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Economicallyliterate

Listed below are comments made by Economicallyliterate between Tuesday, 18th August 2009 and Friday, 9th October 2009.

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Lloyds: compensating taxpayers 8:54pm on 09 Oct 2009 Let me just pose a couple of thoughts.
Various posters have queried why bank base rates haven't been increased? Could it be that many people have annual reviews of their mortgages and that some of the biggest mortgage lenders adjust payments in September?
We can't have people's mortgage payments going up before the next election can we?
Some people have queried why we haven't been inundated with lots of repossessions. Considering that bank base rate is at a 200 year low and will likely remain there or there abouts until after the election this is hardly surprising.
Just wait until they start to rise and then see how many hand back their keys or default?
Tories bash the rich 3:54pm on 06 Oct 2009 Post 12. Option 3 is a hung parliament with Saint Vincent of Cable as Chancellor with Osborne offered another top role.

Imagine the scene the Tories 10 seats short of the majority with the Libs with say 50 seats. Give Vince the Treasury and another Liberal the Environment could or would Nick Clegg turn that down?
'A simple proposition' 10:54pm on 28 Sep 2009 As an Englishman I have been amazed that no one has thrown the 800lb gorilla into this discussion.
There is a lot of SNP and Labour bile being vented against each other but let me suggest another interested party in all this i.e David Cameron.
If I was David Cameron I would want Scottish independence or English liberation, however he wanted to sell it to people on ether side of the border to be sorted sooner rather than later.
I'm sure someone could work out how much less of a swing the Tories would require to have a majority in England and Wales only compared to Britain including Scotland. I will exclude Northern Ireland not out of any malice but in acknowledgement that in Ulster politics is more local hence the SDLP, DUP, UUP, Sinn Feinn et al rtaher than Labour or Conservative MP's.
Without Scottish MP's it would be much more difficult for Labour ever to get back in power.
Perhaps Cameron should put in his manifesto the following.
"If the SNP is elected at the next Scottish Parliamentary election the Conservative Party would support a referendum on Scottish cessession from the Union. If that vote was to be in favour of cessession a conservative UK government would work with a Scottish SNP government on an agreement for financial and political separation which would then be put to the vote as follows.

Do you agree that Scotland should withdraw from the United Kingdom on the basis of the agreement made between the UK and Scottish governments?

However if the original vote was against independence the SNP would agree to not raise an independence ballot for at least ten years."
Many of the biggest issued facing the UK as a whole in the near future such as Trident, Nuclear power renewal or not?, armed forces make up and defence policy such as the new aircraft carriers and NHS reforms all require long term plans that can oly be made with a degree of finality one way or another once the question of Scottish independence or not is resolved in the short to medium term.
Idelogical chasm? Tough sell 10:01pm on 28 Sep 2009 Post 94 the price increase may have something to do with how much sterling has dropped compared to the Euro in the last six months.

Did anyone else see Panorama?

It seems to be that if we are to cut the deficit back to where Gordon originally felt it to be prudent then each and every one of us tax payers is looking at paying GBP 25,000 in extra taxes by 2014 or there are going to be some very serious cuts in services
Brown and bonuses 12:12pm on 27 Sep 2009 Plus ca change from Gordon Brown!Lots of hot air and no real action.
Robert, just a thought if
"In other words, nothing substantially new was announced by the Prime Minister this morning."
They why bother blogging about it?
Big choices 6:57pm on 15 Sep 2009 Can I please have a pint of what post 7 has been drinking?
The PM breaks his silence... 10:15pm on 24 Aug 2009 England winning back the Ashes is a good day to bury the news that our EU contributions will rise by 60% next year.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8219344.stm

Perhaps the EU believed Gordon about us being best equiped to ride out the recession. Most of the other big economies have come out of recession and we haven't yet we get stitched up again!
The PM breaks his silence... 10:05pm on 24 Aug 2009 Saga you just have to get a dig in don't you!

Nice to see the unelected Scottish PM has a comment re the success of an English team with a few foreign born players in it and yet he has nothing to say about what is probably the biggest story and debate in his own country. I suppose he has had so little to celebrate about in Scottish sport recently.

Re your dig re South African's playing cricket for England. I seem to recollect both Scotlands Football and Rugby Union teams having gone down the line of picking foreigners whose grandmothers once bought a tartan in the recent past only with no real success.

We tried having a Scottish captain of the England cricket team before but Douglas Jardine, born in Bombay of Scottish parents, whilst initially successful caused a huge amount of trouble.
The black hole deepens 6:34pm on 20 Aug 2009 And July is supposed to be good month with bumper corporate taxes! Apparently, according to the BBC ceefax the expected borrowing figure for July was GBP 500 million or GBP 8.33 per person in the UK and it actually GBP 8 billion i.e. GBP 133.33 for every man woman and child in the UK.

Just remember back to 1997 "Things can only get better" was what Labour told us. Some hollow promise.
Bloodgate brings Deano down 9:01pm on 18 Aug 2009 As someone who normally posts on other non sport based blogs I can hopefully answer some of the questions re some items still awaiting moderation and others cleared. I'm sure the BBC could clear it up if required.

The subject matter of this blog is controversial and some of the removed or waiting posts made comments that cannot be verified or may come too close to allegations that the BBC find controversial. Sport blogging had issues with legal threats this year so the BBC need to exercise discretion.

I imagine that all posts are initially moderated and if they state nothing controversial then they will be quickly cleared. Others may get referred for a second moderation prior to clearance.

I'm now going to jump in with both feet on the subject.

Many people have compared the punishment for this event against gauging and specific events in South Africa.

I believe, and I may be wrong, that the reason the player involved was originally treated severely was exactly as Simon's post suggests i.e. to get to the bottom of this.

It would appear that the reason the punishment was harsh was that the powers that be took the actions of Harlequins to be.

1) Pre-meditated.
2) Involved the collusion of a number of parties at the club both in the incident itself but also in a concerted cover up. They IRB et al possibly see this event as a watershed moment for the sport. Failure to act sending out the wrong signals.

With regard to gouging it could be argued that the act of gouging is generally undertaken by one player off their own back during the heat of battle as it were. A more troubling incident to me is not the incident in South Africa but the spear tackle on Brian O'Driscoll in 2005 in New Zealand.

Rugby and the Heineken Cup is going the way that Football is with the Champions League so there must be temptation to try everything to win and get further in a highly lucrative cup. The top clubs have huge outgoings and need to get results.

I imagine coaches in Premier Rugby will soon be under the same stresses and hire and fire regime currently shown in top level football.

Maybe the IRB felt they needed to make a stand.

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