EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Ah but was it the ones who lead Reform or the ones who lead the Conservatives.......
James McAsh, @mcash, former leader of the Labour Group and Leader-elect of Southwark Council, primary school teacher and trade unionist has defected to the Green Party.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Ah but was it the ones who lead Reform or the ones who lead the Conservatives.......
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Ah but was it the ones who lead Reform or the ones who lead the Conservatives.......
David Willetts leads Reform?
Given he is famous for two brains perhaps he leads them both......
James McAsh, @mcash, former leader of the Labour Group and Leader-elect of Southwark Council, primary school teacher and trade unionist has defected to the Green Party.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
So what’s the plan?
Tax the working class to give handouts to middle class graduates.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Ah but was it the ones who lead Reform or the ones who lead the Conservatives.......
David Willetts leads Reform?
Given he is famous for two brains perhaps he leads them both......
James McAsh, @mcash, former leader of the Labour Group and Leader-elect of Southwark Council, primary school teacher and trade unionist has defected to the Green Party.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
As a graduate of the University of Edinburgh himself, he'd have been paying tax then?
No, Blair and Brown wanted a way to screw over future voters, without paying taxes themselves or getting current voters to pay taxes either.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Ah but was it the ones who lead Reform or the ones who lead the Conservatives.......
David Willetts leads Reform?
Given he is famous for two brains perhaps he leads them both......
Given he's got two brains he was smart enough to bugger off to the House of Lords before his cunning plan 2 went to shit.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Not the repayment cap - this will be laughed at as another Tory stealth tax same as the one blighting the last Conservative government - as inflation lifts wages, it traps more into the tax threshold. Cutting the interest could work, I would argue find a pot of money to pay for it that is an unpopular pot of money - otherwise it’s a transfer from xx type of taxpayer to the students. And the losers will moan. I would also advise the policy to be selective on which student gain. Higher earners to gain nothing at all, middle to lower earners to gain from the scheme.
If it’s popular and warmly received, the government will simply photocopy and implement it of coarse.
On topic, while the uncancelled polls may do incrementally more damage to the Tories, overall it is Labour who will take the bigger hit by virtue of having more seats to lose and starting from a higher NEV in 2022 when most seats were last up.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
As a graduate of the University of Edinburgh himself, he'd have been paying tax then?
No, Blair and Brown wanted a way to screw over future voters, without paying taxes themselves or getting current voters to pay taxes either.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
On topic, while the uncancelled polls may do incrementally more damage to the Tories, overall it is Labour who will take the bigger hit by virtue of having more seats to lose and starting from a higher NEV in 2022 when most seats were last up.
1,000 Labour losses I reckon.
I seem to recall - staying up through the night and having to explain to PBers logging on at first light what the story was - that Labours NEVs were shit, to the extent psepholigrists (sic) Thrashering around (sic) writing the election headlines “Labour cannot win next General Election with these pathetic NEVs”
But that was in the straightforward old days, like 4 years ago, when the Psephologists knew what a bad NEV was from a two party swing mechanism - largely ignoring the libdems mopping every Tory seat and council up the following afternoon - and long long before seven party politics became the norm.
Labour will seriously under perform. Their NEV in locals being below polling, and doubly so when they are in government, has been baked in since the Sixties.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
Just set the interest rate to the rate of inflation such that everyone pays off what they borrowed. Then there’s no benefit to paying off early vs paying off slowly.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
So what’s the plan?
Help the strivers.
No-one else is.
It’s Strove Tuesday, a whole day dedicated to strivers. What more do they want?
Labour will seriously under perform. Their NEV in locals being below polling, and doubly so when they are in government, has been baked in since the Sixties.
I reckon LibDems second on NEV in the locals.
If you look at by-elections since last May, that's how things stand.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
So what’s the plan?
Help the strivers.
No-one else is.
It’s Strove Tuesday, a whole day dedicated to strivers. What more do they want?
Tomorrow is Lash Wednesday, where you spend all day on the drink.
In immigration news, FO has found a new wheeze to pi** off the British but not British. They can F.O. if they think they can collect £589 from me. Another U-turn in the making.
Under the existing rules, a dual national is able to travel to the UK using a passport issued by a second country - but from 25 February that will no longer be the case.
Instead, they will need to show either a British passport, or a document called a certificate of entitlement - and without one of them, they could face being denied the right to travel back to the UK.
Emirates Airlines in Dubai tried something similar about a year ago and got educated.
Nope. Irish passports are like upgraded British ones.
The Irish passport really is the king of passports. Watching the Brits sweat in various European passport queues as they sail through serenely must be some sweet Irish karma for those centuries of oppression.
I am generally a big fan of the legacy of Empire, but we really should have ended the bizarre and anomalous status of Irish citizens in this country when we left the EU. Either they should have taken British citizenship, or be treated as any other foreigners, which they are. And of course got rid of Northern Ireland too and saved ourselves more even than our outrageous EU contributions..
In fact, we really should have done all that after the Second World War, when their sympathies were so obviously on the Nazi side.
On 21 February 1945 Viscount Cranborne, the British Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs, presented a memorandum to the British War Cabinet regarding Irish–British collaboration during 1939–1945:[43]
They agreed to our use of Lough Foyle for naval and air purposes. The ownership of the Lough is disputed, but the Southern Irish authorities are tacitly not pressing their claim in present conditions and are also ignoring any flying by our aircraft over the Donegal shore of the Lough, which is necessary in certain wind conditions to enable flying boats to take off from the Lough. They have agreed to use by our aircraft based on Lough Erne of a corridor over Southern Irish territory and territorial waters for the purpose of flying out to the Atlantic. They have arranged for the immediate transmission to the United Kingdom Representative's Office in Dublin of reports of submarine activity received from their coast watching service. They arranged for the broadening of reports by their Air observation Corps of aircraft sighted over or approaching Southern Irish territory. (This does not include our aircraft using the corridor referred to in (b) above.) They arranged for the extinction of trade and business lighting in coastal towns where such lighting was alleged to afford a useful landmark for German aircraft. They have continued to supply us with meteorological reports. They have agreed to the use by our ships and aircraft of two wireless direction-finding stations at Malin Head. They have supplied particulars of German crashed aircraft and personnel crashed or washed ashore or arrested on land. They arranged for staff talks on the question of co-operation against a possible German invasion of Southern Ireland, and close contact has since been maintained between the respective military authorities. They continue to intern all German fighting personnel reaching Southern Ireland. On the other hand, though after protracted negotiations, Allied service personnel are now allowed to depart freely and full assistance is given in recovering damaged aircraft. Recently, in connection with the establishment of prisoner of war camps in Northern Ireland, they have agreed to return or at least intern any German prisoners who may escape from Northern Ireland across the border to Southern Ireland. They have throughout offered no objection to the departure from Southern Ireland of persons wishing to serve in the United Kingdom Forces nor to the journey on leave of such persons to and from Southern Ireland (in plain clothes). They have continued to exchange information with our security authorities regarding all aliens (including Germans) in Southern Ireland. They have (within the last few days) agreed to our establishing a radar station in Southern Ireland for use against the latest form of submarine activity.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
It’s working out as a graduate tax.
Only because there's a decent chance you don't need to pay the whole thing back - the threshold is £32k in Scotland, and the whole thing gets wiped after 30 years.
There's a good argument that it should be a low interest rate but otherwise treated like any other ordinary loan. That would help avoid some of the perverse incentives we have now, while making the uni sector much more efficient (you'd think twice before doing some degrees).
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
Just set the interest rate to the rate of inflation such that everyone pays off what they borrowed. Then there’s no benefit to paying off early vs paying off slowly.
Unless you never pay off at all and are perpetually on a 9% higher tax threshold versus someone who pays it off. It takes a high income now to be making any net payments "off" at all, let alone to fully repay the loan, many people are only paying off interest perpetually.
What no longer takes a high income is to be making any payments at all. Plan 5 is disgraceful in that people on Plan 5 are making payments even if they are on just full-time minimum wage. The repayment threshold of £25k is now less than 40 hours a week on NMW.
If the repayment thresholds remain frozen much longer, other plans will be below NMW before too long too.
Labour will seriously under perform. Their NEV in locals being below polling, and doubly so when they are in government, has been baked in since the Sixties.
I reckon LibDems second on NEV in the locals.
If you look at by-elections since last May, that's how things stand.
I'm very fortunate in not wanting to win.
Your wish will be granted. Any ideas on your two others?
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
It’s working out as a graduate tax.
I'm a graduate and I don't pay it. It's only a graduate tax on graduates after a certain date. No way it would have been introduced if the politicians who got their tuition fees paid were asked to stump up 9% tax, they'd have balked at 1%.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
It’s working out as a graduate tax.
Only because there's a decent chance you don't need to pay the whole thing back - the threshold is £32k in Scotland, and the whole thing gets wiped after 30 years.
There's a good argument that it should be a low interest rate but otherwise treated like any other ordinary loan. That would help avoid some of the perverse incentives we have now, while making the uni sector much more efficient (you'd think twice before doing some degrees).
How would that get 50% of 18-21 year olds in university so hiding the true scale of youth unemployment though
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
It’s working out as a graduate tax.
I'm a graduate and I don't pay it. It's only a graduate tax on graduates after a certain date. No way it would have been introduced if the politicians who got their tuition fees paid were asked to stump up 9% tax, they'd have balked at 1%.
Has anyone here ever been positively roused by a Starmer speech?
I tried knocking one out but, alas. Starmer is the anti-spooge
No.
None of the current Party leaders are good orators.
Kemi is pretty good imo.
Chatgpt reckons that Farage is one of the best orators since 1945, and was central to mobilising Leave voters in the Brexit campaign.
The full list: 1. Winston Churchill 2. Enoch Powell 3. Margaret Thatcher 4. Tony Blair 5. Aneurin Bevan 6. Denis Healey 7. Michael Foot 8. Nigel Farage 9. William Hague 10. David Lloyd George
Honourable Mentions Robin Cook George Galloway Boris Johnson.
Enoch Powell, with that thin, reedy voice, was not a great orator.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
Just set the interest rate to the rate of inflation such that everyone pays off what they borrowed. Then there’s no benefit to paying off early vs paying off slowly.
Unless you never pay off at all and are perpetually on a 9% higher tax threshold versus someone who pays it off. It takes a high income now to be making any net payments "off" at all, let alone to fully repay the loan, many people are only paying off interest perpetually.
What no longer takes a high income is to be making any payments at all. Plan 5 is disgraceful in that people on Plan 5 are making payments even if they are on just full-time minimum wage. The repayment threshold of £25k is now less than 40 hours a week on NMW.
If the repayment thresholds remain frozen much longer, other plans will be below NMW before too long too.
Yes, it’s clear the current system leads to people only paying interest. Lowering interest to the rate of inflation would dramatically improve things in that regard.
The US has a just placed more and more air machinery into the region over the weeks. They could put in notably less in if they just wanted to rattle a sabre in the direction of Tehran but all they have done is scale upwards. Forget about talk of a 2nd aircraft carrier taking 2 weeks to turn up in the region, there is enough in-theatre and intercontinental airpower between the US & Israel to run heavy round the clock strikes on a different scale than the last twelve day flare up. This is proper loading
Despite the warm words today after the US/Iran talks, Israeli rumour has it that the talks are going nowhere and Iran and the US are really just trying to get their gear together for inevitable collpase. Israel would say that though, as they are quite happy to lead an air war with considerable US backing.
The Iranians have banked on Trump fearing the Iranian response, however brief. Historic error or great bet?
In immigration news, FO has found a new wheeze to pi** off the British but not British. They can F.O. if they think they can collect £589 from me. Another U-turn in the making.
Under the existing rules, a dual national is able to travel to the UK using a passport issued by a second country - but from 25 February that will no longer be the case.
Instead, they will need to show either a British passport, or a document called a certificate of entitlement - and without one of them, they could face being denied the right to travel back to the UK.
Emirates Airlines in Dubai tried something similar about a year ago and got educated.
Nope. Irish passports are like upgraded British ones.
The Irish passport really is the king of passports. Watching the Brits sweat in various European passport queues as they sail through serenely must be some sweet Irish karma for those centuries of oppression.
I am generally a big fan of the legacy of Empire, but we really should have ended the bizarre and anomalous status of Irish citizens in this country when we left the EU. Either they should have taken British citizenship, or be treated as any other foreigners, which they are. And of course got rid of Northern Ireland too and saved ourselves more even than our outrageous EU contributions..
In fact, we really should have done all that after the Second World War, when their sympathies were so obviously on the Nazi side.
On 21 February 1945 Viscount Cranborne, the British Secretary of State for Dominion Affairs, presented a memorandum to the British War Cabinet regarding Irish–British collaboration during 1939–1945:[43]
They agreed to our use of Lough Foyle for naval and air purposes. The ownership of the Lough is disputed, but the Southern Irish authorities are tacitly not pressing their claim in present conditions and are also ignoring any flying by our aircraft over the Donegal shore of the Lough, which is necessary in certain wind conditions to enable flying boats to take off from the Lough. They have agreed to use by our aircraft based on Lough Erne of a corridor over Southern Irish territory and territorial waters for the purpose of flying out to the Atlantic. They have arranged for the immediate transmission to the United Kingdom Representative's Office in Dublin of reports of submarine activity received from their coast watching service. They arranged for the broadening of reports by their Air observation Corps of aircraft sighted over or approaching Southern Irish territory. (This does not include our aircraft using the corridor referred to in (b) above.) They arranged for the extinction of trade and business lighting in coastal towns where such lighting was alleged to afford a useful landmark for German aircraft. They have continued to supply us with meteorological reports. They have agreed to the use by our ships and aircraft of two wireless direction-finding stations at Malin Head. They have supplied particulars of German crashed aircraft and personnel crashed or washed ashore or arrested on land. They arranged for staff talks on the question of co-operation against a possible German invasion of Southern Ireland, and close contact has since been maintained between the respective military authorities. They continue to intern all German fighting personnel reaching Southern Ireland. On the other hand, though after protracted negotiations, Allied service personnel are now allowed to depart freely and full assistance is given in recovering damaged aircraft. Recently, in connection with the establishment of prisoner of war camps in Northern Ireland, they have agreed to return or at least intern any German prisoners who may escape from Northern Ireland across the border to Southern Ireland. They have throughout offered no objection to the departure from Southern Ireland of persons wishing to serve in the United Kingdom Forces nor to the journey on leave of such persons to and from Southern Ireland (in plain clothes). They have continued to exchange information with our security authorities regarding all aliens (including Germans) in Southern Ireland. They have (within the last few days) agreed to our establishing a radar station in Southern Ireland for use against the latest form of submarine activity.
They did all that because we twice threatened to invade (Plan W) if they didn't cooperate.
On the only thing we really needed, use of the Treaty Ports to stop our ships being sunk in the Atlantic, they were opposed. As Churchill said in his victory speech in 1945, the conduct of the Irish government in not allowing the use of the ports would "never be forgiven by the British people".
And of course de Valera personally gave his condolences to Nazi Germany when Hitler died. Whereas when Churchill died, he refused to attend his funeral, characterising him as an enemy to the Irish people. So it was pretty clear whose side he, at any rate, was on.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
Just set the interest rate to the rate of inflation such that everyone pays off what they borrowed. Then there’s no benefit to paying off early vs paying off slowly.
Unless you never pay off at all and are perpetually on a 9% higher tax threshold versus someone who pays it off. It takes a high income now to be making any net payments "off" at all, let alone to fully repay the loan, many people are only paying off interest perpetually.
What no longer takes a high income is to be making any payments at all. Plan 5 is disgraceful in that people on Plan 5 are making payments even if they are on just full-time minimum wage. The repayment threshold of £25k is now less than 40 hours a week on NMW.
If the repayment thresholds remain frozen much longer, other plans will be below NMW before too long too.
Yes, it’s clear the current system leads to people only paying interest. Lowering interest to the rate of inflation would dramatically improve things in that regard.
Interest already is RPI in most plans.
However if you are leaving Uni with £60k of debt then RPI interest alone is thousands per annum. It takes a salary of nearly £50k to be making even minor net repayments, let alone significant ones.
Has anyone here ever been positively roused by a Starmer speech?
I tried knocking one out but, alas. Starmer is the anti-spooge
No.
None of the current Party leaders are good orators.
Kemi is pretty good imo.
Chatgpt reckons that Farage is one of the best orators since 1945, and was central to mobilising Leave voters in the Brexit campaign.
The full list: 1. Winston Churchill 2. Enoch Powell 3. Margaret Thatcher 4. Tony Blair 5. Aneurin Bevan 6. Denis Healey 7. Michael Foot 8. Nigel Farage 9. William Hague 10. David Lloyd George
Honourable Mentions Robin Cook George Galloway Boris Johnson.
Enoch Powell, with that thin, reedy voice, was not a great orator.
Churchill Bevan Foot
The only 3 great orators on that list in my opinion.
I am back to the B&B phase of weekend digs, so I now have access to a Television. I've just finished a very interesting documentary on Sky Arts about Alec Guinness, and now it's Naked Attraction on E4. The picker on NA is a 74yr old bimale, and he's just rejected the sixty something naked woman with a vajazzle. It's a very odd show.
The US has a just placed more and more air machinery into the region over the weeks. They could put in notably less in if they just wanted to rattle a sabre in the direction of Tehran but all they have done is scale upwards. Forget about talk of a 2nd aircraft carrier taking 2 weeks to turn up in the region, there is enough in-theatre and intercontinental airpower between the US & Israel to run heavy round the clock strikes on a different scale than the last twelve day flare up. This is proper loading
Despite the warm words today after the US/Iran talks, Israeli rumour has it that the talks are going nowhere and Iran and the US are really just trying to get their gear together for inevitable collpase. Israel would say that though, as they are quite happy to lead an air war with considerable US backing.
The Iranians have banked on Trump fearing the Iranian response, however brief. Historic error or great bet?
What choice but to keep performing in the Trump show whilst preparing for decapitation strikes? Seems the Iranians don't have the mindset to go first and maybe harpoon a carrier. So what to do but hide the VIPs, threaten the regions entire oil production and hope the THAAD stocks are as low as possible cos the coalition won't stop unless a chunk of Tel Aviv is blown up.
Do wonder in the Chinese/Russians are willing to just watch another oil rich state de-orbited?
"The arrests confirm what has widely been reported: that those suspected of the murder are far-left militants linked to a banned group called La Jeune Garde (Young Guard).
The most striking news is that among the nine in custody is Jacques-Elie Favrot, a young man who until now has been employed as parliamentary assistant at the National Assembly in Paris for a deputy from LFI.
The murder is putting huge pressure on LFI, on its 70 MPs, and on its veteran leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who is a likely contender in next year's presidential election."
Of course. California and Delaware are losing a lot of company registrations, mostly to Florida and Texas.
I don't think many companies have ever registered in California - certainly when we started seven (!) years ago, I never even considered anything other than becoming a Delaware C Corp.
That said, I think Nevada is the number one destination state for companies leaving Delaware (as far as company registrations go). Dropbox, TripAdvisor, and Pershing Square all moved to Nevada. I can't think of anyone other than Tesla that's moved to Texas.
Yes my bad, I was getting confused between headquarters locations and company registrations while trying not to burn the pancakes!
"The arrests confirm what has widely been reported: that those suspected of the murder are far-left militants linked to a banned group called La Jeune Garde (Young Guard).
The most striking news is that among the nine in custody is Jacques-Elie Favrot, a young man who until now has been employed as parliamentary assistant at the National Assembly in Paris for a deputy from LFI.
The murder is putting huge pressure on LFI, on its 70 MPs, and on its veteran leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who is a likely contender in next year's presidential election."
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
Just set the interest rate to the rate of inflation such that everyone pays off what they borrowed. Then there’s no benefit to paying off early vs paying off slowly.
Unless you never pay off at all and are perpetually on a 9% higher tax threshold versus someone who pays it off. It takes a high income now to be making any net payments "off" at all, let alone to fully repay the loan, many people are only paying off interest perpetually.
What no longer takes a high income is to be making any payments at all. Plan 5 is disgraceful in that people on Plan 5 are making payments even if they are on just full-time minimum wage. The repayment threshold of £25k is now less than 40 hours a week on NMW.
If the repayment thresholds remain frozen much longer, other plans will be below NMW before too long too.
Yes, it’s clear the current system leads to people only paying interest. Lowering interest to the rate of inflation would dramatically improve things in that regard.
Interest already is RPI in most plans.
However if you are leaving Uni with £60k of debt then RPI interest alone is thousands per annum. It takes a salary of nearly £50k to be making even minor net repayments, let alone significant ones.
Addendum, it is worth noting that RPI has exceeded median wage growth in 13 of the past 18 years (72% of the time).
If RPI exceeds wage growth then the real (based on wages, not RPI) amount of debt is increasing even if interest is paid in full.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
Just set the interest rate to the rate of inflation such that everyone pays off what they borrowed. Then there’s no benefit to paying off early vs paying off slowly.
Unless you never pay off at all and are perpetually on a 9% higher tax threshold versus someone who pays it off. It takes a high income now to be making any net payments "off" at all, let alone to fully repay the loan, many people are only paying off interest perpetually.
What no longer takes a high income is to be making any payments at all. Plan 5 is disgraceful in that people on Plan 5 are making payments even if they are on just full-time minimum wage. The repayment threshold of £25k is now less than 40 hours a week on NMW.
If the repayment thresholds remain frozen much longer, other plans will be below NMW before too long too.
Yes, it’s clear the current system leads to people only paying interest. Lowering interest to the rate of inflation would dramatically improve things in that regard.
Interest already is RPI in most plans.
However if you are leaving Uni with £60k of debt then RPI interest alone is thousands per annum. It takes a salary of nearly £50k to be making even minor net repayments, let alone significant ones.
Addendum, it is worth noting that RPI has exceeded median wage growth in 13 of the past 18 years (72% of the time).
If RPI exceeds wage growth then the real (based on wages, not RPI) amount of debt is increasing even if interest is paid in full.
A bit late to this party, but I think a lot of people on here are approaching this problem back to front.
If the cost of uni is so great that people are spending their entire working lives paying it off, then possibly uni was the wrong thing for them in the first place. I'm all for education, but I don't think that uni is actually delivering £50k-60k of value for a lot of students.
I've just taken on an engineering grad, with a 2:1 from a former polytechnic. He's a nice enough youth, but I've literally no idea what they taught him at uni - he's learnt far more useful engineering skills working with me for the past 6 weeks than he appears to have gained in 3 years at university. Both practical stuff (e.g. he can read a tape measure properly now), and more desk based stuff (e.g. he'd been taught some of the rudiments of 3D CAD modeling, but the basic stuff he didn't know until I explained it was horrifying). I certainly wouldn't spend £50k of my money for what he got out of the uni system.
IMHO, we need to undo the Blair era settlement of 50% of students going to uni. We should be sending the top 10-15%, and encouraging the rest to get stuck in in the workforce. Kills a lot of birds with one stone - eg you also get a massive improvement on the dependancy ratio as a load of people enter the workforce earlier.
Employers would have to get their heads round asking for decent A-levels when recruiting, but that's hardly the end of days. My wife works for a financial services outfit that generally recruits graduates. Most of them have poor basic maths skills, which is unfortunate for the tasks they are doing; my wife would much rather they just asked for an A or B at A level Maths.
Interesting observation about British society, especially the final sentence:
"Power Distance:
The UK ranks at 35. This ranking demonstrates that UK society generally believes that inequalities among people should be minimized. They are more egalitarian, believing people should be treated more like equals than countries with higher power distance rankings. This score can seem contradictory to the UK’s established and historical class system. The Hofstede Insights’ research shows that, interestingly, the power distance index is “lower amongst the higher class in Britain than amongst the working classes”. In other words, upper-class citizens view others as more equal, while working-class citizens perceive a greater societal hierarchy."
I am back to the B&B phase of weekend digs, so I now have access to a Television. I've just finished a very interesting documentary on Sky Arts about Alec Guinness, and now it's Naked Attraction on E4. The picker on NA is a 74yr old bimale, and he's just rejected the sixty something naked woman with a vajazzle. It's a very odd show.
Starting to think the Greens are most lilely to win the by-election.
That's funny, I was just thinking about a small lay bet on them.
Just watched an Owen Jones podcast about it. Framed around being a positive story on the greens, but the vox pops to me told a different story. A Burberry cap wearing lady annoyed at 'the immigrants' ended her segment by saying she would probably vote Green - which of course she won't. If that sort of thing is indicative of the wider population telling Green canvassers what they want to hear, the Greens will be massively overestimating their own support. Hannah seemed very nice, but fairly out of her depth. She had no idea what she'd do upon her election, just seemed to think the very fact that a Green female plumber would be elected would change politics.
It's between Reform and Labour for me.
Green candidate has been a plumber for 18 years and she's only 34.
EXCL: Kemi Badenoch is mulling a plan to ease the student debt crisis crippling millions.
The Tory leader is looking at help for graduates on controversial plan 2 student loans.
The Sun understands Ms Badenoch wants to seize the issue as a vote-winner while rivals avoid it.
A Tory source said: "This is about who we stand for as Conservatives under Kemi. Labour are spending more & more on benefits for people to sit at home on their backside, while punishing people in work who want to get on. That it isn’t fair and we need a proper plan to sort it.”
Wait till the Tories discover which idiot Party introduced them.
Tony Blair's Labour introduced tuition fees.
After pledging not to.
Not Plan 2 they didn't.
Brown wanted a graduate tax.
In theory loans/fees etc was meant to be fairer than a graduate tax as you could eventually clear what had been borrowed, whereas with a graduate tax you’d just keep paying. The practice isn’t working out too well right now.
Just set the interest rate to the rate of inflation such that everyone pays off what they borrowed. Then there’s no benefit to paying off early vs paying off slowly.
Unless you never pay off at all and are perpetually on a 9% higher tax threshold versus someone who pays it off. It takes a high income now to be making any net payments "off" at all, let alone to fully repay the loan, many people are only paying off interest perpetually.
What no longer takes a high income is to be making any payments at all. Plan 5 is disgraceful in that people on Plan 5 are making payments even if they are on just full-time minimum wage. The repayment threshold of £25k is now less than 40 hours a week on NMW.
If the repayment thresholds remain frozen much longer, other plans will be below NMW before too long too.
Yes, it’s clear the current system leads to people only paying interest. Lowering interest to the rate of inflation would dramatically improve things in that regard.
Interest already is RPI in most plans.
However if you are leaving Uni with £60k of debt then RPI interest alone is thousands per annum. It takes a salary of nearly £50k to be making even minor net repayments, let alone significant ones.
Outside of certain professions, pretty much everyone is better off going into employment at 18, saving money and getting on the housing ladder, then doing a degree later if they want or need to, either full time or part time. What would make a huge difference is for employers to be flexible WRT schedules and hours/days worked, so for example an accounting practice taking on two part time students on 20h each rather than one graduate trainee. The gold standard is probably the degree apprenticeship, available at a few large companies in fields such as engineering, and just as oversubscribed as any graduate trainee programme.
Starting to think the Greens are most lilely to win the by-election.
That's funny, I was just thinking about a small lay bet on them.
Just watched an Owen Jones podcast about it. Framed around being a positive story on the greens, but the vox pops to me told a different story. A Burberry cap wearing lady annoyed at 'the immigrants' ended her segment by saying she would probably vote Green - which of course she won't. If that sort of thing is indicative of the wider population telling Green canvassers what they want to hear, the Greens will be massively overestimating their own support. Hannah seemed very nice, but fairly out of her depth. She had no idea what she'd do upon her election, just seemed to think the very fact that a Green female plumber would be elected would change politics.
It's between Reform and Labour for me.
Green candidate has been a plumber for 18 years and she's only 34.
18 years ago, you’d leave school at 16 to be an apprentice tradesperson.
Interesting observation about British society, especially the final sentence:
"Power Distance:
The UK ranks at 35. This ranking demonstrates that UK society generally believes that inequalities among people should be minimized. They are more egalitarian, believing people should be treated more like equals than countries with higher power distance rankings. This score can seem contradictory to the UK’s established and historical class system. The Hofstede Insights’ research shows that, interestingly, the power distance index is “lower amongst the higher class in Britain than amongst the working classes”. In other words, upper-class citizens view others as more equal, while working-class citizens perceive a greater societal hierarchy."
The ones at the top believe that everybody should be equal but don't do anything to achieve it. The ones at the bottom know that everybody isn't equal but can't do anything to fix it
Interesting observation about British society, especially the final sentence:
"Power Distance:
The UK ranks at 35. This ranking demonstrates that UK society generally believes that inequalities among people should be minimized. They are more egalitarian, believing people should be treated more like equals than countries with higher power distance rankings. This score can seem contradictory to the UK’s established and historical class system. The Hofstede Insights’ research shows that, interestingly, the power distance index is “lower amongst the higher class in Britain than amongst the working classes”. In other words, upper-class citizens view others as more equal, while working-class citizens perceive a greater societal hierarchy."
American AI boom latest: WSJ is now reporting that companies are converting retired aircraft engines into power generators. They have an actual lifespan well past their aircraft certified lifespan, and are getting a second life powering data centres.
Interesting observation about British society, especially the final sentence:
"Power Distance:
The UK ranks at 35. This ranking demonstrates that UK society generally believes that inequalities among people should be minimized. They are more egalitarian, believing people should be treated more like equals than countries with higher power distance rankings. This score can seem contradictory to the UK’s established and historical class system. The Hofstede Insights’ research shows that, interestingly, the power distance index is “lower amongst the higher class in Britain than amongst the working classes”. In other words, upper-class citizens view others as more equal, while working-class citizens perceive a greater societal hierarchy."
The ones at the top of the pile of mattresses think life is comfy and don't understand what the fuss is about.
The ones underneath the pile of mattresses know life isn't comfy but can't get out from under.
The oddest political reversal of my lifetime is the way that now, the better off you are, the more left wing you are likely to be; the poorer you are, the more right wing you are likely to be.
Comments
@SouthwarkGP
James McAsh,
@mcash, former leader of the Labour Group and Leader-elect of Southwark Council, primary school teacher and trade unionist has defected to the Green Party.
https://x.com/SouthwarkGP/status/2023845804935704661
===
Seems to be a lot defections taking place at the moment. A time of flux?
After pledging not to.
1955, here we come. 84, 85, 86....
No, Blair and Brown wanted a way to screw over future voters, without paying taxes themselves or getting current voters to pay taxes either.
Cutting the interest could work, I would argue find a pot of money to pay for it that is an unpopular pot of money - otherwise it’s a transfer from xx type of taxpayer to the students. And the losers will moan.
I would also advise the policy to be selective on which student gain. Higher earners to gain nothing at all, middle to lower earners to gain from the scheme.
If it’s popular and warmly received, the government will simply photocopy and implement it of coarse.
1,000 Labour losses I reckon.
But that was in the straightforward old days, like 4 years ago, when the Psephologists knew what a bad NEV was from a two party swing mechanism - largely ignoring the libdems mopping every Tory seat and council up the following afternoon - and long long before seven party politics became the norm.
If you look at by-elections since last May, that's how things stand.
I'm very fortunate in not wanting to win.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Raxnx-oYf1s
There's a good argument that it should be a low interest rate but otherwise treated like any other ordinary loan. That would help avoid some of the perverse incentives we have now, while making the uni sector much more efficient (you'd think twice before doing some degrees).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vsMUH0QvN1U
What no longer takes a high income is to be making any payments at all. Plan 5 is disgraceful in that people on Plan 5 are making payments even if they are on just full-time minimum wage. The repayment threshold of £25k is now less than 40 hours a week on NMW.
If the repayment thresholds remain frozen much longer, other plans will be below NMW before too long too.
Any ideas on your two others?
The US has a just placed more and more air machinery into the region over the weeks. They could put in notably less in if they just wanted to rattle a sabre in the direction of Tehran but all they have done is scale upwards. Forget about talk of a 2nd aircraft carrier taking 2 weeks to turn up in the region, there is enough in-theatre and intercontinental airpower between the US & Israel to run heavy round the clock strikes on a different scale than the last twelve day flare up. This is proper loading
Despite the warm words today after the US/Iran talks, Israeli rumour has it that the talks are going nowhere and Iran and the US are really just trying to get their gear together for inevitable collpase. Israel would say that though, as they are quite happy to lead an air war with considerable US backing.
The Iranians have banked on Trump fearing the Iranian response, however brief. Historic error or great bet?
On the only thing we really needed, use of the Treaty Ports to stop our ships being sunk in the Atlantic, they were opposed. As Churchill said in his victory speech in 1945, the conduct of the Irish government in not allowing the use of the ports would "never be forgiven by the British people".
And of course de Valera personally gave his condolences to Nazi Germany when Hitler died. Whereas when Churchill died, he refused to attend his funeral, characterising him as an enemy to the Irish people. So it was pretty clear whose side he, at any rate, was on.
However if you are leaving Uni with £60k of debt then RPI interest alone is thousands per annum. It takes a salary of nearly £50k to be making even minor net repayments, let alone significant ones.
Bevan
Foot
The only 3 great orators on that list in my opinion.
Add
Heseltine
Kinnock
Great orators don't read autocue
Do wonder in the Chinese/Russians are willing to just watch another oil rich state de-orbited?
"The arrests confirm what has widely been reported: that those suspected of the murder are far-left militants linked to a banned group called La Jeune Garde (Young Guard).
The most striking news is that among the nine in custody is Jacques-Elie Favrot, a young man who until now has been employed as parliamentary assistant at the National Assembly in Paris for a deputy from LFI.
The murder is putting huge pressure on LFI, on its 70 MPs, and on its veteran leader Jean-Luc Mélenchon, who is a likely contender in next year's presidential election."
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvgj1qrqd47o
On Sunday, Mélenchon said his party had "nothing to do with this story. Those who accuse us are committing a libel."
If RPI exceeds wage growth then the real (based on wages, not RPI) amount of debt is increasing even if interest is paid in full.
If the cost of uni is so great that people are spending their entire working lives paying it off, then possibly uni was the wrong thing for them in the first place. I'm all for education, but I don't think that uni is actually delivering £50k-60k of value for a lot of students.
I've just taken on an engineering grad, with a 2:1 from a former polytechnic. He's a nice enough youth, but I've literally no idea what they taught him at uni - he's learnt far more useful engineering skills working with me for the past 6 weeks than he appears to have gained in 3 years at university. Both practical stuff (e.g. he can read a tape measure properly now), and more desk based stuff (e.g. he'd been taught some of the rudiments of 3D CAD modeling, but the basic stuff he didn't know until I explained it was horrifying). I certainly wouldn't spend £50k of my money for what he got out of the uni system.
IMHO, we need to undo the Blair era settlement of 50% of students going to uni. We should be sending the top 10-15%, and encouraging the rest to get stuck in in the workforce. Kills a lot of birds with one stone - eg you also get a massive improvement on the dependancy ratio as a load of people enter the workforce earlier.
Employers would have to get their heads round asking for decent A-levels when recruiting, but that's hardly the end of days. My wife works for a financial services outfit that generally recruits graduates. Most of them have poor basic maths skills, which is unfortunate for the tasks they are doing; my wife would much rather they just asked for an A or B at A level Maths.
"Power Distance:
The UK ranks at 35. This ranking demonstrates that UK society generally believes that inequalities among people should be minimized. They are more egalitarian, believing people should be treated more like equals than countries with higher power distance rankings. This score can seem contradictory to the UK’s established and historical class system. The Hofstede Insights’ research shows that, interestingly, the power distance index is “lower amongst the higher class in Britain than amongst the working classes”. In other words, upper-class citizens view others as more equal, while working-class citizens perceive a greater societal hierarchy."
https://www.tbcculturehub.com/post/the-united-kingdom-its-cultural-dimensions-and-cultural-values
The ones at the bottom know that everybody isn't equal but can't do anything to fix it
The ones underneath the pile of mattresses know life isn't comfy but can't get out from under.
https://x.com/aniruddh_mohan/status/2023816253832417450