Chatting with one of my workers last night. Passionate labour and leave voter. His view is that it is all a mess. He voted leave to keep the foreigners out not goods. This simple statement seems to sum up everything.
On LabCon, I am interested in the unforeseen consequences of Chairman MaoDonnell's various grabs.
eg Pension funds own something like 3-5% of the UK stockmarket, worth £50-£150 bn. The loss of 10% of that stake whether by dilution or simple confiscation would be 5-15bn, I think. Which sounds very Brown-ish. Up to date seen hard to come by, but it is not really my area.
We're in the age of post-reality politics now. Only Briefcase Wankers care about things adding up or being affordable. See also Brexit and Trump.
Yep - the Brexit vote showed you can promise Unicorns and win. The far left has learned that lesson well. But Labour has at least realised that the current system is now failing to deliver to millions of people. The Tories are not even at that point yet. May promising further tax cuts for business and less regulation is not going to inspire many working people struggling to make ends meet.
There’s an over indulgence on the left though to wallow in poverty porn though. It was the mistake labour made under miliband. Actually people’s lives aren’t too bad, mass unemployemnt has disappeared, childhood poverty lowest for a generation, pensioner poverty all but disappeared. The system is working pretty darn well. The weakness for the conservatives surrounds the untrue narrative of schools and hospitals starved of funding and on the verge of collapse.
Younger families have wholesale seemed to stop supporting the conservatives.
They need a platform to attract them. Rent reform, mortgage reform (the stress tests put on mortgage applications means that people not on the ladder are getting refused mortgages or have to find very high deposits, when they are prefectly fine paying much higher rents.
Unfortunately what the Conservatives need is a Corbyn led Labour government.
But the economic decline you get from government central planned economic development can take decades to filter through. Stagnation doesn’t a;pear for some time. They’ll bugger up the finances, they always do.
The trouble that labour faces is we have had one of the most anti business Tory governments for as long as I can remember. The result is an economy already heading downwards
Shown in none of the figures whatsoever.....
I heard RBL this morning saying she didn't 'accept' the maths that R4 had done on McMao's clever tax wheeze/10% workers share ownership. Unspoofable.
Labour's pitch is vote Labour and "rich" people who are lazy and greedy and have done nothing to warrant their wealth will give you their money for which you will not have to do anything for. What a lovely world
This is not new. Attacking the idle rich makes a change from attacking the idle poor.
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
Labour's pitch is vote Labour and "rich" people who are lazy and greedy and have done nothing to warrant their wealth will give you their money for which you will not have to do anything for. What a lovely world
This is not new. Attacking the idle rich makes a change from attacking the idle poor.
It's a good plan, except for the fact there are not enough idle rich. When the idle rich have been creamed (or moved away to protect their money), the next targets are the working rich, And then the moderately rich. And then you and me ...
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I feel like attacking too hard on that issue could backfire.l
On LabCon, I am interested in the unforeseen consequences of Chairman MaoDonnell's various grabs.
eg Pension funds own something like 3-5% of the UK stockmarket, worth £50-£150 bn. The loss of 10% of that stake whether by dilution or simple confiscation would be 5-15bn, I think. Which sounds very Brown-ish. Up to date seen hard to come by, but it is not really my area.
We're in the age of post-reality politics now. Only Briefcase Wankers care about things adding up or being affordable. See also Brexit and Trump.
Yep - the Brexit vote showed you can promise Unicorns and win. The far left has learned that lesson well. But Labour has at least realised that the current system is now failing to deliver to millions of people. The Tories are not even at that point yet. May promising further tax cuts for business and less regulation is not going to inspire many working people struggling to make ends meet.
There’s an over indulgence o
They need a platform to attract them. Rent reform, mortgage reform (the stress tests put on mortgage applications means that people not on the ladder are getting refused mortgages or have to find very high deposits, when they are prefectly fine paying much higher rents.
Unfortunately what the Conservatives need is a Corbyn led Labour government.
But the economic decline you get from government central planned economic development can take decades to filter through. Stagnation doesn’t a;pear for some time. They’ll bugger up the finances, they always do.
The trouble that labour faces is we have had one of the most anti business Tory governments for as long as I can remember. The result is an economy already heading downwards
The problem is more "Whose GDP growth?"
Total growth matters less if it is distributed patchily, or even in reverse in many areas. We saw that in the discussion of life expectancy figures dropping in many parts of the country yesterday. There are many causes behind it, and life expectancy is an imperfect barometer, but or many parts of the country stagnation and decline are the lived experience.
"You've never had it so good" worked for MacMillan for a while, but the next election put into power a left wing orator.
I have had solar panels for a number of years now, both in London and Cumbria and am very pleased with them. They provide electricity and help heat our water. We also gave up getting our heating from oil in Cumbria (no gas there) and use biomass there and have oodles of insulation. I fit water butts wherever I can and use wind power to dry my clothes. So I am very in favour of green energy.
But the government has now cut to nil the amount it pays you for solar generated electricity which makes the economics of solar panels much less attractive than when we installed them. It has always seemed to me to be a stupid policy so if that gets reversed that would be a good thing.
I would certainly be in favour of the sorts of policies which Corbyn is apparently set to announce. But it still won’t make me vote for a party led by him. Labour policies may be attractive but the Labour leadership is an absolute bar to my voting for them, however attractive their retail offer may be.
Plus I still think that those Remainers who think a Corbyn led Labour party will push for Britain to remain in the EU or to rejoin are utterly deluding themselves.
Labour's pitch is vote Labour and "rich" people who are lazy and greedy and have done nothing to warrant their wealth will give you their money for which you will not have to do anything for. What a lovely world
This is not new. Attacking the idle rich makes a change from attacking the idle poor.
It's a good plan, except for the fact there are not enough idle rich. When the idle rich have been creamed (or moved away to protect their money), the next targets are the working rich, And then the moderately rich. And then you and me ...
All "rich" people are lazy and do not deserve their money according to labour. And when they say rich they jusy mean someone who earns slightly more than the national average eage.
"He voted leave to keep the foreigners out not goods. This simple statement seems to sum up everything."
The problem is there's no answer to this simple statement. They see people trumpeting the idea of tariff-free trade being Nirvana, but in the EU, they insist on political add-ons. Why are these essential? This isn't rocket science, but until Remainers come up with an answer, they're fooked.
The current explanation …. free trade is good, but we need open borders for people too just invites another Why?
By the way where does Corbyn think we are going to find 400k people to work in the renewable energy field? Does he really think we have got a lot of unemployed engineers or construction workers hanging about waiting for his largess?
Immigration. Lots of it to punish tory voters.
It’s unlikely that you’re joking either.
Which is a disturbing insight into your mental state, like your rather nasty refusal to attend the funeral of someone on account of them being a Leave voter.
People are odd. I knew someone from South Yorkshire who refused to go to a dear friend's wedding in Birmingham as it was 'the south', filled with southern wa*kers, etc, etc.
I heard on the radio this morning that they plan to get private investors to fund the expansion of onshore wind power.
So: asking people to put money in infrastructure and the same time they are nationalising utilities without compensation.
Hmmh
Now now Charles, you are not to quesiton how Labour can be a business friendly government whilst simultaneously planning to hike taxes, nationalise almost everything, confiscating 10% of what they don't nationalise, and be calling for a general strike.
I have had solar panels for a number of years now, both in London and Cumbria and am very pleased with them. They provide electricity and help heat our water. We also gave up getting our heating from oil in Cumbria (no gas there) and use biomass there and have oodles of insulation. I fit water butts wherever I can and use wind power to dry my clothes. So I am very in favour of green energy.
But the government has now cut to nil the amount it pays you for solar generated electricity which makes the economics of solar panels much less attractive than when we installed them. It has always seemed to me to be a stupid policy so if that gets reversed that would be a good thing.
I would certainly be in favour of the sorts of policies which Corbyn is apparently set to announce. But it still won’t make me vote for a party led by him. Labour policies may be attractive but the Labour leadership is an absolute bar to my voting for them, however attractive their retail offer may be.
Plus I still think that those Remainers who think a Corbyn led Labour party will push for Britain to remain in the EU or to rejoin are utterly deluding themselves.
Those remainers might well be so, but the question is once we are out and it us clear rejoining won't happen will they go somewhere else, angry labour didn't try hard enough? Or will most of them accept labour never got the chance to stop it and in any case the Tories need punishing?
Chatting with one of my workers last night. Passionate labour and leave voter. His view is that it is all a mess. He voted leave to keep the foreigners out not goods. This simple statement seems to sum up everything.
Yes, a very pithy summary, though perhaps one that politicians would have to be careful mouthing.
I had lunch with our newest EU recruit yesterday, her first job outside of Greece and looking quite a high flyer. She was surprised at how warmly she was welcomed here, though the NHS is a particularly cosmopolitan employer. Less than 15% of the medical staff in my department are White British, though more than 75% have British passports.
Remember I told you about one of our sparks who won a £1 million on a scratchcard. He wanted to carry on working. However the Camelot financial adivsior has been to see him. As he will get between 3-4% interest on his money, any income he gets from employment will be subject to the top rate of tax, therefore massively reducing his hourly rate, making it pointless for him to carry on working. He has taken his money and moved to America. One of the dangers of over taxing "rich" people, they leave.
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I think you miss the point. It's a quiet reminder that concern for the plight of the Palestinians is a popular and legitimate cause and should not be confused with antisemitism.
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I think you miss the point. It's a quiet reminder that concern for the plight of the Palestinians is a popular and legitimate cause and should not be confused with antisemitism.
If they don't want it confused they should make sure anti Semites using it as a fig leaf are punished. Anyone who says you cannot criticise Israel without being called an anti Semite for instance is a liar.
The problem is there's no answer to this simple statement. They see people trumpeting the idea of tariff-free trade being Nirvana, but in the EU, they insist on political add-ons. Why are these essential? This isn't rocket science, but until Remainers come up with an answer, they're fooked.
The current explanation …. free trade is good, but we need open borders for people too just invites another Why?
If you're a country with weak industries - particularly the former-communist countries - and you open up your markets to countries with stronger industries, you find your industrial base hollows out quite ferociously fast, and you advantage the businesses and brands of the richer countries. Countries in this position have often developed by limiting trade while they build up their own industries.
I'm not sure whether this is an economically rational attitude or not; Free-traders would probably say that free trade in goods would benefit both sides. But part of the core EU quid-pro-quo is that if they open up their markets, in return their citizens get free movement. From their point of view, one country saying "we're leaving to drop the people part but we'll keep the goods part" is the same as if France had said to Britain, "we're leaving to drop the part where your banks can sell financial services to our citizens, but you still have to subsidize our farmers".
Note that this isn't just an EU thing; The same thing happened when the British said "great, we're leaving, we can cut a trade deal with India": The Indian government said, "if you want access to our markets, we'll need to talk about visas".
Can Labour defeat the Tory party of "F*ck Business"?
Coming to an election poster near you soon.
A few Tory Brexiteers pissed at Big Business trying to derail Brexit (out of pure self interest and with no regard to the democratic process) =/= Tory Party is F*ck Business
Nothing in Phil Hammond's upcoming Budget will be F*ck Business. (Although it might have aspects of F*ck Business When It Takes The P*ss...)
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I think you miss the point. It's a quiet reminder that concern for the plight of the Palestinians is a popular and legitimate cause and should not be confused with antisemitism.
If they don't want it confused they should make sure anti Semites using it as a fig leaf are punished. Anyone who says you cannot criticise Israel without being called an anti Semite for instance is a liar.
It's also a little deeper than that. Being pro-palestian rights, and wanting human rights to be respected is one thing (and something hopefully everyone was can agree on), but this has pushed labour from being pro-peace settlement and fair for all parties as a possible faciliator to be only on one side of the middle east-divide.
That's in my opinion, not a place any Western government should be. Sides should not be taken in this, as a solution only come from working with both.
Remember I told you about one of our sparks who won a £1 million on a scratchcard. He wanted to carry on working. However the Camelot financial adivsior has been to see him. As he will get between 3-4% interest on his money, any income he gets from employment will be subject to the top rate of tax, therefore massively reducing his hourly rate, making it pointless for him to carry on working. He has taken his money and moved to America. One of the dangers of over taxing "rich" people, they leave.
So you are saying his patriotism is paper thin, and he is migrating for economic reasons?
Labour has at least realised that the current system is now failing to deliver to millions of people. The Tories are not even at that point yet. May promising further tax cuts for business and less regulation is not going to inspire many working people struggling to make ends meet.
Record employment??
Record employment yes. It’s not fake news, but it’s the wrong news. The news that will sound to voters like spin and get governments chucked out.
Dagenham. A film with people in mini skirts winning, also a place with a car factory. As just one small example of the bigger picture across the nation. Forty thoasand people working in a car factory, now it’s nearer four. There is more than enough evidence Workers in deindustrialised industries and regions don't go on to better jobs, or even similar jobs in different industries. Instead, they shuffle from low-paid job to low-paid job, never recovering the prosperity they had before. Many of them end up on welfare. So individuals and households are not as wealthy, whole towns and regions not as wealthy. That needs a policy. That needs to to be dealt with. It doesn’t need people simply saying “all good here, record employment”.
McDonnell and Corbyn will end up deliriously happy if the Tories merely continue like they are. Britain today has right conditions for a sea change. Globalisation ravaging confidence of the people and their aspirations for their offspring, the governing party of many years perceived as barking up the EU tree, steering us into mercantile rivalry with our nearest geographical and cultural neighbours. the conservatives Need to show more leg on this, show they using time in power recognising and tackling the real causes of Britain’s decline and pain: globalisation, post-industrial Britain, and our demographic time bomb. Not that I am saying rival parties win by exploiting this ground with stronger policy, as I say they can get elected with even weaker policy, but they are not the opponent, show not enough leg on these issues, and mini skirts will be back in.
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I think you miss the point. It's a quiet reminder that concern for the plight of the Palestinians is a popular and legitimate cause and should not be confused with antisemitism.
I think that’s right. The Palestinians aren’t a particularly ‘popular’ cause, but I suspect there’s widespread unease over the way they’ve been, and are being treated. Maybe at a low level, but it’s there.
The YouGov question has left out one of the key decarbonised power generation technologies - carbon capture and storage. Of course no-one wants coal or gas without CO2 abatement, but decarbonised fossil fuel is a different kettle of fish. For one thing it generates electricity when we need it - unlike solar.
I guess all the solar advocates are quite happy to sit in the dark with no TV or internet and unable to boil a kettle on January evenings. Either that or they are prepared to fill their spare room with batteries.
I have had solar panels for a number of years now, both in London and Cumbria and am very pleased with them. They provide electricity and help heat our water. We also gave up getting our heating from oil in Cumbria (no gas there) and use biomass there and have oodles of insulation. I fit water butts wherever I can and use wind power to dry my clothes. So I am very in favour of green energy.
But the government has now cut to nil the amount it pays you for solar generated electricity which makes the economics of solar panels much less attractive than when we installed them. It has always seemed to me to be a stupid policy so if that gets reversed that would be a good thing.
I would certainly be in favour of the sorts of policies which Corbyn is apparently set to announce. But it still won’t make me vote for a party led by him. Labour policies may be attractive but the Labour leadership is an absolute bar to my voting for them, however attractive their retail offer may be.
Plus I still think that those Remainers who think a Corbyn led Labour party will push for Britain to remain in the EU or to rejoin are utterly deluding themselves.
And all this from his 250 billion of borrowing.
You can promise everyone everything if you are putting it on tick
"perhaps one that politicians would have to be careful mouthing."
Therein lies a problem. If we were logical bout this, we'd say immigrants prove to be a positive for the NHS, However, the unsaid response (because it's not encouraged) is why cut nurse bursaries, and why import trained staff from abroad and leave their home country struggling. It seems a very right wing response to a staff shortage here.
Instead we say nothing.
Being selfish, I'm fully in favour of allowing immigration of qualified people - it's obviously a plus for us. But if we opened up discussion, we'd have to include unqualified people too, so we don't.
On LabCon, I am interested in the unforeseen consequences of Chairman MaoDonnell's various grabs.
eg Pension funds own something like 3-5% of the UK stockmarket, worth £50-£150 bn. The loss of 10% of that stake whether by dilution or simple confiscation would be 5-15bn, I think. Which sounds very Brown-ish. Up to date seen hard to come by, but it is not really my area.
We're in the age of post-reality politics now. Only Briefcase Wankers care about things adding up or being affordable. See also Brexit and Trump.
Yep - the Brexit vote showed you can promise Unicorns and win. The far left has learned that lesson well. But Labour has at least realised that the current system is now failing to deliver to millions of people. The Tories are not even at that point yet. May promising further tax cuts for business and less regulation is not going to inspire many working people struggling to make ends meet.
There’s an over indulgence o
They need a platform to attract them. Rent reform, mortgage reform (the stress tests put on mortgage applications means that people not on the ladder are getting refused mortgages or have to find very high deposits, when they are prefectly fine paying much higher rents.
Unfortunately what the Conservatives need is a Corbyn led Labour government.
But the economic decline you get from government central planned economic development can take decades to filter through. Stagnation doesn’t a;pear for some time. They’ll bugger up the finances, they always do.
The trouble that labour faces is we have had one of the most anti business Tory governments for as long as I can remember. The result is an economy already heading downwards
The problem is more "Whose GDP growth?"
Total growth matters less if it is distributed patchily, or even in reverse in many areas. We saw that in the discussion of life expectancy figures dropping in many parts of the country yesterday. There are many causes behind it, and life expectancy is an imperfect barometer, but or many parts of the country stagnation and decline are the lived experience.
"You've never had it so good" worked for MacMillan for a while, but the next election put into power a left wing orator.
it was in three parts of the same part of the country, and that part overall had seen an increase. Don’t be naughty. You know the figures. You showed us them yesterday.
I see we are getting the march of the loft laggers again....this time it's gold plated and going to cost £13bn.
When Gordon announced something very similar to this 9 years ago, the 400,000 new job figure was found to be absolutely spurious. It was a Mandy special.
Yes, people have now broadly accepted that renewables are desirable, either because of climate change or for UK energy independence or both. If it's helping jobs too, so much the better.
O/T: an impressive blue surge in the latest batch of US polls:
It's difficult to see how the Tories can make their conference other than about themselves Preventing cut-aways to Boris J R-M etc isn't within their control and the country watching the Tories naval gazing would be a disaster for them. Everyone's had enough. Pity Kenny Everett is no longer around to do his 'Nuke Russia routine'
Those remainers might well be so, but the question is once we are out and it us clear rejoining won't happen will they go somewhere else, angry labour didn't try hard enough? Or will most of them accept labour never got the chance to stop it and in any case the Tories need punishing?
The latter.
Angry, affluent remainers with multiple homes get punished twice.
First, we leave. Then, they get the full English Corbyn.
I dont get this perceived idea that just a few people have benefited from the ecomoic upturn since 2010. There are now thousands more hotels in this country than there were in 2000. You try and get a room in one, is this just "rich" people paying the high prices that hotels charge, or maybe is it that ordinary people can afford to pay the rates. Three weeks ago I fancied a night at Poole dogs with my other half, thought we would stay the night, not a single hotel room was available in Poole. My golf society had a weekend away last weekend at Celtic Manor. Celtic manor own 5 hotels on the site, we tried to add an extra body to our trip two weeks before we went, we couldn't as every single one of their rooms was taken. Hotels are just one example. My friend loves Center Parcs, I think it is a complete waste of money as you can have three weeks in spain for the cost of one week at Center Parcs. Despite this he reports that the park is always sold out when he goes.
I hear it time and time again on here that just a few rich people have benefited in that past 8 years from this incredible economic upturn, the evidence I see completely refutes that premise.
"perhaps one that politicians would have to be careful mouthing."
Therein lies a problem. If we were logical bout this, we'd say immigrants prove to be a positive for the NHS, However, the unsaid response (because it's not encouraged) is why cut nurse bursaries, and why import trained staff from abroad and leave their home country struggling. It seems a very right wing response to a staff shortage here.
Instead we say nothing.
Being selfish, I'm fully in favour of allowing immigration of qualified people - it's obviously a plus for us. But if we opened up discussion, we'd have to include unqualified people too, so we don't.
Cutting nursing bursaries was accompanied by a removal of the cap on nurse training places. We now have more accepted onto courses.
Remember I told you about one of our sparks who won a £1 million on a scratchcard. He wanted to carry on working. However the Camelot financial adivsior has been to see him. As he will get between 3-4% interest on his money, any income he gets from employment will be subject to the top rate of tax, therefore massively reducing his hourly rate, making it pointless for him to carry on working. He has taken his money and moved to America. One of the dangers of over taxing "rich" people, they leave.
So you are saying his patriotism is paper thin, and he is migrating for economic reasons?
Absolutely and he is taking his money and wealth creating abilities with him
I dont get this perceived idea that just a few people have benefited from the ecomoic upturn since 2010. There are now thousands more hotels in this country than there were in 2000. You try and get a room in one, is this just "rich" people paying the high prices that hotels charge, or maybe is it that ordinary people can afford to pay the rates. Three weeks ago I fancied a night at Poole dogs with my other half, thought we would stay the night, not a single hotel room was available in Poole. My golf society had a weekend away last weekend at Celtic Manor. Celtic manor own 5 hotels on the site, we tried to add an extra body to our trip two weeks before we went, we couldn't as every single one of their rooms was taken. Hotels are just one example. My friend loves Center Parcs, I think it is a complete waste of money as you can have three weeks in spain for the cost of one week at Center Parcs. Despite this he reports that the park is always sold out when he goes.
I hear it time and time again on here that just a few rich people have benefited in that past 8 years from this incredible economic upturn, the evidence I see completely refutes that premise.
"Let me take you by the hand, And lead you through the streets of London; I will show you something to make you change your mind."
The YouGov question has left out one of the key decarbonised power generation technologies - carbon capture and storage. Of course no-one wants coal or gas without CO2 abatement, but decarbonised fossil fuel is a different kettle of fish. For one thing it generates electricity when we need it - unlike solar.
I guess all the solar advocates are quite happy to sit in the dark with no TV or internet and unable to boil a kettle on January evenings. Either that or they are prepared to fill their spare room with batteries.
I dont get this perceived idea that just a few people have benefited from the ecomoic upturn since 2010. There are now thousands more hotels in this country than there were in 2000. You try and get a room in one, is this just "rich" people paying the high prices that hotels charge, or maybe is it that ordinary people can afford to pay the rates. Three weeks ago I fancied a night at Poole dogs with my other half, thought we would stay the night, not a single hotel room was available in Poole. My golf society had a weekend away last weekend at Celtic Manor. Celtic manor own 5 hotels on the site, we tried to add an extra body to our trip two weeks before we went, we couldn't as every single one of their rooms was taken. Hotels are just one example. My friend loves Center Parcs, I think it is a complete waste of money as you can have three weeks in spain for the cost of one week at Center Parcs. Despite this he reports that the park is always sold out when he goes.
I hear it time and time again on here that just a few rich people have benefited in that past 8 years from this incredible economic upturn, the evidence I see completely refutes that premise.
"Let me take you by the hand, And lead you through the streets of London; I will show you something to make you change your mind."
Very unlikley, its the construction boom capital of the world.
The YouGov question has left out one of the key decarbonised power generation technologies - carbon capture and storage. Of course no-one wants coal or gas without CO2 abatement, but decarbonised fossil fuel is a different kettle of fish. For one thing it generates electricity when we need it - unlike solar.
I guess all the solar advocates are quite happy to sit in the dark with no TV or internet and unable to boil a kettle on January evenings. Either that or they are prepared to fill their spare room with batteries.
Quite a lot of wind most Januarys!
Not on those flat-calm, bitter-cold, frosty nights there ain't!
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I think you miss the point. It's a quiet reminder that concern for the plight of the Palestinians is a popular and legitimate cause and should not be confused with antisemitism.
If they don't want it confused they should make sure anti Semites using it as a fig leaf are punished. Anyone who says you cannot criticise Israel without being called an anti Semite for instance is a liar.
I don't believe you can criticise Israel without being called an antisemite unless the person criticising them has very good credentials. And even if they have there will still be virtue signallers and those with an agenda who will make the accusation. Quite a few prominent Jews - jonathan Sacks for example- don't believe it is possible to decouple criticism of Israel from criticism of Jews
I dont get this perceived idea that just a few people have benefited from the ecomoic upturn since 2010. There are now thousands more hotels in this country than there were in 2000. You try and get a room in one, is this just "rich" people paying the high prices that hotels charge, or maybe is it that ordinary people can afford to pay the rates. Three weeks ago I fancied a night at Poole dogs with my other half, thought we would stay the night, not a single hotel room was available in Poole. My golf society had a weekend away last weekend at Celtic Manor. Celtic manor own 5 hotels on the site, we tried to add an extra body to our trip two weeks before we went, we couldn't as every single one of their rooms was taken. Hotels are just one example. My friend loves Center Parcs, I think it is a complete waste of money as you can have three weeks in spain for the cost of one week at Center Parcs. Despite this he reports that the park is always sold out when he goes.
I hear it time and time again on here that just a few rich people have benefited in that past 8 years from this incredible economic upturn, the evidence I see completely refutes that premise.
I'm not aware of Poole Dogs (more of a travel lodge guy) but center parcs and weekends away at the celtic manor with the golf society are indicators of the higher end of society rather than the average or the slightly lower end.
On LabCon, I am interested in the unforeseen consequences of Chairman MaoDonnell's various grabs.
eg Pension funds own something like 3-5% of the UK stockmarket, worth £50-£150 bn. The loss of 10% of that stake whether by dilution or simple confiscation would be 5-15bn, I think. Which sounds very Brown-ish. Up to date seen hard to come by, but it is not really my area.
We're in the age of post-reality politics now. Only Briefcase Wankers care about things adding up or being affordable. See also Brexit and Trump.
Yep - the Brexit vote
There’s an over indulgence o
They need a platform to attract them. Rent reform, mortgage reform (the stress tests put on mortgage applications means that people not on the ladder are getting refused mortgages or have to find very high deposits, when they are prefectly fine paying much higher rents.
Unfortunately what the Conservatives need is a Corbyn led Labour government.
But the economic decline you get from government central planned economic development can take decades to filter through. Stagnation doesn’t a;pear for some time. They’ll bugger up the finances, they always do.
The trouble that labour faces is we have had one of the most anti business Tory governments for as long as I can remember. The result is an economy already heading downwards
The problem is more "Whose GDP growth?"
Total growth matters less if it is distributed patchily, or even in reverse in many areas. We saw that in the discussion of life expectancy figures dropping in many parts of the country yesterday. There are many causes behind it, and life expectancy is an imperfect barometer, but or many parts of the country stagnation and decline are the lived experience.
"You've never had it so good" worked for MacMillan for a while, but the next election put into power a left wing orator.
it was in three parts of the same part of the country, and that part overall had seen an increase. Don’t be naughty. You know the figures. You showed us them yesterday.
Not true, Life expectancy is dropping in quite a few places, though rising in others. I have to be off, but the ONS spreadsheet is here:
I dont get this perceived idea that just a few people have benefited from the ecomoic upturn since 2010. There are now thousands more hotels in this country than there were in 2000. You try and get a room in one, is this just "rich" people paying the high prices that hotels charge, or maybe is it that ordinary people can afford to pay the rates. Three weeks ago I fancied a night at Poole dogs with my other half, thought we would stay the night, not a single hotel room was available in Poole. My golf society had a weekend away last weekend at Celtic Manor. Celtic manor own 5 hotels on the site, we tried to add an extra body to our trip two weeks before we went, we couldn't as every single one of their rooms was taken. Hotels are just one example. My friend loves Center Parcs, I think it is a complete waste of money as you can have three weeks in spain for the cost of one week at Center Parcs. Despite this he reports that the park is always sold out when he goes.
I hear it time and time again on here that just a few rich people have benefited in that past 8 years from this incredible economic upturn, the evidence I see completely refutes that premise.
That’s interesting re Poole - was it the final bank holiday weekend in August (Bmth air festival?). Can recommend the Hotel du Vin if you visit again - close to Harbour and town. And the Poole Arms for a fab plate of fresh fish.
I’ve noticed Dorset being much busier this summer. A good third of my mates had holidays in the UK.
And soon we move onto the conservative conference which may well be the most important one they have held in a generation.
Yesterday TM looked tired in her interviews and we saw her Maybot on display again. This morning she is talking of reducing corporation tax to the lowest in the G20 and making the UK the best place in the world to do business. This is a perfectly reasonable place for a conservative PM but does give the impression she is giving up on a deal.
This worries me considerably and I am concerned that her political antennae is switched off. When asked yesterday by Sky if she would sign upto their petition for leaders debates she refused to answer, when the correct response should have been an immmediate 'absolutely '. A few weeks ago she over ruled Sajid on the 3% police pay increase which is just plain stupid,
I do understand why she will not agree any deal that puts a border in the Irish sea but her stubbornness makes compromise very difficult.
I do not think she can continue like this for much longer but cannot see it is the national interest to replace her now, as desirable as that may be, but I doubt she will survive much beyond late Spring 2019
And to all of you who think I am her cheerleader I do admire her honesty, decency and dedication to public service in stark contrast to some of the objectionable speeches from hard left haters we saw at the labour conference.
Let us hope, despite my reservations, she can get a deal or at the very least a transistion period.
I do not believe we should remain in the EU now no matter the difficulties but I am sure many will start to campaign to re-join post Brexit, but I cannot see that happening in the short term
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I think you miss the point. It's a quiet reminder that concern for the plight of the Palestinians is a popular and legitimate cause and should not be confused with antisemitism.
If they don't want it confused they should make sure anti Semites using it as a fig leaf are punished. Anyone who says you cannot criticise Israel without being called an anti Semite for instance is a liar.
I don't believe you can criticise Israel without being called an antisemite unless the person criticising them has very good credentials. And even if they have there will still be virtue signallers and those with an agenda who will make the accusation. Quite a few prominent Jews - jonathan Sacks for example- don't believe it is possible to decouple criticism of Israel from criticism of Jews
I disagree. And the opposite is true: many people hide their rampant anti-Semitism behind a blanket of opposition to Israel.
On LabCon, I am interested in the unforeseen consequences of Chairman MaoDonnell's various grabs.
eg Pension funds own something like 3-5% of the UK stockmarket, worth £50-£150 bn. The loss of 10% of that stake whether by dilution or simple confiscation would be 5-15bn, I think. Which sounds very Brown-ish. Up to date seen hard to come by, but it is not really my area.
We're in the age of post-reality politics now. Only Briefcase Wankers care about things adding up or being affordable. See also Brexit and Trump.
Yep - the Brexit vote showed you can promise Unicorns and win. The far left has learned that lesson well. But Labour has at least realised that the current system is now failing to deliver to millions of people. The Tories are not even at that point yet. May promising further tax cuts for business and less regulation is not going to inspire many working people struggling to make ends meet.
There’s starved of funding and on the verge of collapse.
Younger families have wholesale seemed to stop supporting the conservatives.
They need a platform to attract them. Rent reform, mortgage reform (the stress tests put on mortgage applications means that people not on the ladder are getting refused mortgages or have to find very high deposits, when they are prefectly fine paying much higher rents.
Unfortunately what the Conservatives need is a Corbyn led Labour government.
But the economic decline you get from government central planned economic development can take decades to filter through. Stagnation doesn’t a;pear for some time. They’ll bugger up the finances, they always do.
The trouble that labour faces is we have had one of the most anti business Tory governments for as long as I can remember. The result is an economy already heading downwards
Shown in none of the figures whatsoever.....
I heard RBL this morning saying she didn't 'accept' the maths that R4 had done on McMao's clever tax wheeze/10% workers share ownership. Unspoofable.
The Tories are currently seeking a trade deal with Europe that will make it harder and more expensive for British companies to do business in their most important export market. They also want to make it harder for British businesses to hire the staff they need.
I dont get this perceived idea that just a few people have benefited from the ecomoic upturn since 2010. There are now thousands more hotels in this country than there were in 2000. You try and get a room in one, is this just "rich" people paying the high prices that hotels charge, or maybe is it that ordinary people can afford to pay the rates. Three weeks ago I fancied a night at Poole dogs with my other half, thought we would stay the night, not a single hotel room was available in Poole. My golf society had a weekend away last weekend at Celtic Manor. Celtic manor own 5 hotels on the site, we tried to add an extra body to our trip two weeks before we went, we couldn't as every single one of their rooms was taken. Hotels are just one example. My friend loves Center Parcs, I think it is a complete waste of money as you can have three weeks in spain for the cost of one week at Center Parcs. Despite this he reports that the park is always sold out when he goes.
I hear it time and time again on here that just a few rich people have benefited in that past 8 years from this incredible economic upturn, the evidence I see completely refutes that premise.
I'm not aware of Poole Dogs (more of a travel lodge guy) but center parcs and weekends away at the celtic manor with the golf society are indicators of the higher end of society rather than the average or the slightly lower end.
My golf society the higher end of society???? Its a pub golf society full of ordinary working men who all happen to go the local pub and like a game of golf.
By the way where does Corbyn think we are going to find 400k people to work in the renewable energy field? Does he really think we have got a lot of unemployed engineers or construction workers hanging about waiting for his largess?
Immigration. Lots of it to punish tory voters.
It’s unlikely that you’re joking either.
Which is a disturbing insight into your mental state, like your rather nasty refusal to attend the funeral of someone on account of them being a Leave voter.
People are odd. I knew someone from South Yorkshire who refused to go to a dear friend's wedding in Birmingham as it was 'the south', filled with southern wa*kers, etc, etc.
Says more about people from South Yorkshire.
Not really. He was a lovely man, and a 'proper' lefty that made Dennis Skinner look like a Thatcherite. I saw him the Saturday after Blair's 1997 GE win and congratulated him on a Labour win. His response. "We haven't won. The Conservatives have!"
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I think you miss the point. It's a quiet reminder that concern for the plight of the Palestinians is a popular and legitimate cause and should not be confused with antisemitism.
If they don't want it confused they should make sure anti Semites using it as a fig leaf are punished. Anyone who says you cannot criticise Israel without being called an anti Semite for instance is a liar.
I don't believe you can criticise Israel without being called an antisemite unless the person criticising them has very good credentials. And even if they have there will still be virtue signallers and those with an agenda who will make the accusation. Quite a few prominent Jews - jonathan Sacks for example- don't believe it is possible to decouple criticism of Israel from criticism of Jews
You had Cynthia Nixon accused the other day, who is Jewish and is raising her kids Jewish.
Because.... she supports BDS. If a Jewish person cannot oppose Palestinian occupation without having racism accusations thrown at them then it certainly does seem true.
How is your friend paying top rate tax? He is just paying 40% higher rate, not the additional (top) rate as you suggest. Like most people on here he is in the 40% tax band. It is rather like saying I have no incentive to work harder because I pay the higher rate. Are you suggesting he shouldn't have to pay income tax on the interest?
On LabCon, I am interested in the unforeseen consequences of Chairman MaoDonnell's various grabs...
We're in the age of post-reality politics now. Only Briefcase Wankers care about things adding up or being affordable. See also Brexit and Trump.
Yep - the Brexit vote showed you can promise Unicorns and win. The far left has learned that lesson well. But Labour has at least realised that the current system is now failing to deliver to millions of people. The Tories are not even at that point yet. May promising further tax cuts for business and less regulation is not going to inspire many working people struggling to make ends meet.
There’s starved of funding and on the verge of collapse.
Younger families have wholesale seemed to stop supporting the conservatives.
They need a platform to attract them. Rent reform, mortgage reform (the stress tests put on mortgage applications means that people not on the ladder are getting refused mortgages or have to find very high deposits, when they are prefectly fine paying much higher rents.
Unfortunately what the Conservatives need is a Corbyn led Labour government.
But the economic decline you get from government central planned economic development can take decades to filter through. Stagnation doesn’t a;pear for some time. They’ll bugger up the finances, they always do.
The trouble that labour faces is we have had one of the most anti business Tory governments for as long as I can remember. The result is an economy already heading downwards
Shown in none of the figures whatsoever.....
I heard RBL this morning saying she didn't 'accept' the maths that R4 had done on McMao's clever tax wheeze/10% workers share ownership. Unspoofable.
The Tories are currently seeking a trade deal with Europe that will make it harder and more expensive for British companies to do business in their most important export market. They also want to make it harder for British businesses to hire the staff they need.
And yet business is booming.
Is there a chance that Remainers have over egged the disaster pudding again.
The weaker pound and domestic policy will have much more of an effect on exports than the mechanics of a post Brexit deal will.
And soon we move onto the conservative conference which may well be the most important one they have held in a generation.
Yesterday TM looked tired in her interviews and we saw her Maybot on display again. This morning she is talking of reducing corporation tax to the lowest in the G20 and making the UK the best place in the world to do business. This is a perfectly reasonable place for a conservative PM but does give the impression she is giving up on a deal.
This worries me considerably and I am concerned that her political antennae is switched off. When asked yesterday by Sky if she would sign upto their petition for leaders debates she refused to answer, when the correct response should have been an immmediate 'absolutely '. A few weeks ago she over ruled Sajid on the 3% police pay increase which is just plain stupid,
I do understand why she will not agree any deal that puts a border in the Irish sea but her stubbornness makes compromise very difficult.
I do not think she can continue like this for much longer but cannot see it is the national interest to replace her now, as desirable as that may be, but I doubt she will survive much beyond late Spring 2019
And to all of you who think I am her cheerleader I do admire her honesty, decency and dedication to public service in stark contrast to some of the objectionable speeches from hard left haters we saw at the labour conference.
Let us hope, despite my reservations, she can get a deal or at the very least a transistion period.
I do not believe we should remain in the EU now no matter the difficulties but I am sure many will start to campaign to re-join post Brexit, but I cannot see that happening in the short term
Feeling a bit melancholy today
I still reckon May will strike a last minute deal. Something like EEA+CU with a fig leaf on immigration. But I doubt much will be sorted this side of Christmas.
Also, there seems to be an unfairness in terms of location. Stand on the top of Honey Hill in Northamptonshire (just south of the A14) and you can see many distinct windfarms and individual wind turbines. Yet go to equally-hilly Oxfordshire and there are virtually none.
The only reason for this can really be the effective power of NIMBYs.
I would point out that Oxfordshire does seem to have loads and loads of solar farms. To be honest, I only really started noticing them when I took up microlighting - most aren't readily visible from the road, but they're very conspicuous from the air (and give convenient thermals)
By the way where does Corbyn think we are going to find 400k people to work in the renewable energy field? Does he really think we have got a lot of unemployed engineers or construction workers hanging about waiting for his largess?
Immigration. Lots of it to punish tory voters.
It’s unlikely that you’re joking either.
Which is a disturbing insight into your mental state, like your rather nasty refusal to attend the funeral of someone on account of them being a Leave voter.
People are odd. I knew someone from South Yorkshire who refused to go to a dear friend's wedding in Birmingham as it was 'the south', filled with southern wa*kers, etc, etc.
Says more about people from South Yorkshire.
Indeed. Yorkshire isolationism and cockeyed northern patriotism are utterly nauseating traits.
Also, there seems to be an unfairness in terms of location. Stand on the top of Honey Hill in Northamptonshire (just south of the A14) and you can see many distinct windfarms and individual wind turbines. Yet go to equally-hilly Oxfordshire and there are virtually none.
The only reason for this can really be the effective power of NIMBYs.
I would point out that Oxfordshire does seem to have loads and loads of solar farms. To be honest, I only really started noticing them when I took up microlighting - most aren't readily visible from the road, but they're very conspicuous from the air (and give convenient thermals)
Fair enough: I can't say I've come across any, but I wouldn't see them unless I was close (or up in the air), unlike wind turbines which are visible for miles.
It's surprising how many solar farms I comes across here in Cambridgeshire, especially in the Fens.
Remember I told you about one of our sparks who won a £1 million on a scratchcard. He wanted to carry on working. However the Camelot financial adivsior has been to see him. As he will get between 3-4% interest on his money, any income he gets from employment will be subject to the top rate of tax, therefore massively reducing his hourly rate, making it pointless for him to carry on working. He has taken his money and moved to America. One of the dangers of over taxing "rich" people, they leave.
How does having £1m get you residency in the US these days?
And soon we move onto the conservative conference which may well be the most important one they have held in a generation.
Yesterday TM looked tired in her interviews and we saw her Maybot on display again. This morning she is talking of reducing corporation tax to the lowest in the G20 and making the UK the best place in the world to do business. This is a perfectly reasonable place for a conservative PM but does give the impression she is giving up on a deal.
This worries me considerably and I am concerned that her political antennae is switched off. When asked yesterday by Sky if she would sign upto their petition for leaders debates she refused to answer, when the correct response should have been an immmediate 'absolutely '. A few weeks ago she over ruled Sajid on the 3% police pay increase which is just plain stupid,
I do understand why she will not agree any deal that puts a border in the Irish sea but her stubbornness makes compromise very difficult.
I do not think she can continue like this for much longer but cannot see it is the national interest to replace her now, as desirable as that may be, but I doubt she will survive much beyond late Spring 2019
And to all of you who think I am her cheerleader I do admire her honesty, decency and dedication to public service in stark contrast to some of the objectionable speeches from hard left haters we saw at the labour conference.
Let us hope, despite my reservations, she can get a deal or at the very least a transistion period.
I do not believe we should remain in the EU now no matter the difficulties but I am sure many will start to campaign to re-join post Brexit, but I cannot see that happening in the short term
Feeling a bit melancholy today
I still reckon May will strike a last minute deal. Something like EEA+CU with a fig leaf on immigration. But I doubt much will be sorted this side of Christmas.
Mr. Anazina, maybe. Maybe taking a sample size of one and then using that to categorise an entire population is unwise. Perhaps you looked at the last Islamic terror attack and concluded all Muslims are murderers. Perhaps you looked at acid attacks in London, and concluded all Londoners are perpetrators or victims of barbaric violence.
Or perhaps you concluded that individuals are not necessarily perfect representations of everyone with whom they share a demographic, and that pretending otherwise is somewhat infantile.
Crisp packets are an utter menace. They destroy the beautiful countryside near where I live. Why doesn't Walkers make them biodegradable?
That is more the fault of the people who drop them, rather than Walkers. I've got no problem with campaigning for them to change, but this sort of virtuous look-at-me campaign is not about crisp packets, and costs us all more.
On the other hand, it's a wonderful problem to have.
It is daft, but it demonstrates that if people do not have an incentive to work or wealth create as they will be over taxed then they will not do it.
Erm.... his Camelot financial adviser should have told him to look at paying in to a personal pension and so defer paying higher rate tax by putting it inside his pension wrapper - it would benefit then from 25% tax free cash when he did fully retire and there could be IHT planning benefits for him too by building his pension pot and which his £1m is unlikely to benefit from. Even if he's a 40% taxpayer in retirement, the effective return is a min 16.7%
So what? No-one cares what Labour says about Brexit and no-one knows what the government's position is, and by the time they find out, it will have changed again.
On LabCon, I am interested in the unforeseen consequences of Chairman MaoDonnell's various grabs...
We're in the age of post-reality politics now. Only Briefcase Wankers care about things adding up or being affordable. See also Brexit and Trump.
Yep - tstruggling to make ends meet.
There’s starved of funding and on the verge of collapse.
Younger families have wholesale seemed to stop supporting the conservatives.
They ents.
Unfortunately what the Conservatives need is a Corbyn led Labour government.
But talways do.
The trouble that labour faces is we have had one of the most anti business Tory governments for as long as I can remember. The result is an economy already heading downwards
Shown in none of the figures whatsoever.....
I heard RBL this morning saying she didn't 'accept' the maths that R4 had done on McMao's clever tax wheeze/10% workers share ownership. Unspoofable.
The Tories are currently seeking a trade deal with Europe that will make it harder and more expensive for British companies to do business in their most important export market. They also want to make it harder for British businesses to hire the staff they need.
And yet business is booming.
Is there a chance that Remainers have over egged the disaster pudding again.
The weaker pound and domestic policy will have much more of an effect on exports than the mechanics of a post Brexit deal will.
That depends on what the post-Brexit deal is.
If business were booming and confident, it would be investing more than it is.
If the Tories want to go into the next election saying everything is fine and all we need to do is cut taxes, keep public spending low, reduce regulation and allow big American corporations much greater access to British markets, then so be it; I am not sure it is actually going to do much to enthuse voters or, more importantly, improve living standards and levels of satisfaction. Corbyn will almost certainly ensure the Tories win the next election, but I cannot see them doing much with the victory. There doesn't seem to be anything there.
And soon we move onto the conservative conference which may well be the most important one they have held in a generation.
Yesterday TM looked tired in her interviews and we saw her Maybot on display again. This morning she is talking of reducing corporation tax to the lowest in the G20 and making the UK the best place in the world to do business. This is a perfectly reasonable place for a conservative PM but does give the impression she is giving up on a deal.
This worries me considerably and I am concerned that her political antennae is switched off. When asked yesterday by Sky if she would sign upto their petition for leaders debates she refused to answer, when the correct response should have been an immmediate 'absolutely '. A few weeks ago she over ruled Sajid on the 3% police pay increase which is just plain stupid,
I do understand why she will not agree any deal that puts a border in the Irish sea but her stubbornness makes compromise very difficult.
I do not think she can continue like this for much longer but cannot see it is the national interest to replace her now, as desirable as that may be, but I doubt she will survive much beyond late Spring 2019
And to all of you who think I am her cheerleader I do admire her honesty, decency and dedication to public service in stark contrast to some of the objectionable speeches from hard left haters we saw at the labour conference.
Let us hope, despite my reservations, she can get a deal or at the very least a transistion period.
I do not believe we should remain in the EU now no matter the difficulties but I am sure many will start to campaign to re-join post Brexit, but I cannot see that happening in the short term
Feeling a bit melancholy today
I still reckon May will strike a last minute deal. Something like EEA+CU with a fig leaf on immigration. But I doubt much will be sorted this side of Christmas.
May won’t strike that deal. She’s boxed in.
As a matter of interest would you agree a deal that puts a border in the Irish sea
By the way where does Corbyn think we are going to find 400k people to work in the renewable energy field? Does he really think we have got a lot of unemployed engineers or construction workers hanging about waiting for his largess?
Immigration. Lots of it to punish tory voters.
It’s unlikely that you’re joking either.
Which is a disturbing insight into your mental state, like your rather nasty refusal to attend the funeral of someone on account of them being a Leave voter.
People are odd. I knew someone from South Yorkshire who refused to go to a dear friend's wedding in Birmingham as it was 'the south', filled with southern wa*kers, etc, etc.
Says more about people from South Yorkshire.
Not really. He was a lovely man, and a 'proper' lefty that made Dennis Skinner look like a Thatcherite. I saw him the Saturday after Blair's 1997 GE win and congratulated him on a Labour win. His response. "We haven't won. The Conservatives have!"
Doesn't sound like a lovely man to me - sounds like a professional curmudgeon.
I dont get this perceived idea that just a few people have benefited from the ecomoic upturn since 2010. There are now thousands more hotels in this country than there were in 2000. You try and get a room in one, is this just "rich" people paying the high prices that hotels charge, or maybe is it that ordinary people can afford to pay the rates. Three weeks ago I fancied a night at Poole dogs with my other half, thought we would stay the night, not a single hotel room was available in Poole. My golf society had a weekend away last weekend at Celtic Manor. Celtic manor own 5 hotels on the site, we tried to add an extra body to our trip two weeks before we went, we couldn't as every single one of their rooms was taken. Hotels are just one example. My friend loves Center Parcs, I think it is a complete waste of money as you can have three weeks in spain for the cost of one week at Center Parcs. Despite this he reports that the park is always sold out when he goes.
I hear it time and time again on here that just a few rich people have benefited in that past 8 years from this incredible economic upturn, the evidence I see completely refutes that premise.
I'm not aware of Poole Dogs (more of a travel lodge guy) but center parcs and weekends away at the celtic manor with the golf society are indicators of the higher end of society rather than the average or the slightly lower end.
My golf society the higher end of society???? Its a pub golf society full of ordinary working men who all happen to go the local pub and like a game of golf.
Did you imagine the word 'with' to be a comma and golf club to be an addition to the list by itself?
Here is part of the sentence again
'weekends away at the celtic manor with the golf society'
It may surprise you to know that the people going to the food bank aren't spending time at Centerparcs or weekends at the Celtic Manor. This isn't me saying you are incredibly rich and privileged, but the people who are struggling are not the types spending time at Centerparcs and weekends at the Celtic Manor.
"The number of migrants attempting the journey from Libya to Europe has gone down since last year, but the proportion of those who die on the way has risen."
How is your friend paying top rate tax? He is just paying 40% higher rate, not the additional (top) rate as you suggest. Like most people on here he is in the 40% tax band. It is rather like saying I have no incentive to work harder because I pay the higher rate. Are you suggesting he shouldn't have to pay income tax on the interest?
Sounds to me like the Camelot adviser gave shockingly bad advice - maybe even tot he extent of being negligent. Good luck with moving to America and living off £1 million without working.
Remember I told you about one of our sparks who won a £1 million on a scratchcard. He wanted to carry on working. However the Camelot financial adivsior has been to see him. As he will get between 3-4% interest on his money, any income he gets from employment will be subject to the top rate of tax, therefore massively reducing his hourly rate, making it pointless for him to carry on working. He has taken his money and moved to America. One of the dangers of over taxing "rich" people, they leave.
That's a weird story, there's a non-trivial difference between the tax you'd pay in the UK and the US, but in the US you have insane healthcare premiums and various other costs, not to mention all the relocation expenses etc. 3-4% interest on £1 million is only 30K to 40K, and from the story they were well below the top tax bracket before the win so we're not talking about vast savings here...
Unless of course your guy already wanted to the live in the US, in which case good luck to them...
Interesting on the above figures that although renewables are most favoured, nuclear energy is now more favoured than gas and coal
It's virtue signalling. The poll lists the General Public views on which are the "greenest" forms of energy. Nuclear beats gas and coal because it is believed to be greener. Put it another way, include a few buzzwords like "clean coal" and you could see that option zooming up the list.
The poll is arguably meaningless (like many polls of course) if people aren't given some idea of the relative costs, risks etc in advance.
Remember I told you about one of our sparks who won a £1 million on a scratchcard. He wanted to carry on working. However the Camelot financial adivsior has been to see him. As he will get between 3-4% interest on his money, any income he gets from employment will be subject to the top rate of tax, therefore massively reducing his hourly rate, making it pointless for him to carry on working. He has taken his money and moved to America. One of the dangers of over taxing "rich" people, they leave.
I'll take some of that 3-4% interest if you can tell us where he's getting it.
Remember I told you about one of our sparks who won a £1 million on a scratchcard. He wanted to carry on working. However the Camelot financial adivsior has been to see him. As he will get between 3-4% interest on his money, any income he gets from employment will be subject to the top rate of tax, therefore massively reducing his hourly rate, making it pointless for him to carry on working. He has taken his money and moved to America. One of the dangers of over taxing "rich" people, they leave.
That's a weird story, there's a non-trivial difference between the tax you'd pay in the UK and the US, but in the US you have insane healthcare premiums and various other costs, not to mention all the relocation expenses etc. 3-4% interest on £1 million is only 30K to 40K, and from the story they were well below the top tax bracket before the win so we're not talking about vast savings here...
Unless of course your guy already wanted to the live in the US, in which case good luck to them...
While we're slapping our anecdata on the table, I work with dozens of top rate tax payers in a job which tends to get paid at least half again as much in the US. Strangely none of us are clamouring to uproot our lives and emigrate
By the way where does Corbyn think we are going to find 400k people to work in the renewable energy field? Does he really think we have got a lot of unemployed engineers or construction workers hanging about waiting for his largess?
Immigration. Lots of it to punish tory voters.
It’s unlikely that you’re joking either.
Which is a disturbing insight into your mental state, like your rather nasty refusal to attend the funeral of someone on account of them being a Leave voter.
People are odd. I knew someone from South Yorkshire who refused to go to a dear friend's wedding in Birmingham as it was 'the south', filled with southern wa*kers, etc, etc.
Says more about people from South Yorkshire.
Not really. He was a lovely man, and a 'proper' lefty that made Dennis Skinner look like a Thatcherite. I saw him the Saturday after Blair's 1997 GE win and congratulated him on a Labour win. His response. "We haven't won. The Conservatives have!"
Doesn't sound like a lovely man to me - sounds like a professional curmudgeon.
Well, he was from Yorkshire.
But he was a lovely man. Capable of intense acts of friendship, generous, funny, witty. It was just that he had some oddities - as many of us do.
And to be fair, he was ahead of the times in calling Blair a Tory.
On LabCon, I am interested in the unforeseen consequences of Chairman MaoDonnell's various grabs...
We're in the age of post-reality politics now. Only Briefcase Wankers care about things adding up or being affordable. See also Brexit and Trump.
Yep - the Brexit vote showed you can promise Unicorns and win. The far left has learned that lesson well. But Labour has at least realised that the current system is now failing to deliver to millions of people. The Tories are not even at that point yet. May promising further tax cuts for business and less regulation is not going to inspire many working people struggling to make ends meet.
There’s starved of funding and on the verge of collapse.
Younger families have wholesale seemed to stop supporting the conservatives.
They need a platform to attract them. Rent reform, mortgage reform (the stress tests put on mortgage applications means that people not on the ladder are getting refused mortgages or have to find very high deposits, when they are prefectly fine paying much higher rents.
Unfortunately what the Conservatives need is a Corbyn led Labour government.
But the economic decline you get from government central planned economic development can take decades to filter through. Stagnation doesn’t a;pear for some time. They’ll bugger up the finances, they always do.
The trouble that labour faces is we have had one of the most anti business Tory governments for as long as I can remember. The result is an economy already heading downwards
Shown in none of the figures whatsoever.....
I heard RBL this morning saying she didn't 'accept' the maths that R4 had done on McMao's clever tax wheeze/10% workers share ownership. Unspoofable.
The Tories are currently seeking a trade deal with Europe that will make it harder and more expensive for British companies to do business in their most important export market. They also want to make it harder for British businesses to hire the staff they need.
And yet business is booming.
Is there a chance that Remainers have over egged the disaster pudding again.
The weaker pound and domestic policy will have much more of an effect on exports than the mechanics of a post Brexit deal will.
May I respectfully suggest that if the problem was an overvalued pound there were simpler solutions than Brexit?
On the other hand, it's a wonderful problem to have.
It is daft, but it demonstrates that if people do not have an incentive to work or wealth create as they will be over taxed then they will not do it.
Erm.... his Camelot financial adviser should have told him to look at paying in to a personal pension and so defer paying higher rate tax by putting it inside his pension wrapper - it would benefit then from 25% tax free cash when he did fully retire and there could be IHT planning benefits for him too by building his pension pot and which his £1m is unlikely to benefit from. Even if he's a 40% taxpayer in retirement, the effective return is a min 16.7%
Indeed. Thanks to the sale of our business I have just come into a decent amount of cash. As far as I can tell, beyond the tax on what I have to pay on the money I made, there is no additional liability. I will carry on working (for now, at least), put the money into various investments and funds, and pay exactly the same tax as I paid before on my salary. Obviously, when I start drawing down on what I have built up, there are tax implications, but by then I will not be working. It seems to me that this bloke may have a cause of action against the Camelot financial adviser.
As an aside. I went to see someone recently about managing what I got and he told me that one of their clients is a very big lottery winner who spent a few hundred grand on a new Lamborghini. He then sold it when he was charged £37,000 for its first service!! It is a different world.
As an aside. I went to see someone recently about managing what I got and he told me that one of their clients is a very big lottery winner who spent a few hundred grand on a new Lamborghini. He then sold it when he was charged £37,000 for its first service!! It is a different world.
The annual service on a Huracan is about 800 quid, maybe 1200 for an Aventador. Two grand a year for tyres if he drives it hard. Double all of that if he tracks it. No way is an annual service on a modern Lambo anywhere near 37k. There is a lot of VW/Audi components in them...
On the other hand, it's a wonderful problem to have.
It is daft, but it demonstrates that if people do not have an incentive to work or wealth create as they will be over taxed then they will not do it.
Erm.... his Camelot financial adviser should have told him to look at paying in to a personal pension and so defer paying higher rate tax by putting it inside his pension wrapper - it would benefit then from 25% tax free cash when he did fully retire and there could be IHT planning benefits for him too by building his pension pot and which his £1m is unlikely to benefit from. Even if he's a 40% taxpayer in retirement, the effective return is a min 16.7%
Indeed. Thanks to the sale of our business I have just come into a decent amount of cash. As far as I can tell, beyond the tax on what I have to pay on the money I made, there is no additional liability. I will carry on working (for now, at least), put the money into various investments and funds, and pay exactly the same tax as I paid before on my salary. Obviously, when I start drawing down on what I have built up, there are tax implications, but by then I will not be working. It seems to me that this bloke may have a cause of action against the Camelot financial adviser.
As an aside. I went to see someone recently about managing what I got and he told me that one of their clients is a very big lottery winner who spent a few hundred grand on a new Lamborghini. He then sold it when he was charged £37,000 for its first service!! It is a different world.
I believe its about the same to stick 4 new tyres on a Bugatti Veyron....
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I think you miss the point. It's a quiet reminder that concern for the plight of the Palestinians is a popular and legitimate cause and should not be confused with antisemitism.
I think that’s right. The Palestinians aren’t a particularly ‘popular’ cause, but I suspect there’s widespread unease over the way they’ve been, and are being treated. Maybe at a low level, but it’s there.
Undoubtedly that's shared by a lot of people, including me. But I am, frankly, more concerned about how British Jews here - our citizens, our friends, neighbours, colleagues - are being treated and talked about, often by the same people so vociferous in their concern for Palestinians. And the Labour leadership seems all too willing to ignore the concerns of some British citizens for the concerns of people about which, bluntly, Britain can do nothing. That is an odd set of priorities - a bit Mrs Jellaby like - and would be harmless were it not for the fact that there does seem to be an overlap between some pro-Palestinians and some anti-semites. That is the issue which Labour is deliberately avoiding. It has made the choice - if the price for being pro-Palestinian is to be anti-semitic or tolerate or do nothing about anti-semitism then Labour - under its current leadership - is willing to pay that price.
Also, there seems to be an unfairness in terms of location. Stand on the top of Honey Hill in Northamptonshire (just south of the A14) and you can see many distinct windfarms and individual wind turbines. Yet go to equally-hilly Oxfordshire and there are virtually none.
The only reason for this can really be the effective power of NIMBYs.
I would point out that Oxfordshire does seem to have loads and loads of solar farms. To be honest, I only really started noticing them when I took up microlighting - most aren't readily visible from the road, but they're very conspicuous from the air (and give convenient thermals)
The “House Thermal” at Didcot used to be way better though
Not that we should design energy policy around the needs of recreational aviation of course...
Remember I told you about one of our sparks who won a £1 million on a scratchcard. He wanted to carry on working. However the Camelot financial adivsior has been to see him. As he will get between 3-4% interest on his money, any income he gets from employment will be subject to the top rate of tax, therefore massively reducing his hourly rate, making it pointless for him to carry on working. He has taken his money and moved to America. One of the dangers of over taxing "rich" people, they leave.
I'll take some of that 3-4% interest if you can tell us where he's getting it.
3 to 4% on £1m is £30-£40k, which by itself wouldn't lead you to the top rate of tax (£150k pa +)
As an aside. I went to see someone recently about managing what I got and he told me that one of their clients is a very big lottery winner who spent a few hundred grand on a new Lamborghini. He then sold it when he was charged £37,000 for its first service!! It is a different world.
The annual service on a Huracan is about 800 quid, maybe 1200 for an Aventador. Two grand a year for tyres if he drives it hard. Double all of that if he tracks it. No way is an annual service on a modern Lambo anywhere near 37k. There is a lot of VW/Audi components in them...
Maybe not a Lamborghini then. I know nothing whatsoever about cars.
I'd say the Labour conference has gone better than anyone could have hoped. They've managed to straddle Brexit without bifurcating themselves. They've given serious hope to the Remainers. They've sidelined the old union barons (to an extent) without falling out and they put themselves well and trully centre stage on the most important issue of the day with the media hanging onto their every word.
A great platform for the leaders speech. Who'd have thought....
Edit ....and the Palestinian flags were a very smart idea.
I'd use the Palestinian flags on Tory graphics in Peterborough, Poole, Portished, Penarth, Portsmouth etc
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
I think you miss the point. It's a quiet reminder that concern for the plight of the Palestinians is a popular and legitimate cause and should not be confused with antisemitism.
I think that’s right. The Palestinians aren’t a particularly ‘popular’ cause, but I suspect there’s widespread unease over the way they’ve been, and are being treated. Maybe at a low level, but it’s there.
Undoubtedly that's shared by a lot of people, including me. But I am, frankly, more concerned about how British Jews here - our citizens, our friends, neighbours, colleagues - are being treated and talked about, often by the same people so vociferous in their concern for Palestinians. And the Labour leadership seems all too willing to ignore the concerns of some British citizens for the concerns of people about which, bluntly, Britain can do nothing. That is an odd set of priorities - a bit Mrs Jellaby like - and would be harmless were it not for the fact that there does seem to be an overlap between some pro-Palestinians and some anti-semites. That is the issue which Labour is deliberately avoiding. It has made the choice - if the price for being pro-Palestinian is to be anti-semitic or tolerate or do nothing about anti-semitism then Labour - under its current leadership - is willing to pay that price.
That is a very fair comment.
Unfortunately, the Conservative party is also willing to give succour to virulent anti-Semites. The UK's moral compass has gone missing.
On the other hand, it's a wonderful problem to have.
It is daft, but it demonstrates that if people do not have an incentive to work or wealth create as they will be over taxed then they will not do it.
Erm.... his Camelot financial adviser should have told him to look at paying in to a personal pension and so defer paying higher rate tax by putting it inside his pension wrapper - it would benefit then from 25% tax free cash when he did fully retire and there could be IHT planning benefits for him too by building his pension pot and which his £1m is unlikely to benefit from. Even if he's a 40% taxpayer in retirement, the effective return is a min 16.7%
Indeed. Thanks to the sale of our business I have just come into a decent amount of cash. As far as I can tell, beyond the tax on what I have to pay on the money I made, there is no additional liability. I will carry on working (for now, at least), put the money into various investments and funds, and pay exactly the same tax as I paid before on my salary. Obviously, when I start drawing down on what I have built up, there are tax implications, but by then I will not be working. It seems to me that this bloke may have a cause of action against the Camelot financial adviser.
As an aside. I went to see someone recently about managing what I got and he told me that one of their clients is a very big lottery winner who spent a few hundred grand on a new Lamborghini. He then sold it when he was charged £37,000 for its first service!! It is a different world.
I believe its about the same to stick 4 new tyres on a Bugatti Veyron....
Sounds like it might have been a Bugatti rather than a Lamborghini!
I have had solar panels for a number of years now, both in London and Cumbria and am very pleased with them. They provide electricity and help heat our water. We also gave up getting our heating from oil in Cumbria (no gas there) and use biomass there and have oodles of insulation. I fit water butts wherever I can and use wind power to dry my clothes. So I am very in favour of green energy.
But the government has now cut to nil the amount it pays you for solar generated electricity which makes the economics of solar panels much less attractive than when we installed them. It has always seemed to me to be a stupid policy so if that gets reversed that would be a good thing.
I would certainly be in favour of the sorts of policies which Corbyn is apparently set to announce. But it still won’t make me vote for a party led by him. Labour policies may be attractive but the Labour leadership is an absolute bar to my voting for them, however attractive their retail offer may be.
Plus I still think that those Remainers who think a Corbyn led Labour party will push for Britain to remain in the EU or to rejoin are utterly deluding themselves.
Those remainers might well be so, but the question is once we are out and it us clear rejoining won't happen will they go somewhere else, angry labour didn't try hard enough? Or will most of them accept labour never got the chance to stop it and in any case the Tories need punishing?
I think it will depend on how bad Brexit turns out to be. If there's a crash out Brexit a lot of people will want to punish the Tories. A lot will want to punish them for Brexit, no matter what. If there's some sort of deal some may be relieved. I simply don't know how large a constituency there is for rejoining after Brexit (time is pretty tight for there to be any sort of effective movement towards Remain before next March) who vote Labour in the expectation that they will seek to rejoin and find themselves disappointed.
And of course there will be a group of voters who find both main parties equally repellent for different reasons and don't vote at all or vote for minor parties, whose vote is effectively wasted. How many of such voters each of the parties "lose" and in which constituencies may determine who wins next time.
Comments
I heard RBL this morning saying she didn't 'accept' the maths that R4 had done on McMao's clever tax wheeze/10% workers share ownership. Unspoofable.
Coming soon to a minority *you* care about ...
LABOUR: PALESTINE OVER NSERT TOWN/CITY NAME HERE
Total growth matters less if it is distributed patchily, or even in reverse in many areas. We saw that in the discussion of life expectancy figures dropping in many parts of the country yesterday. There are many causes behind it, and life expectancy is an imperfect barometer, but or many parts of the country stagnation and decline are the lived experience.
"You've never had it so good" worked for MacMillan for a while, but the next election put into power a left wing orator.
But the government has now cut to nil the amount it pays you for solar generated electricity which makes the economics of solar panels much less attractive than when we installed them. It has always seemed to me to be a stupid policy so if that gets reversed that would be a good thing.
I would certainly be in favour of the sorts of policies which Corbyn is apparently set to announce. But it still won’t make me vote for a party led by him. Labour policies may be attractive but the Labour leadership is an absolute bar to my voting for them, however attractive their retail offer may be.
Plus I still think that those Remainers who think a Corbyn led Labour party will push for Britain to remain in the EU or to rejoin are utterly deluding themselves.
"He voted leave to keep the foreigners out not goods. This simple statement seems to sum up everything."
The problem is there's no answer to this simple statement. They see people trumpeting the idea of tariff-free trade being Nirvana, but in the EU, they insist on political add-ons. Why are these essential? This isn't rocket science, but until Remainers come up with an answer, they're fooked.
The current explanation …. free trade is good, but we need open borders for people too just invites another Why?
I had lunch with our newest EU recruit yesterday, her first job outside of Greece and looking quite a high flyer. She was surprised at how warmly she was welcomed here, though the NHS is a particularly cosmopolitan employer. Less than 15% of the medical staff in my department are White British, though more than 75% have British passports.
On the other hand, it's a wonderful problem to have.
I'm not sure whether this is an economically rational attitude or not; Free-traders would probably say that free trade in goods would benefit both sides. But part of the core EU quid-pro-quo is that if they open up their markets, in return their citizens get free movement. From their point of view, one country saying "we're leaving to drop the people part but we'll keep the goods part" is the same as if France had said to Britain, "we're leaving to drop the part where your banks can sell financial services to our citizens, but you still have to subsidize our farmers".
Note that this isn't just an EU thing; The same thing happened when the British said "great, we're leaving, we can cut a trade deal with India": The Indian government said, "if you want access to our markets, we'll need to talk about visas".
Nothing in Phil Hammond's upcoming Budget will be F*ck Business. (Although it might have aspects of F*ck Business When It Takes The P*ss...)
That's in my opinion, not a place any Western government should be. Sides should not be taken in this, as a solution only come from working with both.
Dagenham. A film with people in mini skirts winning, also a place with a car factory. As just one small example of the bigger picture across the nation. Forty thoasand people working in a car factory, now it’s nearer four. There is more than enough evidence Workers in deindustrialised industries and regions don't go on to better jobs, or even similar jobs in different industries. Instead, they shuffle from low-paid job to low-paid job, never recovering the prosperity they had before. Many of them end up on welfare. So individuals and households are not as wealthy, whole towns and regions not as wealthy. That needs a policy. That needs to to be dealt with. It doesn’t need people simply saying “all good here, record employment”.
McDonnell and Corbyn will end up deliriously happy if the Tories merely continue like they are. Britain today has right conditions for a sea change. Globalisation ravaging confidence of the people and their aspirations for their offspring, the governing party of many years perceived as barking up the EU tree, steering us into mercantile rivalry with our nearest geographical and cultural neighbours. the conservatives Need to show more leg on this, show they using time in power recognising and tackling the real causes of Britain’s decline and pain: globalisation, post-industrial Britain, and our demographic time bomb. Not that I am saying rival parties win by exploiting this ground with stronger policy, as I say they can get elected with even weaker policy, but they are not the opponent, show not enough leg on these issues, and mini skirts will be back in.
I guess all the solar advocates are quite happy to sit in the dark with no TV or internet and unable to boil a kettle on January evenings. Either that or they are prepared to fill their spare room with batteries.
You can promise everyone everything if you are putting it on tick
"perhaps one that politicians would have to be careful mouthing."
Therein lies a problem. If we were logical bout this, we'd say immigrants prove to be a positive for the NHS, However, the unsaid response (because it's not encouraged) is why cut nurse bursaries, and why import trained staff from abroad and leave their home country struggling. It seems a very right wing response to a staff shortage here.
Instead we say nothing.
Being selfish, I'm fully in favour of allowing immigration of qualified people - it's obviously a plus for us. But if we opened up discussion, we'd have to include unqualified people too, so we don't.
When Gordon announced something very similar to this 9 years ago, the 400,000 new job figure was found to be absolutely spurious. It was a Mandy special.
O/T: an impressive blue surge in the latest batch of US polls:
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/latest_polls/
Angry, affluent remainers with multiple homes get punished twice.
First, we leave. Then, they get the full English Corbyn.
I dont get this perceived idea that just a few people have benefited from the ecomoic upturn since 2010. There are now thousands more hotels in this country than there were in 2000. You try and get a room in one, is this just "rich" people paying the high prices that hotels charge, or maybe is it that ordinary people can afford to pay the rates. Three weeks ago I fancied a night at Poole dogs with my other half, thought we would stay the night, not a single hotel room was available in Poole. My golf society had a weekend away last weekend at Celtic Manor. Celtic manor own 5 hotels on the site, we tried to add an extra body to our trip two weeks before we went, we couldn't as every single one of their rooms was taken. Hotels are just one example. My friend loves Center Parcs, I think it is a complete waste of money as you can have three weeks in spain for the cost of one week at Center Parcs. Despite this he reports that the park is always sold out when he goes.
I hear it time and time again on here that just a few rich people have benefited in that past 8 years from this incredible economic upturn, the evidence I see completely refutes that premise.
Wheres tidal.....
https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/healthandsocialcare/healthandlifeexpectancies/datasets/lifeexpectancyatbirthandatage65bylocalareasuk
I’ve noticed Dorset being much busier this summer. A good third of my mates had holidays in the UK.
Yesterday TM looked tired in her interviews and we saw her Maybot on display again. This morning she is talking of reducing corporation tax to the lowest in the G20 and making the UK the best place in the world to do business. This is a perfectly reasonable place for a conservative PM but does give the impression she is giving up on a deal.
This worries me considerably and I am concerned that her political antennae is switched off. When asked yesterday by Sky if she would sign upto their petition for leaders debates she refused to answer, when the correct response should have been an immmediate 'absolutely '. A few weeks ago she over ruled Sajid on the 3% police pay increase which is just plain stupid,
I do understand why she will not agree any deal that puts a border in the Irish sea but her stubbornness makes compromise very difficult.
I do not think she can continue like this for much longer but cannot see it is the national interest to replace her now, as desirable as that may be, but I doubt she will survive much beyond late Spring 2019
And to all of you who think I am her cheerleader I do admire her honesty, decency and dedication to public service in stark contrast to some of the objectionable speeches from hard left haters we saw at the labour conference.
Let us hope, despite my reservations, she can get a deal or at the very least a transistion period.
I do not believe we should remain in the EU now no matter the difficulties but I am sure many will start to campaign to re-join post Brexit, but I cannot see that happening in the short term
Feeling a bit melancholy today
https://www.haaretz.com/us-news/cynthia-nixon-urges-cuomo-to-apologize-for-mailer-calling-her-soft-on-anti-semitism-1.6467994
Because.... she supports BDS. If a Jewish person cannot oppose Palestinian occupation without having racism accusations thrown at them then it certainly does seem true.
How is your friend paying top rate tax? He is just paying 40% higher rate, not the additional (top) rate as you suggest. Like most people on here he is in the 40% tax band. It is rather like saying I have no incentive to work harder because I pay the higher rate. Are you suggesting he shouldn't have to pay income tax on the interest?
Is there a chance that Remainers have over egged the disaster pudding again.
The weaker pound and domestic policy will have much more of an effect on exports than the mechanics of a post Brexit deal will.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leicestershire-45638416
https://order-order.com/2018/09/26/corbyn-forgets-six-labours-brexit-tests/
No wonder he did so shit in his A-levels...
It's surprising how many solar farms I comes across here in Cambridgeshire, especially in the Fens.
Or perhaps you concluded that individuals are not necessarily perfect representations of everyone with whom they share a demographic, and that pretending otherwise is somewhat infantile.
If business were booming and confident, it would be investing more than it is.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2018/09/02/brexit-blows-22bn-hole-business-investment-underlining-need/
If the Tories want to go into the next election saying everything is fine and all we need to do is cut taxes, keep public spending low, reduce regulation and allow big American corporations much greater access to British markets, then so be it; I am not sure it is actually going to do much to enthuse voters or, more importantly, improve living standards and levels of satisfaction. Corbyn will almost certainly ensure the Tories win the next election, but I cannot see them doing much with the victory. There doesn't seem to be anything there.
Here is part of the sentence again
'weekends away at the celtic manor with the golf society'
It may surprise you to know that the people going to the food bank aren't spending time at Centerparcs or weekends at the Celtic Manor. This isn't me saying you are incredibly rich and privileged, but the people who are struggling are not the types spending time at Centerparcs and weekends at the Celtic Manor.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-africa-45631285/europe-migration-horrific-experiences-on-the-crossing-from-libya
Yet some on here congratulate the removal of rescue boats ...
Unless of course your guy already wanted to the live in the US, in which case good luck to them...
But he was a lovely man. Capable of intense acts of friendship, generous, funny, witty. It was just that he had some oddities - as many of us do.
And to be fair, he was ahead of the times in calling Blair a Tory.
As an aside. I went to see someone recently about managing what I got and he told me that one of their clients is a very big lottery winner who spent a few hundred grand on a new Lamborghini. He then sold it when he was charged £37,000 for its first service!! It is a different world.
Undoubtedly that's shared by a lot of people, including me. But I am, frankly, more concerned about how British Jews here - our citizens, our friends, neighbours, colleagues - are being treated and talked about, often by the same people so vociferous in their concern for Palestinians. And the Labour leadership seems all too willing to ignore the concerns of some British citizens for the concerns of people about which, bluntly, Britain can do nothing. That is an odd set of priorities - a bit Mrs Jellaby like - and would be harmless were it not for the fact that there does seem to be an overlap between some pro-Palestinians and some anti-semites. That is the issue which Labour is deliberately avoiding. It has made the choice - if the price for being pro-Palestinian is to be anti-semitic or tolerate or do nothing about anti-semitism then Labour - under its current leadership - is willing to pay that price.
Not that we should design energy policy around the needs of recreational aviation of course...
Unfortunately, the Conservative party is also willing to give succour to virulent anti-Semites. The UK's moral compass has gone missing.
F1: full markets up on Ladbrokes.
Is there a penalty for a Red Bull? 1.66 for them to doubly enter Q3 (same odds as Haas) seems a bit generous.
And of course there will be a group of voters who find both main parties equally repellent for different reasons and don't vote at all or vote for minor parties, whose vote is effectively wasted. How many of such voters each of the parties "lose" and in which constituencies may determine who wins next time.