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UK PoliGAF thread of tell me about the rabbits again, Dave.

J

jimbor

Banned
WayneMorse said:
This is horrible, the governments of the UK and throughout Europe NEED to be spending a shit ton more of money to stimulate the economy and raise rates of inflation.

An aggressive policy of monetary easing and fiscal stimulus would get us out of the economic doldrums in a year or two.
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I'm sure higher inflation would do wonders for people's almost stagnant wages.
 
W

WayneMorse

Banned
jimbor said:
I'm sure higher inflation would do wonders for people's almost stagnant wages.
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Yea cause a deflationary spiral is what we need right now, having inflation go up a few percentage points in exchange for a more stimulated economy with lower unemployment and higher consumer spending will be a good thing and the rise in wages will offset the minor devaluation that'll happen because of a slightly increased inflation rate.
 
V

Volotaire

Member
A particularly humorous moment as I watched to Alan Sked (the former leader of UKIP) debate today. He called Farage a 'dim racist plank'. Of course, there may be political or personal reasons as to why he would say this as well.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/...d-to-rent-out-their-wheelchairs-2014101691776

Mash said:
A GOVERNMENT minister has urged disabled people to rent out their wheelchairs when they are not sitting in them.

Welfare minister Lord Freud said wheelchair users could supplement their income when they are asleep or on the lavatory.

He added: “Wheelchairs look like they would be great fun, but I don’t want to buy one. I would be wiling to pay maybe £20 an hour.

“Disabled people would then be running their own businesses, rather than cluttering-up offices and getting in the way of people who are at least worth the minimum wage.”

Martin Bishop, a wheelchair user from Peterborough, said: “If I rent it out between 11pm and 7am I could make £160. That’s not bad. I assume there are millions of people who want to rent a wheelchair in the middle of night.

“And it usually takes me about half an hour to have a shit, so there’s another tenner.

“Who is Lord Freud and why hasn’t he been promoted?”
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U

Uzzy

Member
So, any thoughts on Barroso's speech this morning? Seems to me that any major changes to the freedom of movement rules in the EU are a non-starter, and that Cameron needs to actually stop throwing out half baked ideas and find something that might work. All Cameron's doing at the moment is playing into UKIP's hands by having his moronic ideas rejected instantly.
 
M

Maledict

Member
Uzzy said:
So, any thoughts on Barroso's speech this morning? Seems to me that any major changes to the freedom of movement rules in the EU are a non-starter, and that Cameron needs to actually stop throwing out half baked ideas and find something that might work. All Cameron's doing at the moment is playing into UKIP's hands by having his moronic ideas rejected instantly.
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I honestly despair sometimes at the conservative parties instinct to swerve to the right at any sort of threat. Elections are won in the middle ground, not the extremes.

The proposal from Cameron was beyond idiotic. Freedom of movement is one of the founding principles of the Treaty of Rome, it was never going to happen. All Cameron has done is piss off our allies in Europe who want the Uk to stay and generated some stupid headlines for himself in any attempt to out UKIp UKIp.

I still believe their best tactic is to focus on UkIPs utterly insane proposals on other policy, and focus on the things which matter to the large majority of the electorate rather than try and match them on being hostile to the EU.

(The entire thing reminds me of the episode of the West Wing where they go to California and discuss a flag burning amendment. The main pollster favours it as the polls show a large number of people support it, but later on they realise that in terms of issues which will make people change their vote it's very low in voters priorities. Cameron should focus on jobs jobs jobs right now).
 
U

Uzzy

Member
Yeah. Trying to out UKIP UKIP isn't ever going to work, because unlike UKIP, the Tories will be expected to implement their policies should they win the next election. These moronic ideas from Cameron are only poisoning any potential future renegotiations and making any changes far less likely.

There's a story in the Spectator that suggests that Ken Clarke argued for exactly what you're saying, that UKIP should be fought on the economy, rather than trying to match UKIP's immigration/EU policy.

Besides, it turns out that the British public are entirely in favour of the EU's freedom of movement rules.

cI1ibnD.png
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M

Maledict

Member
Ken Clark is easily the best politician the Tories have, in terms of both speaking to the public and having fingers on the pulse of national mood. Whenever he was on newsnight it was *embarrassing* how much he outclassed labour.

Cameron was an utter idiot for moving him out of cabinet. He was never going to appease the gibberingly insane right wing, he should have kept him in.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
I'm optimistically hoping that what Cameron is doing is, like the Juncker move, showing how nothing will change as long as Britain can't threaten to leave which can only happen if he's secured a referendum, ie if he's re-elected in 2015. The point isn't really to out-UKIP UKIP, it's to point out again that voting UKIP won't actually get people what they want.
 
M

Maledict

Member
CyclopsRock said:
I'm optimistically hoping that what Cameron is doing is, like the Juncker move, showing how nothing will change as long as Britain can't threaten to leave which can only happen if he's secured a referendum, ie if he's re-elected in 2015. The point isn't really to out-UKIP UKIP, it's to point out again that voting UKIP won't actually get people what they want.
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My problem with this is two fold:

I) it's one of those 'double 3D chess' moves that to be frank I don't think works in politics very often, and certainly doesn't seem to be doable in this country in a coalition government. It's just not how our press works or the media narrative, and we've ended up in a situation where Cameron looks both scared and stupid.

Ii) it pisses off our allies in Europe who want us to stay because it's such a fundamental aspect of the EU.

I also don't think the 'go to bed with Farage, wake up with Ed Milliband' aspect actually works when Farage is saying they'll form a coalition with the Tories in national government if they promise an in/out refendum. If I were a eurosceptic that would make me more likely to vote for him, not less - I'd get a conservative government and I'd be holding DAVIES feet to the fire over a referendum (let's face it, a lot of old school Tories don't trust the guy at all).
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
Maledict said:
My problem with this is two fold:

I) it's one of those 'double 3D chess' moves that to be frank I don't think works in politics very often, and certainly doesn't seem to be doable in this country in a coalition government. It's just not how our press works or the media narrative, and we've ended up in a situation where Cameron looks both scared and stupid.

Ii) it pisses off our allies in Europe who want us to stay because it's such a fundamental aspect of the EU.

I also don't think the 'go to bed with Farage, wake up with Ed Milliband' aspect actually works when Farage is saying they'll form a coalition with the Tories in national government if they promise an in/out refendum. If I were a eurosceptic that would make me more likely to vote for him, not less - I'd get a conservative government and I'd be holding DAVIES feet to the fire over a referendum (let's face it, a lot of old school Tories don't trust the guy at all).
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But it takes two to tango, and the Tories won't coally with UKIP. Or, at the very least, they'll go out of their way to tell people that they won't before the election and even in the case that UKIP held the balance of power, I think that the Tories would rather run a minority government, bartering with the other parties to pass budgets etc.

As for it being a fundamental aspect of the EU, that's certainly true, but I think both our leaders and the leaders in the EU need to recognise that it's one that the people in the UK apparently don't like very much. Part of what makes people hate politicians generally and the EU especially is the idea of being told that what you want is wrong and that, for your own good, you have to follow some other rules. This is especially annoying to people with regards to the EU I think because it's much more distant, both in terms of its democratic accountability and obviously the fact that it's a huge institution of which we're only a small part.
 
M

Maledict

Member
I have to be honest, no matter what the Tories say they have no credibility on this issue with regards UKIP.

They went into a coalition with a party very opposed to their own on some fundamental aspects, and then delivered legislation that definitely wasn't the will of a lot of their voters. Are we then supposed to believe the denial of the possibility of a government with UKIP?

Given the fact that Europe has been the poison eating away at the heart of the Tories for years.

Given the fact it's only Tory MPs that defect.

Given the fact the entire EU thing is a very right wing / centre right argument in terms of the press in this country.


Whilst I've met a lot of labour voters, and liberals, who clearly detest UKIP and what it stands for, when I speak with my conservative friends (and family), it boils down to 'they are mad and a bit racist...but they do have a point!'

I just don't think the Tories can shift the argument with all that going on. Instead, they should bypass it completely. As an electoral strategy, it's silly to try and pretend that UKIP aren't natural partners for a conservative minority government.
 
U

UtterlyPerplexed

Member
Oh fuck me, I've been out of the loop for a while and I come back to see Nigel Farage building a new EU buddy group with Polish Holocaust deniers, and something about an awful UKIP Calypso sung in a faux-Jamaican accent touted as a potential No. 1 hit in the charts. I'd love to say there's nothing new going on, but the latter is remarkable.
 
U

Uzzy

Member
Yeah. Post election, if a UKIP/Tory coalition can get a majority in parliament, it'll happen. Obviously, beforehand, you'll have every Tory out there dismiss it as ludicrous in order to keep the 'vote UKIP, get Miliband' idea in people's heads, but after? I can't see the eurosceptic wing of the party giving up the chance of achieving their goal.
 
D

Deleted member 231381

Unconfirmed Member
Uzzy said:
Yeah. Post election, if a UKIP/Tory coalition can get a majority in parliament, it'll happen. Obviously, beforehand, you'll have every Tory out there dismiss it as ludicrous in order to keep the 'vote UKIP, get Miliband' idea in people's heads, but after? I can't see the eurosceptic wing of the party giving up the chance of achieving their goal.
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Stepping back a couple of days, at the weekend YouGov also released an updated version of polling first conducted last year asking how people would vote if there was a Conservative/UKIP pact at the next general election (tabs). There is sometimes a lazy assumption that because the Conservatives and UKIP together have a very healthy level of support a pact between the two parties would be a winner. That is not necessarily the case – parties do no own their voters. If two parties agree to stand to together it doesn’t follow that their voters will go along with it. The usual voting intention in the poll showed Labour four points ahead of of the Conservatives, but with UKIP on 18%. Asked how they would vote with a Conservative/UKIP pact the Labour lead grew to six points. The reason is that only about two thirds of current Conservative voters would back the joint ticket – some would flake away to Labour or the Liberal Democrats, others wouldn’t vote or aren’t sure what they would do. At the same time only just over half of UKIP supporters would follow their party into a deal with the Tories, others would go to Labour, find an alternate “other” party or not vote. This probably paints an articifically bleak picture because many of those don’t knows would hold their noses and vote for the joint-ticket, but it should still serve as an antidote to those thinking a pact is a panacea to Tory woes.
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In other words, the polls say it would be a terrible idea from the perspective of the Conservatives - there is a larger section of the Conservative voter-base that is closer to Labour than UKIP who would defect given such a pact. The election will be won on the Labour-Conservative marginal voters, alienating them is just stupidity.
 
M

Maledict

Member
Crab said:
In other words, the polls say it would be a terrible idea from the perspective of the Conservatives - there is a larger section of the Conservative voter-base that is closer to Labour than UKIP who would defect given such a pact. The election will be won on the Labour-Conservative marginal voters, alienating them is just stupidity.
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Nobody is saying there will be a pact beforehand - there won't.

But afterwards, if its a choice between Liberals and UKIP? Whilst Cameron would prefer the Liberals the party will force him to UKIP. That's why this sort of pandering is just damaging for him and isn't growing their vote at all.

By marginals, do you mean the floating centre voters who aren't strongly tied to either party? If so then I agree completely - and polling shows that what motivates those people are jobs, the economy and health. The standard bread and butter of politics.

But the conservatives keep pandering to the right because of the idiotic poison the party has been struggling with for 20 years now, Labour are unable to tell people the sky is blue because their messaging is so incompetent and they have a leader who makes IDS look good, and the Liberals aren't trusted on anything no matter what they say or do.
 
D

Deleted member 231381

Unconfirmed Member
Maledict said:
Nobody is saying there will be a pact beforehand - there won't.

But afterwards, if its a choice between Liberals and UKIP? Whilst Cameron would prefer the Liberals the party will force him to UKIP. That's why this sort of pandering is just damaging for him and isn't growing their vote at all.
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A pact after will have much the same effect - moderate Conservatives would leave. It'd probably have a horrendous effect on the Conservatives. UKIP become legitimised as a party of government and the Conservative right peels off towards them, and the Conservative moderates move to Labour as the polls indicate they would should such a deal happen.
 
U

Uzzy

Member
Crab said:
A pact after will have much the same effect - moderate Conservatives would leave. It'd probably have a horrendous effect on the Conservatives. UKIP become legitimised as a party of government and the Conservative right peels off towards them, and the Conservative moderates move to Labour as the polls indicate they would should such a deal happen.
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Sure, I don't disagree that the moderate Conservative voters would leave in good numbers, but I don't think the Conservative party itself sees that. I fear that the party leadership is going to veer to the right in a misguided attempt to see off UKIP, and all that'll do is bring them closer together, while more moderate voices within the party itself get marginalised. Ken Clarke was on the Today program this morning calling for more sensible, moderate voices to drive the debate, and Dominic Grieve was slamming proposed changes to the human rights laws recently, but that's it for MP's willing to speak out, and both of them were recently removed from government positions.

I really hope that more moderate Tories start speaking out soon, but I fear that a UKIP win in Rochester will lead to an accelerated shift to the right from the Tories.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
Also let's not forget that UKIP *aren't* going to get more than a handful of MPs, Max. The Tories are scared of them because they'll split the right vote, not because they'll win seats off of them. Carswell's unique - your random UKIP candidate is not going to generate the groundswell of support that he did, and is be surprised if they get more than two or three MPs in 2015.
 
D

Deleted member 231381

Unconfirmed Member
CyclopsRock said:
Also let's not forget that UKIP *aren't* going to get more than a handful of MPs, Max. The Tories are scared of them because they'll split the right vote, not because they'll win seats off of them. Carswell's unique - your random UKIP candidate is not going to generate the groundswell of support that he did, and is be surprised if they get more than two or three MPs in 2015.
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Currently, they have a target list of 15 seats, of which they're expected to win in 3 or 4, so yeah, they're not really likely to be viable coalition partners. The larger worry by far for the Conservatives is that UKIP is about three-quarters Conservative to one-quarter Labour, and that's votes they'd quite like. Incidentally, does anyone else think the PR voting debate will re-awaken if we end up with a coalition again? The junior party will always have an incentive to make it part of a deal with the larger party, and this time many more on the right have a functional interest in PR now there is a split in the right-wing vote.
 
M

Maledict

Member
Unfortunately as much as I would like to reignite that debate, I honestly don't see it happening in my lifetime. The last referendum was incredibly one sided, with the vast majority of people wanting to keep the current form of government, so no party is going to ignite that debate again.

Additionally, considering how utterly shameless and disgusting the Conservative party were campaigning against it, I don't see them going back on that. Similar to the Scottish Independance vote, in theory it might help the Tories to get PR but in practice they will oppose it to their dying breath.

(Plus lots in labour don't like it either)
 
D

Deleted member 231381

Unconfirmed Member
I don't think they've necessarily backed themselves so much into a corner. They could just say "AV was a terrible system, but this new MMP/STV/AV+ etc system we're proposing works really well! Silly Lib Dems, why didn't you just ask for this last time?". No2AVYes2PR was an actual campaign.
 
Q

QuicheFontaine

Member
Crab said:
I don't think they've necessarily backed themselves so much into a corner. They could just say "AV was a terrible system, but this new MMP/STV/AV+ etc system we're proposing works really well! Silly Lib Dems, why didn't you just ask for this last time?". No2AVYes2PR was an actual campaign.
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I don't feel like they backed themselves into a corner either. I didn't vote for AV, but I'd be more willing to vote for PR if presented with that choice. It's not a binary 'voting reform = good' vs 'voting reform = bad'. All types of voting reform are not equal.
 
M

Maledict

Member
'He needs body armour, not a new voting system'

'Incubators for babies, not more voting bureaucracy'

Whilst I would love to be wrong, as I firmly believe in voting reform, I just think the entire tone of the last campaign, along with the resounding no vote that was delivered, will prevent it coming up again for at least 20 years if not more.
 
Q

QuicheFontaine

Member
Maledict said:
'He needs body armour, not a new voting system'

'Incubators for babies, not more voting bureaucracy'

Whilst I would love to be wrong, as I firmly believe in voting reform, I just think the entire tone of the last campaign, along with the resounding no vote that was delivered, will prevent it coming up again for at least 20 years if not more.
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The wiki page for the AV referendum has this:

The campaign was described in retrospect by political scientist, Professor Iain McLean, as a "bad-tempered and ill-informed public debate"
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Yup. Pretty much sums it up!
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
I think perhaps you're over-estimating the extent to which the AV referendum has stuck in the political brain of the nation, Maledict. I'm pretty sure that, within a few years, it'll simply be forgotten that it ever happened, like Ming Campbell or C&C: Red Alert 3.
 
M

Maledict

Member
I was very proud of the fact my borough voted in favour of reform - one of the very few!

It really was a horrendous campaign though, and the no campaign did some stuff that made me really despair about our political dialogue. The conservatives did a number on Clegg for that.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
It's pretty amazing that we can't find anyone in the country that's simultaneously both a) a senior legal figure and b) not a good friend of a suspected paedophile.
 
M

Maledict

Member
The entire thing seems to just be providing further proof of how endemic the rot went in the country.

I'd like to believe it was a different era, but sadly that's not going to be the case.
 
D

Deleted member 231381

Unconfirmed Member
CyclopsRock said:
It's pretty amazing that we can't find anyone in the country that's simultaneously both a) a senior legal figure and b) not a good friend of a suspected paedophile.
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I'm not actually sure it's that surprising. The political and judicial elite are expected to interact simply by virtue of the jobs they do. Politicians will talk with lawmakers and judges about the virtues of particular sentencing policies and the like, and judges will seek audience with politicians about aspects of the legal system that need fixing. Both are a fairly small pool of people, with about ~1200 Lords and MPs, and ~1200 QCs. I think finding someone from one sample who didn't have even fairly minor connections with the other would be quite difficult. I mean, it doesn't help they all also tend have come from the same social circles in terms of background, school, and university, but even without that, powerful people tend to fraternize with powerful people. If you want someone who 'isn't a member of the establishment', my suspicion is you'd be best off getting a senior judge in from another Commonwealth country rather than a home-grown one.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
Crab said:
I'm not actually sure it's that surprising. The political and judicial elite are expected to interact simply by virtue of the jobs they do. Politicians will talk with lawmakers and judges about the virtues of particular sentencing policies and the like, and judges will seek audience with politicians about aspects of the legal system that need fixing. Both are a fairly small pool of people, with about ~1200 Lords and MPs, and ~1200 QCs. I think finding someone from one sample who didn't have even fairly minor connections with the other would be quite difficult. I mean, it doesn't help they all also tend have come from the same social circles in terms of background, school, and university, but even without that, powerful people tend to fraternize with powerful people. If you want someone who 'isn't a member of the establishment', my suspicion is you'd be best off getting a senior judge in from another Commonwealth country rather than a home-grown one.
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That sounds like a good idea to me, tbh. It worked for the BoE!

But I dunno. I interact with people all day at work without really having a connection with them that would call my judgement of them into question. In fact, given that half of my office and of the offices I work with are staffed by attractive, young, sexily dressed girls with large tits, I'd very much like to be in a position where my ability to judge them was called into question, but it's just not the case. They need to do less of their official state business at drinks receptions I think. And I, apparantly, need to do more.
 
K

kmag

Member
I think today was a new low in PMQ's. Vaguely competent questions badly delivered by the Dweeb although as usual he sticks to 'safe' ground, and Cameron just point blank refusing to even frame a response which sounds like he's trying to answer to the question.

When you add in the fact that 50% of the questions are "Do you agree" plants, I really wonder what is the point. It's not even compelling political theatre anymore.
 
J

JonathanEx

Member
Mainly just dropping a link I thought was interesting, but it's more about the politics of politics etc for want of a better word:

Are the Conservatives about to come a huge cropper with David Cameron’s extremely expensive primary election in Rochester?

A couple of Britain’s top election lawyers say the primary which the Conservatives are currently holding to pick their candidate for the Rochester and Strood by-election could open the by-election result to serious challenge in an election court.
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http://blogs.channel4.com/michael-c...s-judges-overturn-tory-victory-rochester/4541

As well as the actual spending stuff and legal wranglings, I thought the observations about open primaries and Sarah Wollaston were interesting on the other piece it links: http://blogs.channel4.com/michael-c...ster-breach-spirit-legal-spending-limits/4519
 
K

kmag

Member
JonathanEx said:
Mainly just dropping a link I thought was interesting, but it's more about the politics of politics etc for want of a better word:


http://blogs.channel4.com/michael-c...s-judges-overturn-tory-victory-rochester/4541

As well as the actual spending stuff and legal wranglings, I thought the observations about open primaries and Sarah Wollaston were interesting on the other piece it links: http://blogs.channel4.com/michael-c...ster-breach-spirit-legal-spending-limits/4519
Click to expand...

At best it's a shameless bending of the rules. It's certainly against the spirit of the rules.
 
M

Maledict

Member
On a more positive note, support for staying in Europe is at it's highest level for 23 years it seems. The rise of UKIP seems to be pushing people off the fence and into Europe. Even a wafer thin majority of conservatives support staying in(51%).
 
Nicktendo86

Nicktendo86

Member
Maledict said:
On a more positive note, support for staying in Europe is at it's highest level for 23 years it seems. The rise of UKIP seems to be pushing people off the fence and into Europe. Even a wafer thin majority of conservatives support staying in(51%).
Click to expand...
In all honesty I believe most people do want to stay in a reformed Europe. Problem is ukip supporters are very vocal.
 
C

CyclopsRock

Member
I'm one of those people who thinks that staying in Europe is better than us leaving Europe, but that doesn't meant we can't a) improve it with reforms, against the will of the other member states if need be (ie via brinkmanship) and b) complain about its bountiful and large flaws.

It's also a sad fact that Europe is basically the only part of the world getting smaller both economically and on some trends even in terms of population, soon at least. It's failing to create jobs in any significant way (as we all know, the UK has generated more jobs in the last ... 5, is it? Years than the rest of the EU combined) and the Eurozone is built on a total economic fallacy which it seems everyone within it refuses to acknowledge for political reasons. The idea of tying ourselves to them is a bit worrying - and it is a bit of a bind because it's a bit of a choice between who to throw your lot in with, since being in the EU prohibits you from unilaterally forging trade agreements with other countries. Looking forwards and asking who we are going to be doing more trade with in the future (10, 25, 100) years, I think it's hard to argue that it'll be Europe unless something drastic changes and... We don't really have any reason to think that anything drastic will change.
 
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