Return to the fray
Four billion pounds (to be precise, £4.1bn). That's the cost of today's Tory pledge to scrap the tax on savings for basic rate taxpayers and to increase tax-free allowances for pensioners. So how will they pay for it? The answer is by spending less starting now.
Before Christmas David Cameron had already reversed his policy of matching Labour's planned spending increases for 2010 onwards. Now he's saying he'd spend even less this year too. He hasn't however specified what programmes he'd spend less on. That is not how government works. He has a point.
When any large organisation - the BBC for example - cuts spending its boss announces target savings and his underlings are tasked to identify how exactly they can be found. That however has not been how politics has worked for the past two decades.
For three elections Labour has simply added up Tory "spending cuts" - in fact pledges to increase spending at a lower rate than the government - and then they've told voters how many doctors, nurses or policeman would go as a result. In response, the Conservatives have specified savings in waste or government programmes that they cancelled. In each case the Tories lost the argument and the election.
BCC (that's Before the Credit Crunch), David Cameron and George Osborne concluded that they could not win this battle and that the next election would be all about "it's society, stupid". Today's announcement confirms that they've been forced to return to the fray. Their hope is that the changed circumstances, falling interest rates, rising debts and Labour's acceptance that spending can't go on as it has ,will make their policy an election winner now as it's not proved to be in the past.
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Last night I watched George Osborne with despair. 'Flashman' became a stuttering, nervous fourth-former under the bullying of Jeremy Paxman. If he cannot stand up to the rigours of Newsnight, what hope has he if DC becomes Prime Minister, and Osborne becomes Chancellor? More urgently, what hope have we, the long-suffering citizens?
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"falling interested rates" eh Nick? Freudian slip perhaps?
For one I'm happy to see some sensible spending plans from anyone in Westminster as they've been few and far between over this past decade or so.
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No fan of Darling. However last night Osbourne was simply terrible.
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You are right to identify one of the most shocking aspects of the Labour propaganda machine - the theme that not a penny of government expenditure is wasted, that all expenditure is rigidly glued to direct delivery of services to the public, and therefore that any change in public expenditure can be directly related to cuts in numbers of nurses, doctors, teachers and police.
For all that propagandists repeat it until it sounds like a form of proper "truth", in fact the integrity of this argument is in tatters.
Take the example from late last year - the Conservative's proposed cut in the government's consultancy and spin budget. That idea flew very well and wasn't rebutted by Labour at all. Likewise, arguments about the cost of ID cards (which is far, far higher than Labour will openly admit), the NHS data base, the computerised children's register, the proposed database of phone and internet use.
The fact is that the current government spend, and Labour's future plans for how it will rise, are awash with schemes to use up billions of pounds of money, unrelated entirely to delivery of essential public services.
In short, it is possible to cut billions from future expenditure, without the slightest effect on education, health, the armed forces, police..... No sensible party would maintain those grandiose spending plans, because thay involve money we simply don't have.
To Labour, the message has to be "Get Real!" - the money just doesn't exist, you spent it already.
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Aaaaarggghhh!!
Is there not any other subject - please, please, please!
WHat about questioning the Labour party for once - how about actually digging and questioning their policies...
Let's see today there is:
Lobbying rules to be stricter
PM defends handling of downturn - yeah, right
Disabled rights delay criticised
Then we also have the slap on the wrist from the ONC..
Clegg joins VAT waste row
I could go on...
But what do we get? A re-iteration of yesterdays blog.
This has become so embarrasingly biased that it really is not worth tuning in any more..
I fully expect this to be lashed to poets corner before it even makes it to the screen, because, like labour it appears the BBC cannot be criticised!
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Oh dear.
So much posturing and so much speculation on who might win a General Election which probably won't be called this year.
Plus more unadultered spin from the author of this Blog (fourth paragraph).
In the meantime credit crunch Britain flounders deeper into recession:
Hey, let's lift the ban on short selling financial shares - come on you speculators and bet against the British taxpayer. You've not had such an opportunity since, erm*, Black Wednesday.
Poor politicians, poor political commentators.
Pathetic.
And that's before the professional stooges start posting.
*Pun intended.
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Shame on you - making your comment on paying for Cameron's savings initiative an article, rather than a blog item to avoid comments.
With the government spending countless billions of taxpayer money without even trying to justify it, how is £5bn a story? Government propaganda yes - story no. You lose credibility by failing to tell the difference.
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Nick
You and the BBC fully supported the bogus labour 'what are you going to cut' line.
As you now admit - it was nonsense all along.
p.s.
Paxman asked george about his time on a certain yacht.
Any chance of you asking Mandleson about his time on the same yacht Nick?
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4.1 bn quid Wow, about the same as an aircraft carrier then.
Looks like we re in need of a grocers daughter to go through the books again.
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Yeah. It's the same tactic smarmy Jack McConnell used to use in the Scottish parliament. Before he got kicked into touch.
Any time anybody asked him what the hell happened to all the money he'd just give it 'I make no apologies for spending an extra umpty billion on the NHS'.
And there you were. Beaten.
It's the genius of such glib statements of 'We're doing the right thing'.
By implication the other lot would be doing the 'wrong' thing and you needn't even elaborate on what the 'right' thing is. Which in Gordon Browns case will inevitably be borrowing several hundred more billion quid. Because he's a bit of a one-trick pony like that.
In this way we find ourselves sleep-walking through a decade of unsustainable borrowing and squandering all hailed by the Maximum Idiot and his legions of numpty acolytes as a veritable economic miracle. And when the Yanks and the banks finally pull the plug on his debt-fuelled binge how does he react?
Does he 'fess up that yeah, actually, it was all an unsustainable boom perched on a mountain of debt? Does he hell.
He gets stuck into the yanks and the banks for pulling the pin. Borrow more money he proclaims Squander more cash you don't have. That's what I'm going to do. It's the tough choice! It's the right thing to do!
Completely bonkers. No wonder the Germans couldn't bite their tongue in the face of such manifest idiocy.
What puzzles me is why so many commentators in the UK bite their tongue. They should just laugh in Brown's face every time he comes out with such gems.
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Labour troll at #1
Brown (and labour) have been hopeless for the past decade, and are getting rapidly worse - what hope for the long suffering public if they aren't removed at the earliest opportunity?
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The question we should be asking here.. and asking Derekbarker and is newlabour apologists in particular, is this;
What kind of country do we want our children to inherit?
A country with a morally superior son of the manse spending more and more of our money?
Or a country where sustainable wealth is created from hard work and creativity; where saving for the future is encouraged and where government is a last not a first resort.
'Where there's greed. Margaret Thatcher and the destruction of Britain's future' was a book written by Gordon Brown in 1989. It should be rewritten as 'Where there is an unfettered credit boom. Gordon Brown and the destruction of the UK national balance sheet' It would be an instant best seller.
Of course, it will never be written because no-one is capable of the sort of self righteous preaching that Gordon Brown is.
When the Church of England and the Bishops turn against you there message is simple; son of the manse or no, this is not the country we should bequeath to our children.
Gordon Brown and newlabour are morally bankrupt; lying to make all their numbers add up and borrowing our chidrens' future to finance another round of public sector spending splurges. Britian has become a laughing stock again on the international stage; borrowing Peter to pay Paul. The newlabour model is broken and needs changing; the moral argument for more public sector wastrels and benefits junkies is lost.
Call an election.
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"Their hope is that the changed circumstances, falling interested rates, rising debts and Labour's acceptance that spending can't go on as it has ,will make their policy an election winner now as it's not proved to be in the past."
===
My interested rate in how this corrupt and incompetent Government has squandered our children's futures has certainly fallen.
Methinks your predictive text thingy on your word processor has had a Freudian slip, Nick!
Would you please explain why it is such a bad thing to rein in spending when we don't have enough money to pay for everything we would like?
Also, I can't see the point of this thread, on exactly the same subject as "Plus c'est la même chose?" yesterday.
What about a new thread about Bush's poodle Blair going to collect his shiny baubles from the disgraced, has-been, lame-duck US President next week, whilst neglecting his "duties" as so-called Middle East peace envoy?
How about that Nick, a bit of cutting political comment from you for a change?
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Whilst I agree with the overall reporting of this, it seems to me that within an overall Government spend of around £700 billion it is quite a modest proposal to target a saving of £4 billion. If parts of the population fear this then there is much worse to come in future years - especially if the chancellor's forecasts for either GDP or tax receipts (or both) prove optimistic. The consensus is that his forecasts are on the optimistic side of neutral.
And above all of this there is the fact that the state is edging closer towards 50% of GPD - a figure at which ecomomies cease to function in a proper way. This ratio accelarates automatically as GDP declines in 2009.
So much larger spending reductions above growth trends will occur and this £4 billion is just the start. So those who moan about these modest proposed cuts had better hide under the bed covers for a few years.
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Nick,
Can you tell us how much the government will spend in the next financial year? Will it be higher than Darling has publicly forecast? What proportion of the total forecast spending does 4.1 billion represent?
In other words, your key theme is no more than fluff and froth. The real issues relate to; the number of businesses that will have gone under by the time of the next election, the numbers being made unemployed, the falling tax take and the rising benefits bill. These are the factors that will determine whether we can afford to pay doctors and nurses, not some marginal reduction in the tax take on interest payments. Oh and by the way, what impact might the wholesale devaluation of the pound have on the economy?
Try concentrating on the big picture - you know it makes sense.
ATB
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To humour the author of this twaddle.
GBP 4.1 Bn indeed. How about this for saving GBP 12 Bn, without cutting a single nurse, policeman or gold-plated pension scheme?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7805610.stm
For some reason, the Government is addicted to surveillance and large IT schemes - yet it consistently fails to manage suppliers and costs, or learn from its past mistakes.
There, another 7.9 Bn of tax cuts available, or for repayment of national debt, or more nurses and policemen.
Next topic, please.
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So is this blog entry just recognition that you have been giving the wrong people a hard time with your questioning?
Just when will you start being a journalist and asking questions?
If we don't discover what went wrong and hold them accountable then we will be forever condemned to repeat the same mistakes.
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Nick, did you know there's a bit of a fray on in Gaza?
How about some comment on this, the top news story?
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#11
I could not agree more!
What beggars belief is how timid the BBC journos appear to be when dealing with the government. Labour are a shamles, lying and failing in every sense. Every comment on here and the other blogs reflects that, apart from the BBC Bloggers themselves.
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Every hour that Brown and Labour remain at the controls of our nations finances is a hour (and a million quid also) wasted.
Labour needs removal. That is it. End of debate.
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11. At 10:08am on 06 Jan 2009, the-real-truth wrote:
Labour troll at #1
I have written this again, removing what I would like to do to this blogger. I was out of order! How dare you call me a Labour troll, you angry little person? As it happens, I am not Labour, never have been and never voted Tort either. I want a strong, party who are for England, the UK, and the principles this once great country stood for. I am afraid this so-called Tory opposition is just a watered down, or watered up version of Blair's doctrines.
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#13 yellowbelly1959 wrote:
"Also, I can't see the point of this thread, on exactly the same subject... yesterday.
What about a new thread about Bush's poodle Blair going to collect his shiny baubles from the disgraced, has-been, lame-duck US President next week, whilst neglecting his "duties" as so-called Middle East peace envoy?"
Echoes my feelings exactly. Nick and his genetic clone, Andrew Marr, simply don't want to upset Gordon, who just might try to remove another of the BBC's testic*es.
Sorry, my mistake, McBroon couldn't, the BBC hasn't got any.
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is Derek signing on this morning?
or perhaps attending a diversity workshop?
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C'mon Nick ; ask Brown why he squandered the nation's wealth on the workshy, immigration and a host of other Labour dogma fuelled projects that benefit no one except the party members holding down the non jobs in local and national government departments. This is truly the most incompetent government Britain has had since Attlee bunkrupted it. Yet here we are, listening to BBC journalists analysing Tory policies which to say the least are only ideas of what the next government may have to do to repair the damage. Until the government comes clean on the true extent of the problem, ( which is what you should be asking about ) no other party can put forward concrete proposals, and in any case why should they give ideas to the incompetents presently running the country ? I suspect when Cameron enters Downing St. one of his first priorities will be a careful assessment of the BBC's funding and political make up.
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1 and 3
Well, I saw the Paxman - Osborne interview on Newsnight, but reading your comments, I wonder if you did!
Paxman's interviewing, particularly of opposition figures, is nothing to do with political debate and everything to do with massaging the ego of one Paxman, J.
As far as Paxman's performance was concerned, it consisted of interruptions so frequent that Osborne rarely had the chance to finnish a sentence, questioning from such an obtuse standpoint that barely anyone could have known where he was coming from, and sudden subject changes whenever Osborne was developing an argument. It finally dissolved into laughable irrelevancy as the final subject change departed from politics at all and dissolved into facetious remarks about the Cameron - Osborne relationship.
Against all of this, no-one would have managed a coherent exposition of policy, and so measured against what little was achievable, Osborne did pretty well. He said as much as he could, was consistent, waved off the interruptions and dodged the potential pitfalls of mistaking Paxman's ignorant and obtuse huffing for anything sensible.
The wider question is why on Earth did he bother to show up for the interview in the first place. Newsnight is no longer to be taken seriously on domestic political issues because of its overweaning fawning to the Labour party. Paxman is a long way past his prime as a political interviewer; allowing yourself to be interviewed by him is merely making a donation to his retirement fund. I suspect he merely wants a final politcal scalp and then he will be off, and good riddance. Osborne's success was making sure that that scalp was not going to be his.
I would say that good advice to the Conservatives is to steer clear of Newsnight. It is left-leaning trash, dedicated to its own collective ego and the individual egos of its makers, hubris in its purest form, and nothing at all to do with constructive politics.
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Anyone see Brown on Marr?
If the World had listened to Brown the credit crunch would never have happened - apparently.
Brown pointedly refused to accept any blame whatsoever.
He also plumbed new depths when launching into his "do nothing, do nothing Tories mantra" he then went off message (I hope) and said the Tories were revelling in the fact there is a recession.
Crikey - talk about pots and black kettles. I've never seen anyone look so happy.
Disgraceful. What was more disgraceful is that Marr didn't challenge him to justify this appalling statement.
The media need to get a grip.
Someone needs to tell them that Labour are the Government and have been for the past 11 years.
They need to justify why the think that 4 billion is such a big deal when forecast government borrowing is likely to overshoot by 5 times that in 2009.
The media, in short, need a new mindset.
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i'm not a tory but a 'do nothing' mentality makes perfect sense or is understandable or excusable when dealing with such atrocious 'accidental' financial screw ups. it also looks like you are doing nothing when you are deeply thinking.
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26. At 10:55am on 06 Jan 2009, jrperry wrote:
1 and 3
I cannot agree with many points in your letter, but agree that Paxman uses the programme to massage his ego -rather like an intellectual massage parlour - hope the moderator allows this to pass.
As a student I studied rhetoric, concentrating on Aristotle and the Greek classical writers. I learned, by hard experience, that facing a tough opposition to maintain my stance.
If Osborne find the going too rough in the BBC studio, how will he fare in the rough thrust of the House of Commons? Even now, he doesn't do too well.
My advice is crude, If it is too hot in the kitchen get out!!!! There are surely others less 'sensitive' able to take on his position.
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#26
I didn't see the show but it sounds from what you report as if Osborne made the schoolboy error of actually answering Paxman's questions.
Gordon Brown et al have shown the way here.
You simply sit through the question and then launch into a tirade of moonshine about the opposition backed up with some bogus numbers printed by the ONS.
Just completely ignore the presenter. They should be well used to it by now. After all Marr and Paxman have had over a decade of such treatment. Any time the presenter tries to get you back on-topic just give it a full-on patronizing "If I could just finish Mr Paxman...' and then continue with the tirade.
Indeed I'm all for Cameron adopting the tactic at PMQ. Just 'ask' a 30-minute fillibustering 'question' that is essentially a tirade of abuse at Gordon Brown's incompetence.
Fantastic.
I mean it's not like Brown answers the question anyway so why even ask him a question. Just kick off on an avalanche of abuse listing the many idiocies of his past decade of incompetence.
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23. At 10:49am on 06 Jan 2009, brynt41 wrote:
#13 yellowbelly1959 wrote:
...
Echoes my feelings exactly. Nick and his genetic clone, Andrew Marr, simply don't want to upset Gordon, who just might try to remove another of the BBC's testic*es.
===
Of course the problem, as I learned in astronomy, is that Marrs has a lack of gravity ;-)
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#4 spot on.
This fallacy that money spent is directly related to service delivered has to be challenged all the time.
This governement was elected on a mandate to improve public services and set about raising money to do just that. It's mistake, in my opinion, was that it saw the way to do that through the imposition of performance targets.
While at first sight to many people this seems a natural and sensible option unfortunately the law of unintended consequences comes into being. These targets distort the systems of service delivery such that organisations lose sight of their purpose and the end customer gets totally forgotten. Anyone who works in a target based culture will know what I mean.
Realising this, there has been an attempt to implement so-called "lean" principles into service delivery which has been led by consultants who have implemented it in manufacturing with varying degrees of success (generally quite good) unfortunately delivering services to people is totally different from making 3 million widgets due to the complexity of the different requirements, and has led to low morale and even worse service delivery in general.
Unfortunately one principle that seems to apply to so many politicians is "never apologise, never explain", how I long to hear those words "we got it wrong, I'm sorry." Any politician who wants my vote could start here. I'd prefer it if not too many mistakes were made mind, but I'd feel way more comfortable with someone who accepted responsibility and didn't try spinning their way out treating us as fools.
I don't mind paying taxes to fund services that other people require, I do object if this money is used badly on badly designed systems that demotivate the people who are trying to provide these much needed services by professional politicians who frankly would need extra training before running the proverbial whelk stall.
Rant over.
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I can save £18 million at the Beeb just by getting rid of Jonathon Ross! I'm sure there is also massive waste from the top down. The quality of programming is so dumbed down even you Nick seem to have lost what you once had.
Attack attack attack! That is all that seems to come when the Tories announce policy. Please try to be at least a little balanced in your blogging and reporting. The general population knows that Labour has wasted billions. Quangos for example chew up ridiculous amounts of money - that may be an area for the tories to look for example.
This country is in a real mess and yet you seem to take delight in opposing any change. Very strange ideology you and your editors have - must be the cushy number methinks!
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How about a consrvative liberal government of national unity after the next election?
David Cameron as PM and Vince Cable as Chancellor.
Liberals bought off with a referendum on proportional representation in year 2 of the parliament.
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“Labour's acceptance that spending can't go on as it has”
WHO? WHEN? WHERE?
Nick this is the biggest story around bar none.
The £1 Trillion debt figures in the Pre-Budget Report where based on the UK coming out of recession and showing growth in the 3 Q 2009.
Gordon Brown said in his Andrew Marr interview (Party Political Broadcast) yesterday that we will be in recession for 2 years.
If Gordon is right this will mean 6 more quarters of recession than they forecast 3 months ago.
What will the total amount of borrowing if we have 6 quarters more of recession than is currently forecast?
As Brown now does not agree with the forecasts of recession in the PBR the borrowing figures you are relying on are massively out and the amount of debt they are running up is incalculable.
WHOS FIGURES DON’T ADD UP? Surely Labour’s.
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Where's derek this morning?
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Supposed to be the worst recession since the 30's yet not one labour minister has said it and I have not seen or heard you mention it Nick..................."recession".
It's called a downturn in the LBC's (Labour Broadcasting Corporation) eyes and their masters at No 10.
These blogs are simply on here to keep the wheels turning on the Labour spin machine.
Sorry but Nick Robinson & Andrew Marr are simply labour stooges, just watch interviews with ministers and then watch interviews with shadow ministers.
See who gets off easiest with questioning.
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That's the ID card scheme scrapped, then.
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@ #24
ROFL bring back derek!
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24. canttakeanymore
probably not. Champagne socialists don't typically get out of bed before 12pm. All that stamping of the Proles must really take it out of them.
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# 1 phoenixariseng
Disagree.
Jeremy Paxman used his usual line of interview when he did not give George Osborne the chance to answer the question. Osborne did shut up the 'bullying' Paxman when he said the line of questioning was the worst he'd known.
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The Conservatives shouldn't look very far for savings. Here is a piece of news "overlooked" by some of the media.
The UK contributions to the EU, already set to treble over the next three years, this year will cost us 3 additional billion Pounds because the UK had agreed to pay in Euros!
Any connections with the argument about scrapping the Pound? In the meantime we add this little extra to the taxpayers' debt.
Talking about good administration and balancing the books!
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#38
Very well said Sir - completely agree with you.
It is however a travesty that the Brown Broadcasting Corporation - and in particular the Chief Political Editor refuse to question the sqaunder of billions upon billions of £'s of our money - but they can make two days of pitiful reporting questioning just £5b the tories are proposing..
It absolutely beggars belief.
I really though t the new year would bring fresh impetus to this blog debate - but no, it's more of the same - in fact it's only 6th Jan and this is how bad it is already...
I feel as furous as you do Sir...but not only at Labour - but at the BBC also...
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29 phoenix
You miss the point entirely. I'm surprised you hadn't noticed, given your finely-honed debating skills!
Paxman isn't a "tough opposition" - he's an irrelevancy. No more does an opposition politician fine up his arguments by debating with Paxman, than he does by having a rant at a shop assistant.
All Paxman did was get huffy and confused when Osborne pointed out that he could only call for policy in the present; he couldn't anticipate how the policy would have to be developed after the two budgets and another PBR that lie between now and the election. Even Brown and Darling don't know what those budgets would contain. When Osborne refused to weaken on that line of questioning, all that Paxman did was change the subject, indeed, hillariously by the end of the interview.
This is the whole point. The purpose of Newsnight seems to be to try to set up Paxman for one last time as a theatrical "grand inquisitor". If his performance as an interviewer doesn't get him there, and they usually don't these days, then the stage lighting and the editing come to his aid.
There is simply no point in the interviewee being there at all - the slant of the programme is such that they aren't the main feature. So I would say to Osborne - just don't bother to be interviewed by Paxman. There are better ways of spending ten minutes than that!
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There's a book called Squandered by David Craig who outlines how Gordon Brown has wasted one trillion pounds. And that was written before the latest Brown bust.
I would have thought that 4billion is a mere drop in the ocean.
Meanwhile I see Yvette Cooper still has the same tape in her recorder when she "appears" on the BBC, she really is getting a bit tiresome and predictable.
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I for one am really pleased with this story/comment. At last we have a clear point of difference between the two parties and have something to argue about.
At last we have a choice between two different philosophies on how to cope with a recession. To me they are being reported as intervene and increase borrowing to create jobs letting high income earners pay more tax in later years or do nothing allow unsustainable jobs to go and let the recession take its course giving basic rate taxpayers who save more than 3K per year and pensioners a bit more money to spend to stimulate the economy. Which one the electorate chooses will depend on which one they feel is more important to them.
We will also have some clear indication of how a fiscal stimulus works (or not) in practice by the time of the next election by watching what happend in Obama's America.
I am slightly worried about Cameron's plans for a green stockmarket -I think creating another playground for the city to trade in and potentiallty lose billions as they all rush for a new way to make a bonus is a bit risky!
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Your proposals are only for the next 3 month to an opposition spokesman.
He had to keep interrupting because he was short of lines of attack.
Then rounded off with the carrying a bucket following a horse metaphor on why Cameron was leading on the Economy.
Paxman Paxman what has happened to you.
You have reached the heady heights of Robinson & Marr.
The only one who has any credibility anymore is Andrew Neil
BBC, who has kidnapped you and where are you being held.
Does anyone know who the regulator of bias on the BBC is? I wish to make an official complaint.
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All these comments about £billions. I came accross the article below by Steve Bee on Citywire, I know it is pensions based, however it does give an idea of the real magnitude of debt this joke of a Government is building for our children. I totally agree with *38 and am in the same position of employing people and trying to make a business work whilst paying out to fund others total incompetence. Anyone with kids should look at funding their emigration. I am!
"Hmm! Two things. Both from the newspapers one way or another.
First off, the Confederation of British Industry (the CBI) put out a press release called Clearing The Pensions Fog; it's all about the liabilities for the unfunded pensions liabilities in the public sector.
The CBI reckons that the liabilities amount to much more than the £645 billion the Government claims. The CBI estimate is that the liability is more like £915 billion. That's close to one trillion pounds!
And that's the second thing: it's hard to understand exactly what a number that large is all about, but I read something interesting on that subject too, it came from somewhere in America, but I've translated it here for you.
It's this. Imagine you were lucky enough to be put in a massive vault somewhere in the bowels of the Royal Mint and that room was full of five pound notes (they're the little blue ones). And just say you were told that you would get to keep each and every note that you signed your name on; sort of some financial version of Supermarket Sweep or something. How long would it take you to get yourself a trillion pounds?
Well, say you could sign one fiver a second. That would mean that you'd gain yourself £300 every minute by signing 60 of them. After an hour you'd have a pile of £18,000 all signed up and if you could keep going at that rate for 24 hours without a break you'd amass a cool £432,000. Not a bad day's work. If you could keep up that punishing pace and go without sleep for a whole week you would be a millionaire with £3,024,000 in your pile of signed fivers. Keep that up for a whole year and you'd have over £157 million in your pile (my calculator hit the wall with that one, so it's all estimates from here on in – so no smart Alec e-mails please). To get a billion pounds (which is a thousand million pounds) I reckon would take you about six years. To get to a trillion pounds (which is a thousand billion pounds) would therefore take you something in the region of 6,000 years to accomplish.
I suppose, to put that another way, you'd have had to have started the process of signing fivers about 1,500 years before the Great Pyramid of Cheops was built to have any realistic chance of having signed a trillion pounds worth by now. That's a long time to stay alive let alone stay awake! Not only that, but signing one a second would have been pretty difficult with a dip quill and ink from 4000BC right up to 1938 when the biro was invented, so I'd imagine the whole process of putting a trillion pounds together by signing five pound notes would be quite a palaver all in all.
It's a big number a trillion. It'd be a big pile of fivers too. I guess that's what the CBI are getting at when they say it might be useful if an independent public sector pensions commission could be established to analyse the costs and set assumptions that could be used to help us all understand what we're in for from our future taxes to pay for all these pension promises"
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I disagree with Nick, although I praise him for pointing out Labour's usual tactics
the past three elections were not built on winning arguments over taxes, they were built on the tories being hopeless and unappealing - having four leaders since 1997 might be a clue there - they offered no alternative to Blair's Labour who were doing a reasonably good job (politically) until Iraq, then held it together until Blair left, after which the sort of people Labour really are was exposed
now with recession, a weak leader and mounting debts economic policy has become top dog again, tax cuts chime well with people, especially after over a decade of 'stealth' taxes, which we all grumbled about but put up with when there were jobs
basically the tories have had to wait until the one policy that always works for them became popular enough
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Hey Kiki some sense from you. Clear headed? You are dead right. Tories not coming up with anything is indeed because they are THINKING. Something Brown et al seem not to have the talent for.
You know what? I personally have found that all problems in my life have been satisfactorily resolved by THINKING.
Think about it. Could be the Conservative's new slogan.
Time for a Change. We are thinking what you are thinking.....
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47. At 12:11pm on 06 Jan 2009, Paulbeers wrote:
I for one am really pleased with this story/comment. At last we have a clear point of difference between the two parties and have something to argue about.
===
The story, yes, but this is the second blog in 2 days, almost identical to yesterday's posting by Nick. Lazy journalism in the extreme.
Why not a new post about Blair going to the USA next week to receive his US Medal Of Freedom from, apparently with no irony at all, Bush.
Maybe he will collect his congressional Gold Medal at the same time, seeing as he has been too busy since 2003 to collect it.
By the way, what has been the contribution of the Middle East Peace Envoy to seeking a resolution to the present conflict?
See Nick, it's quite easy really if you put your mind to it!
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49. It's a huge number but if you compare it with the likes of France and Germany, we are actually a lot better off.
If you add the pension debt to the existing national debt, the UK owes around 110-130% of GDP (depending on who's figures you use).
Germany's national debt, once you add in public sector pension liabilities, is around 240% of GDP. France's is around 190% of GDP.
I forget Italy's but I think it's another calculator-busting figure.
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#1 I would agree with you, it takes a very astute Politician to stand up to Paxo. Is that why Brown never does an interviewed with him , prefering instead to subject himself to a grilling by the likes of Fiona Phillips on the GMTV sofa ?
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#38, spot on!
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Labour's acceptance that spending can't go on as it has
Hooning heck Nick, stand up to the NuLab bullies putting words in your mouth for once. As long as you continue to push the agenda of this government* we will have no respect for you.
*read as: "sleazy gang united only by a fear of being found out and a lust for power"
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53. At 12:40pm on 06 Jan 2009, Reluctant-Expat wrote:
49. It's a huge number but if you compare it with the likes of France and Germany, we are actually a lot better off.
If you add the pension debt to the existing national debt, the UK owes around 110-130% of GDP (depending on who's figures you use).
Germany's national debt, once you add in public sector pension liabilities, is around 240% of GDP. France's is around 190% of GDP.
===
You haven't included all the PFI costs in your UK figures, nor the Northern Rock bail -out, nor the bank bail-out. What would all those add up to?
Also, how can you say we are better off? don't you mean, even if we accept all your figures, that we are not as badly off as....
From where I am sitting I don't see the UK being better off at all, if that was the case why have the currency markets voted with their feet in respect of Sterling?
Don't forget "a weak currency is the sign of a weak economy, which is the sign of a weak government". - James Gordon Brown.
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52 yellowbelly
I think this is the only story Nick can really cover - his job is covering westminster, political news is slow right now
He has no mandate to cover Tony Blair's medal from Bush, he's a peace envoy now, newsworthy to us but not part of his job
and the Israel conflict is a foreign matter - so Nick can really only focus on what Brown, Cameron and Clegg and co say about it, and most of that will be covered by foreign correspondents unless it's a major thing
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We are faced with an uncceptable Government, I share many of the views expressed here in the comments regarding how are wonderful country is being lead to ruin.
Feel free to contact me here: http://news.spotz.com/groups/gordon_brown_must_go/default.aspx
Alan
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53. I am aware of those numbers - but good point well made.
It does show the issue that 'old' europe has in funding its future. I honestly think that this is one of the basic reasons behind the aim of massive EU expansion. The only way Europe can dilute this massive level of future debt is by a vast increase in taxpayer base without bringing in countries with the same level of future debt.
Without bringing in millions of other taxpayers to spread this I dont know how they will cope. I think we have two big questions:
1) do we want to further increase the liability on the UK taxpayer by helping fund the massive future unfunded promises in 'old' europe?
2) do we have a responsibility to help otherwise we may see massive social unrest?
Nick - these are the propper big questions you should be asking GB. Not that I would expect an answer other than something about 'the do nothing torys'.
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Well folks all the traditional Political debates of old like how should we finance this , how much should we spend on that, should one take precedence over the other and such like are now officially redundant since under Brown there IS NO MONEY !
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57. I'm not a Labour supporter, not by a long shot, but those are the figures. Up to you whether you believe them or not!
If you add in PFI as well, the difference changes but not by much. We're not the only country using this financing scheme.
Germany is spending similar sums on their bail-out as us (despite their finance minister's protestations about the method) so that doesn't change much there either.
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Nick can't you get it into your head, no matter what Labour do they are finished. All the spin you put out about the economy will not decide the next Election, 11 years of wasting tax payers money will come home to roost.
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Paxman has great entertainment value (especially on University Challenge), but as a journalist he is irrelevant.
Personally I don't care what or who the opposition is - or what their policies are.
After 11 years of the Rocky Tony and Gordon Horror Show I want them out.
I'd vote for a pig's head on a stick if I was assured that it would beat NuLabour.
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Nick
While considering the governments exhaltation to spend and not to save, and to take out more credit...
Could you get each of the front bench to publish their net-worth?
I sincerly hope that they are all fully debted-up with no savings, no assets and maxed out credit cards -- otherwise they would appear to be asking us to take a position that they do not consider right for themselves...
And that would be a bit hypocritical... wouldn't it?...
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Oh by the way when we are debating about how bad things are or not for the PM what do the real experts have to say about his chances at an election ie the bookies ?
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Nick, why are you picking holes in the tories plans to use £4.1bn to help savers? This amount is nothing compared to the vast sums of money labour has squandered.
Take the recent VAT cut, for example: 12bn spent for very little in return. By contrast, black wednesday cost the country less than a third of that amount.
Some perspective, please.
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Labour is hopeless socially and economically. We all know that.
Everybody I speak to in all walks of life out here on the street say the same. Many are unsure of the Conservatives but are willing to take the plunge just to get Brown out.
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"In each case the Tories lost the argument and the election. "
Sorry, but that doesn't follow at all. Yes, the Tories lost the election, but how do you know it had anything at all do do with that specific argument?
People vote for all sorts of reasons, and many people don't understand the arguments, let alone know who won them. I suspect the 2 main reasons why the Tories lost the last 2 elections are:
1. People still remembered all the Sleaze of the Major government, which, at the time of the last election (although not any more) was probably worse than Labour Sleaze
2. The Tories kept electing a succession of complete non-entities as leader
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# 65, ouch!
now that WOULD be interesting to see....Toenails, any comments?
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"How much is Britain’s true national debt? Gordon Brown says 37% of GDP, the ONS says 43% of GDP – but this is just government debt. The reason Britain is in so much trouble is that our corporate and household debts are huge. It is the combination that makes us such a credit liability – but no one has ever put together a combination.
Until now.
Michael Saunders from CitiGroup has calculated ‘external debt’ – ie, what Britain owes the rest of the world. It is not 40% but 400% of GDP, the highest in the G7 by some margin. The next down, France, is 176%. America, flagellating itself for blowing such a debt bubble, is just 100%. Japan is about half America. The below graph shows ‘external debt’ – both in mid-2008, and five years ago. "
http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/3078296/the-true-extent-of-britains-debt.thtml
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phoenixarisenq at 1
Well you can see Paxman here, click just below the S on the SHARE button to see the start of the interview.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00gnjl9/Newsnight_05_01_2009/
Osborne isnt great it has to be said, but his point is clear and clearly right. Im all for giving Politicians a hard time but Paxman was crap and didnt even scratch the surface. Which is a shame.
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Oh yes. and Im with Max at 64
A pigs head will do nicely.
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BRASS NECK AWARD 2009
The ex-head of children's services at the council at the centre of the Baby P case is appealing against her sacking.
Sharon Shoesmith was dismissed from Haringey Council last month after a damning initial report into her department's role in Baby P's death.
The 17-month-old, who was on the council's "at-risk" register, died in 2007 after a series of major injuries.
A spokesman for Haringey Council in north London confirmed Ms Shoesmith was appealing against her dismissal.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7812845.stm
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
#62
Reluctant-Expat.
Welcome, have you made the move?
Did you mention the last conservative government had a GDP rate of 43%?
A good new year to you!
Did you get a new coat.
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oo, barking is back on...brace yourself for another dose of ben elton 80's style rehash...
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Shackinup and others re the pensions deficit.
Whatever the actual total figure of Government Debt in the UK as a % of GDP, the fact is it is a lot worse now due to Gordon Brown. The pensions fiasco itself has his fingerprints all over it as the UK had massive private pensions surpluses almost equivalent to the whole requirement of the EU, until Brown came to power and immediately started taxing it. Since then my pension pot has shrunk to less than one third of what it would have been under a fiscally competent Government.
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opps spoke too soon I see the random word generator has returned.
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We all know that both Marr and Robinson will do nothing against their Labour masters.
They both live in a world where they know better than you and I. It will be something of a surprise to them both when this rotten government gets kicked out on it's ear for a generation because they now believe their own nonsense.
The fawning interview of Brown by Marr on Sunday was a disgrace to what was once the great BBC and it probably can't get any worse...but I am sure they will try.
Sky aren't much better but it's the BBC who will wake up to new masters within 18 months.
What goes around.....comes around.....:)
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Nick,
The reason the tories lost the argument was because all the BBC interviewers/journalists used the same totally incorrect line that labour used; the BBC constantly said that the tories would get rid of front-line public servants, and they always over-simplified how savings can be made, and also the BBC never mentioned the fact that you can also reduce the increase in spending by simple natural wastage (ie not employing new people once someone retires in a backoffice).
In short, the BBC have always lied when it comes to how the tories run (or plan to run) the government/economy, and that's one of the main reasons that their poll ratings still aren't significantly higher than labour.
Whenever you hear Paxman (or any other BBC interviewer for that matter) interview MPs on the economy, his line is always this to the tories: "you're going to sack thousands of nurses, and no, I don't want to listen to your logic about why I'm wrong on that point." and his line to labour is always "aren't those tories horrible, they're trying to undo all the wonderful things you've done."
I think it's finally reached the stage now where most people who would previously have believed the BBC, now treat it as a joke when it comes to political reporting, because they can physically see the damage that Brown/Labour have caused in their own pay packets and redundancy notices.
Sorry Nick, but the vast majority of reasonable people don't believe your/labour's line anymore; your party is finished for at least a generation come 2010.
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Interesting but entirely predictable poll result
http://www.whatthenationthinks.com/UK/results.asp?PollID=16765
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Nick,
Do you think that Brown is hanging around long enough to collect one of those individually designed medals that Blair is expecting to receive? After all his services to debt and to b.....ing up the country are just as commendable?
In truth, Brown will hopefully disappear down the plughole, and Blair will become mired in the middle east, while we continue to pay back the billions spent by these obnoxious creatures.
ATB
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I did not even wait to the end of the Paxman interview with Osborne before switching off, it was simply too painful to watch.
For quite some time I have thought that this fairly aggressive 'style' of interviewing is ultimately counter-productive and David Frost has recently indicated the same perspective.
Furthermore, I have decided that it watching news late at night, which recently seems to comprise of horribly injured children, never-ending wars, mass layoffs, business failures, politicians spouting the usual guff et al is NOT conducive to a good nights sleep.
So, sorry Nick, it is C4 News at 7pm, when I'm usually still in a frame of mind that can handle it, and nothing else from now on unless somebody can come up with a late night 'good' news programme.
PS. Perhaps a blogger can come up with the ratio of public to private sector workers that a developed economy might reasonable expect to have. That could be a potential starting point when discussing Government 'savings'.
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One other thing. Sky seem to have at least realised that when they blog they should also comment and respond within the blog.
The aloofness they previously had did much to damage the blogs and any perception of there being a real commitment to listen to the hoi polloi.
It might be nice if BBC bloggers afforded the licence payers the same consideration.....
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77. Hey there!
Got quite bored with trying to debate with a bunch of gullible/lying/deluded/infantile/all-of-the-above Scottish nationalists. That used to be a good blog before they all turned up.
The independence campaign is a dead duck and Shreck's absolute obsession with it is going to be the end of him. There's always a silver lining!
I believe that was the debt ratio in 1997 (although that obviously didn't include PFI/pension debts).
No new coat but this eternal child finally got a Wii!
How's all with you?
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I see you have a reputation on here, Derek!
LOL!
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I can sense - very much as last year, that we are getting bored again...with the labour propoganda that is supposed to be an unbiased blog.
So much so that commentators here are now posting their own news..
I have an idea - why doesn't the Brown Broadcasting Corporation give us a break, allow all these commentators to write the blog of the day and ask the 'journo's' to comment...it will certainly be more interesting than the groundhog day of political reporting we have had for the past few months.
I wonder what Nick's next blog entry will be - it's taking time so I can only assume Mandy is waiting for some kind of glib miniscule of wrong footing by the Cons/Libs so Nick can report it...
But no, let's concentrate on where on earth the Cons are going to find the massive 4.1 billion from - such a heinous crime for them to say such a thing - crikey that is going to break us for sure...
Wake up BBC
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82. yellowbelly1959
You clearly dont understand Derek Barker economics do you.
If the country hired 1.5million recession busting consultants on 100k a year unemployment would be gone in a flash. average salaries would rocket, so would mean average pensions.
In fact lets buy them all a Yacht too
Whats the problem?
Dont you remember Thatcher?
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"Age Concern urged vulnerable older people to take extra precautions to stay warm and keep active during the cold spell.
The charity added that £5bn of benefits were still going unclaimed, although the government said 2.5 million cold weather payments had already been made. "
There's your savings to pay for Camerons savings tax cut right there!
5Bn unclaimed mainly cos the pensioners are too proud and the government dont inform them well enough about their entitlement. So the ideal way to address it is to leave it in thier savings in the first place then they dont need to claim and you dont need to inform them of the entitlement.
Job done, Next!
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Why are the interviews so contrived?
We can't believe a word said on the BBC any more as it's edited in favour of the left.
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90. I'm like you. The endless hand-wringing and griping has totally overwhelmed news reports and made it all too exasperating.
For me, it's just the BBC news site (short and to the point without too many shrill cries of doom and gloom) plus the 'papers' section on Sky News during my morning coffee.
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#93
"Just keeping the kettle luke warm"
The fibre optic fast lane! Jeez! Do you think young Cameron is praying for a rising sun?
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I see my posts #82, #84, & #85 have been referred to the moderator. Very BBC.
They all referred to examples of wasteful public spending highlighted today and now they get censored. Very Stasi/ ZaNuLabour!!
And now #76 has disappeared as well!! What is going on?
That posted a link to the BBC News website!!!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7812845.stm
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Paul Beers at 47 raises a point that has bugging me - the comparison between the "Tories who would do nothing" spin theme (ably replayed a thousand times by left-leaning "news" media) and what Labour really have done.
So far as I can tell, what Labour actually have done is -
The bank bailout - supported by the Tories but with caveats about its effectiveness that now seem very fully justified.
The PBR, which merely raised borrowing (massively) to defend the majority of existing regular government expenditure against the reality of the collapse in tax revenues.
The temporary reduction in VAT, which clearly has achieved so little that even the government doesn't talk about it any more.
All to be paid for by a future hike in VAT, an increase in employers' NI (which suppresses employment) and future massive raises in income tax that we largely can't imagine at present.
And that's it.
We have had some rhetoric on a £3billions capital plan on road-building and a few other areas, to create 100,000 temporary jobs (at £30,000 each) - announced in the PBR and then reannounced by Brown on Sunday and Monday, but otherwise little else, and nothing of substance. Obviously a lot of propaganda showing the PM jumping about like a mad-man, the latest being his "jobs summits", but that is all talk and no action.
Meanwhile, the Conservatives have proposed a succession of sensible macro-economic measures, like credit garuantees, which have genuine potential to save jobs and businesses, but have no chance of being taken up by the government on the "not invented here" principle.
So we have a government that has done nothing of substance but emit hot air (and chuck away billions on the VAT mess), against apparently sensible policies from the opposition. And yet we still hear from Brown of "The Tories who would do nothing"!
Am I alone in thinking that truth has been the first victim of this recession?
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I would have thought anyone with an ounce of common sense would welcome these measures from D. Cameron or do we believe we can continue to spend tax payers money at the same rate. Any money moved from the public sector to the private even in this small way should applauded by all.
The bank bail out did not work and was never destined to whilst banks hold toxic debt so either more money needs to be pumped in or we continue as we are until the banks are able to balance their books. Movement from the public sector needs to happen now to save the private. The spiteful taxes which are to come into force on high earners should be reversed as it will not touch the amount of money we need in taxes, but will impede needed investment and the ability of the banks to lend. I thought we had leant this lesson from the past Labour Governments who tried it and brought Britain to its knees.
Furthermore I would have thought that the English would want to be rid of Labour simply from the point of view of the Scottish issue which needs to be resolved. The money flow to Scotland is unjust in every way an example of which has happened recently, when the overpaid public sector pensions are to be adjusted in England they are not going to be in Scotland under Darlings instruction.
I dont care about the Paxman interview with G. Osborne, I dont want a performer like Blair or someone who just talks on and on like Brown I want someone who knows what hes doing which Osborne does. The only fair interviewer anyway is Andrew Neil and hes the only one I bother to listen to.
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I used to respect Paxo for his tenacity, but the hatchet job on Osborne last night was a rude awakening.
Whether Osborne is up to the cut and thrust is not the point. Personally, I doubt he is. Eitherway, what amazed me was Paxo's line of questioning and constant interrupting.
Considering he's an opposition chancellor with realistically no chance of getting the job until 2010, what is the point of asking him anything?
Couldnt Paxo's energies have been better spent asking the same questions, with the same voracity of Darling and Gordon? And asking Mandy about his stay on Deripaska's boat?
I realise its probably fun for the BBC to pick on the equivalent of the runt in the playground, but just because you can doesnt mean you should.
Hardly makes you look fair and objective, does it?
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D'Oh!
OK.... which one of you chumps said "derekbarker" three times in quick succession??
havent we learned to be careful what we wish for??
Del:
a HSBO????
Not an ASBO??? ;-)
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This is getting ridiculous!
Now my posting does not even appear in the first place.
"Cash-strapped council bosses believe they have come up with a new approach to fighting the credit crunch - by hiring a £100k anti-recession guru.
The taxpayer-funded position has been created by council bosses in a bid to 'protect people against the economic downturn'.
But the move has been met with criticism from taxpayer groups who have labelled the move as a waste of time and money."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1106763/Council-bosses-fight-credit-crunch--hiring-100k-anti-recession-guru.html
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"The Government spent around £200,000 on taking every single member of the Cabinet out of London for one day, it emerged today.
An away-day in November the discuss the economic crisis cost the taxpayer almost £140,000 in policing costs alone, according to data released by West Yorkshire police.
The extra costs in a similar, earlier trip to Birmingham were £62,000 - meaning that if the same amount was spent in Leeds, the total visit cost taxpayers almost £200,000."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1106642/Government-spends-200-000-Cabinet-away-day--discuss-Britains-financial-crisis.html
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"Civil servants are being sent to a luxury hotel for 'diversity' courses costing nearly £2,000 a head, it was revealed yesterday.
The seminars are held over five days at the venue, which stands in 65-acre grounds and boasts a pool, tennis courts, a croquet lawn and a gymnasium.
The courses are run by the little-known National School of Government, an arm of the Cabinet Office, at the Sunningdale Park venue near Ascot, Berkshire.
Sessions involve 'role play with actors', and 'awareness workshops'.
Each bedroom has en-suite facilities, flat-screen TVs and complimentary wi-fi internet connection.
Included in the £1,755 cost of the 'Managing Diversity' course are meals, which are served in the Steam, Bake and Grill restaurant.
Among those sent on courses have been police officers, council tax inspectors and members of financial watchdog Audit Scotland.
Wiltshire Police, a small rural force, sent 20 employees on one course alone.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1106073/Luxury-lessons-diversity-civil-servants-cost-nearly-2-000-head.html
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103
Derek - Do state schools now give lessons for 3 instruments? We never heard of that when our son was a budding musician - we had to pay a king's ransom to get him into a private college.
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87. Good to see the names of all concerned are out in the public domain. Rhy's killer was recently badly injured in prison and hopefully this lot should see similar treatment very soon.
101. Cameron/Osbourne (isn't there anyone better within the Tories?!) need to publicise their policies. All to often, we only hear about how they think Brown is doing this or that wrong.....but what would they do??
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derekbarker @ 99
I think that a fibre-optic network 'to the home' will indeed be a transformational technology thats opens up all sorts of possibilities and should be encouraged.
Especially if (mobile) WiMax technology is also introduced.
However, there is little chance of that happening in the near future because the mobile phone companies foolishly paid Gordon Brown some twenty-two billion, yes billion, pounds for 3G mobile licenses ... which, of course, has mostly turned out to be a almost complete waste of money and a flawed technology (not being scaleable and mast density being the biggest problems with 3G).
So, probably no WiMax in the UK (apart those systems already in Milton Keynes and Maidstone) until the mobile phone companies can swallow their pride and invest in this.
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(edited repost of #38)
#22 labour troll
What exactly is the point of criticizing the opposition ? They have no power to do anything... so who cares ?
I'll tell you - the only objective in criticising the opposition is to divert attention from the genuine, real, actual diaster that is the labour government.
You can waste time guessing what things would be like under the tories, but we can actually see what things are like under labour - they are bad, and getting rapidly worse.
You are right, I am angry - absolutely ******* furious that the government are shafting me and shafting my childrens future.
You are right, I am a 'little person' just running my own little business trying to generate enough wealth so when the government steal my money for their many stupid 'pet projects' and to fill their own pockets, I might have enough left to look after my familly without running up debts.
I've been prudent, but its been squandered by government profligancy.
Brown says 'you must borrow or all will suffer' I say - get thee behind me satan, I will not copy your foolish ways.
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#105
Fubar' D'Oh! Yes, you are quite right ASBO.
Cant get away from this banking mode Eh!
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Nick
If Paxman can ask Osborne on national TV about his visit to Deripaska's yacht, why can't you ask Mandleson what he was doing there?
See.....I haven't forgotten.
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YOU COULDN'T MAKE IT UP AWARD 2009
"Council bosses fight the credit crunch... by hiring £100k anti-recession guru
Cash-strapped council bosses believe they have come up with a new approach to fighting the credit crunch - by hiring a £100k anti-recession guru.
The taxpayer-funded position has been created by council bosses in a bid to 'protect people against the economic downturn'.
But the move has been met with criticism from taxpayer groups who have labelled the move as a waste of time and money.
Bosses at Labour-run Lancashire County Council said the move was part of a wider scheme to boost investment in the county.
The successful applicant will be paid up to £93,180, plus a £5,300 car allowance and the council will spend thousands more advertising to recruit to the post. "
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1106763/Council-bosses-fight-credit-crunch--hiring-100k-anti-recession-guru.html
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@105 Fubar
He's a champagne socilaist so he pronounces it Hantysocial
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#101 jrperry
Good post making a good point! However I personally think that truth was the first victim of this Labour government back in 1997.
You also used the dreaded "R" word so I'd suspect you'll be moderated soon for undermining public confidence.
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#108 yellowbelly
It's not just civil servants who get to go on these irrelevant courses - front line emergency services staff are constantly sent on them, not only at great cost to the taxpayer, but at a much greater cost to the public - after all, if front line service staff are on these courses that means fewer of them are left to police the streets, work in A&E, and so on, and so on. In fact this probably does far more damage than the Tory "cuts" we keep hearing about!
http://inspectorgadget.wordpress.com/2007/11/25/62-french-girls-cant-be-wrong/
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51. flamepatricia
I pass (why Solo?) each to his own
knick knack paddy wack give a dog a bone
I pass P the microphone
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#11
I'm not going to disagree, with the need for more innovation, John, as you have pointed out John, fibre optic's is not a new concept.
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The bank bailout has annoyed me intensely because as Mervyn King recognised in the beginning, these people are being rewared for bad behaviour i.e. a moral hazard.
However, King and us, the people, have been forced to swallow hard and bail out these failing businesses simply because banks are not like regular businesses, they are a utility which must always function.
Despite this, we should exerise our freedom of choice when using banks because not all banks have acted irresponsibly and required bailouts.
For example, the Co-Op and Fortis banks operate such that they only lend out monies that have been received in deposits.
Logically, over time, depositors will migrate their savings* to banks such as these and let the mainstream badly behaved banks whither on the vine.
In that way, business justice will be done.
* Or even become banks ourselves via 'social lending' networks e.g. Zopa.
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"More than 3,000 hospital patients have died because of errors by NHS staff in England over the past year, figures show.
Hospitals reported 3,645 deaths in 2007-8 from patient safety incidents, data from the Lib Dems showed.
The figure included those relating to problems with scans and tests and hospital infections.
It represents a 60% rise in the last two years
"
There we go a few bn more can be saved here. obviously the staff are making more errors because they now have to constantly look over their shoulders for the non job pen pusher put in place by Brown. Sack all the pen pushers hey presto another multi bn saving. Or do it the beeching way and sack everyone doing the work that way they cant make errors can they.
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115. yellowbelly1959
Well done for reposting.
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#112 I had no idea that 38 had been removed in the first place - so far as I can see you haven't done anything wrong apart from making a good valid point about the concerns of ordinary people who are sick of this government.
Then again that would never do on the BBC now would it?
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#100 Yellowbellow
(Duffle Coat calling Anorak?)
I didn't see all the referred/removed posts, but the one I did see clearly identified 'Baby P' and should be withdrawn for the sake of protecting a sibling (which is why this poor child has never been publicly identified).
A little more sense please.
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"Over 27,000 people have been left unemployed by the closure of 815 stores across the UK and many had served the company for over 30 years.
For these people Woolworths, whose first store opened in Liverpool 100 years ago, was not just a job, but a way of life.
Margaret Bewley, 66, has worked in the store in Barrow-in-Furness, Cumbria, for 45 years, for some of that time alongside her son-in-law and grandson. "
Hang on a minute, isnt the retirement age for women 60, so for 6 years this person has been keeping someone young and dynamic from a job.
Its hardly a wonder this dinosaur institution has gone under, they ran it more like a WI than a business
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Derekbarker
You were obviously to busy to answer my questions yesterday
Yesterday you said the Tory figures don’t add up.
The 1 Trillion pounds debt figures in the Pre-Budget Report are based on the UK coming out of recession and showing growth in the 3 Q 2009.
Gordon Brown admitted in his Andrew Marr interview (Party Political Broadcast) Sunday that we will be in recession for 2 years.
If Gordon is right this will mean 6 more quarters of recession than forecast 3 months ago in the PBR.
The borrowing figures you are relying on are massively out and the amount of debt you are running up is now going to be far bigger than 1Trillion pounds.
WHOS FIGURES DON’T ADD UP?
Surely Labour’s.
So how came you claim the Tory figures are wrong?
Also you didn’t give a response to this statement
Labour has destroyed the economy ever time it’s had power.
Any chance of an answer today?
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116#
Nice one, like it a lot!!!
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re: 93, Reluctant-Expat
Derek does indeed. He is the epitome of a Hoon.
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Oh come on, surely it's not difficult to say how you would spend less than New Labour without being ripped apart for it.....
......get rid of id cards, get rid of the numerous super-databases designed to hold private information about us being planned, stop allowing contractors to overcharge, fire the management consultants, sack some of the PR consultants and that's just a few.
If Cameron (I exclude Osborne as he's useless) could tempt himself to stop playing politics for a second he might start getting some credit. The electorate might like him for it too.
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~ 112:
Agreed!
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Anyone who talks about cuts in public wasting of money will get my vote.
They need to start on the golden final salary indexed linked pensions first.
Outdated unaffordable and grossly unfair.
Creating a two tier society.
Very much like the call that we need immigration to pay taxes to fund state pensions.
Compounding the problems for as the number of immigrants reach pension age we need even more immigrants to pay for them. By 2020 we would probably have to double the poulation as these problems are compounded. Goodness knows where all the jobs will come from.
The same has been happening in the public sector.
Thousands more jobs need to be created in this sector so their pension contributions will pay for the extravagant final salary base
pensions they have to pay today.
Even these are not enough to fill the black hole so taxpayers have to step in here too.
This a nightmare scenario which could reach its inevitable climax very soon. The whole system will collapse.
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Nick,
The Government are borrowing as if the recession will be long but forecasting growth as if will be short. Shouldn't you be asking them why that is?
The Government claims debt is 37% of GDP when others say it is much higher. Shouldn't you be asking them why that is?
No poll in over a year has had Labour ahead, and only one has put them in a position in which they could have won an election. Why did you even suggest that an election was a possibility?
In general the polls recently have been no different to those taken at the same time last year. Why did you suggest there was a Brown bounce not just a typical festive season narrowing?
Peter Mandleson filled in a mortgage application with information he knew to be false (he failed to declare a loan). Why haven't you asked Brown if a person who acts like that should have been ennobled?
If you compare Marr's interview with Brown on Sunday, to Paxman's last night they are plainly being treated differently. Do you agree?
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In a crisis situation it's often better to do nothing until the next move is planned with all the implications thought through. Labour's solution can be summed up in three words:
READY
FIRE
AIM!
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I have just read this on another forum...if this is right are they taking the Micheal?
After revealing the new policy the Conservatives seemed to be unsure about how much you will gain.Osborne and Cameron refused to answer how much would be gained on £100 in the bank, and one Conservative MP quoted over £7000....if you have over a quarter of a million in the bank, which begs the question if you had a quater of a million in the bank, how would you be on the basic rate of tax.
Anyway Price Waterhouse Cooper have revealed the figures...which are very interesting and comical:
If you have £10,000 in the bank you will be £40 a year better off providing you keep the money in there throughout the year or in other words...76p a week better off.
If you have £16,000 in the bank the figure rises to £64 a year or £1.23 a week.
To help Mr Cameron and Mr Osborne if you kept £100 in the bank you would earn the pricely sum of 40p for the entire year or less than a penny a week.
There you go,there is the answer to sorting out the recession give people who have 10k in the bank 76p a week more.
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Derekbarker
Labour has destroyed the economy ever time it's had power.
I can't put it more simply than that.
Also can you address # 127
Have we frightend him off?
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132#
This particular time bomb has been ticking for decades and all shades of the political spectrum have ignored it, red and blue. We've been warned many many times.
Tampering with it is a guaranteed vote loser. The fact that something needs to be done about it doesnt matter.
I thought that was meant to be the whole point in taking out a private pension until thousands of them were mis-sold and Gordon and Geoffrey Robinson raped the rest of the funds in 1997 to splurge on their usual tax and spend mission.
It wont become an issue until we demand politicians who will sort it out and vote for them... otherwise we might as well just sit round and wait for it to implode.
Gordon aint gonna do anything. Nothing in it for him.
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#112 - spot on.
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@135 Non-expert as proven
Personally I would rather have the 76p than not have it thank you very much, although its a drop in th ocean its a start to rolling back the stealth taxes that Brown introduced
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Great stuff from the Mirror today(!):
http://www.mirror.co.uk/opinion/voiceofthemirror/2009/01/06/david-cameron-s-savings-tax-cut-doesn-t-add-up-115875-21019836/
"David Cameron's soundbite politics are also bad economics.
To slash spending by £5billion during a recession would be madness and would deepen the recession, not ease it.
The Tory leader's bid for the grey vote smacks of desperation after he lost the initiative to Gordon Brown towards the end of last year. An extra 40p for every £100 saved is unlikely to have pensioners flocking to vote Conservative once they peer behind the spin.
The elderly deserve to be at the top of Chancellor Alistair Darling's list when he draws up this spring's Budget.
But pensioners deserve real help and not fake giveaways."
After what Brown did to their pensions they sure do need real help! This "publication" is beyond satire.
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26. and 45 jrperry
My letter #1 caused some anger, both on the part of other bloggers and myself. I regret lashing out and being moderated, but to be called a Labour Troll so early in the morning is hard to stomach!
You didn't descend to such insults jrperry, but I must respond to your comments regarding Osborne's performance. Paxman is obviously a rude man. on that we agree. The difference in our opinions cpncerns Osborne's reactions. I think he should have appeared, he should have been able to hold his own, and he should have shown Paxman for what he is, a paid-up Nu Labour hack. None of this happened. The trouble is that too many people are searching for a hreat leader, and like ants or bees will follow those whom their party selects. This is marxist behaviour and not what should be expected from the Torys. The Torys have a history of controversial members, controversial supporters and individuals not afraid to speak their mind. Historically they have always been a party of free-thinkers. DC hasn't even been elected yet, Osborne is just a shadow minister. If he continues to act as he did last night he will remain in the shadows!
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Trouble is with Blogs such as this one, is the author is so close to the halls of Westminster, that he believes that the latest runblings there actually have some bearing on actual public opinion out in the country.
From any conversations I've had, everyone, down to the last, believes Gordon Brown is an absoluete nut job.
Call an election and we'll find out once and for all.
Fat chance with Gormless Gord though.
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135 Expert
I have to agree with Potsy, It has been a by word for the goverment of simply taking our money anyway they can. The principle issue is. Whether a lot of cash or little the money is yours and mine.
I get very worried when I hear MP's bandy around statements lilke about XbillionPounds when talking about borrowing. You can say about a fiver, or around a hundred pounds, but can you seriously say about a Billion, that is one hell of an vauge margin.
Gordon Brown please stop squandering our money!
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#10 and #13 ... I quite agree.
#16 (fairlopian_tubester) sums it up brilliantly. Excellent post.
Gordon Brown is well meaning, but has failed. I feel quite sorry for him actually.
Unfortunately he has shown himself to be not fit for purpose, and should gracefully move aside.
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#109 Shellingout
Of course state schools have a selective education role.
Several auditions and talent to get there but these schools do exist.
I hope your not suggesting that it take a pocket full of pretty green to get a selective education Shellingout, are you?
By the way I hope your son, is still enjoying his musical gift.
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While I'm on the subject of waste, the government is still going forward on renewable engery.
Most of which is expensive and dosen't work.
Photo Voltaics - rubbish
Wind Turbines - rubbish
Biomass boilers - rubbish and also not even green!
Ground souce and Air Source Heat pumps - OK however do not generate much heat and would require significantly large heat emmitters to do the same job as a conventional radiator.
Rain Water Haveseting - Expensive to run (requires electricity) and the water gather must be used reaonably quickly and can only be used for WC and washing machines.
Solar Hot water - Only currently capable of realistically supplying 40% required hot water and is seasonal and expensive to install.
One of the above are required within Building Regulations to comply with Government directive. They are expensive and the payback will take decades.
I have a friend who has worked on a project where 20 flats are being supplied by photo voltaics, this has cost 74K the projected pay back is 40 years not including maintenance costs.
What a waste of peoples money!
Stop being knee jerk Gordon and as someone else has stated on this blog. Think before you say or do.
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#135
PwC have links with government and the labour party. I don't think they're allowed to say anything derogatory about labour policy at all. I don't know if it runs to bad-mouthing Tory plans, but I wouldn't expect them to be impartial.
Besides, you don't need an accountant to tell you how much you could possibly save.
Your starting rate band is £2,440 at 10p and the basic rate is £35,000 at 20p.
Maximum saving (assuming Tories include your starting rate to be reduced) is £7,244.
So that is correct.
Of course, if your savings income is taxed at the higher rate, it doesn't benefit you. So if you're still earning well over £40k a year, it won't benefit you. But you don't need it.
It's aimed at people who have saved and have been responsible, rather than those who have had the opportunity and squandered it.
It's not about how much you personally save in tax, it's about rewarding positive behaviour for a change.
It may not be much, but it's a decent start in my opinion.
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Ah Derek is back
Here are some examples of populist poison administered by your beloved leader Gordob Brown to the hapless people of this country:-
* Destruction of private pensions
* Stealth taxes
* Erosion of personal liberty via DNA databanks, 42 day detention, more surveillance cameras than anywhere in the world, ID cards.
* Encouragement of public and personal debt
* Politicisation of public servants and the police thereby perpetuating lies and
deception
* Further submission to the European Union without mandate
* Constitutional break-up of the United Kingdom thereby weakening us as a
nation and fostering nationalism and resentment
* Enlargement of the welfare state breeding dependency, fecklessness,
social tribalism, resentment and violence
* Economic mismanagement, whether by design or not, resulting in
catastrophy in the wealth-producing private sector whilst the public sector,
which it supports is protected.
The list could go on and on but kindly desist from constantly asking for 'meat on the bones' of an alternative to newlabour.
We just want them out. For ever. Never to return and bankrupt this great country again.
Call an election.
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if gordon had implemented his fiscal stimulus package at the same time (and instead) of the removal of the 10% tax threshold band, i.e. 1 year prior to becoming p.m. we would have been okay.
hands up if you agree?
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145 derekbarker
Actually, Derek, private education was all that was available to our son. State funded Colleges would not accept him under any circumstances, because he was a full year younger then the intake age. We also discovered that our son's knowledge of music (practical and theory), was more advanced than some of the lecturers who would have been teaching him.
I do remember that our family allowance was stopped at a time when we needed it the most. Having said that, our son is an accomplished polymath who now teaches others.
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#148
Again Robin, you chose the path of attack,
your entitled to your opinion, however it's an opinion opened to challenge (yes)
Only days before major banks declared their state young Osborne was calling for less bank deregulations, while Cameron, when challenged on his lack of direction and policies would cry wolf and say "the tories have to wait till their in office and get a proper look at the books"
Robin, you cant win an election with a hidden plan, not in nowourdays! If Cameron has a solution to this down-turn, then lets hear it! so far all he is offering is tax cuts, it's the last thing Teachers, hospital staff, and general local authorities want to hear right now.(yes)
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Have a look at the Tory rubbishing peice on Newsnight Editors Mick Cricks Blog you couldn't make it up.
The biggest economic crisis in 100 year and he comes up with this.
Tory 'watch-list' of 'potentially embarrassing' candidates
This is his by line
I'm Michael Crick, and I'm Newsnight's political editor. My guiding rule is that in any story there's usually something the politicians would prefer the world not to know. My job is to find that out.
After last night Paxman Osbourne pathetic interview
Woodwood and Berstein will be coveting the Paxman Crick award for investigative journalism
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145#
Might take a pocket full of petty green to get a loan of £840K written off though, eh Derek? ;-)
Nice tables at Wembley for the Catz Club were they?
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By the way has anyone seen this?
http://www.labour.org.uk/webcabinet
This is actually quite funny! Bravo!
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#150
Thats great! I like success stories, whether you give something back in engineering or chemical or musical is fantasic.
Good stuff, Shellingout, it would seem that there is hope in agreement.
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RE: #150 shellingout:
"Having said that, our son is an accomplished polymath who now teaches others."
bet he hasn't got a girlfriend.
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144#
Its the well meaning with a twist that is particularly grating; the twist being the realisation of megalomaniacal ambition to be king of the heap; But the really galling bit is that it isnt so much the ideas that he has but the half-@rsed implementation of them that proves to be really painful.
FSA being the case in point. No doubt originally a good idea. Kinda half-fixing what wasnt really broken, but thats by the by. 8000 page rule book; great. Everyone knows what the rules are. Good.
Now the hard bit. Enforcing the rules.
Er.....
So many of these things arent bad in principle, they're just not capable of running them or implementing them properly.
THATS one of the main reasons for him to move over. Ambition aint the same as ability.
Ask Gerri Halliwell.
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Re: 135
Actually it is not just the amount but the principle.
A good many elderly people have scrimped and saved to put a little aside, often out of meagre wages, to maintain their independence. They have done so out of taxed income and then find they are taxed again on the interest on their savings. They are also penalised because they find themselves just above the limit for the pension supplement and other benefits. Accordingly, they find themselves little better, and sometimes worse, off than those who haven't bothered to put anything aside for a rainy day.
Both Labour and the LibDems preach about "fairness" but only seem to interpret that in terms of supporting the feckless.
If Cameron is now indicating that he is starting to tip the scales in favour of those who try to be self-sufficient, then good for him.
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156 chrisleopard
On the contrary, Chris. He has a partner and 3 children!
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#154
chrisleopard.
LOL, ouch my side hurts, with all this laughing.
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#154 brilliant!
Really good lampoon. The bit at the bottom sounds just like something the Labour party would come up with too.
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Derek
Of course I choose the path of attack; the newlabour spendaholics have been in power for elven years and deserve to be held to account.
Your attitude towards this sums up perfectly the newlabour response to everything "we are not to blame" How come? Who was running the country then? A ghost in the machine? Thatcher? Total lack of accountability is why newlabour will go down to a heavy defeat at the next election regardless of opposition policies.
I for one shall be cheering them all the way to the dole queue.
Call the election.I dare you.
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WOAH!!! I cannot believe that is their real website. Are you serious?
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I mean, for a governing party to have that as their front page? What a bunch of losers.
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No wonder David Cameron is scared to let any of his Shadow Cabinet anywhere near the studios. They are all a load of useless ex-public schoolboys who prefer to make their presentations to Party workers at Central Office. Osborne is good at ringing media people up with unattributed stories about Labour politicians but is appalling when questioned on TV or Radio.
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Despite the fact that its a drop in the ocean, why not hold Government to account for actual waste, including the USD7bn pssed away selling gold (not a coincedence - damn those pesky commodity traders for forcing down the price when the Government pre-announced it).
The exchange:-
Robert Key: To ask the Chancellor of the Exchequer how many tonnes of gold have been sold from UK reserves in each year since May 1997; what revenue was received from sales in each year; and if he will estimate the revenue which each sale would have generated at current gold prices.
Ian Pearson: 395 tonnes of gold have been sold since 1997: 75 tonnes in 1999; 150 tonnes in 2000; 130 tonnes in 2001; and 40 tonnes in 2002. The date of, the amount of gold sold and the allotment price at each of the 17 gold auctions is set out in the following table. (see Hansard 18 Dec 2008 : Column 932W). The total proceeds from the sales were around US$3.5 billion. At the morning fix on 15 December 2008 the total value of this gold was US$10.5 billion. The gold sales between July 1999 and March 2002 reflected a prudent decision to reduce over-exposure to a single asset in the net reserves portfolio.
Whose fault is this? Why of course, the Tories...
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=RDm8zGwcdZ4
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For all those tory deciples who keep banging on about Nick Robinson being in bed with the Labour party, can I remind them that oor Nick used to be Chairman of the Young Conservatives.
Personally, I could probably (grudgingly) live with David Cameron as PM but I think I'd have to leave the country with the likes of George Osbourne in the Treasury. Could anyone think of anything worse?
I think I'd rather see Margaret Thatcher performing stand-up live at the Apollo.
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Yeah - I can't believe it's their website too - it strikes me as rather desperate and rather pathetic...
Let's see - it would be funny if they put up somethjing to do with Mandy on a yacht..
However, near the bottom in NEWS it says this...
"Plymouth Sutton MP Linda Gilroy returns to Parliament today after the Summer Recess determined to put skills and enterprise on the top of her agenda"
Returned today from summer recess - what is she working from Australia or something...hjow many holidays do they get?
If they are going to Lampoon others, they had better make sure they get their own house in order first - or it just don't work!!
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154 .well that 2 minutes of my life that I'll never get back. Thanks for that.
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I see the Tory bloggers are getting upset whenever Cameron or Osborne start getting grilled about their 'Economic Madness' policies.
I and a lot of people I know shake their heads in fear if the Tories were to be the next government.
Cuts in public spending takes us back to Thatcher days. And look what she did to society.
PS> Remember the Tories opposed the minimum wage!
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#165 Basingstoke William
A pathetic and cheap shot.
Ever wondered why we never see Dawn Primarolo in such contexts?
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#170
Tories Economic madness policies - my sides are splitting - aw, hahahahahahaha..
And what do you call current government economic policies - in fact what have you called them for the past 11 years...
I aint no any party stooge - all I want is proper unbiased stuff from the BBC - something that is as rare as hen's teeth..
But, if you can't see the wood for the trees.....
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#168 Thank you, I thought I was going insane!
I was joking a bit at first but when I realised it was their lead article on their homepage.... I genuinely can't believe that's what the Labour party have to offer the country as their inspiration.
I read some of the rest of it too. It's mostly moaning about the Tories.
Seriously depressing stuff.
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OLinUK. "Cuts in public spending takes us back to Thatcher days"? Come on, (i) 4bn is a rounding error within the context of LuLab's (consistently exceeded) spending proposals* and (ii) there is more than enough fat to cut at in Central Govt.
The pre-Thatcher days you allude to must be different to those that I know of. I don't recall the 1970s being a social utopia.
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170#
Ah, yes Maggie. Out comes the same old cr@p YET again. Scaremongering about someone who hasnt been in power for a generation. Its almost laughable.
I cant be @rsed arguing the point. None so blind as those that wont see.
Derek, have you let the nightshift in then?
167#
It makes you wonder exactly who upset him when he was a Young Conservative then doesnt it? Something perhaps made him a bit bitter and twisted. And being Political Editor for what is meant to be one of the most high profile broadcasters in the world presents an irresistable opportunity to exact some revenge on whoever it may be....
All we are asking for is even handed fair, accurate reporting. Holding the opposition to account is one thing (dont remember it happening to Kinnock BTW), but Christ the government of the day are the ones who are directly accountable to the electorate, who by default are also the BBC's licence payers.
That, I would figure gives us a right to read, observe and criticise where we feel it is due.
Doesnt it?
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This is what happens while Nick Robinson drones on about what a well-heeled Tory toff has to say about savings:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7814054.stm
He and that other undisguised tory, McBroon, should get off their backsides and tell the Israelis that they their actions are contemptible and unacceptable.
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#162
Robin, The economical argument between the two parties is such, Labour had a GDP rate of 37% the last tory government had a GDP rate of some 43%, high interest rates, at a high of 15%, no minimum wage, people exploited for less than 1 pound per hour, local schools in dire need of funding, hospitals in a mess, mass unemployment by design and a very shoddy relationship with the EU.
Of course borrowing rates will rise in this now depression, however this government will do all it can do to minimise the impact of people by design.
People count Robin! Now! if the tories have a plan to stabilise the economy, create new employment, invest in education, health, transport, homes ect... Then lets hear it, dont hide the plan, if it's really there the public have a right to know(yes)
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Its quite remarkable how inept Tory politicians are when confronted on TV.
They have not learnt the Nu Labour techniques of just keep talking over the questioning, confusing the interviewer and the real killer of repeating a mantra - Global, The right thing to do, We understand the fears, Hardworking families, Hard times etc etc..........
Then when in a real spot, field a female spokeswomen who can claim sexual abuse if pressed too hard.
It looks like the BBC political reporting team has decided already who will win the next election. At least the owner of News International is indecided.
Congrats to Tony Blair for his award of the Congressional Freedom medal. Pity it was earned with the sacrifice of British servicemen and women
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Right, especially for the benefit of those who think I'm a duffle-coated Conservative troll, please try on my coat for size.
I'm extremely worried if all Cameron and Osborne can up is trading "catchy" ideas with their Government counter-parts.
For most of the eleven and a half years since the Lulu Labour Government came to power, I've been looking to HM Opposition to mount a serious challenge. I'm still looking.
While the economy was on slow burn, thanks to stealth taxes and general mismanagement, there was a hope that even a second-rate opposition would be able to reverse the damage once they came to power.
Now the full effect of global greed and Gordon Brown's shattering incompetence is being laid bare, the Conservatives are hardly looking as a party able to bring about recovery and restore the fortunes of this country.
Last time we were anywhere near such a parlous state, old Labour, the IMF and all that, it needed drastic action to bring about recovery.
Yesterday we learned of the death of Alan Walters, Margaret Thatcher's "economic guru" and guiding light behind the policies she introduced that led to a recovery (of sorts) during the 'eighties.
At that time, and with the benefit of hindsight, I still believe that "Thatcherism" wasn't the only possible solution, indeed it was far from the best, took unacceptable risks with people's livelihoods and was extremely damaging for many. Had it not been for the Falklands factor, it would have ended up on the scrapheap of history.
Yet, in the conditions of those times, it worked. The country paid a high price, but said goodbye to the dark, depressing days of the 'seventies. We also said goodbye to our industrial base.
This time around, I don't think we need Thatcherism, Monetarism, Friedmanism or any other isms, but we do need clear and decisive leadership. Understanding of business and economics, through hands-on experience, not theory.
Actually Gordon Brown is right when he tells us this is no time for a novice; neither is it the time for a vain, blundering, interfering control freak with little grasp of the necessary skills and no relevant experience, backed by a cabinet with less nous than its wooden namesake.
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I see it didn't take someone with bit of social jealousy to take the "public school boy" shot, conveniently ignoring where a section of the Labour party were educated.
I have met public schooled twerps, but to be fair I have met a larger number of twerps educated by the state.
Personally, I could not care less where you were educated, as long as you can do the job. This is not a ringing endorcement of Osborn, just frustration over the reverse class snobbery that seems acceptable today.
Oh and for the record educated in an Essex Comp guv'nor though apparently I won't be benefitting from the Tory propsals, I earn too much.
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Fubar' alive and kicking now! my friend
I think its fair to compare Cameron, Osborne with the thatcher, I dont see nothing "new" in the conservative's.
Care crash the new expressive tory realm with us!
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Derekbarker
now you have the rest of your 'rapid rebuttal unit' with you can you answer this
4th time lucky?
Derekbarker
You were obviously to busy to answer my questions yesterday
Yesterday you said the Tory figures don?t add up.
The 1 Trillion pounds debt figures in the Pre-Budget Report are based on the UK coming out of recession and showing growth in the 3 Q 2009.
Gordon Brown admitted in his Andrew Marr interview (Party Political Broadcast) Sunday that we will be in recession for 2 years.
If Gordon is right this will mean 6 more quarters of recession than forecast 3 months ago in the PBR.
The borrowing figures you are relying on are massively out and the amount of debt you are running up is now going to be far bigger than 1Trillion pounds.
WHOS FIGURES DON?T ADD UP?
Surely Labour?s.
So how came you claim the Tory figures are wrong?
Also you didn?t give a response to this statement
Labour has destroyed the economy ever time it?s had power.
Any chance of an answer today?
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brynt41 @176,
Why do you want to inflict Blair's and Brown's empty rhetoric on the Gazans. Aren't they suffering enough already?
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#148 yeah but apart from that what harm has this Government done ?
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Can I just take this opportunity to say "Hard working families" There feel lots better now.
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Derekbarker
shall I take that as a no?
You seem to disappear every time ask these questions
#182
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I wonder why the BBC never reports things like:-
Balance of Trade
The UK’s deficit on trade in goods and services was £3.9 billion in October, compared with the revised deficit of £3.5 billion in September (originally published as a deficit of £3.9 billion).
The surplus on trade in services was £3.9 billion, the same as in September (originally published as a surplus of £3.6 billion).
The deficit on trade in goods was £7.8 billion, compared with the revised deficit of £7.4 billion in September (which was originally published as a deficit of £7.5 billion). Exports fell by £0.7 billion and imports fell by £0.3 billion.
The deficit with the EU was £3.4 billion in October, compared with a deficit of £2.8 billion in September. Exports fell by £1.0 billion and imports fell by £0.4 billion. There was a rise in exports of fuels other than oil. There were falls in exports of oil, food, drink and tobacco, and chemicals. There were falls in imports of intermediate goods, capital goods, and chemicals.
The deficit with non-EU countries narrowed to £4.4 billion compared with the deficit of £4.6 billion in September. Exports rose by £0.2 billion and imports were virtually unchanged. There were rises in exports of chemicals, and aircraft. There was a rise in imports of fuels other than oil from a relatively low level in September, and a smaller rise in imports of aircraft.
Excluding oil and erratic items, the volumes of exports and imports were both two and a half per cent lower in October than in September.
Export prices were two and a half per cent lower and import prices were one and a half per cent lower than in September, reflecting lower fuel and basic materials prices.
-----------------------------------------------
Now I don't know about you but the question is: will increasing cost of imports due to a weak pound be offsett by increased exports due to competitivenes caused by the weak pound?
If it is then there may be some light at the end of thetunnel.
If not - well that's £3.8 billion that has left the country to enrich others and impoverish us.
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#154 soooooo funny I too split my sides laughing so much I actually forgot its Labour who are actually the ones who have been in power for the last 11 years and its Labour who consequently screw*d up the economy .
Not the glimmer twins, Good attempted smokescreen though !!
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Labour have reached a new low and are totally disregarding the safety of the public in order to play the statistics game. 'Old news' you might say, 'Nulab have been doing that for eleven years.' Well true--- but this really takes the biscuit...
NuLab are pressuring the NHS who in turn are pressuring nurses (at least at Tameside Hospital) to do cholecystectomies (gall bladder removals) as day surgery--- in and out in SIX HOURS. Back in the seventies (and I know things have advanced since then, except Labour that is) this surgery would have resulted in 10 days in hospital. Even now to have that surgery and be out in six hours is insane to say the least, but that's exactly what NuLab are trying to ram through for the same of upping stats. The nurses I know are outraged at this disgusting abuse of the NHS.
We must stop NuLab. They are willing to sacrifice our lives for votes. Never have I been so ashamed of our government.
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#121
I think you are missing a point here - although I largely agree with what you say.
The banks that were failing are now state owned or backed. I'm not sure how we can walk away from bad banks now they are seen as businesses that are not allowed to fail.
The "Exit strategy" from this situation (nationalised banks) has very likely not been very much considered. There are probably some horrors to come from all this yet.
Nationalised industries have always become a major problem for everyone, not just the government, I don't see why this situation should be any different
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#183 MaxSceptic wrote:
"Why do you want to inflict Blair's and Brown's empty rhetoric on the Gazans. Aren't they suffering enough already?"
I have to admit that you make a valid point.
Perhaps the US might like to adopt them, they should both feel at home there.
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It started in America!
And even if it didn't, then it's Maggie Thatcher's fault!!
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@ 176
yes ... for heaven's sake let's drop all the "men of the world" nonsense and agree, without caveat, that what the great nation of Israel is doing to Gaza is EVIL and WRONG - just that
right?
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#189 power-to-the-ppl
That is truly terrible, and rather scary as well. Where will it end?
That's the trouble with being obsessed with targets, they get in the way of the main objective, which is to make people better.
Typical ZaNuLabour, targets are all, and no compassion!
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160. At 4:35pm on 06 Jan 2009, derekbarker wrote:
#154
chrisleopard.
LOL, ouch my side hurts, with all this laughing.
===
Funny that, I thought it would be from the kicking you took last night on the other blog!
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flmepat sorry bit drunk hvent heard frim you think i love you
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Did I hear someone say that derekbarkingmad was around?
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# 9 carrots
"4.1 bn quid Wow, about the same as an aircraft carrier then"
Yes, but peanuts when you look at the cost of the ID card scheme - possibly as much as 18 billion according to the BBC.
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189. power-to-the-ppl
Good evening old pal,
Regarding your eloquent thesis on NHS penny-pinching, perhaps Gordon could have a brain transplant? Six hours in and out sounds excessive, considering the minute organ which will be removed, although would it make any difference? Maybe a soul would be the answer.
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#186
PortcullisGates, you seem to close those security gates and disappear.
A random user name? or an intented pun.
Not quite sure as to the project debt you refer to, if it's collectively as a whole nation in terms of mortgage, loans and credit card debt, I think it could be a bit higher than you think>
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sagamix @193 wrote:
"yes ... for heaven's sake let's drop all the "men of the world" nonsense and agree, without caveat, that what the great nation of Israel is doing to Gaza is EVIL and WRONG - just that
right?"
Wrong!
It's called self defense. It's messy and bloody and accidents and mistakes happen. But its better than turning the other cheek and being blown away by people who don't even recognise your right to exist.
And, I'm pretty sure that when push comes to shove, most Israelis don't care one way or the other what you, me or the whole world think of them. They'd rather be alive and maligned, than praised and very dead.
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re:196.
please disregard as dumbest post ever
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yellowbelly1959@192
I'm glad you agree. The get rich quick yuppie culture started in the 1980s and shoddy lending and financial practices in the U.S. have led to the banks becoming over cautious with lending. Calling in debts of companies like Woolworths. Making people unemployed.
Strange that some think that because some people say financial system wasn't regulated properly and bankers got greedy and took massive bonuses for taking risks with other peoples money.
We should now turn to the Conservative party. That well known party of regulation and restricting greed.
What would regulation do to Conservative voters property values? Or is it all just nonsense to try and win an election? It'll be the same old Tories if they win.
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#195
Hmmm! Is little Aloisius Penfold in his "Anorak!" getting all power house on me!
Hey! lad got a plan?
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I just can't wait for Wednesday's exciting and enthralling blog episode - now lets see.
In the past twelve months I can count on ZERO fingers how many searching questions of LABOUR policy there have been on this blog...
Since Mandy came back, not only was the decision to do so not covered properly in this blog, but the BBC rhetoric and biased opinion AND this blog took a decidedly nasty turn against any opposition - which is always the sign of a party in desperation - or arrogant - in fact both....at the sime time....with cherries on.
To all the labour apologists - go through this blog and point to me just one single entry that is looking for a political bl00dy nose against the party that is in power - I think you'll find it is like a tacit prayer.
As someone said quite rightly above and I ahve said many times - and countless others have said many times, all we want is unbiased reporting - it is for this reason that the labour apologists, just released from Mandy's detention class have started pouring in and accusing all others of being Tory apologists.
Now if this blog was balanced you have a point - but, the sad fact it is not, but that will not deter us.
At the same time it is almost not worthit posting an opinion - A because the author of this blog (unlike all other blogs) does not respond and B because we know that tomorrow will be more of the same.
One thing I can give Nick, reluctantly, is the forum for all of us, from all sides of the spectrum to have a jolly good laugh.
Sadly, that is not enough - surely, it cannot be impossible to give the ACTUAL government a bl00dy nose now and then on the BBC or this blog - we don't get now or then - we get never, instead, we see the same tactic as the labour lampoon website posted above - desperation and pathetic reporting from the BBC.
What makes this even worse, with cherries on is that we all pay for this - I just about stomach paying the BBC the licvence fee - what I cannot stomach is making a party political donation to the labour party through my licence fee - as this blog and the BBC are showing in abundance - is exactly what we are all doing.
We have the right to ask for better than this.
So I'll bet Wednesday sees the Tories and or the Libs and or anyone else apart from any LABOUR and the Govt get a blogged bl00dy nose once again - whether that is implicitly implied or tongue in cheek - you can bet your bottom dollar it will be the same again...
Political Groundhog Day.....after day....after day....after.....
That is all.
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re: 199, phoenixarisen
Good evening phoenix me old mucker, you make an excellent point. Brown cares not for us but for himself. With his desire to have a soul and be a real human, he is reminiscent of Pinocchio who wanted to be a real boy. However, unfortunately for Broon he's an even worse liar than that wooden puppet (and no I don't mean Alistair Darling, hehe).
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#135
Frankly, if I could have an extra 40 quid or an extra 40p in the bank at the end of the year I would pefer to have it than have it deducted by a govenment which has lost its sense of the value of money to individuals.
It seems to be easier for the government to spend a billion than it is for them to conceive of saving an individual 40p.
I am often dismayed at the feebleness of the arguments against Labour that the Conservatives come up with. I am often dismayed at the smallness of the figures that the Conservatives use which are meant to "help hard pressed families". (It also annoys me that suddenly there are no "hard pressed individuals" any more).
However, I do feel they are moving in the right direction.
I feel we are all watching in disbelief at HMS Britain sinking under a sea of international credit like the Titanic. The Conservatives are suggesting we begin to throw out some of the water using soup spoons. Labour are suggesting we need to sink a lot further before we should begin any bailing out manouvre, as otherwise things will just be unbearably difficult.
Unfortunately, I think the sinking has the upper hand at the moment, with no bailing out on the horizon.
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Once again the news from all sectors is depressing. On the business side, Woolworth's closure has rendered many workers without jobs, and now we have the news that MandS is to discharge 1,000 workers. Why cannot the MandS sackings start with Stuart Rose and the other incompetents in top management? Rather than that, the lowest paid in the humblest positions will get the push. Rose has systematically destroyed a once viable business. Quality control has gone out of the window, sizings are unreliable, and for cheapness the garments are brought in from China. Most of these goods are not really geared to the western figure and the shoes are attractive, but badly fitting. If someone wants cheap goods, they would dp better to buy at Primark, which at least is cheap and cheerful and makes no pretence of being anything else. Woolworths was ruined by trying to be an upmarket store whilst selling cheap goods. In today's uncertain economic markets, I believe the answer to success is honest trading, value for money, and a return to a certain level of decent standards.
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Once again the news from all sectors is depressing. On the business side, Woolworth's closure has rendered many workers without jobs, and now we have the news that MS is to discharge 1,000 workers. Why cannot the MS sackings start with Stuart Rose and the other incompetents in top management? Rather than that, the lowest paid in the humblest positions will get the push. Rose has systematically destroyed a once viable business. Quality control has gone out of the window, sizings are unreliable, and for cheapness the garments are brought in from China. Most of these goods are not really geared to the western figure and the shoes are attractive, but badly fitting. If someone wants cheap goods, they would dp better to buy at Primark, which at least is cheap and cheerful and makes no pretence of being anything else. Woolworths was ruined by trying to be an upmarket store whilst selling cheap goods. In today's uncertain economic markets, I believe the answer to success is honest trading, value for money, and a return to a certain level of decent standards.
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205#
welcome to my world.
I used to have an old Squire Strat, incidentally... Japanese one, 1990, EMG pickups... wish I'd kept it.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
David Cameron and George Osborne. The greatest comedy act in years. They give Morecambe & Wise a run for their money. Care about the people, my foot!!
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Derekbarker
at last
In answer to your question post 200
Watergate was a place where an opposition party was raided by a corrupt incumbent.
Portcullis house is a place where our opposition was raided by corrupt incumbent.
The PBR has projected debt of 1 Trillion pounds with the Enron style off balance sheet liabilities. But if the Great leader sees this going on for 2 years rather than ending in growth quarter 3 2009 these debt totals do not represent the full debt mounting we will face due to the fact that we will need to borrow even longer.
This is the obscene debt your government is inflicting on my children and my grandchildren (who are not born yet) and who's only thought is to get re-elected.
The people you support came to power trying to rid themselves of the tax and spend albatross of always having destroyed the economy on every past occasion and now you have done it again only to a greater extent.
This Government has lost its way and deserves punishing like the Tories were.
I hope that the electorate in every Labour held seat will vote for the second place party LIB Dem, SNP & Conservative and remove as many Labour MP's as possible.
I believe that this would be the best thing for the Labour Party. It could then get back to being a party that has represents the section of society it was created by. At least then it would have the most important thing for any political party, Integrity.
If you were true Labour you would welcome this.
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Derekbarker
at last
In answer to your question post 200
Watergate was a place where an opposition party was raided by a corrupt incumbent.
Portcullis house is a place where our opposition was raided by corrupt incumbent.
The PBR has projected debt of 1 Trillion pounds with the Enron style off balance sheet liabilities. But if the Great leader sees this going on for 2 years rather than ending in growth quarter 3 2009 these debt totals do not represent the full debt mounting we will face due to the fact that we will need to borrow even longer.
This is the obscene debt your government is inflicting on my children and my grandchildren (who are not born yet) and who's only thought is to get re-elected.
The people you support came to power trying to rid themselves of the tax & spend albatross of always having destroyed the economy on every past occasion and now you have done it again only to a greater extent.
This Government has lost its way and deserves punishing like the Tories were.
I hope that the electorate in every Labour held seat will vote for the second place party LIB Dem, SNP and Conservative and remove as many Labour MP's as possible.
I believe that this would be the best thing for the Labour Party. It could then get back to being a party that has represents the section of society it was created by. At least then it would have the most important thing for any political party, Integrity.
If you were true Labour you would welcome this.
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Phoenix 141 - appologies for a slow reply, but thanks for what you wrote too.
In fairness, I would have to agree with your underlying thesis, which is that Osborne is a weak performer in one to one combat on the TV. In private, I suspect he would admit the same.
That said, we have not yet descended to the point where TV persona is the prime qualification for high office. Just look at Brown, for example, who has successfully avoided a proper grilling for ten years or more, absolutely always sending in his juniors to bat for him.
I really don't see why Osborne should bother with Newsnight. It simply isn't a medium for exposition of policy, just a lefty magazine show plus Paxman as a weird blood-sport ego-trip side-show.
I would even go so far as to suggest it would be perfectly reasonable, indeed, for Osborne to raise it to the level of a principle and actively boycott the show.
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#210 Fubar:
"I used to have an old Squire Strat, incidentally... Japanese one, 1990, EMG pickups... wish I'd kept it."
So do I....
That year was one of the best they produced - and 1990 models made in Japan are actually worth quite a bit now...
Unfortunately for me - I am so broke after being shafted by this excuse for a Govt that I can only afford the cheap squires these days and not the real I am US Fenders...
;-)
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#212
So by your calculation, that makes Blair and Brown: Rod Hull and Emu......and Brown and Darling: Harris and Orvil!
Both repugnant.
Either way, one is controlling the other, by hand....I'll not mention how!
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Dave to prove he does not run the "do nothing" party has told the press he told his cabinet to get out there and find out what is effecting businesses during the recession.
But hold your horses....the one person missing from the Shadow Cabinets meet the business leaders was in fact ALAN DUNCAN SHADOW BUSINESS SECRETARY.
Where was the Shadow Business Secretary on the Meet The Business tour.....
THE FLUELA HOTEL, DOVOS, SWITZERLAND ON THE CONSERVATIVE MP'S ANNUAL SKIING TRIP.
So there you have it The shadow Cabinet are told to meet business leaders by their leader and the Shadow Business Secretary was on a Conservative MP's beano in Switzerland.
I think it's called priorities, Dave.
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208#
Why not start with sacking Sir Stuart Rose?
Here we go again.......
Because he's a Sir, probably private school educated, almost certainly a toff, and god help him, a manager who's bound to be a fat cat, the sackings must start with him!!
Revolution, brothers!!!! EVERYBODY OUT!!!
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208#
Why not start with sacking Sir Stuart Rose?
Here we go again.......
Because he's a Sir, probably private school educated, almost certainly a toff, and god help him, a manager who's bound to be a fat cat, the sackings must start with him!!
Revolution, brothers!!!! EVERYBODY OUT!!!
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217. At 9:07pm on 06 Jan 2009, squirestrat wrote:
#212
So by your calculation, that makes Blair and Brown: Rod Hull and Emu......and Brown and Darling: Harris and Orvil!
Both repugnant.
Either way, one is controlling the other, by hand....I'll not mention how!
===
That's how Gordon likes it....allegedly!
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artisticsocrates @ 190
Of course, some of these banks have been effectively 'nationalised' but that does not mean we cannot have an exit strategy.
The point about a 'run' on a bank is that it occurs within a short time frame as everybody rushes for the exit.
What I suggested in my post is that these grossly irresponsible, now nationalised,banks be punished via a 'death via a thousand cuts'.
That is, a 'slow run', whereby individual depositors and businesses slowly withdraw their funds from these banks and place those funds in more responsible financial institutions.
I understand that this is already happening if, for example, the Co-Op Banks recent adverts are to be believed.
I try to practice what I preach and had been a depositor with HBoS since around 1985 but moved a significant (to me) amount of funds out that bank some months ago, because I completely disappoved of the way that bank had conducted its business, and thereby threatened my funds.
I hope that clarifies it for you.
There is an exit strategy from banks which do not deserve, in business terms, to survive.
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And as for bringing China into it; Do you think Primark have their sweatshops over here then?? You want cheap clothes, thats the price you pay. You want quality, you buy British or Italian or German.
You dont want low paid humble work? Since when has ambition been a dirty word? You get out of life what you put in. Just because you might start at the bottom doesnt mean you've got to stay there.
Heaven knows how you arose from those flames, Phoenix. Surprised you found the way out, it must have been very dark up there.
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You dont want low paid humble work? Since when has ambition been a dirty word? You get out of life what you put in. Just because you might start at the bottom doesnt mean you've got to stay there.
Heaven knows how you arose from those flames, Phoenix. Surprised you found the way out, it must have been very dark up there.
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Well, Auntie, your browser sucks. Mistyped HTML my foot. I've tried 10 times to post this.....
All I'm trying to say is Phoenix, your prejudices are getting in the way of the facts.
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Where was the Shadow Business Secretary on the Meet The Business tour.....
THE FLUELA HOTEL, DOVOS, SWITZERLAND ON THE CONSERVATIVE MP'S ANNUAL SKIING TRIP.
So there you have it The shadow Cabinet are told to meet business leaders by their leader and the Shadow Business Secretary was on a Conservative MP's beano in Switzerland.
===
He was obviously doing his job, which is shadowing the Business Secretary.
During the worst recession, oops, downturn for 60 years the Dark Lord chose to spend Xmas as a guest of Nat Rothschild at his luxury villa in Klosters SWITZERLAND!
(Doesn't Rothschild own a yacht as well Nick? Didn't Mandelson spend some time on that this summer talking aluminium tariffs with Oleg Deripaska.)?
Mandelson then spent several days over New Year in Marrakesh, obviously on a fact-finding trip!! ;-)
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219. At 9:32pm on 06 Jan 2009, Fubar_Saunders wrote:
220. At 9:33pm on 06 Jan 2009, Fubar_Saunders wrote:
exactly the same!
223. At 9:41pm on 06 Jan 2009, Fubar_Saunders wrote:
224. At 9:41pm on 06 Jan 2009, Fubar_Saunders wrote:
exactly the same!!
You don't get extra prizes for posting exactly the same thing twice you know!
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219. At 9:32pm on 06 Jan 2009, Fubar_Saunders wrote:
220. At 9:33pm on 06 Jan 2009, Fubar_Saunders wrote:
exactly the same!
223. At 9:41pm on 06 Jan 2009, Fubar_Saunders wrote:
224. At 9:41pm on 06 Jan 2009, Fubar_Saunders wrote:
exactly the same!!
You don't get extra prizes for posting exactly the same thing twice you know!
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Nick,
Welcome back from your hols. Seems that the time spent away from Whitehall hasn't disconnected you from the Labour spin machine at all.
What you should be asking is: Now that the financial market has shown to be a burst bubble and in no way able to support the UK economy, where do we go from here in order to create wealth?
Over the weekend Gordon Brown bandied the figure of 100,000 jobs being created directly by the government's action, but absolutely no detail about how this is to happen. I heard something vague about how these jobs will be created in IT or new digital media.
Great, how's that supposed to happen when IT and hi-tech jobs are now being outsourced to India?
The service industry is now going the way of older industries: east. Third world countries now have a large enough base of educated people to satisfy the world demand for cheap, intelligent labour.
Even if we introduce the savings the Tories propose, it only slows down the inevitable. We still need a plan for the future.
So where exactly are we going to find the next wave of technologies to support our economy and how exactly do we make those jobs happen here and not in some cheaper labour market?
Thats the challenge for the government. Thats the question any political analyst should be asking. Where exactly is our future wealth going to come from? How will we keep those jobs in a global market?
If our wealth reduces, how will we provide energy cheap enough so that our citizens can afford to pay for it?
The cascade of job losses is just starting to pick up speed. The time to make decisions about the future dirction for the country is now. We need substance, not spin. Progress, not prevarication. And above all, true leadership for the people to believe in and follow.
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Fubar_Saunders sorry but I'm not up to date but I think phoenix is/maybe 60-70-80 ish and you should go a little easy on him (prejudices and all)
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
Doesn't every opposition say it is going to save money by cutting out the waste in the public services ?
Remember the Gershon report ?
They are all the same !!
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Errmmm - brownisahoon
Post: #227 and #228 posted at 10:00pm
And neither do you Sir!
I think, as funbar pointed out - there is a browser issue...
...which if you realise by the time it is taking to refresh this page tells you its the BBC web server....
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226#
My apologies, as I've said earlier; I was attempting to post a reply and I kept on getting "Error in parsing HTML at line...."
no matter how many times I corrected it, edited it, it kept telling me to pi$$ off.
There wasnt any html in what I was trying to post, just plain text.
I know though, I shouldnt have risen to phoenix's bait.
Kicking shoes well and truly rediscovered Derek...... will have to get them soled and heeled again.
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#26 jrperry
You are right about Paxman's interviewing technique, but the point is that George Osborne needs to be able to deal with it. Maybe his public school education has made him too polite?
I'm sure George's brother Ozzy would have found a way of countering Paxman - probably would have eaten his hamster!
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You write "So how will they pay for it?"
This seems illogical rehtoric to me, surely it will come from the same bottomless bank account Mr A Darling seems to have.
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233. At 11:01pm on 06 Jan 2009, squirestrat wrote:
Errmmm - brownisahoon
Post: #227 and #228 posted at 10:00pm
And neither do you Sir!
I think, as funbar pointed out - there is a browser issue...
...which if you realise by the time it is taking to refresh this page tells you its the BBC web server....
===
I was being ironic, but it was obviously lost on you!
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If Cameron had any sense he'd ditch the quarter-wit Osborne and bring back Ken Clarke as shadow Chancellor.
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Think some of us bloggers need to go and have a chat with Dave and George to give them a few more pointers-perhaps persuade Vince to join them?!
Frankly, we voters are looking for an inspiring leader, and we need one now. I'd love to see GB and AD completely minced, chewed up and spat out by the opposition.
So frustrated at none of us normal folk not appearing to be heard, I am very seriously considering standing as an independent MP. Although I think the conservatives could modify a little and tick the boxes for more people.
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@151
Derek Barber wrote:
"So far all he [Cameron] is offering is tax cuts, it's the last thing Teachers, hospital staff, and general local authorities want to hear right now."
Not surprised, really.
Around 1-in-4 jobs is in the public sector. Does it really take 25% of the workforce to look after the rest of us?
On any given day of the year around 15,000 teachers are off sick. Seems rather a lot, don't you think?
And public sector workers can, if they fall ill while on holiday, convert those days that they were ill to sick leave and reclaim the holiday back.
I couldn't see that working in the private sector (something of an understatement) so why should it be acceptable in the public sector?
Gordon - having made the transition from prudence to profligacy - has entirely missed the mood of the nation. His 'Callaghan Moment' is not far away.
See you in the pub.
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BTW:
Another package to 'help' the banks is on he way - I think we all know that.
But, as Albert Einstein once said, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, while expecting a different result.
Pub's closed at the moment.
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I for one am getting sick and tired of the pro-Labour anti Conservative rubbish that is spouted by your so called heavyweight political journalists. My licence fee should be spent on hiring some impartial interviewers who don't toe the government line but are fair and balanced to all political parties! It may have escaped your notice but we are now officially in recession and the government get an easy time while the opposition get a hard time on there ideas to help the country recover quickly! trusting G Brown and co to sort out this financial disaster is like asking the arsonist who set fire to your house to lead the fire brigade in putting the fire out! I think that since Blair got rid of Greg Dyke and co the bbc are to scared of labour what will happen after the next election when most likely we will have a new government left with a huge mess to tidy up? how long til 3 day weeks and brown coming back from saying good bye to George Bush and saying when he gets off the Aircraft CRISIS WHAT CRISIS? de ja vous me thinks! No more boom and bust tell that to the hundreds of thousands who have lost there jobs in the last 6 months and the millions more that could very well do so in the next couple of years
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Commonscents
Have you ever tried teaching or nursing?
If you did you'd know why so many are off sick!
One teacher's contract states the number of hours to be worked then adds the phrases:
'plus any additional hours as may be necessary to fulfil your professional responsibility'
And
'your role will include running an after school activity at least once a week'
In practice, most teachers work at least 60 hours a week at school and another 15-20 hours a week doing work they've brought home.
Would also suggest you look at the hours nurses do, then at rising figures of physical and verbal abuse from children, parents and members of the public and at work bullying they receive.
It's the upper levels abd their expenditure that need trimming-for example-my local hospital cannot afford to open wards, but hired an expensive local venue to provide a dinner and dance for the upper management (black tie long dress). I was furious, as a recent trip with my daughter to casualty at that hospital resulted in a wait for 13 hours before she even saw a doctor! She had broken a joint in 2 places so I found this galling!
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@243 TigerJayJ:
It is true that there are too many chiefs, and I certainly agree that there is a lot of fat to be trimmed there - as well.
The point is that savings need to be made across the board, wherever there is room for it.
And it seems to me that the public sector is a great place to start (the non-jobs, to begin with).
The point I was trying to make (and certainly NOT against the workers themselves) was that this Government seems to have adopted a strategy of high-employment in the pubic sector because it:
1. is big government - and any administration that introduces more than 1,000 new criminal laws in only 11 years has demonstrated its love of big government;
2. keeps unemployment artificially low;
3. buys votes come the general election, since any reasonable policy on savings is seen as a threat by the public sector.
With specific reference to the NHS, this Government should never be forgiven for the GP contracts, which has done significant damage to the quality of care.
And with specific reference to education, and speaking as an academic, I could NEVER forgive this Government for rolling back 300 years of history and charging for education. For me, free access to knowledge is the holy grail of civilised society, and for a Labour administration to deny the young access to this knowledge is completely inexcusable.
Can't wait 'til the pubs open.
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The British public are stupid - they allow Labour to use their tax pounds to create a political class that will keep them in power.
The only people who benefit are the new elite - the public sector.
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Nick,
what do you think-http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090107/tuk-tax-allowance-may-rise-to-10000-6323e80.html
good news but are you going ask "do the sums add up"?
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so it's settled then every one has anger management issues that must be addressed
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I hear a rumour that Lord Mandleson, spent some time on a yacht owned by a Russian Businessman!! When you think of all the fuss caused to that silly George Osborne surely Mandy wouldnt have done the same thing ?
I'm sure Nick being the impartial investigative Journo that he is will put us right on that !!
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Nick,
I am assuming that you are on tour with the Grate Leeder. Can you ask him how much more money he now expects to borrow over the duration of the 2 year recession (is it more than 4.1 billion)? Can you also ask him how high unemployment will be expected to rise to by the end of the recession? Finally, can you ask him why I have to pay a licence fee to an organisation that does not begin to represent the vast majority of the UK population?
ATB
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#246
I wouldn't bet on it actually happening. Brown is too obsessed with tax credits as a means of redistribution of money. The idea being it targets those with children better.
The facts that people are scared of claiming them, they are administratively complex and they can create an effective tax rate of over 100% on the poorest are irrelevant....
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245. Absolutely agree. They want to have the majority working in the state sector so they can control them. They want mothers working so they can gain the tax (nothing to do with women's freedom, just a tax issue) and then the children will be state reared from a young age so they can be brainwashed.
A nation of robots owned and directed by Gordy.
We are absolutely mad to allow him to continue.
We should be revolting. He is.
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#237
So was I....!
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This is slightly off-topic, but I think the financial issues will allow it to appear. It concerns Sharon Shoesmith, the Social Services Chief in the Baby P case. This person is claiming £173,000 as a payout. Need I say more. Public voices should be raised to stop this travesty of justice.
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Hi Nick,
Just to let you know I'm looking forward to your piece later today about how the government are now having to reassess the forecasts they gave only a month or so ago about the severity of the recession....
You remember - it was when everyone laughed at their over-optimistic forecasts during the PBR that the recession would be over by mid 2009, and Brown denounced them as being wrong.... only now he & Darling have to admit that it was them who were wrong.
A serious, impartial political commentator such as yourself will surely rip them to threads about this - after all, look at how you've laid into the Conservatives when their financial forecasts are called into question.
Can't wait - it'll be a good read for sure...
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Nick
I am also looking at your excellent future blogg on the plan that Gordon Bropwn has to increase personal allowances to £10,000
I am sure that you will attack him strongly on how such extravaganza willbe paid for and what cuts will he be making in hospitals and schools.
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There are several things that could be done immediately to reduce the size and costs of the public sector.
1) review every single Government quango and close those those that are unnecessary
2) Cease the practice of farming out work from the Ministeries to the highly expensive management Consultant houses.
3) Scrap all the loonie left Management job on councils that seem to eminate from recruitment campaigns in the Guardian
4) Increase retirement age in all of the public sectors to 65(in line with the private sector) and change the pension scheme from final salary to the schemes that the private sector have be forced to adopt.
This undoubtely would be unpopular with those who work in the public sector but why in these hard times should only those who work in the private sector feel the pain.
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I surely cannot be the only person that believes that you only have one agenda, to be the government's spokesperson on Radio 4 etc?
I find your analysis and comments on radio 4 and this blog somewhat offensive in their bias.
I am not an admirer of any of our 3 political parties as they have proved totally inadequate to the task in hand, but surely this bias to the government goes against bbc stated and written objectivity and balance guidelines?
If not, then the bbc has been corrupted, and BOTH opposition parties need to do something about it quick, since the bbc is proving instrumental to destroying UK real values by promoting pure soviet style propaganda.
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#245 & 251
Agree totally.
Our Government have also "pledged" to get a lot of people already on benefits back to work. This means that once these people are on training schemes, they are no longer considered to be unemployed, hence the unemployment figures will be reduced.
The only other question I have, which nobody seems to be able to answer, is this.
How much money is being paid at the moment for public sector pensions? ....and how much will need to be spent in the next three years? Apparently, there is no "pot" for this every month and the money is paid out of immediate revenue raised. which is why we haven't seen any figures for some time. Very worrying.
You couldn't make it up.
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Talking of government waste and squandering cash needlessly, this article in the Times is a classic. Ghost buses and parliamentary trains running empty so as to avoid a public enquiry on the closure of rail services:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article5462099.ece
Not exactly open and honest government.
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Good point, weejonnie -
Today will be a truly disastrous day for Brown - incurring the wrath of Robinson not only for being incapable (or dishonest) in making predictions about the recession BUT ALSO announcing plans that will see a dramatic cut in the front-line services of education, heath, defence and transport...
The journalistic tiger inside Nick has shown us over the last few months that he's ruthless when it comes to picking apart the opposition when he gets (or manufactures) the chance... now he's got the scalps of the government on the plate right in front of him - tuck in Nick, let's see what you've got.
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#256 gavin
Brown and Darling's pensions are protected by generous state-defined benefit schemes.
Why on earth should they worry about us?
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This petition is growing, deadline by 15th Jan. so sign now! Get him out.
http://petitions.number10.gov.uk/Fianance/
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Shellingout:
A friend went to a local council meeting and asked how much we, the general public, pay towards Council workers' pensions.
The answer is each and every one of us pays £58 per year towards them.
I think they should pay towards them themselves out of their own salaries - contributory, like the rest of us.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
#263 flamepatricia
Fat chance of that. Public sector workers are on Tom Tiddler's ground where their pensions are concerned. The rest of us can go hang.
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#259
Normally I'd be horrified to read of such outrageous stories, unfortunately I'm now so used to seeing such things on a daily basis I think I've become desensitised to it.
Oh for a return to common sense!
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To anybody: I am a bit concerned about my name: FLAMEpatricia. I chose it quite innocently completely unaware that it means different things to some people, such as I am a professional blogger, I am stirring up issues etc.
I only write as I feel according to my and my friends' and family's experiences and feelings and any others I meet from day to day.
I just wanted to say that in case I get lumped in with "trolls" whatever they are!
I vote and speak from instinct, not influenced by remuneration in any way shape or form.
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246. At 06:39am on 07 Jan 2009, tenmaya wrote:
Nick,
what do you think-http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090107/tuk-tax-allowance-may-rise-to-10000-6323e80.html
good news but are you going ask "do the sums add up"?
===
A good idea that to help the poorly paid.
Failing that, how about introducing a starter rate of tax, of 10% say, ....oooeer! Tried that already haven't we?
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#267 flamepatricia
Don't worry, everyone can tell you ae a "real" human being.
The NuLabour trolls are easy to spot, they usually hunt in packs, don't start blogging until at least mid-morning once they have received their daily briefing, have atrocious spelling and grammar (you know who we mean derek!) and disappear on bank holidays and weekends.
Oh, and they keep referring to Margaret Thatcher, because they just can't let go, even after 18 years!!
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Where is today Government spin he's late.
Mean while
Derekbarker
beware they will be round knocking you up so no more blogging for you
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1107291/Well-force-Shameless-families-to-work-says-Blears.html
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#267
I think your name is just fine - conjures up images of the 'naughty one' in a steamy novel :-)
#254 onwards..
We can but wait in vain for some vice from Nick whilst he is in the mile high club with his master, sorry Brown...giving him the spanish inquisition!
Unfortunately, we will just get a good school report as usual - he's a good little boy but could try harder!
As for the class bully Cam will get a battering - as usual!
I bet the report includes also a grinning cheshire cat of a photo of Brown...
Actually, I don't understand why this blog does not feature on the labour.org website - it is after all THEIR public soapbox!
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268. Replace income tax with consumption taxation by scrapping the lower rate of tax entirely and raising the VAT rate to 28-30%. Keep an upper rate to ensure higher earners (who spend a lower % of their income) still pay their share into the coffers.
That's what I believe anyway.
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I appear to have been referred (at 264) to the moderator.....whatever that means. Never been referred before. I only questioned what appears to be a concerted 'bigging-up' of Brown's UK tour on the beeb.
Ho hum
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#269 yellowbelly1959
lol i think somehow it's the right-wing obsessives who have the biggest say on this blog.
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270. At 11:08am on 07 Jan 2009, PortcullisGate wrote:
Where is today Government spin he's late.
Mean while
Derekbarker
beware they will be round knocking you up so no more blogging for you
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1107291/Well-force-Shameless-families-to-work-says-Blears.html
===
That's where those "up to" 100,000 new jobs will be then, lagging lofts and waking the feckless up in the morning! Great, where do I apply!!
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#273
It means you are going to be indoctrinated and have your mind taken over in Mandy's detention class...
Tried it with me...but it hasn't worked.
I think that Derek is the invigilator.....and Nick marks your work
;-)
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Do you not think Derek Draper / barker has the look of the guy from shameless?
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273. At 11:21am on 07 Jan 2009, middleenglandtim wrote:
I appear to have been referred (at 264) to the moderator.....whatever that means. Never been referred before. I only questioned what appears to be a concerted 'bigging-up' of Brown's UK tour on the beeb.
Ho hum
===
That will be why you got "modded" then!
Welcome to the club.
They have already wasted £600,000 of our money on these jaunts, and they are out there doing it again. Still, adrop in the ocean compared to 1 TRILLION.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1106642/Awayday-Cabinet-meetings-cost-taxpayer-600-000.html
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No10 Petition - Gordon Brown to resign for economic incompetence.
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274. At 11:27am on 07 Jan 2009, chrisleopard wrote:
#269 yellowbelly1959
lol i think somehow it's the right-wing obsessives who have the biggest say on this blog.
===
Morning briefing finished then?
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273. At 11:21am on 07 Jan 2009, middleenglandtim wrote:
I appear to have been referred (at 264) to the moderator.....whatever that means. Never been referred before. I only questioned what appears to be a concerted 'bigging-up' of Brown's UK tour on the beeb.
===
Re-post it, changing slightly any contentious material, it's your blog, you pay for it, you have a right to post here, don't give up.
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#273 middleenglandtim
I had a post removed yesterday that was a link to the BBC News web site and a story they had posted that morning. Explain that one!
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#275
Careful, do you really want the job title: Knocker Up?
Depending how quick you say it can have different connotations!!
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The thought of Gordon Brown touring the country inspecting the "economic woe" rather reminded me of Colonel Kilgore inspecting the Vietnamese village his troops had just decimated.
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#274
lol, yes, quite!
But as in life, there has to be a balance - as the BBC do not provide it!!
They let you out early then. Tell me, how did Nick get on, top marks again?
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Hey Labour rapid rebuttal unit.
Has Hazel's rapid knocker uppers finally got you out of bed?
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Where is Charles? Plenty of opportunity for him to tell us how Zen can make our economy a bed of roses again.
Have we upset him?
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Haven't you Tory obsessives got anything better to do - moaning on about other bloggers, the blog itself, your blog names - is your life just a blog?
Get real - go and help someone in the real world.
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#284
I love the smell of napalm in the morning!
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SergeantDigby
wrote:
The thought of Gordon Brown touring the country inspecting the "economic woe" rather reminded me of Colonel Kilgore inspecting the Vietnamese village his troops had just decimated.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Is he handing out playing cards with
You have been decimated by
ZaNuLabour
on the back?
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288. At 12:01pm on 07 Jan 2009, Laughatthetories wrote:
Haven't you Tory obsessives got anything better to do - moaning on about other bloggers, the blog itself, your blog names - is your life just a blog?
Get real - go and help someone in the real world.
===
Pot, kettle, black!
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Anyone noticed the report in how the Americans have brought together loads of their big guns agencies to investigate the stock exchange and financial services for fraud?
How about some of that here Gordy? Why isn't it happening?
You want confidence from the electorate?
This would be a great place to start!
The longer you leave it, the more we wonder what you have to hide!
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Thanks Yellowbelly and Squirestrat. :)
Steamy novel - now there's a thought!
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#288 laughwiththetories
Here is an example of Labour helping in the real world - helping themselves that is.
"Labour took illegal gifts from children's charity that received £1m of taxpayers' cash.
A children's charity illegally donated money to Labour after receiving nearly £1million of Government funding.
Catz Club, which runs after-school clubs for disadvantaged children, paid thousands of pounds to attend party fundraising dinners.
In September, the Charity Commission ordered the party to repay £15,000 and flagged up ‘serious concerns’ about the gift.
Charities and other good causes are barred from handing gifts to political parties.
And the commission has now launched a full-scale probe after uncovering an earlier undisclosed £15,000 donation that Catz Club paid for a table at a gala champagne bash at Wembley Stadium.
It has also emerged that the charity had nearly £842,000 of loans written off by a fund which is overseen by the Cabinet Office.
Catz Club – which runs around 100 breakfast, after-school and holiday clubs for 25,000 children – first handed Labour £15,000 in the summer of 2007 for a prized ‘platinum’ table at a Wembley event.
None of the money was declared to the Electoral Commission.
Party officials said they considered only £5,000 as a gift – below the £5,001 threshold at which it must be reported.
And last summer the charity paid another £15,000 to attend a fundraising dinner and auction at Wembley.
Labour only declared £7,500 as a political donation. The other £7,500 was seen as payment towards the ‘cost of the event’.
The Charity Commission launched an investigation into the second donation after being approached by Tory MP Greg Clark.
In a highly-critical report it ruled the gift was unlawful and ordered Labour to return the money. Catz Club said the donation had been an ‘administrative error’. The commission only recently found out about the first dinner donation.
It has since launched a probe into Catz Club, which was registered as a charity in 2004.
It has also been revealed that between March 2005 and February 2006, Catz Club received a £1.3million loan from Futurebuilders, which invests in education projects. It has also been handed £200,000 of lottery cash.
But it has emerged that in March 2008 – between the two gala events – a large amount of the loan was written off.
In a parliamentary answer last month, junior minister Kevin Brennan said the total
funding scrapped by Futurebuilders ‘in relation to the charity Catz Club is £841,979’.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1105258/Labour-took-illegal-gifts-childrens-charity-received-1m-taxpayers-cash.html
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#288
And you are here doing what exactly?
And labour are doing what exactly?
Problem is with the labour apologists, as has been said many times over, you can't see the wood for the trees.
You see, your problem is that anytime ANYONE criticizes labour or indeed this biased BBC you label them a Tory...
I suggest before you post, you read first! But as someone else said - with you it's FIRE-READY-AIM!
Tell you what whilst you are here, press Ctrl+F and search for my blog name - now go read...then come back and tell me I'm a Tory....
I think you will find that I, like most, just want honest, unbiased, truthful reporting and political analysis.
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288. Stop your nervous giggling. You can always blog off if you don't like it. ROFL.
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This is a good indication of what people think:
http://www.whatthenationthinks.com/UK/default.asp
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yellowbelly1959 @ #280
Yeah it went pretty well thanks. We all decided that rather than actually help real people through tough times we'd all just keep arguing on Nick Robinson's blog - as that is where the most important national debates happen these days.
By the way, why isn't Nick in the BB house this time?
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#298 chrisleopard
real help for real people
When will you be available to come round and lag my loft?
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291
What a wit you are yellow belly, positively Wildean
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#298
real help for real people
"Council official evicted elderly tenants from bungalows... then moved in herself
As a council official with responsibility for helping the homeless, Kristine Reeves knows how much people value their homes.
Which makes it difficult to explain how she came to play a key role in evicting frail and elderly tenants from their bungalows - then moved into one with her partner.
The £52,000-a-year head of neighbourhood and strategic housing was just one of 18 council employees who took up residence in former sheltered accommodation at the Greyhound Opening site in Norwich.
She also benefited from the rent at the one-bedroom bungalow she took over two months ago being reduced from £69 a week to £47.
Similar properties in the area cost between £350 and £750 a month.
Miss Reeves, 38, has now been suspended on full pay by Labour-run Norwich City Council, which admits conflict of interest rules were flouted.
Council leader Steve Morphew has promised to 'make good the damage'. Miss
Reeves - who, according to Land Registry documents, bought a three-storey house worth an estimated £190,000 four years ago - was dismissive of her new accommodation yesterday.
She said: 'These are not fit-for-purpose units at all. They are really very cold and you couldn't swing a cat there.'
Some 25 old people were moved out under plans to replace their homes with 100 high-density flats and houses."
Yup, Labour certainly know how to help real people, don't they?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1101999/Council-official-evicted-elderly-tenants-bungalows--moved-herself.html
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Squarehat
"Tell you what whilst you are here, press Ctrl+F and search for my blog name - now go read...then come back and tell me I'm a Tory...."
So what makes you think I was referring to you then?
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Imagine
Derek & Charles lagging your loft.
It would never get done. If they ever got them out of bed.
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Lame pat
"You can always blog off if you don't like it. ROFL."
I didn't say I don't like it - the hypocrisy of complaining about bias and then exhibiting blatant bias bordering on prejudice yourselves is still worth a giggle.
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284#
"Charlie (Whelan) dont surf!"
Derek does though. :-)
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Yellowbelly
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1105258/Labour-took-illegal-gifts-childrens-charity-received-1m-taxpayers-cash.html
the word unbelieveable comes to mind but I'm afraid not anymore.
Nick will come back with words like
No time for a novice
Hard working families
Do nothing
The latest stupid sound bite he's been spoon fed.
But nowhere will his blog have
"Gov found to have been using Tax Payers money in backdoor funding scam"
Labour apologistsare very quiet on this one?
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Backdoor funding scam?
Must have missed that one-do tell!
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300. At 12:26pm on 07 Jan 2009, Laughatthetories wrote:
291
What a wit you are yellow belly, positively Wildean
===
Praise indeed! Thank you, Oscar Wilde is my favourite.
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars".
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Portcullis: Draper and Gameboy would be disastrous at lagging your loft! They would be playing Duke Pukem games all day!
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303. At 12:31pm on 07 Jan 2009, PortcullisGate wrote:
Imagine
Derek & Charles lagging your loft.
It would never get done. If they ever got them out of bed.
===
Zen would see them through!
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303. At 12:31pm on 07 Jan 2009, PortcullisGate wrote:
Imagine
Derek & Charles lagging your loft.
It would never get done. If they ever got them out of bed.
===
Would you like to borrow my copy of "Zen and the art of Loft Lagging"?
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#302
302. At 12:30pm on 07 Jan 2009, Laughatthetories wrote:
Squarehat
"Tell you what whilst you are here, press Ctrl+F and search for my blog name - now go read...then come back and tell me I'm a Tory...."
So what makes you think I was referring to you then?
==========
I would read your own post - there was three of us, myself, yellowbelly and flamepatricia inferred...
I took a lucky guess, I guess.
If you are going to chide be careful - the higher the monkey climbs, the more you see of it's behind!
Wood, trees!!
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Just read post 673. of Gordon's Smiling - one of Nick's blog topics.
Tells you everything you need to know!
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288. At 12:01pm on 07 Jan 2009, Laughatthetories wrote:
Haven't you Tory obsessives got anything better to do - moaning on about other bloggers, the blog itself, your blog names - is your life just a blog?
Get real - go and help someone in the real world.
===
Pray tell laughwiththetories, what are you doing today to help someone in the real world?
"By giving us the opinions of the uneducated, journalism keeps us in touch with the ignorance of the community."
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Ah, where's Derek today? Nursing his wounds after being given a pelting yesterday? Or helping the Dear Leader in and out of his stretch limo as he tours the country scattering his benevelonce on te recently unemployed?
Perhaps Derek could offer an explanationa s to why another one of the government's 'initiatives' is collpasing around its ears:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/jan/06/low-pay
So we can add this basket case of a policy to the banks rescue that still isn't working; the collapsing property market and the government's inept measures to encourage people to buy a collapsing asset class; the child poverty inititative that is going backwards; 42 day detention that was thrown out; ID cards that are a waste of money; Knife crime statistics that are fudged on a daily basis; standards in pub,lic sector education which are still falling relative to the private sector - you name it, the government lays a finger on it and stuffs it up.
Do nothing party? I'd soooner the tories did nothing than wasted all our money on this load of old rubbish.
Just like the old tories? What just like the old labour who took us to the IMF in 1976?
Time to move over for ever.
The paranoia from new labour apologists that greets any tory poster is indicative of a party that knows its days in the West Wing are numbered. The stretch limos and government perks will soon be the lot of another party. There is nothing they can say or do to stop the tide of disgust with the dishonesty, waste and hubris of newlabour. The party (and your party in particular, new labour) is well and truly over.
Call an election.
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"A high street bloodbath could see 72,000 stores putting up the shutters this year - almost 200 a day.
The number of vacant shops is expected to more than double from 63,000 in December to a record 135,000 by the end of 2009.
Small market towns are predicted to feel the worst effects, turning many into ghost towns deserted by both major chains and independents.
The closures will bring huge job losses with some analysts suggesting that as many as 135,000 shop workers will join the rising unemployment total.
"Chancellor Alistair Darling had hoped his temporary 2.5 per cent cut in VAT would boost Christmas trade but even large chains still suffered big drops in sales.
Today, Marks & Spencer revealed it was slashing more than 1,200 jobs and closing 27 stores after its like-for-like sales in the 13 weeks to December 27.
The woe on the High Street prompted the head of one of the country's largest fashion retailers to claim the VAT cut had done nothing to encourage consumer spending.
Next boss Simon Wolfson said that as a measure designed to get people buying more, it had 'no effect whatsover'.
The £12.5billion measure had been a 'missed opportunity' and income tax cuts would have been a better way to increase consumer confidence, he claimed. "
Seems like the 2.5% VAT cut was a monumental waste of time and OUR money then?
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These blog comments have become a victim of overfishing
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Nick,
If I have read the Beeb web site correctly, GB is touring England & Wales to find out how the country is coping in the global recession. What happened to Northern Ireland or Scotland? Has the global recession stopped at the Irish Sea / Hadrian's Wall? Perhaps he has run out of fuel to get there. Or does he realise that England is where the next election might be won or lost, so no point butering up the Scots or Irish?
When you post again, try and include the answers to my earlier post as well (see #249).
ATB
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Ah the joy of blogs, anonymous people think that they can name call and judge other people’s personalities based on what they write. To be honest if anyone was doing something useful to society they would be unlikely to be writing here.
Personally I do what I feel is necessary to help my fellow man but big matters, beyond my control, should be handled by government of the day, as a tax payer and voter I feel I hold a duty to voice my disapproval when I feel they fail to do so.
I feel there are apologists for both of the main political parties on this board, the main difference being is those parties is currently in power. I find it easier to forgive those apologising for politicians who are not actually affecting my standard of living.
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Tell you what Gordo hers an idea which should silence all those moaners who do not appreciate how sucessfull and brilliant you are and will be a true measure of this governments support throughout the country. Hold an election ! Now the advantages would be enourmous: a clear mandate from hard and not so hard working families and a prolonged period in which you can impliment all that is required for your visionary age of change ( as guided by your moral compass ). It would also silence all your misguided critics and expose all these "tory" bloggers as being charlatans posing as ordinary members of the public.
The only dis advantage is that you would lose, but how likely is that after all you and your ministers are never short of confidence when you are asked about your chances and how well you think the country is doing. Go go go Gordo call an election.
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#315
...and you can add to that list the 2.5% VAT cut - we had the CEO of Sainsbury's on Question Time last year saying ti will be a waste of time...
...we have the CEO of Next on Today (R4) saying it was a waste of time...
Then again, Labour know best eh - just throw money down the pan, put us all in a more perilous state and accuse anyone of of doing nothing.
I'm with you on this one - i'd rather nothing was done that make it worse....there is a saying when you are in a hole stop digging, seems labour are digging to the core of the earth trying to speed up the eruption......which is what they did last time..IMF!
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@304 laughinglefty
You need to understand that we are entitled to expect unbiased reporting from the BBC, as we ALL pay for it regardless of our political views.
Ther is no hipocracy in complaining about BBC bias while exhibiting you own.
I for example feel a level of hatred for this government (and all their disgusting apologists) which I never though I was capable of.
The destruction of our country by the boundless stupidity of morons who are clearly out of their depth is no laughing matter.
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Does anyone know if dere kbarker is actually derek draper?
I cant imagine anyone else managing to have his level of fawning subsevience to the group of incompetent dimwits running our country.
What will it take for such people to be able to see labour for the flesh eating disease that they are?
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smfcbuddie @ #318:
"Or does he realise that England is where the next election might be won or lost, so no point butering up the Scots or Irish?"
Makes electoral sense, no? Don't see Cameron making many trips to Scotland.
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Alistair Darling PBR speech 24 November 2008:
"I, too, am forecasting that output will continue to fall in the UK, for the first two quarters of next year.
But then, because of decisions taken in this Pre-Budget Report, I expect it to start to recover. "
Gordon Brown - Andrew Marr Show 4 January 2009
Britain could suffer two years of recession unless the world takes concerted action, Gordon Brown admitted.
===
Is Alistair Darling a liar, or incompetent?
6 months or 2 years? Which is it?
If it is 2 years we are all doomed, the horrendous borrowing figures in the PBR were conditional on growth starting in just 6 month's time. How bad will the borrowing need to be if it is 2 years?
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#324
Is that the Chris Leopard who was in "Des Filles Possedees du Plaisir"?
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324. At 1:47pm on 07 Jan 2009, chrisleopard wrote:
smfcbuddie @ #318:
"Or does he realise that England is where the next election might be won or lost, so no point butering up the Scots or Irish?"
Makes electoral sense, no? Don't see Cameron making many trips to Scotland.
===
I thought Brown was devoting every waking hour to helping hard-working families in this recession, er downturn?
An election is the furthest thing from his mind, apparently. Why ignore N Ireland and Scotland?
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Where have all the Lefties gone? Long time passing......
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#324,
I wasn't aware that DC had announced a three day trip to find out how the country is coping with the recession (sorry, downturn). I may be harsh on poor crash, he may just not be aware that the Nats only won the Scottish elections, and not independence.
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#325
I didn't get it either - but that's nothing new with any labour figures - they never make sense...
But, I'm beginning to see what he was getting at:
...he says Orvil's PBR forecasted growth to start after the4 first two quaters. There, Kieth and Orvil saving the us...
...but he then goes on to say that: "Britain could suffer two years of recession unless the world takes concerted action, Gordon Brown admitted"
...which is his normal get out of jail card - you see it's not Keith and Orvil's fault we may remain in recession for two years - it's the rest of the world's fault of course...
Do'h silly us for not realising...
..He created the wealth HE SAID, he then went on to save the world HE SAID....but the reason we are in this mess is nothing whatsoever to do with him - it's everyone else's fault....in the whole world according to him...HE SAID
He remains as deluded as ever!
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#325 yellowbelly1959
Is Alistair Darling a liar, or incompetent?
..............................................................
...........how about an incompetent liar? :-)
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#328
They're climbing up the tree - I can see their behinds from here...
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@328 phoenix
Dont knock it!! If only they would all find somewhere to go permanently (back to an independent scotland perhaps) we could start to rebuild England.
@325 yellowbelly
bad news I'm afraid, as bothe estimates came from the *towering intellect of Crash Gordon they are both wrong. 2 years still sounds very optimistic to me.
*1 brain cell swimming around in a large empty space, programmed to spout stupid scialist mantra's at evey opportunity....
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phoenixarisenq
wrote:
Where have all the Lefties gone? Long time passing
They will come on when it goes quite in numbers and post many times each.
Then it will look like there were far more supporters of their side of the discussion than is the truth.
To people who just check out a few posts it looks like 50 - 50 for each side.
That is the role of a Draper rapid rebuttal unit.
To fool most of the people most of the time and never to address the real issues.
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#323
Our lab is speedi' in getting the results, which show that "Necrotizing Fasciitis" Is almost as bad for your health as conservative tax cutting.
Greetings' fellow citiZEN, all aloft with new ideas I see.
Pretty Hum Drum! stuff! Any further forward with that elusive plan Robin?
Strumming a bad chord squirestrat or just digging "H ALF a H ole..................
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212 Gravyfox
So Osborne and Cameron are a 'comedy'.....?
I'm tempted to agree with other bloggers above who liken Rod Hull and Emu with Blair / Brown etc....
However - I suggest that Labour and Blair / Brown are more 'Tragedy' than 'Comedy'.
Think about it..... 1 Trillion of debt, increased taxes, increased spending and almost nothing to show for it apart from a new big wheel outside parliament, ID Cards and a couple of wars.
Nice. Thanks Labour.
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Despise etc wrote:
"Ther is no hipocracy in complaining about BBC bias while exhibiting you own."
Classic stuff, you couldn't make it up - with this rare insight from the Right why should Britain worry?
ha ha ha
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198. DistantTraveller
Good point, and when you add that 18 billion to the NHS IT fiasco what da ya get
About 30-35 billion of complete an utter waste.
Makes 60 million on spud promotion look good value.
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Yay - I see Derek's back.
Nice view from the tree tops was it?
The rest of the keystone cops will arrive any minute now...
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288 Laughatthetories
You are getting a little bit sensitive there you know.
Your posts are a case study of 'wasting your life on this blog'.
After three.... one, two, three..... :
'ha ha ha ha ha!'
"They don't like it up 'em Mr Mainwaring".
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#325
Is Alistair Darling a liar, or incompetent?
6 months or 2 years? Which is it?
I must admit I couldn't get my head around this back in Novemeber. Darling says 'all over by Q2 2009 but we'll need to borrow an extra 500bn quid.
Well, that seems like an awful lot of money for a mere four quarter slowdown.
I think this is a classic cock-up by Nu-Labour. Or a deliberate 'cock-up'. Darling meant to say two years but instead said two quarters.
500bn quid looks a lot more like the kind of money we'll need to print to pay all those new public service employees for another two years while our unemployment rates soar to new UK records.
Trouble is, two quarters or two years doesn't really matter. They're both wildly optimistic forecasts.
The only way we'll get a mere two year recession is if Brown does a Mugabe and prints money.
I mean, technically, Zimbabwe isn't in recession. In fact its GDP increases by several million percent every year. And that's the same mechanism Labour will use to end this recession. Print money, devalue the currency, trash the economy but then give us some moonshine about how our GDP increased last year. Just like comrade Bob.
'Thanks to the tough measures I have taken... doing the right thing... increased investment by 20% of GDP (ie printed 300bn quid again this year) ... GDP has grown by 1.4%.... uniquely placed blah blah..'
You know he will.
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315. RobinJD
Surely you have relised by now Derek doesnt do explainations.
Just anti Cameron rants.
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#320
Much to your chagrin; I think you will find the tory posters on here, including myself, are ordinary memebers of the public utterly fed up with a hectoring newlabour administration.
We are not political hacks, we are not party representatives, we are people who have jobs or businesses and save money and try to help our families but we find ourselves completely ignored by the governemnet at best and penalised for working and saving at worst.
We are prisoners in our own land; but not for much longer as we intened to use every manner or means at our disposal to discredit this corrupt and wasteful newlabour administration and get rid of their money grabbing and sponging acolytes for generations to come.
Just as Boris caught the tide of disgust with Ken Livingstone in London, so the whole country will express their disgust at the newlabour administration at the next election.
No-one is whining about Boris dumping the Hugo Chavez oil contract now the oil proice has collapsed form 144 to 45$ a barrel. And no one is whining that, for once, we have a quiet administration running London and not the self righteous, money grabbing, wasteful and self promoting one of Ken Livingtstone.
This will come to the country at large; the years of newlabour do-gooding will come to an end as night turns to day. The evidence of failure is everywhere form failing pensions schemes to collapsing savings to ballooning personal and private sector debt levels to one failed initiative after another.
Ejection from Downing Street beckons the Dear Leader.
Call an election.
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I guess Nick is swanning round Derby with Gordon, so a question he might like to put to the Great leader...
These 35000 apprenticeships that the Govt is spending my hard-earned cash on by giving to firms like Rolls-Royce......how long are they for, what are they in (eg engineering, panel bashing, tea-making) and are there guaranteed full-time jobs at the end of it? In my day apprenticeships were for 3/4 years minimum. If Gordon is to be believed, we should be 3 and half years into growth by the time these apprenticeships come to an end. So I trust we're only paying for the first 6 months while the economy starts to come out of the 'downturn'.
While he's there, I bet he tries to take credit for brokering the transfer of Nigel Clough from Burton Albion to Derby County....
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laughinglefty
Classic indeed. The BBC are paid with MY money to be impartial, while comments from members of the public can exhibit whatever bias they choose - even lefty stupidity.
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Derek....is this you perhaps?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/128061.stm
Ummm: "Strumming a bad chord squirestrat or just digging "H ALF a H ole.................."
Compliments Derek.
However, on a musical theme and taking your hangman approach to fill in the blanks, I would say, in the words of Matthau "I have more talent in my smallest f@rt than you have in your entire body"
Next!
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335. At 2:31pm on 07 Jan 2009, derekbarker wrote:
#323
Our lab is speedi' in getting the results, which show that "Necrotizing Fasciitis" Is almost as bad for your health as conservative tax cutting.
Greetings' fellow citiZEN, all aloft with new ideas I see.
Pretty Hum Drum! stuff! Any further forward with that elusive plan Robin?
Strumming a bad chord squirestrat or just digging "H ALF a H ole..................
===
Times cryptic crossword clue of the day award goes to ... derekbarkingmad.
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Comrade Brown says he wants to "listen and to learn and to act on what people are saying".
If he is really keen to hear what people are saying, why does he post videos of himself on the internet without allowing people to add comments?
If Comrade Brown were really listening, he would let the people decide and call an election.
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LaughAtTheTories wrote:
"
Despise etc wrote:
"Ther is no hipocracy in complaining about BBC bias while exhibiting you own."
Classic stuff, you couldn't make it up - with this rare insight from the Right why should Britain worry?
ha ha ha
"
Actually LATT - if you want to laugh at people, try to do it withou showing your own ignorance - the bbc is supposed to be unbiased - members of the public do not have to be.
According to your logic I cannot complain about the quality of food in a restaurant unless I can cook better myself.
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332. At 2:18pm on 07 Jan 2009, squirestrat wrote:
#328
They're climbing up the tree - I can see their behinds from here...
Thanks. On such a gloomy day, you made me chuckle!
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343. , RobinJD
Good day, RobinJD,
As usual it is a pleasure to read your well written and considered postings. It is a relief not to see and hear the whining, nasal voice of that bigot Ken Livingstone, and London Bridge is NOT falling down despite the fact that the self-promoting Livingstone has been replaced. Boris, so far, is doing his job quietly and with competence, and I wish him all the best.
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I really don't think the BBC is at all biased. I think the right simply can't accept that most people in this country do not share their views.
That is why to them the BBC seems like the media wing of the socialist workers party.
Get the Daily Mail to set up a freeview channel, you can all watch that instead.
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@ 343 Robin
very well said and hear hear!
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#345
See what I mean - it doesn't matter how much you say it to them - they just don't listen..
Wood, trees, wood, trees!
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335
Quick! Dels glued his fingers together get help!
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346. At 2:59pm on 07 Jan 2009, squirestrat wrote:
Derek....is this you perhaps?
===
The real Dolly Draper is in the process of setting up a Labour Rapid Rebuttal Unit.
"PR Week can reveal that the Labour Party is exploring plans for an online rapid rebuttal unit, designed to kill off damaging stories circulating in the blogosphere. Former lobbyist Derek Draper will oversee the initiative, having recently been called in by Labour’s general secretary to advise on how the party can communicate its message. Labour strategists are keen to respond to the growing influence of right-wing blogs. The eventual system could resemble a modern-day version of Labour’s famous Excalibur unit, which was successfully used to kill negative stories by Tory-supporting newspapers in the run-up to the 1997 general election."
http://www.w4mp.org/html/personnel/jobs/disp_job.asp?ref=16926
===
£20,000 a year going begging for someone here if they want to apply. Mind you, you would feel as grubby as a coal miner after work each day.
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#347
Thanks yellowbelly
Though I did figure it out what barkingmad meant....
Sadly for him, however, I've been called worse by better men ;-)
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laughwiththetories
talking of hypocracy:
"Cambridge educated Geoff Hoon was leaving nothing to chance with his daughter's own entrance interview. A co-conspirator was surprised to see him back in November (Sunday, 23 November 2008) at the expensive Interview Preparation Day held at King Edward VI High School for Girls in Edgbaston run by Mayfair based Oxbridge Applications. Guido would of course do the same if he thought it would give his daughter an edge, however Guido isn't an advocate of comprehensive education and egalitarianism like Geoff Hoon. So it is a little hypocritical to see him buying his daughter a private educational advantage."
http://www.order-order.com/
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#346
Squirestrat,
Flatulence will get you no-where! squirestrat.
Odourless fragrant from the leaded plectrum!
On the curry last night squirestrat?
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Despise
"The BBC are paid with MY money to be impartial, while comments from members of the public can exhibit whatever bias they choose - even lefty stupidity."
But surely by being biased yourself you cannot make any judgements about the bias, or otherwise of others?
Sweetbody
"According to your logic I cannot complain about the quality of food in a restaurant unless I can cook better myself."
An interesting analogy but I think a better one is to say that you can't compain about food in a restaurant whilst at the same time saying you only like burnt chips i.e demonstrating that you know little about quality food. The restaurant can't be responsible for your odd tastes in the same way that the BBC can't be expected top please the extremists we seem to get on this blog.
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#344 middleenglandtim
Those 35,000 apprenticeships Gordon is creating:
Seems 6,000 could be in advanced burger flipping!
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090107/tuk-apprenticeships-for-burger-staff-6323e80.html
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"... if you want to laugh at people, try to do it withou showing your own ignorance - the BBC is supposed to be unbiased - members of the public do not have to be.."
Thats true. but you mustn't try to inflict your negative personality on the BBC. It is not biased. It doesn't have to listen to a bunch of inflated egos lecturing them on how to do their job. These comment sections are a courtesy they don't mean anything. Also please stop parroting your newspapers at us. Government deals in big numbers If we want information on the government the last place we would take seriously is here. Im lucky to get a word in edgeways with all these labour trolls eh. This page is swamped with them. You tories should be a bit less shy and speak up for yourselves. Don't let these hundreds of Labour people intimidate you.
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I've heard it all now:
MacDonalds is offering "multi-skilled hospitality training" as part of Gordon Brown's attempt to mitigate the economic downturn.
Maybe Gordon Brown is praticising for when he has to say "Do you want fries with that?"
Joke govenrment; joke prime minister; wandering lamely around the country trying to drum up support.
Call an election. The campaign will be an hilarity if this is the best you can do.
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There's a lack of genuine comment on here.
Looks to be like a Tory activist group is trying to take it over, and regurgitating the same old stuff again and again.
It doesn't even matter if everything you say is true. The repeated message is boring.
Think of something new to say or give us some peace.
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Blogging is an ideal hobby to obtain some stress relief.
There is not much point blogging when you are happy.
Bye!
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A quick review of jobs some public sector non jobs from 2008.
Street Football Coordinator: Moray Council, Salary: £19,887
- European Programme Policy Officer: Advantage West Midlands, Salary: £29,687 - £37,109
- Community Space Challenger Co-ordinator: Southwark Council, Salary: £28,494 - £33,777
- Head of Communities and Partnership: Charnwood Borough Council, Salary: £34,991 - £37,543
- Enviro-Crime Enforcement Officer: Lambeth Council, Salary: £29,241 – £30,774
- Equality and Diversity Manager: East Kent Hospitals University NHS Trust, Salary: £29,091 - £38,352
- Communications and Strategy Manager: Allerdale Borough Council, Salary: £34,991 - £37,543
- Public Affairs Manager: East of England Development Agency, Salary: £40,304 - £45,189
- Head of Participation and Inclusion: Hertfordshire County Council, Salary: £38,729 - £42,197
- Climate Change Manager: Braintree Council, Salary: £34,542 - £38,556
Hey ho
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50 quid to anyone who can decode 359
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BTW it's clear that the "educashun" system is this country is going to the dogs, by the number of people posting here unable to spell the word hypocrisy.
Please use your spell-checkers before posting your poorly written drivel.
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#348 my own message!
The link I gave was to a BBC page "Brown boost for apprenticeships" which originally quoted him as saying he wanted to "listen and to learn and to act on what people are saying". That page was updated 14:05 GMT, Wednesday, 7 January 2009.
But after posting my message, the page has been updated 15:24 GMT and now that particular quote seems to have gone. (I'm looking at both versions of the same page in my tabbed browser)
However, another quote from Brown is still there. He says: "I want to hear what people have to say, to explain what we are doing and to explain what we are going to do next."
That's very reassuring.....
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#359
No not last night - Friday yes, and looking forward to it....but it doesn't have the effect you allude to - beans do however, and that I did eat last night...
Debating against Derek is no fun, say something insulting and he looks at you like a whipped dog..
Now, insults aside, can we get back on topic, as like labour, you have no more sense of direction than a firecracker...
Unless you want to go next again...
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Here is what gives me cause for hope: I attended the episode of 'Any Questions' one month before the London elections at the Royal College of Music in London.
Ken Livingstone was on the panel and, in fairness, having an unremarkable sort of evening. He wasn't really winning any aguments but then he wasn't really losing any either.
The show ended and Jonathan Dimbleby thanked the audience for their support and the show went off air.
Then the audience stood up to go and Ken Livingstone asked if anyone had put in a question about his £25 congestion charge (the question had not been raised all evening)... There was silence. Then everyone turned to go. No-one replied. And in one brief, fleeting momnet Ken Livingstone allowed a look to cross his face which said 'I've lost this race' before he left.
He had picked completely the wrong argument to fight his cause. Bashing innocent motorists again and again.
It wasn't the £25 that people were against; it was this - if we let Ken get away with this - then what next? So even his own supporters could see they were backing an unpopular choice; someone who would go on taking until ejected from office.
This, I believe, is where the great British public have arrived in theri minds - left and right now know alike that if they let newlabour in agian they will have a mandate to just go on increasing taxes left right and centre. 45% for the rich will be the tip of the iceberg; indeed it already is as NI is going up as well.
So Derek and CEH and jimbrandt can be as idealogically superior as they like; British people who work, earn, save and try to look after and educate their own have seen through the charade fo newlabour. It's national socailism by another name; you can all have a car as long as you all have the same one - a peoples' car. Meanwhile we will drive around in our limos feeling superior.
Take heart all opponents of the newlabour superiority complex. We shall win because 'intervention' newlabour style is now about as appealing as a cup of cold sick. It's suffocating, demeaning and patronising.
Call an election.
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344
Not remotely devaluing your very valid question....
But in addition, I think you will find that these 35,000 apprenticeships are within (and not additional to) the 100,000 jobs that were announced in the PBR, and then reannounced by Brown on Sunday and Monday.
So, not a new announcement at all, just a recycling of something from the recent past (itself recycled at least once already). Experienced Brown-watchers will recognise this technique, which is, of course, somewhat dishonest, from countless other times in the past.
Vince Cable recently pointed out the problem with delivery that Brown has, when making promises like this. In other words, don't believe any of it until it has genuinely happened and been confirmed by independent witnesses (btw, on that last one, the BBC does not count as independent!).
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Re my post at #325
"Is Alistair Darling a liar, or incompetent?"
Seems the answer is both!
Recession is 'far from through,' says Darling as he warns that 2009 will be 'difficult'
"Alistair Darling warned Britain was 'far from through' the recession last night and hinted that the Government will have to abandon its target that the economy will start to recover later this year.
The Chancellor struck a decidedly downbeat note as he repeatedly described the outlook as 'difficult'.
Increasing numbers of experts and forecasters say the Treasury's forecasts of an upturn in the second half of 2009 were hopelessly optimistic.
According to the official predictions, Britain should now be half way through a one-year recession.
But the Chancellor used an interview with the Financial Times to say those projections were 'based on the evidence we had at the time'.
He added: 'This year is going to be difficult. There are going to be some tough calls.
If the forecasts are downgraded, government borrowing may have to spiral further still.
Already it is forecast to hit eight per cent of national income, higher than when Denis Healey was forced to go to the International Monetary Fund in 1976 because the country was close to bankruptcy.
Mr Darling said that if interest rates fell close to zero, the Bank of England and the Treasury would have to work 'hand in hand' since any move by the bank to print money would have to be authorised by him."
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#367
"Is it a kind of scream! Carrots"
Or are you just floating up a potato tax.
The bright eyed catalyst of gloom seems adrift of reality.
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chrisleopard wrote:
I really don't think the BBC is at all biased. I think the right simply can't accept that most people in this country do not share their views.
That is why to them the BBC seems like the media wing of the socialist workers party.
------------------------------------------------------
Nick's job is not to represent one side or the other but simply to challenge all parties announcements and actions. Do you not think in this role that Nick should have blogged on the following:
Delay in building aircraft carriers within days of Labour declaring that public projects were to be brought forward to boost the economy?
UK Statistics Authority slapdown to the Home Office after premature and misleading release of knife crime statistics?
Increasing evidence that the 12.5 billion spent on VAT cut has been wasted?
The list goes on .....
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When are you anti-labour/pro-tory blogists going to realise that your opinion DOES NOT represent the rest of the country.
You are entitled to your opinion but don't make wild assumption that everybody feels the same way.
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@366 laughinglefty
So your theory is that anyone who is biased is incapable of recognising an unbiased opinion?!
On the contrary, the fact that I am aware of (and acknowledge) my own bias means that I am well placed to comment on bias.
I can also confrm that I am more than capable of recognising stories that dont have labour fingerprints all over them, unfortunately they are few and far between while Crash tries to convince the sheeple that everything is rosy....
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I guess no new entries today from Nick because he's busy with his new origami business?
http://www.nickrobinson.info/origami/index.htm
"Nick's Origami, we fold faster than a worthless high street store in a credit crunch!"
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#348:
'Comrade Brown says he wants to "listen and to learn and to act on what people are saying".'
I'm sure I've heard them say that they're listening once or twice in the past.
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dhwilkinson wrote -
"... if you want to laugh at people, try to do it withou showing your own ignorance - the BBC is supposed to be unbiased - members of the public do not have to be.."
Thats true. but you mustn't try to inflict your negative personality on the BBC. It is not biased. It doesn't have to listen to a bunch of inflated egos lecturing them on how to do their job. These comment sections are a courtesy they don't mean anything. Also please stop parroting your newspapers at us. Government deals in big numbers If we want information on the government the last place we would take seriously is here. Im lucky to get a word in edgeways with all these labour trolls eh. This page is swamped with them. You tories should be a bit less shy and speak up for yourselves. Don't let these hundreds of Labour people intimidate you.
---------------------------------------------------
I don't inflict my 'negative personality' on the bbc. I just notice how they attack the tories yet let Gordon say anything without question. Surely as he is the one currently holding us all by the short and curlies - he is the one who should be under the most scrutiny?
As to parroting newspapers - I don't read one, so thats a bit difficult.
And do you really think that you can state that 'the BBC is not biased' as you did above, and expect anyone to take that as fact because you say so? I guess you haven't watched BBCs London news recently.
'All' individuals have their biases - it is important that those in the BBC do everything they can to ensure that theirs do not bias their reporting.
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peteinamerica wrote:
There's a lack of genuine comment on here.
Looks to be like a Tory activist group is trying to take it over, and regurgitating the same old stuff again and again.
It doesn't even matter if everything you say is true. The repeated message is boring.
Think of something new to say or give us some peace.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Pete
your in America that's where it all started. It wasn't you was it.
So you’re a true Labour believer.
If labour runs things so well why not come back to Gordon’s promised land? Tax burden?
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@368 peteinamerica
By god I think you're right. That's 11 years of education, education, education down the drain then!!
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@ 366
I bet you'd be the first to complain if one of the services administered by these people were axed.
You consider a Climate Change Manager a non-job??!
Maybe you'll change your mind in 30 years when your floating around in your living room wondering where all the water came from. I can imagine you reaching for the sodden telephone: "I'm going to call the climate change manager, this is an outrage!"
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Yellow fever sweeping through the tories rank.
So the tories hold a press conference with the slogan "Now for something completely conservative" tax cuts (very monty python)
The thing is! young Ronald McOsborne was side-lined, from making an economic speech,Hmmm, Only last year at the conservative conference Camera On Cameron was saying Osborne had made the best shadow chancellor's speech, he had ever heard? Hmmm! Yellowbelly fever indeed.
Always look on the bright side of life, may have been a better slogan choice.
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#367
I got his first one - but his post 359 ??
Usual labour claptrap - say anything, anything at all and hope the 'proletariat' (as they like to think of us taxpayers) understand them...
#364
We are all quite used to this stage of commenting on a blog - it happened before christmas too - we wait and wait and wait for the next one, in the meantime have a bit of banter.......then we know what's coming - another 'impartial' blog entry from Nick...
..I say impartial what I really mean is biased, but take it as you read it!!
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This apprenticeship creating story is fairly symptomatic of what is really going wrong with the government at the moment.
It shows how they care more about politics than actually governing.
It looks like we're paying to directly create jobs to reduce unemployment. The government says that it has created jobs and can point to it directly. The problem is the government want to create the jobs themselves.
That's not what a good government should do. It should create the conditions to encourage these jobs to be created naturally. (How you do that is another matter)
Now, I think this stems from Labour's seeming fanatacism regarding winning elections.
Labour see this as a good thing. It is something they have done directly and can point to and say "look, we create jobs!" If you don't look beyond to the principles behind it, you think that's a good thing.
Opposition parties can only try to get beyond that impression by talking principles and details. But principles and details don't really make it through the noise any more. The headline is all that matters.
It appears to me that Labour know this and keep playing to it. The thing I don't know is, whether Labour actually know what the right long-term decisions are for this country.
I've got to the point where I believe that they don't even care what those decisions are any more.
That's actually why we need an election. Whoever wins it, we need to start thinking long-term. At the moment nobody is looking beyond 2010.
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#370
Squiresrat,
Come on! admit it, you did crack a smile.
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#360 laughatthetories
"An interesting analogy but I think a better one is to say that you can't complain about food in a restaurant whilst at the same time saying you only like burnt chips i.e demonstrating that you know little about quality food."
No, this doesn't quite work! If the restaurant advertised "burnt chips" on the menu (unlikely I grant you), but instead they were greasy and soggy, you would still have cause to complain.
The BBC is supposed to be impartial - but clearly won't please everyone all of the time. However, if they really have nothing to hide, why not publish the Balen Report?
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#376
376. At 4:39pm on 07 Jan 2009, My-Pet-dragon wrote:
When are you anti-labour/pro-tory blogists going to realise that your opinion DOES NOT represent the rest of the country.
You are entitled to your opinion but don't make wild assumption that everybody feels the same way.
===========
And neither does yours - so what?
Right then - I implore to urge your leader to call an election - I have not once seen any labour minister, backbencher, whip, blogger, newspaper column or apologist say an election should be called.
Unlike the rest of us...
If you are that confident - then urge an election - the rest of the country is ready - are labour?
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My Pet Dragon wrote:
When are you anti-labour/pro-tory blogists going to realise that your opinion DOES NOT represent the rest of the country.
You are entitled to your opinion but don't make wild assumption that everybody feels the same way.
------------------------------------------------
If the rest of the country agrees with Gordon, then why did he bottle an election, and why won't he hold one now?
Oh I forgot, he's concentrating on 'hard-working families'
Its pretty clear that if gordon had the support you seem to think he has, then he would have had his election to get his mandate from the people, and then gleefully rubbed the tories faces in it, but he can't and he knows it.
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#369
And anyone else who thinks a story has changed...
Newssniffer tracks changes to many news articles... And removed postings...
http://www.newssniffer.co.uk/articles/list_by_revision
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376#
Yeah ok Chris, if you say so.
And you think that the Dear Leader speaks for the whole of the nation and the rest of us malcontents should just wind our necks in.......
Does your passport say "Peoples Republic Of North Korea" on the front of it???
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Chris, my apologies for 392, pointed the finger in the wrong direction.
Unless the pet windbag who'se jibe I was addressing also goes by the real name of Chris. :-)
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383 Chris
My God! I hope your joking!
What do you think the joker who takes up the position will actually do?
Will he be a scientist?
Will he be an engineer?
Will he be yet another jobsworth who will believe in the new religion of 100 watt lightbulbs are killing Polar Bears?
Suatainable Technology does not work!!!
Efficiency is the key!
More then likely this is another money sucking campaign that will send out obvious rhetoric about turning lights out and pulling plugs out of sockets, on the publics cheque book once again.
It's up there with Compliance Managers. Produce nothing cost lots.
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Just a word in your ears to alleviate any concerns that you may have regarding this website and ourselves.
We are not any of the following:Bigots / Zealots / Fanatics / Weirdoes / Homophobics / Terrorists / Misogamists / False Prophets / Criminals / Subversives / Deviants or Disciples of The Anti-Christ.
Neither are we trying to foster a Psuedo Religious cult / A Political Party or amassing an army to overthrow the elected governments of any country.
'We are just people, and we believe in justice for all the people'.
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Is racism a pigment of the imagination?
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What destroyed Soddam?
What is the 'Mark Of The Beast'?
What is the significants of 'The Two Sevens Clash'?
Why do governments carry out inhumane actions in the name of humanity?
Why are so many wars fought in the name of religion when it is universally accepted that there is only one God?
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sorry 397 should have been aimed at the gaza blog, here's the correct one
Insanity:Why if you are rich you are eccentric,but if you are poor you are mad?
Why does the government blame the poor for being poor and not their policies?
Why are the old treated with such disrespect, when if it wasn't them the young wouldn't be here?
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Do you trust those entrusted with your well being?
Do you know where you are going?
Do you know where you have come from?
Do you know where you are today?
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364. At 4:06pm on 07 Jan 2009, peteinamerica wrote:
There's a lack of genuine comment on here.
Looks to be like a Tory activist group is trying to take it over, and regurgitating the same old stuff again and again.
It doesn't even matter if everything you say is true. The repeated message is boring.
Think of something new to say or give us some peace.
===
Thanks for the inciteful comment pete, much appeciated. If you are truly in America, why does it bother you anyway?
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...do you really think that you can state that 'the BBC is not biased' as you did above, and expect anyone to take that as fact because you say so? I guess you haven't watched BBCs London news recently.
I will rephrase that. I see no evidence that the BBC is biased outside these comments pages.
As for judging bias on BBC London News that would be difficult as I, like millions of others don't live in London. perhaps if I watch Breakfast on News 24 or on the iPlayer but why? Local news tends to be a bit soft anyway. I don't see the problem.
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376. You silly old dragon. Look you boy-oh!
If you study these posts you will see that overwhelmingly people are supporting Conservative or at least something other than Labour.
You are entitled to your niave opinion Drag, but sooner or later you will realise that Labour just doesn't work in this country.
They try to be all things to all people, Recipe:
a little bit of Socialism
a little bit of Communism
a little bit of Conservative
a little bit of "new" Labour whatever that is
all wrapped up in a bunch of flat faced misguided saddos who are desperate to keep their job with a big whipped topping of a man who thinks he's saved the world but can't help this country.
Eeeeeek. Bin it.
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368. At 4:14pm on 07 Jan 2009, peteinamerica wrote:
BTW it's clear that the "educashun" system is this country is going to the dogs, by the number of people posting here unable to spell the word hypocrisy.
Please use your spell-checkers before posting your poorly written drivel.
===
If we did that we would never get any of Derek's little gems.
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383. At 4:58pm on 07 Jan 2009, chrisleopard wrote:
@ 366
I bet you'd be the first to complain if one of the services administered by these people were axed.
You consider a Climate Change Manager a non-job??!
Maybe you'll change your mind in 30 years when your floating around in your living room wondering where all the water came from. I can imagine you reaching for the sodden telephone: "I'm going to call the climate change manager, this is an outrage!"
===
I do call Climate Change Manager a non-job. Who is going to apply, King Canute?
Funny how you used to call it global warming, now it's "climate change". I have news for you, the climate has always changed, and always will.
"The freezing conditions have continued to produce scenes of ice and snow across the UK as temperatures plunged to -12C (10.4F) overnight."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7815773.stm
Not much global warming around at the moment, is there?
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364. At 4:06pm on 07 Jan 2009, peteinamerica wrote:
There's a lack of genuine comment on here.
Looks to be like a Tory activist group is trying to take it over, and regurgitating the same old stuff again and again.
It doesn't even matter if everything you say is true. The repeated message is boring.
Think of something new to say or give us some peace.
===
You haven't exactly covered yourself in glory with your postings so far either.
Wrapping up
Nick 23 Dec 08, 10:29 AM
Plus c'est la même chose?
Nick 5 Jan 09, 09:15 AM
Then a re-hash of the previous posting the next day, 6 January, not 5 January as Nick claims.
That is the total output from the BBC's Political Editor in 2 weeks, not exactly a lot to get your teeth into.
And you are well wide of the mark, the only party activists on here are from the Dolly Draper Labour Rebuttal Unit.
"Think of something new to say or give us some peace."
I couldn't have put it better myself!
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383. At 4:58pm on 07 Jan 2009, chrisleopard wrote:
@ 366
I bet you'd be the first to complain if one of the services administered by these people were axed.
You consider a Climate Change Manager a non-job??!
Maybe you'll change your mind in 30 years when your floating around in your living room wondering where all the water came from. I can imagine you reaching for the sodden telephone: "I'm going to call the climate change manager, this is an outrage!"
===
"You consider a Climate Change Manager a non-job??!"
Yes I do. And I can live without a Street Football Co-ordinator as well. Playing football in the street is a criminal offence!!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/manchester/4965136.stm
Paying £20k a year to encourage breaking the law, that is a non-job.
I can also do without a £100k a year anti-recession guru as well, but it seems Labour-run Lancashire County Council can't.
Also, why is it not called global warming any more? Could this be why?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7815773.stm
or
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7814922.stm
I have news for you, the climate has always changed, and always will.
Who is going to be a climate change manager, King Canute?
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kikidread @ #395, 396 & 397
Good posts, you are on top form tonight!
"As long as war is regarded as wicked, it will always have its fascination. When it is looked upon as vulgar, it will cease to be popular."
Oscar Wilde
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#268-yellowbelly-
Cannot help wondering that maybe Brown just thinks the VAT reduction has been a complete waste of time(obviously he will never admit it) and surely it would have been better giving everybody a extra money in their wages and therefoere a chioce to do what they like with it. Maybe this is to simple for this goverment, they probably prefer the more complex tax credit system, at least it keeps the goverment jobsworths in work.
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401 DHwilkinson
Here is a whole web-site dedicated to BBC bias:
BBC Bias
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This blog is basically the same as yesterday's, but a bit less interesting, yet it has 410 posts to only 329 on yesterday's.
Is this because the great British blogging public didn't pay attention in French?
I blame Brown / Thatcher for wrecking our education system / hating foreigners (delete as appropriate)
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Cooo eeeh, Mr/Mrs/Ms moderator
Over 90 minutes to mod the blogs tonight, not exactly conducive to a healthy exchange of thoughts, is it?
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dhwilkinson
I agree with you. The local news on the BBC is very soft.
Perhaps the powers that be at the BBC think that because we live in the country, we can't cope with anything hard line.
We had quite a long presentation about rats this morning and how to get rid of them. 'Nuff said.
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Labour and all its minions have nothing to offer except slavery, corruption and debt. Disgusting. NuLabour is a festering boil.
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Gurkhas decision delay criticised
"The government has been criticised for delays in producing a new policy on Gurkha veterans wanting to settle in the UK.
The High Court had ruled immigration rules that excluded from the UK Gurkhas who retired before 1997, was unlawful.
The government was to review all cases by the end of 2008 but it has asked a tribunal for a further three months.
A solicitor for the Gurkhas said he would ask the tribunal to enforce the ruling unless ministers took action.
David Enright said a new policy had been promised before Christmas but the government "did not know" when it would be published.
He said he would be going back to the Asylum and Immigration Tribunal in 21 days to ask it to enforce the original ruling.
Mr Enright said there were more than 300 veterans in the UK waiting for their cases to be decided.
Some, he said, were living 10 to a room, unable to work or claim benefits."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7815775.stm
===
It is shameful that these brave, proud men, who fought for our freedom, are still being denied the right to settle lawfully in this country, that they helped defend.
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#366 Carrots:
"- Climate Change Manager: Braintree Council, Salary: ?34,542 - ?38,556"
It's reassuring that somebody is managing the climate change, so now we'll know who to blame when the ice-caps melt!
I think I would want more money than this person gets to take all the stick that's coming his/her way.
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404 yellow
Using this week's weather conditions to predict the future climate is, to put it mildly, nonsense.
If I were stupid enough to invest a fiver on some of those nice Camelot scratch cards today and won a hundred quid, would that mean that by 2020 I could expect to have won a couple of million?
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Hello Barking Derek, this is your duffle coat speaking...
A couple of days ago, you may recall, you got into something of a tangle over deregulation, the formation of the FSA and Margaret Thatcher. I gave an explanation of how regulation of the Stock Exchange developed in the aftermath of Big Bang.
I left you a open goal by omitting to mention the deregulation of the banking industry under Margaret Thatcher. I've since given you a couple of days to kick the ball into the empty net, but alas, it's still on the same spot where I left it...
Margaret Thatcher, you may recall, regarded the retail banks with antipathy. The effect of deregulation was to allow banking services to be offered by a variety of other institutions - most notably that the then still mutualised building societies could play at being banks.
Whilst they grew, demutualised and grew larger, only to be swallowed up by bigger fish already in the pond, they moved away from what they had been doing well into territory they didn't quite understand.
Much of the weakness and instability of HBoS, The Crock etc., stems from building inadequate foundations and can be traced back to those heady days of deregulation.
At this point, you ought to be jumping up and down with glee and exclaiming "it was all Maggie T's fault!".
Except I fear that you get hold of words like "deregulation" and "liquidity" and use them without really understanding what they mean.
Must be hard being an extra from the Mountain King's hall in Peer Gynt...
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Following the brilliant posts on the Apocalypse Now theme ("Charlie don't surf" - brilliant, Mr Fubar)...
If tonight's front page of the "Evening Standard" is correct in saying that Gordon Brown is about to start printing money to make up the deficit (and another big drop in interest rates), then the theme tune to his "sow the wind, reap the whirlwind" tour of England and Wales should be "This Is The End".
The Horror.
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chrisleopard @383 asks:
"You consider a Climate Change Manager a non-job??! "
Absolutely. Just like 'Diversity Managers' and other parasites.
One might as well pay taxes for a publicly-funded Manager for the Orbit of Uranus.
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There is something that is going to hit Keith and Orvil in the face like a wet fish pretty soon regarding the Global Warming....sorry Climate Change....sorry....tax system.
A study which has been going on for years, which us run by Professors (somehow I tend to believe them before I believe a politician) has shown a cyclical growth in the type of sea algea that eats CO2 when it has increased levels - furthermore this on-going study has shown CO2 to not be a pollutant!
This algea growth occurs on natural cycles - (you know before Gordon Brown invented the human) - when the earth has naturally gone through warming/cooling/warming/cooling....that's before humans were invented ;-)
Indeed, to further smack the botty of the labour apologists backing non-jobs - tell me - what is the season in the southern hemisphere - the same place as the Antarctic - yeas, got it - okey dokey - now what is happening to the ice down there?....yes, got it.
Good.
Now what season is it in the northern hemisphere - where the arctic is - yes, got it - now what is happening to the ice up there? Clue; the exact opposite of what is happening down there...
Now, labour apologists explain to me why we 'need' a climate change manager!! Is it to feather the boa and massage the tax raising measures?
Now, I'll continue...
To all those labour apologists who suggested the tory apologists should change the record and stop complaining and stop this thing of bias at the BBC and stop whinning and just accept that the BBC are biased by inference....tell me this:
If the torys were in power for these past 11 years and had made a complete cock up of things and the BBC was biased toward the tories - would you STFU and not complain, or not post to blogs like this trying to strike a balance?
No, thought not!!
this is like the advert for the credit card - for every dumb thing the labour party do a balance is struck, somewhere in the world - in this case here.
Next!
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http://www.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/3214231/ed-balls-debuts-the-apprenticeships-brownie.thtml
Any chance this Government will ever tell the truth about anything????
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the man has already told us all one huge multi-billion pound saving he would make from day one
cancel the unneeded, unnecessary and unworkable national ID card schame
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215. jrperry
My apologies too. I'm afraid I only found your posting a short while ago, since I share this computer with my spouse and am often thrown off it!
If TV had been around when some of the great politicians were in office, I wonder if their reputations would be as high as they are today. It is unfortunate that apart from having a policy, and hopefully the energy and honesty to pursue it, today's politicians must also be 'film stars'. Perhaps if no politicians were allowed to appear, and one had to either read about them, and analyse what they were saying, or if sight-impaired, listen to the radio, a more intelligent voting public would result. One cannot of course put the clock back, but it is an interesting thought.
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#387
387. At 5:13pm on 07 Jan 2009, derekbarker wrote:
#370
Squiresrat,
Come on! admit it, you did crack a smile.
============
Sorry Derek, I missed that one - yes I'll admit it I did 'crack' a smile...
...but not at what you think I'm afraid.
I do find you amusing though, I'll give you that.
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410. MunichMadrid7980
plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose
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413. power-to-the-ppl wrote:
Labour and all its minions have nothing to offer except slavery, corruption and debt. Disgusting. NuLabour is a festering boil.
(To the tune
of "There's a hole in my bucket"
So prick it, dear Henry, so prick it"
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414. yellowbelly1959
These brave men have one fatal flaw: tehy are true heroes and loyal to Queen and Country. Only terrorists and lowlifes receive compassion and 'human rights' in today's UK.
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#409
Nice find Sir....
So we are not alone with our views!
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Here's the top ten list of non-jobs from the TA:
- Street Football Coordinator: Moray Council, Salary: £19,887
- European Programme Policy Officer: Advantage West Midlands, Salary: £29,687 - £37,109
- Community Space Challenger Co-ordinator: Southwark Council, Salary: £28,494 - £33,777
- Head of Communities and Partnership: Charnwood Borough Council, Salary: £34,991 - £37,543
- Enviro-Crime Enforcement Officer: Lambeth Council, Salary: £29,241 – £30,774
- Equality and Diversity Manager: East Kent Hospitals University NHS Trust, Salary: £29,091 - £38,352
- Communications and Strategy Manager: Allerdale Borough Council, Salary: £34,991 - £37,543
- Public Affairs Manager: East of England Development Agency, Salary: £40,304 - £45,189
- Head of Participation and Inclusion: Hertfordshire County Council, Salary: £38,729 - £42,197
- Climate Change Manager: Braintree Council, Salary: £34,542 - £38,556
What - street football co-ordinator, anyone met one - do they hand out ASBO's too for smashed windows??
Diversity Manager - there had to be one!
And Southwark Council are looking for someone to pilot the space shuttle it seems...
Nice!
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Interesting spectator article..
Fraser Nelson says this at the end:
"The danger for Balls is that he's damaging the potency of his Tory "cuts" card. He'd be advised to stick to areas that are genuine, for now at least. One presumes he has enough real Tory policies to disagree with. Today's line about apprenticeships is not exaggeration but outright fiction, and no self-respecting interviewer would let him get away with it. It's the sort of fevered nonsense that normally only emerges in an election campaign. Which does make you wonder if Brown's new setup - working from something akin to a war room in 12 Downing Street - is making them all a little too excitable."
So, there you have it, if Nick has any respect he wont let Balls get away with balls...
Then again...he probably will - and we'll have political groundhog day all over again....
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22:20 In the blogsphere, Dufflecoat and Anorak are in the cow-shed manuring over yesterdays news, unable to put a glimpsing finger on a new drape, they remain frozen and lost to the 1980's
While farmer squirerat is forming a new band with the grunting pigs in the sty pen,hoping that tax cut will deliver his bacon.
The funny farm with the funny plan,
Hey! thats entertainment...laugh...laugh.....
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418#
You're too kind :-)
Very appropriate choice of song as well...
"This is the end, my only friend, the end
Of our elaborate plans, the end,
Of everything that stands, the end,
No safety or suprise, the end,
I'll never look into your eyes again...."
Or one that'll stir Derek up a bit, from the bridge before the coda.....
"Come on baby take a chance with us,
Come on baby take a chance with us,
Come on baby take a chance with us,
Meet me at the back of the blue bus
Meet me at the back of the blue bus!"
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Just watched our esteemed Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary getting the Paxo treatment.
At times he looked like a rabbit caught in the headlights.
To think that a few months ago he had ambitions towards leading his party.
Cometh the hour, cometh the boy...
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414#
Its not just shameful.
Its disgusting. I have never worked with more dedicated, disciplined and affable soldiers as the Ghurkas. The way the MOD has treated them is a badge of national shame and is now proven to be illegal.
I thought John Hutton could have been different to the muppets we have had as defence ministers; we havent had a decent one since Tom King. More fool me, just another jellyback politician with no honour and no conviction.
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This comment was removed because the moderators found it broke the House Rules.
#416 munichmadrid7980
"404 yellow
Using this week's weather conditions to predict the future climate is, to put it mildly, nonsense."
===
Where in my post did I predict future climate?
What I said was it is funny how the buzzwords of "Global Warming" have disappeared, and the new buzzwords are "Climate Change".
The climate has always changed, and always will. It is seriously doubted whether CO2 is a cause, more an effect, and that man-made CO2 emissions are not a factor.
"One such challenge comes from Dr. Bob Carter, Research Professor at James Cook University and paleoclimate analyst with more than 30 years' experience, including 95 research papers.
In an Accuracy in Media guest column in April 2007, Carter emphasized: "The evidence for dangerous global warming forced by human carbon dioxide emissions is extremely weak. That the satellite temperature record shows no substantial warming since 1978, and that even the ground-based thermometer statistic records no warming since 1998, indicates that a key line of circumstantial evidence for human-caused change-the parallel rise in the late 20th century of both atmospheric carbon dioxide and surface temperatures-is now negated."
It is a con to control our lives and an opportunity for a new revenue stream, carbon taxes.
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/reprint/media_con_job_global_warming.html
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371. RobinJD
Nicely put and your conclusion is spot on sir.
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415. croydo
Hey dont knock the dosh, its probably only 2 days a week and you dont actually have to do anything.
Also being a public sector job, flak never arrives, it just gets spread out across the department and some fresh uni grad takes the wrap and gets moved sideways.
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#409, #428
The BBC may have its bias, but sorry, that website is dreadful.
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427. At 9:51pm on 07 Jan 2009, phoenixarisenq wrote:
414. yellowbelly1959
These brave men have one fatal flaw: tehy are true heroes and loyal to Queen and Country. Only terrorists and lowlifes receive compassion and 'human rights' in today's UK.
===
Or 7' 2" Pakistani women!!
"A 7ft 2in Pakistani woman has just been granted asylum in Britain on the grounds of her height. She claims she was a victim of ridicule in her homeland."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1106185/LITTLEJOHN-Welcome-2009-Heads-lose-tails-doomed.html
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383. chrisleopard
Well yes I do. its a complete waste.
And for the record, if I were to need anything doing, the last thing I would do is call the council.
They cant even empty the bins and sweep the streets properly.
Just how do you think they manage climate change.... exactly?
Money down the drain like most NuLabour projects. Mere job creation.
Hey ho.
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Now - to the labour apologists - this is the balanced view that most of us want to see:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/
The blog entry: More Statistical Fury
It is very balanced - well done mark Easton.
It is for reasons such as this as to why we get so mad about Nick's blog - I have never seen Nick write this way before - why not Nick?
If I may be so bold as to borrow the comment on that blog from 'the-real-truth'
"If the tories get stats wrong it may embarass them later - they are only the opposition.
When labour get stats wrong it can bankrupt the country - they are the government!
Given this difference, I don't see you have any reason to mention the tories in your piece, let alone try to draw parallels. I assume it was just to give you an excuse to give the impression 'they are all at it', while ignoring the possible consequences (embarassment vs national collapse)..."
Well said that man and spot on.
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Guess who?
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421. alsodisenchated
Unlikely
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2009/01/more_statistical_fury.html
But at least one BBC reporter is prepared to hammer at government lies.
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431. At 10:19pm on 07 Jan 2009, derekbarker wrote:
22:20 In the blogsphere, Dufflecoat and Anorak are in the cow-shed manuring over yesterdays news, unable to put a glimpsing finger on a new drape, they remain frozen and lost to the 1980's
While farmer squirerat is forming a new band with the grunting pigs in the sty pen,hoping that tax cut will deliver his bacon.
The funny farm with the funny plan,
Hey! thats entertainment...laugh...laugh.....
===
derekbarkingatthemoon
Well done! One of your best. I have just twigged. You are actually a Tory plant, spouting nonsense to discredit the whole ZaNuLabour ideology. Why would anybody who actually supports Labour put out such drivel in their name.
It also explains your fixation with Maggie Thatcher.
Well done, keep it up.
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The rat-pack:
Wee sleekit, cow'rin, tim'rous beastie,
O' what a panic in thy breastie,
Thou need na start awa sae hasty,
Wi bickering brattle!
I wad be laith to rin an chase thee,
Wi murdering pattle,
I'm truly sorry man's dominion,
has broken natures social union,
An justifies thee startle at me,
thy poor earth born companion,
An fellow mortal:
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#431
You really are barking mad aren't you Derek!! Your post is like being savaged by a dead sheep.
You are the prime example of why some animals eat their young! You have such a bitter outlook, enough to sour a ripe grape.
Whilst you sit there looking like an envelope without an address on it, have at least the decency to make your posts amusing rather than yourself! It does you no favours - at all!
You simply do not get it do you, you are unbelievably so narrow minded that if you were to fall on a pin it would blind you in both eyes. Please, for your own sake, grow up Sir!!
Now can you please get back on topic - or get your coat - whichever is the quickest is fine.
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# 409 jonathan_cook
Interesting link. The trouble is, the BBC thinks that it is not biased and any suggestion to the contrary is simply dismissed. If they are so sure they are genuinely impartial, why has the BBC fought so hard to avoid publication of the Balen Report?
The BBC is a fantastic organisation, producing superb TV and Radio programmes. But in recent years its News and Current Affairs has been tainted by the suggestion that it is not always as even-handed as it should be when reporting certain controversial issues. Some interviewers, like Paxo or John Humphrys can usually be relied on to give everyone an equally hard time. Having grilled a guest, they might then turn to an opposing guest and give them an equally hard time. And that's exactly how it should be!
But some reporters or correspondents appear to substitute 'comment' for fact - and give the impression of having their own agenda. Rather than let us decide for ourselves, they 'interpret' for us or present the facts in a selective way. Until this is addressed, the BBC can expect some criticism, such as this article in The Spectator
We need confidence to be restored. Publishing the Balen Report would be a good start.
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BBC, why are my post going missing?
I have commented twice now that Tony McNulty got a good kicking from Paxman tonight on Newsnight.
It seems that Employment Minister McNulty didn't know whether the 35,000 apprenticeships announced today were in addition to, or included in, the figure of 100,000 announced in the Queen's speech in 2007.
If he doesn't know, who the heck does?!
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It seems my posts have been blocked because I called the Employment Minister McNum_pty!
If I called him a Hoon that would be OK then?
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443. At 11:21pm on 07 Jan 2009, CarrotsneedaQUANGO2 wrote:
Guess who?
===
Is it derekbarkingupthewrongtree?
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409 jonathan cook
Sorry but your website appears to be ranting right wing. it could have been created by one of you. So is therefore not evidence of bias at the BBC. Anyone can set up a website on the internet to voice their predjudices.
Which is why its a good thing we have good sources of news open to criticism here no matter how misguided that criticism is. There are plenty of niche news sources out there to cater for everyone who chooses to pay extra for them. But the BBC/ITN/C4 must cater for everyone. Not just the vocal minority.
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#445
Nice to know you've accepted your Anorak name?
7ft 2" Eh, well!in your case I didn't know they stacked it that high.
Do I sense a bit of BNP flavour there?
Careful now! knock...knock.....
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#450
450. At 00:39am on 08 Jan 2009, yellowbelly1959 wrote:
It seems my posts have been blocked because I called the Employment Minister McNum_pty!
If I called him a Hoon that would be OK then?
==================
That's given me a good chuckle before bedtime.
Nice post.
:-) :-) :-)
Still giggling....
Still...I'm switching off now.....
:-) :-) :-)
hahahahaha..no stop it. G'night
hahahahahahahaha.....
I wonder if Nick picks up on that then?
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#Despise the world
"So your theory is that anyone who is biased is incapable of recognising an unbiased opinion?!
On the contrary, the fact that I am aware of (and acknowledge) my own bias means that I am well placed to comment on bias."
That's gibberish - it's like saying I know I've got blinkers on but that leaves me well placed to comment on the nature of blinkers.
Well maybe, but not much else!
Why not try removing the blinkers and widening your horizons.
By the way, yellow belly (ugh) - you are very boring
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Bloomin' marvellous! Just what I've been looking for!
In times of trouble, we're the only nation who use humour to lighten the weight.
Thanks everyone-I'm not being sarcastic-it's well needed.
Critics take note and read the blogs carefully-under the humour lies the comment you seek, but you do need a sense of humour to see it!
Some of it is hysterically funny, and very clever too! Well done all-we need light relief!
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Re paxman
Just saw a programme about him emailing M and S's CEO about the lack of support in their men's undergarments! No wonder Jez is bad tempered-he must be very uncomfortable!
Bet this comment gets moderated!
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#453 derekbarkingatthemoon
derek, I haven't the faintest idea what you are talking about, nor I suspect do you, but you are entertaining, like watching a monkey scratch its @rse at the zoo, amusing, but stupid too, at the same time.
Nurse says up your dosage for tomorrow, there's a good boy!
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#455 laughwiththetories
Very erudite! Such rapier-like wit you have.
"In all matters of opinion, our adversaries are insane."
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re rate of moderation-I believe it is dictated by teabreaks and shift changes
Re Gurkas-what's so hard to process? Just order a big rubber stamp saying approved and stamp the lot. All done-not difficult, surely?
Re religion-that and politics cause the most wars-both used as a cover to get land, resources, domination or out of a recession or depression. One wants what the other has so uses religion and/or politics to get it. Watch the carry on over gas in Russia and the Ukraine, Gaza etc etc.
Re GB touring-why does he never make visits to small rural areas like mine? Because we are forgotten about-we can't even get decent broadband. Unemployment is high, disaffected teenagers have kids as they have no other future-especially when the local community centre won't even give up one evening a month for the teenagers to stay off the street. I love my home, but hate the attitudes of mainly elderly people who alienate anyone around them under the age of 50!
In fact, Michael Howard was the only politician to knock on my door when campaigning. I am not in his constituency, but I asked him in, grilled him persistently for an hour over issues I wanted answers for, and he was an absolute gent. Polite, answered my questions calmly, directly and respectfully.
Take note Mr Cameron. This is how you should be!
Don't expect Gordon to do the same! In 10 years Michael Howard has been the only one!
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