strategy and that there's a cunning plan floating around behind the bullshite, however sometimes what you see really is what you're getting. Sadly there seems to be a large minority of English voters who don't even need a cunning plan to make them drop their drawers.
Vide
If that is the Guardian complaining, maybe you can ask them how much the Government has spent on running unconscious bias courses and all that stuff. Bet you a fiver it is a multiple of that.
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
You've repeated this over the years here. I can only assume that you were in your halcyon adolescence at that time. Well I can tell you that I was analysing and forecasting the UK and Irish economies for the OECD in the mid-70s, and in their economics department, which had economists from many countries, the UK was seen as a basket case with its dire economic performance, awful industrial relations, rip-roaring inflation, "social contract" and price controls.
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
I agree voters are more concerned about the migrant crossings overall.
However while Red Wall voters could switch to Labour over Boris' mine comments, voters most concerned about immigration are hardly going to switch from the Tories to Labour who are even more pro migration (they may have gone to Farage but the BXP and UKIP have near disappeared and he has a media career now).
People don't care. It's nearly 40 years ago. The idea that Northerners are sitting over pints of bitter pining over the mines is a fantasy of middle class southerners.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
My family were Warwickshire miners who bitterly hated the union bosses and supported Thatcher. The strike was much more a struggle between parliamentary democracy and unaccountable union power than it was about class war.
Yes, I understand that view. Though the miners who opposed the strike got just as screwed as the Scargillites in the end.
It was an epochal battle that redefined the economy. Away from unionised heavy industry and to shopping and financial services. It was a time of yuppies, filofaxes and the Big Bang, as much as it was about picket line battles and coalfield communities.
That is why it was so visceral, and why it looms large in the National memory. Indeed I have long seen the Red Wall Brexit vote as revenge served cold on a Southern based finance economy that marginalised them. Brexit is the antithesis of Eighties Thatcherism.
Which would still see a hung parliament on the UK Survation numbers and PM Starmer propped up by the SNP and LDs, the SDLP, PC, Alliance and Greens despite another Tory majority in England.
The DUP would not support the Tories again unless they removed the Irish Sea border
Err… yes. Thanks. Hate to be a pain, but I repeat my question:
Scottish figures are largely irrelevant to the UK total unless the SCons take the lead as the SNP will prop up Labour anyway, so your Scottish subsample demand is also largely irrelevant.
However the Scottish figures are SNP 39%, Tories 22%, Labour 19%, Greens 5%, LDs 4%
Nope. Now you’re answering a question I did not ask. I know it’s terribly old-fashioned, but could you give a straight answer to a straight question? Please inform us where you got the figures you pumped in to Martin Baxter’s ElectoralCalculus calculator:
For unless the Scottish Conservatives take the lead in Scotland whether the SNP lead or SLab lead it makes no difference, their MPs will both make Starmer PM
Nope, you are still obfuscating. The link you provided does not contain the numbers you yourself pumped into Baxter’s calculator.
Please inform us where you got the figures you entered in to the ElectoralCalculus calculator:
Nope Nats like you have got to realise not all polls revolve around you, I have now given you both the UK and Scottish Survation figures both of which would make Starmer PM with minor parties support, exactly as the 2019 Scottish numbers would.
You are Labour's little helpers at Westminster so obviously we don't give a toss precisely how many little Nationalists there are at Westminster as you will all be making Starmer PM anyway. Unless the SCons make significant gains in Scotland, Scottish figures are therefore irrelevant for UK elections
BritNats like you have got to realise that folk can see through all your huffing and puffing. Behind the bravado you’re shitting it.
Everybody can clearly see how you are allocating figures to the Scottish parties, so it is you that is clearly obsessed with Scottish electoral behaviour.
Fascinatingly, you are predicting the following Unionist losses:
SNP gains from SCon: Aberdeenshire West and Kincardine Dumfries and Galloway (Alister Jack, Secretary of State for Scotland) Moray (Douglas Ross, Leader of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party)
SNP gains from SLD: Caithness Sutherland and Easter Ross Edinburgh West North East Fife Orkney and Shetland (Alistair Carmichael, former Secretary of State for Scotland)
You are talking about 1 local by election in Scotland, in which the Conservative vote went up and treating it like you have already won independence, it is absurd.
However the actual latest indyref2 polling now shows a clear No lead, not that it matters as you will never get a legal indyref2 with this Tory government before the next UK general election so tough!
When Sheffield Wednesday, Sheffield United, Barnsley etc take on Nottingham Forest or Notts County the Nottingham teams are still referred to as the scabs.
That bumps M5S a couple of points - he is personally quite popular. Likely to be close to a genuine 4 way tie now between individual parties.
My feeling is that M5S have been far more comfortable when dealing with the left these last few years, they are broadly a strange mix of a number of non Social Democratic leftist tribes - in UK terms a mix of Lexiteer, traditionalist, direct democracy, green, anti-corruption, and slightly conspiracist. I think their eventual destiny may be close to the main left grouping, but their founding principals put up big barriers to that and it will take some years before they are able to admit it and act on it. Which is a shame because it would make the next election far more competitive.
To underpin the popularity (in the party), 93% voted in favour of making Conte leader.
A decent amount of that is reflected beyond the party.
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
People don't care. It's nearly 40 years ago. The idea that Northerners are sitting over pints of bitter pining over the mines is a fantasy of middle class southerners.
To what do you attribute the segment disagreeing with the remarks being working-class northerners, and the segment most in agreement higher-income southerners?
Note that the poll doesn't actually ask whether people liked the remark - they're only being asked if closing coal mines was good for the climate. The answer to that is yes, but I think the northerners are probably influenced by not liking the gloating sentiment.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
You've repeated this over the years here. I can only assume that you were in your halcyon adolescence at that time. Well I can tell you that I was analysing and forecasting the UK and Irish economies for the OECD in the mid-70s, and in their economics department, which had economists from many countries, the UK was seen as a basket case with its dire economic performance, awful industrial relations, rip-roaring inflation, "social contract" and price controls.
True, but the Thatcher cure involved a destructive asset stripping of the industrial north, from which it has never recovered in relative terms.
Which would still see a hung parliament on the UK Survation numbers and PM Starmer propped up by the SNP and LDs, the SDLP, PC, Alliance and Greens despite another Tory majority in England.
The DUP would not support the Tories again unless they removed the Irish Sea border
Err… yes. Thanks. Hate to be a pain, but I repeat my question:
Scottish figures are largely irrelevant to the UK total unless the SCons take the lead as the SNP will prop up Labour anyway, so your Scottish subsample demand is also largely irrelevant.
However the Scottish figures are SNP 39%, Tories 22%, Labour 19%, Greens 5%, LDs 4%
Nope. Now you’re answering a question I did not ask. I know it’s terribly old-fashioned, but could you give a straight answer to a straight question? Please inform us where you got the figures you pumped in to Martin Baxter’s ElectoralCalculus calculator:
For unless the Scottish Conservatives take the lead in Scotland whether the SNP lead or SLab lead it makes no difference, their MPs will both make Starmer PM
Nope, you are still obfuscating. The link you provided does not contain the numbers you yourself pumped into Baxter’s calculator.
Please inform us where you got the figures you entered in to the ElectoralCalculus calculator:
Nope Nats like you have got to realise not all polls revolve around you, I have now given you both the UK and Scottish Survation figures both of which would make Starmer PM with minor parties support, exactly as the 2019 Scottish numbers would.
You are Labour's little helpers at Westminster so obviously we don't give a toss precisely how many little Nationalists there are at Westminster as you will all be making Starmer PM anyway. Unless the SCons make significant gains in Scotland, Scottish figures are therefore irrelevant for UK elections
BritNats like you have got to realise that folk can see through all your huffing and puffing. Behind the bravado you’re shitting it.
Everybody can clearly see how you are allocating figures to the Scottish parties, so it is you that is clearly obsessed with Scottish electoral behaviour.
Fascinatingly, you are predicting the following Unionist losses:
SNP gains from SCon: Aberdeenshire West and Kincardine Dumfries and Galloway (Alister Jack, Secretary of State for Scotland) Moray (Douglas Ross, Leader of the Scottish Conservative and Unionist Party)
SNP gains from SLD: Caithness Sutherland and Easter Ross Edinburgh West North East Fife Orkney and Shetland (Alistair Carmichael, former Secretary of State for Scotland)
You are talking about 1 local by election in Scotland, in which the Conservative vote went up and treating it like you have already won independence, it is absurd.
However the actual latest indyref2 polling now shows a clear No lead, not that it matters as you will never get a legal indyref2 with this Tory government before the next UK general election so tough!
'You are talking about 1 local by election in Scotland from which without any encouragement I was cherrypicking a 0.35% SCon swing as if it meant something, let's all stop talking about it now.'
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
You've repeated this over the years here. I can only assume that you were in your halcyon adolescence at that time. Well I can tell you that I was analysing and forecasting the UK and Irish economies for the OECD in the mid-70s, and in their economics department, which had economists from many countries, the UK was seen as a basket case with its dire economic performance, awful industrial relations, rip-roaring inflation, "social contract" and price controls.
Oh, I have no doubt that an economic forecaster didn't like the state of the British economy in the Seventies. Neither did my father for that matter, hence our move to the USA.
It was though a relatively good time to be a British worker, who had a new world of consumer treats available. Cars, foreign holidays, colour TV etc, all these became the staples of working class life.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
Sick bag of Europe. Winter of Dismay. Bodies of the dead piling up in the streets and we couldn't even bury our rubbish.
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
And it will remain a useful wedge issue, so long as they can sound tougher than their opponents.
I have Cornish cousins, of the Nationalist variety (they exist) who blat on about Cornish tin mines "closed by the English" the same way effete, brownshirt Scots like Dickson, Carnyx, Theuniondivvie go on about Scottish coal mines
Facts: the average life expectancy of a Cornish miner was about 42. They often spent 18 hours underground. Some only saw the sunshine in high summer on one day: Sunday. Their daughters were sent to the mines age ten to sort rocks, as "bal maidens"
The lament for the mines is pathetic faux working class sentimentality from middle class people, tinged with typical wheedling Celtic self pity. I have seen it in my own people. Time to grow up
The most infantile poster in the history of PB* tells other posters to “grow up”.
(*might only be top ten upon reflection. There have been some real humdingers on here.)
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
The Tories have just replaced free movement from the EU with a points system as was already in place for migrants from across the world.
However policing the entire English channel to control the number of African migrants coming from France is a different matter, it has to be done in conjunction with Macron to be effective
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
Sick bag of Europe. Winter of Dismay. Bodies of the dead piling up in the streets and we couldn't even bury our rubbish.
Then came the Lady. The Lady.
"We are, all of us, the children of Margaret Thatcher."
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
I agree voters are more concerned about the migrant crossings overall.
However while Red Wall voters could switch to Labour over Boris' mine comments, voters most concerned about immigration are hardly going to switch from the Tories to Labour who are even more pro migration (they may have gone to Farage but the BXP and UKIP have near disappeared and he has a media career now).
People don't care. It's nearly 40 years ago. The idea that Northerners are sitting over pints of bitter pining over the mines is a fantasy of middle class southerners.
And @HYUFD is wrong about the Cumbrian deep mine as the planning has been called in and the article he uses is out of date
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
Sick bag of Europe. Winter of Dismay. Bodies of the dead piling up in the streets and we couldn't even bury our rubbish.
Then came the Lady. The Lady.
"We are, all of us, the children of Margaret Thatcher."
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
You've repeated this over the years here. I can only assume that you were in your halcyon adolescence at that time. Well I can tell you that I was analysing and forecasting the UK and Irish economies for the OECD in the mid-70s, and in their economics department, which had economists from many countries, the UK was seen as a basket case with its dire economic performance, awful industrial relations, rip-roaring inflation, "social contract" and price controls.
True, but the Thatcher cure involved a destructive asset stripping of the industrial north, from which it has never recovered in relative terms.
You're into the 80s now. It's a different picture, and the Thatcher cure as you call it really was a cure for the economy. What is the "asset stripping"? Do you mean the ending of subsidies? "In relative terms" is a cop out unless like Foxy you think the be all and end all of economic life is how the cake is shared out never mind how large it is.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
I have Cornish cousins, of the Nationalist variety (they exist) who blat on about Cornish tin mines "closed by the English" the same way effete, brownshirt Scots like Dickson, Carnyx, Theuniondivvie go on about Scottish coal mines
Facts: the average life expectancy of a Cornish miner was about 42. They often spent 18 hours underground. Some only saw the sunshine in high summer on one day: Sunday. Their daughters were sent to the mines age ten to sort rocks, as "bal maidens"
The lament for the mines is pathetic faux working class sentimentality from middle class people, tinged with typical wheedling Celtic self pity. I have seen it in my own people. Time to grow up
The most infantile poster in the history of PB* tells other posters to “grow up”.
(*might only be top ten upon reflection. There have been some real humdingers on here.)
SeanLeon has had a tough time recently, self-owned as a parvenu purchaser of flaked Parmesan then an auld fud barely aware of the term 'burner phone'. Be gentle with him.
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
I agree voters are more concerned about the migrant crossings overall.
However while Red Wall voters could switch to Labour over Boris' mine comments, voters most concerned about immigration are hardly going to switch from the Tories to Labour who are even more pro migration (they may have gone to Farage but the BXP and UKIP have near disappeared and he has a media career now).
People don't care. It's nearly 40 years ago. The idea that Northerners are sitting over pints of bitter pining over the mines is a fantasy of middle class southerners.
And @HYUFD is wrong about the Cumbrian deep mine as the planning has been called in and the article he uses is out of date
Well he might well need to restart it if he does see a plunge in support in the Redwall from his anti coal comments
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
No, I was a London Medical student at the time, enjoying the booming city, with all its excess. I did not support the strikers, though neither did I like Thatcher. I was an observer, but we see even now how visceral that 35 year old dispute remains for both sides.
It shows up the fracture in the Conservative Party between the traditional Southern base and the newly acquired CDE voters in the North who have been promised a levelling up. Levelling up as a policy of economic redistribution that intrinsically recognises the damage done to the Red Wall over the decades.
I have Cornish cousins, of the Nationalist variety (they exist) who blat on about Cornish tin mines "closed by the English" the same way effete, brownshirt Scots like Dickson, Carnyx, Theuniondivvie go on about Scottish coal mines
Facts: the average life expectancy of a Cornish miner was about 42. They often spent 18 hours underground. Some only saw the sunshine in high summer on one day: Sunday. Their daughters were sent to the mines age ten to sort rocks, as "bal maidens"
The lament for the mines is pathetic faux working class sentimentality from middle class people, tinged with typical wheedling Celtic self pity. I have seen it in my own people. Time to grow up
The most infantile poster in the history of PB* tells other posters to “grow up”.
(*might only be top ten upon reflection. There have been some real humdingers on here.)
Perhaps you should heed your own advice and spend less hours "arguing with folk on an obscure blog"?
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
Sick bag of Europe. Winter of Dismay. Bodies of the dead piling up in the streets and we couldn't even bury our rubbish.
Then came the Lady. The Lady.
"We are, all of us, the children of Margaret Thatcher."
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
It is quite the revelation: learning that @foxy's dad actually emigrated them all to America, in the 70s, such was the shitty state of the UK.
Yet still he whines on about "British workers having colour TVs!". In the marvellous GINI-equal 70s. When Britain was so great he and his family had actually fled to America.
It has been my observation through life that all humans are hypocrites, but leftwingers are the worst kind of hypocrites, because their hypocrisy is simultaneously so overt, yet so denied.
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
And, when push is about to come to shove, a lot of people don't really want to take measures of sufficient ruthlessness, as shown by the RNLI row.
The corner the government have backed themselves into is that they have made immigration an issue, and said they will stem it. And in the real world, there's not much that they can do which is both effective and palatable. The moral is that you shouldn't make damnfool undeliverable promises.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
Sick bag of Europe. Winter of Dismay. Bodies of the dead piling up in the streets and we couldn't even bury our rubbish.
Then came the Lady. The Lady.
"We are, all of us, the children of Margaret Thatcher."
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
The Tories have just replaced free movement from the EU with a points system as was already in place for migrants from across the world.
However policing the entire English channel to control the number of African migrants coming from France is a different matter, it has to be done in conjunction with Macron to be effective
Good job we've built such a strong relationship with France over the past few years then. Oh...
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
I agree voters are more concerned about the migrant crossings overall.
However while Red Wall voters could switch to Labour over Boris' mine comments, voters most concerned about immigration are hardly going to switch from the Tories to Labour who are even more pro migration (they may have gone to Farage but the BXP and UKIP have near disappeared and he has a media career now).
People don't care. It's nearly 40 years ago. The idea that Northerners are sitting over pints of bitter pining over the mines is a fantasy of middle class southerners.
And @HYUFD is wrong about the Cumbrian deep mine as the planning has been called in and the article he uses is out of date
Well he might well need to restart it if he does see a plunge in support in the Redwall from his anti coal comments
You do agree though that it has not been approved as you said it had
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
No, I was a London Medical student at the time, enjoying the booming city, with all its excess. I did not support the strikers, though neither did I like Thatcher. I was an observer, but we see even now how visceral that 35 year old dispute remains for both sides.
It shows up the fracture in the Conservative Party between the traditional Southern base and the newly acquired CDE voters in the North who have been promised a levelling up. Levelling up as a policy of economic redistribution that intrinsically recognises the damage done to the Red Wall over the decades.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
The Tories have just replaced free movement from the EU with a points system as was already in place for migrants from across the world.
However policing the entire English channel to control the number of African migrants coming from France is a different matter, it has to be done in conjunction with Macron to be effective
Good job we've built such a strong relationship with France over the past few years then. Oh...
Well if Macron does not get a grip on it too by next year's presidential election he may well find some trouble in his own backdoor from Madame Le Pen
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
It is quite the revelation: learning that @foxy's dad actually emigrated them all to America, in the 70s, such was the shitty state of the UK.
Yet still he whines on about "British workers having colour TVs!". In the marvellous GINI-equal 70s. When Britain was so great he and his family had actually fled to America.
It has been my observation through life that all humans are hypocrites, but leftwingers are the worst kind of hypocrites, because their hypocrisy is simultaneously so overt, yet so denied.
I was 11 years old when we migrated, and my parents not left wing, so I am not sure where the hypocrisy lies.
The economy was in deep troubles in the Seventies, but it actually was a good time. Indeed 1976 was the happiest year on record.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
Sick bag of Europe. Winter of Dismay. Bodies of the dead piling up in the streets and we couldn't even bury our rubbish.
Then came the Lady. The Lady.
"We are, all of us, the children of Margaret Thatcher."
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
No, I was a London Medical student at the time, enjoying the booming city, with all its excess. I did not support the strikers, though neither did I like Thatcher. I was an observer, but we see even now how visceral that 35 year old dispute remains for both sides.
It shows up the fracture in the Conservative Party between the traditional Southern base and the newly acquired CDE voters in the North who have been promised a levelling up. Levelling up as a policy of economic redistribution that intrinsically recognises the damage done to the Red Wall over the decades.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
We are in utopia, all divisiveness swept away! Rejoice!
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
The Tories have just replaced free movement from the EU with a points system as was already in place for migrants from across the world.
However policing the entire English channel to control the number of African migrants coming from France is a different matter, it has to be done in conjunction with Macron to be effective
Good job we've built such a strong relationship with France over the past few years then. Oh...
Well if Macron does not get a grip on it too by next year's presidential election he may well find some trouble in his own backdoor from Madame Le Pen
He can get a grip on it by punting the problem over to us, and probably will given the dire state of our relations with the EU and especially France.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
No, I was a London Medical student at the time, enjoying the booming city, with all its excess. I did not support the strikers, though neither did I like Thatcher. I was an observer, but we see even now how visceral that 35 year old dispute remains for both sides.
It shows up the fracture in the Conservative Party between the traditional Southern base and the newly acquired CDE voters in the North who have been promised a levelling up. Levelling up as a policy of economic redistribution that intrinsically recognises the damage done to the Red Wall over the decades.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
The Romans make a desert and call it peace.
This fatuous drivel devalues everything else you say. It really does
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
I agree voters are more concerned about the migrant crossings overall.
However while Red Wall voters could switch to Labour over Boris' mine comments, voters most concerned about immigration are hardly going to switch from the Tories to Labour who are even more pro migration (they may have gone to Farage but the BXP and UKIP have near disappeared and he has a media career now).
People don't care. It's nearly 40 years ago. The idea that Northerners are sitting over pints of bitter pining over the mines is a fantasy of middle class southerners.
And @HYUFD is wrong about the Cumbrian deep mine as the planning has been called in and the article he uses is out of date
Well he might well need to restart it if he does see a plunge in support in the Redwall from his anti coal comments
You do agree though that it has not been approved as you said it had
The county council approved it, the government did not block it, just announced a public inquiry
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
And, when push is about to come to shove, a lot of people don't really want to take measures of sufficient ruthlessness, as shown by the RNLI row.
The corner the government have backed themselves into is that they have made immigration an issue, and said they will stem it. And in the real world, there's not much that they can do which is both effective and palatable. The moral is that you shouldn't make damnfool undeliverable promises.
As I mentioned earlier my son had his first 'shout' since joining the RNLI last night at 10.15 but fortunately they were stood down as the vulnerable person was taken into care before he could jump into the sea
The issue here isn't the battles of the 1980s, it's the total inability of Boris to avoid flippancy on any topic, no matter how sensitive or serious.
Yes, I agree. This was most obvious in his brief and undistinguished stint as Foreign Secretary, when his ability to put his foot in it was manifested frequently. His unfitness for that office presaged his unfitness to be PM.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
You've repeated this over the years here. I can only assume that you were in your halcyon adolescence at that time. Well I can tell you that I was analysing and forecasting the UK and Irish economies for the OECD in the mid-70s, and in their economics department, which had economists from many countries, the UK was seen as a basket case with its dire economic performance, awful industrial relations, rip-roaring inflation, "social contract" and price controls.
True, but the Thatcher cure involved a destructive asset stripping of the industrial north, from which it has never recovered in relative terms.
You're into the 80s now. It's a different picture, and the Thatcher cure as you call it really was a cure for the economy. What is the "asset stripping"? Do you mean the ending of subsidies? "In relative terms" is a cop out unless like Foxy you think the be all and end all of economic life is how the cake is shared out never mind how large it is.
As regards UK governments their impact on how the cake is shared is greater and more important and more interesting than on how large in total it is. The latter - the amount of long term sustainable growth in wealth per capita - is primarily determined by factors outside of the government's control. A truth which they emphasize in hard times and conveniently forget when things are rocking.
I just accidentally clicked on Johnson on the thread header and the dictionary defined it as a man's penis.. interesting if spooky....
Well, it wouldn’t be a woman’s penis.
Scottish Nationalism: The home of transphobia.
British Nationalism: The home of Jockophobia..
There you go again.
Conflating criticism of the SNP with criticism of Scotland.
Fortunately the majority of Scots know that too.
Yeah, that’s right, BritNats like you are so in tune with “the majority of Scots”.
I accurately forecast that Scotland would vote No in 2014 when you said the clueless wonders on here were in for a shock. I believe 55% of Scots constitutes a majority of Scots.
I also accurately predicted that Alba would do shite in the Holyrood elections when one of your fellow Nats was predicting 12%-14% minimum for Alba on the list.
I also successfully tipped the SCons would get over 9.5 seats in 2017 at 20/1.
I love it how punters are always so willing to tell you about the ones they guessed right, but never about the long list of failures. Stopped clocks.
I’m such a successful political punter that I’m typically restricted to max wagers of about 50p. The very fact that you’re still allowed to bet shows that the bookies are winning.
That’s nothing. I’m such a successful political punter that I’m paid seven figure sums to both refrain from it and refrain from giving tips on it. So successful am I that I am forced to hide behind the assumed identity of a semi aquatic marine mammal that practices labour law while laughing at you amateurs on here. Stick around Dickson, I might teach you a few things.
I've been heavily restricted by three bookmakers, more for horses than politics, perhaps, but the books are so trigger-happy these days I'm not sure it is such a badge of honour any more.
Thanks. I feel less singled-out if what you say is true. But I do find this very worrying. Is it not close to fraud? Accepting significant wagers from punters with a proven track record of losing, but restricting wagers to insignificant sums for punters with a winning profile.
Having worked in the industry 24 years, here are my thoughts (from when I’d worked in the industry 17 years)
“You Don't Have To Be A Hypocritical Coward To Be A Bookmaker... But It Helps"
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
The Tories have just replaced free movement from the EU with a points system as was already in place for migrants from across the world.
However policing the entire English channel to control the number of African migrants coming from France is a different matter, it has to be done in conjunction with Macron to be effective
Good job we've built such a strong relationship with France over the past few years then. Oh...
Well if Macron does not get a grip on it too by next year's presidential election he may well find some trouble in his own backdoor from Madame Le Pen
He can get a grip on it by punting the problem over to us, and probably will given the dire state of our relations with the EU and especially France.
That still means large numbers of migrants crossing from Italy into France and ending up in French migrant camps, even if he diverts the flow further on to the UK across the channel
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
I agree voters are more concerned about the migrant crossings overall.
However while Red Wall voters could switch to Labour over Boris' mine comments, voters most concerned about immigration are hardly going to switch from the Tories to Labour who are even more pro migration (they may have gone to Farage but the BXP and UKIP have near disappeared and he has a media career now).
People don't care. It's nearly 40 years ago. The idea that Northerners are sitting over pints of bitter pining over the mines is a fantasy of middle class southerners.
And @HYUFD is wrong about the Cumbrian deep mine as the planning has been called in and the article he uses is out of date
Well he might well need to restart it if he does see a plunge in support in the Redwall from his anti coal comments
You do agree though that it has not been approved as you said it had
The county council approved it, the government did not block it, just announced a public inquiry
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
Johnson's gloating tone has cut through I'm afraid.
Indeed. Often in politics it’s not what you say but the way you say it. Laughing as he said it was very unwise. It’s like his brain realised what his mouth was saying about a second too late.
And the key thing is not what Johnson said today- it's that he keeps saying things like this, and will keep doing it. Because it's part of how he has learned to operate. And whilst each individual gaffe only cuts through a bit with a handful of voters, the combined effect could add up to a lot.
Talking of which, here's the latest Wikipedia swam graph of the polls;
The striking thing is how steady the Conservative decline from 44% and 10 points ahead to 40% and 4 points ahead has been.
And yet, most ruling parties would donate a kidney to have a decent lead in mid term, and so many leads in a row
Sean, when was the last time a Unionist party had a decent mid-term lead in Scotland? Organ donation is unnecessary when quiet competence does the trick.
Latest VI polls:
Con lead in London 7% SNP lead in Edinburgh 22%
I don't know why you keep referring to me as Sean. Sean who? Connery? The dead Scottish Nationalist who accidentally lived in the Bahamas? Seany Bean, the famous Scottish cannibal who managed to improve his typical Scottish diet by feasting on human brains?
Who?
I am not Sean. I am, however, sure that you are Stuart "der Sturmer" Dickson, purveyor of blood and soil ethno-nationalist memes to your fellow Gestapo-Jocks from your tiny bungalow in, er, Sweden
Yes Sean, I do see the squirrel. It was a lovely fluffy one with a big tail. While we’re waiting for it to reappear, could you possibly facilitate us with an answer:
When was the last time a Unionist party had a poll lead in Scotland?
There was that big referendum thingy a few years ago that the unionists won
I have Cornish cousins, of the Nationalist variety (they exist) who blat on about Cornish tin mines "closed by the English" the same way effete, brownshirt Scots like Dickson, Carnyx, Theuniondivvie go on about Scottish coal mines
Facts: the average life expectancy of a Cornish miner was about 42. They often spent 18 hours underground. Some only saw the sunshine in high summer on one day: Sunday. Their daughters were sent to the mines age ten to sort rocks, as "bal maidens"
The lament for the mines is pathetic faux working class sentimentality from middle class people, tinged with typical wheedling Celtic self pity. I have seen it in my own people. Time to grow up
The most infantile poster in the history of PB* tells other posters to “grow up”.
(*might only be top ten upon reflection. There have been some real humdingers on here.)
SeanLeon has had a tough time recently, self-owned as a parvenu purchaser of flaked Parmesan then an auld fud barely aware of the term 'burner phone'. Be gentle with him.
He needs to be more gentle with himself, judging by that growing pile of damp Kleenex.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
You've repeated this over the years here. I can only assume that you were in your halcyon adolescence at that time. Well I can tell you that I was analysing and forecasting the UK and Irish economies for the OECD in the mid-70s, and in their economics department, which had economists from many countries, the UK was seen as a basket case with its dire economic performance, awful industrial relations, rip-roaring inflation, "social contract" and price controls.
True, but the Thatcher cure involved a destructive asset stripping of the industrial north, from which it has never recovered in relative terms.
You're into the 80s now. It's a different picture, and the Thatcher cure as you call it really was a cure for the economy. What is the "asset stripping"? Do you mean the ending of subsidies? "In relative terms" is a cop out unless like Foxy you think the be all and end all of economic life is how the cake is shared out never mind how large it is.
As regards UK governments their impact on how the cake is shared is greater and more important and more interesting than on how large in total it is. The latter - the amount of long term sustainable growth in wealth per capita - is primarily determined by factors outside of the government's control. A truth which they emphasize in hard times and conveniently forget when things are rocking.
In 1979 UK gdp per capita was amongst the lowest in western Europe, by 1990 amongst the highest
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
My family were Warwickshire miners who bitterly hated the union bosses and supported Thatcher. The strike was much more a struggle between parliamentary democracy and unaccountable union power than it was about class war.
Mugs. Them and the UDM stooges got shafted by the Tories just the same as the NUM lads.
You have fond memories of flying pickets and union tossers trying to kill you if you wanted to work do you?
I to this day remember the wanker from Socialist Worker at Clapham Common tube Station shouting victory to the miners the day that guy got killed.
I also remember a mate having to climb though a window into county hall to avoid a pasting from the union thugs who insisted he should not work
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
Sick bag of Europe. Winter of Dismay. Bodies of the dead piling up in the streets and we couldn't even bury our rubbish.
Then came the Lady. The Lady.
"We are, all of us, the children of Margaret Thatcher."
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
My family were Warwickshire miners who bitterly hated the union bosses and supported Thatcher. The strike was much more a struggle between parliamentary democracy and unaccountable union power than it was about class war.
It was about all sorts of things, depending on whom you ask, and in most cases emotion still outweighs analysis, I think.On both sides of the divide. In this particular case I still tend to be sympathetic with Thatcher, but not unreservedly so. The baby got thrown out with the bath water.
It was massive in our house. My dad was pro Maggie and crossing the picket lines as management and my brother who still lived at home was on strike and pro Arthur. The subject is still not safe to raise.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
Sick bag of Europe. Winter of Dismay. Bodies of the dead piling up in the streets and we couldn't even bury our rubbish.
Then came the Lady. The Lady.
"We are, all of us, the children of Margaret Thatcher."
She was transformational, this much is beyond dispute.
Yes, and Blair was her heir. The things that grate the Red Wall did not begin or end with Mrs Thatcher, but that was the apogee.
Arguably Blair was the most Thatcherite of her heirs and Boris is the least, on economics at least.
And yet woe betide anyone on your side who acted on that type of thought at the ballot box.
On economics Thatcher was more a Gladstonian Liberal than an old school Tory, on social and cultural issues and the EU however Boris is much closer to Thatcher than Blair was.
Thatcher was a cultural conservative but economic liberal
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
We are in utopia, all divisiveness swept away! Rejoice!
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
Yes, pretty much, as anyone who (like me) worked in industry at the time can attest. The contrast between the hierarchical, them-vs- us structures of 1979, with separate canteens and career structures, with all activity riven with strikes, and 1990 when this had all gone, was spectacular. It's really hard for anyone who didn't experience the awfulness of pre-Thatcher industry to comprehend.
Personally, I am rather more concerned about the prospect for the economy in the next 5-10 years post-covid, than rerunning arguments from 50 years ago.
Am considering if a career re-adjustment is sensible given the above, over a bottle of Nyetimber (obvs)....
Yougov finds voters narrowly disagree with Boris that Britain got an 'early start' on tackling climate change by closing coal mines in the 1980s by 31% to 27%.
Tory voters agree with the PM's remarks by 35% to 26%, Labour voters disagree with his remarks by 40% to 18%.
Older voters tend to disagree with the PM, as narrowly do 25 to 49 year olds, 18 to 24s narrowly agree with Boris by 27% to 20%.
Northerners disagree most with Boris' remarks by 39% to 22%, 37% of Scots also disagree with 25% of Scots backing Boris, those in the Midlands and Wales disagree with the remarks by 30% to 27%, Southerners agree with the PM by 30% to 26% and Londoners are split 27% each.
However most Tory and Labour voters and voters in every region and GB country and across every age group would back closing coal mines if they were still around today, although working class C2DE voters would keep them open by 35% to 33%
Interesting - older voters, working-class voters and Northerners most against - all of them in the Tory base. Middle-class and London voters presumably like the green aspect.
As I said earlier today Boris' remarks will not go down well in the Red Wall and clearly they have not, the North, the Midlands and Wales, older voters and C2DE voters all disagree with what he said and they are the core Red Wall demographic.
The fact they have gone down better with younger voters and voters south of Watford might provide some small comfort to the PM but a lot of Tory MPs in the Red Wall will be waiting nervously for the next opinion polls
I don't think anyone gives a fuck about the mines any more, apart from professionally embittered middle class lefties who never went nearer a mine than going to see Billy Elliot at that nice cinema which does banana cake. If there is any polling damage it will be transient
What could fuck the Tories is the migrants crossing the Channel. Terrible optics. They need to sort
What optics? Where are you seeing it? It's not making the BBC news site or any of the front pages as far as I can see.
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
Personal anecdote. I've heard it raised several times from centre-right family and friends (independently): Why aren't they closing the Channel? Why can't they control the borders?
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
Actually, to be fair, I can see you may have a point. Those for whom this issue is important do of course tend to vote Tory and may well hurt the Tories at the next GE by seeking an alternate right-wing party or simply abstaining.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
The Tories have just replaced free movement from the EU with a points system as was already in place for migrants from across the world.
However policing the entire English channel to control the number of African migrants coming from France is a different matter, it has to be done in conjunction with Macron to be effective
Good job we've built such a strong relationship with France over the past few years then. Oh...
Well if Macron does not get a grip on it too by next year's presidential election he may well find some trouble in his own backdoor from Madame Le Pen
He can get a grip on it by punting the problem over to us, and probably will given the dire state of our relations with the EU and especially France.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
No, I was a London Medical student at the time, enjoying the booming city, with all its excess. I did not support the strikers, though neither did I like Thatcher. I was an observer, but we see even now how visceral that 35 year old dispute remains for both sides.
It shows up the fracture in the Conservative Party between the traditional Southern base and the newly acquired CDE voters in the North who have been promised a levelling up. Levelling up as a policy of economic redistribution that intrinsically recognises the damage done to the Red Wall over the decades.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
You've repeated this over the years here. I can only assume that you were in your halcyon adolescence at that time. Well I can tell you that I was analysing and forecasting the UK and Irish economies for the OECD in the mid-70s, and in their economics department, which had economists from many countries, the UK was seen as a basket case with its dire economic performance, awful industrial relations, rip-roaring inflation, "social contract" and price controls.
True, but the Thatcher cure involved a destructive asset stripping of the industrial north, from which it has never recovered in relative terms.
You're into the 80s now. It's a different picture, and the Thatcher cure as you call it really was a cure for the economy. What is the "asset stripping"? Do you mean the ending of subsidies? "In relative terms" is a cop out unless like Foxy you think the be all and end all of economic life is how the cake is shared out never mind how large it is.
As regards UK governments their impact on how the cake is shared is greater and more important and more interesting than on how large in total it is. The latter - the amount of long term sustainable growth in wealth per capita - is primarily determined by factors outside of the government's control. A truth which they emphasize in hard times and conveniently forget when things are rocking.
In 1979 UK gdp per capita was amongst the lowest in western Europe, by 1990 amongst the highest
Great news for those living in northern pit villages who had been thrown on the scrapheap at the age of 50 when the pits shut down.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
We are in utopia, all divisiveness swept away! Rejoice!
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
Yes, pretty much, as anyone who (like me) worked in industry at the time can attest. The contrast between the hierarchical, them-vs- us structures of 1979, with separate canteens and career structures, with all activity riven with strikes, and 1990 when this had all gone, was spectacular. It's really hard for anyone who didn't experience the awfulness of pre-Thatcher industry to comprehend.
How much did Thatch's epochal, unifying influence have on the divided binfire of a kakocracy that is the UK today (I am of course happy to acknowledge her huge contribution to Scotland's current status within it)?
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
You've repeated this over the years here. I can only assume that you were in your halcyon adolescence at that time. Well I can tell you that I was analysing and forecasting the UK and Irish economies for the OECD in the mid-70s, and in their economics department, which had economists from many countries, the UK was seen as a basket case with its dire economic performance, awful industrial relations, rip-roaring inflation, "social contract" and price controls.
True, but the Thatcher cure involved a destructive asset stripping of the industrial north, from which it has never recovered in relative terms.
You're into the 80s now. It's a different picture, and the Thatcher cure as you call it really was a cure for the economy. What is the "asset stripping"? Do you mean the ending of subsidies? "In relative terms" is a cop out unless like Foxy you think the be all and end all of economic life is how the cake is shared out never mind how large it is.
As regards UK governments their impact on how the cake is shared is greater and more important and more interesting than on how large in total it is. The latter - the amount of long term sustainable growth in wealth per capita - is primarily determined by factors outside of the government's control. A truth which they emphasize in hard times and conveniently forget when things are rocking.
In 1979 UK gdp per capita was amongst the lowest in western Europe, by 1990 amongst the highest
Great news for those living in northern pit villages who had been thrown on the scrapheap at the age of 50 when the pits shut down.
As Leon pointed out earlier the average life expectancy of a cornish miner was 42, they did not even live to 50.
However yes I agree more could have been done to retrain ex miners
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Ridiculous. She didn't want revenge, she wanted victory. She had to prove who ran the country, ultimately. Could a bunch of commie unions hold the whip hand over the nation, as they did to Heath in 73?
No. She she planned, she stockpiled, she lulled Von Paulus-Scargill into the salient, and then she sent in the crack troops to pincer them. She won
Revenge was not in her emotional lexicon. Triumph? Yes
Yes, Scargill was foolish to fall into the trap, but the plan was not just to crush the unions* but to publicly humiliate them, and she did.
*While the leaders were hard left, the union members were not so much interested in politics as grabbing a better share of the economic benefits of capitalism. Pay rises, secure employment, and the like. The Seventies were a time that the working classes finally got a decent slice of the economic pie, and Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal.
What an absolute pile of twaddle. The 70s were shite. I was there.
Good music, granted, but otherwise, relentless shite and national decay. Britain was a morbid pool of feculent matter. We produced nothing, and went on strike to moan about it. It was awful. The mood was remorselessly sour
You are either too young to remember, too old to think straight, or just fibbing, if you are the right age
I was in America for 5 years from 1975, but there were similar times there. Indeed our container of household belongings sat on the docks in New York for 2 months due to a dock strike.
But I remember the Seventies well, and we came back every summer. It is though an objective fact that Britain's Gini coefficient was at its most equal in the Seventies.
Those were the days that workers finally gained access to the consumer goods that had been the preserve of the middle classes before. Gormley had gained the parish that gave miners a much better standard of living, though these good pay rates, pensions and secure employment were all part of the reason that foreign coal was cheaper, and mines uneconomic.
You've repeated this over the years here. I can only assume that you were in your halcyon adolescence at that time. Well I can tell you that I was analysing and forecasting the UK and Irish economies for the OECD in the mid-70s, and in their economics department, which had economists from many countries, the UK was seen as a basket case with its dire economic performance, awful industrial relations, rip-roaring inflation, "social contract" and price controls.
True, but the Thatcher cure involved a destructive asset stripping of the industrial north, from which it has never recovered in relative terms.
You're into the 80s now. It's a different picture, and the Thatcher cure as you call it really was a cure for the economy. What is the "asset stripping"? Do you mean the ending of subsidies? "In relative terms" is a cop out unless like Foxy you think the be all and end all of economic life is how the cake is shared out never mind how large it is.
As regards UK governments their impact on how the cake is shared is greater and more important and more interesting than on how large in total it is. The latter - the amount of long term sustainable growth in wealth per capita - is primarily determined by factors outside of the government's control. A truth which they emphasize in hard times and conveniently forget when things are rocking.
In 1979 UK gdp per capita was amongst the lowest in western Europe, by 1990 amongst the highest
I will take your word for this. It sounds plausible. It doesn't rebut my unorthodox but very solid point though. You'll see I'm right if you really think about it.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
We are in utopia, all divisiveness swept away! Rejoice!
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
Yes, pretty much, as anyone who (like me) worked in industry at the time can attest. The contrast between the hierarchical, them-vs- us structures of 1979, with separate canteens and career structures, with all activity riven with strikes, and 1990 when this had all gone, was spectacular. It's really hard for anyone who didn't experience the awfulness of pre-Thatcher industry to comprehend.
How much did Thatch's epochal, unifying influence have on the divided binfire of a kakocracy that is the UK today (I am of course happy to acknowledge her huge contribution to Scotland's current status within it)?
24 years after her premiership 55% of Scots voted to stay in the UK she did so much to shape yes
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
No, I was a London Medical student at the time, enjoying the booming city, with all its excess. I did not support the strikers, though neither did I like Thatcher. I was an observer, but we see even now how visceral that 35 year old dispute remains for both sides.
It shows up the fracture in the Conservative Party between the traditional Southern base and the newly acquired CDE voters in the North who have been promised a levelling up. Levelling up as a policy of economic redistribution that intrinsically recognises the damage done to the Red Wall over the decades.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
We are in utopia, all divisiveness swept away! Rejoice!
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
Yes, pretty much, as anyone who (like me) worked in industry at the time can attest. The contrast between the hierarchical, them-vs- us structures of 1979, with separate canteens and career structures, with all activity riven with strikes, and 1990 when this had all gone, was spectacular. It's really hard for anyone who didn't experience the awfulness of pre-Thatcher industry to comprehend.
You think it was the workers who wanted a separate canteen to the managers, rather than vice versa?
Oh for the days of those middle class sitcoms where someone gets a key to the executive washrooms.
I think this is great. If Bozo has managed to wake working class Red Wall voters up to the fact that intrinsically the Tories despise them, he's done a great service to the nation.
Now if Labour can remember that the party is meant to represent working class voters' interests, rather than looking down on them, we might stand a chance.
Anger as Boris Johnson does not isolate after staffer’s positive Covid test
A senior government source told the Guardian the prime minister and official were “side-by-side” on several occasions and even travelled together on an RAF Voyager between Glasgow and Aberdeen, but a Downing Street spokesperson said they did not come into close contact.
The group were tested upon landing, and the official’s result was positive so they went into isolation. Some whose result came back negative were told to make their own way home, while others, including Johnson, finished the tour. The prime minister was then pictured meeting the business secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, the Scottish Tory leader, Douglas Ross, and the Conservative MP Andrew Bowie.
Johnson and several members of the No 10 contingent are not isolating – but a government source said “the whole lot should be”.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
We are in utopia, all divisiveness swept away! Rejoice!
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
Yes, pretty much, as anyone who (like me) worked in industry at the time can attest. The contrast between the hierarchical, them-vs- us structures of 1979, with separate canteens and career structures, with all activity riven with strikes, and 1990 when this had all gone, was spectacular. It's really hard for anyone who didn't experience the awfulness of pre-Thatcher industry to comprehend.
How much did Thatch's epochal, unifying influence have on the divided binfire of a kakocracy that is the UK today (I am of course happy to acknowledge her huge contribution to Scotland's current status within it)?
I reckon Maggie would have had BoJo's number. Second division Cecil Parkinson. Minister for Arts and comic turn at the Conference, tops.
Even if you don't agree with her vision, she valued intelligence and integrity in a way that has gone out of the window now.
Not sure. It could do. But the pits closing was approaching 40 years ago. More to the point, no one would turn round now and say “we should have kept them open”.
I’m a big fan of the view Thatcher should have done more to support the communities when the pits closed. But I think most people in those areas recognise the direction it was heading in and see it now in the past.
Don’t think this will make any difference at all
It gives something for 70s and 80s political nostalgics to get erections over, and for poseurs of the 2000s to pretend outrage about something that happened decades ago. That it was unnecessarily foolish of him to give people the chance to be outraged is true though - sure people will get outraged over anything, but he could have avoided it.
Of course the over 65 CDE vote in the Redwall are just the sort that remember.
I'm neither CDE nort over 65 - and I remember very, very well.
Snap.
The intentional, single-minded, vicious annihilation of the mining industry in Wales, Scotland and England was *huge*. It dominated the news for months and months on end. There was something primeval and savage about it. It was very public sadomasochism. There was no alternative media either: everybody was forced to observe the slaughter.
Indeed, I was a student at the time and made a road trip to Newcastle with some friends mid strike. I vividly remember the tense atmosphere and minibuses of police from the South.
It wasn't just a matter of economic rationalisation, and certainly not of green politics. It was a deliberate final battle to crush the trade unions, and the miners in particular. Maggie was after all a Minister in Heath's government during the 1970s miners strike. She wanted revenge, and had it.
Sniggering, infantile Conservative staffers have no comprehension of such matters.
Nor does @Foxy, judging by his ludicrously partisan account.
No, I was a London Medical student at the time, enjoying the booming city, with all its excess. I did not support the strikers, though neither did I like Thatcher. I was an observer, but we see even now how visceral that 35 year old dispute remains for both sides.
It shows up the fracture in the Conservative Party between the traditional Southern base and the newly acquired CDE voters in the North who have been promised a levelling up. Levelling up as a policy of economic redistribution that intrinsically recognises the damage done to the Red Wall over the decades.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
Thatcher and Johnson have one thing in common: a total lack of empathy. Which, in Thatcher's case, meant she was never as popular as her boosters make her out to be. But she did have a split opposition, another and useful thing she shares with Johnson.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
We are in utopia, all divisiveness swept away! Rejoice!
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
Yes, pretty much, as anyone who (like me) worked in industry at the time can attest. The contrast between the hierarchical, them-vs- us structures of 1979, with separate canteens and career structures, with all activity riven with strikes, and 1990 when this had all gone, was spectacular. It's really hard for anyone who didn't experience the awfulness of pre-Thatcher industry to comprehend.
How much did Thatch's epochal, unifying influence have on the divided binfire of a kakocracy that is the UK today (I am of course happy to acknowledge her huge contribution to Scotland's current status within it)?
I reckon Maggie would have had BoJo's number. Second division Cecil Parkinson. Minister for Arts and comic turn at the Conference, tops.
Even if you don't agree with her vision, she valued intelligence and integrity in a way that has gone out of the window now.
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
We are in utopia, all divisiveness swept away! Rejoice!
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
Yes, pretty much, as anyone who (like me) worked in industry at the time can attest. The contrast between the hierarchical, them-vs- us structures of 1979, with separate canteens and career structures, with all activity riven with strikes, and 1990 when this had all gone, was spectacular. It's really hard for anyone who didn't experience the awfulness of pre-Thatcher industry to comprehend.
How much did Thatch's epochal, unifying influence have on the divided binfire of a kakocracy that is the UK today (I am of course happy to acknowledge her huge contribution to Scotland's current status within it)?
I reckon Maggie would have had BoJo's number. Second division Cecil Parkinson. Minister for Arts and comic turn at the Conference, tops.
Even if you don't agree with her vision, she valued intelligence and integrity in a way that has gone out of the window now.
The pace elite athletes run the marathon is jusr incredible. They basically do it at a pace that normal humans would call sprinting....and they do this for 42km...and today are doing it in 30+ degrees.
The pace elite athletes run the marathon is jusr incredible. They basically do it at a pace that normal humans would call sprinting....and they do this for 42km...and today are doing it in 30+ degrees.
They kicked off at 6am Japan time, so hopefully it's not too hot now!
You framed it as 'revenge'. Utterly ludicrous. Do you not remember the flying pickets - violent thugs intimidating innocent citizens and wrecking businesses totally unrelated to any dispute? Or the divisions in workplaces, unimaginable today because Maggie swept all that divisiveness away?
We are in utopia, all divisiveness swept away! Rejoice!
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
Yes, pretty much, as anyone who (like me) worked in industry at the time can attest. The contrast between the hierarchical, them-vs- us structures of 1979, with separate canteens and career structures, with all activity riven with strikes, and 1990 when this had all gone, was spectacular. It's really hard for anyone who didn't experience the awfulness of pre-Thatcher industry to comprehend.
How much did Thatch's epochal, unifying influence have on the divided binfire of a kakocracy that is the UK today (I am of course happy to acknowledge her huge contribution to Scotland's current status within it)?
I reckon Maggie would have had BoJo's number. Second division Cecil Parkinson. Minister for Arts and comic turn at the Conference, tops.
Even if you don't agree with her vision, she valued intelligence and integrity in a way that has gone out of the window now.
I'd agree that Margaret was relatively immune to empty charm, but Parkinson (see also John Moore and Jonathan Aiken) suggests she had a weakness for a comely countenance. BJ is of course a munter so maybe not even a second division ministry.
Comments
Funnily enough, he still hasn’t answered this conundrum:
Scotnat 47.7%
Scotcon 23%
Scotlab 19.6%
Scotlib 6%
Scotgreen 2.1%
Scotreform 0.4%
My feeling is that M5S have been far more comfortable when dealing with the left these last few years, they are broadly a strange mix of a number of non Social Democratic leftist tribes - in UK terms a mix of Lexiteer, traditionalist, direct democracy, green, anti-corruption, and slightly conspiracist. I think their eventual destiny may be close to the main left grouping, but their founding principals put up big barriers to that and it will take some years before they are able to admit it and act on it. Which is a shame because it would make the next election far more competitive.
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1423664805991362564?s=20
However voters would also support closing coal mines if they were still around by 41% to 30%
https://twitter.com/YouGov/status/1423664816443600905?s=20
I agree voters are more concerned about the migrant crossings overall.
However while Red Wall voters could switch to Labour over Boris' mine comments, voters most concerned about immigration are hardly going to switch from the Tories to Labour who are even more pro migration (they may have gone to Farage but the BXP and UKIP have near disappeared and he has a media career now).
So for Boris I think the gaffe will be more serious politically (ironic given the government approved the first new deep coalmine in 30 years)
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2020/oct/02/first-new-deep-coalmine-in-uk-for-30-years-gets-green-light
Could it be that you are a little obsessed with furriners?
I'll be pleased to be proved wrong - I hope it's a huge success. But spare the popcorn.
For some reason I just can’t stop laughing. Whenever I see her fizzog I’m involuntarily reminded of her daughters as portrayed in The Windsors.
In this particular case I still tend to be sympathetic with Thatcher, but not unreservedly so. The baby got thrown out with the bath water.
If you voted Tory to 1. take back control, 2. Get Brexit done and 3. control the European borders in particular, then the sight of thousands of boats landing with apparent impunity in Kent, from the EU, full of illegal immigrants, is provocative
I am sure this is, in part, driving Patel's appalling personal ratings. She is meant to be in charge. It doesn't look like she is
I offer this merely as passing anecdotal evidence. It may be nothing.
It was an epochal battle that redefined the economy. Away from unionised heavy industry and to shopping and financial services. It was a time of yuppies, filofaxes and the Big Bang, as much as it was about picket line battles and coalfield communities.
That is why it was so visceral, and why it looms large in the National memory. Indeed I have long seen the Red Wall Brexit vote as revenge served cold on a Southern based finance economy that marginalised them. Brexit is the antithesis of Eighties Thatcherism.
However the actual latest indyref2 polling now shows a clear No lead, not that it matters as you will never get a legal indyref2 with this Tory government before the next UK general election so tough!
A decent amount of that is reflected beyond the party.
Of course, the Tories were never, have never, and will never do anything to significantly constrain immigration because: a) it is too hard, b) they are inept and c) many of their donors benefit significantly by having an open source of cheap labour.
Note that the poll doesn't actually ask whether people liked the remark - they're only being asked if closing coal mines was good for the climate. The answer to that is yes, but I think the northerners are probably influenced by not liking the gloating sentiment.
It was though a relatively good time to be a British worker, who had a new world of consumer treats available. Cars, foreign holidays, colour TV etc, all these became the staples of working class life.
Then came the Lady. The Lady.
(*might only be top ten upon reflection. There have been some real humdingers on here.)
However policing the entire English channel to control the number of African migrants coming from France is a different matter, it has to be done in conjunction with Macron to be effective
https://vimeo.com/205881931
Not much better in the 80s or 90s either tbf.
It shows up the fracture in the Conservative Party between the traditional Southern base and the newly acquired CDE voters in the North who have been promised a levelling up. Levelling up as a policy of economic redistribution that intrinsically recognises the damage done to the Red Wall over the decades.
Yet still he whines on about "British workers having colour TVs!". In the marvellous GINI-equal 70s. When Britain was so great he and his family had actually fled to America.
It has been my observation through life that all humans are hypocrites, but leftwingers are the worst kind of hypocrites, because their hypocrisy is simultaneously so overt, yet so denied.
The corner the government have backed themselves into is that they have made immigration an issue, and said they will stem it. And in the real world, there's not much that they can do which is both effective and palatable. The moral is that you shouldn't make damnfool undeliverable promises.
The economy was in deep troubles in the Seventies, but it actually was a good time. Indeed 1976 was the happiest year on record.
https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/1976-britians-best-ever-year-2070469
Where there is discord, may we bring harmony; Where there is error, may we bring truth; Where there is doubt, may we bring faith; And where there is despair, may we bring hope.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsA7rdZelLc
I to this day remember the wanker from Socialist Worker at Clapham Common tube Station shouting victory to the miners the day that guy got killed.
I also remember a mate having to climb though a window into county hall to avoid a pasting from the union thugs who insisted he should not work
Thatcher was a cultural conservative but economic liberal
Am considering if a career re-adjustment is sensible given the above, over a bottle of Nyetimber (obvs)....
However yes I agree more could have been done to retrain ex miners
Oh for the days of those middle class sitcoms where someone gets a key to the executive washrooms.
I think this is great. If Bozo has managed to wake working class Red Wall voters up to the fact that intrinsically the Tories despise them, he's done a great service to the nation.
Now if Labour can remember that the party is meant to represent working class voters' interests, rather than looking down on them, we might stand a chance.
Good night all.
A senior government source told the Guardian the prime minister and official were “side-by-side” on several occasions and even travelled together on an RAF Voyager between Glasgow and Aberdeen, but a Downing Street spokesperson said they did not come into close contact.
The group were tested upon landing, and the official’s result was positive so they went into isolation. Some whose result came back negative were told to make their own way home, while others, including Johnson, finished the tour. The prime minister was then pictured meeting the business secretary, Kwasi Kwarteng, the Scottish Tory leader, Douglas Ross, and the Conservative MP Andrew Bowie.
Johnson and several members of the No 10 contingent are not isolating – but a government source said “the whole lot should be”.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/aug/06/boris-johnson-will-not-isolate-after-staffer-tests-positive-for-covid
The idea of running a marathon in that heat and humidity.....
Even if you don't agree with her vision, she valued intelligence and integrity in a way that has gone out of the window now.
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/mayor/boris-johnson-teachers-demonised-margaret-thatcher-8567367.html
I get that some people are absolutely desperate for a story to "get Boris" with but I really don't think this is it.
But it is silly season so have your fun.
They weren’t consecutive - you’re forgetting the thread on Boris’ poor ratings and the one on why Sunak would be better than Boris.
He'll be happy with that.