StefanAVFC Posted October 12, 2018 Share Posted October 12, 2018 3 minutes ago, meregreen said: It’s a prerequisite to join the Tories isn’t it. There are some Tories I don't despise and that have some good ideas. Misguided I would say. Just like I would have I have some friends for are Blues fans. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wainy316 Posted October 12, 2018 Share Posted October 12, 2018 My Tory MP (Ed Vaizey) isn't a complete bastard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StefanAVFC Posted October 12, 2018 Share Posted October 12, 2018 Mine (Fabricant) is Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wainy316 Posted October 12, 2018 Share Posted October 12, 2018 Oh yes, he definitely is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post Chindie Posted October 12, 2018 VT Supporter Popular Post Share Posted October 12, 2018 Eurgh. It turns out that part of the contract organisations sign up to when becoming part of the universal credit back to work programme is a requirement to sign a clause stating they cannot criticise the programme or Esther McVey. The latter of which must be pretty difficult as she's a **** moron. Apparently the clause extends to saying anything containing adverse information about her, anything that may affect her 'reputation' (snigger) or affect public faith in her (is there any?). This government sure likes gagging orders. It isn't sinister at all. 4 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted October 12, 2018 Share Posted October 12, 2018 20 minutes ago, Chindie said: Eurgh. It turns out that part of the contract organisations sign up to when becoming part of the universal credit back to work programme is a requirement to sign a clause stating they cannot criticise the programme or Esther McVey. The latter of which must be pretty difficult as she's a **** moron. Apparently the clause extends to saying anything containing adverse information about her, anything that may affect her 'reputation' (snigger) or affect public faith in her (is there any?). This government sure likes gagging orders. It isn't sinister at all. What do you expect in a government run by Mrs May? Still, she did a little jig to Abba so she must be funny and human. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tonyh29 Posted October 12, 2018 Share Posted October 12, 2018 9 hours ago, HanoiVillan said: I have honestly tried to put it in your way and I can't see how it makes any sense: 'Our biggest [challenge/goal/opportunity, not problem] with UC is the bad press it gets (some self inflicted obvs), and therefore some of our hardest to reach communities (eg disabled) don't come forward, and go for longer on less money than they are entitled to'. He's clearly describing problems, not opportunities. presumably ,Peter will be along shortly to question your interpretation of language and meaning then Our problem is to put a man on the moon Houston , we have a challenge doesn't 't work does it He clearly says "challenge" .. problem doesn't fit the context of his sentence , ... the replier deliberately changes his words in order to change the message I don't think we will agree on this so happy to leave it there ..... I'm off to watch a few episodes of University Problem hosted by Jeremy Paxman Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xann Posted October 12, 2018 Share Posted October 12, 2018 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Popular Post bickster Posted October 12, 2018 Moderator Popular Post Share Posted October 12, 2018 11 minutes ago, Xann said: Could have saved themselves an awful lot of typing by just stating she's a Tory 4 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted October 12, 2018 Share Posted October 12, 2018 10 hours ago, tonyh29 said: presumably ,Peter will be along shortly to question your interpretation of language and meaning then Not to challenge his interpretation, but yours. Concept One: Challenge and problem are different words with different meanings. Concept Two: at some point in the not too distant past, some people started to use "challenge" to denote a positive, go-get-'em approach to problems. I don't know if it was company PRs, or the people who make those tiresome "motivational" posters. Mercer's use is the second. Do you agree with both concepts? And that the existence of concept one doesn't support your point, because of concept two? Mercer was very obviously using the PR sense of the word. I would sincerely be astonished if you don't actually know this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted October 12, 2018 Share Posted October 12, 2018 More on the piece from the CSJ bloke about Universal credit that Mercer used to defend himself - there's a thread beginning with this tweet: and ending with this one: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xann Posted October 15, 2018 Share Posted October 15, 2018 Quote Virgin Trains and Stagecoach shared in £51.2m worth of dividends from the West Coast main line railway, shortly before walking away from another franchise. Virgin Rail Group's dividends, for the year ending 31 March 2018, are almost double the £27.9m that was given back to its shareholders in 2015. The details come after the firms' East Coast franchise collapsed in June, with the government losing out on £2.3bn. Virgin said strong performance had led to record payments for taxpayers. But Labour said the failing rail system was "lining the pockets of billionaires". Virgin owns 51% of the operator which runs the West Coast main line connecting London to Glasgow - known as Virgin Rail Group - while Stagecoach owns the remaining 49%. BBC 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisp65 Posted October 15, 2018 Share Posted October 15, 2018 Yep, profit from the profitable contracts, hand back the ones you don't like. A bit like only taking on the good profitable bits of a failed bank. I'd do the same if that was the way the government set up their dealings with me. I'd happily take the benefits but reject the risks and outgoings. Can't blame the machine that was set up to extract profit for extracting profit. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted October 15, 2018 Share Posted October 15, 2018 Trouble at t'mill. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xann Posted October 17, 2018 Share Posted October 17, 2018 Quote Britain fell for a neoliberal con trick – even the IMF says so The fund reports that Britain’s finances are weaker than all other nations except Portugal, and says privatisation is to blame Pundits will say that neoliberalism is about markets and choice – tell that to any commuter wedged on a Southern rail train. Columnists usually proffer answers, but today I want to ask a question, a big one. What price is paid when a promise is broken? Because for much of my life, and probably yours, the political class has made this pledge: that the best way to run an economy is to hack back the public realm as far as possible and let the private sector run free. That way, services operate better, businesses get the resources they need, and our national finances are healthier. It’s why your tax credits keep dropping, and your mum has to wait half a year to see a hospital consultant – because David Cameron slashed public spending, to stop it “crowding out” private money. It’s why water bills are so high and train services can never be counted on – because both industries have been privatised. We let finance rip and flogged our assets. Austerity was bound to follow From the debacle of universal credit to the forced conversion of state schools into corporate-run academies, the ideology of the small state – defined by no less a body than the International Monetary Fund as neoliberalism – is all pervasive. It decides how much money you have left at the end of the week and what kind of future your children will enjoy, and it explains why your elderly relatives can’t get a decent carer. I don’t wish to write about the everyday failings of neoliberalism – that piece would be filed before you could say “east coast mainline”. Instead, I want to address the most stubborn belief of all: that running a small state is the soundest financial arrangement for governments and voters alike. Because 40 years on from the Thatcher revolution, more and more evidence is coming in to the contrary. Let’s start with the IMF itself. Last week it published a report that barely got a mention from the BBC or in Westminster, yet helps reframe the entire debate over austerity. The fund totted up both the public debt and the publicly owned assets of 31 countries, from the US to Australia, Finland to France, and found that the UK had among the weakest public finances of the lot. With less than £3 trillion of assets against £5tn in pensions and other liabilities, the UK is more than £2tn in the red. Of all the other countries examined by researchers, including the Gambia and Kenya, only Portugal’s finances look worse over the long run. So much for fixing the roof. ‘British governments have flogged nearly everything in the cupboard from airports to the Royal Mail – often at giveaway prices – to friends in the City.’ Almost as startling are the IMF’s reasons for why Britain is in such a state: one way or another they all come back to neoliberalism. Thatcher loosed finance from its shackles and used our North Sea oil money to pay for swingeing tax cuts. The result is an overfinancialised economy and a government that is £1tn worse off since the banking crash. Norway has similar North Sea wealth and a far smaller population, but also a sovereign wealth fund. Its net worth has soared over the past decade. The other big reason for the UK’s financial precarity is its privatisation programme, described by the IMF as no less than a “fiscal illusion”. British governments have flogged nearly everything in the cupboard, from airports to the Royal Mail – often at giveaway prices – to friends in the City. Such privatisations, judge the fund, “increase revenues and lower deficits but also reduce the government’s asset holdings”. Throughout the austerity decade, ministers and economists have pushed for spending cuts by pointing to the size of the government’s annual overdraft, or budget deficit. Yet there are two sides to a balance sheet, as all accountants know and this IMF work recognises. The same goes for our public realm: if Labour’s John McDonnell gets into No 11 and renationalises the railways, that would cost tens of billions – but it would also leave the country with assets worth tens of billions that provided a regular income. Instead, what this IMF research shows is that the Westminster classes have been asset-stripping Britain for decades – and storing up financial trouble for future generations. Just look at housing to see the true cost of privatisation. Privatisation and austerity have not only weakened the country’s financial position – they have also handed unearned wealth to a select few. Just look at a new report from the University of Greenwich finding that water companies could have funded all their day-to-day running and their long-term investments out of the bills paid by customers. Instead of which, managers have lumbered the firms with £51bn of debt to pay for shareholders’ dividends. Those borrowed billions, and the millions in interest, will be paid by you and me in our water bills. We might as well stuff the cash directly into the pockets of shareholders. Instead of competitively run utilities, record investment by the private sector and sounder public finances, we have natural monopolies handed over to the wealthy, banks that can dump their liabilities on the public when things get tough, and an outsourcing industry that feasts upon the carcass of the public sector. As if all this weren’t enough, neoliberal voices complain that we need to cut taxes and red tape, and further starve our public services. Guardian 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xann Posted October 17, 2018 Share Posted October 17, 2018 Quote To: David Lidington MP, Secretary of State for Justice Don't give G4S & Serco the power to arrest Please don't give security firms like G4S and Serco the power to make arrests Why is this important? In a shocking 290m privatisation deal, Serco and G4S – the same two companies who were stripped of contracts for tagging prisoners because a Serious Fraud Office investigation revealed they were charging for tagging people who didn’t exist – are going to be trusted with the handcuffs by the government. Essentially, the proposals would see G4S staff given the powers of Civilian Enforcement Officers. That is, authorised officers/employees of Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service becoming vested with the power to seize and sell goods to recover money owed under fines and community penalty notices, and to execute warrants of arrest, committal, detention and distraint. The sticking point here is that although much of the recovery and enforcement arms of the Court service has long been outsourced to ‘Authorised’ Enforcement Officers (employees of various other private companies), the line has until now been drawn at outsourcing the power of arrest. No more. 38 Degrees Petition to stop what's obviously a shit plan. 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peterms Posted October 17, 2018 Share Posted October 17, 2018 What an utter tool. Slimy little Representative for Wellingborough. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
snowychap Posted October 17, 2018 Share Posted October 17, 2018 (edited) 16 minutes ago, peterms said: What an utter tool. Slimy little Representative for Wellingborough. Isn't yer man taking a bit of time off to be in a telly programme? **** off with no good reason would get you some sort of serious sanction on UC. The kind of thing that would put you on or below the breadline. Jonny Mercer is an utter word removed. Edited October 17, 2018 by snowychap 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
meregreen Posted October 18, 2018 Share Posted October 18, 2018 The Tory plan to “encourage” people back to work through the benefits system, seems to be, make benefits so inadequate that it’s a work or suffer hunger choice. Caring Conservatism is more and more a contradiction in terms. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted October 18, 2018 Author Moderator Share Posted October 18, 2018 11 hours ago, snowychap said: Isn't yer man taking a bit of time off to be in a telly programme? **** off with no good reason would get you some sort of serious sanction on UC. The kind of thing that would put you on or below the breadline. Jonny Mercer is an utter word removed. A few days doing something for charity (and no doubt his "profile") the rotter. And despite that Hunted on the run thing, he still managed to turn up to do voting in parliament. The problems with UC aren't his doing. Mind you, he's still a tory, so...carry on. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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