Con/dems v Labour

[cashman]

Originally Posted by cmonstanley

tell thet to the people who were working for a pittance before te national minimum wage.the will tell you it wasnt much fun working for a pittance.i remember people working in old people homes factories for £2.00 an hour yes that was just before it was introduced,people have short memories.

Originally Posted by cashman

Thats beyond doubt, but socialism is long dead, all ******* now.

Ok what part of post7 do ya not understand? the only way i can see to introduce a fairer society, is to introduce a good % of ordinary working M.P.s into cabinet, cos whilst it remains silver spooned oiks in it, people who have NO concept of the situation of ordinary people, we will all be stuffed,

[entwisi]

err, I sort of understand what you are trying to say cashy but by definition the sort of "ordinary bloke" MP that you speak of wouldn't have the experience or skills required for the role you want to put them in. Can you imagine just how much a mess the Budget would be if someone with no head for figures was given the role? at teh very top level you need very well educated people with experience of the type of work they have to perform. In this respect it even begs the Q should MPs be even in charge of teh country? I personally would rather someone with proven record in finance such as Bob Diamond be in charge of teh Budget ( And whether you like or dislike Banks right now, check out his performance and you will see he delivers the goods..... )

[jaysay]

Originally Posted by cashman

Ok what part of post7 do ya not understand? the only way i can see to introduce a fairer society, is to introduce a good % of ordinary working M.P.s into cabinet, cos whilst it remains silver spooned oiks in it, people who have NO concept of the situation of ordinary people, we will all be stuffed,

And the country will go tits up like it is now

[Boeing Guy]

Not wishing to start another thread full of politics, I thought this added a bit of balance:

THE LABOUR LEGACY
1997 - 2010


Labour has ruled for the last 13 years, this in spite of receiving less than 23% of the total votes that could have been cast by the voting population. In 1999 Scotland gained its own Parliament and the 50 Scottish MPs in Westminster thereby became redundant, both as a voting entity and a right to sit in the House of Commons, yet continue to do so. Their Scottish leaders, Blair and Brown, one a lawyer the other a former television producer, have managed to wreak havoc between them in their English fiefdom.

Blair, who brought about the biggest demographic upheaval in the history of England, where 97.6% of immigrants have settled, has gone. Brown, blaming a global crisis for our economic woes, but he himself the root cause of them, remains. One has to ask oneself would voting him back into power change anything. This overview records some of the events and aftermath of their legacy.



Blair
Introduced a presidential-style of government. Lacking management skills and experience in government, he surrounded himself with advisors, ‘experts’ and consultants. The Civil Service became onlookers, their traditional role and advice frozen out.


As Prime Minister:

Led the country into two major wars; in the case of Iraq presented a flawed ‘weapons of mass destruction’ reason for doing so.

Reneged on holding a referendum on Europe.

Meekly surrendered the EU rebate, so ferociously fought for by Thatcher.

Treated Parliament as an irrelevance, demeaning its customs and procedures, confirming his attitude by replacing Black Rod, a post created in 1350.

Undermined the moral standards of public life by countenancing/endorsing:
The Cash for Honours debacle.
Having banned cigarette smoking in public places, allowed Formula One advertising in return for a £1million donation from Ecclestone.
Suppressed the enquiry into the Saudi Arabian military contract.

Reshuffled key ministerial posts like musical chairs, preventing ministers from getting to grips with their portfolio.



When the EU expanded its membership he opened our borders to East Europeans who eventually numbered 600,000. France and Germany did not allow this, using a clause allowed for in EU rules for a seven-year moratorium, avoiding the consequences that have engulfed our local authorities, schools, NHS, utility supplies, housing and transport.

Deliberately and culpably engineered mass immigration on a monumental scale from outside the EU, the greatest act of betrayal in our history. The consequences for future generations are incalculable.

As a direct consequence of his actions, he increased considerably the security threat to our nation and stirred, in our midst, a religion whose customs and traditions are at variance with Christian and other religions.

Completely disregarded the plight of the underclass and the traditional supporters of Labour and gave no thought, help or consideration whatever to the trauma caused by the tsunami of foreigners arriving in their midst.

Allowed the unions Unite and Unison to pervade and influence government policies and actions. 59 Unite and 64 Unison nominees will stand in safe Labour seats in the forthcoming election. One member of Unite actually works in No.10 in the Policy Unit, her salary and pension funded by Unite.

Labour receives £8million a year from unions, who have become increasingly militant. However, since 1998 Labour has given more than £135million to the unions - taxpayers’ money, much of it presented under the guise of ‘education’, ‘skills training’ or ‘modernization’. The spectre of regenerated union militancy now faces the next Parliament.

Failed to initiate and implement a long-term strategy for the economy and manufacturing, especially for the provision of electricity, which should have had priority as early as 2002.

Failed to address and tackle the rapid decline in the manufacturing base of England. In this respect grossly failed to set out and implement a policy and schemes to provide the younger English generations with the skills and opportunities for life enhancement. Each of these failures enforces the fact that England is the only major country in the world not in control of its own destiny.


Brown
Became Chancellor in 1997.

Stopped tax-relief on dividends paid to pension funds, leading to the collapse of a system that had been the envy of Europe. The action has cost occupational pension schemes £175billion and has led to the near-extinction of final salary schemes.

Freed the Bank of England to set interest rates, but stopped it from regulating the financial sector, which ultimately contributed to the banking crisis.

Betrayed the Armed Services with lack of funding, particularly the withdrawal of £1.4billion from the MoD budget to buy helicopters, and lied to the Chilcot enquiry about it.

May 1999 – sold 395 tonnes of the Bank of England’s gold reserves at $275.6 an ounce, the lowest price in two decades. Price today - $1,114 an ounce. Total loss to the economy - £7.9billion.
Omitted housing costs from the price index, contributing to the house-price bubble.
Poured money wastefully into the economy. From 2000 – 2008 spending rose 4% per annum in real terms. 3.6% was in extra outlay on services and no less than 16.4% annually in public investment. The non-productive public sector rising to 6.08 million employees by 2010.

Encouraged a hands-off approach to the City and banks, leading to profligacy and risk-taking and ultimately to the meltdown in the banking sector. When Brown became Chancellor the national debt was £400 billion having taken a little over 300 years to reach that amount. The Office of National Statistics forecast for the national debt in 2010 is £2.1 trillion.

Brown’s intention to raise living standards generally were scuppered by Blair’s covert operation to flood England with immigrants. Over a 7-year period the population exploded by 3.6 million, eager to take advantage of Blair’s Trojan Horse treachery and Brown’s largesse.

Between the immigrants, the public sector and his munificence, Brown had a big problem with finance. One solution was to sell the ‘English family silver’. This included the energy companies. Blair colluded: ‘Liberalised energy markets and more open markets are good for business and for consumers, right across Europe’. The French and Germans strongly disagreed and hung on to theirs, along with their industrial base, because they were ‘strategic assets’.

Assets sold to foreigners, disposed of, purloined, include household-name English companies.
Not all of the utilities, authorities and firms listed here were publicly owned. However, because a ‘public interest test’ clause was omitted from a shake-up of competition law, introduced by Blair and Brown, it allowed national firms to pass into foreign ownership. This was contrary to the policy of France and Germany, who realized the importance and value of retaining such assets. One wonders if such an attitude would have prevailed had it been a ‘Scotch’ distillery.

The Water Industry; Cadbury – to Kraft; Camelot; British Steel (Corus) – India; Maritime Rescue Service; Gatwick Airport – to an American company; BAA – sold to the Spanish group Ferovial;
Dover Harbour – to Calais Port Authority; The Car Industry – what was left of it; The Ports Authorities – passed from P&O to Dubai World; 3 English building societies – to Spanish company Santander; Electricity Suppliers – to EDF (of France) and E.on (of Germany);
The Atomic Energy Industry – EDF (French) will now build all our atomic power stations;
Westinghouse, our last world-class nuclear construction company, sold at a knock-down price to Japan;
Internal sales in England of barracks, airfields, playing fields form part of the rampage. (Since we won the Olympic bid in 2005, 50 state-school sports’ fields have been sold off).

Darling, to fund his new Green Investment Bank, is to sell off more English assets:


The Tote
The Dartford Crossing
Student Loans Company

Future sales under consideration:
Aldershot Garrison – Home of the British Army
Shrewsbury Garrison
Consumers have paid the price:

Water. Foreign companies regularly make 30 - 40% profits in the UK. In Europe 5 -10%.
Electricity – 2004/5 profits in the UK 29%, 2005/6 – 31%.

That said they all eat from the same trough

[jaysay]

Well BG isn't that what I've been saying but not in so many words

[DaveinGermany]

Originally Posted by setayas

For pities sake don't we need to fix things? Arguing about who did what, when and why doesn't start solving the problems.

The global financial crisis was brought about by American banks!

Nice going ! By your assertions you've once again set opposing viewpoints into motion. So let us come back to your point, you've issued a statement as to where the problem lies so your solution is ?

If you hadn't wanted to fan the flames of Boliktical bitching, why such an inflammatory heading ?

[Barrie Yates]

Originally Posted by DaveinGermany

Nice going ! By your assertions you've once again set opposing viewpoints into motion. So let us come back to your point, you've issued a statement as to where the problem lies so your solution is ?

If you hadn't wanted to fan the flames of Boliktical bitching, why such an inflammatory heading ?

I presume the thread title says it all - rather than the back and forth slanging matches as to who is to blame for the present situation - present government blaming the last government - can we not hear suggestions as to what actions could be taken to get us out of this mess that we are in?
I realise that it is impossible for an incoming government to stick rigidly to the manifesto as they do not have the full details of the state of national affairs - however, certain items are not really cost related - particularly matters concerning the EU - therefore, why not "ring fence" certain manifesto pledges e.g. the referendum on membership of the EU

[JCB]

Originally Posted by setayas

I was just wondering if anyone else is bored to deathwish with the title.

Yes , I am . So lets bury the title , and the politicians with it , and get on with life in the world where real people live , far away from the politicos in their ivory towers .

[cmonstanley]

Originally Posted by entwisi

err, I sort of understand what you are trying to say cashy but by definition the sort of "ordinary bloke" MP that you speak of wouldn't have the experience or skills required for the role you want to put them in. Can you imagine just how much a mess the Budget would be if someone with no head for figures was given the role? at teh very top level you need very well educated people with experience of the type of work they have to perform. In this respect it even begs the Q should MPs be even in charge of teh country? I personally would rather someone with proven record in finance such as Bob Diamond be in charge of teh Budget ( And whether you like or dislike Banks right now, check out his performance and you will see he delivers the goods..... )

ye very good at tax evasion

[Eric]

Originally Posted by entwisi

err, I sort of understand what you are trying to say cashy but by definition the sort of "ordinary bloke" MP that you speak of wouldn't have the experience or skills required for the role you want to put them in. Can you imagine just how much a mess the Budget would be if someone with no head for figures was given the role? at teh very top level you need very well educated people with experience of the type of work they have to perform. In this respect it even begs the Q should MPs be even in charge of teh country? I personally would rather someone with proven record in finance such as Bob Diamond be in charge of teh Budget ( And whether you like or dislike Banks right now, check out his performance and you will see he delivers the goods..... )

"Someone with a proven record in finance": like the guys at Goldman Sachs, or AIG ... I don't be thinking so. Perhaps the people who are most skilled in income management are those who manage to get by on a small, fixed income. I'm with Cashy on this one.

[Ken Moss]

Originally Posted by JCB

Yes , I am . So lets bury the title , and the politicians with it , and get on with life in the world where real people live , far away from the politicos in their ivory towers .

Yet you're drawn to obviously political threads like a magnet, wherein you complain about political threads.

Irony towers, perhaps?

[accysimon]

How can 'we all be in it together' when over half a dozen cabinet members are millionaires in their own right?

Further, most people on here musn't have had any savings in the banks, otherwise they would have been grateful that the Labour Government bailed them out and saved their money. They would have been complaining if they'd lost it all, the banks all collapsed and the government had done nothing, so how can they win?

[Boeing Guy]

accysimon, did you even bother to read my post!!!! let me reiterate it for you.
Gordon Brown as Chancellor did:

Freed the Bank of England to set interest rates, but stopped it from regulating the financial sector, which ultimately contributed to the banking crisis.

May 1999 – sold 395 tonnes of the Bank of England’s gold reserves at $275.6 an ounce, the lowest price in two decades. Price today - $1,114 an ounce. Total loss to the economy - £7.9billion.

Encouraged a hands-off approach to the City and banks, leading to profligacy and risk-taking and ultimately to the meltdown in the banking sector. When Brown became Chancellor the national debt was £400 billion having taken a little over 300 years to reach that amount. The Office of National Statistics forecast for the national debt in 2010 is £2.1 trillion.

and I am meant to be grateful for that!!!!!
Rose tinted glasses.

[jaysay]

Originally Posted by accysimon

How can 'we all be in it together' when over half a dozen cabinet members are millionaires in their own right?

Further, most people on here musn't have had any savings in the banks, otherwise they would have been grateful that the Labour Government bailed them out and saved their money. They would have been complaining if they'd lost it all, the banks all collapsed and the government had done nothing, so how can they win?

Oh don't come that old soldier for Gods sake there are more money men today wallowing about in the Belly of the Labour Party than ever, how much are Tony (I love me) Blair and his I'm still a socialist Wife worth, you divvy

[accysimon]

Originally Posted by jaysay

Oh don't come that old soldier for Gods sake there are more money men today wallowing about in the Belly of the Labour Party than ever, how much are Tony (I love me) Blair and his I'm still a socialist Wife worth, you divvy

Back to the personal insults again eh John?...wot a t....r you really are.

I don't agree with anyone who's a multimillionaire saying 'we are all in it together', but the Tories said it and they are running the country now aren't they?