peterms

:? How many homes were taken out of local authority stock in those periods? The equation is surely homes out minus homes in? To understand what was happening in that period, you have to have some knowledge of local authority finance and housing policy. The simple figures lead to the big misunderstanding which Jon displays. For example, the policy changes the Tories made choked off council housebuilding, but this didn't really start to bite until the mid-80s. If you check out tables of local authority house completions year by year, you will see a massive change from the early 80s to the late 80s. The reason for the low completions under Blair is that the policy remained in force - and the tiny numbers show how effective it was at stopping councils building. Another factor is that grant was redirected from councils to housing associations. But they had to borrow to make up the grant, meaning loans from the City, paid for by rents, largely subsidised from housing benefit - so tax income was directed towards making interest payments to city firms. Nice business for Thatch's mates, and of course the growing housing crisis meant a revival of the largely crappy private rented sector, and a crisis in homelessness, meaning exorbitant fees paid to slum landlords, another of her constituencies of support. Taxes redirected into astonishing profits for slum landlords keeping people in dangerous conditions. And of course council house sales drove the imbalance in supply and demand which drove this mad equation. Was it all Thatcher's fault? Possibly not. Maybe there were a few local factors at work. But as a quick overview, was the housing crisis of the 80s and 90s, and the countless tales of human misery which lie behind the figures, driven by Thatcher's and the Tories' efforts to redirect public money into the pockets of themselves and their mates? Yes, without question.

Of course they deny it but then Brown also denied cutting defence spending while we were at war, despite that demonstrably being a lie. Of course if you dare to raise this issue you are labelled a "bigot". What a bunch of arse. The definitive shift in UK immigration policy took place in the post-war period. For pretty obvious reasons, we were short of labour, and encouraged people to immigrate. This policy was still active under the Tory government, 1959-64. In fact, the Ministry of Health sent out people to the West Indies, to encourage immigration in order to fill empty jobs as nurses, porters and so on. Minster of Health at the time? Wasn't that Enoch Powell? No serious person labels anyone discussing immigration as racist per se. However, it remains the case that an awful lot of people expressing concern about immigration are in fact racists. Sorry if that sounds "PC", whatever that idle term is now meant to connote.

Well, twice a season, to be fair.

Never heard of it, but this review says, in summary, Love the way the page you linked shows "accessories" as being the cameras you would need to put it on!

Commentator said over 7 mins just for the head injury, so yes...

Nice control, Fagan.

That do you, squire?

Yes, god forbid he should track back and try and get the ball when we have a man down. Kilbane was looking for that - not Gabbys fault. Good that he was tackling back, bit clumsy though.

Think your wish came at least partly true.

Don't agree on the back four, but I'd like to see that midfield and attack given a chance. I think it could be pretty strong.

Young was very accurate with a couple of balls in the second half. Trouble is, they were Pienaar's.

This. I agree, we're not doing badly.

Jeremy Grantham is probably one of the dozen or so sharpest money managers in the world (he pretty much just manages money for large institutional players), with a particular expertise in spotting bubbles before they get close to bursting. He predicted in 2006 that "in five years, at least one major bank (broadly defined) will have failed and that up to half the hedge funds and a substantial percentage of the private equity firms in existence today will have simply ceased to exist," due to excessively high valuations in debt and equity markets. In his Autumn 2008 letter to his investors, Grantham wrote: I think that observation holds very well in politics and in any organisation. It probably does. But what can you do about it? Which organisations, outside government or well-funded think thanks, can employ people to think long-term? Well, apart from German industries. And probably lots of other examples as well.

there was no contact so how was it a penalty? There was contact. Minimal, but enough.

Yes, sign me up for that view. I hope it won't be drowned out by more pessimistic voices.

Fascinating to see Mandy commenting that I thought it was the yanks who didn't do irony. How quickly does he forget his own past history. Was it Hoon who said he had been taken in by the deception because the company "had a website and everything"? That might shed some light on the degree of credulousness with which the Cabinet scrutinised the dodgy dossier when taking us into an illegal war.

It's the misspelling of "utmost". It gets me that way, too.

Worst recession for 50 years, 10+% inflation, 20% interest rates, massive increase in military spending but congressional inquiry into why so little result was evident for the money... ...and the way out of recession was reduced inflation via falling oil prices, and covering the combination of falling taxation and rising state spending by more than doubling national debt, turning the US into the world's biggest debtor... What would be interesting is to consider the effect of tax cuts on economic growth without making up the gap by borrowing from abroad. That might be a better test of the theory.

I see your snigger, and I raise you a guffaw.

To think that missing the bullets/blades flying in front of one's face is 'entirely missing the point' in favour of some flimsy international viewpoint is, I fear, more than just getting it wrong - it is fundamentally missing the point of international socialism. Could you expand on your point a bit more?

Well, could I propose an idea? Drug abuse has many unpleasant consequences, such as the effect on individuals, on neighbours, on victims of crime, and more widely on national economies and international relations. But all that is as nothing compared to the effect of energy policy. If you could translate one into the terms of the other, Dubya and his oil mates would be the biggest gangsta in the playground, dealing to the pre-school kids and shooting the teacher who asked them to tone it down a little. These are the people who are the real problem, who should be locked up in a deep hole on some deserted island, for all our sakes. To ignore these international criminals and focus on some street corner **** Mr Big is entirely, shockingly, missing the point.

Not sure that you needed me to respond but, to fit in with the VT vogue, 'this'. Ithankyew. So with that one put to bed, it's on to energy policy...

Hey! I'm not on drugs. And I'm sensible anyway.

I think it's a very good argument, Peter. It is also an argument that addresses the move from selling the 'soft stuff' to mates to being pushed into selling harder stuff to a less matey clientele (that isn't to excuse those dealing but just to address the situation where it changes from a simple difficulty with the quantity of the footfall to a difficulty with the state of the bodies and minds above those feet). And on that point, I'm sure we would all prefer that people who need the harder stuff were able to turn up to a clinic in a controlled environment and be supplied with clean goods, administered in a way which didn't spread contamination, without ending up having to burgle and rob to pay for it, and without hanging round a dealer's house and intimidating neighbours who don't feel comfortable walking through groups of people who show little awareness of or sympathy with their fears. But of course that would mean being soft on druggies, so that could never happen. Wash my mouth out.

First thing would be to cut the umbilical cord between casual drug use and (potentially extreme) criminality. It isn't the use of blow (or even his high retail footfall) that worries me about my neighbour dealing (though it does piss me off) - it is the possibility that his dealing might really piss somebody else off and that I or my brother or some other innocent will get caught up in the ensuing market skirmish. There's an argument that decriminalising the soft stuff at the same time as being firmer on selling harder stuff would be helpful, exactly by cutting that connecting chain. When it's easier to buy something hard than something softer, that's a clue that drugs policy isn't working.