The banker loving, baby-eating Tory party thread (regenerated)

[blandy]

Dunno Tone. The logic within the last labour manifesto (not that I read it in any detail) seemed a little...curious _(edit) by that I mean it was like they felt perhaps they did have some principles and plans to kind of enact them, but they weren't actually going to tell anyone.

 

in the light of Chris's post below, the manifesto says 

• We will restrict winter fuel payments for the richest five per cent of pensioners but guarantee no changes beyond this — to the winter fuel payment, free TV licenses, or free bus passes.

Edited October 21, 2015 by blandy

[chrisp65]

Could you quote or source where in the 2015 Labour Manifesto it says they will remove winter fuel allowance altogether, please.

It doesn't say that on the version I've found, but perhaps you have seen a different page? On the version I have, it says it will remove WFA from the richest. Vague and waffly as you'd expect. But definitely not 'all' as you've been arguing.

Hopefully you weren't just sound biting from stuff you've read in the Mail?

[tonyh29]

Could you quote or source where in the 2015 Labour Manifesto it says they will remove winter fuel allowance altogether, please.

It doesn't say that on the version I've found, but perhaps you have seen a different page? On the version I have, it says it will remove WFA from the richest. Vague and waffly as you'd expect. But definitely not 'all' as you've been arguing.

Hopefully you weren't just sound biting from stuff you've read in the Mail?

oi , get your own sound bite

 

Edit - but it seems I was mislead by the Newstatesmen where I leeched my information from , that will teach me not to double check in my haste to win an internet ... I withdraw my argument and Chris can temporarily have custody of the interweb until I win it back

 

Edited October 21, 2015 by tonyh29
ineptitude

[blandy]

you lost the internet Tony. Ha ha ha. You'll never get it back. 

[Xann]

 

... I'm not subscribing to this general view  that the NHS has been killed... 

It's being strangled.

My other half is a district nurse not a million miles from your stomping ground in Surrey.

I get daily updates.

[tonyh29]

you lost the internet Tony. Ha ha ha. You'll never get it back. 

I didn't lose it someone deleted it

 

 

[snowychap]

 

Incidentally in labour 2015 election manifesto they pledged to remove the winter heating allowance completely

 

Edit: I see Chris and blandy already covered it. Have we got to have a VT fact check service for your posts, Tony? 

Edited October 21, 2015 by snowychap

[tonyh29]

 

Incidentally in labour 2015 election manifesto they pledged to remove the winter heating allowance completely

 

Edit: I see Chris and blandy already covered it. Have we got to have a VT fact check service for your posts, Tony? 

meh ... They got lucky that's all 

[MakemineVanilla]

 

*my own personal experience: due to the way I work / get income, a small unnoticed change in the last budget means that my car / travel tax and expense is no longer calculated in the same way. To cut some very dry accounting short, I'm now better off by a three figure sum every month. Why do that? Where was the clamour for that terrible injustice on people that travel around with their job ever championed? Personally, I shall obviously now spend my extra money on some very good things that interest me. But perhaps, just perhaps, if the government had kept it, then people that earn £8,000 p.a. wouldn't be facing a real drop in their earnings.

 

So what is wrong with that? 

Why would a party famous for telling people to get on their bikes tax people for doing so?

Why should you be punished for doing something a lot of people refuse to do because it is stressful, exhausting and disruptive to family life?

Why should the money you earn from working so hard and commuting for hours you don't get paid for be transfered to people who would not do it?

Why should you be punished for making the effort to acquire the education and skills you have to help those who couldn't be arsed?

Why do you think paying £10k a year (my guess) in tax and NI is not enough?

You are not confiscating other people's surplus value, you are generating profits and providing a service for which you are rewarded with the market rate; so why do you need to pay more tax?

 

 

[omariqy]

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/new-laws-to-allow-spies-to-hack-into-smartphones-and-computers-to-be-introduced-in-the-coming-weeks-a6702301.html

New laws to allow spies to hack into smartphones and computers ‘to be introduced in the coming weeks’

The Government has pledged to bring back major powers to Britain’s spying agencies

• Andrew Griffin
• @_andrew_griffin
• 19 hours  ago
• 172 comments

2K

A painting of the government listening station GCHQ (L) is displayed at the 'A Year with MI6' exhibition at the Mount Street Gallery on February 14, 2011 in London, England

Getty Images

Britain’s spies are about to be given huge new powers that will allow them to look in on people’s phones and computers, according to reports.

A revived and re-named version of the hugely-controversial “Snoopers’ Charter” is set to give spies a “dizzying” range of surveillance and hacking powers, The Times has reported. The new legislation will be introduced next month, the paper reported.

ADVERTISING

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The new powers will please MI5, MI6 and GCHQ, which have said in the past that they lack the powers to be able to protect the country against threats. But they are likely to anger privacy campaigners, many of whom united to defeat the Snoopers’ Charter when it was first presented.

Read more

• US law limits spies' powers, just as UK gears up to pass 'Snoopers'
• British spies sacked for inappropriately and illicitly snooping
• ISC report: intrusive mass surveillance is fine, so long as spies are
• Technology firms like WhatsApp and Apple need to agree how to share

The new powers could include giving Britain’s spying agencies the power to take over a phone remotely and access all of the documents – including text messages and emails – and photos that are stored on it. They will then be able to install software that will allow them to look in on the messages and data of people at any time, according to reports.

Earlier this year, a major report recommended that the UK should completely overhaul the law that regulates the powers that spies have to intercept people’s communications. The new legislation will partly respond to those problems with the current regulation – but will also introduce huge new powers allowing people to spy on targets with little restriction, according to the reports.

The new powers will also partly work to bring back some of the powers of the Snoopers’ Charter. That law was defeated by the Liberal Democrats during the last government, but the Conservatives indicated almost as soon as they were elected that they would look to revive it.

[blandy]

 

*my own personal experience: due to the way I work / get income, a small unnoticed change in the last budget means that my car / travel tax and expense is no longer calculated in the same way. To cut some very dry accounting short, I'm now better off by a three figure sum every month. Why do that? Where was the clamour for that terrible injustice on people that travel around with their job ever championed? Personally, I shall obviously now spend my extra money on some very good things that interest me. But perhaps, just perhaps, if the government had kept it, then people that earn £8,000 p.a. wouldn't be facing a real drop in their earnings.

 

So what is wrong with that? 

Why would a party famous for telling people to get on their bikes tax people for doing so?

Why should you be punished for doing something a lot of people refuse to do because it is stressful, exhausting and disruptive to family life?

Why should the money you earn from working so hard and commuting for hours you don't get paid for be transfered to people who would not do it?

Why should you be punished for making the effort to acquire the education and skills you have to help those who couldn't be arsed?

Why do you think paying £10k a year (my guess) in tax and NI is not enough?

You are not confiscating other people's surplus value, you are generating profits and providing a service for which you are rewarded with the market rate; so why do you need to pay more tax?

Surely that's the wrong question (and perhaps is based on a false premise). Surely the right question is why has Chris had his taxes reduced by the Gov'ts budget, when [the Gov't claim] they need to be raising more money in taxes and spending less - so why are they cutting taxes on company cars or mileage or whatever the exact detail is by, in Chris's case, around £1200 / year, and at the same time people on low wages are being made worse off by the same sort of figure?

Frankly where's the sense or logic in it?

[Jon]

 

*my own personal experience: due to the way I work / get income, a small unnoticed change in the last budget means that my car / travel tax and expense is no longer calculated in the same way. To cut some very dry accounting short, I'm now better off by a three figure sum every month. Why do that? Where was the clamour for that terrible injustice on people that travel around with their job ever championed? Personally, I shall obviously now spend my extra money on some very good things that interest me. But perhaps, just perhaps, if the government had kept it, then people that earn £8,000 p.a. wouldn't be facing a real drop in their earnings.

 

So what is wrong with that? 

Why would a party famous for telling people to get on their bikes tax people for doing so?

Why should you be punished for doing something a lot of people refuse to do because it is stressful, exhausting and disruptive to family life?

Why should the money you earn from working so hard and commuting for hours you don't get paid for be transfered to people who would not do it?

Why should you be punished for making the effort to acquire the education and skills you have to help those who couldn't be arsed?

Why do you think paying £10k a year (my guess) in tax and NI is not enough?

You are not confiscating other people's surplus value, you are generating profits and providing a service for which you are rewarded with the market rate; so why do you need to pay more tax?

Surely that's the wrong question (and perhaps is based on a false premise). Surely the right question is why has Chris had his taxes reduced by the Gov'ts budget, when [the Gov't claim] they need to be raising more money in taxes and spending less - so why are they cutting taxes on company cars or mileage or whatever the exact detail is by, in Chris's case, around £1200 / year, and at the same time people on low wages are being made worse off by the same sort of figure?

Frankly where's the sense or logic in it?

I guess the 'logic' all stems from their seemingly pathalogical hatred of the poor and vulnerable. They're in 'power', and they see that as a green light to basically do whatever the **** they want, which sadly seems to mostly involve victimising the poor and vulnerable. These people are sociopaths.

[lapal_fan]

I don't believe anybody purposefully goes out to try and victimise people.

It's neglect of people not in their thoughts, not active hatred.

[MakemineVanilla]

 

*my own personal experience: due to the way I work / get income, a small unnoticed change in the last budget means that my car / travel tax and expense is no longer calculated in the same way. To cut some very dry accounting short, I'm now better off by a three figure sum every month. Why do that? Where was the clamour for that terrible injustice on people that travel around with their job ever championed? Personally, I shall obviously now spend my extra money on some very good things that interest me. But perhaps, just perhaps, if the government had kept it, then people that earn £8,000 p.a. wouldn't be facing a real drop in their earnings.

 

So what is wrong with that? 

Why would a party famous for telling people to get on their bikes tax people for doing so?

Why should you be punished for doing something a lot of people refuse to do because it is stressful, exhausting and disruptive to family life?

Why should the money you earn from working so hard and commuting for hours you don't get paid for be transfered to people who would not do it?

Why should you be punished for making the effort to acquire the education and skills you have to help those who couldn't be arsed?

Why do you think paying £10k a year (my guess) in tax and NI is not enough?

You are not confiscating other people's surplus value, you are generating profits and providing a service for which you are rewarded with the market rate; so why do you need to pay more tax?

Surely that's the wrong question (and perhaps is based on a false premise). Surely the right question is why has Chris had his taxes reduced by the Gov'ts budget, when [the Gov't claim] they need to be raising more money in taxes and spending less - so why are they cutting taxes on company cars or mileage or whatever the exact detail is by, in Chris's case, around £1200 / year, and at the same time people on low wages are being made worse off by the same sort of figure?

Frankly where's the sense or logic in it?

I suppose you would have a point if the questions were addressed at the government but I just wanted to know why Chris thinks he pays too little tax?

It just seemed that Chris was making the case that he doesn't deserve the money and I was making the case that he does.

He has a point of course because the working poor earning £8k a year would definitely think that his £30-40k a year puts him amongst the minted.

And even for median earners it would be an aspirational salary.

Under New Labour that earnings bracket ceased to be net contributors to the Exchequer and so a case can be made to increase his taxes.  

I suppose when you have a government which won't increase taxes, the only solution is charity.

 

[HanoiVillan]

In Defence of Universal Benefits

• means-testing is expensive, requiring vastly more bureaucracy, and always ends up costing more than it saves
• the successful funding of services for the needy is reliant upon tax collection - studies show that wealthier people are less willing to pay tax if they get no personal benefit from the system
• wealthier people have paid into the system their whole lives in the expectation of receiving said benefits, and withdrawing benefits from them is unfair
• universal benefits help social cohesion, and reduce the stigma of claiming a benefit
• party because of those stigmas, and partly because of the time and difficulty involved in form-filling, those who need the benefits the most, including disabled people and people with learning difficulties, are the least likely to claim them
• redesigning a complex system to remove vanishingly rare anomalies like millionaires in Thailand claiming winter fuel allowance is wholly counterproductive - these sorts of claims aren't even a rounding error on the whole size of the welfare budget. 

[Xann]

I don't believe anybody purposefully goes out to try and victimise people.

It's neglect of people not in their thoughts, not active hatred.

Willful neglect veering into disdain.

The civil service do their best to predict the potential consequences of policy changes.

Ministers are briefed accordingly.

[chrisp65]

I don't believe anybody purposefully goes out to try and victimise people.

It's neglect of people not in their thoughts, not active hatred.

Edited October 22, 2015 by chrisp65
tried to kill my community

[snowychap]

It's called monopsony!

[snowychap]

The sale of the UK to China is an utter disgrace.

It's Cameron and Osbrone's disgrace currently but whoever is responsible is an utter piece of shit.

It's bad enough to be involved with Saudi; to be involved with China (and blowing them at every opportunity) is shoddy.

[OutByEaster?]

The more I read about the nuclear deal, the worse it sounds - we're guaranteeing £17b of the cost and we've committed to paying a guaranteed rate for the electricity produced that's almost twice the going rate, basically guaranteeing that there will be a profit for EDF which will paid for in subsidies by the British taxpayer. Essentially, the British taxpayer will be paying a fortune in tax to subsidise the French taxpayer so that a few people involved in an industry can make a fortune out of the deal and we can keep the Chinese happy. Can Cameron still be charged with treason?