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[Deleted member 231381]

Well it's his employer, ain't it? I mean, what's he meant to do if - as part of his job - he's accruing expenses?

But the trouble is that it seems rather suspicious that he accrues expenses at a rate only 14 other parliamentarians can match when he lives actually inside London itself, drastically cutting commuting expenses, and in a relatively well-off constituency, cutting the need for staffing costs. One might rather wonder if he is using those expenses frivolously... hardly befitting a minister bent on shaving every last sliver from the welfare of the poorest, no?

 

[kharma45]

One might rather wonder if he is using those expenses frivolously... hardly befitting a minister bent on shaving every last sliver from the welfare of the poorest, no?

After the expenses scandal I'd imagine they're watched fairly closely.

 

[pulsemyne]

As Cylops said, it's his employers expenses. And you're living in a fucking fantasy expecting someone to pay their own work related expenses, regardless of income or cash in bank. Absolutely crazy.

So it's okay not to demonise a millionaire taking the taxpayer for a ride but it's perfectly fine to do so to the poor and strip someone of their benefits or deny them rightfully owed benefits?
And yes he fucking should pay his own expenses, he's got the money to do so and he's a part of a governments that's going to announce billions in cuts. He should have a fucking conscious and not charge the taxpayer for something that he can afford.
May just be me though, maybe I'm just being naive into thinking that millionaires should pay for the meals and expensive dinners.
Just think of it, he has enjoyed the fruits of your hard work. He has enjoyed himself with your taxes. He could have paid for it himself, the money shouldn't bother him so why do it? Oh that's right it's because he's a bastard. And not only that he's a bastard who has the bare face cheek to call himself a christian. Talk about not getting the message.

 

[CyclopsRock]

So if his policies were to give out loads of money, you'd be OK with it? Fucking madness.

 

[kharma45]

So it's okay not to demonise a millionaire taking the taxpayer for a ride but it's perfectly fine to do so to the poor and strip someone of their benefits or deny them rightfully owed benefits?
And yes he fucking should pay his own expenses, he's got the money to do so and he's a part of a governments that's going to announce billions in cuts. He should have a fucking conscious and not charge the taxpayer for something that he can afford.
May just be me though, maybe I'm just being naive into thinking that millionaires should pay for the meals and expensive dinners.
Just think of it, he has enjoyed the fruits of your hard work. He has enjoyed himself with your taxes. He could have paid for it himself, the money shouldn't bother him so why do it? Oh that's right it's because he's a bastard. And not only that he's a bastard who has the bare face cheek to call himself a christian. Talk about not getting the message.

Yes you're being extremely naive. No employee should be expected to pay expenses incurred through their work, regardless of their financial position.

It's not as if the expenses weren't ever paid back, and £1000 is nothing in expenses.

 

[twobear]

This migration worker salary stuff is... when did this happen?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-33201189

This is like the most savage idea of fucking the NHS through new means yet.

Ive almost been avoiding political news recently because I knew the boot was going to be coming crushing down in this period, and it genuinely feels like the Cons are trying to kill the country and leave scars so deep it'd take 15-20 years of a kinder government to heal.

whoever could have seen this kind of thing coming???????????????????

Well it's his employer, ain't it? I mean, what's he meant to do if - as part of his job - he's accruing expenses?

yeah because we have absolutely no reason to think that MPs make immoral expenses claims. none at all.

That's what I'm thinking. It's a bit like the Eurosceptics in the Tories - they need the EU referendum so the rest can finally point to them and go "Look, no one gives a fuck, just shut up about it you morons." Likewise with the old curmudgeonly buffoons on the left who genuinely think there's an appetite out there for a radical left party. Give them the opportunity, watch it burn and then they can get back to grown up business.

with the current state of political discourse in the UK being as shit as it is, i don't think anybody on the left genuinely believes that the tories and right-wing press would actually let a genuinely left-wing party exist. but, you know, it would be nice if anyone in the labour leadership were even notionally left-wing. all of the candidates just sound like tories. nobody with any kind of left-wing sensibilities could look at the frontrunners and be happy with the choices.

 

[CyclopsRock]

yeah because we have absolutely no reason to think that MPs make immoral expenses claims. none at all.

Well who needs IPSA and criminal courts when we have goselsmetric and pulsemyne armed with headlines about minor bureaucratic errors.

I don't see how anyone can read the article and come away thinking anything other than "It sounds like the system is working exactly as intended." No one run up too much or inappropriate expenses - including the shadow DWP minister who had the same thing done to her card - and all the paperwork got done. Yaay. A victory for tax-payer advocates everywhere.

with the current state of political discourse in the UK being as shit as it is, i don't think anybody on the left genuinely believes that the tories and right-wing press would actually let a genuinely left-wing party exist. but, you know, it would be nice if anyone in the labour leadership were even notionally left-wing. all of the candidates just sound like tories. nobody with any kind of left-wing sensibilities could look at the frontrunners and be happy with the choices.

#Corbyn4leader.

It's not "The tories and the right wing press", it's the electorate that doesn't allow such parties to exist.

 

[pulsemyne]

So if his policies were to give out loads of money, you'd be OK with it? Fucking madness.

Did I ever say that? No I didn't.
Jeez how dare someone be a bit annoyed at a millionaire taking the tax payer for a ride...

 

[CyclopsRock]

Did I ever say that? No I didn't.
Jeez how dare someone be a bit annoyed at a millionaire taking the tax payer for a ride...

You made quite a play about his policies, so either you did say that or it was just a random interjection at the top of your post. And go ahead, be annoyed, but it's ridiculous.

 

[twobear]

#Corbyn4leader.

It's not "The tories and the right wing press", it's the electorate that doesn't allow such parties to exist.

because the left wing has no way (outside of the guardian) to speak to the electorate.

again, unless you believe that everyone in scotland is left-wing and everyone south of the border is radically right wing, this doesn't add up. there's real space for a real left-wing party in the uk. labour just have to actually believe in it. but they don't. they're just tory lite.

you only have to see how successful the tories were over the last five years at hoodwinking the electorate over the recession to see the right's command over the press.

 

[Walshicus]

I can't imagine there are that many people in Crawley looking for flights, are there?

No, I meant that people in Crawley want the additional flights to operate and to keep unemployment in the area down. Gatwick is Crawley's biggest asset and people there realise it.

Heathrow just doesn't seem to have the same level of support.

 

[CyclopsRock]

because the left wing has no way (outside of the guardian) to speak to the electorate.

again, unless you believe that everyone in scotland is left-wing and everyone south of the border is radically right wing, this doesn't add up. there's real space for a real left-wing party in the uk. labour just have to actually believe in it. but they don't. they're just tory lite.

you only have to see how successful the tories were over the last five years at hoodwinking the electorate over the recession to see the right's command over the press.

Yikes. I mean it's pretty good for, you know, swan eaters like me but I really think that the biggest mistake Labour could make is of coming out of 2015 with the mindset that they would have got away with it if it weren't for those medellin' newspapers. Aside from anything it's entirely untestable as a hypothesis and basically relies on the the idea of the inherent superiority of left wing ideology as an election-winner and that any deviation from this must be the result of some nefarious media manipulation. I think the SNP and Scotland is something that people will be picking apart for decades, but clearly it's more than simply about left-vs-right and that The Scottish Sun supported the SNP etc.

No, I meant that people in Crawley want the additional flights to operate and to keep unemployment in the area down. Gatwick is Crawley's biggest asset and people there realise it.

Heathrow just doesn't seem to have the same level of support.

Aah, sorry, gotcha. You may well be right, I have no idea though it's always worth remembering that there are more people concerned than just the local stakeholders eg people like me, who want cheap flights to generic Spanish islands to have sex with teenaged girls and, if possible, their mums.

 

[Uzzy]

The plans for EVEL has been announced in the commons. Seems a bit of a mess to me, letting the speaker decide on what bills or portion of bills apply only to England might lead to a few issues.

 

[pulsemyne]

You made quite a play about his policies, so either you did say that or it was just a random interjection at the top of your post. And go ahead, be annoyed, but it's ridiculous.

The reason I mentioned his policies was to show the hypocrisy of the man. Lets not forget this was the man who claimed he could live on 53 quid a week and that the poor couldn't budget themselves. There is a reason he is one of the most loathed people in politics.

 

[phisheep]

The plans for EVEL has been announced in the commons. Seems a bit of a mess to me, letting the speaker decide on what bills or portion of bills apply only to England might lead to a few issues.

The Speaker bit shouldn't be a particular problem. It is already the Speaker's role to determine what is a finance bill or a hybrid bill and so on.

 

[twobear]

Yikes. I mean it's pretty good for, you know, swan eaters like me but I really think that the biggest mistake Labour could make is of coming out of 2015 with the mindset that they would have got away with it if it weren't for those medellin' newspapers. Aside from anything it's entirely untestable as a hypothesis and basically relies on the the idea of the inherent superiority of left wing ideology as an election-winner and that any deviation from this must be the result of some nefarious media manipulation. I think the SNP and Scotland is something that people will be picking apart for decades, but clearly it's more than simply about left-vs-right and that The Scottish Sun supported the SNP etc

Hardly. The right wing is just a gigantic mechanism for generating and maintaining power for the small number of people who already have power. The media is one of the most effective ways of doing that.

The Scottish Sun supporting the SNP is pretty simple to work out—it keeps out a Labour minority government by splitting left wing voters up. You really think the Sun has any more say over her political support than what benefits Murdoch the most?

[edit] To expand on this point, I don't think that left-wing ideology is some automatic election-winner. I do think it beats the shit out of right-wing ideology, but it's not like you don't have to put effort into convincing people of that too. But there is no free forum of ideas in the mainstream British political discourse at the moment. The messaging is almost entirely controlled by the right wing. You only have to look at the mismatch between public belief and factual reality in areas such as fraudulent benefits claimants, tax avoidance, the causes and cures to the Great Recession, the quality of the NHS, the effectiveness of publicly owned companies, etc. to see that.

The country has voted left-wing before. They voted for Social Democracy in 1946. It's not unthinkable that people could be convinced to vote left-wing again if the left had any substantial means of communicating with the populace, but they don't--because the modern right wing is an entity that exists for the sole purpose of generating and maintaining power for the small number of people who already have it. And since the right wing controls the majority of media outlets, they control the majority of the political discourse in our country.

 

[Daffy Duck]

So we're heading into the week we find out how we're going to bent over.

Not looking forward to this.

 

[Jezbollah]

Seems that Unite have put their backing behind Jeremy Corbyn.

Hmm!!!!

 

[Deleted member 231381]

Seems that Unite have put their backing behind Jeremy Corbyn.

Hmm!!!!

I think this is actually a strategic choice. Secretly, they prefer Burnham, but actually backing Burnham would mean his death sentence, so they've backed Corbyn given that the previously left-most candidate, Burnham, now looks like a reasoned moderate in between the extremes of Corbyn and Kendall.

 

[War Peaceman]

I think this is actually a strategic choice. Secretly, they prefer Burnham, but actually backing Burnham would mean his death sentence, so they've backed Corbyn given that the previously left-most candidate, Burnham, now looks like a reasoned moderate in between the extremes of Corbyn and Kendall.

This, plus it puts significant weight behind a left-wing candidate, shifting the political poles in that direction.

 

[phisheep]

Seems that Unite have put their backing behind Jeremy Corbyn.

Hmm!!!!

There may be a few people who proposed Corbyn now wishing that they hadn't. We've got something of a tradition of unexpected outsiders winning leadership elections - Thatcher, Major, Miliband ... Corbyn?

 

[anonymous_abc]

There may be a few people who proposed Corbyn now wishing that they hadn't. We've got something of a tradition of unexpected outsiders winning leadership elections - Thatcher, Major, Miliband ... Corbyn?

That would be glorious.

 

[phisheep]

Hello people, been a while no?

Going to be my first and last post for a while, new job,

Oh, hi there zomg. Missed this post in passing.

Good luck with the new job - is that the same one you mentioned last year?

GAF has become a bit disappointing as well, and the main election thread was pretty much the last straw for me, proved that there is not much room for "wrongthink" any more.

Oh bollocks. We need you here.

Sure the election thread got somewhat overheated with (understandably) disappointed lefties, but it will all settle down to relatively sane conversation - and all the better if you are playing.

Looking forwards to what Osborne has in store in July

... and at the very least I'd welcome your views on that!

 

[CyclopsRock]

I now live in Grant Shapps' constituency. It feels beautiful just waking up in the morning. God bless the home counties.

 

[Deaf Spacker]

Has anyone seen the bit about social housing tenants who earn over £30,000 combined before tax e.g. a couple earning £15k each having to pay market rates for the properties? That's me and my wife fucked then.

It's times like these that I wonder why I fucking bother.

 

[RobotNinjaHornets]

There may be a few people who proposed Corbyn now wishing that they hadn't. We've got something of a tradition of unexpected outsiders winning leadership elections - Thatcher, Major, Miliband ... Corbyn?

You never know, having a leader of the opposition who actually opposes might help.

I feel like voter turnout is a huge thing that barely anyone is really addressing. I mean the fact that we now have an electorate that has 4 million people larger than 1983, but actual turnout is only 100k more is ridiculous. That's a huge amount of people, especially those who are younger and poorer, who just aren't voting. Chase after the supposed centre as much as you want, but you'll never get them to vote for you. Changing tact so that there is a proper, mainstream left-wing party (i.e. one that opposes cuts, Trident, is for renationalisation of rail etc., all things that the general public are for) and you might reengage those that have dropped off.

I mean the biggest indication of this, to me, is that the drop off happened after Tony Blair's first government. That's what I think people should be taking away from Blair. People stopped voting because the two main parties got too similar.

 

[CyclopsRock]

Chase after the supposed centre as much as you want, but you'll never get them to vote for you.

But they did, en masse, vote Labour three elections in a row. The centre ground is defined by who wins elections; It's no coincidence that Blair won by moving to the right and Cameron won by moving to the left (compared to his predecessors of Hague and Howard, who both obviously failed to win, even after Iraq). Obviously there's a lot more to it than that, but I don't see where you get the idea that chasing the middle ground won't win you votes (and elections) when history shows that, actually, that's the only that wins you elections.

 

[Daffy Duck]

Has anyone seen the bit about social housing tenants who earn over £30,000 combined before tax e.g. a couple earning £15k each having to pay market rates for the properties? That's me and my wife fucked then.

It's times like these that I wonder why I fucking bother.

Yep, I read that last night. Bad times man, feel for you.

 

[f0rk]

You never know, having a leader of the opposition who actually opposes might help.

I feel like voter turnout is a huge thing that barely anyone is really addressing. I mean the fact that we now have an electorate that has 4 million people larger than 1983, but actual turnout is only 100k more is ridiculous. That's a huge amount of people, especially those who are younger and poorer, who just aren't voting. Chase after the supposed centre as much as you want, but you'll never get them to vote for you. Changing tact so that there is a proper, mainstream left-wing party (i.e. one that opposes cuts, Trident, is for renationalisation of rail etc., all things that the general public are for) and you might reengage those that have dropped off.

I mean the biggest indication of this, to me, is that the drop off happened after Tony Blair's first government. That's what I think people should be taking away from Blair. People stopped voting because the two main parties got too similar.

By this logic what do you think it is that holds the green party back?

 

[phisheep]

You never know, having a leader of the opposition who actually opposes might help.

Worked for Miliband didn't it.

Joking aside, there's a difference between opposing things and having a credible alternative to them - and that's where someone like Corbyn tends to lose out. It isn't a credible proposition to just go about refighting the battles that were already fought and lost in the 1980s.

I suspect there is room for a credible leftist alternative, but nobody has got round to articulating one yet.

I feel like voter turnout is a huge thing that barely anyone is really addressing. I mean the fact that we now have an electorate that has 4 million people larger than 1983, but actual turnout is only 100k more is ridiculous. That's a huge amount of people, especially those who are younger and poorer, who just aren't voting. Chase after the supposed centre as much as you want, but you'll never get them to vote for you. Changing tact so that there is a proper, mainstream left-wing party (i.e. one that opposes cuts, Trident, is for renationalisation of rail etc., all things that the general public are for) and you might reengage those that have dropped off.

I mean the biggest indication of this, to me, is that the drop off happened after Tony Blair's first government. That's what I think people should be taking away from Blair. People stopped voting because the two main parties got too similar.

Or more likely, because they felt their vote counted for nothing - in this case because the New Labour juggernaut was that big that nobody could stop it but themselves.

It's noticeable for example that turnout in marginal constituencies is about 9% higher than in safe seats.

If the opposition has credible enough policies to get within spitting distance of the government the turnout should follow.

 

[CyclopsRock]

I also think that it's a somewhat natural result of the parties being similar in many respects, but whether that's a good thing or not is a genuinely tricky question to answer. The 20th Century saw some pretty enormous ideological battles being fought, especially in the ~40 years after the 2nd world war, encompassing the creation of the welfare state, the height of socialist control over industry, then swinging the other way to Thatchers privatisation... I mean, those were days when there was real opposition and choices and, yeah, voter turnout was higher. But was that actually better? Or, to put it another way, would you trade a higher voter turnout for the possibility of someone more extreme (be it left or right) getting in, as required by such a dichotomy-driven debate? You don't get moderates or centrists in that sort of political climate.

 

[RobotNinjaHornets]

But they did, en masse, vote Labour three elections in a row. The centre ground is defined by who wins elections; It's no coincidence that Blair won by moving to the right and Cameron won by moving to the left (compared to his predecessors of Hague and Howard, who both obviously failed to win, even after Iraq). Obviously there's a lot more to it than that, but I don't see where you get the idea that chasing the middle ground won't win you votes (and elections) when history shows that, actually, that's the only that wins you elections.

By them, I meant the people who don't vote. And again, there was a massive drop off in voter turnout between 1997 and 2001, the vast majority from Labour voters. 3 million fewer people voted for Labour in 2001 than 1997, 1 million for the Tories and half a million for the Lib Dems. Labour then lost another million in 2005. How would you explain the drop?

Not to mention that the number of votes for Labour actually increased this year. Which is impressive, given how fucked they were in Scotland.

By this logic what do you think it is that holds the green party back?

FPTP making people think it's not worth it (seriously, a million people voted for them and Caroline Lucas is still our only MP), people thinking they're a load of middle class hippies who don't have anything to say to the working class. I definitely think there's an image problem, even in just the name.

 

[CyclopsRock]

By them, I meant the people who don't vote. And again, there was a massive drop off in voter turnout between 1997 and 2001, the vast majority from Labour voters. 3 million fewer people voted for Labour in 2001 than 1997, 1 million for the Tories and half a million for the Lib Dems. Labour then lost another million in 2005. How would you explain the drop?

Sorry, it sounded like you meant that the centre ground will never vote for you.

I imagine the drop is due to a number of factors. Because Blair's first term wasn't some U-turn in policy based on what he'd campaigned on or anything - people largely got the government they voted for. Unless it was simply an Obama-ish case of over-promising (But I don't think that's the case either, given how well the economy did between 97-01 and how much money was being ploughed into key services). And this was before Iraq, too, so I don't think it's immediately obvious that the 3m drop off is because of how similar the parties were. I think it has more to do with people just being sick of a tired and sad Tory majority that had been around for 4 terms compared to this exciting young guitar-playing, open-collar wearing sex bomb. These two things - Tory fatique and excitement over a fresh young face - both sort of disappear into the void when it comes to the second term. I suspect there are a multitude of reasons beyond this, too.

 

[MrChom]

FPTP making people think it's not worth it (seriously, a million people voted for them and Caroline Lucas is still our only MP), people thinking they're a load of middle class hippies who don't have anything to say to the working class. I definitely think there's an image problem, even in just the name.

Given my recent move from Bloxwich to Basingstoke my vote has ceased to count. Previously it was keeping a Labour MP safe-ish. Now....well....can anyone say unassailable Tory lead? I'll still vote. But it will be with a heavy heart, and knowing there's virtually no chance of disposing of the services of Maria Miller despite her repeated and blatant dipping of her handed into till to falsely claim around £90,000 in expenses of which she paid back just £5,800 on condition she apologise to the house.

She was returned with a VERY healthy majority because, apparently, fraud just isn't enough for some of the electorate.

 

[twobear]

Why are we pretending that Cameron is a centrist? This Tory government is the most ideologically right-ring we've had since WW2.

 

[kharma45]

License fee going to be required for catch up services. I wonder whether Netflix is part of that.

 

[phisheep]

Why are we pretending that Cameron is a centrist? This Tory government is the most ideologically right-ring we've had since WW2.

I'm pretty certain that it isn't. Not compared with, say, the late 1980s.

Ideology aside, what matters is that Cameron appeals to the centre of the country, and it is the country - not the poliitical theorists - who decide what the centre is.

License fee going to be required for catch up services. I wonder whether Netflix is part of that.

It won't. The proposal, and it is only a proposal so far, covers public service catch-up services like iplayer and itvplayer, it doesn't catch subscription services.

 

[CyclopsRock]

It won't. The proposal, and it is only a proposal so far, covers public service catch-up services like iplayer and itvplayer, it doesn't catch subscription services.

Indeedy - if they don't give any money to Netflix (and I'm 99.99% sure they don't), then they have basically no sway over them as an American company operating via the magic of telephony.

 

[Daffy Duck]

How amazing is it that they are going to extend the Sunday working hours.

It's almost as if it was planned to perfection to cut tax credits for low earners and thus make it so businesses can open longer on Sunday so they can tell those people that they have just cut their tax credits they have given them the opportunity to earn more by working longer hours on Sunday.

 

[kharma45]

Sunday working hours shouldn't be any different from any other day of the week. I'm glad to see this.

 

[twobear]

I'm pretty certain that it isn't. Not compared with, say, the late 1980s.

Ideology aside, what matters is that Cameron appeals to the centre of the country, and it is the country - not the poliitical theorists - who decide what the centre is.

I suspect that the Tory party of the 1980s wouldn't have seriously thought about cutting up the NHS and outsourcing it to private contractors. They were barely more economically competent than the current Tory party in that they probably understood that a publically run NHS is vastly more efficient. Now they just don't care. Chop it up and sell it off, there's money to be made.

 

[phisheep]

I suspect that the Tory party of the 1980s wouldn't have seriously thought about cutting up the NHS and outsourcing it to private contractors. They were barely more economically competent than the current Tory party in that they probably understood that a publically run NHS is vastly more efficient. Now they just don't care. Chop it up and sell it off, there's money to be made.

Whatever gives you the impression that that is Conservative policy?

 

[Pie and Beans]

Wonder how long C4 had been keeping this one in the back pocket!

http://www.channel4.com/news/george-osborne-family-business-6m-deal-with-offshore-firm

Chancellor George Osborne's family business made £6m in a property deal with a developer based in a tax haven, a Channel 4 News investigation has found.

 

[CyclopsRock]

Wonder how long C4 had been keeping this one in the back pocket!

http://www.channel4.com/news/george-osborne-family-business-6m-deal-with-offshore-firm

:/

It happened 12 years ago and it wasn't even his family's company that is based off shore. If they've been keeping this in their back pocket, their cupboards really must be bare.

 

[Yen]

Interesting scandal in NI over the past week:

Mick Wallace TD is the mop-haired Independent TD for Wexford. Today he opened a veritable can of worms – and the story is beginning to break on this evening’s bulletins on the BBC.

Wallace today (2/7/15) revealed in Tánaiste Questions in the Dail that Northern Ireland law-firm Tughans allegedly, according to Wallace, held a £7m Isle of Man bank account “reportedly earmarked for a Northern Ireland politician or party.”  Tughans was the law-firm acting for Cerebus Capital Management, the private equity firm that acquired NAMA’s Northern Ireland loan-book (that had a par value of £4.5B) for £1.5B.

The scandal is ongoing, and is very interesting, but a reading of a few NI publications would possibly provide some clues as to the mystery figure.

 

[phisheep]

Budget, cricket, or tennis? Tough call.

 

[QuicheFontaine]

Nick Robinson on Radio 4 right now. His voice still hasn't recovered from the General Election!

 

[War Peaceman]

Nick Robinson on Radio 4 right now. His voice still hasn't recovered from the General Election!

That's from the chemo he's undergoing for his lung cancer...

 

[QuicheFontaine]

That's from the chemo he's undergoing for his lung cancer...

Shit, didn't know that

 

[phisheep]

England 88/3 at lunch. Bell is about as useful as ed miliband.