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politicalbetting.com » Blog Archive » After a difficult couple of days Burnham still very strong favourite
Latest from Betfair on the LAB leadership betting pic.twitter.com/ANXZDlEf5P
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That fickle old oil price is rather ruining their socialist paradise. Amazingly, the gov found the money to install 20 000 fingerprint scanners in its shops to prevent food hoarding.
In the past, I'd have opposed such an idea as changing the cost retrospectively is against the philosophy of allowing people to weigh up the value of a degree against it's cost, but as that's obviously no longer a valid philosophy, I trust that the Government will be instituting such.
Socialism killed Venezuela, long before the oil price collapsed went down a bit.
A couple of random thoughts on the day's news - first, a fascinating report in the Racing Post concerning staff shortages in racing stables. Apparently, there are at 500 and perhaps as many as 1,000 vacancies in yards. The reason seems to be the tightening of restrictions on non-EU immigration which has reduced the flow of labour from places like Pakistan and Brazil where it's easier to find people of small stature weighing 9 stone or less.
Second, curious to read George Osborne talking about the disposal of land by the public sector. In my view, that's a terrible decision in many cases. Many sensible local authorities are looking at property investment as an alternative income stream. Far from being shocked that the MoD owns 15 golf courses, we should be delighted the Government is getting in the rental income from the golf club itself as well as the companies running the on-site catering.
Thoughtful Councils know retaining an investment portfolio is a good idea in times of reduced central Government funding whether that be tenanted commercial (ideal) or part commercial part residential. The other side of this is Councils need to be far quicker to make property decisions - having sites sit vacant for years is extraordinarily foolish when they can either be re-used, re-developed or sold on for re-development as required.
The problem is either competing Council needs and departments (sites for Free Schools, additional sites for residential accommodation for vulnerable adults and/or children) or dithering Councillors who all want to play at being property developers when such decisions should be based on proper professional guidance from the internal property professionals.
https://orderorder.files.wordpress.com/2013/11/venez.jpg?w=900
e.g. http://www.raf.mod.uk/rafmarham/stationfacilities/golfclub2.cfm and look at all the other clubs and facilities listed on the same page.
There will be plenty more where that came from too.
It's totally unworkable, unenforceable and - if it ever by some miracle ended up with demands for payment landing on peoples doormats - probably open to very heavy challenge in the courts.
Even if some leftwingers switch to Corbyn doubt that means Cooper will overtake Burnham, it simply means it will be tighter between Burnham and Corbyn in round 1, as Cooper also abstained on the welfare bill it will also make little difference on preferences. The next leader will either be Burnham or Corbyn in my view and that helps Burnham in the general as it means he does not owe any favours to the left, while if Corbyn wins Labour have almost no chance anyway
I disagree that it was a sensible thing for Harman to have done - and if Corbyn were to win - unlikely I think- she would be rightly blamed for the backlash caused that led to such a result.She has shown lack of political insight here.As an Acting Leader she simply lacked the authority for such a decision and has ended up creating difficulties for the new Leader. It might have been a bit different if she was running to be confirmed in the role herself
We'd be more likely to forget about ferrets in a sack once a leader is elected and put it down to the current vacuum.
7,825,700 Degree (for example BA, BSc), Higher degree (for example MA, PhD, PGCE)
2,006,440 NVQ Level 4-5, HNC, HND, RSA Higher Diploma, BTEC Higher Level
6,414,702 Professional qualifications (for example teaching, nursing, accountancy)
http://www.nomisweb.co.uk/census/2011/QS502EW/view/2092957703?cols=measures
Charging that lot a grand each would make about 16 billion.
If they've been subsidised by the tax payer then the govt should crack on with charging for it.
Curious how many would have been paid for by provate sector employers.
I favour swingeing taxes on Arsenal supporters instead.
How about retrospective income tax for further lunacy?
We either need to change EU systems to require a double majority - both Eurozone and non-Eurozone countries - or we need to leave.
How about a 2% Sunday Times rich list wealth tax:
" Sunday Times Rich List: Britain's richest double their wealth in 10 years Crisis? What crisis? The 1,000 wealthiest people in the UK are now worth £547bn. "
That's another £11 Billion - we'll have this deficit sorted by 11pm.
I'd have agreed before, but why is it fair to rule in 2015 to retrospectively increase the cost by 6k for a 3 year degree on those who started in 2013 yet not to retrospectively increase it for those who started in 2012? Or 2002? Or 1992?
What grounds do those who started sooner have over those who started in 2013 and have seen their costs increase retrospectively?
For Pulpstar: it's the decision to freeze the repayment threshold.
Given that the system is actually a capped graduate tax, dropping the threshold in real terms increases the amount paid. By, on average, 6k over the repayment period until the time cap is invoked.
In essence, it's the first time ever that graduates have had the cost ofbtheir degree retrospectively changed after having started their course. It destroys the entire philosophy of invoking the market (that people may judge the worth of a degree against its cost). It's tantamount to increasing VAT on things you've already bought, or increasing stamp duty on houses and making it retrospective for the past x years of transactions.
I am pleased my MP appears to be flogging a dead horse
Yet that is just what Osborne is doing to those who've started degrees under the new system. "Oops, you know those calculations of the cost of a degree and the fact that you won't pay unless you earn 80% of median wages? Yeah, sorry about that; you're paying an extra 6k. No returns."
I agree with you. It is very wrong to use the power of law to change the cost of something after you are already committed to paying for it. When done in the private sector, it is called "bait-and-switch".
I was the last year to get £3,500 fees, paid throughout the length of my course even though new starters would be charged £9,000 the next year. The extent of the retrospectiveness can only be a matter of months for offer holders, deferrals and the like.
Will be interesting if they follow Perkins lead.
Kendall has attracted a surprisingly strong field of prominent New Labour backers, who must not like the alternatives much.
So about a million or so?
It also makes it a far worse deal to all prospective students in the future.
EDIT: Actually it's not a speech, but a "conversation" with him
http://www.progressonline.org.uk/event/in-conversation-with-tony-blair/
To win she needs effectively to be too far ahead on round one to be caught because she isn't going to get many transfer votes.
I don't see how she can get from here to that point. She will be doing very well now not to finish dead last.
I hadn't yet started when fees went up to £9,000, and yet I qualified for £3,500 only.
At most the people who were charged £9,000 had offers, I don't recall about that; but none of them were in the middle of a degree.
It's the young bull old bull joke.
"Look" said the young bull "all those cows down there let's run down a grab us one or two"
Wait" said the old bull " let's walk down and get them all"
Top notch reporting
@SkyNewsBreak: Reuters: #Microsoft reports $3.2bn (£2.1bn) quarterly loss due to charges in its Nokia business & weak demand for #Windows operating system
In reality it's people like me who should be the first in line to pay up for their past uni experiences - I left after a couple of years as the course no longer fitted what I could realistically do, although there was also a large smidgen of personal choice in it.
It's very skilful politics from Osborne. No-one will listen to any Lib dem criticism, as they're fatally compromised already. The SNP won't raise it as it doesn't affect Scottish students. Labour are too disorganised to mount any challenge. The general public (and thus the media who follow what the public want) won't notice due to the persistence of looking at it as a conventional debt (which it is, of course, certainly not) and the headline numbers won't have changed.
Yet it makes it a far worse deal for students than the system brought in after the latest hike, and it changes the amount paid by the students.
See Martin Lewis at MoneySavingExpert: http://blog.moneysavingexpert.com/2015/01/09/a-deliberate-threat-to-the-government-u-turn-on-the-21000-student-loan-repayment-threshold-i-will-organise-mass-protest/
I would like it uprated, as in the article. But I do not believe some great injustice would be done if it were raised less than expected.
Liz is less inconsistent than the other two, but Burnham will say what he thinks the audience wants to hear.
I still think he'd be a harder opponent for the Tories than Yvette because there would always be a feeling that she made it just because they needed a woman, and one who wouldn't rock the boat.
Tell you one thing. Tony Blair wouldn't have passed up the opportunity to defeat the Tories on welfare cuts if he were still Labour leader.
Especially as windows phones sucked more than a hooker that swallowed a Dyson.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2015/07/21/what-al-sharpton-learned-from-james-brown-that-donald-trump-hasnt/
I've a Sony that uses Android, never liked Apple stuff ever since I was forced to use them for work.
Their system used a solitary data bus for everything in the car. (A data bus is a link between two parts of a computer system that carries data). Everything was fine until they had an incident on their test track. Someone changed a CD in the CD changer, and the data swamped the bus for a few seconds, preventing the steering and braking from working for that time.
After that, they moved to separate data buses for critical driver-related systems (steering, braking, indicators, lights etc), and another for peripherals. This cost more, but was a fair bit more definable.
If a car has a two-way data link with the outside world (Wifi or celluar), then they must ensure that *anything* related to the driving of the car is kept firewalled from the safety-critical systems.
I also know a considerable number of students who did use the calculators provided to help their decision. My eldest daughter chose to wait a year and go under the new regime as it did, in fact, offer her a better deal (those who just looked at the headline numbers, of course, wouldn't do that, but she actually weighed up the pros and cons).
Osborne fucked that up, though. By retrospectively changing the conditions on her.
I know that their products are supposed to be top-notch but I don't feel any deep-down attraction for Apple.
Have you got something tangible to say against them?
It was a joke that it was called Win CE, or 'Wince'.
Having said that, newer versions are apparently much better, although I refuse to work with it. I want to retain what little is left of my sanity...
The only reason I ask is that I think that day may well be approaching and sooner than we think
I see where you are coming from, but Governments change rules like this all the time.
Private pensions used to be a good thing, until Gordon Brown came along. Maybe someone would have invested differently for their retirement, had changes not been made.
Or how about if someone created a business and expects to sell it - then the capital gains tax changes. Perhaps it wouldn't have been worth the risks with the new tax regime.
There are many examples.