Howdy, Stranger!

It looks like you're new here. Sign in or register to get started.

Options

He that troubleth his own house shall inherit the wind – politicalbetting.com

1246

Comments

  • Options
    Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,385
    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    That's just the UK's money recycled back, it isn't a subsidy.
    It isn't. UK money (and other countries) were for access to trade markets at a favourable rate. Cost/benefit.

    Anything we got back after was a subsidy.

    It's like saying child benefit is a taxpayers tax recycled back, which is obvious rubbish.

  • Options

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    I would have opposed on all three occasions. I was outraged Mrs May brought the same deal back on a one more heave basis.

    However, knowing what I know now, I would have voted it through on the first time of asking, such is Johnson's thin gruel deal.
    A thin deal is what the Tory Brexiteers wanted though. I opposed Mrs May's ridiculously obese deal that maintained us trapped indefinitely in the Single Market and Customs Union without any votes and without any unilateral exit because of the backstop which had no unilateral termination clause.

    Did you not stop to think that if Mrs May fell, she'd be replaced by one of those Tories demanding a thinner deal? Who did you think would replace her?
  • Options
    CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 59,612
    For any (remaining) fans of iSage:

    I-Sage is part of 'The Citizens'; extract of their manifesto below (they've changed the wording since). I don't believe this attitude is compatible with public health. I believe I can criticise a group of political activists in harsh terms without insulting all its members.

    https://twitter.com/BallouxFrancois/status/1432155181236506624?s=20
  • Options
    Alphabet_SoupAlphabet_Soup Posts: 2,743
    TOPPING said:

    In Afghan over the past 12 or 18 months the UK should have been winding down operations, getting the people out who we wanted to get out and ensuring that come the deadline it was just the ambassador left ceremoniously getting on board a C30 hold on that's a cassette tape C130 and that should have been it.

    That is why the FCO is culpable.

    There was a working assumption that the highly trained and well equipped Afghan national army would hold the line indefinitely. Wishful thinking, in retrospect. Every other mistake flowed from this one. If we and our allies had started evacuating people en masse 18 months ago it would have signalled to the Taliban that we expected the Kabul government to fall. How would they have responded?
  • Options
    Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,885
    TOPPING said:

    Also I note on this thread how people are lauding Brexit as it pertains to NI.

    Love Brexit if you must but don't deny that it has completely fucked the ROI/NI situation.

    For the Little Englanders, that's a feature, not a bug
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    That's just the UK's money recycled back, it isn't a subsidy.
    It isn't. UK money (and other countries) were for access to trade markets at a favourable rate. Cost/benefit.

    Anything we got back after was a subsidy.

    It's like saying child benefit is a taxpayers tax recycled back, which is obvious rubbish.

    A subsidy using the UK's own money, with limitations on what it could be spent on.

    As for your analogy, why can't you view it like that? It's just the government taking with one hand and giving back with another.
  • Options

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    That's just the UK's money recycled back, it isn't a subsidy.
    It isn't. UK money (and other countries) were for access to trade markets at a favourable rate. Cost/benefit.

    Anything we got back after was a subsidy.

    It's like saying child benefit is a taxpayers tax recycled back, which is obvious rubbish.

    Child benefit is taxpayers tax recycled back.

    Anyway if you wish to claim that as a subsidy then you are doubling the costs of access to trade markets - which makes it even less valuable and even more expensive access. So swings and roundabouts.
  • Options
    TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 41,282

    TOPPING said:

    In Afghan over the past 12 or 18 months the UK should have been winding down operations, getting the people out who we wanted to get out and ensuring that come the deadline it was just the ambassador left ceremoniously getting on board a C30 hold on that's a cassette tape C130 and that should have been it.

    That is why the FCO is culpable.

    There was a working assumption that the highly trained and well equipped Afghan national army would hold the line indefinitely. Wishful thinking, in retrospect. Every other mistake flowed from this one. If we and our allies had started evacuating people en masse 18 months ago it would have signalled to the Taliban that we expected the Kabul government to fall. How would they have responded?
    There was an agreement to leave. We were going so the agreement was a pretty strong signal.

    Plus fine, don't have the ticker tape parade with the massed bands of the Household Division leading the way to the airport.
  • Options
    MexicanpeteMexicanpete Posts: 25,137

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    I would have opposed on all three occasions. I was outraged Mrs May brought the same deal back on a one more heave basis.

    However, knowing what I know now, I would have voted it through on the first time of asking, such is Johnson's thin gruel deal.
    A thin deal is what the Tory Brexiteers wanted though. I opposed Mrs May's ridiculously obese deal that maintained us trapped indefinitely in the Single Market and Customs Union without any votes and without any unilateral exit because of the backstop which had no unilateral termination clause.

    Did you not stop to think that if Mrs May fell, she'd be replaced by one of those Tories demanding a thinner deal? Who did you think would replace her?
    No because I was blinded by EURef2.

    My mistake.
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961
    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    In Afghan over the past 12 or 18 months the UK should have been winding down operations, getting the people out who we wanted to get out and ensuring that come the deadline it was just the ambassador left ceremoniously getting on board a C30 hold on that's a cassette tape C130 and that should have been it.

    That is why the FCO is culpable.

    There was a working assumption that the highly trained and well equipped Afghan national army would hold the line indefinitely. Wishful thinking, in retrospect. Every other mistake flowed from this one. If we and our allies had started evacuating people en masse 18 months ago it would have signalled to the Taliban that we expected the Kabul government to fall. How would they have responded?
    There was an agreement to leave. We were going so the agreement was a pretty strong signal.

    Plus fine, don't have the ticker tape parade with the massed bands of the Household Division leading the way to the airport.
    Right, the army was going to leave, but I doubt they had planned for the entire embassy and local workers to also leave.
  • Options
    kinabalukinabalu Posts: 39,187

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    I would have opposed on all three occasions. I was outraged Mrs May brought the same deal back on a one more heave basis.

    However, knowing what I know now, I would have voted it through on the first time of asking, such is Johnson's thin gruel deal.
    Defo. I was always for it. Never a Ref2 man. Just felt like tilting at windmills.
  • Options
    TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 41,282
    Scott_xP said:

    TOPPING said:

    Also I note on this thread how people are lauding Brexit as it pertains to NI.

    Love Brexit if you must but don't deny that it has completely fucked the ROI/NI situation.

    For the Little Englanders, that's a feature, not a bug
    You wonder whether the same people who would have described themselves as UK patriots are those now saying well it's best if there is Irish unification.

    Funny because in all their previous outpourings they never mentioned that caveat.

    Or perhaps it is no wonder.
  • Options
    CarlottaVanceCarlottaVance Posts: 59,612
    About blooming time:

    NEW: Met Police intercept an attempt by Extinction Rebellion to block a road.


    https://twitter.com/PoliticsForAlI/status/1432317729629999105?s=20
  • Options
    kinabalukinabalu Posts: 39,187

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
  • Options
    williamglennwilliamglenn Posts: 48,052
    DougSeal said:

    DougSeal said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    tlg86 said:

    Does anyone actually want a referendum in NI? The losers would be incredibly bitter and goodness only knows what the consequences might be.

    No political goal worth having can be obtained through democracy but I'd welcome a referendum from a Marxist accelerationist perspective.
    Interesting. Don’t you think accelerationism is remarkably dangerous? The main historical examples of accelerationism I can think of would be the tactics promoted by the Comintern during the “Third Period” and the CPUSA's line during the early 30's ("It has to get worse before it can get better."). The former led to the German Communist Party proclaiming things like "After Hitler, us!" (which was true to an extent I guess - but not in the way hoped for).
    What about John Major’s “If it’s not hurting, it’s not working”? That led to Tony Blair.
    Never had Back to Basics or Cones Hotlines down as Marxist Accelerationism TBH.
    The signs were there.

    image
  • Options
    Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,385

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
  • Options
    kjhkjh Posts: 10,619
    kinabalu said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    I would have opposed on all three occasions. I was outraged Mrs May brought the same deal back on a one more heave basis.

    However, knowing what I know now, I would have voted it through on the first time of asking, such is Johnson's thin gruel deal.
    Defo. I was always for it. Never a Ref2 man. Just felt like tilting at windmills.
    I was 100% sure Brexit would never happen.
  • Options
    TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 41,282
    RobD said:

    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    In Afghan over the past 12 or 18 months the UK should have been winding down operations, getting the people out who we wanted to get out and ensuring that come the deadline it was just the ambassador left ceremoniously getting on board a C30 hold on that's a cassette tape C130 and that should have been it.

    That is why the FCO is culpable.

    There was a working assumption that the highly trained and well equipped Afghan national army would hold the line indefinitely. Wishful thinking, in retrospect. Every other mistake flowed from this one. If we and our allies had started evacuating people en masse 18 months ago it would have signalled to the Taliban that we expected the Kabul government to fall. How would they have responded?
    There was an agreement to leave. We were going so the agreement was a pretty strong signal.

    Plus fine, don't have the ticker tape parade with the massed bands of the Household Division leading the way to the airport.
    Right, the army was going to leave, but I doubt they had planned for the entire embassy and local workers to also leave.
    Why not? What changed over the past 18 months? The Taliban conquered the country. Well they had been well on their way to doing that for some time.

    What did the scenario analysis throw up when the Trump agreement was signed?
  • Options
    kinabalukinabalu Posts: 39,187
    malcolmg said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    HYUFD said:

    kinabalu said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    pigeon said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    IshmaelZ said:

    Dura_Ace said:

    MrEd said:

    Thanks for the thread TSE

    Two things:

    1. The DUP effectively did not have any choice in backing Brexit or facilitating it. It’s clear that pro-Brexit voters would have chosen Brexit over keeping NI in the Union if the NI problem was seen to be blocking Brexit. So allowing the NI tail to wag the England / Wales dog was never going to happen;

    2. I’m sceptical of these polls now showing such high support for a United Ireland. Wait until you get into a campaign and NI voters suddenly realise they have to pay for their GP visits and medical treatment if they become part of an United Ireland

    Identity overpowers economic considerations as Brexit and Trump demonstrate.
    I don't think so. People may not be sensitive to forecasts of declines in GDP per capita, but they are sure as fuck sensitive to buses which say "Let's start paying £50 a pop per GP visit if our gross income exceeds £14,000" which seems to be the case in Ireland. Killer point from @MrEd.
    The prospect of a united Ireland is not going founder on the rocks of fucking GP charges. If necessary the HSE will reform (or promise to reform) the system just enough to obfuscate and neutralise the issue.
    If anything's going to kill off reunification it'll be the plain fact that Northern Ireland is a very expensive pain in the backside. The voters of the Republic might be delighted to welcome into the fold the (presumably very pissed off) 40% of the Northern populace that identifies as "British only" and have their taxes shoot through the roof to keep them in the style to which they are accustomed, but I doubt it.

    The North is heavily subsidised. Yes, the Republic is rich, but OTOH Great Britain is 13 times its size and can more readily shoulder the burden. Follow the money.
    Which is precisely why NI should be cut free.

    Why is NI a burden? Why have we contributed so much and seen so little return for it?

    Why can the Republic be rich, England be rich, but NI is a backwater burden?

    The union isn't working.
    NI is richer than the North East of England in terms of average house price and as much a part of the UK as it is

    https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices/bulletins/housepriceindex/march2021
    Hence the levelling up agenda for the North, though it's worth noting that the North East does not remotely get the same funding as NI has which is money poured permanently down the drain.

    There is nothing preventing NI from catching up with the Republic besides the failed union.
    There is nothing wrong with the Union and the North East gets plenty of net subsidy from London and the South East too.

    The Republic has lower taxes than the UK but also has charges for hospital visits etc unlike the UK
    "We don't get fees cos we're part of the Union." - I can see this on the Better Together bus when the Border Poll happens.

    More seriously, relative to Sindy, I detect a certain warmth from you towards the idea of Irish Reunification. Would this be fair or have I misread things very badly?
    No. I am a staunch Unionist and want to keep both Scotland and NI in the UK.

    However there is a point that the Dublin government of FF and FG is economically right of the Johnson government let alone any future Starmer government, while clearly the current SNP and Green Holyrood government is economically left of both Johnson and Starmer.

    So on that point alone joining with Dublin would make more sense for rightwingers than joining with Edinburgh
    The current complexion of devolved (or Irish) governments shouldn't really be a factor in a forever decision but I suppose it's bound to be to an extent. I often think the most frustrating position to be in would be a Scot Nat who is on the right of the politics. Such a person is getting a double whammy - sitting in what seems like a permanent waiting room for independence whilst at the same time being governed at home by a left of centre party and - the kicker - having to vote for it. I read many of (eg) Malcolm's posts with this thought in mind.
    Just never call Malc a Tory unless you’re prepared for death by turnip.
    Ha, no. I won't be doing that. Stick with the ultra safe "politically right of centre". Any case, my def of a Tory is as discussed (and I think accepted by all of good faith and standing) the other day and Malcolm fails it unless he's secretly voting for them.
    I can assure he is NOT
    Did consider it unlikely.
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961
    TOPPING said:

    RobD said:

    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    In Afghan over the past 12 or 18 months the UK should have been winding down operations, getting the people out who we wanted to get out and ensuring that come the deadline it was just the ambassador left ceremoniously getting on board a C30 hold on that's a cassette tape C130 and that should have been it.

    That is why the FCO is culpable.

    There was a working assumption that the highly trained and well equipped Afghan national army would hold the line indefinitely. Wishful thinking, in retrospect. Every other mistake flowed from this one. If we and our allies had started evacuating people en masse 18 months ago it would have signalled to the Taliban that we expected the Kabul government to fall. How would they have responded?
    There was an agreement to leave. We were going so the agreement was a pretty strong signal.

    Plus fine, don't have the ticker tape parade with the massed bands of the Household Division leading the way to the airport.
    Right, the army was going to leave, but I doubt they had planned for the entire embassy and local workers to also leave.
    Why not? What changed over the past 18 months? The Taliban conquered the country. Well they had been well on their way to doing that for some time.

    What did the scenario analysis throw up when the Trump agreement was signed?
    It certainly does point to a lack of contingency planning, although maybe it happened more rapidly than they anticipated. Still, I don't think the plan devised at the outset included evacuating the ambassador.
  • Options
    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    He didn't need to facilitate it, he could have easily (just as Keir did after he took over) abstained on the deal and allowed a deal to get through Parliament on the pretext that any deal is better than no deal. Instead he opposed it every step of the way.

    If he's abstained on May's deal it would have gone through and torn the Tories asunder and he's possibly be PM by now. And we'd still be in the Single Market and Customs Union via the backstop. And Boris would never have become PM.

    Thank goodness none of that happened!
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961
    edited August 2021

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
  • Options
    TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 41,282
    RobD said:

    TOPPING said:

    RobD said:

    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    In Afghan over the past 12 or 18 months the UK should have been winding down operations, getting the people out who we wanted to get out and ensuring that come the deadline it was just the ambassador left ceremoniously getting on board a C30 hold on that's a cassette tape C130 and that should have been it.

    That is why the FCO is culpable.

    There was a working assumption that the highly trained and well equipped Afghan national army would hold the line indefinitely. Wishful thinking, in retrospect. Every other mistake flowed from this one. If we and our allies had started evacuating people en masse 18 months ago it would have signalled to the Taliban that we expected the Kabul government to fall. How would they have responded?
    There was an agreement to leave. We were going so the agreement was a pretty strong signal.

    Plus fine, don't have the ticker tape parade with the massed bands of the Household Division leading the way to the airport.
    Right, the army was going to leave, but I doubt they had planned for the entire embassy and local workers to also leave.
    Why not? What changed over the past 18 months? The Taliban conquered the country. Well they had been well on their way to doing that for some time.

    What did the scenario analysis throw up when the Trump agreement was signed?
    It certainly does point to a lack of contingency planning, although maybe it happened more rapidly than they anticipated. Still, I don't think the plan devised at the outset included evacuating the ambassador.
    Also fine. Although as you say why was that conclusion reached. So leave him with his staff there. There was still a long list of people likely to be at risk who needed to be evacuated.
  • Options
    Alphabet_SoupAlphabet_Soup Posts: 2,743
    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    In Afghan over the past 12 or 18 months the UK should have been winding down operations, getting the people out who we wanted to get out and ensuring that come the deadline it was just the ambassador left ceremoniously getting on board a C30 hold on that's a cassette tape C130 and that should have been it.

    That is why the FCO is culpable.

    There was a working assumption that the highly trained and well equipped Afghan national army would hold the line indefinitely. Wishful thinking, in retrospect. Every other mistake flowed from this one. If we and our allies had started evacuating people en masse 18 months ago it would have signalled to the Taliban that we expected the Kabul government to fall. How would they have responded?
    There was an agreement to leave. We were going so the agreement was a pretty strong signal.

    Plus fine, don't have the ticker tape parade with the massed bands of the Household Division leading the way to the airport.
    But that's not my point. There was an agreement to pull out, but the assumption was that we would leave behind a well-defended democracy (of sorts...). Our actions needed to be consistent with this. If we'd started a mass evacuation (cats, dogs and donkeys included) in early 2020 it would have signalled to the world that we didn't believe Kabul could hold out. As events have proved, that would have been correct, but it wasn't what we and the rest of the world believed at the time. In short, we could not have embarked on a policy 18 months ago whose necessity has only become apparent in the past couple of weeks.
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961
    TOPPING said:

    RobD said:

    TOPPING said:

    RobD said:

    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    In Afghan over the past 12 or 18 months the UK should have been winding down operations, getting the people out who we wanted to get out and ensuring that come the deadline it was just the ambassador left ceremoniously getting on board a C30 hold on that's a cassette tape C130 and that should have been it.

    That is why the FCO is culpable.

    There was a working assumption that the highly trained and well equipped Afghan national army would hold the line indefinitely. Wishful thinking, in retrospect. Every other mistake flowed from this one. If we and our allies had started evacuating people en masse 18 months ago it would have signalled to the Taliban that we expected the Kabul government to fall. How would they have responded?
    There was an agreement to leave. We were going so the agreement was a pretty strong signal.

    Plus fine, don't have the ticker tape parade with the massed bands of the Household Division leading the way to the airport.
    Right, the army was going to leave, but I doubt they had planned for the entire embassy and local workers to also leave.
    Why not? What changed over the past 18 months? The Taliban conquered the country. Well they had been well on their way to doing that for some time.

    What did the scenario analysis throw up when the Trump agreement was signed?
    It certainly does point to a lack of contingency planning, although maybe it happened more rapidly than they anticipated. Still, I don't think the plan devised at the outset included evacuating the ambassador.
    Also fine. Although as you say why was that conclusion reached. So leave him with his staff there. There was still a long list of people likely to be at risk who needed to be evacuated.
    The need only materialised after the government collapsed, so it may not have factored into the withdrawal plan. I'm not sure how early on it was known that was going to happen.
  • Options
    TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 41,282

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    He didn't need to facilitate it, he could have easily (just as Keir did after he took over) abstained on the deal and allowed a deal to get through Parliament on the pretext that any deal is better than no deal. Instead he opposed it every step of the way.

    If he's abstained on May's deal it would have gone through and torn the Tories asunder and he's possibly be PM by now. And we'd still be in the Single Market and Customs Union via the backstop. And Boris would never have become PM.

    Thank goodness none of that happened!
    He was ironically pursuing a strategy that it is the LotO's duty to oppose whereas as you say had he not then the events you describe might well have transpired.

    Ironically? Because SKS is getting a shellacking now precisely because he is not following that It is the LotO's Duty to Oppose strategy.
  • Options
    felixfelix Posts: 15,124

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
  • Options
    .
    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
  • Options
    TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 41,282

    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    In Afghan over the past 12 or 18 months the UK should have been winding down operations, getting the people out who we wanted to get out and ensuring that come the deadline it was just the ambassador left ceremoniously getting on board a C30 hold on that's a cassette tape C130 and that should have been it.

    That is why the FCO is culpable.

    There was a working assumption that the highly trained and well equipped Afghan national army would hold the line indefinitely. Wishful thinking, in retrospect. Every other mistake flowed from this one. If we and our allies had started evacuating people en masse 18 months ago it would have signalled to the Taliban that we expected the Kabul government to fall. How would they have responded?
    There was an agreement to leave. We were going so the agreement was a pretty strong signal.

    Plus fine, don't have the ticker tape parade with the massed bands of the Household Division leading the way to the airport.
    But that's not my point. There was an agreement to pull out, but the assumption was that we would leave behind a well-defended democracy (of sorts...). Our actions needed to be consistent with this. If we'd started a mass evacuation (cats, dogs and donkeys included) in early 2020 it would have signalled to the world that we didn't believe Kabul could hold out. As events have proved, that would have been correct, but it wasn't what we and the rest of the world believed at the time. In short, we could not have embarked on a policy 18 months ago whose necessity has only become apparent in the past couple of weeks.
    As I said that's fine. Leave a skeleton staff at the Embassy. But given we were withdrawing our troops then we couldn't have protected those we have now deemed vulnerable in any case.

    And anyone who thought we were going to leave behind a well defended democracy hasn't been paying attention to Afghan over the past couple of decades or indeed centuries.
  • Options
    TOPPING said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    He didn't need to facilitate it, he could have easily (just as Keir did after he took over) abstained on the deal and allowed a deal to get through Parliament on the pretext that any deal is better than no deal. Instead he opposed it every step of the way.

    If he's abstained on May's deal it would have gone through and torn the Tories asunder and he's possibly be PM by now. And we'd still be in the Single Market and Customs Union via the backstop. And Boris would never have become PM.

    Thank goodness none of that happened!
    He was ironically pursuing a strategy that it is the LotO's duty to oppose whereas as you say had he not then the events you describe might well have transpired.

    Ironically? Because SKS is getting a shellacking now precisely because he is not following that It is the LotO's Duty to Oppose strategy.
    Its not the LOTO's duty to oppose. If the LOTO only ever opposed then you could replace the LOTO with an automatic nay vote, but that's not the case.

    The LOTO's duty is to provide an alternative. That alternative might sometimes agree and sometimes disagree with the government; and can sometimes do both.

    Corbyn could have very easily said that May's deal was better than no deal (remember how all the Labour/Remain spin was mocking "no deal is better than a bad deal) so he wouldn't vote it down, but he opposed it so he wouldn't support it, and at the next election he'd be putting forwards his own better alternatives to replace it.

    That would be entirely appropriate for a LOTO.
  • Options
    CarnyxCarnyx Posts: 39,671

    What's an RAF Voyager doing heading towards Kabul? Tanker run?

    https://www.flightradar24.com/NAG99/28f71cb1

    ISTR they can also be used for self-loading cargo. Human or non-human animals.
  • Options
    TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 40,035
    kinabalu said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    I would have opposed on all three occasions. I was outraged Mrs May brought the same deal back on a one more heave basis.

    However, knowing what I know now, I would have voted it through on the first time of asking, such is Johnson's thin gruel deal.
    Defo. I was always for it. Never a Ref2 man. Just felt like tilting at windmills.
    I'd say a definite error Sturgeon made (as opposed to all the ones the twerps on here fantasise about) was to throw her lot in with Euroref2 mob. Her tone should have been 'we recognise England and Wales have chosen to leave the EU and while we feel strongly this is a mistake we absolutely accept their right to make it. We expect Scotland's choice to be similarly respected'. May not have made much difference in the end but it would have helped on the consistent principle line.

    I reckon her head was turned by all the great and good progressives who usually spit bile at her and the SNP slapping her on the back.

  • Options
    Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 60,976
    Mr. Isam, I kind of disagree.

    They never had a shot. If they had, it might make sense. But they never even tabled such an amendment.

    All they did was successively oppose any kind of deal, helping to remove all softer options. The clue should have been when they were regularly voting alongside Mark Francois.
  • Options
    TOPPINGTOPPING Posts: 41,282

    TOPPING said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    He didn't need to facilitate it, he could have easily (just as Keir did after he took over) abstained on the deal and allowed a deal to get through Parliament on the pretext that any deal is better than no deal. Instead he opposed it every step of the way.

    If he's abstained on May's deal it would have gone through and torn the Tories asunder and he's possibly be PM by now. And we'd still be in the Single Market and Customs Union via the backstop. And Boris would never have become PM.

    Thank goodness none of that happened!
    He was ironically pursuing a strategy that it is the LotO's duty to oppose whereas as you say had he not then the events you describe might well have transpired.

    Ironically? Because SKS is getting a shellacking now precisely because he is not following that It is the LotO's Duty to Oppose strategy.
    Its not the LOTO's duty to oppose. If the LOTO only ever opposed then you could replace the LOTO with an automatic nay vote, but that's not the case.

    The LOTO's duty is to provide an alternative. That alternative might sometimes agree and sometimes disagree with the government; and can sometimes do both.

    Corbyn could have very easily said that May's deal was better than no deal (remember how all the Labour/Remain spin was mocking "no deal is better than a bad deal) so he wouldn't vote it down, but he opposed it so he wouldn't support it, and at the next election he'd be putting forwards his own better alternatives to replace it.

    That would be entirely appropriate for a LOTO.
    Yes of course they would have had to come up with an alternative. That is part of the premise of opposing or as you say you could just set up a no voting machine.

    The opposition should proceed from the premise that everything they want to do would be better than anything the government is planning to do
  • Options
    kinabalukinabalu Posts: 39,187

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    He didn't need to facilitate it, he could have easily (just as Keir did after he took over) abstained on the deal and allowed a deal to get through Parliament on the pretext that any deal is better than no deal. Instead he opposed it every step of the way.

    If he's abstained on May's deal it would have gone through and torn the Tories asunder and he's possibly be PM by now. And we'd still be in the Single Market and Customs Union via the backstop. And Boris would never have become PM.

    Thank goodness none of that happened!
    As I said, he saw himself above all as representing the members and the members wanted Brexit fought to the bitter end.
  • Options
    malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 41,862

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    Is that like the twenty pound Scottish we send you and don't even get a tenner back with a note saying "you are now seven pounds in debt".
  • Options
    Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 60,976
    F1: important news, seems Verstappen may have the fastest lap:
    https://twitter.com/adamcooperF1/status/1432294717832712194

    No extra half point for him on the official website, though.
  • Options
    TOPPING said:

    TOPPING said:

    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    kinabalu said:

    kinabalu said:

    Sandpit said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    If Labour had backed Mrs May’s deal, they’d have torn the government in half, and we’d quite likely have a PM Corbyn by now - but they were more interested in trying to engineer a second referendum without explicitly voting for one, than they were in trying to bring down the government.

    (Oh, and I’m very pleased I was working yesterday, and didn’t bet on that farce in Belgium).
    The irony of course was that Corbyn was not at all interested in a second referendum as is detailed in some detail, in "Get Out".

    It was John McDonnell who really pushed it, in the end
    Yes, left to his own devices Corbyn would have voted May's deal through, but there was no way the party would have allowed that. The counterfactuals in this regard are for fun only.
    He was leader of the party and won two leadership elections. Who would have stopped him from allowing that?

    Do you mean his Shadow Brexit Secretary perhaps who was behind the failed scheming to get a second referendum? Whatever happened to him I wonder?
    The membership. He fetishized his mandate from them. He was their tribune. No way could he facilitate Brexit.
    He didn't need to facilitate it, he could have easily (just as Keir did after he took over) abstained on the deal and allowed a deal to get through Parliament on the pretext that any deal is better than no deal. Instead he opposed it every step of the way.

    If he's abstained on May's deal it would have gone through and torn the Tories asunder and he's possibly be PM by now. And we'd still be in the Single Market and Customs Union via the backstop. And Boris would never have become PM.

    Thank goodness none of that happened!
    He was ironically pursuing a strategy that it is the LotO's duty to oppose whereas as you say had he not then the events you describe might well have transpired.

    Ironically? Because SKS is getting a shellacking now precisely because he is not following that It is the LotO's Duty to Oppose strategy.
    Its not the LOTO's duty to oppose. If the LOTO only ever opposed then you could replace the LOTO with an automatic nay vote, but that's not the case.

    The LOTO's duty is to provide an alternative. That alternative might sometimes agree and sometimes disagree with the government; and can sometimes do both.

    Corbyn could have very easily said that May's deal was better than no deal (remember how all the Labour/Remain spin was mocking "no deal is better than a bad deal) so he wouldn't vote it down, but he opposed it so he wouldn't support it, and at the next election he'd be putting forwards his own better alternatives to replace it.

    That would be entirely appropriate for a LOTO.
    Yes of course they would have had to come up with an alternative. That is part of the premise of opposing or as you say you could just set up a no voting machine.

    The opposition should proceed from the premise that everything they want to do would be better than anything the government is planning to do
    But the beauty of opposition is you don't need to say what your better alternative is today. Most of the time you can get away with wishy washy principles.

    So he could have easily abstained on May's deal (as even a bad deal is better than no deal) while saying he'd have better solutions in the future at the next election.

    And if he'd done that, that would have been that. The Tories would have been ripped asunder, the UK would have been trapped in the backstop, and he'd likely be on his way to becoming our most unlikely ever PM.
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961
    malcolmg said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    Is that like the twenty pound Scottish we send you and don't even get a tenner back with a note saying "you are now seven pounds in debt".
    Bit early for the turnip juice, isn't it? ;)
  • Options

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    But the Brexiteers campaigned on "we send £350 million a week to the EU". they didn't campaign on "we send £350 million to the EU, but £150 million comes back to places like Pembrokeshire".
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    But the Brexiteers campaigned on "we send £350 million a week to the EU". they didn't campaign on "we send £350 million to the EU, but £150 million comes back to places like Pembrokeshire".
    Both technically accurate. But the real reason that they used the gross rather than net figure was that the Remain side just wouldn't stop talking about it.
  • Options
    malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 41,862

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    You will give him a sore head trying to understand that.
  • Options
    kinabalukinabalu Posts: 39,187
    kjh said:

    kinabalu said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    I would have opposed on all three occasions. I was outraged Mrs May brought the same deal back on a one more heave basis.

    However, knowing what I know now, I would have voted it through on the first time of asking, such is Johnson's thin gruel deal.
    Defo. I was always for it. Never a Ref2 man. Just felt like tilting at windmills.
    I was 100% sure Brexit would never happen.
    Yes, a lot of people thought that. I think they underestimated just what a momentous and necessarily one-off event the 23 June vote was and that it really had to be implemented in some fashion.
  • Options
    malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 41,862
    RobD said:

    malcolmg said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    Is that like the twenty pound Scottish we send you and don't even get a tenner back with a note saying "you are now seven pounds in debt".
    Bit early for the turnip juice, isn't it? ;)
    You can never beat a Tory when you have money to be picked from your pocket o:)
  • Options
    eekeek Posts: 24,963
    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    But the Brexiteers campaigned on "we send £350 million a week to the EU". they didn't campaign on "we send £350 million to the EU, but £150 million comes back to places like Pembrokeshire".
    Both technically accurate. But the real reason that they used the gross rather than net figure was that the Remain side just wouldn't stop talking about it.
    They used the Gross figure because they knew that even the net figure was bad so any argument against it's use really wasn't going to get very far.
  • Options
    IshmaelZIshmaelZ Posts: 21,830
    RIP Lee 'Scratch' Perry.

    Saw him at Belladrum in ? 2006. Genius.
  • Options
    malcolmgmalcolmg Posts: 41,862
    felix said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
    Exactly like Scotland paying England far more than it ever sees back and the cheeky barstewards then pretend we are in debt as well. You people have more faces than the town clock
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,181
    eek said:

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    But the Brexiteers campaigned on "we send £350 million a week to the EU". they didn't campaign on "we send £350 million to the EU, but £150 million comes back to places like Pembrokeshire".
    Both technically accurate. But the real reason that they used the gross rather than net figure was that the Remain side just wouldn't stop talking about it.
    They used the Gross figure because they knew that even the net figure was bad so any argument against it's use really wasn't going to get very far.
    I would have thought a bigger advantage was that rebuttals concentrated on the net figure, not what we got for that money.
  • Options
    DavidLDavidL Posts: 51,219
    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    But the Brexiteers campaigned on "we send £350 million a week to the EU". they didn't campaign on "we send £350 million to the EU, but £150 million comes back to places like Pembrokeshire".
    Both technically accurate. But the real reason that they used the gross rather than net figure was that the Remain side just wouldn't stop talking about it.
    No, no, no Robb, the fact that it was only somewhere between £200m and £250m a week net was definitely a winning argument for remain. No doubt about it.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,181
    DavidL said:

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    But the Brexiteers campaigned on "we send £350 million a week to the EU". they didn't campaign on "we send £350 million to the EU, but £150 million comes back to places like Pembrokeshire".
    Both technically accurate. But the real reason that they used the gross rather than net figure was that the Remain side just wouldn't stop talking about it.
    No, no, no Robb, the fact that it was only somewhere between £200m and £250m a week net was definitely a winning argument for remain. No doubt about it.
    QED.
  • Options
    Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,385

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
  • Options
    kinabalukinabalu Posts: 39,187
    felix said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
    And the bottom line below that bottom line was that the wider economic benefits exceeded the net contribution. Whether that was true - and if so the extent of its truth - will become clear in due course.
  • Options
    squareroot2squareroot2 Posts: 6,340
    Scott_xP said:

    TOPPING said:

    Also I note on this thread how people are lauding Brexit as it pertains to NI.

    Love Brexit if you must but don't deny that it has completely fucked the ROI/NI situation.

    For the Little Englanders, that's a feature, not a bug
    You as a remainer spend every living minute trying to point what you see as flaws in Brexit . By and large the Nation has moved on and accepted it.. You haven't. You are trapped i your own world of personal misery. Suck it up.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,181

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    Well, it had to be explained to Dominic Raab.
  • Options
    Morris_DancerMorris_Dancer Posts: 60,976
    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961
    eek said:

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    But the Brexiteers campaigned on "we send £350 million a week to the EU". they didn't campaign on "we send £350 million to the EU, but £150 million comes back to places like Pembrokeshire".
    Both technically accurate. But the real reason that they used the gross rather than net figure was that the Remain side just wouldn't stop talking about it.
    They used the Gross figure because they knew that even the net figure was bad so any argument against it's use really wasn't going to get very far.
    Sorry, that's what I meant. It would encourage a lot of discussion about whether the gross or net figure was correct. All the time reminding people just how much is being sent.
  • Options

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961
    malcolmg said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    You will give him a sore head trying to understand that.
    So you agree with Daveyboy, it's the UK's money and not Scotland's?

    *innocent face*
  • Options
    DavidLDavidL Posts: 51,219
    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
    And the bottom line below that bottom line was that the wider economic benefits exceeded the net contribution. Whether that was true - and if so the extent of its truth - will become clear in due course.
    Absolutely not so. The real cost of membership of the SM was an £80bn a year trade deficit with the EU year after year after year. The cost of that was roughly 1m well paid jobs in this country and low tens of billions of foregone tax revenue.

    You can make arguments that we did not play the game well, that it was our own fault that we were so inept at exporting and so prone to import, that government policy in this country positively encourages excess consumption etc but the fact remains that being in the SM was economically ruinous for this country and free trade with the EU is not actually in our interests until we can improve our competitiveness.
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    The easiest way to tell that it was a subsidy from the fee-paying parents would be for those parents to stop paying. I suspect the free scholarship would soon end.
  • Options
    CiceroCicero Posts: 2,209
    DavidL said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
    And the bottom line below that bottom line was that the wider economic benefits exceeded the net contribution. Whether that was true - and if so the extent of its truth - will become clear in due course.
    Absolutely not so. The real cost of membership of the SM was an £80bn a year trade deficit with the EU year after year after year. The cost of that was roughly 1m well paid jobs in this country and low tens of billions of foregone tax revenue.

    You can make arguments that we did not play the game well, that it was our own fault that we were so inept at exporting and so prone to import, that government policy in this country positively encourages excess consumption etc but the fact remains that being in the SM was economically ruinous for this country and free trade with the EU is not actually in our interests until we can improve our competitiveness.
    Not a man who beleives in competative advantage, obviously. Or indeed in trade, if it comes to it.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,181

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
  • Options
    TheuniondivvieTheuniondivvie Posts: 40,035
    I see Brexit is a distant memory again.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,181
    RobD said:

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    The easiest way to tell that it was a subsidy from the fee-paying parents would be for those parents to stop paying. I suspect the free scholarship would soon end.
    Many parents in private schools are about to find that out due to the loss of overseas students.

    In particular the China market is looking very dicey.
  • Options
    felixfelix Posts: 15,124
    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
    And the bottom line below that bottom line was that the wider economic benefits exceeded the net contribution. Whether that was true - and if so the extent of its truth - will become clear in due course.
    May well be - although money was not the reason I voted remain. BTW is this the same 'due course' we've been hearing about from the Labour since 2010 about the polls on the turn from Miliband/Corbyn/Starmer et al? Or is it the 'due course' beloved of Sir Humphrey?
  • Options
    RobDRobD Posts: 58,961

    I see Brexit is a distant memory again.

    I was actually just trying to remember whether the Remain campaign actually said the net contribution was value for money, or just tried to avoid talking about the cost whatsoever.
  • Options
    algarkirkalgarkirk Posts: 10,517
    kinabalu said:

    kjh said:

    kinabalu said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    I would have opposed on all three occasions. I was outraged Mrs May brought the same deal back on a one more heave basis.

    However, knowing what I know now, I would have voted it through on the first time of asking, such is Johnson's thin gruel deal.
    Defo. I was always for it. Never a Ref2 man. Just felt like tilting at windmills.
    I was 100% sure Brexit would never happen.
    Yes, a lot of people thought that. I think they underestimated just what a momentous and necessarily one-off event the 23 June vote was and that it really had to be implemented in some fashion.
    People confuse what will cause great inconvenience and trouble and what can't happen. Lots of people think deep down that the worst case prospect of global warming couldn't happen just because the consequences are so grave.

    Brexit is a special case. Once a truly significant number of people (I am one, though in general politically boring centrist/one nation/communitarian) believe that membership of the EU is, in the very long run, unsustainable for good reasons, including old fashioned sovereignty, there is a problem which no more has a good solution than Israel/Palestine or RoI/NI/UK.

    It belongs to the category of problem where the one thing you should avoid is starting from where we currently are, because we should should never have got here in the first place.

    Such problems have alternatives and choices, but not solutions.

  • Options
    felixfelix Posts: 15,124

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    Sounds like 52% decided the game wasn't worth the candle?
  • Options
    DavidLDavidL Posts: 51,219
    Cicero said:

    DavidL said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
    And the bottom line below that bottom line was that the wider economic benefits exceeded the net contribution. Whether that was true - and if so the extent of its truth - will become clear in due course.
    Absolutely not so. The real cost of membership of the SM was an £80bn a year trade deficit with the EU year after year after year. The cost of that was roughly 1m well paid jobs in this country and low tens of billions of foregone tax revenue.

    You can make arguments that we did not play the game well, that it was our own fault that we were so inept at exporting and so prone to import, that government policy in this country positively encourages excess consumption etc but the fact remains that being in the SM was economically ruinous for this country and free trade with the EU is not actually in our interests until we can improve our competitiveness.
    Not a man who beleives in competative advantage, obviously. Or indeed in trade, if it comes to it.
    The theory of competitive advantage only works in the interests of both parties if their strengths and weaknesses offset each other in broad terms, at least over time. Otherwise 1 party is enriched and the other impoverished. We had strength in services, especially financial services, but they never came close to offsetting the manufacturing and farming shortfalls.

    So one part of our economy focused on London did very nicely out of the arrangement with cheaper goods and a ready export market. The rest of us? Not so much.

    As I say, this is not the fault of the EU, it is the fault of our own policies. But it was and is a problem.
  • Options
    Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,385

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    Who said the Parents paid extra fees to cover bursaries? That's like saying that our tins of beans are increased in price due to the adverts on TV. Fees are set at schools using a variety of factors. There will be an advertising budget and a scholarships/bursaries budget amongst others. There is a whole package. The value of the package is set and the parents then purchase it. It is not the other way round, where scholarships are awarded then we ring up everyone to provide an extra £100. Ridiculous. When they purchase it, money changes hands. They get the education plus pastoral support etc, the school gets the money to produce this. If parents don't like this, they can go elsewhere. I was in a fairly middling private school, but very few parents objected to scholarships etc.
  • Options
    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
  • Options
    GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 20,847
    DavidL said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
    And the bottom line below that bottom line was that the wider economic benefits exceeded the net contribution. Whether that was true - and if so the extent of its truth - will become clear in due course.
    Absolutely not so. The real cost of membership of the SM was an £80bn a year trade deficit with the EU year after year after year. The cost of that was roughly 1m well paid jobs in this country and low tens of billions of foregone tax revenue.

    You can make arguments that we did not play the game well, that it was our own fault that we were so inept at exporting and so prone to import, that government policy in this country positively encourages excess consumption etc but the fact remains that being in the SM was economically ruinous for this country and free trade with the EU is not actually in our interests until we can improve our competitiveness.
    Weird mercantilism.
    I thought this kind of thinking died out in the early 19th century.
  • Options
    Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,885

    You as a remainer spend every living minute trying to point what you see as flaws in Brexit . By and large the Nation has moved on and accepted it..

    If only that were true.

    The problems become ever more visible.

    Brexiteers are desperate to forget.

    Suck it up!!
  • Options
    Scott_xPScott_xP Posts: 32,885
    I also not that those who are quick to say "forget about the bus" are more than happy to talk about "£350m for the NHS..."

    Why is that?
  • Options
    GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 20,847

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    Pre Covid, the period 2015-2019 saw our rate of growth fall behind peer nations.
  • Options
    kinabalukinabalu Posts: 39,187
    edited August 2021

    kinabalu said:

    Mr. Pete, it seemed bizarre to me that pro-EU MPs didn't even attempt (they had three shots) to slip in a confirmatory referendum clause and back May's deal.

    By what means would they get something better? And, if they opposed her deal, what alternative except a harder departure was on the table?

    I would have opposed on all three occasions. I was outraged Mrs May brought the same deal back on a one more heave basis.

    However, knowing what I know now, I would have voted it through on the first time of asking, such is Johnson's thin gruel deal.
    Defo. I was always for it. Never a Ref2 man. Just felt like tilting at windmills.
    I'd say a definite error Sturgeon made (as opposed to all the ones the twerps on here fantasise about) was to throw her lot in with Euroref2 mob. Her tone should have been 'we recognise England and Wales have chosen to leave the EU and while we feel strongly this is a mistake we absolutely accept their right to make it. We expect Scotland's choice to be similarly respected'. May not have made much difference in the end but it would have helped on the consistent principle line.

    I reckon her head was turned by all the great and good progressives who usually spit bile at her and the SNP slapping her on the back.
    That People's Vote campaign was just fundamentally "off". It felt wrong. Loads of my family got into it but I was Mr Iconoclast, once provoking a tense atmosphere around the place with the pronouncement, "I'd rather have a No Deal Brexit than rerun that wretched thing."

    So, yes, I agree with you on Sturgeon there. Bad move. It had her arguing for a Referendum result to be not implemented. You don't need the punchline, I'm sure.
  • Options

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    Who said the Parents paid extra fees to cover bursaries? That's like saying that our tins of beans are increased in price due to the adverts on TV. Fees are set at schools using a variety of factors. There will be an advertising budget and a scholarships/bursaries budget amongst others. There is a whole package. The value of the package is set and the parents then purchase it. It is not the other way round, where scholarships are awarded then we ring up everyone to provide an extra £100. Ridiculous. When they purchase it, money changes hands. They get the education plus pastoral support etc, the school gets the money to produce this. If parents don't like this, they can go elsewhere. I was in a fairly middling private school, but very few parents objected to scholarships etc.
    You're really struggling with business and economics.

    The price of a tin of beans is increased in price to pay for adverts on TV.

    That's part of the reason why own-brand beans can be so much cheaper.
  • Options
    GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 20,847
    The “money” wasn’t Pembrokeshire’s either.

    Only the Greater South East (London and the
    greater commuter belt) actually makes money in this country.

    The rest live on handouts.
  • Options
    TimTTimT Posts: 6,328

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    I highly doubt it. The No vote was not about economics. That is the huge mistake that the Remain campaign made - to assume it was.
  • Options
    Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,385

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    Are you sure it hasn't? So many industries down the toilet, short of HGV drivers, short of workers? Not collecting customs at the borders to save queues? City of London individual earnings up the creek?
  • Options

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    Pre Covid, the period 2015-2019 saw our rate of growth fall behind peer nations.
    By a rounding error.

    Pre-Covid, the period 2010-2019 saw our rate of growth increase beyond that of our peer nations. "Despite Brexit" referendum result being in that period.
  • Options
    GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 20,847

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    Pre Covid, the period 2015-2019 saw our rate of growth fall behind peer nations.
    By a rounding error.

    Pre-Covid, the period 2010-2019 saw our rate of growth increase beyond that of our peer nations. "Despite Brexit" referendum result being in that period.
    It is retarded to use 2010-2014 as in any way relevant to Brexit, though, isn’t it?
  • Options

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    Are you sure it hasn't? So many industries down the toilet, short of HGV drivers, short of workers? Not collecting customs at the borders to save queues? City of London individual earnings up the creek?
    Yes.

    The reason there's a supposed "shortage of workers" is because we're doing so very well that we've got full employment and burgeoning demand, not because of a collapsing economy leading to mass layoffs.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,181

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    I said it was very approximate :smiley:

    The point that could be raised against that is if there are to be significant losses from Brexit they won’t be instant. They will likely be incremental. A decision between keeping a factory in Britain and one in Italy now tends towards Italy. A decision about where a multinational wants to open a new branch for European operations might have gone to London before and to Dublin now.

    Which over time means we will be less prosperous than we would have otherwise been.

    What ultimately tipped me to Remain - and I don’t think I come across as a great admirer of the EU - was the belief that partly due to Northern Ireland and partly due to the sheer size and proximity of the EU it would be very difficult in practice for us to regain any meaningful level of sovereignty commensurate with those future losses and short-term disruption.

    But nuanced arguments were strangers to both sides in the campaign.
  • Options
    HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,983
    ydoethur said:

    RobD said:

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    The easiest way to tell that it was a subsidy from the fee-paying parents would be for those parents to stop paying. I suspect the free scholarship would soon end.
    Many parents in private schools are about to find that out due to the loss of overseas students.

    In particular the China market is looking very dicey.
    Is it? For many wealthy Chinese a British private school followed by British university or US college remains the best education for their children.

    Plus plenty of private schools like my own former school have regular fundraising campaigns for scholarships and bursaries
  • Options
    Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,385

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    Who said the Parents paid extra fees to cover bursaries? That's like saying that our tins of beans are increased in price due to the adverts on TV. Fees are set at schools using a variety of factors. There will be an advertising budget and a scholarships/bursaries budget amongst others. There is a whole package. The value of the package is set and the parents then purchase it. It is not the other way round, where scholarships are awarded then we ring up everyone to provide an extra £100. Ridiculous. When they purchase it, money changes hands. They get the education plus pastoral support etc, the school gets the money to produce this. If parents don't like this, they can go elsewhere. I was in a fairly middling private school, but very few parents objected to scholarships etc.
    You're really struggling with business and economics.

    The price of a tin of beans is increased in price to pay for adverts on TV.

    That's part of the reason why own-brand beans can be so much cheaper.
    I don't receive a bill in the post for 1p the day after my favourite asparagus is advertised on TV
  • Options

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    Pre Covid, the period 2015-2019 saw our rate of growth fall behind peer nations.
    By a rounding error.

    Pre-Covid, the period 2010-2019 saw our rate of growth increase beyond that of our peer nations. "Despite Brexit" referendum result being in that period.
    It is retarded to use 2010-2014 as in any way relevant to Brexit, though, isn’t it?
    No it is absolutely not. Looking over the course of a decade gives a big picture.

    Plus the referendum was announced with accompanying "uncertainty" around the start of the decade not the middle of it.

    If your argument is that the referendum result led to a drop in GDP so utterly inconsequential that we still grew faster than Europe over the course of the entire decade, then it can't have been a very significant drop now, can it?
  • Options

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    Who said the Parents paid extra fees to cover bursaries? That's like saying that our tins of beans are increased in price due to the adverts on TV. Fees are set at schools using a variety of factors. There will be an advertising budget and a scholarships/bursaries budget amongst others. There is a whole package. The value of the package is set and the parents then purchase it. It is not the other way round, where scholarships are awarded then we ring up everyone to provide an extra £100. Ridiculous. When they purchase it, money changes hands. They get the education plus pastoral support etc, the school gets the money to produce this. If parents don't like this, they can go elsewhere. I was in a fairly middling private school, but very few parents objected to scholarships etc.
    You're really struggling with business and economics.

    The price of a tin of beans is increased in price to pay for adverts on TV.

    That's part of the reason why own-brand beans can be so much cheaper.
    I don't receive a bill in the post for 1p the day after my favourite asparagus is advertised on TV
    Who said you did?

    Its priced in the bill when you pay for it.
  • Options
    eekeek Posts: 24,963
    HYUFD said:

    ydoethur said:

    RobD said:

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    The easiest way to tell that it was a subsidy from the fee-paying parents would be for those parents to stop paying. I suspect the free scholarship would soon end.
    Many parents in private schools are about to find that out due to the loss of overseas students.

    In particular the China market is looking very dicey.
    Is it? For many wealthy Chinese a British private school followed by British university or US college remains the best education for their children.

    Plus plenty of private schools like my own former school have regular fundraising campaigns for scholarships and bursaries
    I think the point is that someone who may have knowledge regarding private schools is pointing out that the richest Chinese are no longer rushing to send their children here (for it is now seriously frowned upon by the Chinese leadership).

  • Options
    DavidLDavidL Posts: 51,219

    DavidL said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
    And the bottom line below that bottom line was that the wider economic benefits exceeded the net contribution. Whether that was true - and if so the extent of its truth - will become clear in due course.
    Absolutely not so. The real cost of membership of the SM was an £80bn a year trade deficit with the EU year after year after year. The cost of that was roughly 1m well paid jobs in this country and low tens of billions of foregone tax revenue.

    You can make arguments that we did not play the game well, that it was our own fault that we were so inept at exporting and so prone to import, that government policy in this country positively encourages excess consumption etc but the fact remains that being in the SM was economically ruinous for this country and free trade with the EU is not actually in our interests until we can improve our competitiveness.
    Weird mercantilism.
    I thought this kind of thinking died out in the early 19th century.
    It went out of fashion because both ourselves and then the Americans had huge competitive advantages that made free trade very much in our interests. We were in the 19th century extremely competitive and the US was the same in the 20th. In these circumstances the country with these advantages is the one enriched and their economists were quick to sell the advantages to everyone else.

    Now that neither ourselves or the US has these advantages the benefits of free trade are less obvious. Creating a free trade market with China has been one of the most disastrous policies in the history of the west and may ultimately prove fatal to it. It has created a dangerous rival which has no interest in our views on civil rights, equality and human rights. Massive mistake.

  • Options
    Daveyboy1961Daveyboy1961 Posts: 3,385

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    Are you sure it hasn't? So many industries down the toilet, short of HGV drivers, short of workers? Not collecting customs at the borders to save queues? City of London individual earnings up the creek?
    Yes.

    The reason there's a supposed "shortage of workers" is because we're doing so very well that we've got full employment and burgeoning demand, not because of a collapsing economy leading to mass layoffs.
    Not according to the last GDP figures. Also in a full employment situation you can't create workers, you need to import them.
  • Options
    ydoethurydoethur Posts: 67,181
    HYUFD said:

    ydoethur said:

    RobD said:

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    The easiest way to tell that it was a subsidy from the fee-paying parents would be for those parents to stop paying. I suspect the free scholarship would soon end.
    Many parents in private schools are about to find that out due to the loss of overseas students.

    In particular the China market is looking very dicey.
    Is it? For many wealthy Chinese a British private school followed by British university or US college remains the best education for their children.

    Plus plenty of private schools like my own former school have regular fundraising campaigns for scholarships and bursaries
    It’s looking dicey because of the vaccine situation, not because of a lack of desire.

    In China, you can only have Sinopharm or Sinovac. In Britain, the only way to avoid ten days’ self isolation on arrival from China is to be jabbed with Pfizer, Moderna or AZ. So that leaves them with an awkward quarantine period to negotiate that they can’t do in a school.

    I suspect the top party cadres will find paperwork that says their children have been Pfizered, but for the majority it poses a real problem.
  • Options
    GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 20,847

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    Pre Covid, the period 2015-2019 saw our rate of growth fall behind peer nations.
    By a rounding error.

    Pre-Covid, the period 2010-2019 saw our rate of growth increase beyond that of our peer nations. "Despite Brexit" referendum result being in that period.
    It is retarded to use 2010-2014 as in any way relevant to Brexit, though, isn’t it?
    No it is absolutely not. Looking over the course of a decade gives a big picture.

    Plus the referendum was announced with accompanying "uncertainty" around the start of the decade not the middle of it.

    If your argument is that the referendum result led to a drop in GDP so utterly inconsequential that we still grew faster than Europe over the course of the entire decade, then it can't have been a very significant drop now, can it?
    It is not relevant to use 2010-2014 to look at the impact of Brexit. Only a liar or an idiot would seek to do so.

    In terms of the impact of Brexit, the analysis I’ve seen suggests our growth rate has dropped compared to peer economies, and in fact this is broadly in line with the Treasury’s estimates before the vote.

    Year on year it’s not very noticeable.
    Give it 5 or 10 more years and people will be wondering why they are noticeably poorer than European travellers.

    Covid has swamped everything, temporarily.
  • Options
    paulyork64paulyork64 Posts: 2,461
    Carnyx said:

    What's an RAF Voyager doing heading towards Kabul? Tanker run?

    https://www.flightradar24.com/NAG99/28f71cb1

    ISTR they can also be used for self-loading cargo. Human or non-human animals.
    some planes are also now using Mazar-I-Sharif. not sure who's in control there.

    A Pakistan international airlines 777 took off from there and did a complete anti-clockwise circuit of Afghanistan before heading to Islamabad.

    and a Kam Air flight left there and is heading NW over Turkmenistan.
  • Options
    felixfelix Posts: 15,124
    edited August 2021
    Scott_xP said:

    I also not that those who are quick to say "forget about the bus" are more than happy to talk about "£350m for the NHS..."

    Why is that?

    I say let's not forget the one who posted fake Covid figures cos he was so excited to see the UK doing worse than the EU. I wonder who that was?
  • Options
    ydoethur said:

    ydoethur said:

    Mr. kinabalu, if Remain had made that argument, it would've won.

    Yes. ‘The EU adds £500 million a week to our economy.* If we leave, the NHS is screwed’ would have been far more effective.

    *Very approximate figure based on the estimate EU membership had increased the size of the economy by around 10%.
    Though if that were the case then our economy should have shrank £500mn a week post-Brexit.

    Strip out the Covid effects and that's absolutely not happened. So it was never the case.
    I said it was very approximate :smiley:

    The point that could be raised against that is if there are to be significant losses from Brexit they won’t be instant. They will likely be incremental. A decision between keeping a factory in Britain and one in Italy now tends towards Italy. A decision about where a multinational wants to open a new branch for European operations might have gone to London before and to Dublin now.

    Which over time means we will be less prosperous than we would have otherwise been.

    What ultimately tipped me to Remain - and I don’t think I come across as a great admirer of the EU - was the belief that partly due to Northern Ireland and partly due to the sheer size and proximity of the EU it would be very difficult in practice for us to regain any meaningful level of sovereignty commensurate with those future losses and short-term disruption.

    But nuanced arguments were strangers to both sides in the campaign.
    But we have regained a meaningful level of sovereignty haven't we?

    At the Referendum the Leave campaigned promised to: Leave the ECJ, Leave the Single Market, Leave the Customs Union, stop paying fees and determine immigration policy.

    Post-Brexit deal we've left the ECJ, left the Single Market, left the Customs Union, stopped paying fees and can now determine our immigration policy.

    How is that anything other than all five promises of meaningful sovereignty met?
  • Options
    HYUFDHYUFD Posts: 116,983
    edited August 2021
    eek said:

    HYUFD said:

    ydoethur said:

    RobD said:

    .

    RobD said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    It was other parents' money, the ones subsidising those on the scholarships. Much like how subsidies in the EU work.
    Even worse, what Davey is describing is akin to saying "pay us £25,000 per annum and we'll give you a scholarship for one month's fees" and describing that as a subsidy. Err no its not, that's just a deal to refund some of the money you paid yourself.

    You used to see this regularly with mobile phone contracts a decade ago. "Pay us £40 per month and we'll give you £40 cashback after three months" ... that's not a subsidy, that's your own money being refunded back to you and is wrapped up within the costs you're paying for.

    Funnily enough since then the cost of handsets has gone up, but the cost of contracts hasn't, because fripperies like that have been eliminated.
    You have no idea. Bursaries are designed to either retain bums on seats in a competitive market by reducing the fee burden a little in touch and go cases, or raise the standard of the ability of a year group or subject by offering something to someone who is a good athlete or very bright at his subject. Scholarships are much greater and go toward providing a place for less well off students/parents. They are all examples of subsidies. What you used to do with your phone contracts is your own affair. It was not other parents' money. They were purchasing a service at a price and they got it.

    OMG, do I have to explain commerce or economics to Tories? You'd have thought they'd have some idea....
    No you have no idea.

    If people are getting full scholarships paid by other parents fees then they're getting subsidised absolutely but that's entirely paid for by the extra fees levied on other parents as a result. It is not some magical free "own" money from the school unless that school has its own resources it can access to provide for that. Some schools do have their own resources to pay for bursaries and scholarships, left in Trust or otherwise from prior graduates and their families etc for that purpose, but that's not the case with the EU.

    If your school were levying £25,000 in fees then giving £1,000 back to all feepayers, paid for entirely from the fees, then that's not a subsidy to the feepayers, that's a rebate of their own money back.
    The easiest way to tell that it was a subsidy from the fee-paying parents would be for those parents to stop paying. I suspect the free scholarship would soon end.
    Many parents in private schools are about to find that out due to the loss of overseas students.

    In particular the China market is looking very dicey.
    Is it? For many wealthy Chinese a British private school followed by British university or US college remains the best education for their children.

    Plus plenty of private schools like my own former school have regular fundraising campaigns for scholarships and bursaries
    I think the point is that someone who may have knowledge regarding private schools is pointing out that the richest Chinese are no longer rushing to send their children here (for it is now seriously frowned upon by the Chinese leadership).

    Is it? Half the Chinese leadership have their children boarding at British public schools, Oxford or Harvard
  • Options
    GardenwalkerGardenwalker Posts: 20,847
    DavidL said:

    DavidL said:

    kinabalu said:

    felix said:

    RobD said:

    HYUFD said:

    HYUFD said:

    Charles said:

    kle4 said:

    A united Ireland makes sense on a number of points, but occasionally people stumble into arguing for it on the basis that both current entities are in the same island so should be together or words to that effect, which I doubt they hold consistently for other islands like hispaniola, new guinea or Britain, as if islands are required to have unified politics.

    The partition of Ireland is a historical anomaly, driven by decisions hundreds of years ago and then a political miscalculation by Carson combined with shameless manipulation and opportunism by Craig. It were better that it had never happened.

    Unfortunately we are where we are - unless and until our brothers and sisters in the North chose differently they remain part of the United kingdom (which is why @Philip_Thompson ‘s approach - “good riddance” - is so inappropriate)
    Its an anomaly that should have never happened that has been almost criminally devastating to the people of Northern Ireland.

    Unless I'm very much mistaken Northern Ireland was the relatively wealthier part of Ireland when partition happened. Now its completely the other way around as quite frankly the Republic has in recent decades much better managed their own business than the United Kingdom has managed Northern Ireland.

    Which is hardly a surprise because the people of Northern Ireland are quite frankly a forgotten irrelevance to British politics. They're not even a part of Britain proper and the British parties don't even stand properly in Northern Ireland either.

    Median full time salary in Northern Ireland is £28,000
    Median full time salary in the Republic of Ireland is €48,946 which converts to £42,000

    What possible good reason is there that the people of Northern Ireland should be worth 2/3rds of a person just over the border? Its a disgraceful and shameful situation and I unashamedly will say good riddance to it the day that the people in NI vote to end this ridiculous mess that should have never occurred. That's entirely appropriate in my eyes.
    Yes well we would expect no different from a republican, non Unionist, non conservative as you are.

    Some of us proper Conservatives however remain committed to our Unionist brothers across the sea.

    The Republic of course has no NHS either unlike the UK, it has hospital charges instead which pay for its very low taxes to boost its median income. It also has investment from the EU you voted to leave
    So committed to the union you want to continue to impoverish your "brothers" [and forgotten sisters no doubt] across the sea?

    The union has failed Northern Ireland because the people of Northern Ireland are alternatively either forgotten about, misunderstood or treated as an inconvenience by their "brethren".

    Self determination works better than subsidies which is why no amount of "subsidising" NI has made them succeed like the Republics self-determination has allowed them to succeed.

    I wonder which is better off for a household's income - avoiding a £50 charge rarely needed, or £14,000 extra in annual salary? 🤔
    Every region and country of the UK is net subsidised apart from London, the South East and East.

    On that basis the only parts of the UK left would be those 3 regions.

    Ireland has also had vast subsidy from the EU, as almost every development project there has had EU funding.

    It also benefits from very low corporation tax attracting multinational companies which Biden and the G7 want to end
    I suspect they are also benefiting from UK companies getting a foothold in Ireland to make trading with the rest of the EU easier. Also just as a matter of interest, Ireland may have benefitted from subsidies, like a lot of EU countries, but in return they joined a free trade area and customs Union etc. It's a shame we never made use of EU subsidies as much when we were in.
    The UK would have had to have a significantly lower GDP to receive vast subsidies from the EU. Instead it got its own recycled money back (well, a small fraction of it).
    https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/cbp-7847/

    We used to receive a lot of subsidies based on a like for like basis I think. I remember a large number of local charities and organisations also received funding from the EU, (CADW etc), in Pembrokeshire. It's a shame the local populace threw it away by putting their cross in the wrong box.

    No you didn't get any subsidies from the EU. You got a fraction of the UK's own money back.

    If you give me a £20 note, then I give you back a £10 note along with a letter saying "this £10 note has been given to you by Philip Thompson", then is that a good arrangement for you or not?
    It depends what the other £10 was for, such as access to free trade markets helping to grow our trade? You Tories are all the same, never telling the whole story.

    It reminds me of the old joke about a Bed+Breakfast.

    "The morning bill was larger than usual, and when queried the proprietor says there is an extra charge of £1 for the cruet set. The customer said that he didn't use it, yet the proprietor said it was there anyway. In retaliation the customer gave back a bill for £10, for sleeping with his wife. The proprietor said no way, it wasn't me. The customer replied 'but she was there anyway'.
    You're the one being dishonest and not saying the whole story, claiming that charities and organisations received funding from the EU in Pembrokeshire but the local populace "threw it away". They didn't, there was no such thing as EU money. People in Pembrokeshire got a fraction of their own taxes back recycled to them.

    Now you may claim that being net contributors was worthwhile in order to get access to trade markets, in which case make that argument. You're wrong IMHO, but at least that is a credible argument to be had. But to claim people got money from the EU when that was just a tiny fraction of the UK's own money returned back to us having had a massive haircut? That's preposterous.
    No such thing as EU money?, like UK government money? or even BBC money? Tesco money?, Leisure centre money?

    When you buy a service, such as membership of a leisure centre the money ceases to be your money, but the Leisure centre's money. If someone in the community gets cheap use of the pool before 8am that's still leisure centre money paying for it. When I taught in a private school, the school offered scholarships. That was school money not parents' money.
    The bottom line is that the UK paid in to the EU much more than it got back. I voted remain in spite of that but to pretend otherwise is frankly absurd.
    And the bottom line below that bottom line was that the wider economic benefits exceeded the net contribution. Whether that was true - and if so the extent of its truth - will become clear in due course.
    Absolutely not so. The real cost of membership of the SM was an £80bn a year trade deficit with the EU year after year after year. The cost of that was roughly 1m well paid jobs in this country and low tens of billions of foregone tax revenue.

    You can make arguments that we did not play the game well, that it was our own fault that we were so inept at exporting and so prone to import, that government policy in this country positively encourages excess consumption etc but the fact remains that being in the SM was economically ruinous for this country and free trade with the EU is not actually in our interests until we can improve our competitiveness.
    Weird mercantilism.
    I thought this kind of thinking died out in the early 19th century.
    It went out of fashion because both ourselves and then the Americans had huge competitive advantages that made free trade very much in our interests. We were in the 19th century extremely competitive and the US was the same in the 20th. In these circumstances the country with these advantages is the one enriched and their economists were quick to sell the advantages to everyone else.

    Now that neither ourselves or the US has these advantages the benefits of free trade are less obvious. Creating a free trade market with China has been one of the most disastrous policies in the history of the west and may ultimately prove fatal to it. It has created a dangerous rival which has no interest in our views on civil rights, equality and human rights. Massive mistake.

    I wasn’t clear in my original response.

    The bit I take objection to is the idea that a trade deficit equals millions of lost jobs.

    That’s a fantasy.

    One can argue that the U.K. could / should be protectionist but of course there are considerable downsides to doing so (ie slower growth, slower productivity, lower wages, and loss of consumer choice).
This discussion has been closed.